No Man's Mistress

by Mary Balogh

  “Is that what you did?” she asked.

  “Actually, yes.” He chuckled softly. “I used to read a great deal, though not openly when my father was at home. He did not approve of bookish sons. But the more I read, the more I realized how little I knew. I used to gaze out at the universe feeling all the frustration of my small-ness—especially the smallness of my brain. And then I would gaze at a blade of grass and tell myself that if only I could understand that, then perhaps I could penetrate the larger mysteries too.”

  “Why have you not done that for many years?” she asked.

  “I don't know.” But he had obviously thought more deeply about her question before he spoke again. “I have been too busy being busy, perhaps. Or perhaps I realized when I was at university that I could never know everything and so gave up the attempt to know anything. Perhaps I have been in the wrong place. London is not conducive to thought—or wisdom.”

  The interior of the carriage became a little lighter as it moved clear of the trees. The conversation had not taken the course she had expected. More and more she was realizing that Lord Ferdinand Dudley was not at all the man she had taken him for when he first arrived at Pinewood. She wished she did not like him. Liking him was making things very difficult for her.

  “What about you?” he asked. “Are you ever lonely?”

  “No, of course not,” she said. Why were people so reluctant to admit to loneliness? she wondered. It was almost as if it were something shameful.

  “That was a hasty answer,” he said. “Too hasty.”

  “Loneliness can be a balm to the soul,” she said, “especially when one considers some of the alternatives. There are far worse afflictions than loneliness.”

  “Are there?” In the faint light she could see that his face was turned toward her.

  “The worst thing about loneliness,” she said, “is that it brings one face-to-face with oneself. That can also be the best thing about it, depending upon one's character. If one is strong, self-knowledge can be the best knowledge one can ever acquire.”

  “Are you strong?” His voice was soft.

  She had thought she was. She really had thought so.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “What have you learned about yourself?”

  “That I am a survivor,” she said.

  The carriage rocked to a halt on its comfortable springs, and the door opened almost immediately. Lord Ferdinand's groom set down the steps.

  Mr. Jarvey had waited up and took her cloak and Lord Ferdinand's cloak and hat when they stepped into the hall. He disappeared with the garments.

  “Come into the library for a nightcap?” Lord Ferdinand asked her.

  She could probably accomplish her goal tonight if she set her mind to it. They would share a drink and more conversation, and then he would escort her upstairs. She would pause outside his room and thank him for bringing her home. She would sway toward him so that he would be kissing her before he even had a chance to realize his danger. It would all be over within an hour after that. Tomorrow he would be gone. Pinewood would be hers.

  She felt the soreness of unshed tears in her throat and chest and shook her head.

  “I am tired,” she said. “Thank you for bringing me home. Good night.”

  She did not sway toward him. Neither did she offer her hand. But there it was in his, and he was raising it to his lips, and his eyes were regarding her over the top of it, a faint smile softening their darkness.

  “Thank you for the dance,” he said. “But it is the maypole dance for which I will always remember you.”

  She fled, not even pausing to take a candle from the hall table. Had she done that deliberately? Caused him to kiss her hand and look at her like that and speak so softly about always remembering her? It was what she had set out to do. It was exactly what she had hoped to accomplish. But she had not really done it, had she? She had simply been herself.

  Or had she been the Viola Thornhill who intended to throw him off guard sufficiently that he would not realize that when he bedded her he would be losing his wager to Lilian Talbot?

  She no longer knew who was herself and who was the courtesan. She no longer knew whether she wanted to win that wager or not. She dreaded—dreaded— being in bed with him, feeling him coming inside her while she coaxed him to a pleasure so prolonged and so intense that he would never after feel cheated. How could Viola Thornhill hide deeply enough in the persona of Lilian Talbot to allow it to happen?

  Viola Thornhill—the real Viola—wanted to join herself with him in love. It was something she had never experienced and could not really imagine experiencing. For the physical joining of man and woman was an ugly, demeaning act. But dreams were not quite dead after all, she was finding. And her dreams wove themselves about his person in a way that had nothing to do with any wager.

  What she should do, Viola thought as she fled along the upper corridor in the darkness, was go back down to the library and announce to him that their wager was off, that she would leave Pinewood tomorrow. But she kept going until she was inside her room, the closed door firmly and safely between her and temptation.

  13

  For the next two days Viola went about her daily round of activities with her usual energy and cheerful smile, but her mind and emotions were in turmoil. Perhaps, she thought sometimes, she should go away to somewhere other than London and seek employment. But Hannah and her family would have to fend for themselves, then. Why should she have to bear all the responsibility? But the thought of relinquishing her family to their own resources consumed her with guilt.

  She could win Pinewood with her wager, and life would be back to normal again. But she could not bear the thought of seducing Lord Ferdinand—it nauseated her and filled her with self-loathing. He was a decent man.

  But remaining at Pinewood was not just about money. It was her home, her legacy. She simply could not face leaving it.

  On the third morning after the assembly, with two more days to go before she must either win her wager or leave Pinewood, matters were severely complicated by the arrival of another letter from Claire. It was lying on the desk in the library when Viola returned from a morning walk along the avenue. She snatched it up eagerly and took it with her to the box garden. She sat on the bench that surrounded the fountain, after checking to see that the seat was dry. It had rained all the day before, though the sun was shining again today.

  Everyone was well, Claire reported. She was working every day for their uncle. She liked serving in the coffee room best, where she met and talked with travelers and a few local people who came there regularly. One gentleman in particular had begun to come quite often. He was extremely pleasant and always thanked her for her kind service and gave her a generous tip. She had not recognized him at first, not having seen him for many years, but Mama and Uncle Wesley had.

  Viola clutched the single sheet of paper with both hands and suddenly felt her heart beat faster. She sensed what was coming even before her eyes confirmed her premonition.

  “He is Mr. Kirby,” Claire had written, “the gentleman who used to frequent the inn when you worked here and then was obliging enough to recommend you for a governess's position with his friends. Mama and Uncle Wesley are delighted to see him again.”

  Viola clenched her eyes tightly closed. Daniel Kirby. Oh, dear God, what was he doing back at her uncle's inn? She opened her eyes and read on.

  “He has asked about you,” the letter continued. “He had heard you had left your position, though he did not know you are now living in the country. He gave me a message for you yesterday. Let me see, now. I want to get it just right. He had me repeat it after him. He said that he hopes that you will come back to town for a visit soon. He has discovered another paper that he is certain would be of interest to you. He said you would know what he meant. He also said that if you were not interested in seeing it, then he would show it to me instead. Was that not a provoking thing to say, for now of course I long to know what is
in that paper. But he would not tell me no matter how much I pleaded. He would only laugh and tease me. But you see, dear Viola, we are not the only ones who long to see you again….”

  Viola stopped reading.

  Another paper. Oh, yes, indeed, she knew what he meant. He had “discovered” another bill to be paid, even though he had sworn in writing that he had produced them all, that they had all been settled. They were her stepfather's numerous unpaid bills, most of them gaming vouchers, which Mr. Kirby had purchased after his death.

  He had become a regular customer at the White Horse Inn after Viola's family moved there. He had been very amiable, very kind, very generous. And then one day he had told Viola he could help her to find more interesting employment than she had. He had friends, new to town, who needed a governess for their four children. They preferred to choose someone from a personal recommendation than go to an agency or put an advertisement in the papers. He would arrange for an interview if she wished.

  If she wished. She had been ecstatic. So had her mother. And Uncle Wesley had raised no objection. Although he would be losing help at the inn, it pleased him that his niece would be in employment more suited to her birth and education.

  She had gone to the interview, escorted by Mr. Kirby. And she had found herself in a dingy house in a shabby part of London, confronting a woman whose orange hair and painted face had made her look frighteningly grotesque. Sally Duke would train her for her new profession, Mr. Kirby had explained—and he had made no bones about what that profession was to be. Viola had flatly refused to proceed, of course. She could remember now the terror she had felt, the fear that she was a prisoner and would not be allowed to go free. But Mr. Kirby had assured her in his usual kindly manner that she was free to leave whenever she wished, but that her mother and her young sisters and brother faced long incarceration in debtors' prison if they were unable to pay off all their debts. He named the total to her, and she had felt all the blood draining downward until her head was cold and her ears were ringing and the room began to spin about her.

  She had been nineteen years old. She had a mother who was in a state of nervous and physical collapse after the death of her husband. Claire had been nine years old, the twins six. Uncle Wesley had already paid off a few debts, which seemed trifling in comparison with these—there was no way he could pay them. And Mr. Kirby, of course, knew it. Viola had been able to see no way out but compliance with his demands.

  The arrangement had been that eighty percent of all she earned was to go toward the reduction of the debt. She was to live on the remaining twenty percent. It behooved her, then, to work hard, to establish a reputation for herself, so that her twenty percent would enable her to keep body and soul together.

  Later, when she was already working, she had been informed that only twenty of Mr. Kirby's eighty percent could be applied to debt reduction. The remaining sixty paid Mr. Kirby's fee for housing her, procuring clients for her, and looking after her best interests. To all intents and purposes, Viola had been a slave. But she had used the little power she had to insist upon working no more than one night a month and to refuse to be any man's exclusive mistress. She had quickly become more sought after than any other courtesan in London.

  By some strange miracle, she had kept the secret from all of her family. Only to Hannah had she rashly poured out her heart as soon as she knew the truth of what her future held. Hannah had insisted upon going with her even though Mama had warned that a governess would not be allowed to have her own personal maid. Her family still believed she had been a governess for four years before coming to Pinewood. Her mother had been furious with her for leaving such respectable employment in order to accept the gift.

  The debts had not been significantly reduced in four years. The interest had eaten up the bulk of her payments. She had known Mr. Kirby would hold her in thrall for the rest of her working years, but she had not been able to think of a solution. It had seemed that she was caught in a lifelong trap. But then she had met the Earl of Bamber. And he had discovered the truth—she had poured her heart out to him one night, seated beside him on the plush sofa in her living room, his arm securely about her shoulders, her head nestled on his shoulder. She had told him everything she had kept bottled inside for four long years, and he had kissed her cheek and told her she was a good girl and he loved her.

  A good girl. Love.

  The words had been like a spring of pure water in the middle of a desert. Balm to an aching soul.

  He loved her. She was loved. She was a good girl. She was three-and-twenty years old and a veteran at her profession. But she was a good girl and she was loved. He loved her.

  He had called on Daniel Kirby and persuaded him to produce all the bills still owing. He had paid them all off and obtained a signed, witnessed note that there were no more. And then he had asked Viola if she would like to go to Pinewood Manor to live. It was a long way away, in the middle of nowhere, to use his own words, and as far as he knew it was probably shabby. Certainly it did not fill his coffers with income. But he would send her there if she wished, and he would send a good steward down to get everything sorted out for her, and a good butler to set the house to rights and hire other servants. The manor would be hers. He would leave it to her in his will.

  She had buried her face in the hollow between his shoulder and neck and wrapped her arm about his portly middle. She had felt safe and loved and strangely clean for the first time in four years.

  “Oh, yes,” she had said. “Oh, yes, please. But I don't want to leave you.” She had known he was gravely ill.

  He had patted one large hand against the side of her face and kissed her temple. “I will be going home to the country to die,” he had said gently. “My wife is there.”

  Grief and love and gratitude and happiness had soaked his cravat and neckcloth with a flood of tears.

  The sound of booted feet on stone brought Viola back to the present with a jolt. She was sitting on the bench in the box garden at Pinewood, Claire's letter clutched in both her hands. Lord Ferdinand was striding toward the house from the direction of the stables. He always looked his most enticing in riding clothes, she thought. He paused for a moment, seeing her, and touched the brim of his hat with his whip. She half raised one hand in greeting. He did not come down the steps to join her but continued on his way into the house. She breathed a deep sigh of relief.

  Claire was in terrible danger. The meaning of the message was very clear. Daniel Kirby wanted Viola to return. Although she was twenty-five years old, rather aged for a courtesan, she had retired at the height of her fame. She would still be remembered. There would surely be a rush of prospective clients, at least for a while, if word spread that she had returned to town—and Mr. Kirby would see to it that that happened. She could earn far more money for him, at least for a year or two, than Claire could do as a raw novice, who might never take as well as her sister even after training.

  Viola swallowed once, and then again. For a minute or two she had to concentrate very hard not to vomit. The very thought of Claire …

  If she did not return, he would use Claire. That was the threat he held over her head. He had kept back at least one of the bills. She was going to have to pay it off by going back to work.

  Unless she owned Pinewood.

  It was prospering. It was true that she had planned to put most of the profits back into improvements. It would be many years—if ever—before she could consider herself a wealthy woman. But the profits did not have to be reinvested. They were hers, to be spent as she wished. She could make payments on the debt. They would be endless payments, of course, but there was little she could do about that. She could…

  But Pinewood was not hers. It was Lord Ferdinand's.

  Unless…

  Viola closed her eyes and crumpled the letter in her hand.

  Yes, unless.

  Ferdinand would have dined at the Boar's Head except that he had been told that Viola Thornhill was to spend the e
vening with the Misses Merrywether. He was counting down the days. There were two to go. He was stubborn to a fault. He knew that. He had made a decision, but even so he was going to torture himself for two more days with brief glimpses of her—like this morning in the box garden—and short encounters with her. He wanted her with every beat of his pulse, but he was determined to win his wager, to be able to throw that, at least, in her teeth.

  She was being very foolish, of course. There had been no glimpse of Lilian Talbot since the day of their wager. Only of Viola Thornhill. How could she hope to seduce him like this?

  He dressed for dinner even though he would be dining alone—it was the habit of a lifetime. He was humming as he entered the dining room, but he stopped abruptly. She was standing by the sideboard, talking with Jarvey, and there were two places set at the table. She was wearing a gold silk gown without any jewelry or other adornment. The garment itself was of such simple design that Ferdinand knew at a glance that it was very costly indeed. It shimmered over her curves in a way that would have made further adornment quite redundant. Her hair was a smooth, shining, dark red cap over her head. Her braids were coiled at the back, low on her neck. She was beauty and elegance personified.

  Ferdinand checked his stride. For a moment he misplaced the rhythm of his breathing. She smiled, and he was not at all sure whether she was Viola Thornhill or Lilian Talbot. He suspected that she was wearing one of the latter's gowns. But it was a sweet smile.

  “I thought you were dining with the Misses Merrywether,” he said.

  “No.”

  There was nothing for it, then, but to seat her at the table, take his own place, and make the best of the situation. They conversed politely on a number of topics. She told him how she had started the ladies' sewing group as a social outlet for the women of the neighborhood and observed with a smile that even when they were being sociable, women liked to be useful too. He told her about Tattersall's and the horse auctions that were held there every week.