“Aye, milord. The Delmars are friendly people. Not too high in the instep, as you English would say.” The groom was older, and his accent proclaimed him a native son of the area. He tugged his cap and unwrapped the reins from the brake.
Hessian had no plan for this part of the expedition. He’d simply knock on the door, explain to the lady of the house that her sister had need of her. In aid of that sister’s circumstances, Hessian was prepared to commit housebreaking, theft, kidnapping, riot, affray, and mayhem.
As plans went, it was somewhat lacking for well-thought-out details.
Hessian was admitted by a housekeeper into a spotless foyer, then shown to a sunny parlor sporting a deal of green-and-blue plaid upholstery. Mullioned windows made a pattern on a similarly plaid carpet, and a bouquet of bright yellow gorse—surely the prickliest of shrubs—sat on a spinet.
“Himself will be along directly,” the housekeeper said, bobbing a curtsey and leaving Hessian in solitude.
A sketch hung above the piano, of a woman who had something of Lily about the nose and chin. She was young, her expression both coy and pert. The artist had signed the work, “Lady Nadine Leggett on the eve of her presentation.” The year and initials had been tucked into the lower right corner.
“She was very pretty.”
This observation was made by a dark-haired man of about Hessian’s age. He was an inch or two shorter and lean. Even four words were enough to reveal his burr.
“Mr. Delmar.” Hessian offered his host a bow. “Hessian, Earl of Grampion, at your service. My thanks for welcoming a stranger into your home.”
Shrewd blue eyes measured Hessian over a genial smile. “You’re our neighbor down in Cumberland. I’ve bought sheep from you, or from your factors, and I suspect you’ve purchased a bull or two from me. Shall we have a seat?”
Hessian had driven past acres of lush pastures, where shaggy dark Galloway cattle had grazed in significant numbers.
“My errand is somewhat delicate,” Hessian said, remaining on his feet. “I’ve come to make off with your wife.” Yes, he had just said that. “I’m sorry. That came out badly. I’ve gone perilously short of sleep.” His boots had gone short of several polishings, his greatcoat had been left in the gig for reasons, and his cravat was nothing short of disgraceful.
He was short of sleep, short of plans, short of sanity, and unbearably short of Lily.
Delmar took a seat by a hearth swept clean of ashes, though the scent of peat smoke perfumed the parlor.
“I thought kidnapping womenfolk from across the border went out of fashion before our grandpapas’ time, but you’re welcome to try. Mrs. Delmar can be contrary and lively when certain moods are upon her. Shall I ring for tea?”
This was not a man who rattled or took offense easily. Some of the dreadful tension Hessian had carried for nearly four hundred miles eased.
“A pot of tea would be appreciated.” Hessian took a matching chair, grateful for something to sit on that neither jostled nor rocked. “In the normal course, I’d maunder on about the weather or your fine pastures and gradually wander around to admiring that sketch above the piano. I take it that’s your wife’s mother?”
“’Tis. I never had the pleasure. Her ladyship died before my bride and I spoke our vows.”
Delmar had the Scottish ability to hold a silence, while Hessian felt an un-English temptation to rant, wave his arms, and shout.
“Did you know Mrs. Delmar has a younger half-sister?”
Delmar swore in Gaelic, something about bull pizzles and the English always bringing trouble behind a polite smile.
“Do I take that for an affirmative?”
“Ye do, not a happy one. We keep in touch with an old friend, who tells us that my sister-in-law is thriving, in great good health, and wanting for nothing.”
“If you refer to Ephrata Tipton, her reports are inaccurate, though I suspect her editorializing is well-intended. Lily is in good health, but she wants very much for freedom from Walter Leggett’s schemes.”
Another oath, this one referring to greedy, black-hearted, conscienceless bastards.
“I cannot claim to be fluent in the Erse, Mr. Delmar, but I did grow up in Cumberland and have studied a number of languages besides English.”
“I will call Walter Leggett a black-hearted, conscienceless bastard to his smiling face,” Delmar said. “My wife will call him worse than that. A greedier man I never met, nor one less grateful for all the privileges of his station. Which brings us to the interesting question: What is your role, my lord? Are you married to my sister-in-law? A suitor, perhaps?”
“I’m the man who will bring her some long-overdue answers.” And Hessian was Lily’s lover, for now.
“A hopeful, then. The English must do everything their own way, I suppose. Mrs. Delmar has gone into the village with my sister. They claim they’re visiting the shops, but we have a bakery that makes scones no mortal man or woman should resist. If we’re lucky, Cook will put a few on the tray for us.”
The tray Delmar hadn’t ordered, but which nonetheless showed up in the very next moment. The offerings were enough to make Hessian’s belly rumble and his spirits rise. Aromatic China black tea brewed to full strength, scones, butter, biscuits, peeled oranges, and that particularly Scottish confection, tablet.
Hessian made himself eat, because he was famished, and because Delmar, for all his geniality, was not to be underestimated.
Then too, the scones were luscious.
“What do you know of Walter Leggett?” Delmar asked as Hessian finished his third cup of tea.
“Not enough. He socializes selectively, and I suspect our paths would never have crossed but for two things. First, he and my father were friends and I sought to respect that connection when I took up residence in London earlier this year. Second, my brother is something of a commercial genius, and Leggett seeks to take advantage of Worth’s expertise. What’s interesting about Leggett otherwise is how little we’ve learned of him.”
“He’s canny,” Delmar said, “or he was when I knew him. I learned a lot from him. My great-uncle left me a tidy sum, but said that working for a man like Leggett would teach me how to turn one coin into three. Leggett doesn’t gossip, gamble, or chase skirts. Doesn’t entertain lavishly, doesn’t call attention to himself in any way.”
“So he was secretive even before he decided to substitute one niece for another?”
Delmar dusted his hands over the tea tray, peered into his empty cup, set it back on the tray, then folded his serviette just so.
Hessian munched a scone and held his peace.
“I’ve suspected that’s what Leggett was about,” Delmar said. “I don’t bother with the London papers. What good would they do me when Leggett all but hides? We mind our own business, and Leggett has been content to do likewise. Now there’s an English earl on our doorstep, looking like a death’s head on a mop stick, and I can only conclude—”
The door opened, and a pretty redhead filled the frame. Hessian couldn’t see much resemblance to Lily. This woman was average height, where Lily was petite. Both women had red hair, though this lady’s was lighter than Lily’s.
Hessian desperately hoped he was not in the company of Lily’s sister, because whatever else was true of the lady, she was in no condition to travel the distance to London. By Hessian’s admittedly inexpert estimation, the poor woman was about fourteen months gone with child.
* * *
“As regular as the summer mail coach,” Roberta said, taking the scissors to the very edge of her cutwork. “Did I not say so? Nursery maids and governesses are creatures of habit and routine, and thus Amy Marguerite is marched out to the park rain or shine at precisely the same time three days each week. The poor dear must feel like a convict.”
Penelope’s nose remained buried in her book. “Not rain or shine, ma’am. Since this dreadful rain began, I’ve seen no sign of the child.”
For three days, the skies had visited upon
London the dreariest mizzling damp. During those three days, Roberta had plotted and planned and even gone so far as to buy a used doll in one of the charity shops.
Roberta was practicing a new cutwork pattern on an old letter from Dorie Humplewit. She opened the paper and found she’d cut too few diamonds into the center of each panel of her hexagon.
“Have you befriended Amy Marguerite yet?” Roberta asked. “Will she recognize you?”
Penelope lay a length of embroidered silk between the pages of her book. “I’ve told you, the child is well guarded. She often has another little girl with her, a nursery maid, a footman, her aunt, the physically Sir Worth, Miss Ferguson, and the London public attending her every visit to the park. If I snatch her bodily, I am a kidnapper, and even for you, Mrs. Braithwaite, I will not take that risk.”
Independence was such a disagreeable quality in a servant. Roberta took up another old letter, cut it into a circle, and folded it into sixths.
“Let me be very plainspoken, Penelope. If you do not contrive to coax the child from the park—I would never condone kidnapping—then you will soon find yourself again enjoying the company of your aged parents and nineteen brothers. Amy Marguerite belongs with me, and if you must tempt her to pay a call on her aunt with candy, kittens, or promises of a puppy, then do so.”
Penelope rose and picked up her book. “I’d best locate some sweets, then. This rain cannot go on forever.”
Roberta snipped away. “Belinda was partial to dolls. There’s one in the spare room. Perhaps you could embroider a new dress for it.”
Anything to pry the infernal books from Penelope’s hands. Anything to get Amy Marguerite where Grampion would have to take Roberta’s situation seriously.
“I can find some scraps to make into a doll’s dress, but ma’am, I beg you to reconsider this scheme. Amy Marguerite dwells in the home of a peer. Her uncle has the ear of the sovereign and has married into another titled family. Her playmates include an earl’s daughter, and that earl is related to half the titles in Mayfair on his father’s side.”
“That is the very point,” Roberta retorted, stabbing the air with her little scissors. “I am but a helpless widow arrayed against the powerful and privileged. If helplessness is all that’s left to me, I’ll use it to shame Grampion into doing his duty.”
The courts wouldn’t see it that way—Grampion had that blasted will on his side—but Grampion would never let his ward become the subject of a lawsuit.
“Did you mean to cut up that letter, ma’am?”
“It’s merely so much old gossip—oh, blast.” The letter was one Roberta’s late husband had penned to her from Ireland, the last trip he’d taken before he’d died. Seeing the snippets of paper all over the table, Roberta was irrationally annoyed with her late husband, her late sister, the Earl of Grampion, and Penelope. “I’ll frame it and start a new fashion for preserving the letters of the departed.”
“I’m sure it will look lovely, but I cannot kidnap your niece right out from under Miss Ferguson’s nose, ma’am. Sir Worth is nothing if not protective.”
“You mistake the matter,” Roberta said, taking one more tiny snip at Sir Hilary’s letter. “Lily Ferguson is finding every opportunity to ingratiate herself with the Kettering family. She hopes that Grampion will resume his outings to the park, and thus she can further her acquaintance with the earl. Lady Nadine Leggett’s daughter is not stupid nor she is attached to a noisy, difficult child.”
Though if Grampion was no longer taking Amy Marguerite to the park personally, Lily Ferguson’s ambitions in that regard were doomed.
“If you say so, ma’am.” Penelope bobbed a curtsey and left, her French grammar clutched in her hand. What she was doing with a French grammar, Roberta did not know.
Developing airs above her station, no doubt.
* * *
“This time next week, we’ll be man and wife.” Oscar twirled his walking stick, clearly in charity with the world. Lily wanted to wallop him over the head with the nearest heavy object.
The rain came down in a steady drizzle as she and Oscar waited beneath the port cochere for the town coach.
“Have you and Uncle finished negotiating my settlements?” she asked. “I do hope you’ve notified the Fergusons, lest they take you to court over the whole business.”
Oscar’s twirling stick clipped his hat brim and cocked the hat down over one eye. He righted his hat and tucked the walking stick under his arm like a baton.
“Papa has everything in hand. You and I will be man and wife, all legal and binding, before the Fergusons catch wind of the nuptials. Ireland is the other side of civilization, you know, especially the west of Ireland. You’ll likely be with child before you hear from your father’s family, and then it will be congratulations on finally finding a fellow willing to shackle himself to you.”
Doubtless, Uncle had concocted that taradiddle, but then, for the past ten years, the Fergusons hadn’t been much in evidence that Lily could see.
Oscar breathed on the handle of his walking stick and used the sleeve of his coat to polish the silver. The handle was fashioned into the shape of a bowsprit or mermaid, her hair and long tail forming part of the grip, her head and breasts the rest.
Her naked breasts.
“Oscar, that is not a decent article to take with you to a toy shop.”
“Nonsense. Mermaids are fanciful creatures from fairy tales, and children love fairy tales.”
The coach pulled up, the horse’s iron shoes striking sharply against the cobbles. Lily climbed in, ready to beat Oscar with his own walking stick if he so much as touched her hems while assisting her into the coach.
This was what marriage to him would be like, a constant struggle for the last word, for dignity and reason over selfish fancies. And that would be the daylight portion of the undertaking. He’d tried her lock last night—or somebody had.
Lily had slept with her window half open, ready to bolt from the house if need be to avoid Oscar’s attentions.
They arrived at the toy shop, and Oscar commenced flirting with one of the shop girls. Lily pretended to examine the storybooks, but she was coming to know the inventory, and children’s tales didn’t take long to read.
If Rosecroft was on the premises, he wasn’t about to approach Lily while Oscar stood guard.
“Perhaps we might interest you in some of our newer items?” the shop owner said. She held a girl’s fan, small, painted with a colorful rendering of a rainbow. She closed the fan, tapped it against her lips, and laughed. “I loved dressing up as a child. Perhaps you did too?”
The woman had white hair in a neat bun, kind eyes, and a grandmotherly air. She was also regarding Lily very steadily as she touched the fan to her lips.
Tapping the mouth with a fan meant: I wish to speak with you.
Lily took the fan and half closed it, shielding the lower portion of her face: We are being watched.
“Dressing up as a fine lady never much appealed to me,” Lily said, “but even a small child can appreciate a fan on a warm day.”
“Maybe travel books are more to your taste?” the owner asked, drawing Lily away from Oscar’s discussion of toy guns and aiming for small targets.
“I do enjoy reading,” Lily said as the owner thrust a book into her hands.
“I particularly like the story that begins on page fifty-one. So full of inspiration for young ladies in difficult circumstances.”
She moved away, leaving Lily with the book. In the margin on page fifty-one, somebody had scrawled a few words in light pencil:G heading south. Complications. Delay WL’s plans at all costs. R.
Lily read the message three times and turned the page just as Oscar came up on her elbow. “Should I purchase your morning gift from among this inventory?” He snatched the book from her. “Travel stories? Perhaps you’d like a wedding journey?”
Lily took the book back and set it on a shelf between a stuffed bear and a stuffed horse. Rosecroft’s messag
e had said to delay at all costs.
“I’m more concerned with where the happy couple will live,” Lily said. “What have you and Uncle decided?”
“Decided?” Oscar had lowered his voice, as if Lily had brought up a great scandal.
“Let’s discuss this in the coach.” Lily prayed the shop owner was eavesdropping as she tallied a purchase for another customer. “I can come back tomorrow morning to browse at greater length if the weather is too dreary to begin my day riding in the park.”
“Your infernal racketing about will stop when we’re married.” Oscar tipped his hat to the shop girl and held the door for Lily.
So polite while others were watching, and so intent on ruining Lily’s future.
“What do you expect me to do all day, Oscar? Sit about embroidering your initials onto my handkerchiefs?”
“Heavens, no. You’ll be too busy embroidering them on mine.” He handed her into the coach, smiling as if he’d made a joke.
Lily settled on the bench and pulled the shade down. “Oscar, please tell me you’ve at least read the settlements before you speak your vows. I do have paternal family, and they will expect that much of you if you’re determined to keep them from seeing to my welfare. What do the agreements say about my pin money, for example?”
Oscar had taken the place beside Lily, and again, she allowed it. Make small concessions, Jacaranda had said.
“Why do you need pin money?” Oscar asked. “Papa pays all of your bills.”
“As my husband, that responsibility will fall exclusively to you. I’m also curious about where we’ll live and how many servants you expect us to have.”
He raised the shade on his side of the coach and peered out the window. “We’ll live with Papa, of course. Lovely house, discreet staff. Excellent address.”
“All very true. Uncle does have a lovely house, a discreet staff, and an excellent address.”
The coach pulled into the street, while Oscar left off gawking to scowl at her. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“This coach is Uncle’s.” And while the exterior of the coach was beautifully maintained, the velvet on the interior was growing worn.
His Lordship's True Lady (True Gentlemen Book 4) Page 25
