by Gayle Buck
“The only way to correct that is to expose Agnes to the gentlemen,” said Miss Blythe firmly. “She must learn to hold her ground and smile and speak a few proper words. Otherwise, she will not gain any notice, and we shall never get anyone to come up to scratch.”
“And that is, of course, the primary objective,” agreed Lucinda. “Very well, Tibby. How shall we teach Agnes that most gentlemen do not bite?”
“I think we should begin by enlisting Lord Mays’s help,” said Miss Blythe. “His lordship has bachelor friends. Miss Mays is his cousin, after all. It will not seem so strange for him to step in on her behalf, surely. If Lord Mays can persuade his friends to stand up with Agnes at Almack’s, for instance, or take her driving or some such thing—”
Miss Blythe broke off as Lucinda leaped up from the settee. She looked after Lucinda in astonishment. “My dear, whatever have I said?”
Lucinda continued to the door of the drawing room. “I forgot to inquire of Church whether Lord Mays called. I shall be back directly, Tibby.” And she disappeared out the door.
She returned almost at once. A frown was formed between her brows. Miss Blythe asked sympathetically, “There has been no word?”
Lucinda shook her head. “No, none. I know Wilfred would have sent around if there had been any further news. But that is not only what is bothering me, Tibby.” She looked very levelly at her companion. “Church informs me that Agnes has been keeping company with my cousin Ferdie.”
Miss Blythe stared, aghast. “My dear. When I suggested that Agnes needed to be exposed to male company, I hardly meant Mr. Stassart’s!”
“Well I know it, Tibby. What that baby means by slipping into the bedroom of one of Ferdie’s stamp is more than I can fathom, but I intend to find out,” said Lucinda grimly.
“Do you mean to say that she is with him now?” asked Miss Blythe, shocked.
“So I am informed. It seems that Agnes was not quite as exhausted as she led us to believe,” said Lucinda, turning away toward the door.
Miss Blythe rose hastily. “I am coming with you, Lucinda. She is my charge as well. If a peal is to be rung over her head, I shall do it. I have a few more years of experience in dealing in that area than have you!”
“It is not Agnes that I am at this moment thinking of,” said Lucinda, her eyes glittering in the candlelight. “I have a few choice words to say to my dear cousin. He shall not soon forget them, I promise you!”
She swept out of the drawing room with Miss Blythe in close pursuit.
Chapter Twenty-two
Lucinda thrust open Mr. Stassart’s bedroom door. It never entered her head until she had already walked inside what she might possibly find. But it was too late to put discretion into play. Her presence had already been noticed.
Two astonished faces stared at Lucinda and Miss Blythe. Mr. Stassart lay propped up against the pillows of his bed, attired in a dressing gown. His left arm was in a sling and rested lightly atop the coverlets.
Miss Mays perched in a chair near the bed. She was attired in her evening gown, her cloak thrown over the back of the chair. Between her and Mr. Stassart was a game board lying on the bed. The miscreants were obviously playing cribbage and for points, since there was a large pile of matchsticks at Mr. Stassart’s hand and a lesser number on Miss Mays’s side.
Mr. Stassart was the first to recover. An amused expression crossed his face, and he settled back against the supporting pillows. “Now there is the devil to pay. We have been found out, Miss Mays!”
“Oh!” Miss Mays regarded the stunned expressions of the ladies with dawning dismay. “Have I done something that I should not?”
“I think it would be best if this was discussed elsewhere, Agnes,” said Lucinda with admirable restraint.
“Of course you haven’t, Miss Mays. It is I who have been amazingly at fault. Isn’t that so, fair cousin?” murmured Ferdie.
“Quite.” Lucinda turned to Miss Mays, who had risen from the chair and stood next to it with one hand raised to her throat. The young woman’s eyes had grown large and fearful. Recognizing that her sister-in-law was fast falling into the throes of a panic, Lucinda made an effort to soften her expression and her voice. “You are to go with Miss Blythe now, Agnes. She knows just what to say to you. I will be along shortly.”
“Oh, oh, oh! I am undone! I know that I am!” Miss Mays covered her face with her hands and gave a gusty sob.
Miss Blythe took hold of her elbow. “We shall have none of that, if you please. Now come along. There are a few things that I wish to say to you. Miss Mays!”
Miss Mays went docilely, already sniffling.
“The lamb being led to the slaughter,” said Ferdie pityingly.
“More like to the shearer,” said Lucinda tartly. The door closed firmly behind Miss Blythe and Miss Mays, and she turned a hard stare on her cousin. “What do you mean by such conduct, Ferdie? Agnes is my sister-in-law, not some trolloping housemaid! I knew you for a worthless scoundrel, but I did not know you were a blackguard to boot! How could you place Agnes in such a damaging position? Have you no sense of shame, no sense of decency?”
“Cousin, cousin! Why these histrionics?” Ferdie threw out his hand at the game board. “We were playing cribbage. I admit to cheating a trifle, but there is nothing in that, I assure you! Miss Mays scarcely knows the difference.”
“Yes, and she scarcely knows the difference between a gentleman and a bad man, either!” retorted Lucinda.
Ferdie flushed. “I am not a bad man,” he stated with dignity. “I am many things, but that I am not. I do not besmirch the good names of ladies of quality.”
“Do you not, Ferdie?” asked Lucinda softly. There was a wealth of meaning in her tone, at which he suddenly narrowed his eyes. Lucinda did not wait for him to realize her suspicion concerning herself, if there indeed was one, but continued, “The servants are talking, Ferdie. Perhaps it is only cribbage that you have been playing at, but you have done a damage to my sister-in-law’s standing in this household. I do not regard that lightly.”
“Oh, do give over, Lucinda. What is a fellow to do lying in bed for hours at a time?” said Ferdie wearily. “I was about to go out of my mind when in pops Miss Mays offering to divert my thoughts.”
At Lucinda’s expression, he cast her an indignant glance. “Really, Lucinda, your face is about as open as any book! Seduction is not the first thing that came to my mind. I am in no condition to make the attempt, even if I was tempted, which I was not! Miss Mays is not in my style at all. Too skittish by half. I prefer statuesque beauties who offer a challenge. I look for one who is a fitting mate for a gamester, who must thereafter gamble whether he will go home to a beautiful virago or a lovely angel. Ah, Lucinda! If you could but see yourself as I see you now. The fire in your sparkling eyes, the pout of your lovely lips, the—”
“Stuff it, Ferdie,” said Lucinda rudely. She put her hand on the cord that kept the bed curtain tied up. “I shall expect you downstairs in the morning for breakfast, Ferdie. As far as I am concerned, you are recovered enough to be up on your feet again.”
Ferdie lay back against the pillows in a weak attitude. His hand went to his pallid brow. “But I am so weak still, dear cousin. I fear that I shall do permanent damage to my constitution if I am forced too soon to strenuous exercise.”
“You shall get out of this bed in the morning, or I shall have my men put you out,” said Lucinda quietly. “I shall not allow you to presume upon my hospitality for much longer, and so I warn you!” She jerked the heavy cord and the curtain fell down, obscuring her cousin from her sight.
“Good night, Ferdie!” Lucinda turned on her heel and marched away across the bedroom.
Behind her, Mr. Stassart thrust apart the bed curtains with his head. “You are a cold fish, cousin! A cold fish!”
As she opened the door, Lucinda turned a hard smile in her cousin’s direction. “Pray do not forget to blow out the candle, Ferdie. I would not wish the light to keep you
awake, for dawn is but a few hours away.”
“Dawn!” gasped Ferdie. His astounded expression gave way to fully roused indignation. “I say, you don’t mean to have me tumbled out of bed at some ungodly hour! I won’t have it, I tell you! I shall have you know that I never rise until noon at the earliest!”
“The candle, Ferdie,” said Lucinda. He swore wrathfully at her, but she paid him no heed. Lucinda stepped out and shut the bedroom door. Something crashed against the other side of the panels. Angered, she was about to go back in when she caught herself up. There was no possible victory to be gained by whirling in to scold her cousin over throwing a childish tantrum. No, she had said what she had wanted to, and she had laid down her ultimatum. Anything more would simply dilute the effects of her displeasure.
Besides, there was another matter that needed her attention. Lucinda sighed and turned toward Miss Mays’s bedroom door. She saw that it was not completely shut, a crack of light showing around its edges. She crossed the hall and pushed the door fully open. Immediately she could hear wrenching sobs punctuated by an occasional word in Miss Blythe’s calm voice.
“What a perfectly wretched end to a lovely evening!” she exclaimed and went in.
Miss Mays saw her at once, and her face twisted in misery. “Oh, Lady Mays! I am s ... so sorry! Had I known that... but I did not! I did not! Oh, oh, oh!” She wailed loudly, “I thought you would be pleased!”
“Pleased!” Lucinda turned astonished eyes on Miss Blythe. “What the devil is she talking about? Why would I be pleased?”
Miss Blythe had risen from her place beside the weeping young woman and walked over to the water bowl to wring out a cloth with fresh water. She said gravely, “There is no need to swear, Lucinda.”
Lucinda flushed, at once repentant. “Of course you are right, Tibby! I have let my temper run away with me. Forgive me, pray.”
Miss Blythe nodded acknowledgement. She turned back to Miss Mays and put a hand under that young woman’s chin. A reddened woebegone face was fully revealed, and Miss Blythe gently wiped away the still coursing tears with the cool cloth.
“There now, Agnes. That will make you feel more comfortable,” she said soothingly, encouragingly. “You will be much better able to talk with Lady Mays now.”
It was doubtful that Miss Mays agreed, for she shuddered. But she nevertheless turned to face Lucinda. There was fear in her brown sloe eyes, and Lucinda was reminded of nothing so much as a trapped rabbit.
She sat down on the bed beside her sister-in-law and took one curled hand in her own. “Agnes, why did you think that I would be pleased to find you with Mr. Stassart? Didn’t you realize that it is not at all the thing to visit a gentleman in his bedchamber?”
Miss Mays shuddered again. She shook her head quickly. She refused to look at Lucinda. “Miss Blythe explained it all to me. I have been very wicked, very wicked, indeed!”
There was such abject despair in her voice that Lucinda’s eyes flew to Miss Blythe’s face. Miss Blythe shook her head. Lucinda correctly interpreted this as her companion’s way of saying that she had done all that she could.
“I would not say that you have been wicked precisely, but certainly you have been very foolish. Now listen closely to me, Agnes. No, look at me! That’s a good girl. When I invited you to stay with me for the Season, I made myself responsible for you. I cannot simply wash my hands of you now. That would be ignoble of me, indeed,” said Lucinda.
Miss Mays threw her arms around Lucinda and clung, crying, “Oh, you are too good to me! I do not deserve it, truly I do not!”
Lucinda tried to extricate herself, but her sister-in-law’s embrace was too tight. On a note of laughter, she exclaimed, “Agnes, you are stifling me. I shouldn’t like it in the least if I was to suffocate.”
At once she was released. Miss Mays stared at her anxiously. “You are not hurt, my lady? Pray say that I have not hurt you!”
“No, of course you haven’t. Agnes, you are a goose.”
“Yes, I know that I am very foolish. Everyone has always said so, so it must be true,” said Miss Mays, sighing a little.
Lucinda was glad to see that at least the noisy part of Miss Mays’s emotional outburst was done. She heard a relieved sigh from Miss Blythe’s direction, and she almost laughed. But that would not have been appropriate in the circumstances. For one thing, Miss Mays would have been utterly confused by such a display, and Lucinda felt that she could not afford the least confusion to interfere in what she wanted to get across to her sister-in-law.
“Agnes, pray tell me why you thought I would be pleased that you were visiting my cousin?” she asked.
“Why, because he was certain to be such a very bad patient,” said Miss Mays hesitantly. She made a little forlorn gesture. “I had hoped to make myself useful to you. I do know how to nurse someone and to keep them entertained. I am really quite good at it. It is the only thing that I am good at.”
“You are a wonderful musician,” said Miss Blythe firmly.
“Quite true. You are also a funny, helpless baby who looks very pretty in peach,” said Lucinda.
Miss Mays blushed. She looked shyly at them both. “Oh! What nice things to say!” She didn’t seem to mind in the least being described as an infant. On the contrary, she looked quite pleased. She was so used to hearing herself renounced and vilified that any kind word was something to regard with gratitude.
Miss Mays smiled at Lucinda. “I shan’t go to see Mr. Stassart anymore.”
“Very good. My cousin will be coming downstairs tomorrow, in any event, so you must not concern yourself that he is not making good progress,” said Lucinda.
Miss Blythe raised her brows as she digested this pronouncement, but Miss Mays accepted it at its face value. “How wonderful! I know that you will be much less anxious now, my lady,” she said happily.
“I will be even less so when my cousin is finally on his way,” said Lucinda.
“Oh, it will not be long now, now that Mr. Stassart is getting out of bed,” said Miss Mays, speaking from the well of her extensive nursing experience. “It is when a person stays overlong in bed that he begins to lose much of his strength. Mr. Stassart is young, besides. He will be able to go home very soon.”
“I know that you are right, Agnes. In point of fact, I was just encouraging my cousin to that effect,” said Lucinda with a small laugh.
Miss Mays beamed at her. “There! We are all comfortable again. Are we not, my lady?”
“Yes, Agnes, we are all comfortable again,” agreed Lucinda. She rose from the bed. “I shall have your maid sent in to undress you for bed. It is very late.”
“Oh, pray do not waken her. I told her that I would do for myself tonight,” said Miss Mays, wringing her hands.
Lucinda eyed that telltale gesture. She said hastily, “It will be just as you say, my dear. Now I really must say good night, for my own dresser will be wondering what has become of me.”
“You must not keep her waiting on my account,” agreed Miss Mays. She saw that Miss Blythe was also leaving, and she trailed them to the door. When Lucinda and Miss Blythe had exited, she offered another shy smile to them. “Good night.”
“Good night, Agnes,” said Lucinda.
The door shut softly. Lucinda turned her head to look at her companion. “How much I admire you, Tibby. I do not think that I could have borne to put up with a number of such charges, as you have done over the years.”
Miss Blythe chuckled. “They have not all been so difficult to handle, my dear. Indeed, I can recall one who was a veritable treat to be around. She was always my favorite pupil.”
Lucinda reached out her hand quickly, her eyes misting. “Oh, Tibby! Must you make me cry in the small hours of the morning?”
“Go to bed, my dear,” said Miss Blythe gently.
Lucinda glanced over at Mr. Stassart’s door, and her unaccustomed sentimentalism evaporated. “Oh, I shall. But first I must relay a few orders concerning my cousin, Ferdie,” sh
e said.
“Whatever do you mean?” asked Miss Blythe curiously.
“Only that my cousin is to be assured of every consideration in the breakfast room,” said Lucinda blandly. They had traversed the hall and, having reached her own door, she parted from Miss Blythe with a quiet good night.
The next morning when Lucinda went down to the breakfast room, she found her cousin sprawled sulkily in a chair. “Good morning, Ferdie,” she said cheerfully.
He glared at her. “Much you know about it. I was dragged from my bed and positively thrust into my clothing by those churlish bullies of yours. Look at me! My cravat is permanently creased; there are wrinkles in my coat and waistcoat. These are not the son of garments that I am used to, by the by! You promised to replace my coat, cousin! This is hardly fair return!”
“If you are so discontented with my efforts on your behalf, Ferdie, I suggest that you return to your own lodgings and get your man to attend to you properly,” said Lucinda.
As she had known he would, her cousin quit his complaints and subsided into low grumbling.
Miss Blythe and Miss Mays soon joined them at the breakfast table.
Miss Blythe nodded to Mr. Stassart. “I am glad to see that you are recovering, Mr. Stassart.”
Mr. Stassart made a bow. “It was inevitable, Miss Blythe. One would not dare to malinger in this house,” he said, somewhat bitterly.
Miss Blythe raised her brows a little. “Indeed!”
The company was served and the servants left. Near the conclusion of breakfast, Church came in and bent to say something quietly in Lady Mays’s ear. Lucinda looked up quickly. “I shall come at once.”
“Is there something untoward, my dear?” asked Miss Blythe.
“Not at all. Lord Mays has come to call,” said Lucinda, rising from the table.
“What! Surely you are not going to receive his lordship without benefit of chaperone,” said Ferdie maliciously.
Lucinda looked at him. “Lord Mays is a gentleman and a friend, sir. I have complete confidence in him.”
“As do I,” said Miss Blythe coldly, staring down Mr. Stassart’s pretensions.
