Barbara Metzger (13 page)

Juneclaire rounded up the other kittens and soothed them in their basket, with the familiar sack. She did not want to offend the old man’s hospitality but had to renew her offer: “You have been so kind, Mr. Yerby, and I was no help with the chores at all to speak of, and David won’t be feeding on Mrs. Yerby’s mice for a while still, so will you not accept my shilling for his feed?”

“Nay, lass, you’ll be needing it more. Howbeit you can do something worth more than gold, missy. I couldn’t get to church today without the donkey, not on these old legs, and I never did learn me my letters.” He handed her a worn book. “Would you read me the story?”

So Juneclaire sat on the stool by the fire that Christmas night while the old man leaned back in his chair, one knobby hand resting on his dog’s head, the other stroking a sleeping kitten.

“ ‘And it came to pass in those days,’ ” she began, “ ‘that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.’ ”

H
ome for the holidays. Oh, joy.

St. Cloud meant to head directly to the stables to begin to organize the grooms’ search. Instead, he saw the gardener’s boy race from the gate lodge across the lawns to announce his arrival at the Priory. Oh, blast!

By the time the earl tooled his weary chestnuts through the tree-lined drive, over the bridge at the ornamental lake, past the formal gardens and the maze, a welcoming delegation was waiting in the carriage drive.

His relatives would never be so outré as to demonstrate what might be taken for affection; they’d be waiting in the gold salon having predinner sherry and dissecting his character. St. Cloud Priory kept Town hours, even though Countess Fanny hadn’t been to London in years. Instead, they sent servants to wait outside in the snow. There were two grooms and Foley to help with one curricle, three footmen to carry his bags that had been delivered the day before. His valet, Todd, took one look at the earl and about-faced up the steps to order a hot bath. Talbot, the butler, remained at attention in the open doorway and a maid was there to—Hell, St. Cloud couldn’t figure why a maid was there at all, shivering. He handed her the hatbox and told her to wait inside.

He waved off the footmen and let the grooms take the chestnuts, with orders to double their rations. He held Foley back. The wiry ex-jockey was pale, with a small bandage still on his head.

“Old man, am I glad to see you. How are you feeling?” the earl asked.

“Fairly, my lord, iffen I can say the same? It’s a rare takin’ they been in, up to the house, with me no wiser from talkin’ to that boy you sent with the blunt. I was that worried about the chestnuts, I was,” the older man scolded.

“They’ve taken no harm, I swear. Listen, Foley, I need a groom to ride to London as soon as possible, through the night if the snow doesn’t get worse.”

“I’ll go saddle Lightning, my lord. You have a message for me to take?”

“You’re not going. Find one of the other men, someone you trust.”

“You mean a younger man. I’ll be handin’ in my livery, then.”

“Don’t get all prickly and puss-faced on me, old man. Not now. You’ve been hurt, and I need you here.”

Talbot coughed from up the stairs, subtly. “Old stone britches should shut the door if he’s gettin’ cold,” Foley pointed out, not so quietly, not so subtly.

“Ignore him. Here is the message your man is to give to my secretary at Jordan House: I want every available footman and groom out in Mayfair, going house to house, looking for a housekeeper named Mrs. Simms. Some of the knockers will be off, but they should be able to ask around for the housekeepers’ names.”

Foley pulled at the bandage on his head. “I thought I was the one concussed. Of all the crack-brained starts—”

“Enough, Foley. I am sure there will be more than one lecture waiting for me inside. I do not require yours.”

Foley knew the short limits to the earl’s patience. “Yes, my lord. And when the men find this here Mrs. Simms, what are they supposed to do with her?”

“Send for me, but give Mrs. Simms ten pounds to hold on to the lady—she’ll know who I mean—and keep her safe until I can get there. I also want a man at every posting house that takes coaches coming into Town from Bramley, Springdale, or anywhere closer. They are to look for a lady in a gray, rabbit-lined cloak. She has brown hair and a smile like a Madonna. The man should follow her, find out where she goes, and make bloody hell sure she gets there safe. And send for me. I’ll be in London as soon as possible. Is that clear?”

“Clear as pitch. Every man jack in London is to look for a housekeeper or a pretty chit.”

“Right. Now go, get someone started while there’s still light.”

Foley left, shaking his head and muttering. “I take my eyes off the lad for less’n a day and there’s a female involved. Should’ve known.”

 

“Welcome home, my lord,” Talbot intoned as he bowed the earl through the door. “Merry Christmas, my lord, and may I offer you the felicitations of the day on behalf of the staff and myself. The coincidence of your natal day with the Nativity brings double cause for joy and celebration.” Talbot must have been practicing since yesterday. “The family and guests are in the gold parlor. Shall I announce you?”

“Good Lord, no. I’m not fit for company, much less milady’s dinner table. Tell them to go in without me. I’ll join them later for tea.” He took the hatbox from the blushing maid, who curtsied and fled down the hall. “I have a great many arrangements to make, Talbot. I am sure Todd is seeing to my bath, but could you send up some dinner on a tray? Make that a large dinner. And a basket.”

“A basket, my lord?”

“Large. And a decanter of that cognac my father put down. Large, if I have to face the family later.”

Before St. Cloud could cross the black-and-white tiles of the huge entry hall to reach the arched stairways, his grandmother’s less-than-dulcet tones floated down the hall: “So where is the scapegrace? Been home twenty minutes by my count, two days late, and nary a word for his worried kin. If I hadn’t sent my maid out, we’d be sitting here like ninnies not knowing if he was dead or alive. Why, the jackanapes could have expired on the doorstep, and without an heir, mind you.”

The dowager’s words were punctuated by raps of her cane and, since she couldn’t see what she was thumping, muffled oaths and tumbled footstools. “Sad lack of manners you taught the boy, Fanny. No sense of responsibility either, the rakehell. I’ve been sitting all day in this mausoleum among confounded strangers waiting for the whopstraw to show, instead of being home in my own comfort with my own people. Deuced if I’ll stay here all night waiting on his convenience. Be like waiting for your haunt to come, Fanny. I’m going home. Talbot! Munch! Get the carriage! Where’s my wrap?”

Before St. Cloud could flee upstairs past Talbot’s stiff-spined, measured tread, the dowager’s cane rapping started down the hall, followed by the crash of china. Lady Fanny’s fluttery “Mother St. Cloud, please” came after. “What about dinner? Oh, I feel ill.”

“Not in front of the guests, you ninny.” That from Uncle Harmon. “Who’s got the vinaigrette? Where’s that blasted Talbot? No, Florrie, we won’t burn feathers under Fanny’s nose. Give Lady Pomeroy back her headpiece, you clunch. Elsbeth, stop batting your eyelashes at the admiral. Get over here and help your aunt.”

Welcome home, my lord.

St. Cloud’s silent appearance in the gold salon put an end to all the commotion except the dowager’s flailing cane and demands for her carriage. “I am here, Grandmother, so you can stop enacting us a Cheltenham tragedy and upsetting Lady Fanny. I simply did not wish to present myself in all my dirt.”

The dowager sniffed when he kissed her powdered and rouged cheek. “I can tell why. So what fustian are you going to give us for being two days late and near missing your own birthday party?”

“Why, Grandmother, you should know me better than that. I haven’t seen fit to explain my actions since my youth. Surely you don’t expect a rakeshame to make excuses?”

The dowager cackled and banged her cane down on Talbot’s foot. The butler did not disgrace his calling by more than a wince, St. Cloud observed, as the earl turned to kiss his mother’s brow, removing a lavender-soaked handkerchief to do so. “I am sorry if I interfered in your plans, my lady. You should know better than to fret over me.”

“Dear boy, how could I not? My condition . . .”

St. Cloud was already shaking hands with his cousin, ignoring the younger Wilmott’s smug looks. Niles was wearing white satin knee breeches, a white satin coat, and a white waistcoat picked out with red-and-green embroidered holly. None of it paid for, most likely. St. Cloud took great care to pat Niles on the shoulder in greeting, leaving a smudge. His cousin Elsbeth presented the tips of her fingers for his salute, her nose wrinkled. “That’s more than travel dust, St. Cloud.”

Uncle Harmon Wilmott did not put his hand out or step closer. He nodded curtly, frowning. “I think you could show more remorse for turning the house upside down and upsetting your mother’s delicate nerves.”

“Do you, Uncle?” The earl spoke slowly, deliberately, watching the color rise in the baronet’s pouchy face.

Lady Fanny was quick to step into the silence, although she found interchanges between her son and her brother particularly wearing. “Yes, dearest, I was quite overset to think something must have happened to you, and there was the bother of redoing the seating plan, you know. I don’t see what I would have done without Harmon’s support. It’s been that way for years, of course, and we mustn’t let Harmon think we’re ungrateful, dear.”

St. Cloud bowed in his uncle’s direction but did not add to his mother’s words. She held a gray filmy scarf to her cheek. “You really should have been here,” she reproved. “Harmon had to light the Yule log in your place. You know the head of the household holds that honor.”

“I am certain Uncle Harmon found no difficulty in usurping my . . . honors.” He turned to greet others of the company while his mother searched for her hartshorn.

Lord, even Sydelle Pomeroy was dressed—or undressed—to the nines. Red silk with nothing under it, unless he missed his guess.

“I knew you wouldn’t forsake us, my lord,” she breathed, making his appearance a compliment to her undeniable beauty.

“ ‘Us,’ my lady? How could I forsake you when I did not know you would be here?” The sultry widow had been after St. Cloud’s title as long as Cousin Niles had been after her fortune. Lady Pomeroy had been Uncle Harmon’s wife’s godchild and milked the tenuous relationship for all the invitations she could. She and Niles made a fine pair: cold, calculating, and conceited.

Damn, he wished they were all gone! Then St. Cloud remembered Junco—he hadn’t thought of her for at least five minutes—and her wishes. An evil kind of grin came over his face, lips half quirked, eyes slightly narrowed. Only Niles recognized the St. Cloud smile for what it was and left off denigrating the earl’s shabby manners. St. Cloud stepped back to the hall and returned with the hat-box.

Aunt Florrie clapped her hands together. “Oh, goody! You brought us a present!”

“My gifts to you must still be with my baggage upstairs, Aunt Florrie. This was a present given to me, which I was going to take upstairs, if I had been permitted. Since you’ve all made me feel so welcome, I’ll share it with you.”

He tipped Pansy out to the floor, and the piglet headed straight for the scent of biscuits, in ladies’ hands, on low tables, and under gentlemen’s pumps, where crumbs were ground into the Aubusson carpet. So Juneclaire was right, St. Cloud acknowledged. Christmas wishes come true. The room was almost clear in no time, the indomitable Talbot having the presence of mind to announce dinner. Juneclaire was right about another thing: a man with a pig really did have more opportunity to smile. St. Cloud was positively beaming.

None of those remaining in the parlor seemed to share his good humor, except for Florrie, who had tied a napkin around Pansy’s neck and was helping her sip from the hastily discarded sherry glasses. The dowager was shouting to know what was going on, and how could everyone have gone into dinner without her taking precedence. Niles was snickering at more evidence of his cousin’s gaucherie, and Lady Fanny had collapsed back on the sofa.

“Come, Mother, they cannot start without you.” The earl half lifted his mother into Niles’s arms. “Uncle Harmon, I am sure I can leave you to escort Lady St. Cloud into dinner.”

Lord Wilmott was seething, his jowls quivering. “How dare you, sir, shame your mother by setting an animal loose in her drawing room? How could you bring such disgrace to this house?”

St. Cloud took out his quizzing glass, blessing Charlie Parrett for treating it kindly, and surveyed the overturned furniture, the broken glassware, and, finally, the livid baronet. “Odd,” he drawled. “I thought this was my house.” He bowed. “My ladies, I shall see you after dinner.”

“
H
ogwash,” St. Cloud told his cousin Niles. “The man works for me. If Todd can’t look after one little pig for an evening, he’s not worth his wages.”

The efficient, even-tempered, and elegant gentleman’s gentleman was worth a fortune, which was about what it took to convince Todd to play swineherd for a few hours. St. Cloud had no intention of discussing his domestic arrangements with Niles, however, not even to rid the coxcomb of that supercilious grin.

Todd had wrought miracles. The pig was fed, walked, and bedded down in St. Cloud’s dressing room, with promises that Pansy would be installed in the stables tomorrow. And St. Cloud was combed, brushed, and polished to a fare-thee-well, from glossy black curls to glossy black footwear. His cheeks were as smooth as a baby’s bottom, and the bruise on his face was almost unnoticeable. With his muscle-molding white Persian knee smalls, wide-shouldered black coat of Bath superfine and stark white linen enlivened only by an emerald stickpin the color of his eyes, he made Niles look like a man-milliner and the squire’s sturdy sons look like bumpkins.