Byron's Child (18 page)

It was the first time the earl had issued an invitation. Jodie had no hesitation in ascribing it to his new-found respect for his betrothed. She envied Emily, though she had decided long since that dashing, handsome, macho Lord Thorncrest was not what she wanted. An arranged marriage might have its drawbacks but undeniably it added a certain sense of security to the courting process, a security Jodie was far from feeling in any aspect of her life.

At least, since Harry was still in Kent, Giles had no excuse not to go with them to the ball at Devonshire House.

Chapter Fifteen

“I’m glad to see you’re not wearing your livery to this affair,” said Giles as Jodie joined him in the living room. “A ball gown suits you much better.”

“I only hope all the gossipmongers do not recognize it.” The amber silk had been retrimmed with knots of rich brown velvet ribbon. “Charlotte wanted to buy me a new one but I simply could not accept it. Sometimes I think she has forgotten that I am not really your sister, that I have no possible claim on her and Roland.”

“I know what you mean, even though I am distantly related. Fortunately a gentleman is not expected to turn out in a new coat for every occasion.

“You are prodigious elegant in black and white. Do you ever wear a tux at home?”

“A dinner jacket? As rarely as possible. You should see me in my robes for the state opening of Parliament.”

“You mean you get all dressed up in red velvet and ermine and parade around the House of Lords? Oh Giles, not a coronet?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Now that I have to see to believe.” She giggled.

“I’ve only done it a couple of times, but I do go up now and then to speak on scientific matters. I wear a white lab coat; it seems to impress people.”

“You constantly surprise me. I did not know you had any interest in government.”

“Noblesse oblige. Given a free soapbox, I feel it’s my duty to stand on it occasionally. Roland’s the same, I may say.  He’d rather steer clear of the place and tend his acres. However,” he added, deliberately sententious, “we Faringdales have duty bred in the bone.”

“And pomposity,” Jodie snorted. “It’s Roland’s besetting sin. If it wasn’t for that, his other faults might be easier to overlook, because he’s not a bad guy in lots of ways.”

“I shall endeavour to overcome my inherited tendency to pomposity,” said Giles solemnly.

“Idiot. I never met anyone less pompous in my life.”

The others came in and they all set off for Lord Thorncrest’s house. Emily was wearing deep rose with a white lace overdress. Jodie thought she had never seen her look so happy and carry herself with such confidence. It was amazing what simply having her opinion consulted had done for her, and all because the earl had recognized Jodie in the Royal Saloon.

His lordship came out to his vestibule to greet them, and escorted them to the drawing room. To Jodie’s surprise, he had also invited a number of his own relatives, all appearing perfectly respectable. His younger brother and his wife, both plump and cheerful, welcomed Emily with open arms. There were also an aunt and uncle, and their daughter with her husband, all amiable if uninteresting.

Emily met them with composure and joined in the conversation, which centered around Princess Charlotte’s coming marriage to Prince Leopold. Though Lord Thorncrest listened with a cynical air to the romantic raptures of the ladies, Jodie noticed that more than once he cast a glance of approval toward Emily. Towards Jodie, his attitude could only be described as wary.

After a few minutes, he took Emily aside and spoke to her privately and briefly. She colored, hesitated for a moment, then nodded, whereupon he took her hand and led her back to the group. There was an expectant hush.

Thorncrest cleared his throat and tugged at his neckband with an uncharacteristic uncertainty. “Most of you know, or have guessed,” he began, “that Miss Emily and I have been unofficially engaged for some weeks. I wish to announce that she has done me the honour of agreeing to make the betrothal official. A notice will be sent to the papers immediately.”

There was some applause and a great deal of kissing and congratulating, and then they went in to dinner.

Emily was seated at the earl’s right hand and Jodie was some way down the table, but she watched the couple whenever she could spare attention from her neighbours.

To her exasperation, she saw that Emily had returned to her bashful reticence. Lord Thorncrest helped her to the most delicate morsels with evident solicitude, but then he had never treated her with less than courtesy since Jodie had known them. She wondered whether his attitude had really changed.

Most of the party were not going on to Devonshire House. Rather than fit a sixth person into the Faringdales’ carriage, thus endangering the ladies’ gowns, Thorncrest suggested that he should take up Emily.

Emily looked alarmed, and Charlotte a trifle worried, but Roland considered it a most suitable notion which settled the matter.

“Don’t worry, he can’t eat you,” Jodie whispered to Emily, squeezing her hand. “If he misbehaves, remind him that I shall await him at Devonshire House.”

Emily managed a feeble giggle.

In fact, it was she and the earl who arrived first, as Roland’s coachman had settled comfortably in the Thorncrest kitchens and had to be routed out. When Jodie reached the ballroom of the vast mansion on Piccadilly, Emily and Thorncrest were among the dozens of couples already on the floor. Fortunately, Giles managed to find the four of them seats near the set in which the pair were dancing.

“Oh dear, what has gone wrong?” Charlotte said softly to Jodie. “I thought Emily was quite comfortable with him, but they are as stiff as marionettes.”

“I don’t know,” said Jodie, frowning, “but you may be assured that I mean to find out.”

The dance ended. The earl brought his woebegone partner to join her family. He looked puzzled. It was hardly possible to embark upon an interrogation in the ballroom, but to Jodie’s surprise he abruptly asked her to stand up with him for the next set.

“All right—I mean, thank you, my lord, that will be delightful. Only let us not dance. I want to talk to you.”

Again the wary look entered his eyes, but he said grimly, “Precisely my own desire. Pray take my arm, Miss Judith, and we shall find somewhere less crowded. However,” he added, “I am not going anywhere with you unless you wipe that scowl off your face.”

Jodie forced her lips into a bright smile. Charlotte was anxiously whispering to Emily. Giles and Roland—typical men!—apparently had no idea anything was amiss. Jodie took Thorncrest’s arm and they made their way around the ballroom.

There were several anterooms. They decided the card room was the most appropriate for their purpose, inhabited as it was by matrons playing silver loo and gentlemen of all ages with more serious games in mind. There were a number of small tables set up for piquet players, and at one of these Lord Thorncrest seated Jodie.

A footman brought cards and another offered a tray of champagne-filled glasses. The earl accepted both.

“A game of piquet, Miss Judith,” he asked politely, setting one glass before her.

“I do not want a drink and I cannot play piquet.”

“Pretend. We cannot sit here doing nothing, and I refuse to play pinochle in public. It will only arouse attention. I shan’t dun you for my winnings.” He removed a number of cards from the pack, shuffled and began to deal.

She glared at him. “What did you do to Emily?” she demanded.

“Nothing.” He shrugged helplessly. “That is, nothing but ask her to allow me to publish a notice of our engagement. She agreed, as you know.”

“You did not try to kiss her in the carriage?”

“I do not go about forcing my attentions on defenceless fe…” He flushed. “Well, you were not precisely defenceless. Pick up your cards and pretend to be interested.”

She obeyed. “So you did not kiss her. Perhaps you should have.”

“For heavens sake, Jodie!” he said in exasperation. He put down four cards face up and picked up four from the pile on the table. “I mean, Miss Judith. How could I kiss a girl who shrank into a corner and when I spoke to her would only murmur ‘Yes, my lord,’ and ‘No, my lord.’ It’s your play.”

“She just suddenly clammed up, huh?” Jodie laid down four cards at random.

“Yes. No, you can only discard three unless you want one of those I discarded.”

“How the hell do I know whether I want one? I haven’t a clue what I’m doing. Okay, okay, I’ll take that one. She must suddenly have gotten nervous when you brought her to the point.”

“I have twenty-three points. I have sometimes wondered whether Faringdale forced Emily to accept me.”

“In the first place, yes. Here, you count up my points for me. But lately I have thought she was reconciled to the marriage.”

“You are flattering! Your hand is worth twenty-nine. Are you sure you have never played before?”

“Never. All right, better than reconciled. She was beginning to quite like the idea. She was terrified of you at first, you know. That was why she was hiding in the stables in a thunderstorm.”

“Tricks,” said Lord Thorncrest blankly, as if he had suddenly lost his train of thought, or one of them. “Terrified? You cannot trick me so easily—I was not even at Waterstock that night.”

“Tricks? We play for tricks? Don’t be muttonheaded, Thorncrest, she wasn’t hiding from you, just hiding her misery from her brother.”

He played a card and stared silently at the one she put on top of it.

“Did I take it?” she asked, reaching for them.

“No, it’s mine. But if she was becoming reconciled, why has she turned shy as bedamned again? I don’t want a terrified wife. That one’s yours.”

“I don’t know.” Jodie picked up the trick and played a card. “I’ll have to talk to her.”

“I did not really want a wife at all, yet I too am growing reconciled to the notion. There is a lot more to Emily than I had guessed. Pretty, complaisant, well-born, wealthy—I knew all that before I approached Faringdale. But she’s intelligent, too.” He sounded surprised. “She has a mind of her own, and besides, there is something about her…. Dash it, Miss Judith, you have gone and taken all the tricks while I was rambling on!”

“I daresay that means I have won?” asked Jodie, smugly pleased not only with the game but with the tenor of their conversation. Lord Thorncrest was at last beginning to appreciate Emily as he ought.

“Yes. A partie usually consists of six games, but I must get back to Emily. We did not settle on stakes. I usually play for pound points, so I’ll give you a draft on my bank.”

“Don’t be muttonheaded, we were not playing for money. I haven’t a penny in this world.”

“I beg your pardon, I had forgotten your circumstances, though that only makes it the more reasonable that you should accept your winnings.”

She shook her head, adamant.

“Very well, but I hope that as my wife’s cousin you will always feel you can turn to me in case of need.” He paused. “Sweet-natured—that is the word I was looking for.”

Jodie was touched. Perhaps the earl might make a good husband for Emily after all.

“Actually,” she said, “piquet is not that different from pinochle.”

When they returned to the ballroom, Roland was just leading his sister into a waltz. Giles jumped up from Charlotte’s side.

“Charles, if you will keep my cousin company, Jodie has promised this dance to me.”

Thorncrest looked somewhat disconcerted, but accepted with good grace what he could not escape without being ungentlemanly. Giles whirled Jodie onto the floor.

“What’s going on?” he demanded. “Charlotte wanted a private word with Thorncrest and Emily looks like the middle of a wet week.”

“It is the middle of a wet week,” Jodie pointed out. “I daresay it is some stupid misunderstanding. Emily has turned missish again ever since Thorncrest asked permission to announce the engagement.”

“Perhaps you should toss him around a bit more.”

“I don’t think it’s anything he has done. He claims innocence and he seems pretty upset. Maybe Charlotte can sort it all out. Talking about it isn’t going to help, unless you have some startling revelation?”

“No startling revelations, I’m afraid. Do you have any good tidbits about our host, as you did at the Cowpers’?”

“The Duke of Devonshire? Lord, yes. At least, the present duke merely fell in love first with Caro Lamb and then with Princess Charlotte. Two narrow escapes. He will never marry though, probably because of the trauma of the household he was brought up in.”

“That bad?”

“A classic ménage a trois,” Jodie told him. “The present duchess—Charlotte says she lives abroad—was both the last duke’s mistress and best friend of the last duchess, Georgiana, our host’s mother. They all lived together for decades, while Georgiana ran up enormous gambling debts, like Ada Lovelace actually only on a grand scale. When Georgiana died the duke married his mistress, so she’s the present duke’s stepmother, if you follow me.”

“I think so.”

“And Byron is renting a house belonging to the duchess but he hasn’t paid the rent and the bailiffs will arrive ten minutes after he flees.”

“How do you know all this?” asked Giles curiously.

“Most of today’s on-dits will end up in tomorrow’s books. There’s even one called The Scandalmonger. After all, scandal is one of the chief pastimes of the age.”

“Which gives you every excuse to study it. It is in our time, too, of course, only most people are more interested in film stars than the aristocracy.”

“How fortunate for you,” Jodie teased, curtsying as the music ended. The waltz had gone by far too fast. She regretted having talked instead of concentrating on the pleasure of being in his arms.

“Save the next waltz for me,” he requested. “I wouldn’t want you to miss it and you know how Roland dislikes you dancing such a shocking dance with strangers. Speaking of strangers, here comes a dear friend of yours.”

“A friend?” Jodie turned to look, and groaned. “Lord Alfred Barnes! Save me, Giles.”

“Too late, he’s seen us. Good evening, my lord.”

“Evening, Faringdale. Miss Judith, beg you’ll do me the honour of standing up with me.” The young man’s round, beaming face was ingenuous, but Jodie remembered his love of cockfighting and ratting—and that he had described her as a spirited filly.