by Sandra Heath
“I had hoped that you’d behave a little more responsibly, Stephen, but it seems that you’ve paid no heed at all to Father’s wishes and warnings.”
“How? Simply by going to Avenley’s club? Sis, I may have been going there, but only because the company is so excellent. I swear that I haven’t been sitting at the tables.”
“And you honestly expect me to believe that? I’d rather believe a cat would knit scarves for mice!”
“I’m not fibbing to you, Emma.”
“Not one card has soiled your lily-white fingers?”
“Not one.”
She searched his face, wanting to believe him.
He saw that she was no longer quite sure, and he pressed home his advantage. “Emma, I swear that I’ve been observing Father’s wishes about gambling, but I know how my friendship with Avenley must appear, and that’s why I’ve been at pains to keep it secret. I like Avenley, and I enjoy visiting his club, and I see no harm in that, provided I adhere to Father’s wishes concerning the tables. Besides, the stakes are so astronomically high there that I couldn’t possibly indulge, even if I wished to.”
He was very believable, and against her better judgment she found herself being persuaded, but she still wasn’t convinced that Lord Avenley was the angel he claimed. “Stephen, why has Lord Avenley singled you out so?”
“We get on, it’s as simple as that.”
“I’m told he asked to be introduced to you.”
“My word, chitter-chatter does get around, doesn’t it?” he replied coolly. “Very well, yes, he did ask a mutual friend, but only because someone told him I was an expert on gun dogs.”
“Gun dogs?”
“Yes. Avenley likes grouse shooting on his Scottish estate, and is always interested in gun dogs. It was a case of mistaken identity, but once we’d been introduced, we found that we hit it off. That’s all there is to it, Sis, it’s nothing untoward. I tell you, Avenley is an excellent chap.”
“I’ve been told that he’s unscrupulous and dangerous.”
“Servants’ tittle-tattle. I’m surprised at you, Sis, for since when have you listened to kitchen gossip?”
“I haven’t heard it only from Dolly, Stephen.”
“Who else?”
“Lord Kane.”
He stared at her. “Kane?”
“Yes, and he warned me most earnestly against your Lord Avenley. What reason could he have for telling untruths?”
“What reason? Only the extreme bad feeling that exists between him and Avenley. They despise each other, it’s a well-known fact. Look, Emma, can’t we talk about something else? You have my word that I haven’t been plunging in at Avenley’s tables, so can’t we leave it at that?”
“Stephen—”
“Please, Emma,” he pleaded wearily. “I haven’t been straying, I promise.”
“I want to believe you, Stephen.”
“Then do so, and don’t worry Father with wild stories about the bad lot I’m mixed up with, for it isn’t true about Avenley. Just trust me.”
“I will, provided you give me your solemn word that you will stay away from the gaming tables.”
“You have my word.”
She smiled then. “Then I won’t say anything to Father.”
“Thank you, Sis.” He bent to kiss her on the cheek. “So, you’ve already seen Kane, have you?”
“Yes, he called a few minutes after we’d arrived. Oh, Stephen, I’m afraid that he caught me at a complete disadvantage. I was wearing that white jaconet gown, and it was all crumpled, and you know how poorly I manage my hair without Dolly. I looked like an untidy haystack.”
He grinned at her doleful expression. “Come, now, I’m sure that even the Countess of Purbeck is sometimes caught at a disadvantage.”
“That I doubt very much,’’ Emma replied with feeling. Raine, Countess of Purbeck, was the acknowledged belle of London society. As the widowed Mrs. Backford she had taken the capital by storm, and had soon acquired a convenient second husband in the form of the elderly, infirm Earl of Purbeck, who doted on her, indulged her every whim, and who remained conveniently out of town at Purbeck Park in Sussex.
Raine was golden-haired, with lilac eyes, a voluptuous figure, and the sort of fascinating ways that men apparently found irresistible. Emma’s fashion journals were constantly extolling her virtues, describing her perfect taste, immaculate manners, and flawless beauty, and never failed to give full details of her clothes, jewelry, and hair at whatever function she attended. The Countess of Purbeck was the paragon of fashion, and the thought of her ever being caught as ill-prepared as Emma Rutherford had been that day was too ridiculous for words.
Stephen pulled a face. “Sis, you shouldn’t believe all you read about the countess, for she isn’t all she’s cracked up to be, you have my word on that.”
“You’ve met her?”
“Our paths have crossed,” he replied shortly.
Emma looked curiously at him. “I take it that you don’t like her?”
“She’s a chienne of the highest order.”
Emma was a little surprised by the deep dislike the countess appeared to have aroused in her usually placid and easygoing brother. Stephen very rarely displayed antagonism, or aroused antagonism in others.
He smiled. “Enough of her, let’s talk about you and Kane instead. How did your first London meeting go?”
“Well enough, I suppose. He came to invite us all to join Lord and Lady Castlereagh’s party at the theater tomorrow night, and again at a Manchester House assembly on Friday.”
“And happy chance brought him the very moment you’d arrived?”
“He said he was driving from Upper Brook Street and saw our carriage.’’
Stephen’s smile faded. “Upper Brook Street? Are you sure?’’
“Quite sure. Why?”
“Nothing. Go on.”
“Stephen, you can’t just leave it at that. What is so significant about Upper Brook Street?”
“Nothing whatsoever.”
“Then why did you say it like that?” she demanded.
“I didn’t say it like anything, Sis, you’re imagining it. So, he came to invite you to the theater and to Manchester House, did he?”
“Not just me, I said it was all of us. Father can’t come, of course, because of his health and the journey, but you and I are to go.”
“Ah, that presents a slight problem.”
“Problem?” She looked quickly at him.
“The Manchester House invitation I can accept, and do so gladly, but I’m afraid that tomorrow night is out of the question.”
She was dismayed. “Oh, Stephen!”
“I have a prior engagement, Sis, and it’s simply not done to accept something and then cast it aside in favor of another.”
“But it’s my first time in London, Stephen. Can’t you possibly wriggle out of this other invitation, just this once?”
“It’s Donkey Shingleton’s coming-of-age birthday tomorrow, and I’m dining with him and a party of other friends at White’s. It’s a special dinner, Sis, very grand, and my absence would be very glaring. Look, I’ll gladly escort you on Friday, but I simply cannot do it tomorrow night. Surely you can conjure a chaperone from somewhere, if that’s what’s worrying you?”
“It’s not just the matter of a chaperone, Stephen, because I am assured that Lady Castlereagh will gladly perform the duty, it’s more that I’m dreadfully nervous and would feel much happier if you were with me.”
He smiled, pulling her into his arms and hugging her tightly. “My poor big sister,” he murmured fondly.
She held him close. “I don’t know whether I can carry this match off, Stephen,” she whispered. “I felt so painfully countrified when he called today, and I dread to think what he must have thought when he saw me. He must have compared me with his first wife and found me lacking in every single way.”
“If he found you so lacking, he’d never have embarked upon the match in
the first place,” he pointed out gently. “Look at me, Sis. Kane made all the approaches, and he decided upon you after a single meeting. Doesn’t that tell you something?”
“Yes, that he didn’t much care about anything, provided he found the necessary wife.”
“That isn’t what it tells you at all,” he said reprovingly, tilting her face toward his. “It tells you that he liked what he saw at Foxley Hall, and decided that you would more than do. He didn’t have to proceed after that first meeting, did he?”
“No, but—”
“No buts, for that is the end of it. He saw you, liked you, and offered for you. What more is there to say? Besides, I doubt very much if you will be the main attraction tomorrow night, not if you are in Castlereagh’s party. Rumors are flying all over town today concerning things that have been going on behind his back in the government, and odds are being laid as to when and how he finds out.”
“I know all about the rumors. It seems that Father heard them before we left Dorchester.”
“Did he, be damned?” Stephen gave a low whistle. “Fancy old Dorset getting the sniff before London. Well, if you know about it, you’ll understand why odds are even being laid that when Castlereagh finds out, he’ll feel obliged to call Canning out over it.”
“A duel?” she gasped. “Oh, surely not.”
“Castlereagh’s honor has been gravely impugned, Sis. So, as I said, you will most definitely not be the only attraction tomorrow night, for his lordship will steal your thunder. You won’t need me, Emma, and you’ll carry it all off splendidly, I know you will. Now, then, shouldn’t we show our faces for dinner?”
“Dinner! I’d forgotten all about it! Oh, that wretched roast beef will be a positive cinder!” She hurried to the door, but as she opened it, she turned to look back at him. “Stephen, you haven’t humbugged me tonight, have you?”
He met her gaze. “No, Sis, I haven’t. Everything I’ve told you has been the truth.”
She smiled, holding out her hand to him. “Come on, let’s go to Father.”
Chapter Five
There was a thin mist the following morning, but it dispersed as soon as the sun rose, and soon the sky over London was clear and blue, although still with that crispness that accompanied even the most mild of autumn days.
Emma and Stephen breakfasted alone in the sunlit morning room, for the ordeal of the journey had now caught up with their father, who had elected to remain in his bed all day. Propped up on a mound of pillows, his room heated almost unbearably by a roaring fire, he breakfasted on several glasses of hot milk, consumed while he read a volume on Chinese plants that he had discovered the night before in the library.
A hearty breakfast was out of the question for Emma, who had awoken in a state of immense trepidation over the coming visit to the theater. Her anxiety made her pale, a fact which was not concealed by the judicious application of a little rouge to her cheeks, and although she wore a cheerful peach-and-white-striped muslin gown that was gathered beneath her breasts with a wide peach satin ribbon, she knew that she looked less than carefree. Her dark hair was piled up beneath a lace-edged day cap from which fluttered peach ribbons to match her gown, and she wore no jewelery at all.
She had hoped to wake up feeling a little more buoyant, but her courage seemed only to grow more feeble. She was nervous about facing society for the first time, especially without Stephen at her side, and even though he would be with her on Friday at the assembly at Manchester House, the prospect of royalty possibly being present was almost too much to countenance.
Her father had written to Gerald the evening before, as soon as he heard that Stephen would not be able to join the theater party, and a running footman had delivered the communication promptly to Gerald’s residence in St. James’s Square. The footman had soon returned with Gerald’s reply, an extremely courteous note written on cream vellum that bore the phoenix crest of the Fitzroy family.
In it he reassured Mr. Rutherford that Lady Castlereagh had agreed to act as Emma’s chaperone, and that as a consequence there would be no danger at all to her reputation. To be certain of this, Lord and Lady Castlereagh would accompany him to Grosvenor Square at eight o’clock, and they would all four leave together for the theater. He added that should circumstances change as far as the Friday engagement was concerned, Lady Castlereagh willingly offered her services for that occasion as well.
Emma sighed, gazing at the slice of buttered toast on her plate. Her cup of coffee was now almost cold, and she had declined any thought of sampling the delicious bacon and scrambled eggs that her brother was enjoying with such gusto.
Stephen looked up, his glance encompassing her untouched meal and withdrawn expression. He poured himself another cup of the coffee, and then sat back in his chair, surveying her. “No appetite, Sis?”
“Not really.”
“You’re worrying about nothing, you know. The morning paper is full of speculation about the Castlereagh-Canning affair, which means that Castlereagh himself must be aware of it by now. It’s bound to be the sole topic of interest at the theater, especially if Castlereagh is present, so you are going to come a rather poor second, I fear.”
“I hope you’re right.” She paused. “I think that poor Lord Castlereagh has been treated very badly.”
“And so he has. If he does decide that his honor must be satisfied, then very few will blame him.”
“Do you really think it would come to that?”
Stephen shrugged. “There is a precedent. The late Mr. Pitt fought a duel while he was still prime minister.”
She fell silent, returning her gaze to the toast.
Stephen tossed his napkin aside and got up. “Enough of this moping. What you need is a good brisk walk, and that is what Dr. Stephen Rutherford prescribes. What do you say to a look at the Oxford Street shops?”
She smiled. “It sounds a sovereign remedy, sir.”
“Then off you toddle to put on your walking togs,” he said, holding out her chair as she rose to her feet. “I will await you in the hall in a quarter of an hour.”
Shortly afterward, dressed in an orange wool pelisse trimmed with brown braiding, and a brown beaver hat with golden tassels, Emma emerged from the house on her brother’s arm. Her brown-gloved hand rested on Stephen’s sage-green sleeve, and a brown silk parasol twirled slowly over her shoulder.
Beside her, Stephen looked very much the young man-about-town. The stand-fall collar of his coat was very high, as was the stock around his throat, and his voluminous cravat was of a rather startling green silk spotted with gray. His breeches were very tight, his top boots sported rather large and ornate spurs that did not simply jingle as he walked, but rang out clearly like bells, and an ivory-handled cane swung elegantly in his hand.
He wore his high-crowned hat at a rakish angle over his forehead, so that he had to tilt his head back a little in order to see where he was going, and there was a definite hint of cologne about his person. His friends in Dorchester would scarcely have recognized him, and his sister found it difficult to believe the change that had come over her hitherto rather untidy sibling. The Stephen Rutherford of Foxley Hall had not been all that interested in matters of fashion; the Stephen Rutherford of Grosvenor Square was a positive fashion fiend.
They strolled west along the pavement, toward the junction of South Audley Street and Upper Grosvenor Street, the latter along which the carriage had traveled from Dorchester the evening before. A light breeze rustled the trees in the square’s central garden, and the sun shone brightly on the gilded statue. The flower girl was seated by the garden railings, her replenished baskets beside her, and her plaintive calls rang out around the house. “Roses. Buy my red roses.”
Several carriages drove past, and a party of horsemen returned from a brisk ride in Hyde Park. A chimney sweep had been called to a house on the corner, and his cart had been left in a very awkward place, requiring Emma and Stephen to step out into the road in order to pass by. As they left
the safety of the pavement, an expensive open landau swept past, its team of four creams stepping high.
Stephen pulled Emma swiftly back out of danger, for the carriage was really dangerously close. The coachman didn’t even glance at them, even though he’d almost run them down, and the landau drove on down South Audley Street.
Stephen looked anxiously at Emma. “Are you all right, Sis?”
She nodded a little breathlessly, gazing after the landau and its single lady occupant. “Yes, just a bit shaken, that’s all.”
As Emma looked, the lady turned to glance back. She was very beautiful indeed, with bright golden curls and a heart-shaped face of incredible sweetness. She was dressed from head to toe in turquoise corded silk, with soft silver plumes curling down from her elegant little hat, and would have presented an almost perfect vision of loveliness had it not been for the cold set of her mouth as her lilac eyes met Emma’s.
For the space of several heartbeats the two women looked at each other, and then the lady turned to the front again, and the landau drove on. Emma glanced at Stephen. “Who was she?” she asked, seeing that he too was now gazing after the landau.
“That, my dear sister, was Raine, Countess of Purbeck, the paragon whose example you think so unrivaled, and whose name fills the foolish pages of your fashion journals.”
Emma’s lips parted in surprise, and she looked after the retreating vehicle. Stephen spoke again. “I meant it last night when I called her a chienne, Sis, for she is no friend of mine, and she will most certainly be no friend of yours.”
“Why are you and she so hostile toward each other, Stephen?”
“It doesn’t matter why. Suffice it that you should always be on your guard where she is concerned, for she will do her utmost to belittle you.”
Emma stared at him. “Belittle me?”
“Yes.”
“Stephen—”
“That’s all I mean to say concerning the dear countess, Sis. Just be very wary of her. Now, then, let’s get on with this excursion to Oxford Street.’’
He took her hand firmly and drew it over his sleeve, leading her across the corner of the square to walk northward toward the other corner and the road that gave onto Oxford Street.
