They went in to dinner, Aunt Frances on Papa’s arm, Cathy with Mr. St. James. Bianca trailed silently behind, plotting how best to achieve her ends.
She had schemed to invite a large party of people, including Mr. Mayne the curate, all the better to contrast him with Mr. St. James, but Papa had put his foot down. “Family,” he’d barked at her, “and no one else.”
That meant it was up to Aunt Frances. And fortunately, the older woman seemed spoiling for the chance.
“Who, pray, are your people, sir?” she asked him over the fish course. “I have forgotten.”
He smiled. “Have you? I’m sure I never mentioned them at all.”
Frances bared her teeth at him. “That explains it! My memory is usually faultless. Do tell us, that we may all know.”
“My father,” he said easily, “was, as you know, a St. James, a relation of the Duke of Carlyle.”
“How distant?” asked Bianca innocently. “My goodness, sir, were you raised amidst the splendor of Carlyle Castle?”
Cathy gave her a reproachful look and Papa growled under his breath. Bianca only batted her eyes at their guest, who sat smiling back with the self-possession of a panther, biding his time.
“No, Miss Tate,” he replied. “I am only a distant cousin, and had not the privilege of visiting the castle often.”
“Oh,” she said. “Only on visiting days, I suppose?” Visiting days, when any strangers passing by would be permitted to stroll the castle grounds and see the house.
He continued smiling at her as if he knew exactly what she was up to. “Not even then, I’m afraid. I have resided in London for some time. Much too far away to drop in for a cup of tea, or even a visiting day.”
Bianca’s mouth flattened. Thankfully Frances rushed into the breach.
“Yes, yes, Carlyle.” She dropped a bite of turbot on the carpet, and Trevor noisily slurped it up. “Who are your mother’s people?”
“I doubt you will know them, ma’am. My grandparents came from Hanover.”
“German,” said Frances with a whiff of disdain.
Mr. St. James only bowed his head in acknowledgement. “Their parents were retainers of His Majesty George the First, when he came from Hanover.”
Frances directed a frigid look at him, for mentioning that the recent kings had been more German than English. “Retainers! Who were they? A Groom of the Stool, perhaps?”
Bianca almost spat out her wine. She cast an admiring glance at her great-aunt for suggesting St. James’s ancestor had been in charge of the royal chamber pot.
“Not at all,” he said easily. “I believe my great-grandfather was a falconer.”
“Falconry!” Papa seized the point. “Very noble sport, what? Fit for a king!”
“I daresay it is considerably less noble when one must clean the mews,” said Frances tartly.
St. James laughed. “Perhaps that is why they gave it up for farming, ma’am.”
Frances’s mouth pinched. She regarded farming as a proper and hearty occupation.
“Enough of grandparents and farmers,” declared Papa. “St. James, you’ve been in London. Tell us all the entertainments to be found there. Cathy was just reading to us from The Lady’s Magazine about a fencing match at Carlton House, between a Frenchman and a lady, of all people! Are such things common there?”
“Would that they were,” murmured Bianca, imagining running an épée through the rogue who sat across from her.
He, rudely, heard her. “I would not call it common, Miss Tate, but enthralling nonetheless.”
“At Carlton House, I’m sure all was as proper as it should be,” said Cathy, giving Bianca a look of warning. “It is the home of the Prince of Wales.”
“And yet we have seen how even the noblest of gentlemen, like His Highness, may harbor a wild and scandalous nature,” replied Bianca with a simpering smile. “Wouldn’t you agree, Mr. St. James?”
He sent her a searing glance across the table. “I would, Miss Tate,” he said with a faint smile. “In the case of the prince.”
“We’ll not be gossiping about His Highness,” warned Papa, before forcing the conversation toward inane topics like the weather and the state of the roads near Marslip. Bianca ate in silence and hoped Mr. St. James was as bored by this excessively polite conversation as she was.
By the time Aunt Frances led the way to the drawing room after dinner, she was seething. Thanks to Papa’s dry conversation, St. James had come across as faultlessly polite and capable of discussing roads and turnpikes until everyone in hearing fell asleep. It was one of Papa’s favorite subjects, though, and even Aunt Frances had recognized how unlikely she was to deter him from it. The ladies had retreated from the dining room to avoid falling face first into the pudding.
“He’s very much a London gentleman.” Bianca returned to her first plan, persuading Cathy that St. James was too snobbish and too elegant to make a good husband. “No wonder he agreed so enthusiastically with Papa’s raving about the roads. It must have been a vicious shock to his person to make the journey north.”
Cathy looked at her sadly and said nothing.
“He seems hearty enough.” Frances was having more port. “Solid farm stock.”
“Yes, how astonishing! I never would have guessed, from the amount of lace on his coat.”
“Don’t you disdain a farming man,” said Frances sternly. “It makes a man ever so strong and firm-minded, well grounded in his passions and purposes.”
“I shudder to imagine Mr. St. James’s passions,” said Bianca before she could stop herself.
With a faint noise of distress, Cathy jumped up and fled the room.
Frances raised her brows, mellowing with her second taste of port. “What’s got into her? I declare, that girl needs a husband. She’s been very emotional lately. One dinner with a man and she’s in tears!”
Bianca scowled. Contrary to all previous indications, Aunt Frances sounded almost like Papa. “You do know St. James wants to marry Cathy?” she said.
Frances’s brows snapped upward. “What, what? Cathy?”
“He’s already made Papa an offer for her,” she replied. “That’s why he’s come to Marslip—to win a bride and secure a handsome income from Perusia, no doubt. And Papa approves.” She gave a tiny shrug. “Only I don’t believe Cathy is coming around to the idea.”
“Fool girl,” said Frances stoutly. “She could certainly do worse.”
“Yes, of course,” said Bianca innocently, “the great-grandson of a Groom of the Stool! Or no—forgive me—a falconer. The honor! The prestige! We shall be elevated above everyone in Staffordshire.”
The older woman shot her a dark glance. “I see what you’re up to. You disapprove, and you want me to blow it all up. Well, I won’t! Making foolish marriages is a Tate family tradition.”
Bianca flushed at being caught out. “But Cathy and Mr. Mayne,” she began hotly.
“Pshh!” Frances rose and aimed a stern finger at her. “If that were meant to be, Mayne would have been here on his knee, begging Samuel for her hand. Has he even made her a proposal?”
Bianca scowled in furious acknowledgement that no, the gentlemanly curate had not.
“Nor will he,” finished Frances with savage coolness. “Between the two of them, nothing would ever get decided, let alone accomplished. I never met two more docile, agreeable people in my life! They both require someone with more backbone. At least this St. James fellow has that. He didn’t let you rumble over him, did he?”
Bianca shot to her feet. “Why can’t two people who are matched in disposition make a happy marriage? Why must there be one with backbone and one who gives way? I daresay two gentle, accommodating people would sort things out quite well, if left to their own devices.”
“No?” Frances leaned closer, her sharp blue eyes pitying. “Then why hasn’t Mayne gone to your father, even in the face of a determined rival? Why is your sister sitting by accepting St. James’s compliments and flattery
? You always think you know best, miss, but this isn’t your problem to solve.” She threw up one hand. “You can’t save people from getting what they deserve!”
She swept out of the room, Trevor waddling after her with a startled yip.
Bianca seethed. Did no one see that Papa had been dazzled to the point of imbecility by the Londoner’s manners and elegance? Did no one realize Cathy had been cowed into silence, not charmed into agreement? She reserved judgment about Mr. Mayne, who certainly could use more backbone, but he ought to have a chance to prove himself, and this hurried rush to get Cathy to the altar seemed specifically designed to prevent him having one.
She stormed up the stairs and banged on her sister’s door before flinging it open. “Cathy, I—”
She stopped cold. Her sister jerked upright from the open bureau drawer, red-eyed and with a petticoat in her hands. An open valise sat on the floor at her feet. “Don’t try to stop me, Bee,” she said, her voice trembling. “Don’t you dare!”
Bianca closed the door. “From doing what?”
Her sister’s wild eyes darted to the door, then to the window. “I’m eloping with Richard.” She took a crumpled paper from her skirt pocket and thrust it out, almost defiantly. “I’m going.”
Bianca read the first sentence of Mr. Mayne’s scrawl—My darling, I am in agony; if you love me half as much as I love you, let us fly to Manchester this very night before we are divided from each other forever—and smiled.
“Of course I won’t stop you,” she said quietly. “I’ve come to help you.”
Chapter Four
Max’s plan was proceeding brilliantly, by any objective measure.
The business was as solid as he’d thought, with far more potential to grow. Tate had shown him some spectacular samples of a brilliant cerulean glaze, unlike anything he’d ever seen. Max pictured services painted not with bucolic country scenes but with replicas of the great works of art—not merely Fragonard and Rubens but Michelangelo’s Sistine ceiling. He was sure the painters Tate employed had the talent to do it, given what he’d seen so far. It would cause a sensation in London.
His marriage proposal had been accepted. Samuel Tate had given his blessing, and Miss Tate had blushed and stammered in gratitude when he spoke to her about it. Max stayed only one night in Marslip before dashing back to London to wind up his affairs there, keen to see the thing through.
Within a fortnight it was all but done. Tate had eagerly received the marriage contract. It was more fashionable to marry by license, so Max went to the effort of visiting Doctors’ Commons to secure one. He gave notice on his rooms, packed his things, and hired a manservant away from a friend who had recently suffered a disastrous loss at the gaming tables.
This time the journey to Staffordshire seemed easy and familiar, as if he were going home. In fact, Max reflected with satisfaction, he was—not only a new home and a new bride, but the first settled, fixed home and family he’d known in many years. Tate had offered him the former family house on the far side of the hill from the potteries. It wasn’t as fine as the house atop the hill, but it was solid and comfortable, and would allow Miss Tate easy access to her family while Max was traveling, spreading Tate wares around the country.
Max spent considerable time contemplating how best to make Perusia the preeminent source of fine pottery wares. He must establish contacts in Edinburgh, Antwerp, Calais, eventually Paris . . . Now that the war in America was over, trading was resuming with Boston and Charleston as well. The colonials must be starved for anything elegant after so many years of blockade. Yes, the Americans had enormous potential, particularly if Max made an early, bold strike to seize the market.
He said as much to Tate that night as they shared a cold supper in Max’s new home. Tate had met him at the door to hand over possession. His daughters, Tate explained, had begged off, to prepare. In the morning Max would marry Catherine, and she’d seen the house comfortably furnished and supplied. Just stepping over the threshold filled him with such a feeling of contentment that he knew, deep in his bones, this was his destiny.
“I thank God we crossed paths,” said Tate at the end of the evening. “You’re a rare one, St. James.”
Max could not agree more. “Mr. Tate,” he replied, “I might say the very same to you.”
At that moment, it seemed as though everything he had ever wanted was in the palm of his hand. And it was.
Until the next morning, in the church.
Bianca’s plan went off almost perfectly, if she did say so herself.
Cathy never had been one for scheming. The night she tearfully declared she was running off with Mr. Mayne had proved that. Her plan—if it could be called such—had been to pack her valise, lug it down the hill to the church after everyone had gone to bed, and tell Mr. Mayne that she was ready to elope. In the middle of the night. With no preparation whatsoever.
“Don’t be a goose,” had been Bianca’s reply to that. There was no need to flee in the dead of night; St. James was returning to London in the morning. They had days, even weeks to prepare, and the better they prepared, the better off Cathy would be with her curate.
First, they’d gone to the vicarage together. Any doubts Bianca had about Mayne’s stoutheartedness were swept aside by the way he seized Cathy and bent her backward in a passionate kiss. It went on so long, in fact, she had to turn her head and clear her throat twice to regain her sister’s attention.
This time Mayne rose to the occasion. Far from the dithering fool Aunt Frances called him, he arranged for a travel chaise. He plotted their journey to his elder sister’s home, where they could be married in peace and propriety. He took the money Bianca offered him without blinking an eye or saying a word of protest. He gazed at Cathy with rapt devotion, and swore to protect her with his life. Cathy twirled home with stars in her eyes and roses in her cheeks.
A week later Papa announced he had received the marriage contract from Mr. St. James. Cathy grew quiet and nervous, but bravely ventured a protest that it was perhaps too soon to wed someone she’d barely met. She spoke fondly of Mr. Mayne, and how much more at ease she felt around him. Deceiving Papa had not sat well with Cathy, and she seized that last chance to change his mind.
Up until then both sisters had hoped he would yet see reason. Papa was bewitched by St. James, but he could still come to his senses and recognize Cathy’s unhappiness and Mayne’s worth. Cathy especially hoped he would reconsider, no matter what it cost his business. By nature she was kind and caring, and she hated to hurt anyone’s feelings, let alone her beloved father’s.
Papa overrode her, saying firmly that Mayne was nothing but a country curate while St. James was a gentleman—and cousin to a duke, if she hadn’t forgotten—and that she would have years to become acquainted with him. It was a very advantageous marriage, and he was certain she would thank him someday.
After that Cathy stopped fretting about how upset Papa would be when she was gone.
As for Bianca, she had such an argument with her father over his callous dictating of Cathy’s marriage that he hadn’t spoken to her for a week. This time it suited her perfectly. It gave her freedom to help Cathy smuggle her trunk to the vicarage and plan how to slip out of the house the night before the wedding. It gave Cathy leisure to write a long letter to her father explaining everything—Cathy refused to leave without doing it, but Bianca was relieved to see that her sister’s eyes were dry at the end. There was a certain poetic justice in the thought of Papa dining with the interloper St. James on one side of the hill while Cathy sneaked down the far side of that same hill to meet her true love.
And now it was the morning of the wedding. Papa had invited half the town to celebrate his daughter’s marriage to a gentleman. Bianca had argued against that, too, but been overruled again. Mayne, of course, was nowhere to be seen, although Papa hadn’t been coldhearted enough to ask him to perform the ceremony. Mr. Filpot from St. Anne’s in Waddleston Grange had come, and was cooling his heels in
the morning room, trimming his fingernails with a penknife.
Aunt Frances, as if scenting something on the wind, had walked over that morning and was installed in the breakfast room with Trevor, calling for a rasher of bacon and more preserves for her bread.
Maximilian St. James, Bianca presumed, was somewhere gazing fondly at himself in the mirror, preening at how he’d gulled an ambitious country potter and his simple daughters, and tallying up the many ways he could spend Cathy’s inheritance.
Bianca had also risen early, to monitor the maids and keep them from telling Papa about Cathy’s absence for as long as possible. She sent Jennie and Ellen running for water, the iron, the curling tongs, more water, then a cup of chocolate, until both maids eyed her resentfully and Ellen finally declared she must go to Miss Cathy, who was the bride after all—condemning Bianca’s unusually demanding behavior with a severe look.
And thus it was Ellen’s scream that announced to all of Perusia that Cathy was not in her room dressing for her wedding. Papa came thundering up the stairs in alarm, until Bianca calmly handed him the letter her sister had written. The concern on her father’s face, however, did not last long.
“Eloped!” Papa thrust the page to arm’s length, then held it up to his face as if the words might change shape up close. “With Mayne!” He turned on her even before reading the second paragraph, let alone the next two pages. “You knew about this?”
“Yes.”
For a moment his face went so red, she feared it would give him an apoplexy. Her grandfather had died of one, after all, and Papa had such a temper—
“Bianca,” he said in a savage whisper, “come with me.” He took her arm roughly and marched her into Cathy’s room and slammed the door behind them. “What have you done?”
“I didn’t do anything.”
He gripped his wig with both hands, but didn’t tear it off. “I know you,” he growled. “And I know Cathy. She would never do something like this on her own.”
About a Rogue EPB Page 5
