Mesalliance

by Riley, Stella

  ‘You are too critical, Charles,’ said his lordship. And then, to Rockliffe, ‘Meanwhile, where does this leave Mr Horton? Do you wish him to be admitted to the Club?’

  There was a long, enigmatic pause. Finally, the dark eyes rose and the Duke said blandly, ‘No, my dear. I most certainly do not. And I would be obliged if you could ensure … in whatever manner you see fit … that Ludo Sterne is made aware of the fact.’

  ‘So that he can tell Mr Horton?’ enquired Mr Fox, evincing faint signs of interest.

  ‘Just so. With life so full of disappointments, it seems only fair that he should know who to blame for this one, don’t you think?’

  ‘If you have a particular reason,’ remarked March thoughtfully, ‘I suspect we might be glad to be made privy to it.’

  ‘Yes.’ His Grace paused for a moment and then said, ‘Have either of you ever played cards with Mr Horton?’

  ‘I haven’t,’ replied the Earl. ‘You, Charles?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then I would suggest,’ said Rockliffe gently, ‘that you never do.’

  He settled down, by and by, to a game of picquet with Jack Ingram and won it by an unusually large margin.

  ‘Am I,’ asked Jack, examining the score with mock-gloom, ‘playing particularly badly this evening – or have you been visited by divine inspiration?’

  ‘A little of both. But I hope that you’re not going to dwell on it. I had thought to ask you a trifling favour.’

  Jack grinned at him.

  ‘I must say, you pick your times. But – very well. Ask away. And I’ll commit myself when I know what it is.’

  ‘Dear Jack. Always so cautious.’

  ‘Well, for all I know, you’ve challenged some poor fool and are about to ask me to be your second.’

  ‘Perish the thought!’

  ‘Good – because I wouldn’t do it.’

  ‘I think you may safely assume me to be aware of that fact.’ Rockliffe smiled. ‘I sometimes wonder, however, what exactly I’ve done to make you think me eternally bloodthirsty.’

  ‘I don’t think it,’ said Jack frankly. ‘What I do think is that you’d do it out of boredom. You used to be forever offering to fight Dominic.’

  Laughter flared in the dark eyes.

  ‘Ah. But that, beloved, is an entirely different matter. But we digress. I wished to ask you – since I must leave town for two or three days – if you would be good enough to keep an eye on Adeline and Nell. It shouldn’t, I hope, prove too taxing.’

  Mr Ingram stared at him incredulously.

  ‘Not taxing? Looking after Nell? You must think I’m less than the full shilling!’

  The Duke considered him for a moment. Then, ‘I suppose you may have a point. Very well. Adeline will keep an eye on Nell and you may keep on Adeline. Is that better?’

  ‘Much!’ grinned Jack.

  ‘And why,’ demanded Harry Caversham, arriving in time to catch Rockliffe’s last words, ‘can’t you keep an eye on Nell yourself?’

  ‘Because,’ came the patient reply, ‘I have to go into the country.’

  His lordship pulled up a chair and sat down, frowning. ‘Is it urgent?’

  ‘Yes.’ Rockliffe paused and then said sweetly, ‘I was not aware of any need to ask your permission.’

  Harry had the grace to look mildly abashed.

  ‘I beg your pardon. But the thing is, I’m getting dashed sick of seeing Nell with that Brierley fellow – and I should think you would be too!’

  ‘Would you?’ The Duke sipped his claret, apparently unperturbed. ‘Now why should you think that?’

  ‘Isn’t it obvious? He’s twice her age and has been hanging out for a rich wife for the last two seasons. I’d be damned if I’d let him get his hands on my sister.’

  ‘So crude,’ sighed his Grace. ‘But you see, Harry, I have no intention of allowing him to … get his hands on her. Indeed, I doubt he has any desire to do so; and if I should find that he has … then it will be my sad duty to dissuade him.’

  His lordship leaned back in his chair, chin on chest, and turned a sardonic blue gaze on Mr Ingram. He said, ‘I must be missing something. Do you know why it’s all so simple?’

  ‘Trusts and trustees, I should imagine,’ replied Jack. And then, glancing briefly at Rockliffe, ‘Think about it, Harry. Nell’s eighteen and I’d guess that her inheritance is tied up in the usual way until she’s twenty-five.’

  ‘Or,’ countered Harry, ‘until she marries.’

  ‘Or until she marries with Rock’s approval. There’s a difference. Rock won’t give his blessing to Brierley; and, if it’s low water with Brierley now, he won’t want to wait seven years for the tide to come in.’ He looked back at the Duke. ‘Am I right?’

  ‘I couldn’t have put it better myself,’ drawled Rockliffe. ‘And now, Harry, I really must ask what concern all this is of yours? Can it be that you’ve an eye to Nell yourself?’

  Lord Harry came abruptly to his feet, looking distinctly and uncharacteristically irritable.

  ‘You would think that, of course. But why shouldn’t I have a care for a chit I’ve known since she was ten years old? Especially since it seems you’re too damned busy to do it.’ On which Parthian shot, he left them.

  Grey eyes met black.

  ‘Touchy, isn’t he?’ asked Jack, companionably. And then, ‘I think you’d better prepare to welcome him into the family.’

  ‘Probably.’ Rockliffe shuffled the cards with casual expertise. ‘If, that is, Nell ever decides to look beyond the end of her nose. Will you deal – or shall I?’

  *

  On the following morning he entered Adeline’s room to find her sitting up in bed, sipping her chocolate and sifting through a number of gilt-edged invitations. The dark brown hair cascaded around her shoulders and over a thin, blue silk nightgown, threaded interestingly with silver ribbon. Rockliffe’s heart missed its accustomed beat and caused him to pause for an infinitesimal second before moving calmly on.

  Adeline, meanwhile, narrowly avoided choking on her chocolate and felt herself blushing. It was not that he was any longer a stranger to her rooms – for, since the night of the Bedford House ball, he had made a habit of attending the final stages of her toilette and even, sometimes, of staying to talk with her while she discarded her jewels at night. It was, however, the first time he had caught her in bed … and she felt decidedly disadvantaged by it.

  ‘Good morning,’ he said. And, as Jeanne discreetly removed herself, ‘You look delightful.’

  ‘Are you sure you don’t mean untidy,’ she asked, striving for her normal tone and sternly repressing a childish inclination to pull the covers up to her chin. She eyed his austere black coat and polished top-boots. ‘You’re up and dressed betimes. Are you going somewhere?’

  ‘With reluctance, yes.’ He crossed the room to sit on the side of her bed. ‘A small matter of business necessitates a visit to the country. And suddenly I find I do not at all wish to go.’

  Adeline didn’t want him to go either but wasn’t quite up to saying so. Instead, she kept her gaze resolutely fixed on his buttons and said casually, ‘Will you be gone long?’

  ‘Not long. Three days, perhaps. Dare I hope that you’ll miss me just a little?’

  His tone was light but his eyes, had she looked, told a different story. She said, ‘But of course. Who will help me choose my jewels?’

  ‘I’m sure there will be no shortage of volunteers … though I’m rather hoping you’ll decline them.’ ‘Particularly,’ he thought, ‘in the case of my lord March, who is already more than half in love with you - which means that if you don’t discourage him soon, I’ll have to do it.’ He took possession of her hands and said, ‘Why won’t you look at me?’

  Her breath snared and the aquamarine eyes flew to meet his.

  ‘Ah … that’s better.’ He smiled at her. ‘At least I shall have a charming picture to carry with me.’

  She said, ‘You’re … you are parti
cularly gallant this morning.’

  ‘Yes. I’m glad you noticed that. It’s because, you see, I was rather hoping that you might give me something.’

  ‘Oh? What?’

  ‘This.’ And, entirely without haste, so that she could read his intention and thwart it if she wished, he gathered her into his arms.

  The warmth of his hands seared her through the flimsy stuff of her night-gown and her head fell back, exposing the long, creamy column of her throat. He folded her close against him, sliding his fingers slowly into the mass of unbound hair to cradle her skull and letting his eyes caress her face. Their expression set Adeline’s nerves alight and, as the moment stretched out on an invisible thread, she thought hazily, ‘If he doesn’t kiss me now, I’ll drown.’ Then he did kiss her … and she drowned anyway.

  This time there were no interruptions and he was in no hurry. His mouth teased and tempted, soliciting a response that sent a tremor thought the pliant body in his arms and causing him to gradually deepen the kiss until she made a tiny, helpless sound and her arms slid round his neck, holding him even closer. Releasing her mouth and letting one hand glide unhurriedly down her back to discover the curve of her waist, he trailed his tongue lightly down her throat to kiss the place where a pulse was erratically beating … and felt her hands tangle in his hair. Very briefly, he lifted his head to look at her and then, satisfied, captured her mouth again.

  Long moments later, he drew back a little and, still holding her, absorbed the dilated blue-green eyes and the fact that her breathing was hopelessly disrupted. Controlling his own voice with an effort, he murmured, ‘Well … that was undoubtedly worth waiting for.’

  Her whole body flooded with sensations she was now able to recognise for what they were, Adeline said huskily, ‘Tracy … ?’

  ‘Yes, darling?’

  Her heart was screaming, ‘I love you, I love you, I love you. Don’t go.’ Her head, ingrained with caution, made her reduce it to, ‘Must you really go?’

  Even this was more than he had dared hope for; and it was intensified by the fact that she was still toying with his hair – from which the riband seemed to have vanished - in a way he found curiously erotic. Summoning all his control, he reminded himself that it was broad daylight and her maid was in the next room. Moreover, the sooner his errand was completed, the better it would be for both of them. So with enormous reluctance, he said, ‘I’m sorry … but, yes. I really must. However, when I come back, do you think we might regard this as a beginning?’

  Adeline drew a long breath. ‘Yes,’ she said. And managed not to add the word, ‘Please.’ Instead, letting her hands slide away from him, she added, ‘I have disordered your hair.’

  ‘So you have – and may do so again any time you wish.’ He kissed her hands and rose from her side. ‘And now I’d better go – or it is quite likely, with you looking so inviting, that I’ll forget it’s a matter of some importance. If you need money, see Matthew. Problems of any other kind, should there be any, you may safely take to Jack. He knows I have to go away. And if Nell is difficult, tell her there will be dire retribution.’ He smiled at her. ‘I promise I won’t linger. Will you be all right?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Adeline mechanically. ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘Good.’ He allowed himself the indulgence of fleetingly touching her cheek. ‘Au revoir, my dear.’

  Then he left her for Oxfordshire … and the home of Sir Roland Franklin.

  The decision to go there was the right one. The timing of it was to prove disastrous.

  ~ * * * ~

  FIFTEEN

  Sir Roland accepted his arrival cautiously but without any undue surprise and led him to the privacy of the book-room. Then, when wine had been brought and the servant withdrew, he said simply, ‘Thought you might come. Been half-expecting it.’

  Banishing from his mind all images of a certain momentous evening in June, Rockliffe concentrated on the matter in hand.

  ‘Have you? Why?’

  Sir Rowland regarded him owlishly.

  ‘It seemed to me you’d start asking yourself questions. Bound to, really. Adeline’s your wife – but you don’t know much about her.’

  ‘About Adeline, I know everything I need to know,’ came the cool reply. ‘It is – as I suspect you are well aware – her mother who interests me.’

  ‘Ah.’ Sir Roland nodded several times, his face settling into lines of worry. ‘You want to know about Joanna.’

  ‘I do. The question is … are you going to tell me?’

  ‘Depends.’

  ‘On what?’

  ‘On whether you’ve already asked my wife. She doesn’t want you told, you see – so it’s better if she knows nothing about it. Thing is,’ he said earnestly, ‘Miriam can be a very difficult woman. Wouldn’t like her to guess you’d found out from me.’

  Rockliffe repressed a temptation to tell the baronet it was clearly time he got a grip on his own household and said, ‘There is no reason why she should. I have not approached her and can safely promise not to do so. Neither have I told anyone of my visit here today.’

  ‘Not even Adeline?’

  ‘Particularly not Adeline. I need to learn everything I can in order to protect her as best I may. Then, if necessary, I can reveal those things she ought to know at a time when I judge her best able to cope with them. I trust that makes the position plain?’

  ‘Very,’ said Sir Roland. ‘Agree with you. Always thought she should be told. Said so often.’ He paused, thinking it over. Then, ‘Better start by telling me what you know.’

  Resting his elbows on the arms of the chair, his Grace laid his finger-tips lightly together and eyed the other man across them. At length, he said, ‘I know nothing. What I have is a collection of surmise and supposition which leads me to one conclusion and one only. That Joanna Kendrick did not die twenty-four years ago and is still, in fact, very much alive. Am I right?’

  Roland drained his glass.

  ‘Yes,’ he said flatly. ‘More or less.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘She was alive six years ago.’ He opened the bureau and rummaged about till he released the catch of a concealed drawer. Then, pulling out first a slim packet of letters, he produced a small box. ‘Sent this for Adeline’s eighteenth birthday. Trouble was, I couldn’t give it to her.’

  Rockliffe accepted the box and opened it to reveal a gold locket engraved with a tracery of flowers. Inside was a beautifully painted miniature that could have been Adeline herself. For a moment he was silent. Then, snapping the lid shut, he said, ‘Could you not have lied a little more and called it a bequest?’

  ‘No,’ said Roland. He turned the letters over in his hands and then added baldly, ‘Joanna wrote to me from time to time and I sent her news of Adeline. Miriam didn’t know.’

  His Grace expelled a long breath.

  ‘I see. When did you last hear from her?’

  ‘Told you. Six years ago. She was in Paris.’

  ‘Lodging with Charles’ inviting little widow,’ thought the Duke. And said, ‘I think it’s time you told me the whole story.’

  ‘Suppose I’d better.’ Sir Roland fortified himself with another glass of canary. ‘The Hortons were a respectable enough family but they’d connections with trade. Joanna and Miriam were supposed to mend that by marrying well. Problem was that Joanna fell in love. Younger son, no prospects and a Frenchie, to boot. Old man Horton wouldn’t have it, of course. Gave the Frog his marching orders and sent Joanna to his sister in Hexham.’

  ‘Where,’ suggested Rockliffe, ‘she met Tom Kendrick?’

  ‘Yes. Wouldn’t have anything to do with him at first so they told her the French fellow was married.’ Roland took a gulp of his wine. ‘Not true – but she believed it and married Tom. He idolised her – even more so after she had Adeline. Would have done anything for her. Shouldn’t have taken her to London, though.’

  ‘Let me guess.’ The dark eyes were gently reflective. ‘She met her Fre
nch lover again?’

  ‘That’s it. Met him and ran off with him straight away. Just vanished – and Adeline less than three months old.’

  ‘Quite. So you all joined ranks to bury the scandal by announcing that Joanna was dead. Was that not rather drastic?’

  ‘Wasn’t my idea,’ replied Sir Roland, a shade irritably. ‘Not my business, either. Only recently married to Miriam at the time. Old man Horton wanted it – Kendrick wanted it. I just did as I was told.’

  ‘I see.’ For a long time, Rockliffe was silent. Then he said, ‘If Joanna is still alive, I need to find her. And to that end, I’d like her last known address in Paris.’

  ‘Take it,’ came the prompt reply. ‘Take all the letters and the locket. Not my responsibility any more, thank God.’

  ‘No,’ agreed the Duke. He rose and pocketed the items he had been given. ‘You have been most helpful. I’m grateful.’

  ‘Pleasure. Just don’t involve me, that’s all.’

  ‘I won’t. There is, however, just one other question I’d like to ask. Has it at any time ever occurred to you that Adeline might not be Tom Kendrick’s child?’

  ‘Yes,’ came the blunt reply. ‘But it ain’t likely. Joanna wouldn’t have left her if she’d been Michel’s.’

  ‘Michel?’ queried Rockliffe gently.

  ‘The Frenchie. Michel du Plessis. It’s all in the letters. Rather you than me – but I wish you luck all the same. Just hope Adeline don’t get hurt by it. You looking after her?’

  ‘I am doing my best.’ His Grace paused, an odd smile lurking in his eyes. ‘And will continue to do so. Always.’

  *

  In London, meanwhile, Adeline was living with a heady mixture of fear and delight and trying hard not to let it show. The fear was in finally accepting the fact that, against Tracy, she had no defences – the delight, in the ravishing possibilities to which this might lead. She didn’t know what he felt for her and, for the first time, it occurred to her that perhaps he did not either. But that, when suddenly put beside what she should have seen long ago, was not so very important. He had made it plain from the first that he wanted her but she had made him wait because she had been so afraid of falling in love with him. And that, she now knew, had been pointless – for she loved him anyway and had done for weeks, with an intensity that was beyond anything she had ever imagined.