by Jane Feather
"Yes. Decide which gown she should wear this evening." Imogen gestured toward Miranda and the array of gowns on the bed. "Maude's shoes are too small for her, unfortunately. She'll have to put up with pinching until the shoemaker can accommodate such big feet."
That at least didn't trouble Miranda. She knew that she didn't have big feet, although they were long and narrow, and the soles were somewhat rough. "I think I look best in the peach velvet," she said firmly. "Are you experienced in matters of wardrobe, sir?"
"I have some small reputation," he said modestly, lifting the peach gown from the bed. He held it up against her and shook his head. "No, it does nothing for your coloring, my dear. It didn't do anything for Maude's, either."
"Oh," Miranda said, disappointed. She'd thought the peach velvet embroidered with gold thread quite enchanting.
"But we all make mistakes in taste on occasion," Miles continued, warming to his subject, as he examined the other gowns. "It's very easy in a particular light to think something will look well and then in another setting to see how perfectly dreadful it is."
Miranda glanced toward Imogen, wondering how her ladyship was taking this discourse from her husband. To her surprise, she saw that the lady was paying close attention, her lips pursed as she nodded in agreement.
"What about the emerald green?" Imogen suggested, and again to Miranda's surprise, the suggestion sounded almost tentative.
Miles lifted the gown, examined it in the light, held it up to Miranda's face, then said with a considering frown, "Put it on, my dear. The color may be right, but the style might drown you. You're so very small."
Miranda stepped into the gown and peered down at her front as the maids laced the stomacher that was of plain apple-green silk, contrasting with the rich emerald brocade skirt embroidered all over with a pattern of vine leaves.
Lord Dufort walked all around her, tapping his lips with one finger, his expression grave. "Oh, yes," he announced finally with an approving nod. "Yes, it will do very well. The color is excellent and the style is simpler than I thought at first sight. If I might just…" He twitched at the pads beneath the high shoulders, smoothed the close-fitting sleeves over her upper arms, then adjusted the small ruff that circled her throat and brushed her earlobes.
He stood back and took another look, still tapping reflectively at his mouth. "Very nice," he pronounced. "Do you not think, dear madam?"
Imogen nodded, that same startled look in her eyes. "If she can carry the part…" she murmured, half to herself. "Gareth was quite right. Maybe we'll pull the coals out of this fire after all.
"But what of her hair?" she continued, a deep frown furrowing her brow. "It's all very well to say it was cropped for a fever, but it looks quite dreadful, perfectly ugly."
Miranda ran a hand over her head, thinking of Maude's auburn-tinted locks. Maude's hair was a trifle lifeless, but it was enviably long. She'd never thought about her own crop, but now she could imagine how ugly and unfeminine it must look.
“The snood worked quite well last even," Miles said, pulling at his almost nonexistent chin as he pondered the question. "But I believe a cap and veil will work even better. With her hair drawn back from her forehead beneath a jeweled cap and the falling veil at the back no one will see the deficiency." He smiled apologetically at Miranda as he made this comment.
"In a few weeks, of course, you'll have an abundance of lovely thick, dark hair, my dear, and then we can dress it properly. It will be a delight to do so."
"In a few weeks it's to be hoped the girl will be long gone," Imogen said tardy. "By that time, my cousin will have been brought to a proper sense of her duty." She swept toward the door, commanding the maids," Take the gown off her and have it pressed and made ready for this evening. Do the necessary alterations on the others and have them ready to wear by this afternoon."
"I believe Lady Mary is belowstairs, Imogen," Miles said. "I heard the chamberlain letting her in through the front door as I crossed the hall."
"Oh, for goodness' sake, Miles, why could you not have said so before?" Imogen demanded crossly.
"We were a little busy, my dear," Miles said apologetically.
Imogen paused in the doorway, surveying Miranda with the same frown. "You had better put on that turquoise gown again and present yourself downstairs to pay your respects to Lady Mary. You had as well get used to being in company." Without waiting for a response, she swept from the room.
"You'll do very well, my dear, I have every confidence in you," Miles said, seeing Miranda shiver suddenly in the thin undergarments. "Put on the chamber robe, before you catch cold." He draped the garment around her shoulders and she gave him a grateful if slightly wan smile.
"There, there," he said awkwardly, patting her shoulder. "Everything will work out, you'll see." He hastened after the maids, leaving Miranda to her own reflections.
Chip, with impeccable timing, bounded back onto the windowsill. "Ah, Chip!" Miranda held out her arms to him and received his scrawny little body. "How did I get myself into this?" She buried her nose in his damp fur. "You smell like a compost heap!"
Chip grinned and patted her head, stroked her cheek.
Chapter Twelve
"Lord love us! Is this it, then?" Mama Gertrude pulled her shawl closer over her head to protect her velvet hat and its golden plumes that were becoming a little bedraggled in the fine drizzle.
"Bleedin palace," Bertrand declared in awe, taking another step backward to gain a more complete view of the Harcourt mansion across the road. "Don't look like no brothel."
"I 'eard tell the stews is all in Southwark, t'other side of the river," Gertrude said." This ain't no brothel, it's a gentleman's residence."
"But what's our Miranda doin' in a gentleman's residence?"
"She's been taken by that lord, fer 'is own pleasure," Jebediah said, relishing as always his doom-laden prophecies. "An' 'e's 'oldin' 'er in his 'ouse, till he's tired of 'er." He rubbed his cold hands together, the rough, dry skin rasping. " There's nowt we can do if she's in there. 'Tis a fool's errand, pissin' in the wind… I always said so."
"Oh, you're such a naysayer, Jebediah," Luke protested. "If this lord is holding Miranda against her will, then we have to rescue her."
"And just 'ow would you be a-doin' that, young feller-me-lad?" Jebediah hunched into his threadbare cloak. "You look crosswise at this Lord 'Arcourt, and 'e'll 'ave ye locked up quick as a wink, an' 'anged afore ye can say Jack Sprat."
"Is M'randa in that 'ouse?" Robbie finally caught up with the troupe, his little face squinched with the pain of his dragging foot. Wet weather always made the ache worse.
"Don't know fer sure, laddie." Raoul looked down at the child. "But the car
ter said this was the 'Arcourt mansion, so, unless we're on the wrong track, this is where we'll find 'er."
“The man in the livery stable in Dover seemed very sure it was a Lord 'Arcourt what 'ad taken 'er," Gertrude mused. "Isn't that so, Luke?"
Luke nodded vigorously. "A right noble lord, he said, and he described our Miranda to a T. Didn't like her one litde bit. He said she was an interfering doxy."
"There's some as would agree." Raoul chuckled, a rumble deep in his throat.
"But 'e didn't say this lord 'ad taken 'er agin 'er will," Jebediah reminded them, shivering. "Let's get outta this mizzle. It's gettin' into me bones."
"Aye, we need to find lodgin' afore the city gates is closed, Gert," Bertrand said. "An' Jeb is right. We don't know that Miranda was taken agin 'er will."
Gertrude's mouth pursed. "I tell you, she'd not 'ave gone with 'im of 'er free will wi' out a trick or summat. Our Miranda's not goin' to sell 'er virtue, an' if it's been taken from 'er by a trick, then we got to get 'er back."
"She's one of us," Luke affirmed with uncharacteristic fierceness. "We can't abandon her."
"No one's suggestin' any such thing, laddie." Raoul put a comradely arm around Luke's skinny shoulders and Luke's knees almost buckled beneath the weight. "We've done good work for today. We've found the 'ouse an' we'll make inquiries tomorrow. Let's find some lodgin' now. I'm fair famished fer me dinner."
Reluctantly, Luke bowed to the majority opinion, and the small group moved away from the Harcourt mansion toward the city gates, Raoul pulling the cart with their belongings. The bells would soon be tolling for curfew and if they wanted to be inside the walls for the night they had to hurry.
Robbie dragged along in their wake, but he couldn't take his eyes off the house. Was Miranda in there? He missed her with an ache that was almost as bad as the one in his foot. She used to rub his foot when it hurt. She put him in the cart when he was tired. She always made sure he had enough to eat. The rest of the troupe were not unkind, indeed they cared for him in a casual way, but they didn't look out for him as Miranda did, and sometimes, when he was far behind, he was desperately afraid of losing them, and he wasn't confident they would come and find him the way they were searching for Miranda. Miranda was much more important to them than a cripple, who cost more than he earned.
A commotion in the courtyard made him pause. The great iron gates were thrown open and four stalwart men trotted out bearing a sedan chair. Despite their burden, they overtook Robbie very quickly. A woman's hand drew aside the curtain and Robbie's heart beat fast as he tried to see in. A long, sharp-featured face peered out, greenish gray eyes skimmed over Robbie as if he weren't there, then the woman withdrew and the curtain fell back.
Robbie hobbled faster after the troupe. The woman had looked cold and unfriendly, coming from the house where Miranda was kept. What did she have to do with Miranda?
Lady Mary had not noticed the small boy hobbling along the road, and she didn't notice the troupe of strolling players with their cart. Her litter passed through the city gates without challenge; the bearers wore the queen's livery as Lady Mary was one of Her Majesty's ladies of the bedchamber. Not a very important one, but the position gave her free board and lodging and one new gown a year. Not insignificant benefits when her own money was held in the tight-fisted hands of her uncle, ostensibly in trust for her, although Mary was under no illusions that she would see much of it, even as dowry in her approaching marriage.
Her hands in their silk mittens curled into fists in her lap. Now that Gareth was returned safe, nothing could prevent her becoming countess of Harcourt by next May Day. A woman of consequence, a woman of wealth. And now the prospect was even more dazzling. With Gareth's ward married to the king of France's closest advisor, Gareth would be sure to gain advancement and influence, and his wife, his consort, would share in it. There were so many slights she had to avenge, so many rebuffs, so many whispers. She would watch the tattlers eat their words, the smiles of malice turn to the ingratiating smiles of supplicants. She would have favors to give.
Oh, it was a delicious prospect. And yet for some reason this afternoon it didn't fill her with the usual delicious anticipation. She couldn't put her finger on what was bothering her, but something was definitely tarnishing the gilt of her elation at Gareth's safe return from a successful mission.
Every time she tried to identify the unease, she thought of Maude. But that was ridiculous. She'd known Maude for two years, she knew that Gareth found her irritating and had little sympathy with her megrims and many ailments. She had always thought of the girl as a nonentity. Even as the duchess of Roissy, Maude would still be unimportant except as a conduit for her family's advancement. But Maude had somehow changed. Her eyes were as large and blue as always, but they held a sparkle, a glint that was new, and her wide mouth, instead of its customary downturned corners, was more often smiling. And then there was the laughing ease she showed in Lord Harcourt's company.
Earlier, Gareth had come into the parlor where Mary and Imogen were talking, waiting for Maude to join them. He had come in with Maude and Mary could still hear their laughter, could still see Gareth's smile, the soft glow in his eyes that had lingered long after he had turned his attention away from Maude and greeted his betrothed.
But Mary knew that the glow was not for her. She'd never caused it before, and she didn't expect to. She expected the same dutiful attention from her husband-to-be that he would accord her after their marriage, but anything stronger than that was unthinkable. Theirs was a connection of convenience and duty. She would do her duty by her husband as he would by his wife. She would give him heirs, God willing, because that was part of her duty, but her whole being shrank from anything as vulgar as expressed emotion.
So why did it trouble her that Gareth seemed to take such sudden and unusual pleasure in his ward's company?
Mary uncurled her fingers slowly, aware that the nails were biting into her palms. She was accustomed to the cool, composed Gareth, a man who smiled rarely, who never said anything that was not rational and carefully considered. And now he had taken to talking and laughing and teasing a chit of a girl in the most inappropriate fashion, and the girl responded with lamentable lack of the deference due her guardian, the supreme authority in her life. And instead of putting his ward in her place, Gareth seemed to encourage it. Mary couldn't begin to understand such a complete turnaround in her betrothed's attitude, she only knew she distrusted it as much as she disliked it.
The litter turned into the outer courtyard of Whitehall Palace and the bearers stopped at the farthest staircase where Lady Mary shared cold and inconvenient lodgings with two other la�
�dies, lesser members of the queen's train.
Lady Mary hurried up the stairs as the clock struck three. She needed to make adjustments to her dress. Her Majesty was holding court at Greenwich this evening and the barge transporting her ladies from Whitehall would be leaving from the water gate within the half hour.
"So what do you think?" Miranda turned around before the tiny mirror of leaded glass, trying to get a look at her back view.
"You look every inch the courtier," Maude commented from her bed, where she lay pale and weak after the morning's bloodletting. The comment had a slightly acidic tinge and Miranda frowned.
"Is that a bad thing?"
"Not if that's what you want to be."
"Why wouldn't I?" Miranda asked curiously. "A life of luxury, fine clothes, dancing, feasting…"
Maude's expression was answer enough. "It's empty, pointless, nothing but hypocrisy," she said scornfully.
Miranda perched gingerly on the edge of Maude's bed, arranging her skirts around her. "So, tell me about it. Lady Imogen has been bombarding me with instructions about how to stand, how to curtsy, who to talk to and who not to, when to speak and when not to. She makes me as nervous and cross as two sticks, so I forget to listen.
"And milord just seemed to think that it'll come naturally and I don't need any instruction." She opened her palms in a helpless gesture. "I'm terrified, Maude. I have no idea what to expect."
Maude hitched herself up on the bed with a rather livelier air. " There's no need to be frightened. They're all silly and empty-headed. Just remember that they can't see anything beyond their noses. They'll believe you're me because they've been told so, and because you'll look like me and be wearing the right clothes and be vouched for by the right people. It wouldn't occur to any one of them that someone might have the audacity to perpetrate a fraud."
