A Little Deception (28 page)

Rose had always thought Polly mild to the point of timidity.
Frustrated, she demanded, ‘Why is it that no one wishes to accompany my sister?
Has Arabella been unkind? Is she not as sweet and mild-mannered to the servants
as she is to her family?’

Polly had dropped her chin on to her chest. This unusually
sharp demand from her mistress caused her to jerk her head up and bite her lip.

‘It ain’t Miss Arabella, my lady. Lord knows, she’s the
sweetest mistress and I’d have danced for joy at the prospect o’ accompanying
her anywhere else.’ She took a deep breath, struggling. Then at last she
blurted out, ‘But it’s the master I ain’t so fond of.’

For a moment Rose thought she was alluding to Rampton. Then
realization dawned. ‘You mean Viscount Yarrowby?’

Polly nodded.

There was silence. Rose stared out of the window miserably
as comprehension dawned. At last she asked, ‘And why has no one said anything?’

‘Weren’t our place, ma’am. And Miss Arabella’s been so ’appy
in love.’

Deep dismay was now replacing Rose’s misery. It seeped through
her bones. More insinuations. This time she had to discover something
substantial.

‘Did it not occur to anyone that Arabella might be saved
heartache herself – considering you all felt Lord Yarrowby was not an
employer whom any of you would wish to work for?’

Polly didn’t answer. Her narrow shoulders slumped even
further. At last, as the silence stretched into seeming eternity, she said in a
small voice, ‘We talked about it, ma’am but … but then we decided that what
great lords do to servants and what they do to fine-bred ladies surely ain’t
the same thing. So we decided that, since Miss Arabella found him so to her
liking, and her being a great lady and no common serving lass, he’d most likely
be good to her.’

Rose digested this in silence for some moments. After a
while she said, ‘So Lord Yarrowby chooses to take his pleasures in the
servants’ attic?’ Distractedly she nibbled the tip of her forefinger. It was
not a good reflection on the man’s character. Unfortunately, so many men did
indeed take advantage of their staff. It was not as if Lord Yarrowby were the
only one.

When Polly still did not answer Rose said, more sharply this
time, ‘So you’re telling me that Lord Yarrowby made advances to the servants?’
She sighed. What should she do?

She moved to the window, her tone half apologetic as she turned,
saying, ‘I’m afraid, Polly, that it is not only in Lord Yarrowby’s residence
that such things happen—’

‘Well, it don’t ’appen here!’ Polly interrupted fiercely.

‘I am relieved to hear that,’ said Rose with a wry smile.
‘Nevertheless, it is, sadly, a well-established double standard that the way
gentlemen cavort with obliging kitchen maids is not the way they deal with
womenfolk of their own class.’

‘Well, it ain’t as if Jenny were that obliging,’ Polly
muttered under her breath.

Rose, about to continue her exoneration of Lord Yarrowby,
stopped short. ‘What did you say?’

Colour flooded the girl’s peaky little face. Eventually
Polly raised a pair of defiant eyes. ‘I’m trustin’ you ’eard me first time,
ma’am, as I don’t care to repeat it.’ Gone was the timid little creature with
whom Rose was so familiar. ‘Jenny was my friend. I knew ’er ’cause we came from
the same village and she’s sister to the master’s man, Fanshawe. Anyway, Jenny
were a good, honest girl and, what’s more, about to be married. But she were
too pretty by ’alf and my lord Yarrowby didn’t like that she objected when he
tried to kiss her.’ The slumped shoulders rose and the voice became more
resolute. ‘One day he chanced upon her, alone, in the scullery. It were late at
night and she ’ad just one or two more things to finish up. Everyone else was
abed ’cause otherwise we’d ’ave ’eard her screamin’.’ There was a long,
uncomfortable pause. ‘Well, ’course, once she was … spoiled … and, what’s more,
’aving a baby, she couldn’t marry Johnny. Oh, he wanted to, but she were set on
that point.’

Rose’s chill deepened as Polly recounted her story. Of
course, there was no proof that Jenny had been telling the truth, she told
herself. She didn’t even know what kind of a girl Jenny really was. She asked,
‘Was Lord Yarrowby accused of the crime? I mean … it’s only Jenny’s word….’

Polly looked first confused, then affronted and Rose,
despite the fact that she could not accept slander with no evidence, felt
deeply ashamed. ‘No, it ain’t! Anyway, ’sides from the fact that Jenny ain’t no
liar, there was bruises on her arms, and blood on her dress, and, what’s more,
Rafferty, the butler, saw Lord Yarrowby sneakin’ up the back stairs minutes
before he came down and found Jenny all hurt and cryin’.’

Rose didn’t need any more convincing. Added to her distress
at Polly’s tale was the fact that Rampton had known of Yarrowby’s crime all
along.

‘I’m sorry, Polly,’ she said, truly humble. ‘I had no idea
of this. I think … perhaps … my husband knew something.’ Then, realizing that
this sounded more like an accusation she was about to rephrase her sentence
when Polly broke in, ‘’Course he did. Fanshawe’s been valet to my lord since
the master came back from Eton, and Jenny’s ’is sister. The master’s bin
supporting Jenny and the young ’un nigh on three years.’

‘But … but why was Lord Yarrowby able to get away with such
a crime?’

Polly’s look made Rose squirm with embarrassment as the
inequality of their respective situations was brought home to her. Great men
like Lord Yarrowby were not brought to justice for raping mere kitchen maids.

Not three minutes after Rose had dismissed Polly Rampton
strode, unannounced, into the drawing room.

The pale and drawn countenance his wife raised to his face,
coupled with the fact that he had passed Polly in the corridor left Rampton in
no doubt that Rose was now in complete possession of the facts. It had not been
a certainty that one of the girls would volunteer the story. In fact, Rampton
would not have been surprised if shame had kept their lips sealed.

‘Did you mean to make a fool of me, Rampton?’ Rose’s tone
was bitter. ‘Or should I be apologizing for having misjudged you?’

Rampton shot her an ironic smile as he leant against the
mantelpiece. ‘When I explain you can rest easy that I am indeed the base
scoundrel your miscalculations forced you to wed.’

Before Rose could raise an objection he went on, ‘First of
all, my dear, how would you have explained to Arabella that the man she
professes herself to be madly in love with is, in fact, not just a philanderer,
but a brute of the first order?’

She was silent.

‘Could you have found the right words to explain it to her?
Would Arabella in fact have understood? It is my understanding that the
mysteries of life are a somewhat neglected part of the education of a young,
unmarried female.’

‘Yarrowby should have been brought to justice,’ Rose
declared, hotly. ‘Then Arabella would never have found herself in such a situation.’

‘Of course, my dear,’ Rampton agreed, admiring the
gold-andenamel snuffbox he withdrew from his coat pocket. ‘Unfortunately,
justice is not always served – most often not served in such situations.
I think you know that.’

‘But how could Yarrowby have the audacity to offer for
Arabella, your own sister-in-law, when he knew you were acquainted with his
crime?’

‘Yarrowby is a conceited villain. But he didn’t know’ —
he stopped abruptly before adding — ‘He has a child, you know. But he
doesn’t know that I know that. He doesn’t in fact believe that what he did was
a crime, much less that it’ll ever be laid at his door. He thought he was quite
safe in offering for Arabella.’

‘She’ll be heartbroken when she discovers the truth. Why did
you allow the romance to progress … when you knew all along? It’ll be so much
harder for her, now.’

Rampton hid his discomfort, saying in a careless tone, ‘Not
when she is the object of so much flattering attention from other quarters.’

‘I perceive you have as much faith in her constancy as you
do in mine.’

He ignored this, saying, ‘Arabella is so unworldly and
ingenuous and this is only her first season out.’ Nevertheless, he was feeling decidedly
guilty as he put his hands on Rose’s shoulders and looked deeply into her face.
‘Rose, I made it quite clear, several times, that I had good reason for warning
you off Yarrowby. For a long time he withdrew his interest and it was only when
you generously provided your sister with a portion that he returned.’

He was glad to see that her eyelids flickered as she
silently acknowledged that she wasn’t guiltless. He went on, ‘I admit that when
I spoke to you of it again, I should have furnished you with specific reasons.
I don’t feel proud of the fact that I felt aggrieved and so instead of speaking
plainly – though I wonder if you would have believed me - I decided to
offer irrefutable evidence, such as has just been given you by young Polly.’

Rose shook off his hand and went to the window. ‘So what do
you plan to do now? Confront Yarrowby and make him withdraw his offer? If you
never intended Arabella to make a match with Lord Yarrowby, don’t you think it
would have been more prudent to have acted earlier?’

‘You forget, Rose, I did try to prevail upon you to trust me
in this.’ She was turning the screws upon his guilt and he didn’t like it. Yes,
he was in the wrong – but so was she. Before she could answer he went on,
‘A man cannot withdraw his offer without risking a breach of contract. Not that
I see Arabella driven by vengeance to such extremes. But Yarrowby is a cad.
Arabella will soon discover this. Yarrowby thinks he is untouchable. He will
soon find out he is not.’

Rose stared at him, as if the truth were only just now
dawning. ‘You’ve played hard and fast with Arabella’s happiness in order to
settle a score, haven’t you? What were you trying to prove? That where justice
could not serve Yarrowby his just desserts, then you could?’

Had there been, unconsciously, an element of this? Rampton
squared his shoulders. To hear it put like that made him distinctly
uncomfortable but he said, smoothly, ‘That was not my first motivation.’ He studied
the snuffbox in his hands. ‘Catherine gave me this,’ he said, opening the lid
and trailing a finger over the engraving. He did not look at Rose to see her
reaction. ‘You may be surprised to learn that lust is not the only motivation
for taking a mistress. There is companionship … often mutual benefits in a wide
range of matters. I was instrumental in her husband’s promotion, incidentally.’
Rampton closed the lid, pocketed the gilt box and directed his wife a level
look. ‘And, of course, there has to be trust. That,’ he finished pointedly, ‘as
much as anything else, is what this was all about.’

He looked at his watch. ‘My dear, we must get ready for Lady
Gunther’s alfresco party.’

Rose could only stare. The flint in his deep blue eyes
belied the easy tone before he delivered his coup de grâce, ‘And I was
genuinely curious as to what kind of a husband you thought you had married.’
His eyes bored into hers with disarming intensity. ‘Quite obviously, you
assumed you had married a petty tyrant.’

‘Naturally I shall withdraw the offer of the house,’
murmured Rose.

‘So now you wish us both to appear tyrants.’ He gave a
mirthless laugh. ‘Do you really want to deprive poor Arabella of any shoulders
to cry on? Now, when is the contract to be signed? Tomorrow?’ Rampton appeared
to be thinking. ‘You must remind Charles that you meant merely to offer the
newlyweds the loan of the Mayfair house but that Arabella won’t come into
possession of any proceeds until she’s twenty-one.’ He chuckled. ‘That should
get Yarrowby’s back up.’

‘Arabella will be crushed. It’s not what was promised.’
Though Rose had no wish, now, to see the marriage go ahead, she felt unbearably
compromised.

‘Of course it is! Besides, Yarrowby is a man of great
fortune.’

Rose, still sickened by her interview with Polly and the
fact Rampton had not disclosed, earlier, the real reason for his objection to
Yarrowby, felt close to tears. ‘How shall I explain it to Arabella? She’s just
out of the schoolroom. I don’t think she’d even understand what … what Yarrowby
is actually guilty of.’

Rose suspected by Rampton’s look that he too deeply
regretted not having been more forthcoming, though to be fair, she had to
accept it was not entirely his fault. Yarrowby had appeared to have withdrawn
his interest in Arabella weeks ago and had only re-emerged as a serious suitor
once the Mayfair house was incorporated into her sister’s dowry. ‘I cannot see
Arabella reneging on this marriage, even though she’s the only one who can cry
off.’

Rampton put his hand on Rose’s shoulder. The gesture, no
doubt meant to be consoling, made her want to pull him down to the sofa beside
her and curl into his arms. She felt ill, both in body and spirit. As she
reached up a hand to stroke his, he pulled away and began to pace, muttering,
‘Far better to show Arabella Yarrowby’s less pleasant side: the real reason, in
fact, behind his interest.’

Staring into the grate, he went on, ‘If Yarrowby is after
Arabella because he loves her, why should it concern him whether the pecuniary
benefits brought by this chit of a girl land in his lap next month, or in three
years’ time? He’ll be devilish put out ’ - thoughtfully he rubbed his chin with
his forefinger - ‘while Arabella will have no choice but to alter her mind and
feelings when her erstwhile adoring swain turns ticklish over a few pence.’