Knave's Wager

by Loretta Chase

  “I doubt I shall be able to restore my arm to its socket.”

  Robert abruptly released him. “Yes, of course. Carried away. You can’t know how—how—Gad, I’m so relieved. I just kept sinking lower and lower the longer you were gone, until I thought I’d just better hang myself.”

  “‘Men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but not for love.’”

  “Well, if you say so. But I thought I would die. I don’t know when I’ve spent a worse night.”

  “I’m tired, Robin. I want to go to bed. Can we just get this letter done?”

  “Yes, yes, absolutely. This minute.” Robert plunked himself down at the desk, tore out a stack of paper, picked up a pen, and waited.

  “Mind you don’t spoil all my pens. And no blots.”

  “Yes, Julian,” was the docile reply.

  As it turned out, Lord Robert spoiled a dozen quills, because not one but two letters needed to be written. After Julian had examined the first and pronounced it tolerable, he had gone into a queer sort of trance. Then, in an equally queer voice, he had reminded Robert of Cecily’s aunt.

  Though the young pair had not eloped, they had caused the widow considerable distress. She deserved a personal apology, of course, but an advance note—properly penitent—would be needed, if Robert expected to be admitted to speak to her at all.

  This note turned out to be far more difficult than the first, with Julian revising every word a hundred times and ordering sheet after sheet torn up. At last the thing was done.

  It was sent to the widow midmorning, with a request for an appointment in the early afternoon.

  Shortly after noon, a frantic Robert received word that Mrs. Davenant would await him at two o’clock.

  He arrived at one-thirty, and was left to cool his heels the full remaining half hour before he was shown into the drawing room.

  “You intend to seek Lord Glenwood’s consent, I trust?” the widow asked after she’d listened composedly to Robert’s incoherent apologies.

  “Yes, ma’am. That is, if you don’t object. I know I’ve given you every reason to dislike me, but you must know—”

  “I don’t dislike you,” she said coolly. “I’ve never disliked you, Lord Robert. That was an unfortunate misunderstanding. If you truly care for my niece—”

  “Oh, I do. Believe me, I’d die to make her happy. Really, I would. She’s the finest girl in the world!”

  “Yes. Well.” She paused and Robert waited anxiously.

  Really, he thought, she was as bad as Julian for dragging a thing out and driving a man distracted.

  “Are your parents aware of your intentions?” she asked finally.

  He assured her there would be no trouble with his family. They’d be delighted. Julian had written this very day—a wonderful letter. “But he’s so clever,” Robert went on. The words just come to him, you know. That is... well, he spoke so highly of Cec—of Miss Glenwood. And when they meet her, I know they’ll love her. They can’t help it. No one could,” he said fervently.

  That earned a small smile. “Very well,” she said. “I shall ask Cecily to step down to speak with you.”

  “Oh, Mrs. Davenant!” Robert shot up out of his chair, and forgetting altogether who she was, yanked her up from hers and hugged her. “Thank you,” he cried. “You really are splendid. Julian was quite right. That is—” Hastily, he let go and blushed. “I beg your pardon.”

  She flushed a bit as well, but she nodded with her customary cool politeness, then turned away to summon her niece.

  Lord Robert was given a very generous half hour alone with his darling., though the door to the drawing room was left open and a servant hovered nearby. When the young man finally took his leave, Cecily ran upstairs to her aunt’s sitting room, hugged her a dozen times, and told her she was the sweetest, kindest, most understanding aunt a girl could ever want—even a horribly ill-bred, ungrateful girl like herself.

  “I only want you to be happy, Cecily,” said Lilith.

  “Yes, Aunt, and I shall be,” said Cecily. She dropped onto the footstool and gazed thoughtfully at her aunt. “Though I do wish you’d be happy as well.”

  “Naturally, I am, dear. You have been a great success, and now you will marry a very suitable young man who loves you dearly. That is all I could wish for.”

  “Is it?” Cecily took her aunt’s hand and squeezed it. “Is it all you wish for? Don’t you ever wish for yourself?”

  The aunt’s posture grew more rigid.

  “Don’t you ever wish to be with someone who loves you dearly? Even if he doesn’t quite know it. Because they never do, do they?” she asked, half to herself. “We have to tell them everything.”

  She came out of her abstraction with a grin. “I must tell you, Aunt, this Season has been extremely educational. I had no idea men could be so confused and impractical. They will wander about aimlessly, making themselves cross and unhappy, and it never occurs to them what the trouble is. Or if it does, they won’t speak of it, because it isn’t dignified—or something. Do you know, Lord Robert was thoroughly astounded when I told him I cared for him?”

  “Was he?” Lilith asked faintly.

  Cecily nodded. “Did you ever hear anything so ridiculous? Almost as ridiculous as his not knowing he cared for me.” She stood up. “Thank heaven that’s over. He’s much more sensible now.”

  “I’m glad to hear it, dear.”

  “Well, I should like to speak more with you, Aunt, but I know Sir Thomas is coming, and you probably have a great deal to discuss with him. I suppose he’ll want to set a date at last, now I’m off your hands. But we can talk tonight, can’t we, after we come home?”

  “Yes, of course we can. As much as you like, dear.”

  “Downs?” Sir Thomas repeated as he took the cup and saucer Lilith held out to him. “Well, that is very good, I suppose. Excellent family, of course. He has been a bit wild, but he is young. I daresay he’ll settle down soon enough. Married life is marvelously settling—when, that is, the characters are well-suited.”

  “And when there is deep affection.”

  “Indeed, yes. Mutual regard and respect—that is the foundation.”

  “Oh, Thomas.” Lilith put down her cup and rose from the sofa.

  He jumped up. “My dear, what is it? Have you qualms about the match? If so—”

  “No. That is, not about Cecily.” She folded her hands before her and raised her chin. “It’s about us, Thomas. There’s no way to work up to it tactfully, I’m afraid. I cannot marry you.”

  “Lilith! What is this?” Angry scarlet mounted his neck and ears.

  “I cannot,” she said. “I cannot be your wife. I married once without love. I shall not make that mistake again.”

  He was obviously striving for patience. “Come now, Lilith. We are not a pair of moonstruck children. Infatuation is no basis for a marriage—not a sound one. You know that as well as I, surely.”

  “I know our basis is not a sound one—not for me, at least. I’m not what I thought I was—or what you think me. I know I’ll make you unhappy, and myself as well. To marry you is to injure us both.”

  With an effort he regained his self-restraint, and the angry colour subsided. “You have been ill,” he said, more judiciously. “You are overwrought, and a few natural anxieties—perfectly natural, my dear—seem insurmountable obstacles. You want more rest. It is all these late nights, hurrying from one noisy place to another, and too much rich food.”

  “I have been... unwell,” she said slowly, “but I am not so now. I have been troubled, but it’s my conscience troubles me. In my heart of hearts, I knew I was wrong to accept you. I pray you will forgive me for having done so. I did not know my own heart.”

  “You didn’t know Brandon then, is what you mean,” he snapped.

  Her features hardened to marble.

  His hands clamped together behind his back, Thomas began to pace the carpet.

  “You think I’m blind,�
�� he said heatedly. I’m not. I’d heard enough of him. He must make a conquest of every woman he meets. Yet I saw no great harm in my future bride’s cultivating one who has the ear of the world’s most powerful men: Castlereagh, Wellington, Metternich, and not only our own Regent, but half the monarchs of Europe. Knowing you, I saw no danger in the acquaintance. And so I told my sister. Lilith Davenant, I told her, would never lose her head over such a man. But you have, it seems.” He paused to glare at her. “Now you will throw your life away. For what? A libertine who’ll make love to you at ten o’clock and lie in the arms of a ballet dancer at twelve.”

  Lilith let him rage on. He was entitled. She had insulted him deeply, betrayed him repeatedly. He could devise no words harsher than those with which she’d already flogged herself. Nevertheless, no words either could produce would ever change her heart. She stood, and endured, and when it was done and he’d gone at last, she ordered a bath and calmly walked up to her room to prepare for the evening ahead.

  The letter was delivered shortly after Lilith had arisen from her bath. It lay on the tray next to the cup of herbal tea Emma had prepared. The handwriting was unfamiliar. It was, however, a woman’s hand.

  Within a few sentences, the sender’s identity became painfully clear. Lilith turned the page over.

  “I tell you, Madame, for him I care nothing. If he is in misery all his days, I should not be troubled. But you, I think, suffer as well, and I prefer you did not, for you have done me so much good.”

  Then it came, all of it, the entire story of the “knaves’ wager,” as Elise titled it: Lord Brandon’s efforts to keep Robert from disgrace, and Elise’s refusal to yield her so-easily-managed lover. The letter continued:

  “You will wonder what wicked devil inspired me to so vile a game with another’s virtue. I answer, Madame, that I never believed your virtue in danger. Ah, and how I wished to see the noble marquess taught a lesson—to see him thwarted, just once. For I must tell you he was abominably insolent. To be humbled by such a man was more than my pride could bear. I perceive his strong attraction to you. I see as well he is doomed to fail, and so I goad and challenge him.

  What would you have me do? Plead and weep? Throw myself at his feet? Beg for mercy from a man who thinks women weak and mindless, like infants?

  In my place, you would have defied him. But you are a great lady—his social equal—and I am merely une fille publique. So I put you in my place, as my champion. And you did defy him.

  Today he tells me I have won. But I see I have won more than our wager. He is not so arrogant now. This time it is the great lord who seeks mercy. Well, I have given him what he wishes— not for his sake, or Robert’s, or even for the girl’s—but for yours. You have given me better revenge than I hoped. I will not repay you by bringing shame upon you and your family. Also, to tell you frankly, I am paid well for my forbearance.

  There is but one matter more. Not important, perhaps, for you may be happy to see the last of him. He leaves in two days’ time for Paris. This time, I do not think he will return.”

  ***

  The room was spacious and luxurious, yet not ornate. Golden threads glistened in the green draperies and in the chair coverings; otherwise, gilt was at a minimum. Several choice landscape paintings hung in elegantly simple frames upon the walls.

  Above the large marble fireplace loomed a man’s portrait. Tall, stern, forbidding, he glared down his hawk-like nose at the woman who stared defiantly back.

  Beneath the wig, Lilith thought, his hair would be thick and raven black—perhaps streaked with grey at the temples, for this was not the portrait of a young man. The mouth was thinner, and the lines there and at the corners of the eyes were more deeply etched. The eyes themselves were not quite the same green—but what artist could capture that colour?

  An intimidating figure he must have been, the late Marquess of Brandon. What would he have made of the woman who stood in his drawing room, her hair unbound, streaming down her back, her tall, slim body draped—and scarcely concealed—in slate-blue silk?

  Lilith heard footsteps approaching. She turned to the door, straightened her spine, and raised her chin.

  The man she awaited burst through the door, then stopped short, visibly composed himself, and proceeded more slowly into the room. He halted some distance from her.

  Lord Brandon had been dressing—and was not altogether done, she thought wryly. His neckcloth was crooked, and the knot was loose, clumsily tied.

  “This is an unlooked-for honour,” he said. He sounded short of breath.

  “I should hope so,” she said. “I don’t know many ladies who are in the habit of paying late-night calls.”

  “Not to single gentlemen.” He glanced about the quiet room. “And certainly not without escort. Have you taken leave of your senses, Mrs. Davenant?”

  “I have come to take leave of you,” she answered frostily. “Since you are far too busy to take proper leave of me. I suppose you meant to depart without a word. Paris, I understand.”

  “You are well informed.”

  “Not so well as I could wish. I wanted to satisfy my curiosity.”

  She moved past the fireplace in a rustle of silk, and paused at the sofa. No, it was better not to sit down. She felt stronger upright. She let her fingers trail lightly over the silken embroidery.

  “Women are excessively curious, are they not?” she continued. “It is a known failing of our gender. We have a regrettable need to be enlightened on every matter that appears to concern us. For instance, I have been the object of a wager.”

  She threw him a glance from under her lashes, and saw his colour deepen. “It is very tiresome of me, I know, but I long to be apprised of the details,” she added.

  “Lilith, don’t—”

  “Have you truly lost? You see, I have no idea how much time you had to seduce me. Perhaps you’d be so kind as to tell me the truth.”

  “Eight weeks,” came the low reply.

  “Good heavens! So much? And how odd.” She calculated rapidly. “I thought you’d been in London but seven. Unless my addition is at fault, you might have seduced me the other day, and won your wager. I realise, of course, you were anxious about the children. Yet we were already delayed by the storm. Another few minutes could not have made a great difference.”

  “A few minutes?” he asked with something like his customary coolness. “Please consider my reputation.”

  “All you had to do was bed me,” she shot back. “Surely you hadn’t bargained how long you’d be about it. I do not recollect, in any case, making any effort to prevent you. On the contrary—”

  “Stop it!” He moved a few steps nearer. “I know well enough what I’ve done and what I am.”

  “I don’t,” she said. “It seems I know nothing about you.”

  “That’s true. You knew a stranger, a man I created for the occasion.” He turned away to the fireplace and took up a poker. There was no fire, but he thrust angrily at the coals laid in the grate while he went on. “You said the other day my words were always lies and easy speeches. It was worse than you know. You asked for truth. If you can bear it, I suppose I can bear to tell it.”

  “I want the truth,” she said.

  He told her. He explained how he’d employed two of her servants to apprise him of all her plans. That was how he’d happened to be at Hookham’s—and everywhere else she went. He told how he’d bribed the clerk to block the aisle, ordered Ezra to ply the Enderses’ coachman with drink, maneuvered their walk at Redley Park. All this and more— all his strategems.

  “I was awake to every opportunity, you see,” he said. “I would have said anything, done anything. Scarcely a word or gesture escaped me but was deliberately intended to weaken you. Every wile and guile I ever learned, Lilith— and new ones I invented. Never was there such a calculated siege,” he finished, his voice weary.

  She had not suspected—not the half of it—and was mortified at her naivete. Still, he’d gone to co
nsiderable lengths. Any woman must be flattered by so painstaking a pursuit.

  “So that is why I succumbed. No wonder. What mere female could be proof against such an onslaught? My conscience is quite clear, then,” she said, glaring at him. “But you, after putting yourself to such trouble—why did you not reap the fruits of your labours the other day?”

  “I could not.” His gaze was still locked upon the grate.

  “Why was that? An attack of conscience? But you haven’t any, as you’ve just explained. Was I not sufficiently eager? Or was there some other way you found me... inadequate?” she asked, her chin determinedly aloft.

  He turned round. “Good God, woman. How can you imagine such a thing? The one matter I never lied about was wanting you. In that I was never false.”

  “Then why, Julian? And don’t repeat your ludicrous speech about my vulnerability. Pray have some respect for my intelligence.”

  She waited through a long silence. He would tell her the truth. He must. And she would bear it, whatever it was, because she must.

  “It was what I saw in your eyes,” he said at last. “Or what I thought I saw—but that was enough.”

  “What was it?” He must have felt her gaze hard upon him, but he wouldn’t meet it.

  “I thought it was love.”

  She stood proudly still while hot embarrassment swept her face. “Oh.”

  “Naturally, I was delighted. I had only connived for your person, not your heart. Indeed, I was in raptures.” He struck the coals savagely, once, then replaced the poker in its rack. “Overjoyed to discover I’d made you love a man who didn’t exist.”

  “I can see that must have been a blow to your pride,” she said evenly, though her heart lightened within her. “Still, was it worth losing your wager? Was it worth sacrificing your cousin?”

  He threw her a surprised glance, then looked away again. “What do you know of that?”

  “I had a letter from Miss Fourgette. I must admit there was some consolation in learning the stake was not money or property. My honour for your cousin’s. Abstract, but equitable, perhaps. Why did you deliberately lose?” she asked.