A Little Deception

by Beverley Eikli

‘I feel mortified that your obligations towards me have placed you in such a difficult situation,’ murmured Rampton, whose smile did nothing to bear out such a sentiment. ‘Perhaps a hand or two at the card table could reverse matters?’

  Rose cast him a narrow-eyed glance, tinged with doubt. It was difficult to know whether his tone of enquiry suggested that his offer might be one of gallantry, whereby he’d allow her to win thus settling the debt, or whether he was playing with her, enticing her to be as reckless and as daring as the Lady Chesterfield described by his friend, Babbage. She suspected it was the latter.

  ‘I may be a gambler, Lord Rampton, but I am a principled one,’ she declared, virtuously. ‘I will not be returning to the gaming table until my debt is cleared.’

  ‘I am sure your husband would be very relieved to hear that.’

  ‘It was he who stipulated it.’

  ‘Indeed? Then I am sure you would not dream of disobeying him and suffering the consequences of his displeasure.’

  Rose bridled at his mocking tone. How dared he speak in such slighting, sarcastic tones about Charles? ‘No, Lord Rampton, I would not dream of it!’

  ‘Said like the most loyal and obedient of wives.’ His tone was gently mocking.

  ‘Besides,’ muttered Rose, ‘there will be little time for such an opportunity since I understand you are leaving within the week.’

  ‘I’ve changed my plans, Lady Chesterfield.’

  Rose nearly gasped aloud at his sardonic smile while his words struck terror into her heart.

  His smile broadened as he placed his large hand over her fingertips which she’d been obliged by good manners to tuck into his arm. Was his amusement due to the fact he’d heard her small intake of breath. She certainly hoped he had not. Rose was a consummate actress and her role was to play the careless, self contained Helena. She could do it. She had to do it.

  Lord Rampton lowered his head so that his striking eyes were on a level with hers, and said in conspiratorial tones, ‘I’m a jaded bachelor, Lady Chesterfield, who has already sampled the wares across the waters.’ He squeezed her fingers. ‘The evening I spent with you and your husband made me realize that London offers greater diversions than I had thought.’

  Oh, Dear Lord, what had she got herself into? Rose had no response though she understood his subtext perfectly. What she didn’t understand—and certainly didn’t like—was the tumultuous churning in her breast. Was it gratification, excitement or horror? Lord Rampton was making clear his interest in her.

  But she was a married woman. Unobtainable. She didn’t understand.

  They walked on in silence, listening to the other three chattering and laughing behind them. Rose was struck by the unaccustomed girlish ring to Helena’s laugh. She tried to force her mind from the implications of Lord Rampton’s declaration. Of course, she must tell Charles immediately they returned, she decided. And with the next breath immediately decided that she certainly must not.

  They had nearly completed their circuit. Rose indicated that the waiting carriage ahead of them was theirs and would transport them home directly.

  ‘Sadly, if we are not to meet at the gaming table, we may see little of each other this Season,’ said Lord Rampton.‘In which case, we shall have to arrange some other venue to discuss our business dealings.’

  Withdrawing her hand from the crook of his arm, Rose managed, ‘I’m sure that won’t be necessary.’ No, it would be far too dangerous and besides, she was to all intents and purposes, a married woman. He couldn’t possibly expect to further his acquaintance with her when Charles was in the shadows.

  The pressure of Lord Rampton’s fingers upon her own hand which she’d been in the process of clasping around her reticule made her breath catch while the unexpected steel in his voice made her realize she had spoken rashly.

  ‘Indeed, Lady Chesterfield, I think it will. You do not deny that I have been unusually lenient in this matter.’ The lively conversation behind them as they waited by the carriage reassured Rose that they could not be overheard. Or observed for she feared she was trembling like some pitiful debutante caught in the glare of a powerful man’s interest, and certainly not immune to his magnetism. ‘I am not usually so with my debtors. It is one of the reasons I am successful in my business dealings. However, most of my debtors are not as beautiful, nor so …’ he brought Rose’s hand to his lips, ‘desirable.’

  Rose opened her mouth to speak but no words came. She was glad at the chance to step back as the jarvey jumped down to open the door and let down the steps.

  Undeterred, Lord Rampton stepped closer. ‘Call it my interest on the debt, Lady Chesterfield,’ he murmured, his voice warning before becoming the consistency of rich treacle. ‘I think my leniency entitles me to a little indulgence from you, do you not?’

  Rose managed an uncertain smile. Was such blatant familiarity accepted with equanimity by married women? She felt as if she were on another planet where all the social rules had changed. And yet, disconcerting though that was, she had never felt so … alive.

  As he swung round to greet the others Lord Rampton’s smile transformed into one of expansive good humour. ‘Ladies …’ He bowed before handing first a blushing Arabella, followed by Helena, into the carriage. ‘And Lady Chesterfield …’ his smile was half-conspiratorial, half-mocking as he assisted Rose, ‘I await our next meeting with the most agreeable anticipation.’

  Once settled in the carriage, Helena sent Rose a narrow-eyed look. ‘So that was Lord Rampton.’

  Rose realized that she had made a serious mistake in playing down the man’s obvious attractiveness to Helena. Not even a blind woman would have been impervious to his charm.

  ‘Now I understand why you’ve told me so little about him.’ Helena’s voice was cold.

  Her unawareness of the tension between the two women made Arabella’s admiring declaration: ‘He’s so handsome!’ sound a false note in the stony silence.

  Rose was relieved that her sister had failed to register Helena’s suspicion of Rose’s motives. It gave her a moment in which to formulate a defence, while Arabella added, with a thoughtful frown, ‘His brother was very charming, too – don’t you think?’

  Helena dismissed this with a toss of her head. ‘Young master Felix? Why, he’s just a greenhorn. But, my dear Rose,’ her smile was curious, ‘what I should like to know is why you would wish to hide from us the fact that Lord Rampton is such an attractive man? Generous, apparently; accommodating, certainly … but not, we would be forgiven for thinking, in view of your description of him the other night, attractive. Surely that is a telling omission?’ She paused, and Rose, already feeling the heat, knew she was fuelling Helena’s enjoyment with her fiery blushes. ‘I understood,’ Helena went on, ‘only that he had agreed to give you more time in which to honour your debt.’

  ‘Your debt, since you seem to have forgotten, Helena.’ Rose managed a scornful look before transferring her gaze to the passing street traffic.

  ‘I beg your pardon. My debt,’ Helena amended, unrepentantly. She paused, and a sly look crossed her lovely face before she added, disingenuously, ‘Thank you so much for reminding me. I think it’s time for me to pay Lord Rampton a call and make clear I am the one guilty of misdemeanour.’

  ‘You mustn’t!’ Instantly Rose knew she’d made another grave miscalculation.

  ‘Rose, darling.’ The honeyed tone was at odds with the expression in Helena’s almond-shaped, green eyes, narrow with speculation as she added, ‘I believe you are quite taken with the generous Lord Rampton.’ She leaned across to pat Rose’s knee and her voice dropped to a whisper. ‘Just a word of caution: be careful. Without wishing to interfere, I don’t think you realize what dangerous ground you’re treading. Lord Rampton,’ she uttered his name with relish, removing her hand from Rose’s knee as she drew herself upright, ‘is not the kind who likes to be deceived.’

  ‘I thought he looked very nice.’ Arabella looked in puzzlement at the two women.
>
  Rose hesitated. She did not want Arabella to be privy to the reasons for the undercurrents between her and Helena. Forging on, she responded with steely determination, ‘Do not underrate me, Helena. I am not the young innocent you imagine.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it.’ Helena feigned relief as she leaned back into the squabs. ‘In which case, since dear, clever Rose is on a mission to undo the harm wicked Helena has wrought, I’m compelled to play the part you’ve assigned to me.’ She gave a husky laugh, cleared her throat, then uttered a girlish trill. ‘It’ll be quite a novelty playing the unworldly schoolroom miss again.’

  ‘If you ever knew how.’ Stung into such an uncharacteristically barbed response Rose was determined not to back down. ‘You were not even out of the schoolroom before you were calculating how to make the most advantageous marriage possible.’

  ‘Charles?’ Helena’s laugh was bitter, tinged with hysteria. ‘I was never in the schoolroom, Rose. You know Father’s thoughts on education for females. He considered my beauty a lure for a duke at least! What use was education? But you insult me by implying that I was always motivated by avarice. When I was seventeen I was prepared to sacrifice everything for love! Yes! I’d have run away with nothing but the clothes I had on, but he who had no prospects was too proud to condemn me to a life which, he said, would be one of unending struggle. You didn’t know that about me…that I was so selfless…did you? Now I’m married to your brother …’ Her eyes glittered with angry, unshed tears. ‘So don’t you accuse me of not making sacrifices!’

  As the carriage negotiated a deep rut in the road the silence inside was tense. Rose bit her lip, repenting her earlier accusations. Helena was as unhappy with her lot as she was.

  ‘Rose,’ said Helena at last, the familiar mocking tone returning as she fixed Rose with a level look, ‘this uncharacteristically madcap charade is, I assume, motivated by the desire to save us all … and not, I trust, prompted by romantic folly?’ Squeezing Arabella’s shoulder in a motherly fashion, she went on, ‘Perhaps you should talk some sense into your sister, my dear Arabella. She is taking a big gamble in her desire to be the confident woman of the world she imagines Lord Rampton would admire. And we all know that Rose is not a natural gambler.’ She clicked her tongue. ‘I fear what may happen if she pursues this dangerous charade.’

  Arabella, out of her depth, remained silent.

  ‘Lord Rampton and I have come to an arrangement, Helena,’ Rose said, trying to sound more confident than she felt. ‘It’s only for …’ she steeled herself, ‘a few weeks.’

  ‘A few weeks! You told us all he was leaving by week’s end.’ A slow smile curved Helena’s lips. ‘Ah, but he is taken with you, Rose. He believes Lady Chesterfield can offer him diversions sufficient to make him want to stay.’ She burst out laughing. ‘What an interesting situation, and I, who have been bored for so long, am now enthralled.’ Her eyes glittered above the steeple she made of her gloved hands. ‘How will sweet Rose play the dangerous Lord Rampton?’ She looked thoughtful before adding, ‘Meanwhile, I am only too happy to take my cue from Arabella so that I can convincingly play the ingenuous schoolroom miss.’

  ‘You are?’ It was all Rose could manage.

  Helena leaned forward and tapped Rose playfully on the shoulder with her fan. ‘Now that you have engaged the interest of London’s most notorious rake, Rose, I shall have much more fun as an innocent with an eye to London’s most eligible bachelors than I would as Charles’s wife.’ She sat back again, adding, ‘While I watch you sink deeper into a mire of your own making.’

  Chapter Three

  ‘HE ASKED YOU to dance three times?’ Helena repeated. Rose, conscious of Helena’s dampening effect on Arabella’s previously high spirits, looked up from her stitching and remarked, with a smile, ‘Viscount Yarrowby was obviously very charming, dearest.’

  She knew Helena was chagrined; that she’d wanted to attend the ball the previous night but instead had had to nurse Charles, who had come down with a mild fever. Aunt Alice had chaperoned Arabella while Rose had hastily summoned an imaginary megrim herself. She had no intention of nursing her brother, who was not a good invalid, when that was Helena’s duty.

  ‘He’s lovely,’ Arabella enthused, eyes shining as she held one of the blue drawing room cushions to her chest and executed a twirl in the middle of the room. ‘He was so sweet and charming all evening. Of course, he couldn’t take me into supper as Lady Belton had engaged him to take in Miss Mawks, but he was by my side the moment he’d executed his duties.’

  Rose could see she was intoxicated by her success. And why shouldn’t she be? Arabella exuded a fresh, ingenuous charm.

  Her gaze strayed from her admiring appraisal of Arabella to Helena and a wave of trepidation engulfed her. Helena had always been, undeniably, the most beautiful of them all. She had spent her life being fêted and admired. Now, suddenly, she had been eclipsed. Not only by Arabella, but by Rose too.

  Helena had promised not to expose her. But could she behave with malice towards Arabella?

  Last night as neither Rose nor Helena had gone out in public, the charade over Rose’s identity had not been an issue. But what of the next ball or masquerade? Aunt Alice had lent Rose sufficient items from her wardrobe so she could deport herself in reasonable style and Helena had agreed to play the debutante out of malicious interest, but what of Charles’s reaction? And that of Aunt Alice?

  Rose had come to England with no intention of entering into the social whirligig. So why did her heart now thunder at the possibility of venturing forth into society. Thunder—not from trepidation, but anticipation?

  She was saved from having to explore the uncomfortable conclusion to these thoughts by Helena’s dampening response, ‘I believe Lord Yarrowby is quite a bit older than you.’

  ‘What does that signify?’ Arabella’s eyes widened. ‘Papa was twenty years older than Mama, don’t forget. And Lord Yarrowby is only fifteen years older than me.’

  ‘Oh, so you’re well advanced with your calculations,’ remarked Helena, apparently tiring of the conversation. She rose, her high heels clicking on the parquetry, her silk gown swishing around her ankles as she made her way towards the door. As she turned, her gaze travelled Arabella’s length, as if assessing her worth.

  Arabella’s jaw dropped as she realized that Helena was mocking her, but the hurt look on her face only made her sister-in-law laugh. ‘I was not insulting you, ma chérie,’ she said, her tone more kindly now. ‘Rather the contrary. It would have been simply too stupid of you not to have considered all matters pertaining to his eligibility. Ah, a letter!’ she cried, gaily, snatching up the thick cream parchment sealed with wax as the maid entered with the morning’s post. But her disappointment showed as she turned it over.

  ‘Rose, your admirer,’ she said, stonily, after she’d dismissed the maid. ‘Although, by rights, any letter addressed to Lady Chesterfield should be opened by me. Well?’ she demanded, when Rose merely stared at the missive as if she didn’t know what she should do.

  Rose would have told her to mind her own business had Arabella not also begged with childlike enthusiasm, ‘Yes, do tell, Rose. Is Lord Rampton your new admirer?’

  ‘Lord Rampton merely wishes to meet me this afternoon,’ replied Rose evenly, once she had scanned it, folded up the paper and placed it in the pocket of her skirt. ‘No doubt something to do with the arrangement we have over the debt.’

  But after being ushered into Lord Rampton’s drawing room, then spending several minutes engaged in trivial chatter about the appalling traffic conditions occasioned by that afternoon’s wet and windy weather, Rose realized that her debt was far from Lord Rampton’s mind as he eventually got down to the real reason for his request to her.

  ‘I understand it was Miss Arabella’s debut into society,’ he said, conversationally, regarding Rose from above the rim of his cut-glass tumbler.

  ‘Yes.’ For some reason Rose was wary. With little experience of men sh
e found being alone with one both disconcerting and exhilarating—or was that because of the man, himself? Her palms felt sweaty and her throat dry but she held her head high as she practised the self possession that had always served her well.

  ‘She has a certain charming freshness,’ he went on, seeming to observe her more acutely than the remark warranted. ‘More sherry?’ he asked, suddenly by her side, bending to relieve her of her half-empty glass.

  Rose hoped that if she kept her eyes trained on the fire, and a polite but distant smile upon her lips, he would not notice the rapid rise and fall of her bosom and the heat that flamed in her cheeks.

  ‘I couldn’t help noticing that she appeared to catch the eye of Lord Yarrowby.’ Surveying her with an assessing look as he returned to his seat, Lord Rampton raised his tumbler in salute, took a thoughtful sip, then smiled. It was an intimate smile, as if he had known her a long time, and was assured that each understood the relationship between them.

  Rose felt both foolish and naïve. She should never have agreed to meet Lord Rampton, alone, though Edith had accompanied her here, allaying any suspicions Charles might have had. ‘You were, perhaps, expecting Arabella to comport herself like a country bumpkin?’ she asked, cautiously.

  Lord Rampton’s shout of laughter gave but short-lived relief.

  ‘Having met the other women in her family the thought never crossed my mind.’ His eyes twinkled.

  Rose felt her defences crumble. No man had ever looked at her like that: with such unreserved admiration. Her pulse quickened. Nor would such a look ever have been likely to breach her defences, had it come from another man. She had never lost her heart, or had it even slightly bruised; she would not have thought such a thing possible. But Lord Rampton, with his strong, angular face, his frank, direct gaze and the most beautiful mouth she had ever seen, was doing all that and more.

  ‘No, indeed, I’d wager that with your sister-in-law’s refreshing want of airs and her pretty face she’ll be the toast of the town. Which is all the more reason to warn you—’