Daring Masquerade

by Mary Balogh

  He was not of an original turn of mind, but neither was he a vicious or unprincipled man. Annette was gently born. He had brought shame and dishonor on both her and her mother. He had ruined her chances of a decent life. He must marry her. He did not quite know why the notion had not struck him before, in fact. Just because she was French, perhaps? But what was wrong with having a foreign bride? The idea of bringing home with him such a dark little beauty suddenly had great appeal. Not in her present state, of course. It would be in very poor taste, and not a little embarrassing, to present her thus to his father. After the birth of the child. His child! It was a sobering truth.

  In fact, on further thought, he considered that the whole business of breaking the news to his father was going to be deucedly awkward. If the truth were known, he was a little afraid of the earl, who ruled all around him, including his son, with a heavy hand. Lord Barton would not approve of a French bride, particularly one who had been increasing for all of eight months. Better to provide handsomely for the bastard child and turn his back on that youthful episode of his life, the earl would advise. Command, rather. Stoughton could almost hear him.

  It was not his habit to defy his father. But seeing the well-controlled unhappiness of Madame Marcelin and the almost frightened hope in the eyes of his little Annette gave Stoughton the courage that he knew with some discomfort he would not have if his father were anywhere near. He decided to do the decent thing and make an honest woman of Annette and a legitimate child of her offspring.

  While arrangements were being made for a hasty wedding, Stoughton basked in a sense of his own noble gesture. Madame Marcelin was suddenly the charming lady she had been on his first visit. Annette, though huge and ungainly, was again the warm, smiling beauty he had been unable to forget during the months of his tour.

  He married her one week after his arrival and kissed her farewell the same day. It was impossible for her to travel when she was within a few weeks of her confinement. And it was out of the question for him to stay for long. He must return to Barton Abbey to inform his father that he had taken a wife and that soon there was to be a child, a boy it was to be hoped. The new viscountess was tearful and clung to his neck awkwardly, hindered by her large bulk. But she was forced to admit the wisdom of his decision. He would return within the month, perhaps even before the birth of their child.

  By the time he reached the shore of England several days later, Viscount Stoughton was finding it hard to believe in the reality of the last couple of weeks. He did not feel like a married man. He did not feel any different at all. And his own precipitate action in marrying Annette seemed to him decidedly rash under the cloudy skies of home. It was not that he did not love his wife or want his child. If he had only himself to please, he would feel well-satisfied with his choice. But he had to face his father with the news, and the prospect was even more daunting now than it had seemed earlier. In fact, he really did not know how he was to go about it.

  As his hired carriage carried him closer to Dorset and to home, Stoughton knew that he would not be able to do it. Not immediately, anyway. He would give himself a week. During that time he would talk to his father about his travels, impress upon the earl the new maturity he had acquired while abroad, make a friend of him perhaps. Then gradually, somehow, be would break the news.

  Was there any way his father could discover his secret by accident before he was ready to tell it himself? Annette knew that he lived at Barton Abbey, but he considered it very unlikely that she would write. Not until after the birth of the child, anyway, and by that time he would be back in France. No one in England knew. He was safe. But Stoughton was not convinced. The earl had always had an uncanny way of discovering his secrets when he was a child, and always those secrets that his son least wished him to know.

  There was the time, for example, when he and his cousin Clive had tied up the gardener’s daughter, meaning to release her when it was appropriate to their childhood game to do so. The gardener, discovering his daughter in a garden shed before her release, had sworn not to tell the earl, but had taken the alternative—far preferred by the boys themselves-of thrashing the captors himself. But the earl had found out anyway—Stoughton never knew how—and they had received a second and far more severe thrashing.

  The only thing that could possibly incriminate him on this occasion was the marriage papers that he had with him. And there was no reason why the earl should see those unless they were left lying around in the open. However, by the time the carriage was traveling the familiar roads of Dorset, those papers felt as if they were burning a hole in the viscount’s pocket. Where could he put them that would be entirely safe from accidental discovery? The answer should have been obvious. The papers should be perfectly safe anywhere in his own bedchamber or dressing room. Who would wish to search his personal possessions anyway, and for what purpose?

  But Lord Stoughton had been traveling quite alone for several days with nothing to do but think. And by this stage of his journey his thoughts were not at all rational. A hiding place must be found, somewhere where the papers would be quite safe for the week it would take him to find the courage to tell his father of his marriage. He was almost home before he finally decided upon a suitable place. What made it even more satisfactory was that he would be rid of his guilty burden by the time he greeted his father. There would be no possible danger of the papers falling out of his pocket and landing, open, on the floor as he bowed over the earl’s hand.

  Viscount Stoughton was not renowned for his wisdom. Perhaps his youth accounted for the lack. He had gone to extreme lengths to ensure that his father would not discover his marriage until he paved the way and could tell the terrible secret himself. And yet he found after only two days at home that his news was fairly bursting from his own lips. It was still impossible to tell his father. The earl had had word of his son from other returned travelers, and he had a tendency to harp on about that occasion when Stoughton had lost close to five hundred pounds at a card game in Vienna, his rashness in betting caused in large measure by the fact that he had been sadly foxed at the time, Stoughton told Clive.

  Clive Seyton and his sister, Alice, had come to live at Barton Abbey twelve years before on the demise of their parents. The Earl of Barton was their uncle. Alice had stayed only two years before moving to live with an aunt on her mother’s side, who had engaged to educate the girl and bring her out when she was older. Clive had remained at Barton Abbey and was treated in the same manner as Jonathan. He was two years younger than the latter, still a student at Oxford when the viscount returned from his Grand Tour. The cousins had always been close, the bond between them more like that of brothers than cousins.

  Clive had always been a placid, good-natured lad who cheerfully followed the lead of his more outward-going and impulsive cousin. Many was the thrashing he endured because he had not had the willpower to refuse to join in some piece of mischief suggested by his companion. He had proved his loyalty time and again, once suffering punishment for a crime he had not committed—putting frogs into a pot that the nervous cook used frequently—rather than reveal that his cousin was the real culprit. He could keep a secret even if someone were trying to worm it out of him. Stoughton told him of his marriage and of the imminent birth of his child.

  Clive reacted predictably. His cousin grew in his esteem for having done something so manly and so daring. He agreed that his uncle would have to be carefully prepared before the news was broken. He promised solemnly that the secret would never be drawn from him, even by wild horses. News of the marriage would never be revealed if the matter depended on him. He applauded his cousin’s intelligence in hiding the marriage papers.

  Strangely, perhaps, Stoughton did not tell his cousin where those papers had been left. The matter did not seem of any importance at the time. It became of crucial importance just two days later when the viscount, rashly jumping a high gate on the back of a horse that was not accustomed to his horsemanship after his long absence, fell
and broke his neck. He died instantly.

  Clive Seyton was genuinely distraught over the death of his cousin. It was not until the following day that he consciously remembered that the viscount had died with his secret intact. No one in England but him knew of the marriage. And clearly those marriage papers had not been hidden on Stoughton’s person, else they would have been discovered the previous day after the body had been brought home and dressed for burial. Clive realized that the responsibility of telling the earl of the marriage now rested on his shoulders. Despite the promise of undying secrecy he had made, he must reveal the truth. Circumstances had changed so drastically that he could no longer be held by his oath.

  Yet the thought came unbidden into his mind on the same day that he was now the heir to the earldom of Barton and would remain so if the child of that Frenchwoman were a girl. Even if it were a boy, he would remain the heir if the secret of the marriage never did come to light. If he could find the marriage papers and if he could reach Annette, no one need ever know that the child was the legitimate heir of the Earl of Barton. Clive, good-natured and unassuming by nature, was tempted.

  And gave in to temptation. He reasoned that if Stoughton had not confided in him, he would not have the burden of the secret in the first place. He reasoned that the child might very possibly turn out to be a girl and he would be the rightful heir anyway. He reasoned that his right to the title and the estate and fortune was far more forceful than that of a child who had not even been born yet, who had been conceived out of wedlock, and who would be born to a foreign woman in a foreign land.

  He decided to search for those papers and destroy them. There was nothing he could do about the wife, of course, because he did not know where she lived or what her maiden name had been. If he were fortunate, the child would be a girl and there would be no problem. But there was just as strong a chance that it would be a boy. He set himself the task of checking the mail himself before his uncle saw it, so that he might intercept any letter from France. He was not quite sure what he would do if a letter announcing the birth of a son did come into his uncle’s hands. He would think of that when the time came. But the effort to keep the truth from the earl was at least a worthwhile one. If he failed, well, at least no one would be able to accuse him of any dishonesty. And he would merely see the end of hopes that he had only recently conceived. While his cousin had lived, it had never occurred to Clive that he might one day succeed his uncle.

  His plans worked, though not quite as smoothly as he would have liked. Try as he would, he could not find the papers, which his cousin had assured him existed. He searched both in the house and outside. And his search was an informed one. He knew all the likely hiding places that his cousin might have chosen. He felt uneasy at his failure but was at least partly consoled by the fact that no one else came across them either.

  He had almost begun to hope that the viscountess would not write to the Abbey when, almost two months after the viscount’s death, a letter addressed to him did arrive. Unfortunately, it came on one of the few days when Clive was not at home to check the day’s post. And the letter was delivered to the Earl of Barton. The first Clive knew of it was on his return home later that afternoon, when his uncle summoned him to his cabinet.

  “You were close to Jonathan,” the older man said, the letter open on the desk before him. “Did he say anything to you of a wife?”

  “A wife?” Clive drew on acting skills he did not know he possessed. He regarded his uncle with a puzzled frown. “Jonathan?”

  “There is a Frenchwoman claiming to be the Viscountess Stoughton and writing to my son as if he were her husband,” the earl said.

  “Absurd!” Clive exclaimed. “If there were any truth in that, Jonathan would have told me. We kept no secrets from each other. May I?” He held out a hand for the letter.

  The earl handed it to him. “There is a son,” he said, “whom she claims to be Jonathan’s.”

  “That is as may be,” Clive said, deeming it wise not to protest too much. “You know, sir, as well as I, that Jonathan liked a willing wench. In fact, he told me quite freely of a few conquests he made while in Europe. But not one by the name of . . .”—he glanced at the letter again—“Annette. And she is from a place I have never heard of. An adventuress, sir, I would guess. She has probably heard from some traveler of the demise of my cousin and thinks to benefit from it on behalf of her son.”

  The earl frowned. “I am inclined to agree with you,” he said. “My son was too chickenhearted to take such a major step in life as marriage without my consent. On the other hand, he was quite lusty enough to have begotten a bastard during his travels. The woman must be a fool. Does she believe I will welcome her and her son with open arms without an ounce of proof for her claim? If she was married to my son, I shall find out. If she was not, she will be sorry she thought to outwit the Earl of Barton. I shall go to this . . .”—his hand made circular movements toward the letter still in his nephew’s grasp—“whatever the place is and see for myself.”

  “And—with all due respect—you would be laughed at for a dupe for many years to come,” Clive said. “It will not do, Uncle, if you will pardon me for saying so. Investigate the claim you must. If the wench is telling the truth, then this child is your grandson and heir. But let me go. No one need even know why I have decided to make a short journey into France, whereas word will quickly leak out if you make the journey. I shall discover the truth. You have been a father to me in the last twelve years, and Jonathan was as dear as any brother. I shall not rest until I have discovered beyond the shadow of a doubt who this woman and her child are.”

  The earl considered. “You are a good boy, Clive,” he said at last. “And you have a good head on your shoulders. You are right. I must not dignify the woman’s impertinence by investigating her claim in person. But do the thing properly, Clive. If it is true, she is the viscountess and the boy will be the new Viscount Stoughton. They must be brought back to the Abbey with proper ceremony. If she lies, then you may turn your back on her without further thought. But if she is partly telling the truth, if the child is a bastard and my son’s, then I want him. Buy her off; do what you will; but bring me my grandson. He will be raised here.”

  It was a measure of the earl’s deep and inconsolable grief that he was willing, and even eager, to take in the illegitimate child of his son.

  Clive Seyton suffered a severe crisis of conscience during his journey to Belleville in France. Like his cousin a few months before, he was alone and had plenty of time to think. He was new to duplicity and deceit and found it difficult to keep rationalizing what he was doing and what he was going to try to do. But he succeeded. Ambition having once been aroused in him, he found himself unwilling to put it to rest for the sake of a French child who had no rightful claim on the Barton property at all except for the fact that Jonathan had married the child’s mother on impulse almost at the very moment of his birth. Clive had loved and admired his cousin a great deal, but even he had been aware of the essentially weak will of Lord Stoughton. This Annette and her mother had obviously talked him into a marriage that he would never have contracted of his own free will. Why should they benefit now from their cunning?

  By the time he reached the village and found the modest home of Madame Marcelin, Clive had convinced himself that what he was doing was morally right even if not quite legally justifiable.

  He broke the news of Jonathan’s death to the ladies and said no more for the first day. He was made uncomfortable by the suffering of the little viscountess. She was damned pretty. But then, he might have guessed as much. Jonathan had always had an eye for a lovely female. And she must have been fond of him. Her grief was total, though not at all ostentatious. He would have been suspicious and a little disgusted by loud wailing and lamenting.

  But during that day he did satisfy himself that indeed the marriage had taken place. He had known it, of course, from Jonathan himself. But the records were there for all to see in the v
illage church. The knowledge that it had been a Catholic ceremony hardened his resolve. It somehow seemed less of a marriage if performed out of the Anglican church. But legal it was, and it would be difficult for him to cover up its existence.

  Madame Marcelin and Annette made his task somewhat easier. Knowing that her husband was now dead, Annette had little wish to be taken to England. And she had a healthy fear of her father-in-law, instilled no doubt by stories the viscount had told her. Her mother did not want to see her go. She even rallied her spirits sufficiently to confide to Clive when her daughter was absent that another marriage might now be made quite easily. Annette’s status as the widow of an English nobleman would make her very eligible. It was easy enough for Clive to inform both ladies that the Earl of Barton was prepared to make a sizable settlement on his daughter-in-law.

  The other parts of his plan were a little more delicate. Annette was quite eager to stay in France, but she naturally assumed that her son would remain with her. Persuading her to give up the boy, who still had not been weaned, was no easy matter. It was natural that his grandfather would want the boy, Clive had explained. The child was now the heir to a vast inheritance and must be brought up to the life he would be expected to lead. He must be brought up as an Englishman. The Earl of Barton would be able to lavish on him the things that Annette, even with her large settlement, would not be able to give him.

  Annette agreed, but it was more difficult to persuade her that it would be better for the boy to be separated from her. It would be undesirable to confuse him with a double identity. Now that she was widowed, his mother’s interests would be focused in France. He must be an Englishman with no conflict of interest.

  Finally she agreed. Her mother helped, knowing that it would be easier to marry Annette well if she were unencumbered by a child. But Clive’s victory was still not complete. The most difficult part of all was still to come. There would be no safety for him in the situation if at any time Annette might write to Barton Abbey or decide to pay her son a surprise visit. She must be persuaded to sever all ties with her child.