Honor's Players (2 page)

Katharine the curst!
A title for a maid of all titles the worst

—Act I, Scene 4

It was some two hours later, as the gray autumn dusk gave way to night, that the Viscount St. Ryne entered his house on Upper Brook Street, shaking fine raindrops off his multi-caped greatcoat and from the brim of his high crowned beaver. Handing the articles over to a waiting footman, he turned to his butler standing silently by the staircase, awaiting his lordship’s pleasure.

“Predmore, see that a fire is laid in the library. It is a damned cold night, and I vow I’m chilled to the bone.” Rubbing his hands together, he strode over to the silver tray on the table in the hall where the accumulated mail of several days lay.

Predmore motioned with the bare lift of his hand to a footman who immediately trotted down the hall to the nether reaches of the house for a coal scuttle while St. Ryne looked down at the pile of envelopes and smirked. Even though it was only the beginning of the little season, society was quick to note the return of a prodigal son with deep pockets. With a satisfied smile he discovered a heavy cream bond envelope bearing the Amblethorp crest. Picking that one up and ignoring the rest, he walked toward his library. Predmore opened the double doors. “Ask Cook to prepare a light repast,” St. Ryne said, pausing in the doorway, “and have it brought to me in here.” He tapped the envelope against his hand thoughtfully for a moment then continued into the room. The doors closed soundlessly behind him.

When the footman left after kindling a roaring blaze in the hearth and lighting branches of candles around the room, St. Ryne began prowling his shelves searching for one slim volume he knew to be there. It was, on a lower shelf next to a Prussian history. Smiling sardonically, he drew it out, his fingers smudging a fine layer of dust on the spine. He scowled as he saw the dust on the book and noted the condition on all the shelves. Absently he drew out a handkerchief to wipe the book and then his hands clean. Obviously he had been away too long or had been too lax.

Taking the slim volume in hand, he walked over to a large mahogany desk dominating the room. He pulled out paper, fresh quills, and ink from a drawer in the top, setting them on the gleaming dark surface. Opening the small book before him, he began to read, his quill dipping occasionally into the ink as from time to time he made note of passages. Smiles came and went, sometimes widening into a grin or erupting into a short bark of laughter.

A little more than an hour later his butler entered and quietly set a small table by the fireplace. St. Ryne ignored him until he’d finished, stood aside, and cleared his throat respectfully.

“Thank you, Predmore,” he acknowledged, his eyes intent on the lines before him. “Be so kind as to have Cranston lay out my evening dress.”

“Yes, my lord.”

“That is all. No, wait,” St. Ryne said, glancing up briefly as that worthy turned to leave. “There is dust on top of my books.”

Predmore blanched. “My apologies, my lord. It will be attended to.”

The Viscount nodded absently and resumed his writing. “You may go.”

Predmore bowed and left the room to search for Mr. Cranston, milord’s valet, and afterward to have a few choice words with a certain footman whose duties included maintaining milord’s library. Predmore had been with St. Ryne for nine years, ever since the young man had set himself up in London, much to the Countess’s annoyance. Predmore enjoyed working for his lordship but knew he brooked no difference for the rules he set.

As heir to the Earldom of Seaverness, St Ryne had been immediately feted and courted when he came to London. Too much so, to Predmore’s mind. He’d witnessed an open and curious young man with a ready wit and dry humor slowly jaded by a fawning society. The cynical man who remained drifted seemingly untouchable. His one refuge, his library, which if he so chose, was inviolate to the outside world, off limits even to his mother, the formidable Countess of Seaverness. She, to give her her due, respected his independence, if only for a short while.

Predmore shook his head as he mounted the stairs. It did not appear his lordship’s sojourn to the heathen lands had been auspicious. He, at least, he decided righteously, could be certain the Viscount would find nothing further to disturb his comforts at home.

Sometime later, the Viscount St. Ryne sat sprawled in a large dark blue wing chair by the fire, the substantial remains of the stuffed game hen offered by his household to tempt his appetite pushed negligently away from the place set before him. He idly twirled his wineglass between strong tapering fingers. He gazed with heavily lidded eyes out the window of his library into the street below. It was dark and the wind was driving rain against the glass. There was little activity besides the occasional closely shuttered carriage with wildly swinging lanterns and hunched coachmen. The Viscount scarcely noticed the rain and wind; he was lost in his own brooding thoughts and stared unseeing at the vista before him.

Dressed soberly in a chocolate-brown jacket and dove pantaloons, someone passing him by when he walked in town might mistake him for a clerk unless they chanced to glance at his face or note his bearing. No clerk ever strode with such arrogance and pride in every step. His visage was not remarkable; he was neither excessively handsome nor ill-favored. His expression was arresting, however, and if one happened to be favored with a smile, one would note how it lit his face and how his eyes danced with some secret mirth. In form he was of average height and weight. This did not dissuade the dandies from envying him, for his coats needed none of the padding currently in vogue to minimize physical shortcomings. The Viscount’s hair was disheveled, though not due to the careful artifice of the windswept look currently popular with young aspirants to fashion. A couple of dark locks fell forward to curl over his brow and catch the light from the tall candelabrum at his elbow. His arresting features were now marred by a pronounced scowl that drew his thick brown brows together creating deep furrows in his forehead and turning down the corners of his mouth.

Back only a sennight after a year away, and already his mother was haranguing him to choose a bride. It had been her efforts to put one or another of her new protégées before him as perspective brides that had driven him away. That, and the ceaseless fawning he received from debutantes and matchmaking mothers. He should have realized his return would herald renewed activity on the Countess’s part, particularly as she was flush with success from marrying off his cousins last season. She now considered herself a triumphant matchmaker. Thankfully his parents were leaving within the week for a protracted stay in Paris, and not scheduled to return until the holidays. At that time, no doubt, she would fill the estate with nubile eligibles and expect him to do the pretty.

As the wealthy heir to the Earl of Seaverness, he was considered a catch on the marriage market. He dragged his hand through his thick dark hair. Tired of false attentions, he often idly thought it preferable to choose for a wife a woman who did not consider him as a prospective bridegroom, one who in fact disliked him and whom he could woo to favor. He sank deeper into his chair as he sipped his wine. He knew he was at heart a romantic, a trait he was almost ashamed of and hid behind a cynical front.

St. Ryne glanced toward his desk where lay the book he had been reading along with the notes he’d taken. He smiled wryly, and wondered what his mother’s reaction would be to his chosen bride, for that afternoon at Whites he had decided he would marry Elizabeth Monweithe. He laughed out loud when he realized he had not yet met the woman. It was best that he settle with her rather than one of the whey-faced young paragons of virtue his mother found suitable for the position of Countess of Seaverness. He tossed off the last of the wine and rising from his chair, gathered the book and papers from the desk. Atop them all he placed the cream-colored invitation to the Amblethorp rout. Still chuckling to himself, he left the library to change for the evening’s entertainment.

It was late, after eleven o’clock before St. Ryne arrived at Lady Amblethorp's. Inasmuch as the receiving line in the hall before the ballroom had long since dispersed, his entrance went unheralded—to his great relief. Pulling on the sleeves of his evening coat, he found himself glancing into a pier glass between tall windows in the ornate rococo styled hall. Now, as the play was about to unfold in earnest, he wondered at his audacity. Sir James Branstoke had given impetus to this wild idea by his bet. For his own part, he knew he could do no worse. He smiled grimly at his reflection before turning toward the ballroom. The die was cast, he thought, walking forward.

Stopping at the ballroom doorway, St. Ryne glanced around. He grimaced at the hothouse effect Lady Amblethorp made of the room; flowers, probably the last of summer’s bounty, were everywhere and the room, already quite warm and denied by the rain the respite of doors opened onto the terrace, was heavy with a floral scent. To the right he noted a crowd of gentlemen around a honey-haired beauty. Recognizing a few of her entourage, St. Ryne concluded she must be La Belle Helene. Descending the steps into the room, he moved toward the beauty and her entourage. If Freddy was correct, the shrew would not be far away.

He made his way slowly, stopping to talk with various acquaintances, most of whom he had not seen since his return. Lady Amblethorp scurried forward with one of her daughters.

“Viscount St. Ryne! We are honored by your appearance. Isn’t this the first social function that has been graced with your presence since your return?” she cooed. Inwardly crowing at her success in snaring that parti, she gleefully thought of a few hostesses she would enjoy advising of his lordship’s attendance.

St. Ryne murmured all the proper phrases: delighted himself; yes, this was the first; and Lady Amblethorp was an accomplished hostess.

Lady Amblethorp smiled delightedly, tapping him playfully on his arm while the puce plume in her turban swayed wildly. “But please, though you’ve known her since she was a child, let me officially present you to my third daughter, Janine, who made her debut while you were out of the country,” she enthused, pulling her shy youngest daughter forward.

St. Ryne grimaced at Lady Amblethorp’s flirtatious forwardness, gauche in any woman, let alone a woman of her years. As the poor girl couldn’t help her parents, however, he turned to smile at Janine. “I didn’t realize, Miss Amblethorp, this was to be your year. Sometime you must tell me how you have enjoyed your first season,” he said smoothly. Then, before her mother could interrupt, “As I told Lady Amblethorp, this is my first function since my return, and I am delighted to see so many familiar faces. If you’ll excuse me, I must continue my reacquaintance.” Bowing low to the Amblethorp ladies, he turned to continue toward his goal; thankful to have made his escape without having to stand up with the young debutante and knowing he left behind a pleased yet exasperated Lady Amblethorp.

“Adroit, as usual,” a dry voice at his side murmured in the wake of a rustle of silk and a waft of French Musk perfume.

“Sally! Your humble servant.” St. Ryne bowed to Lady Sally Jersey. As one of the vaunted patronesses of Almack’s, there was not much going on in town she missed. It was on his tongue to inquire of his prey, desiring a woman’s summation on the situation, but her nickname of Silence—for everything she was not—gave him pause.

“And you are an impertinent pup!” she said rapping his hand with her fan. “Sally indeed.”

“A thousand pardons,” St. Ryne raised her hand to kiss it. “I have been told I received a surfeit of sun on my trip to Jamaica, and it has left me with an addled mind,” he explained lightly.

Lady Jersey pulled her hand away quickly though a little smile lifted the corners of her thin aristocratic lips. “Trip! A euphemism for escape. I know. But who trifled with his health by that remark?”

He laughed. “The day of the duel for such stupidity is past. I’ll save that for the young bucks and old goats. If you must know, and I can tell by that gleam in your eye you’ll have it out of me, it was Carlton Tretherford.”

“Bah!” she snorted, waving her arm in dismissal. “The man has more hair than wit. That’s one randy old goat who thinks to stay amongst the bucks. Look at him over there after this year’s jewel of the Marriage Mart.”

“La Belle Helene.”

She eyed him shrewdly. “Do you seek to join the ranks?” she asked, slowly unfurling her fan and waving it languidly before her.

“Acquit me, madam. I choose more sprightly game.”

Lady Jersey laughed. “You would or else you'd have one of Lady Alicia’s protégés. Do you have someone in mind?” she asked archly.

He merely smiled.

“Oh! I know you’ll not say and I’m wasting my breath ask.” She closed her fan with a snap. “Be off, you arrogant jackanapes,” she commanded petulantly.

St. Ryne bowed again, leaving an amused and exasperated Lady Jersey staring after him.

He had almost made his way to La Belle Helene and her tail when out of the corner of his eye he saw the older girl. She was standing between a pillar and a tall vase filled with large white roses. He recognized her immediately from Freddy’s description but was surprised she did not appear the glittering shrew of his imagination. She was dressed all white in a ridiculously childish muslin gown trimmed with pink rosettes. By its appearance it was a gown more suited to her sister. Lady Elizabeth would appear to better advantage in dark, vibrant colors. She was turned toward her sister’s coterie, her face related, almost devoid of all expression, yet St. Ryne felt sure he noted an odd trace of sadness in the fine set of her mouth and the expression of her golden eyes fringed with coal-dark lashes. He knew then she was not one of Lucifer’s angels as Branstoke had described her; more like a lost and confused child lashing out to protect herself, her temper giving her the strength not to shatter into a thousand pieces. Child? Nay, young woman for that was not the figure of a child, he thought, looking her over with a practiced eye.

Coming up on Freddy Shiperton, St. Ryne hooked his arm in his.