Barbara Metzger (6 page)

“But I don’t know you, sir. You’ve never given me your name.”

He bowed slightly over the reins. “Courtney Choate, Viscount Chase, at your service, ma’am.”

Kathlyn thought he might have muttered “Damn it all” at the end.

Chapter Six

“It’s snowing, you great looby. What do you mean leaving a girl out in the street with your horses? Bring her in, m’lord. Bring her in.” Nanny Dawson hustled the viscount back out the door, clucking her tongue. “Since when did I ever turn away a friend of yours? As if I would now, in your very own house. Yes, yes, I know it’s my home, and you wouldn’t bring a guest in without asking, but the poor child must be half frozen to death.”

“She’s not a child, and she’s not a friend. She’s simply someone who needs help.”

Nanny stood in the doorway, her woolen shawl protecting her head from the weather, while the viscount limped over to the curricle. “And weren’t you always bringing me those injured creatures to mend?” she asked.

Kathlyn felt just like a battered, broken-winged sparrow, one the cat wouldn’t drag home, much less a titled gentleman. Still, the cozy figure in the lighted doorway was like a welcoming beacon to warmth, sustenance, safety.

Nanny was a whirlwind in the little parlor, taking off Kathlyn’s cloak, adding more coal to the fire, pushing an old dog off the chintz-covered sofa so Kathlyn could
sit closest to the hearth. While Courtney was seeing to his horses, Mrs. Dawson bustled back and forth to the kitchen, the closet, the bedrooms, chattering on nineteen to the dozen.

“What is this world coming to when no one watches over innocent young lambs?” She added another dash of rum to the china teapot. “To ward off the chill. Or would you rather have sherry? I’ll just set out some of both for you, dearie. And there’s my good lamb stew heating up. They never do feed a body right at those posting houses, do they? Five days on the road, you poor poppet? It’s no wonder you’re all afrazzle.” She fetched another quilt to put over Kathlyn’s feet, and refilled the glass of sherry.

“I’ll get Little George to make up a fire in the master bedroom as soon as he’s done helping his lordship with the horses. George is my man-of-all-work that Master Courtney thought I needed. Protection, he calls it, but seeing how George is deaf and dumb, I don’t know how much help he’d be. Still, no one else would hire him, and he does carry the coal upstairs for me.”

Nanny brought in the stew and a bottle of brandy, then started to unbraid Kathlyn’s wet hair while she ate. “I call it the master bedroom,” she went on as if there were no interruption, “because I keep it nice in case Master Courtney wants to stay over, but he seldom does, and he won’t tonight, so you needn’t worry about your reputation, dearie.”

Kathlyn wasn’t worried about anything, her reputation or her tomorrow or where she was going to sleep. One more sip of the hot tea laced with rum—more like rum laced with tea, by now—and she’d sleep right there, on the spaniel-smelling sofa. Nanny put another blanket over her.

       “You did as you ought,” the older woman told the viscount when he came in from the carriage mews behind the small row house, stamping snow off his boots. “But then, you always do.” She took away an empty dish whose remains looked suspiciously like his favorite lamb stew, nodding toward the mound on the couch. “Poor dear looks worn to a shade.”

She looked like a ragamuffin to him, with a comforter pulled up to her reddened nose, black hair every which way on a towel, and skin the color of the snow he was still brushing off his pant legs. “You don’t think she’s ailing, do you?”

“No, a few days in bed will see roses back in her cheeks, I’m sure.”

Mrs. Dawson’s words roused Kathlyn from her stupor, not enough to sit up, but enough to mumble through the blankets over her face, “No, I have to go to the agencies tomorrow, to find a position and a place to stay.”

“You’ll do no such thing, miss. You have years ahead of you to be a governess. I won’t hear of you starting until you’ve had a good long rest. Why, you might have taken a chill, isn’t that right, my lord?”

Courtney was sipping his brandy, standing on his bad leg, still in his damp clothes. No one was going to invite him to sit by the fire, he was beginning to realize, or offer him stew or sympathy. “You’ll find that you cannot tell Miss Partland anything, Nanny. She has to do things her own pigheaded way.”

Kathlyn couldn’t let such an insult pass over her, lest Mrs. Dawson think she was an obstinate, ungrateful chit. She sat up, pulled the quilt down, and opened her eyes. “I’m sure Mrs. Dawson’s advice is sensible and well founded, not simply an ultimatum issued out of a misguided feeling of superiority.”

“Ah, coming the soldier with you, was he? That’s what comes of sending boys off to war, I always say. You spend a lifetime smoothing the rough edges off the little hellions, and the army puts them back. Give his lordship time with gentler folks, he’ll come around.”

Courtney didn’t even bother defending himself or the army. Nanny was still riled that he’d gone off to war, he knew, outraged that he’d come home injured. She blamed Lord Wellington personally for not looking after her nursling better.

“I thought that kind of arrogance was bred in the blood,” Kathlyn noted, still smarting from the viscount’s ill opinion of her. Pigheaded indeed. She glared at him.

“I—” Courtney got no further. The chit had the most glorious black-rimmed, blue eyes he’d ever seen. They were shadowed with weariness, but still flashing with spirit and little dancing flecks. And all that black hair must come to past her waist, at least. The girl was too thin, of course, with a pinched look about her, but, by George, Lady Rotterdean must never have seen Miss Partland in person!

Nanny hadn’t even noticed his lapse, refilling Kathlyn’s cup and retucking the blankets around her. “You want some pride in a lad, dearie, else you’ve got a man with no strength of his convictions.”

Lord Chase’s convictions were undergoing a severe trial. At least his blood was warm again.

“And if it’s governessing you want to do”—Nanny talked while she toweled those long, silky, black locks— “why, I have just the thing. My daughter Meg is close to being confined with her third child and feeling poorly. I’ve been watching over the other two, but I’d like to sit more with my girl. Her husband’s a law clerk and can’t stay home with her or the youngsters. The boy is a bright one who should be off to school, but his mam can’t part with him. And my little Angela is ready to learn her letters, I’d guess. So you can look after them a bit in a day or two, while you catch your breath, so to speak.”

The good Lord
did
answer prayers. In His own good time, but at least Kathlyn could rest easy for now.

Not so his lordship. Nanny was shoving him into his greatcoat. “Get on home with you now, our Miss Kathlyn needs her sleep.”

The chit hadn’t been here an hour, and she was “our” Miss Kathlyn, Courtney thought with a degree of resentment commensurate with the discomfort of a cold, hungry drive back to Choate House.

“I’ve packed up some of my liniment in a jar,” Nanny told him on the way to the door. “You can heat it when you get home. Your stableman will know how, if you can’t do it.”

The stableman? No one was going to massage Courtney’s leg or listen to his troubles? No one was going to make sure he was warm and dry and well fed? Bloody hell, even old Wolfie was curled at Miss Part-land’s feet while Nanny was tossing out the owner of the house. Courtney fumed, pulling his collar up and his hat down; he’d pulled some rubbishing waif out of a blizzard and now he was yesterday’s kippers? And it was still snowing, Courtney observed in silent outrage as he rehitched his horses to the curricle without Little George’s assistance. Little George, who had to stoop to pass under the doorframe, was carrying water for “our” Miss Kathlyn’s bath. Blast!

* * * *

Kathlyn slept the night through. She awoke to find herself in a damask-draped bedchamber, in her own cotton nightgown. A weak winter sun was beginning to peek through the pulled curtains, so the storm must be over. A fire was burning brightly in the hearth, and a cup of chocolate rested on the bedside table along with a buttered roll. Kathlyn ate, drank, smiled, and went back to sleep.

Not so his lordship. Viscount Chase ate—cold chicken—and he drank—more brandy than was good for him—but he didn’t sleep. Since he hadn’t bothered with the liniment, his leg was aching too badly for him to get comfortable. Besides, Courtney had an idea. It was an idea so grand, so marvelously comprehensive, that he couldn’t wait to share it. In one fell swoop, one night and an outlay of blunt, he could resolve all of his problems.

Miss Partland needed a position. Courtney needed a mistress. How simple! She was too honorable, or too unyielding, he thought, to go back on her word of confidentiality once given. Furthermore, she didn’t know anyone, anyway, so she couldn’t gossip. His secrets would be safe.

And she wouldn’t need a mask at the Cyprians’ Ball, not to hide those magnificent eyes. Instead, Lord Chase decided, there in his study a long way from Kensington, he’d costume Miss Partland like a houri, with her inky hair flowing down her back and a diamond hanging from a chain at the center of her forehead. He’d have her bare governess bones covered in filmy, flowing drapery so no one could think he was too miserly to keep her well fed. Scheherazade, he saw in his mind’s eye, with bells on her fingers and her ankles bare. Oh yes, and she’d have a gauze veil over her nose (in case it was still red) and the lower part of her face, adding mystery, allure, and hopefully silence. Perhaps the shrew would even keep her mouth shut, with that caustic tongue in it.

He’d parade her around for everyone to see. No, that didn’t match the air castle he was building, not with his limp. He’d arrive late, that was it, and make a grand entrance. The sultan and his odalisque? Too obvious. He’d wear his own dress clothes instead, with a sapphire in his neckcloth, perhaps, if he could find one to match her eyes. No mask, for that would defeat the whole purpose.

A brief appearance would be enough to establish his reputation as a connoisseur of women. Then he could go courting. The viscount was determined to wed this very Season, to be done with clacking tongues and cold baths. He’d find himself an innocent young bride, and he’d make dashed certain of it this time, sweeping some rosy, rounded, sweet little miss off her feet the same night she made her first curtsy at Almack’s.

By then he’d be long rid of the maggoty female installed in Kensington. He’d pay Miss Partland off and get her out of London, out of his life, out of Nanny’s parlor. He didn’t like going home as if he were a tot leaving the candy shop empty-handed. Duty to the downtrodden was well and good, but did it require such instant devotion? Courtney didn’t like feeling childishly jealous of his nursemaid’s attachment to a foundling either! He only hoped he could act the smitten swain for the occasion of the Cyprians’ Ball. Of course he could. Miss Partland wasn’t an antidote, and her ill fortune was not entirely her fault. Besides, she could make up for his miserable evening and miserable temper in one night at the Argyle Rooms.

Peeling more charitable, the viscount thought that perhaps he’d send Miss Partland to his mother in Trowbridge when their performance was done. It was respectable and it was far away. Yes, that would serve.

* * * *

So enamored of his idea was Lord Chase that he didn’t think of the impropriety of sending his paramour to act as companion to his mother. Nanny did, along with the evil of ruining a good girl’s reputation. She wasn’t having any of it.

“But it won’t be for real. Nan. Your lamb’s virtue is safe as houses, I assure you. And we’ll change her name, so no one has to know it was Kathlyn Partland at the ball. One night, and she’ll earn a year’s worth of governess wages.”

“ ‘Tain’t right, and that’s all I’m going to say until Miss Kathlyn wakes up. She won’t do it, so I can save my breath. She’s a good girl, our Miss Kathlyn.”

“Well, I aim to try, and I’ll wager she accepts the offer. She must feel some gratitude to me for bringing her here, and she needs the blunt. Besides, her life must have been so dull, she’ll jump at the chance for an adventure! It’s not as though anything interesting ever happens to impoverished tutors’ dowerless daughters.”

Chapter Seven

It wasn’t snowing, but it was so cold, the Thames was freezing over. And hell would freeze over, too, before Kathlyn Partland accepted such an outrageous offer.

Courtney had had to wait until late afternoon to see Miss Partland alone. Clucking her tongue and muttering about men having muscles where their brains should be, Nanny went off to visit her daughter. Kathlyn was on the sofa again, a blanket over her knees. Her hair was braided and coiled at the back of her neck, and she wore a high-necked, low-fashioned gown whose shapelessness was as unattractive as its muddy color. Very governessy indeed, except for the spots of high color on her ivory cheeks.

The viscount was being polite, inquiring for her health and fetching the tea things. He thought he was being subtle, too.

Kathlyn thought he was being a clunch. “You wish to hire me to be an actress? My father would have a stroke. Of course, my father did have a stroke or I wouldn’t be in this position. But no, of course not. Performing in public is not a respectable occupation, you must know.”

  “Yes, but this is only for one night. Miss Partland.” He was seated next to her on the sofa so they could share the plate of scones. He tried to look sincere. ‘Struth, he was sincere. “One night, that’s all I ask of you.”

Kathlyn stirred her tea, pretending to deliberate for courtesy’s sake. “I did take part in amateur theatricals once at the vicarage. Precisely what character is it that you wish me to portray?”

“My mistress.”

The dog had sense enough to run away.

“I have never seen such a female for flying into the boughs,” Courtney said, rubbing his cheek. “I said you’d be performing a role for one night, not performing naked dances on top of a table. I did
not
proposition you actually to
be
my mistress. By Jupiter, nothing was further from my thoughts.”