Harlequin Historical February 2014 - Bundle 1 of 2: The Major's Wife\To Tempt a Viking\Mistress Masquerade (68 page)

* * *

Their last day at Ragley Hall was spent in talks with Lady Benistone intended to persuade her of an ecstatic welcome at Montague Street, although Annemarie was not able to say with any conviction how much, or little, the living conditions had changed to make her future comfort greater than before. But with a year's news to catch up on, the day flew past easily, with breakfast on the following day, a Monday, their last meal together for some time. Neither of them knew for how long.

Just like Lord Benistone, Lord Hertford's addiction to
The Times
at breakfast was excused; one was rarely expected to converse at such times, even with guests present. Spontaneous outbursts of information
did
emerge, however, when it was thought worth sharing. ‘Oh, listen to this,' he said from behind the double pages.

Annemarie exchanged glances with her mother and smiled. ‘My lord?' she said, politely.

‘Four people killed,' he said. ‘That's appalling!'

‘Where is this?' said Verne, mopping up his egg yolk.

‘Vauxhall Gardens. Saturday night. The fireworks, you know. Prinny's latest attempt to entertain the masses. Well, no one expected them to turn up in their thousands, apparently. Dreadful crush. Dangerous conditions,' he read, picking through the most evocative words. ‘Carriages smashed. Clothing ripped to shreds. Two women crushed against the barriers. One man badly burned by a firework, died from injuries. Another fell into the river. Oh! What's this? Good heavens above, Verne. You're not going to believe it.' The newspaper collapsed in a heap upon the Marquess's empty plate, revealing a shocked expression and a pallor in stark contrast to the red hair. ‘Perhaps...?' Deep with concern, his eyes indicated that the ladies might prefer to leave rather than hear the details.

‘What is it, Francis?' said Lady Benistone. ‘I'm not going to be shocked and nor is Annemarie. Read it to us, if you please.'

‘I think you are,' he said, lifting the newspaper. ‘A body, found downstream from Vauxhall, was identified as that of Sir Lionel Mytchett, well-known gamester and member of White's Club. Well, they've got
that
wrong. He was thrown out last year. The body was badly lacerated, it says. Fell into the river and drowned. No witnesses. So that's the last we'll be seeing of him, then. Can't say I'm heartbroken.'

When there was no response from across the table, his lordship let
The Times
fall again to look at his guests before folding it up and laying it quietly down. Lady Benistone was being held in her daughter's arms, with only one hand smoothing over her back to indicate the direction of their thoughts. Then, still with their arms around each other, they turned and left the room.

‘No witnesses?' said Verne, frowning. ‘At Vauxhall?'

‘That's what it says.'

‘Rubbish! What do
you
make of it?'

‘I think,' said the Marquess, pulling at his whiskers, ‘that this makes the problem of Esme's return to London a little less complicated. Wouldn't you say so?'

‘Imminent, Francis. I'll do what I can to make it happen.'

‘So Benistone's selling up, is he?'

‘I have yet to find out. He's playing his cards very close to his chest, these days. What he'll do when he finds she'd been under
your
roof for the last few months I cannot imagine. I hope he doesn't jump to the same conclusions as Annemarie.'

That idea gave the Marquess several moments of very loud and irreverent amusement, his wife not being in the room, entirely inappropriate to the news just imparted, ending with the flippant suggestion that he might have to go into hiding.

Chapter Eleven

F
or some reason, neither Evie nor Samson knew what, their master and mistress were delayed at Ragley Hall while they had been sent off at the appointed time a little after dawn with instructions to contact Lady Golding's family and invite them to Curzon Street without delay. Both Evie and Samson knew what that was about. Lady Benistone had been found. So, with leather bags and boxes piled on the opposite seat of the coach, trunks behind and on top, and the groom sitting up there with the coachman, they'd been told to change horses as often as necessary to reach London before dinner. It was just as well, Evie said to herself, that she had begun to like Mr Samson again when such proximity for a whole day could be a severe test of one's inclinations. She was pleased to find that her original opinions of the smart young man had been, on the whole, correct.

Samson's opinion of Miss Evie Ballard, despite the peppery encounter at the inn, was rather more basic than hers of him. In his book, she was a little cracker with a temper like a wildcat and a pair of eyes that flashed like lightning, a figure as trim as any stage-moll and a pair of lips that just skimmed a row of pearls, just ripe for kissing. In short, it had been worth his ride on the box with the supercilious groom and the outrageous fib he'd concocted to explain away the stinging handprint on his cheek. By the end of this journey, Samson was reasonably sure he could turn the fib into a reality.

Since then, he had adhered strictly to ‘Miss Ballard' but now, for no apparent reason, she had responded to ‘Evie' without a murmur. ‘I suggest we take Lady Golding's luggage to Curzon Street first,' he said, ‘and then I'll go on to Montague Street and Park Lane before I take his lordship's things to Bedford Square.'

‘Except for his overnight valise,' said Evie. ‘I expect he'll be staying...'

‘He's not spent one night at home since...'

‘Since Brighton.' They had changed horses for the third time and were now on the last stage of the journey, having taken cold food into the coach to save every last moment. Evie brushed the crumbs from her skirt and folded away the linen napkin.

Passing her the water bottle, Samson adopted his helpless expression. ‘Where does this go?' he said.

‘Tch! Here.' She leaned forwards to push it into one of the bags and found that, when she leaned back again, Samson's arm was around her waist, pulling her gently to his side.

‘There, that's better,' he said.

With only the slightest hesitation, Evie relaxed against him.

The coach rocked and bumped along the roads to London with only the briefest of halts at the turnpikes or to let a wide wagon squeeze past. Evie untied the ribbons under her chin and eased the bonnet off her head, allowing her dark curls to brush against Samson's cheek. ‘Nice,' he whispered. ‘Very nice.'

* * *

Behind Evie and Samson by about one hour, the occupants of the other more luxurious coach were similarly disposed to go over old ground, in the light of recent revelations, and then to nestle together for a few more miles of comfortable silence until the need for another discussion. Having no doubt at all of the family's forthcoming delight at the news of Mama's safety, Annemarie's main concern was that her comfort at Montague Street would not be any more designed around her wishes than it was before. Although Mama's sudden walkout was, on the face of it, for a very unselfish reason, there was also an element of desperation behind it which, the women of the family knew, had been growing through years of neglect from the man she adored. His insistence on using their home as a museum, where visitors to his collection were more important than his wife and daughters, had contributed in no small part to Lady Benistone's assumption that her husband would hardly miss her. She had told them so last night. Without his help, her plan had been the best she could devise and not a very clever one at that. Annemarie found it hard to anticipate any expression of joy on her Mama's lovely face when she returned to Montague Street after Papa's recent changes, whatever they were. Annemarie had not had a chance to look, nor had the others been inclined.

The news of Sir Lionel Mytchett's death had been a shock to both mother and daughter, not a cause for rejoicing, but creating a kind of numbness. His not being there would take some getting used to. There had been many times, they said, when no death could have been too painful for him in their minds. Now, their relief was tinged with a sadness that any man's death could be so ignominious. A fall into the river. What a lonely way to go.

Verne's thoughts ran along rather different lines. Lacerations on the body,
The Times
had reported. To him, that meant only one thing. A horsewhipping. In public. By whom? Another cuckolded husband, more recent than Benistone? Or Benistone himself? Almost certainly, the family would have read the report by now. The forthcoming meeting at Curzon Street promised to be interesting.

* * *

Sipping brandy from one of Annemarie's new crystal glasses, Lord Benistone had already made up his mind that the hasty summons to Curzon Street could only be to discuss the news in
The Times
that morning. He would, of course, have to explain to Annemarie his part in the tragedy, if that's what it was, and hope that she would understand their reasons for leaving Vauxhall Gardens without delay. In the circumstances, it would have been quite impossible in such a crush to find any witnesses willing to describe exactly what had happened without implicating themselves at the same time. Nor was he himself inclined to volunteer any information. Without going into all the painful reasons for his being there, that would be out of the question. If Esme had also seen the news, he wondered what effect it would have on her decisions for the future. Sighing, he took another sip.

‘Elmer, my dear,' said Cecily, entering the dining room as if the effort of responding to Annemarie's message had been a little inconvenient, to say the least, ‘I wonder why this couldn't have waited until tomorrow? What can there be to discuss? We had only just finished dining. Have you eaten yet?'

‘No.'

‘Then you ought not to be drinking that on an empty—'

‘Leave him alone, Cecily,' said Oriel. ‘Hello, Papa. You all right?' With a kiss to both cheeks, her smile lingered as she searched his face for signs of tiredness. Marguerite followed, hugging her father without a word, saying more in that one embrace than she'd said in a year. He could see that she had slept badly, that the fidgeting and simpering was missing, that her gown was without the usual frill and fuss, her hair swept upwards from her neck into the tall crown of her bonnet, her eyelids still puffy with weeping, yet the blue eyes bold with a new wisdom. She had been given a brief view of a man's world and it had both frightened and sobered her for, as her father's man had told her, it was not a pretty sight to see her peaceable parent in such a vengeful role. She had never thought him capable of it. She had never heard a man scream before, either, nor the howling of a crowd for the blood of a man they didn't even know. Had they thrown him into the river, too?

Annemarie and Lord Verne were not far behind, their own news temporarily engulfed by hugs and handshakes and questions about who had read what and how that news was affecting them. ‘More than you might think, dear,' said Cecily, helping herself from a plate of warm shortbread biscuits. ‘We were there, at Vauxhall Gardens. Elmer will tell you.'

‘What, all of you?' said Annemarie.

‘Yes, all of us,' said her father. ‘I
was
about to explain, thank you, Cecily. It was our Marguerite who orchestrated it. She's the heroine in this.'

Attention was immediately switched to Marguerite, but the young lady's attention was firmly fixed on the complicated pattern of the Axminster and it was clear, after a pause, that she was not going to take advantage of the situation to explain what had happened. So Cecily and Oriel gave a very detailed account of what had occurred on that night and the one before, adding that no one other than themselves, Lord Benistone's three men and a very uncaring crowd of hooligans knew exactly what part Father had played in causing Mytchett's injuries, which he had apparently tried to bathe in the river. It was not, they said, a very sensible thing to do, was it? However, said Cecily as an afterthought, they could hardly be expected to help him, so they had hurried away from the scene without knowing what became of him. It had taken them almost as long to get home as it had to get there, and she had lost a shoe and Elmer, poor dear, was exhausted by his rage.

And Marguerite, thought Annemarie, must have been shaken to the core to witness the brutality, however deserved. What was Father thinking of to allow her to see it? Was this more of the blindness that afflicted him where his family were concerned? Would he always put his own needs first? In a sudden outpouring of motherliness, she went to kneel before Marguerite, taking her into her arms and feeling the immediate response of softness in place of the resistance she had half-expected. Pressing her cheek against Marguerite's, she crooned her sympathy as their mama had often done. ‘Oh, my sweet...oh, how dreadful for you...I'm so sorry it had to come to this.'

She felt the head shake against hers. ‘No, don't be, Annemarie. Really. It was not like that. I
wanted
to be there. I wanted to do my part. Papa knew how much I wanted to make amends.'

‘Amends for what, love?'

‘For all the times I've not behaved like a lady,' she whispered, ‘and said the wrong things without thinking.'

‘Oh, dearest. That's all over now. But you should not have seen what you did.'

‘It has not harmed me, Annemarie. Papa knew what he was doing. We were well protected and what I saw may not have got Mama back, but it's made me very proud of my papa.' Reaching out with one hand, she sought her father's and was immediately clasped, warmed and caressed.

‘You're very courageous,' said Annemarie, ‘and Mama will be proud of you.'

There was something in the way she said ‘will be' that made Lord Benistone focus intently on her face to watch the smile radiate like the sun from behind a cloud. ‘Will be?' he said. ‘Annemarie?'

‘Yes, Papa. Lord Verne and I have found her. Safe and well.'

Incomprehension played around his eyes. ‘But you've been to Ragley Hall.' He looked across to Verne for verification. ‘Haven't you?'

‘Yes, my lord,' said Verne. ‘Lady Benistone is there. She's been cared for by the Marchioness of Hertford since last year.' There was never going to be an easy way to say this other than by leaving the Marquess's name out of it, Verne thought, watching how his lordship's eyes changed, hardened and challenged his.

‘
Has
she, indeed?' Lord Benistone said, quietly. ‘And how safe is
safe
,
exactly? In the Hertfords' care? Yes, well I can guess what
that
means.' He stood up, dropping Marguerite's hand, visibly shaking.

‘She
is
safe, my lord,' said Verne, glancing at Annemarie for help.

‘Papa,' she said. ‘Are you not glad?'

He had turned white like parchment and, to hide his shock, held his face in his hands, his gnarled knuckles quivering. ‘Yes,' he growled, ‘but I did not expect
this
, to be cuckolded
twice
...by...'

‘Papa! Stop! Listen! Please listen!'

But he was not listening. ‘I shall
thrash
the mangy little red-haired lecher!' he yelled. ‘I shall take that whip to him and do as I did to—'

‘Papa...please...no, you're not listening to me. You're wrong. Mama has not been in any way unfaithful to you, nor has Lord Hertford acted dishonourably towards her. Please sit down and let Jacques and me tell you about it. Come on, Papa darling. You're tired and distraught, and jumping to all the wrong conclusions. There, sit down while I pour you another brandy. And for pity's sake eat something. Have you eaten anything since yesterday?'

The question was ignored as Lord Benistone's confused emotions were engulfed in three pairs of loving arms that hugged and comforted, the sound of the women's joyful cries eventually calming the fury that had not quite dissipated since Vauxhall. There were tears in his eyes, too, when he emerged, unashamedly sobbing. ‘Will she come back to us?' he said. ‘Tell us what happened. Where's she been all this time?'

Between them, Annemarie and Lord Verne gave them the full story of what, how and why their mama's plan had failed, including Lady Benistone's own interpretation of her incompetence that took care not to direct any of the blame towards her husband, although his nods showed them how he suffered. ‘My fault,' he murmured more than once. ‘My fault entirely. She'd rather go to Hertford than to me. Too bad...too bad!'

‘It was
Lady
Hertford she needed,' said Annemarie. ‘Her old friend. She was ashamed. She still is. She doesn't believe you'll take her back.'

‘Not take her
back
?' his lordship roared. ‘How could she ever think that?'

‘Quite easily, my lord,' said Verne, ‘after what happened to her. Mytchett made sure of her disgrace and now she doesn't feel she deserves to be forgiven for it.'

‘God's truth, man! It's not a question of
my
forgiveness, is it? She must come home to us. She belongs here. The longer she stays away, the more talk there'll be. I'm the one who needs her forgiveness. Me. I've treated her shamefully, poor woman. Just imagine going to
those
lengths to protect her daughter when I could have done it with two well-chosen words. I shall go up there myself and demand—'

‘Papa,' said Marguerite, ‘do you think it might be better to
ask
rather than demand? Plead with her? Beg her? Tell her how we love and long for her? Tell her that in future you'll pay her more attention, perhaps? And thank the Hertfords graciously for their care of her. You'll have to accept their hospitality, remember, unless you stay overnight at the local inn.'