“You were,” agreed Sir Antony.
“Thank you, Tony —and that, so I am informed, poor eyesight is nothing of which to be ashamed—”
“It isn’t. Sensible advice.”
The Earl’s lips twitched. “—when I am perfect in every other way.”
Sir Antony grinned. “Ah! Well, I’ll leave that subjective estimation to your fair and frank admirer.”
Salt gave a huff of embarrassed laughter. “Yes, she is bruisingly frank.”
Diana St. John glanced from one male face to the other with no idea they were referring to the Countess. She sat up with a frisson of expectation, completely misreading the mood. “How unfair of you not to tell me Salt’s latest interest!” she pouted at her brother then looked at the Earl. “So who is it? Jenny? Frances? Margaret?”
Salt removed his eyeglasses and pocketed them, a glance over his shoulder at Ellis. “Leave the rest. I believe you are wanted elsewhere. We can deal with the Rockingham papers later this afternoon.”
Sir Antony took the opportunity to glare at his sister and shake his powdered head, but Diana St. John was oblivious to the warning and leapt right in. “Oh, Salt, please don’t tell me you’ve made that Morton creature your latest interest! I couldn’t bear it. She’ll positively gloat when I next see her in the Mall.”
“I wasn’t about to tell you anything of the sort, my dear,” the Earl said flatly, all humor gone. He addressed Sir Antony. “I presume you are also wanted elsewhere?”
“Oh! So you hadn’t forgotten your engagement this afternoon?”
“Not at all. Were you sent to fetch me?”
“No.”
“You perhaps presumed I had forgotten? For shame, Tony!”
Sir Antony smiled. Inwardly he was jumping for joy. It was something the Countess had let slip on one of their many excursions beyond the Grosvenor Square mansion that alerted him to the favorable turn of events within the Earl’s household. He had become very fond of Jane and he genuinely enjoyed her company for its own sake. That she loved the Earl, he was in no doubts. Being a romantically minded young man he hoped that one day her feelings for his cousin would be reciprocated.
A sennight ago she had inadvertently revealed that she and the Earl had begun spending their evenings after dinner in the bookroom, where her husband was teaching her to play at chess. A small domestic detail in itself, but knowing the Earl as he did, Sir Antony saw this gesture as a huge hurdle for the matrimonial harmony within the Salt Hendon household. Which would mean he was a step closer to fulfilling his own matrimonial plans, his motives being not entirely altruistic. And just then he heard the name of the very object of his desire and dreams. Shaking his mind free of romantic ruminations, he heard his sister say in all seriousness, as she slipped on her mules,
“But surely you cannot have any objections to George Rutherford as a suitable match for your sister? He is worth fifteen thousand a year, not a penny less, and has an estate in Ireland that’s the size of Surrey! Caroline could do worse.”
“Much worse. But she can do better.”
“Got anyone in mind?” Sir Antony asked, and inwardly cursed himself for he heard the edge to his own voice.
Salt regarded him steadily. “No. But when I do, you will be the first to know, Tony.
Diana shut her fan with a snap. “At almost eighteen, Caroline is practically on the shelf—”
“—where she will remain until her twenty-first birthday and not a day before.”
Sir Antony made his cousin a small bow of understanding. “Three years is not such a stretch when she has the rest of her life to be married.” And abruptly changed the subject. “We had best not keep her ladyship waiting. I believe the entertainments are due to begin on the hour in the nursery.”
Diana St. John could barely say the word but curiosity got the better of her. “N-Nursery? What entertainments?”
“Surely Ron and Merry told you all about it, Di?”
She shrugged a bare shoulder at her brother. “Possibly. They are always prattling on about inconsequentialities that it gives one the headache. None of it bears remembering.”
Salt paused, a liveried footman holding wide the door, and regarded her steadily. “It is the anniversary of their father’s birth. Had he lived, St. John would have turned four and thirty today.”
ELEVEN
SUCH WAS THE CACOPHONY coming from behind the double doors that led into the rooms designated as the nursery, that it brought Salt up short, Sir Antony and Diana St. John at his back. But it was not the noise it was this section of the house that made him hesitate. He had not set foot on the third floor since inspecting the house just before purchase some four years ago. He could not even remember the configuration of the rooms, how many there were or how they had been furnished, if indeed they contained any furniture at all. He seemed to recall the selling agent telling him that with a coat of fresh paint, pretty wallpaper with matching curtains, and a good fire in the grates, the rooms would do very well indeed for a brood of growing noble children.
He had not given the rooms another thought, until now. He had even dismissed as farcical Diana’s refusal to mention the rooms by their designation as a theatrical means of protecting any feelings of inadequacy he had at being unable to father a child. Yet, now faced with crossing the threshold he had a twinge that Diana’s affected display of refusal was not so melodramatic after all, for it seemed laughable to be holding a birthday memoriam for a dead father in a nursery that would remain for him as silent as the grave.
Still, he could not disappoint Ron and Merry.
He had two fingers to the door handle when Diana pushed past him in a crush of petticoats to fling wide the doors. She misinterpreted his hesitation for embarrassment at being forced to enter a wasted nursery. Her own smoldering anger that the Countess had somehow deliberately set out to taunt her by using the very rooms she so despised was enough to make her drop her guard and speak without thought to her words or her audience.
The door banging hard against the wallpapered wall did not stop the chatter and movement. Those that heard Lady St. John’s outburst above the din dropped their jaws and a few little faces crumpled with fright at the sight of the angry lady. In one sweep, Diana took in the assembled company, adults taking tea and seedy cake while children played skittles or statues under the guidance of their nannies and tutors at one end of the long room. All were happy and content and enjoying themselves. The warmth and color, the freshly painted walls and upholstered furniture, the Turkey rugs covering the floorboards where small children took their first steps and chubby babies crawled, all made her seethe with resentment. Then she recognized the young woman standing beside Jane and her hazel eyes widened with new knowledge then narrowed to slits of mischief.
She saw the Countess before Jane saw her.
“Well! How like you to unsettle his lordship’s household with a pathetic display of domestic felicity!” and with a hand to her throat and a look of shocked disbelief that would have done any actress proud, she turned to the Earl with a swish of her petticoats to say in a loud whisper, “There’s Lady Elisabeth Bute that was. The silly creature has invited the Bute sisters!”
Sir Antony had seen the married daughters of the Earl’s political rival almost upon entering the room and though it raised his eyebrows in surprise he was not so dismissive or so accusatory. How was Jane to know the connection? Both young ladies were married women and thus used their husband’s moniker. Their presence in the house of their father’s political nemesis was indication enough that they looked upon Jane with great favor and were prepared to weather the displeasure of their statesmen father by visiting her home, than it did about the Countess of Salt Hendon’s lack of political acumen. Sir Antony was surprised his sister could be so blind to the gesture. Yet, he thought with a depressed sigh of resignation, where Salt was concerned it was his sister who was the simpleton.
Jane did not catch the content of Diana St. John’s outburst, only her deris
ory tone. She had been in conversation with Lady Elisabeth Bute Sedley, whose much-admired newborn son was cradled in her arms, and because Lady Elisabeth’s two-year-old daughter was intent on seeking her mother’s undivided attention with as much chattering as possible; a grubby fist clutched to Jane’s petticoats, while a nurse tried to untangle the chubby fingers free from the delicate silk. Thus when Jane swiveled on a silk-slippered foot, baby cradled in her arms, it was not in answer to Diana St. John’s spiteful remark but in expectation of seeing her husband.
Her blue eyes lit up and her smile widened, but fell away when Salt merely blinked at her as if she was a stranger. When she saw him sway, face blanched as white as the elaborately tied cravat about his throat, she carefully placed the sleeping infant into the waiting arms of its wet-nurse, scooped up the two-year-old who was taken away by her nurse, and scurried across the crowded room to his side.
Sir Antony had Salt by the elbow. “It’s all right, dear fellow. I have you.”
“It’s… I’ll be fine directly,” the Earl muttered, mortified to be so weak-minded as to be affected by such a trifle as the sight of Jane with a baby in her arms and another tugging at her skirts.
He swallowed and took a deep breath, and for want of something to mask his momentary feebleness, he glanced about the room, seeing people without seeing faces. But his heart would not quiet and continued to pound hard against his chest, and no wonder. He had suffered a shock. The recurring dream he had been experiencing every night for a fortnight had come to life before his very eyes. Not entirely accurate, for in his dream (or was it a nightmare?) Jane was heavily pregnant. But the infant in her arms and the child clinging to her skirts were just as he had conjured them up in his disturbed sleep. So vivid and repetitive was this dream that one night he had woken in a lather of perspiration and immediately escaped to his own rooms to douse his body with cold water.
The very next night he had stayed away from Jane’s rooms, and the night after that a late parliamentary sitting had given him a reason to dine with Sir Antony and spend the night at his Arlington Street townhouse. Alone in a cold bed, staring up through the darkness at the plastered ceiling, he had ruminated over the reasons for the recurring dream and come to the realization that it was guilt that haunted him; guilt at marrying Jane when he knew very well he could not give her children. He had denied her motherhood to serve his own selfish need. Guilt was eating away at him. He who had spent his life commanding and receiving at will felt utterly helpless for the first time in his life, and he had no idea what he could do about it and that made him utterly miserable.
“You are just in time for the puppet show, my lord,” Jane said brightly, as if nothing was amiss but a worried glance exchanged with Sir Antony, who had relinquished the Earl’s elbow to allow Jane to take his arm. “Mr. Wraxton was all for commencing the afternoon’s entertainments but Ron and Merry would not listen to his entreaties. They said we must wait for you, and so we have.”
The crowd parted to allow the Earl and Countess to pass to the far end of the room, and then closed ranks, swallowing them up in a sea of silk before Diana St. John could follow. That she was shown the backs of these perfumed and patched parents of precious brats did not greatly bother her, only that they had dared to side with the Countess against her. As it so happened, being left stranded at the back of the room gave her the perfect opportunity to slip away unseen to seek out the Countess’s maid.
Jane guided Salt to a corner of the room where the adults had seated themselves on an arrangement of ladder back chairs, in front of which were half a dozen children cross-legged on plump cushions. All before a raised platform that had upon it a marionette theater. Nurses, nannies, and tutors stood off to one side with their smaller charges and babes in arms, while servants in livery scurried about with food and drink on silver trays for members of the audience.
“Uncle Salt! Sit here next to Tom. Sit here! It’s about to start!” Merry demanded eagerly, grabbing for the Earl’s hand.
“Not the puppet show,” corrected Ron with a roll of his eyes. “We have to sit through a yawning poem first.”
“But you are just as eager as the rest of us to see Mr. Wraxton’s iron wig,” Merry countered. “Isn’t he, Aunt Jane?”
Salt cleared his throat as he took a swift look about the long room, with its fresh coat of powder blue paint, sprigleaf patterned wallpaper and soft matching curtains. He smiled down at his wife. “All your endeavor, my lady?”
“I cannot claim all the glory. Tony, Merry, Ron and Tom proffered their expert opinion on decoration. Although I suspect Ron and Tom will deny any involvement in such a womanly venture. Tony is made of sterner stuff.”
This made Salt laugh, a glance over her dark hair at her stepbrother who gave a shrug of defeat. “I do not doubt it. Not a very manly pursuit to own to poring over swatches of fabric.”
“Speak for yourself, Salt,” Sir Antony quipped, quizzing glass plastered to an eye and a wink at Tom. “You’d be surprised how many pretty girls occupy the counters of drapery shops.”
“Uncle Salt! Sit!” demanded Merry, pointing to an empty chair central to the row as she scrambled on to one of two tasseled cushions at the claw and ball foot of his chair. “Aunt Jane? Aunt Jane! Here! Here!”
Jane let go of the Earl’s arm and would have stepped away to take her place on the cushion placed between Merry and Ron, but he grabbed her hand.
“Are you abandoning me, my lady?”
Jane looked down at his possessive hold on her wrist. “I—The children have reserved a cushion and I promised…”
He let her go and sat where requested with an outward flick of his frock coat skirts. “Naturally they have placed you at my feet which is only right and proper.”
Jane glanced up, saw the wink and turned away to sink down on a cushion beside Merry. He leaned in to whisper at her ear before settling back to enjoy the performance.
“I would gladly trade places if it was in my power to do so.”
His words were still reverberating in her ear as Hilary Wraxton minced across to stand center stage dressed in a canary yellow frock coat with matching breeches, diamond paste buckles in the large leather tongues of his red-heeled shoes, and carrying a lace handkerchief. He unfurled a parchment and held it out at arm’s length then cleared his throat as if about to make an announcement as town crier. But it was at his head that all eyes were glued. He was wearing a full bottom wig, all tight brown curls and festooned above each ear with yellow ribbons.
A strident elderly female voice cut into the stunned silence.
“What’s that you say, dear boy? Iron? The fellow’s wearing an iron wig?”
“Can’t tell ’em from the real thing.”
“What? You must be mad! It’s bloody obvious the thing ain’t real!”
“Steady! Ladies and brats present.”
“Sorry.”
“Ha! Ha! Can’t tell horsehair from the real thing so why should iron be any different. Aye? Still. Ridiculous creation.”
“Hope the poetry is better than the finery.”
“It’s an Ode.”
“Ode-or. Ha! Ha!”
“Oh do be quiet and let the fellow get on with it!”
“Yes, do!”
“What’s it called, this Ode?”
“Ode to a Bloody Obvious Iron Wig. Ha! Ha!”
“Not amusing at all, George.”
“What’s that you say about a carriage, dear boy?” came the same strident elderly female voice. “I thought we were talking about wigs?”
“Do listen, Aunt! Hilary’s poem. It’s called an ode, and it’s about a carriage.”
“Good—Lord!”
“Shhhhhhh!”
The children were being better behaved than the assembled adults, who giggled behind fluttering fans and guffawed into lace handkerchiefs. Jane glanced over her shoulder at the Earl.
“You see the level to which poor Mr. Wraxton has had to condescend to garner your patronage,
my lord.”
Salt playfully tugged one of her curls.
“Wearing an iron wig at a children’s tea party is certainly descending, my lady. But why does Hilary require my patronage?”
“Oh? You have neglected him! Poor Mr. Wraxton will be devastated if he discovers his poetry accumulating in your bookroom remains untouched and unread.”
Salt continued to play with her hair.
“I’ve been rather preoccupied of late… If poor Mr. Wraxton wishes to place blame, he had best place it at your elegant feet. No! You cannot argue with that. Now do stop distracting me,” he added loftily, eyes on the stage. “I must give my full attention to Hilary’s ode.” And in the manner of a sultan, waved a languid lace covered hand for Mr. Wraxton to begin his recitation: Ode to a Well-Sprung Carriage.
Oh, thy torment of a rut in the road
To the muck and manure, the slush and the slurry…
~ ~ ~
IT WAS USUALLY after dinner, when tea and coffee were taken in the Long Gallery and her children drew Salt and Sir Antony, and that creature with her big blue eyes and radiant complexion, and any of the guests who had a mind for childish pursuits, to play at charades, that Diana St. John quietly disappeared upstairs to the Countess’s private chamber.
She was never away for more than half an hour at a time. And when she returned without ever having been missed, it was in a brooding temper. Because as hard as she fought to remain a force in the Earl’s life since his marriage, with her disruptive Tuesday visits with her children in tow, being within his orbit at all the same parties, party-political dinners, routs and theater evenings, there was one area of the Earl’s life that remained off-limits and beyond her control to influence. She might continue to insinuate herself into his waking hours, but his nights belonged very much to his wife, and much to her angry disgust, only his wife.
That he had not strayed one night from the marital bed since his marriage gnawed away at her day and night. She tried to convince herself that to a man of Salt’s experience and strong appetites, physical gratification was as necessary and as mundane as satisfying hunger and thirst, no more and no less. But when the Countess’s personal maid reluctantly told her that the Earl had not only spent every night since his marriage with his wife but always stayed the entire night in her bed, Diana St. John began to realize with bitter disappointment that such long-held, cold-blooded beliefs could be applied to Salt’s lovers, but not, it seemed, to his wife.
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