Mesalliance

by Riley, Stella

  Seconds later he was at her side and begging his hostess’s pardon for his lateness with all his usual audacious charm. Her ladyship, who was Isabel Vernon’s mother and a creature of eccentric vagueness, listened for a while and then said kindly, ‘Yes, Harry. I understand perfectly. But you really need some new excuses, you know. The ones you have are becoming threadbare through constant use.’ And she drifted amiably away.

  Harry and Nell were left looking at each other. Finally, he grinned and said laconically, ‘Well? Do you think it’s time we agreed a truce?’

  ‘I – I didn’t know we were at war.’

  ‘Didn’t you?’ The blue eyes brimmed with laughter. ‘Then perhaps we weren’t. I don’t suppose there’s much point in my asking if you’d care to dance?’

  And that, Nell suddenly realised, was generous of him. She swallowed and said, ‘Yes. Yes, there is. And I’m sorry I’ve been behaving so rudely. The truth is that I thought that you and Rock had come to – to a s-sort of agreement. About me, that is. And I didn’t want to be … manipulated.’

  She felt pardonably pleased with the last word. Harry looked mildly stunned.

  ‘Are you saying,’ he asked at length, ‘that you suspected Rock of offering me your hand- or me of asking for it – without finding it necessary to consult you?’

  Put like that, she realised how unlikely it sounded.

  ‘Yes. But it isn’t true, is it?’

  ‘I should damned well say it’s not! It’s the most outrageous idea I ever heard. What do you take me for? Another Jasper Brierley?’

  ‘That’s not fair,’ she said feebly. ‘It’s just that I’ve always known it would suit Rock to have me married. And then, when we were staying in Oxfordshire and he was so insistent about my being polite to you, it began to seem that he – that you – oh, I don’t know! I can see now how stupid it was – but that’s what I thought.’

  Harry’s expression relaxed and the familiar gleam crept back into his eyes.

  ‘At least now you’ve seen your mistake – so I suppose that’s something. And perhaps I can best set your mind completely at rest by categorically stating that, if and when I wish to be married, the lady concerned will be the first to know of it. Better?’

  ‘Oh yes.’ Even to her own ears, Nell’s voice sounded hollow. ‘Much better.’

  ‘Good,’ said Harry cheerfully. ‘So now, at last, perhaps you and I can try being simple friends. What do you think?’

  *

  Simple friends. Driving home in the company of a silent Adeline, Nell wondered why those two words should be so curiously depressing. She was still wondering it when they entered Wynstanton House to be told that his Grace had returned; and then something in Adeline’s face pierced her self-absorption and made her decide that, if something peculiar was brewing between her brother and his wife, she herself would prefer to be well out of the way.

  Adeline responded mechanically to Nell’s “goodnight” and then, as calmly as she was able, asked the butler where the Duke might be found.

  ‘I believe, your Grace,’ said that stately person expressionlessly, ‘that his Grace has retired.’

  ‘I see. Thank you, Symonds.’ And thank God, too, she thought. It will be easier tomorrow.

  Wearily, she climbed the stairs. Soft candlelight spilled over her as she paused in the doorway of her boudoir to brace herself for one final performance in front of Jeanne. Then, closing the door behind her, she moved on into the room … and stopped as if she had walked into a wall.

  Rockliffe sat by the hearth, watching her. His face was in shadow but she could see that he had discarded his coat and held an untouched glass of wine in one tapering, white hand. Adeline’s throat closed with shock and her brain froze. She did not know how long she stood there, mutely staring. It could only have been seconds; it felt like an eternity.

  ‘You look startled,’ he said. ‘Did you not guess that you would find me here?’

  ‘I – no.’ Her mouth was dry as dust and it hurt to breathe. ‘Symonds said you had retired.’

  ‘Without first seeing you? How could you think it?’ His voice was warm … half-teasing, half-not. He set down the glass and came smoothly to his feet. ‘And it seemed unlikely that you would stay very late at the Lintons. In my experience, no one ever does.’

  She managed a smile of sorts.

  ‘It was a somewhat insipid party.’

  ‘They usually are.’ Leaving the fire, he moved unhurriedly towards her. ‘Which is why I rather hoped you might have chosen not to go.’

  ‘I – I had to.’ Without thinking about it, Adeline turned away to her dressing-table and began stripping off rings and bracelets with shaking hands. ‘Nell and Cassie had a small falling-out at Ranelagh last evening so it didn’t seem a good idea to send Nell to the Linton’s with Lady Delahaye as I’d originally intended.’ Reaching up to unfasten the pearls around her neck, she caught sight of his face in the mirror and her fingers fumbled clumsily with the catch which wouldn’t open. ‘Of course, they’ve made it up now – so I could probably have stayed at home after all.’

  He closed the space between them and, gently putting her hands aside, said, ‘Let me help you. I took the liberty of telling Jeanne that you wouldn’t need her. I hoped that you might make do with me, instead.’ The pearls slid from her throat and he reached past her to place them on the table, his shirt-sleeve brushing her bare arm as he did so. ‘I’m not, you may find, entirely inexperienced in the role … and, if you were to sit down, I could demonstrate it by unpinning your hair.’

  Her nerves snarled into knots. She said, ‘I – no, thank you. I can manage. Did you have a pleasant journey? I’d half expected not to see you until tomorrow. I hope your business was successful?’

  This was not the home-coming to which he had looked forward through every mile of the long drive back from Oxfordshire. Disappointment washed over him and he took a moment to conquer it. Then, when he finally spoke, it was not in answer to her questions, but to say thoughtfully, ‘I returned as soon as I could. I believed, you see, that I had an incentive.’

  There did not seem to be any satisfactory answer to that. She began removing pins from her hair with elaborate and time-consuming care.

  ‘Adeline.’ Frowning slightly, the dark magnetic gaze fixed on her reflection. ‘What happened while I was away?’

  ‘Happened? Why, nothing.’ My life has been ripped apart and I don’t know how to mend it - or how to tell you. ‘We did a little shopping and went to Ranelagh, as I told you. Nothing at all extraordinary.

  ‘I see,’ he said. ‘So nothing has occurred to upset or worry you?’

  ‘Of course not. Why should you think that? It’s only been three days, after all.’

  ‘Quite. But you seem a trifle … nervous. And then there is the rouge.’

  ‘The rouge? Oh – that!’ She gave a tiny, careless shrug. ‘It’s this gown. I don’t think lilac suits me. But there was no time to change so I tried to mend matters with artifice, for once. I don’t think it worked, do you?’

  What Rockliffe thought was that she looked under-slept and feverishly brittle – but that he was getting no closer to discovering why. Three days ago she’d melted in his arms as though there was nowhere else she wanted to be; now the barriers were back with a vengeance and she was further away than ever – retreating behind a wall of light, meaningless chatter. There had to be a reason for it, something she wasn’t telling him; unless … but he wouldn’t explore that possibility. Not yet. It hurt too much.

  Setting his hands on her shoulders, he turned her gently to face him and said, ‘These things matter, of course – but need we discuss them now? I have been waiting to greet you and have yet to do so.’

  ‘Of course.’ Adeline forced herself to remain still and knew not which temptation was the stronger – the one to hurl herself against him or the one to run away.

  He could feel the tension running through her and her mouth remained coolly unresponsive under hi
s. This time the disappointment he’d tried to put aside solidified like a stone and, repressing a pointless desire to tell her so, he made one last attempt to get her to talk to him.

  ‘Adeline, I don’t wish to be tiresome … but if something is wrong, I wish you would tell me. It’s just possible, you know, that I might be able to help.’

  ‘But nothing is wrong,’ she replied brightly. ‘Nothing at all. It’s just that I’m very tired and – and therefore not the best of company just at present.’

  His hands dropped away from her and he said, ‘You are saying you would simply like me to go.’

  ‘If – if you wouldn’t mind. I think it might be best.’

  The subtle change in his expression all but undid her and she turned abruptly back to the task of unpinning her hair. She had chosen her course almost by accident and it was even worse than she had feared. Three days ago she’d let him see that she wanted him; now she was pushing him away. She could only imagine how that must feel. But, at some point in the last ten minutes she’d somehow come to the muddled conclusion that she either had to tell him everything right now - or avoid any further intimacy until she could do so. Anything else didn’t bear thinking about. And though the second was going to be hard, the first – at this stage – was downright impossible.

  ‘Oh God,’ she thought miserably. ‘What can I do? I can’t tell him. I can’t cheat him by not telling him … and I can’t let Richard hurt him. What can I do? I am in a cage.’

  Rockliffe regarded her out of hooded eyes for a long moment and then made her a small, ironic bow. ‘It seems we are faced with yet another instance of my lamentable timing, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Not at all. The fault is mine … and I’m sorry.’

  ‘Are you?’ He walked away to pick up his coat. ‘That’s nice. But don’t allow yourself to feel too guilty, my dear. It might lead you to do something else you will come to regret.’

  The door closed behind him with a gentle click that might, as far as Adeline was concerned, have been the slamming of Hell’s gate. An uncontrollable shudder tore through her body and, dropping slowly to her knees, she put her face in her hands and cried.

  *

  Rockliffe rarely drank to excess and never alone. That night, he went downstairs to the library and did both.

  The first glass did little to numb the pain that was carving its way through his chest. He had come home prepared, at last, to say the words he’d never said to any woman in his life before – and she’d brushed him aside like a minor inconvenience. She had said there was nothing wrong – which, if it was true, left only one logical explanation; that her response to him on the morning he’d left for Oxfordshire had been a mistake she didn’t intend to make again. He found he could just about live with the thought that she was still not ready to let him make love to her. What he couldn’t live with, however, was being held at arm’s length like a total bloody stranger. That had hurt more than he would have believed possible.

  It took time, effort and a third glass of port before he was able to think with his brain instead of his emotions … not a problem he was accustomed to … and, when he did, a number of other things occurred to him.

  She’d insisted there was nothing wrong. He hadn’t believed her - but had wondered if that was just because he didn’t want to. However, when she had first walked into the room and seen him, her expression had not been just startled – it had been stricken. As if she was afraid to face him. Why? What could have happened – what could she have done that was so terrible she couldn’t tell him about it? Didn’t she know there was nothing he wouldn’t forgive her?

  ‘Ah,’ he thought wryly. ‘Well, perhaps just one thing.’

  But he knew it wasn’t that. She hadn’t managed to keep him out of her bed all this time only to fall headlong into that of some other man in the space of three days.

  And that brought him back to what had happened between them before he had left. Her response had been real. He was experienced enough to know when a woman wanted him … experienced enough also to know that what Adeline had been feeling that morning had not been purely physical. All of which meant that the situation, though unfortunate, was not – could not be – irretrievable.

  His mind recovered its tone and he left the fourth glass untouched.

  Aside from the one thing she’d denied him, he’d tried everything he knew and it had not been enough. Perhaps it was time for a change of tactics.

  ~ * * * ~

  SEVENTEEN

  Nell, who – despite one niggling reservation – felt a good deal better after her talk with Lord Harry, arose refreshed and brimming with vigour. She sang on the way down the stairs and, finding her brother alone at the breakfast table, bade him a sunny “Good morning”, prior to launching into her chosen theme. She was not, of course, to know that she had chosen a bad time – or even that the answer would have been the same had she chosen a good one. But Rockliffe, having heard her out in enigmatic silence, was in a mood of less than his usual tolerance and not disposed to mince his words.

  ‘No, Nell,’ he said flatly. ‘I will not take you to a ridotto at Covent Garden. You had as well ask me to take you sight-seeing in Bedlam.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘Because vulgarity amuses me no more than the misfortunes of the insane. And it would do you no good whatsoever to be seen in such a place.’

  ‘But if one is masked, who is to know?’ she objected. ‘And Sir Jasper says that many fashionable people go there.’

  ‘Does he indeed?’ Rockliffe folded his arms and eyed her sardonically. ‘But I, sadly, do not consider his judgement superior to my own – and, furthermore, I believe I have already desired you to terminate that friendship.’

  ‘Well, yes. But -- ’

  ‘No more buts, if you please. They grow tedious. And that is the end of the matter.’

  Nell stiffened. ‘I think you might at least listen to me.’

  ‘Do you? Then I suggest that you start doing as you would be done by. Ah.’ This as the door opened on Adeline. ‘Good morning, my dear.’

  It was a moment before she replied. Since the night of their own ball, he had always left his hair unpowdered … until today. Plainly, this was a message of some kind. ‘Good morning.’

  ‘I trust you slept well?’

  She hadn’t – but it would obviously not do to say so. ‘Yes, thank you. And you?’

  ‘More than I’d anticipated, shall we say. Coffee?’

  The tone was bland enough but his meaning was unmistakeable. Adeline set her teeth, allowed him to fill her cup and wondered, bleakly, what else she had expected.

  It was Nell who unwittingly broke the tension by saying baldly, ‘I’m sorry about yesterday, Adeline. You were right, of course – I see that now. So I apologised to Cassie and – and made my peace with Ha– Lord Harry, too. I just thought you’d like to know.’

  And, on this laconically uttered invitation to applause, she left the room.

  The door closed behind her and Rockliffe returned to the piece of correspondence he’d been perusing when she first came in. This, too, was unusual. His manners were invariably impeccable and Adeline had never known him read at the table when anyone else was present. The sinking feeling in her chest intensified and she toyed aimlessly with a slice of bread-and-butter. Then, when she couldn’t stand the silence any longer, she said, ‘About last night … ’

  The dark eyes rose to encompass her. ‘Yes?’

  ‘I – I’m sorry. I know I disappointed you.’

  He refrained from saying that disappointment in no way covered it. In fact, he refrained from saying anything at all.

  Adeline waited and, when he continued to regard her with an air of mild enquiry, said weakly, ‘It … truly, it was just that I was tired and out of sorts. This constant round of balls and parties with Nell … I suppose I’m not quite accustomed to it yet.’

  Finally, he laid down the letter he had been holding.

  ‘If that is so
, the solution would seem to be very simple. You once said, I believe, that if I ever suggested a quiet evening at home, you would listen. I’m suggesting it. Tonight, perhaps?’

  ‘Oh.’ She swallowed, belatedly recognising the pit into which her excuse had led her. ‘It’s the Cavendish House ball. We accepted Dolly’s invitation weeks ago.’

  ‘Of course. Tomorrow, then?’

  ‘The Delahaye’s masquerade. Nell and Cassie have talked of little else for weeks. And after that, the Vernon’s rout --’

  Rockliffe silenced her with a movement of one hand.

  ‘Pray spare me a catalogue of all our social engagements for the rest of the season. I would also be obliged if you could stop insulting my intelligence.’

  ‘I wasn’t.’

  ‘Of course you were. The situation is perfectly plain. You have no intention of allowing our relationship to progress. I think I may be said to be well aware of that fact. The only thing I don’t know is – why.’

  ‘Are you asking me?’

  ‘Would there be any point?’ He waited and then, when she did not reply, leaned back in his chair and said, ‘Very well. Since you raised the subject, let us talk about last night – dispensing with any further excuses, if you don’t mind. There are only two reasons to account for your behaviour. One is that the idea of lying with me is still … insufficiently appealing; the other is that something happened while I was away – something you don’t trust me enough to share with me. If one of them has to be true, I suppose I’d prefer the latter. Well?’

  Adeline stared at him aghast. This was worse than she had anticipated and she didn’t know what might make it better. She said, ‘It’s not either of them. I -- ’

  ‘Don’t lie to me.’ Suddenly his voice was clipped and incredibly cold. ‘I think I deserve better than that.’ He paused, letting silence take over again. Then, in something closer to his usual manner, he said, ‘I have been patient. Indeed, I think you will own that I have shown commendable restraint – given the circumstances.’