Gayle Buck (4 page)

Mrs. Burlington perceived scorn in her niece’s laughing rejoinder and she reacted accordingly. “ ‘Tis but the truth.”

When Lady Caroline merely sighed, Mrs. Burlington’s increasing incensement rallied her to her former style. “I am sorry to wound your sensibilities, Lady Caroline, but since his lordship and his dear lady embarked upon their honeymoon, you have become quite the anecdote!’’

“Have I? Then certainly my brother’s return will set all straight again,” Lady Caroline said. Her composure was again intact, as though the brief exercising of her temper had exorcised the worst of its heat.

“Oh, assuredly it will. You will have to give over precedence to the new countess at tea and elsewhere. You will no longer be mistress of this grand house. That will hardly suit you, will it, my dear niece?” Mrs. Burlington said, her narrowed eyes glittering once more with unmistakable malice.

Lady Caroline looked up quickly, renewed anger kindling in her eyes. The insult was not one to be lightly borne. A devastating retort trembled upon her lips, but at that instant the drawing-room door opened and she was forced to confine herself to an astringently delivered reproof. “My sister-in-law will naturally take precedence over us both. I am surprised that you did not realize it before now, Amaris.”

While Mrs. Burlington sucked in air. Lady Caroline turned to the butler with almost palpable relief. “Yes, Simpson? Oh, it is the post. Thank you!” She sent a swift smile up at the butler as she took from the silver salver that he proffered to her several missives and a letter opener. The butler bowed and left the ladies alone once more.

Lady Caroline sifted quickly through the stack. There were several official-looking letters addressed to her and to her brother, which she set aside for later perusal in the study, and a number of personal letters as well. She extracted a few of the letters to hand to Mrs. Burlington. “Your mail, ma’am. I know that you will not mind if I open my own correspondence.” She did not wait for an answer, but slit open the seal on one letter immediately and spread the sheets.

“No, indeed,” Mrs. Burlington said with heavy sarcasm. She took up the letter opener in her turn and broke the seals of her correspondence. She was immediately riveted by the direction upon one, and with unusual eagerness unfolded the sheets. After a few moments’ reading, a small satisfied half-smile appeared on her lips. “Well, well. How vastly interesting, to be sure,” she murmured softly.

At the sound of a chuckle from her niece’s direction, Mrs. Burlington raised her eyes from her own correspondence. Her sharp glance took in Lady Caroline’s softened expression. It was easy to guess that the source of Lady Caroline’s amusement was the letter that she read so attentively. Mrs. Burlington caught a glimpse of the sprawling hand of the address on the back of the letter, and even across the distance that separated her from her niece, the scrawl was unmistakable. With deliberate spite she said, “I see that you have received another letter from Lord Trilby. How amusing that his lordship should still recall your existence these many years.”

Lady Caroline raised her eyes. The warmth that had been kindled in her eyes by the contents of the letter cooled upon meeting her aunt’s gaze. All of the amusement of the moment before vanished from her expression, but a trace of it remained in her voice. “Yes, isn’t it? Lord Trilby and I have remained the best of friends. I suppose much of that has to do with our families having been neighbors for upwards of two generations.”

She started to fold away the missive, and gathered up the rest of her correspondence, intending to finish reading all the letters later in privacy so that she would be able to fully enjoy them without her aunt’s unpleasant interruptions.

“If you will excuse me, Amaris, I shall take the rest of these with me to the study. It is past time that I returned to my duties.” She rose from her chair, letters in hand, and started toward the door.

“A pity that Lord Trilby was never brought properly up to scratch. It would have made an admirable match.” Mrs. Burlington paused fractionally, her sharp eyes on her niece’s retreating back. “Do you not think that you have outworn your hopes in that direction, my dear niece?”

Lady Caroline paused before she turned. Her eyes and her voice were extremely cold. “If you are implying that I have been setting my cap for Lord Trilby during his visits to the neighborhood, you are wide of the mark. His lordship and I have always enjoyed a neat, uncomplicated friendship. I am confident that we shall always do so.”

Mrs. Burlington was delighted to have touched a nerve. “One may hope so, of course, for your sake. A lady needs gentlemanly companionship by inclination, and you have not precisely set yourself to capture the interest of any other eligible gentlemen.”

“I have no great wish to excite anyone’s interest, Amaris. Along with my unnatural headstrong independence, you may add that additional oddity of character to your mullings about me,” Lady Caroline said. She reached for the brass doorknob and turned it.

“My dear niece! Such fortitude, I do swear! No female actually wishes to find herself on the shelf, but here you are at four-and-twenty with nary a gentleman in sight,” Mrs. Burlington said.

Over her slender shoulder, Lady Caroline gave her aunt a slow, cool smile. “My dear Amaris, I suspect it is better never to wed than to wed mistakenly, as your own example has so eloquently proved to me.” She exited the drawing room.

Mrs. Burlington gasped. “How dare you! You insolent ...” Whatever else she might have said was lost as Lady Caroline pulled the door closed behind her in a decisive manner.

Lady Caroline spent the remainder of the afternoon in the study, finishing up the most pressing business awaiting her attention on the desk. She had requested that a cold collation he brought to her in the study in lieu of dinner, as she was unwilling to stop what she was doing or to spend another unpleasant hour in her aunt’s company.

Later, when the butler brought in the tray of watercress sandwiches, thinly sliced slivers of beef and ham, cheeses, fruit, wine, and so on, she put down her pen with a thankful sigh. “You come in good time, Simpson. My eyes are beginning to swim in my head.”

“I do not doubt it, my lady. It is going on dusk and you have not called for candles,” the butler said in quiet reproof. He arranged the collation on an occasional table against the wainscoted wall.

Lady Caroline looked about her in surprise. She had not realized it was so late, nor that the shadows had deepened in the room. “I shall need them, indeed, if I am not to go blind,” she said humorously.

“I shall see to it at once, my lady. Will there be anything else?”

“No, that will be all, thank you, Simpson.” Lady Caroline bent her head again to the figures on the page before her, her brows knitting again in concentration. She picked up the pen.

The butler bowed and went away. Shortly thereafter a footman entered and lighted a long taper from the fire in the hearth. He lighted the several bunches of candles gracing the study before he, too, left on silent feet.

Lady Caroline scarcely noticed; by that time she was properly engrossed in the tallying of the accounts.

A half-hour later, Lady Caroline stretched her arms above her head with bone-popping satisfaction. The columns of figures had tallied at last and she could turn her attention to other things. Her eyes alighted on the letter lying on top of the stack of correspondence she had tossed onto the desk earlier. She picked it up, wanting to reread the missive that had so unexpectedly excited such vitriolic attention from her aunt that afternoon.

As Lady Caroline read the letter again, a smile lighted her eyes. She sighed when she was done. “My aunt has the right of it in her own twisted fashion. I have indeed outworn my hopes. Dearest Miles. You have quite, quite spoiled me for any other gentleman,” she said softly. She sat very still for several moments, her eyes not seeing the collation that awaited her or, indeed, anything at all in the study.

The families’ estates had been close enough that she had often met the youth who would one day ascend to the earldom of Walmesley. However, the future earl had gone away to Oxford and she herself had been sent to a seminary for young ladies and nearly forgot his existence.

It was during Lady Caroline’s first Season in London that she was formally introduced to Miles, Lord Trilby, the Earl of Walmesley. She had been stunned, for this elegant lord who bowed over her hand was vastly different from the young sprig that she so vaguely remembered.

She had tumbled head over heels in love with his lordship and she had thought that he reciprocated her feelings. Certainly Lord Trilby had been extraordinarily attentive toward her, so much so that there had been widespread expectation in society that he meant to offer for her hand.

Lady Caroline recalled the dances, the whispered confidences, the shared laughter that they had enjoyed together even in the midst of the glittering round of entertainments. She could always depend upon Lord Trilby to be an amusing companion and, indeed, on occasion the trusted confidant. There had even been a few stolen kisses between them.

But it had all come to naught, after all. Lord Trilby never quite crossed the line that lay between his established position as intimate acquaintance and that of ardent lover.

Lady Caroline sighed again, a trifle wistfully. “It was such a lovely spring. Why ever did you not offer for me, Miles?”

Her father had known of her deep infatuation for Lord Trilby and he had not disapproved of a connection with such a noble house. The earl therefore had not pressed Lady Caroline to accept any of the proffered suits of a score of other admirers.

When the Season had ended without the hoped-for offer from Lord Trilby, the Earl of Berwicke had hoped that with time and a Season or two more his daughter would outgrow her first painful experience with love. But it had not proved to be so.

Six years later Lady Caroline remained unwedded, having spurned a dozen offers along the way, until she had settled quietly into her routine at Berwicke Keep as her brother’s permanent hostess whenever he should take it into his head to invite several of his cronies into the country. Between these infrequent bouts of entertaining a roistering band of gentlemen, Lady Caroline saw to those things that the new earl declared to be a dead bore.

Lady Caroline knew it was of no use to dwell on what might have been. Indeed, she supposed she was content enough. She had tired of the round of London entertainments, especially so after she had come to be thought of as a permanently unattached female and it was assumed that she could always be depended upon to entertain the dullest or the most ineligible of gentlemen in a social gathering. Therein lay the reason for her quiet retreat into the country, but she had quickly discovered that idleness was not to her taste either, and it had come as a godsend when her brother had carelessly dumped the responsibilities for Berwicke Keep into her lap. Of course, by remaining at Berwicke Keep for the best part of the year, excluding the few visits she made to London to see friends, she had been compelled to tolerate her aunt’s company.

Lady Caroline thought on the whole she had been rather fortunate. She must be thankful that Lord Trilby considered her still in the guise of one of his most intimate acquaintances. They corresponded regularly and she did not miss much about London doings because Lord Trilby kept her fully informed.

The years that had passed since their fateful meeting in London had but deepened an extraordinary friendship between them. Lady Caroline was confident that she could call upon Lord Trilby to render whatever assistance was within his power to give were she ever to find herself in need of aid, and she rather thought that his lordship could depend upon her to the same considerable degree.

Lady Caroline at last set aside the letter from Lord Trilby, rising from her chair at the same time. Without glancing at the untasted collation on the occasional table, she walked out of me study.
Her thoughts still dwelled pleasantly on the Earl of Walmesley.

In the not-too-distant future she was to recall those same reflections with certain misgivings.

Chapter Five

The following day Lady Caroline sustained a visit from Lord Hathaway, that same gentleman who was so highly recommended by Mrs. Burlington.

Lord Hathaway was a stocky gentleman of unimposing height and rather ordinary features. His slightly protuberant blue orbs and his rather heavy mouth lent him a habitual expression of mild surprise. Everything about Lord Hathaway, from his dress to his mannerisms to his opinions, could be summed up in one word—conservative.

Lord Hathaway himself would have been the first to agree that his person was not such as to inspire passion or dread or excitement in the female breast. Nor did he possess that flair of personality that seemed to characterize many of his peers. He was no Corinthian or reckless rake like a number of other gentlemen of his social standing. Not for Lord Hathaway the manly sports or skirt-chasing.

Lord Hathaway did, however, possess one quality almost unique to himself. He flattered himself with the belief that very few other gentlemen could lay claim to such a spotless reputation as his own.

Lord Hathaway had heard himself referred to as “The Worthy.” He had passed over, as being of little consequence, the fact that the speaker had spoken in a derisive tone, but instead had accepted the sobriquet with all the gratification inherent of a gentleman secure in his position and positively certain of his own worth.

Some months previously, Lord Hathaway had concluded after careful reflection that it had become time to cast about for an acceptable helpmate with whom to share his table. His deliberations upon the worth of several possible candidates were as studied as for any other decision he was called upon to make in the discharging of his duties and responsibilities.

One by one the candidates had fallen short of expectations as he discovered some previously unguessed-at fault or imperfection. At last his lordship made his choice, and it was to Lady Caroline Eddington that he had thrown his favor.