No wonder your father gives you no respect, if you never stand up to him.
That terse assessment still stung, but it didn’t mean she was right. Easy enough for her to make judgments when she was safely on the outside. In the end, however, determined though Chloe Fletcher might be, the Earl of Chiswick would stand for no nonsense from a mere wife. He’d crush her like a grape.
It would be a shame for that to happen—for that spirit of hers to be smashed out of existence. Lucien supposed that was why he had given in to her demands and why he was riding off on this mad errand.
The scent of roasting meat drifted from a wayside inn as he passed, and Lucien’s belly rumbled. The horse needed rest, he told himself, so he turned the animal over to the ostlers and went into the taproom for a pint of ale and to check out the innkeeper’s wife’s skill with a hearty breakfast.
Exactly how mad the errand—and Chloe herself—might be, Lucien wasn’t certain. Obviously he was helping to arrange an elopement; there was no room for doubt about that. Captain Hopkins must be more than just a friend, because Chloe had colored a bit when she spoke of him, and there had been that telltale softness in her voice when she said his name.
Equally obviously, Sir George and Lady Fletcher did not approve of Captain Hopkins as a suitor for their daughter. They probably had an inkling of Chloe’s feelings—thus her need for complete privacy to ask the favor. The captain’s mere existence might help explain why they were so quick to agree to marry off their only daughter to a much older man, earl or not. If Chloe Fletcher had tumbled into an attachment with a soldier who had no family or connections to speak of, her parents would have done everything in their power to stand in the young lovers’ way. No doubt they thought that once married, she would be safe from foolish thoughts about a soldier in a bright red uniform.
Now, because of their clumsy handling of the entire affair, she was planning to elope. Could they have made any more of a mull of things?
But was Lucien helping matters? He had agreed to aid and abet a girl—barely past her first Season—who was running away to Gretna Green!
So much for me never going against my father’s wishes. If Chloe succeeded in making her escape—or even if she didn’t—and the earl found out the role Lucien had played in the scheme…That didn’t bear thinking about.
But he might have read too much into the letter that weighed so heavily in his pocket and on his mind. Chloe might not really be planning a flight to Scotland; she might only wish to have the support of her beloved when she made her stand to her parents and the earl. After the way she had scolded Lucien for not voicing his opposition when his father applied pressure, surely she wouldn’t simply run away rather than face the music.
He needed to know what was in that letter. He’d be in a far better position to offer real assistance if he knew exactly what she was planning.
He pulled the folded page out of his pocket and studied the seal. Was it his imagination, or was it slightly loose on one edge? If he was to slip a warm knife under the wax and pry just a very little, surely it would pop loose without breaking.
It wasn’t that he wanted to snoop, of course. His intentions were pure; he only wanted to help. Investigating exactly what she was up to would be for her own good.
When he first stepped into the portrait gallery, Gavin would have said the castle housed far too many dark, stiff, and solemn oil paintings of dark, stiff, and solemn people, most of whom looked too much alike to hold his interest. Emily’s stories, however, kept him entertained, and by the time they’d circled the gallery he had a fair grasp of the Mainwaring family.
But all too soon they finished with the portraits, and she said shyly, “I should go.”
Gavin groped for an excuse to keep her beside him a little longer. “This is the perfect place for a dancing lesson.”
“Apart from the lack of music, perhaps.”
“You could walk me through the figures. You wouldn’t want me to embarrass the duke at his ball, would you, by showing myself as a clumsy colonial?” He did his best to look innocent and helpless.
Isabel’s maid found them wheeling around the portrait gallery in a silent parody of a country dance, and with an embarrassed flutter Emily peeled her hand from Gavin’s arm and went off to have her ball gown fitted.
Gavin found himself standing once more in front of the full-length portrait of the fourth duke’s daughter, who did look amazingly like Emily. He thought, however, that the resemblance lay more in the expression than in the features themselves—a sort of mixture of haughty entitlement and mischief. He wouldn’t be surprised if the minx in the painting had deliberately led the artist on so he would fatter her on the canvas.
And what about Emily? In their little dance of enjoyment, he wondered who was leading whom.
For a young woman who had been so unhappy about the state of her wardrobe, Emily seemed awfully unconcerned about her new ball gown.
Isabel had plenty of time to consider the matter, since her own fitting was complete and one of the seamstresses was doing up the fastenings of her day dress—her own maid having been dispatched to search the castle for her missing sister—when Emily finally appeared, almost breathless.
“I am so sorry to keep you waiting,” Emily said to the head seamstress. “I—well, the truth is I forgot.”
The woman bobbed a curtsey. “It’s perfectly all right, Lady Emily, but let’s get you out of that dress right away so we can see how the ball gown looks.”
“It is not all right,” Isabel said. “How did you manage to forget? When you left the breakfast room before me, you said you were coming directly here.”
“No, I didn’t.” Emily’s voice was muffed because one of the seamstresses was lifting her dress over her head. She emerged with her hair askew and her face a bit pink. “I got here, didn’t I? Oh, don’t give me that look, Isabel—you remind me of Mother when I’d violated good manners, only you don’t look nearly as stern as she did. You’ll need to practice, so you’ll be ready when you have a daughter of your own.”
Isabel’s stomach did a flip. A daughter of your own.
No. Fate couldn’t be so cruel. The baby she would carry—the child she might be carrying even now—would be a boy. It had to be a boy. Then the Earl of Maxwell would have his heir, and Isabel would have Kilburn and her freedom. But if she were to give birth to a girl instead—a girl who could not inherit…
I will absolutely not have a girl. I just won’t stand for it.
“Isabel?” Emily stood stock-still in the center of the room, wearing only her chemise and corset, and waved off the seamstress who was approaching with an armful of frothy deep-pink gauze. “Are you all right?”
“Perfectly,” Isabel said mildly. “And I am practicing Mother’s look—on you.”
“Well, you can stop right now. I suppose next you’ll be harping at me that I must hire another companion when I go back to Barton Bristow, since I won’t have the benefit of your guidance.”
“I can’t think it matters. Mrs. Dalrymple never seemed in the least able to exert a good influence on you.” Isabel sat down so her maid could touch up her hair where the fitting had disarranged it. “What have you been up to, anyway, to make you forget?”
“I found her in the portrait gallery, ma’am,” Martha murmured into Isabel’s ear. “Dancing—or something like that—with Lord Athstone.”
Dancing—or something like that. With Gavin, whom Emily hadn’t even spoken to at breakfast. Isabel’s gaze went to Emily in the mirror, but her sister was submerged for the moment in pink gauze.
Finally, Emily’s face reappeared. “Besides, other than my obvious rudeness to the seamstresses—for which I have apologized—what’s the hurry?”
“You didn’t hear Lady Fletcher say last night that she and Chloe might come to call on us this afternoon?” But of course she hadn’t, Isabel realized, for Emily had been off to the side just then, arranging with Gavin to drive home with him in his curricle. “Mr.
Lancaster might come with the ladies.” Isabel stole a look at her sister to see if the shot hit home.
Emily shook out the skirt of the ball gown and glanced at her reflection over Isabel’s shoulder. “His conversation would be preferable to listening to Lady Fletcher’s hints.”
“He seemed quite enamored of you last night—and you didn’t appear to be put off by his interest. I thought you were determined not to encourage Father in making matrimonial plans for you.”
“At least if Father is arranging alliances for me, he won’t have so much energy to devote to his own.” Emily tugged at the bodice, pulling it down a little lower. “I should be certain to tell Mr. Lancaster what color I’m wearing. He can choose his coat accordingly so that we shall look well together as we dance.”
A fitting room full of seamstresses and maids was not the place to take her sister to task for flirting, Isabel reminded herself, and this was hardly the right time to dredge for the reasons why Emily was suddenly so flighty and so brittle.
And in any case, if I pry into her secrets, she may return the favor, and I’d much rather not share mine.
Isabel inspected Martha’s handiwork, nodded, and stood up. “Do try to hurry, won’t you, Emily?” She didn’t wait for an answer.
As Isabel entered the drawing room, Gavin leaped to his feet, but she barely noticed him, for she was no sooner across the threshold than her nerves gave the characteristic thrum she had come to recognize as her own personal signal that the Earl of Maxwell was in the room.
“Gentlemen,” she said. “It’s not that I wish you to be gone from here, but…”
Maxwell had also stood. Her gaze was instantly drawn to the perfect fit of his dark-green coat, unblemished buckskins, and highly polished top boots.
Especially, she had to admit, the buckskins.
As she saw him start to smile, she dragged her gaze away. “I am half expecting Lady Fletcher to call at any moment.”
Gavin looked puzzled.
“If we are here when the ladies arrive,” Maxwell murmured, “we will no doubt be condemned to playing the gallants until they say their farewells, because it would be rude to leave them for other pursuits. And since they are coming from a distance, they may well stay for the entire afternoon. However, if we have already gone out when they arrive—”
“I believe,” Isabel went on, “that Mr. Lancaster, at least, intends to accompany them.”
Gavin was frowning. “Do you truly wish to be left alone with all of them?”
Isabel wanted to say that she would happily entertain an entire army as long as her husband wasn’t part of it, but she kept her voice pleasant. “I am certain my father will be able to occupy any part of Mr. Lancaster’s attention that is not focused on Emily.”
She almost missed the way Gavin’s mouth tightened, because only an instant later he said calmly, “Then I am not needed here, and I find myself longing for a ride. How about you, Max?”
The earl didn’t answer. “How thoughtful of you, my dear Isabel, to offer Cousin Gavin and me the option of disappearing in such a timely fashion. But are you quite certain you would not prefer me to remain to support you?”
“Oh, do go away,” she said irritably. “And as long as you’re going, be certain to take Lucien with you so I don’t have to deal with another of his heavy-handed attempts to show Chloe Fletcher the errors in her thinking.”
Maxwell frowned a little. “I have yet to see him today. Gavin?”
Gavin shook his head. “His bedroom door was open and his man was about when I came downstairs, so he’s not still abed, or ill. I wonder…”
The two of them went off, and Isabel sank into a chair to enjoy the quiet. At least she wouldn’t have to deal with Maxwell, on top of Lady Fletcher and Chloe, and Emily flirting with Lancaster.
Her peace lasted only a moment, it seemed, before the butler announced Lady Fletcher’s arrival. Such a short interval had passed that Isabel wondered if Maxwell and Gavin had managed to make their escape in time after all—but they did not reappear in the visitors’ wake. Lady Fletcher rattled on, Chloe sat silent and prim as if she were trying to be invisible, and Mr. Lancaster looked around the room, obviously hoping to find Emily hidden in a corner.
Half an hour had gone by and the tea tray had just come in when Emily finally arrived, once more neat and trim. She had changed into a pale-blue day dress, Isabel noticed, one that flattered her golden-brown hair and peaches-and-cream complexion.
Emily fluttered for a moment over her apologies to Lady Fletcher and Chloe—and a more insincere performance Isabel had never seen—and gave Mr. Lancaster a melting glance that summoned him instantly to her side. “Have none of the gentlemen stayed at home to entertain you? I thought Lucien at least might finally make an appearance. But he seems to have gone off on some mysterious errand as well.”
Isabel handed a teacup to Chloe just as a wave of pink rose in the girl’s cheeks. She looked, Isabel thought, as though the heat of the entire teapot had suddenly washed over her.
“What a pity,” Emily went on, “but I shall do my poor best to amuse you, Mr. Lancaster.”
Isabel turned to look at her sister, dismissing Chloe’s odd reaction from her mind. A bruising ride, Isabel thought grimly, sounded more appealing by the moment, if the alternative was to watch Emily flirt!
Early afternoon found Lucien once more within a few miles of the castle. As though his horse had sighted the towers and landmarks of home, the animal tossed his head and whickered eagerly. Lucien patted the gelding’s neck. “You’re tired out, aren’t you, and longing to run for your stable? But it’s not a good idea to start a race now, after the day we’ve had.”
He had started to skirt the village when he thought better of the idea and drew up in front of the inn instead. Resting the horse for an hour would mean he wouldn’t turn over an exhausted mount to a stable master who would without doubt question what he’d been up to.
A coin to an ostler assured that the gelding would be brushed down, watered, and supplied with hay and grain, and Lucien himself went off to the taproom while he waited. He could almost smell the innkeeper’s ale all the way from the yard.
Delivering Chloe’s letter had not been the simple errand she had seemed to think it would be. Merely finding Captain Hopkins had been a challenge. The army barracks had been full of bustle and noise, and Lucien had had to stop soldiers three times to ask directions. Finally he located his quarry at the smithy, where the captain had been overseeing a blacksmith who was tending to his horse—an animal that in Lucien’s opinion was a great deal more show than substance. To add to Lucien’s problems, Captain Hopkins had not been of a mind to interrupt his pursuits to listen to the confidential business of a complete stranger.
Lucien’s eyes hadn’t yet adjusted to the dimness inside the taproom when he heard his name called. “Lucien! Where in the name of heaven have you been all day?”
Lucien strode across the room to where Gavin sat by the window with a tankard of ale the innkeeper had just set in front of him. He plucked the tankard out of Gavin’s hand and drained it. “Thoughtful of you to have a drink ready for me, Cousin.” He turned to the Earl of Maxwell, sitting across the table, and eyed his tankard as well. “And you, too, Max—I couldn’t have asked for more of a welcome than this.”
The earl prudently moved his ale out of reach and gestured to the innkeeper. “You don’t look as though you’ve been laboring in the fields all day, Lucien. What causes the great thirst?”
“Never knew I needed a reason to be thirsty,” Lucien said. “Especially not when the ale is as good as this.” He settled himself at the table as the innkeeper delivered another round. This time he sipped slowly and appreciatively.
He wouldn’t have been surprised if the two of them had quizzed him. But Maxwell only raised an eyebrow and Gavin smiled a little, and Lucien relaxed. This might work out for the best after all. They could enjoy their ale, then ride back to the castle together—and with luck no one
would ask exactly when he had turned up or where he might have gone before that.
“Are you two escaping the party preparations or the dress fittings?” he asked.
“Riding the estate,” Gavin said. “Meeting tenants, seeing the land.”
Lucien gave a soundless whistle. “Uncle Josiah approved that? I’d have liked to hear the conversation!”
“He told me to look around, get a feel for the estate.”
“It was hardly a formal inspection,” Maxwell added, “but enlightening nonetheless. And it fitted well with Gavin’s urge to escape Lady Fletcher’s call.”
Lucien silently gave thanks for the impulse that had made him stop at the inn rather than ride straight on to the castle.
Maxwell consulted his pocket watch. “I suppose if we don’t turn up at a reasonable hour, and in a reasonably sober condition, there will be a price.”
“Surely not for you,” Lucien said idly. “Isabel seems to prefer it when you’re nowhere in sight.”
Maxwell’s hand clenched for a moment on the handle of his tankard, and then relaxed.
Lucien wondered why Lady Fletcher was making the trek over to Weybridge today, of all days. They’d all been together for dinner the night before, and the garden party and ball were tomorrow. Why wasn’t she staying at home for once? Surely, just like his sisters, the Fletcher ladies needed to occupy themselves with—oh, things like ribbons and fripperies, he thought vaguely, and whatever else females did all day when getting ready for a big occasion.
Worry gnawed at him. Max seemed to think this was an ordinary call—but then Max had no reason to be suspicious of Lady Fletcher’s motives. Surely Chloe would be careful not to let her mother suspect she was up to something—wouldn’t she? But they did say mothers had a special sense about these things.
Lucien was just glad he didn’t have to face Chloe’s dragon of a mother right now—before he had a chance to talk to Chloe herself. He wished he didn’t have to wait until morning, when they had agreed to meet once more in the linden grove, to work out a story.
The Birthday Scandal Page 17
