Betina Krahn (56 page)

Remington sighed with resignation and propped his chin on his hand, against the arm of the sofa. Antonia
watched his eyes close and saw his pained expression as Basil Trueblood rattled on with his list of hopelessly unflattering compliments. She couldn’t help smiling just a little. He had obviously expected more from this visit. It seemed to really matter to him that Everstone and Trueblood reclaim their wives.

He must have felt her gaze on him, for he looked up just then and caught her staring at him. His slow, wistful smile was irresistible. She let the warmth she was feeling rise into her face, while memories of his loving began to stir powerfully in her. It was a minute before she realized he was standing and speaking, responding to something Hoskins was saying to her. Then he turned to her and the sense of it righted in her head: the butler had announced more callers.

“Who?” She scowled at Hoskins. “Who, did you say?”

“Lord Woolworth, ma’am.” The old butler looked down at the cards he held, squinted, and shoved them out to full arm’s length. “Also a Lord Richard Searle … and that Mr. Howard fellow … him of the excessively sharp revers.”

She turned on Remington, who took his time meeting her eyes. “The rest of them, too? What would you have done if I had tossed the lot of you out on your coattails?”

“I had faith that your fairness and good judgment would rule,” he said, producing a smile that was both mischievous and endearing. And she knew he lied. He wasn’t counting on her head, he was counting on her hopelessly soft heart to win his battle for him. And it looked as if his faith in it hadn’t been misplaced.

No sooner had Everstone and Trueblood bade their wives good-bye and departed, than she found her drawing room being invaded by three more men she had sworn never to allow through her door again. The sight of them stirred a confusing mix of feelings in her. Each carried
flowers, each wore his most dashing clothes, and each greeted her with a blend of trepidation and grim deference.

Again she let them stand and shift uneasily while she sent Hoskins for their wives. Elizabeth, Daphne, and Ca-mille arrived forthwith, their faces flushed becomingly and their eyes bright. When they glimpsed Antonia’s erect, crossed-arms posture, they halted in the doorway, shoulder to shoulder. They were sensible and clever and capable, Antonia thought with some pride. But they were also warm-hearted and forgiving. She glanced at the handsome faces and brimming bouquets of flowers they faced, and she sighed, preparing herself for the worst.

With considerable dignity they accepted the flowers and refrained from eyeing the boxes under their husbands’ arms. Richard Searle held out his hand to little blond Daphne expecting to escort her to a seat, but she surprised him by withholding it.

“Come with me, Daphne,” he said emphatically. “I have a few things to say to you … in private.”

Daphne’s pale perfection grew a bit paler, but she lifted her chin and made herself say: “You have already said a great deal to me in private, Richard. For now, anything you have to say to me must be said in public … or at least before my dearest friends.”

“Now, Daphne,” he ground out with an edge of warning, his face and shoulders swelling with bruised pride and irritation.

“No!” she shouted fiercely, startling him back a step. “I said no and I meant it!” she continued forcefully. “I’ll not suffer your wretched outbursts of temper in silence anymore, Richard!”

Everyone in the room stood as if bolted to the floor, their ears ringing. When the sound died away, he stood in complete shock, fumbling for a response. She reddened slightly, seeming a little unsettled by her own blast, then
took herself in hand. Crossing her arms over her chest, in imitation of Antonia’s adamant pose, she lowered her voice.

“I am sorry, Richard, but I thought you should learn the way it feels to be yelled at before others—the servants, your family, even waiters in restaurants. It is not a very pleasant experience.”

“I … well … I …” Searle’s face set like granite and his tongue seemed to have turned to stone as well.

“I’m quite sure you don’t raise your voice to your gentlemen friends, Richard. And I believe I deserve at least the respect you would show to them.” She steeled herself. “Are you willing to talk with me as if I am a reasonable being?”

All of his carefully prepared speeches had been blasted out of his head. He nodded and, in a desperate move, handed Daphne the flat box he carried. When she accepted it, he seemed to find his tongue. “I thought you might like to have some music to sing by.” He gestured to the box. “I got you some. I … miss your singing.”

Daphne met his darkened eyes, gave him a wary but warming smile, and put out her hand. Together they moved to a settee near the window.

Antonia watched them go, feeling oddly reassured. Of all the brides that had returned to her, she would have judged Daphne the most tender and vulnerable. Daphne’s firm stance with her overpowering husband left Antonia feeling there might actually be some hope for them all to better their lot.

Lord Carter Woolworth stepped forward and handed Elizabeth a small package, asking her to open it. She did so with trembling hands and found a printed note card inside. “Read it,” he said quietly.

“Lady Penelope Woolworth, Countess Dunroven, is receiving guests at Dunroven Hall, Kewes, Sussex,” she read
aloud. For a moment she stared at it, frowning, uncertain what it meant.

“Not that she will have many guests,” Woolworth said, edging closer. “But if she entertains, it will be there, or nowhere. She no longer lives in my house, Elizabeth.”

Antonia watched Elizabeth’s tenuous smile as she settled on the settee by the pianoforte with him. Then she turned back in time to see Bertrand Howard removing a pair of thick spectacles from his pocket and donning them. Camille watched him in astonishment.

“I think you should know … you are looking at a new man, Camille,” he said in a dry voice. “I have taken to wearing spectacles. I have probably needed them for some years. Vanity kept me from wearing them … the same way vanity kept me from seeing you.”

Her jaw dropped. “Bertrand, are you saying your eyesight is bad?”

He swallowed hard and plunged ahead. “I don’t always scowl because I’m displeased, Camille. Sometimes I am simply squinting in order to see better. I didn’t mean to look through you. Sometimes I just couldn’t see that you were there at all. And that is the most inexcusable of wrongs … not seeing you.”

Camille blinked, disarmed by his admission, and by the thickness of the glass that magnified his eyes and made him look owlish and a bit comical. She pressed her lips together to prevent a laugh, and it was a minute before she could speak.

“Do you expect me to believe you ignored me—wouldn’t speak to me or take me anywhere, or introduce me, or simply talk with me—because you couldn’t see me?”

“It’s the truth, Camille … in part.” He squared his shoulders and admitted: “The other part is that I’m just a terrible bonehead.”

Camille stood looking at him, watching his discomfort,
sensing a new sincerity in his manner. “Yes, you are a bonehead. A very infuriating and annoying and self-absorbed bonehead.” As she spoke, he held out a small, delicately wrapped package to her. She accepted it hesitantly and at his urging opened it.

Inside was another pair of spectacles. She frowned and held them up.

“I don’t need spectacles, Bertrand Howard. There is nothing wrong with
my
eyesight.”

“I know, Camille,” he said, moving closer. “You have lovely eyes, splendid eyes. But I would like you to wear these lenses when you are looking at my faults.” He winced appealingly. “They make everything look smaller.”

Surprise melted Camille’s reserve and she allowed herself to smile. And they were soon seated on the middle sofa, talking.

There were no blinding revelations, no wrenching reconciliations in the drawing room that afternoon. But as Antonia showed the gentlemen out and then watched the Bentick brides climbing the stairs with hopeful faces, she realized they had made a start at reworking and reclaiming their loves and their lives. As she turned toward the drawing room, she saw Remington standing in the middle of the room, watching her through the doorway, and she went soft inside.

“It was you, wasn’t it?” she demanded as she joined him. “You were responsible for the flowers and the gifts and the speeches.” His ears reddened and a small guilty smile appeared. Irresistible smile. Irresistible man. “Those spectacles … they had to be your idea. They were just the right balance of the absurd and the touching. And you probably told Trueblood not to shave for several days, so he’d look
perfectly
pathetic.” She couldn’t hold back the smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. “Lord, what a devious man you are, Remington Carr.”

He took her into his arms and kissed her deeply.

“Not devious enough, apparently,” he said against her lips. “I’m still a bachelor. And it feels as if I’m going to be the last bachelor on earth.”

She escorted him upstairs to see Cleo, and after a short visit he declared that he had to leave. He had work waiting at his offices and intended to stop by Uncle Paddington’s town house to see if the newlyweds had returned yet. Promising to send word if he found them at home, he gave her a quick kiss and warned that he and the husbands would be back the next afternoon to continue their courtship. It was as good as an admission that this scheme was indeed a “courtship” … and that its true object was her heart.

And he was gone before Hoskins could say, “Smug bastard.”

With Antonia’s kiss still warm on his lips, Remington went straight to his offices, where he spent a miserable afternoon. The bank had called in several of his “call notes” and proved reluctant to discuss the situation with him. He managed to set up an appointment with Sir Neville Thurs-ton for the following morning, then left his offices, feeling a bit grim despite the day’s personal successes. He stopped by Uncle Paddington’s house and found him expected home later that evening. Deciding not to wait, he promised to call first thing the next morning and headed home himself.

With his mind set on a hearty supper and a bit of port, he relaxed back in the seat of his carriage, considering the possibility of creeping up the back stairs of Paxton House, to Antonia’s room, without being seen. He sighed as he thought of the intrigue and tension involved. How much better it would be to have supper across the table from her,
to share a bit of wine with her, and then to take her by the hand and lead her upstairs to their marriage bed … where no one would disturb them until noon unless they permitted it.

How long would it take, he wondered, for her to understand that it was meant to be and give herself up to the idea of marrying him? He had only five days before the queen’s deadline. He told himself there was a reasonable chance that he could get her to agree to an engagement in that time. Perhaps the queen’s expectations could be fulfilled by an engagement announcement. And in any case—how much damage could the queen do him in two or three days’ time?

The front door of his house swung open, and he handed Martin, the underbutler, his hat, gloves, and cane. “You have visitors, sir,” Martin said, looking a bit harried. “In the drawing room.”

Remington’s footsteps rang off the marble floors and reverberated around the marble walls of the huge entry hall. It was odd that Phipps wasn’t there to meet him, he realized—just as he pushed back the half-open doors and spotted the butler sitting on a straight chair, being restrained by two burly men. Up from the nearby sofa sprang two others dressed in dark suits and holding black bowlers in their hands. As he lurched into the room, glaring at them, Phipps tried to rise, calling out: “I’m so sorry, your lordship. There was nothing I could do!”

They pushed him down onto the chair again, and the doors slammed shut behind Remington. He whirled to find two uniformed constables brandishing nightsticks, blocking his avenue of escape.

“Remington Carr, Earl of Landon?” One of the two men in suits came toward him, looking him over with a pugnacious thoroughness.

“I am the Earl of Landon,” he answered with scarcely
contained outrage. “And who the hell are you … to barge into my house and lay hands on my butler like this?”

“I’m Inspector Gibbons of Scotland Yard. It is my duty to place you under arrest, your lordship, in the name of the queen.” He jerked his head, ordering the two toughs who held Phipps to release him and seize Remington instead.

“What?” Remington was too stunned to react at first, and they seized him without much of a struggle. “You must be joking—on what grounds?”

The inspector waved a Queen’s Bench warrant, then tucked it back into his breast pocket and rocked up and down on his toes. “There’s a list of ‘whereases’ and ‘wherefores’ as long as my arm, your lordship. But they all boil down to ‘corruption of public morals.’ Take him away, gents.”

“This is an outrage!” Remington declared fiercely, planting his feet to resist, his patrician pride at full swell. “I demand that you unhand me—or, better yet, that you convey me straight to Buckingham Palace! I demand to be permitted to speak with the queen!”

“Oh, I don’t think she’d want to be seein’ you, your lordship,” the inspector said, unimpressed by Remington’s invocation of noble privilege. “It was
her
and the PM what brought the complaint in the first place.”