Maggie MacKeever (27 page)

“What on earth?” gasped Rosemary, upon whose bosom Marigold had collapsed.

In pursuit of his parent’s vinaigrette, which had dropped to the floor, Fennel bent down. “Lily’s been snooping again,” he muttered, from beneath the sofa. “As near as I can make it out—you know Lily will never win honors for her penmanship!—Angelica sloped off with your necklace!”

Silence greeted this announcement. Cautiously Fennel peered over the sofa arm. In the face of such continual catastrophes, Lady Chalmers had taken her only logical recourse. Following the excellent example set by her mama, Rosemary had fainted dead away.

Chapter Twenty-two

And so it was that Valerian Millikin and Simon Brisbane, upon arrival at Chalmers House, were conducted to a drawing room most remarkable not for six-paneled doors with classical motifs in the carved panel borders, the richly decorated ceiling of white plaster nor the massive cornice that ran around the room, not for the sash windows nor wainscoting nor the gilt suite, but for what appeared a preponderance of corpses strewn around the chamber. One was stretched out gracefully on a sofa upholstered in needlework, another sprawled half on the sofa and half on the floor; yet another lay wholly on the floor and partially beneath the sofa.

The latter body stirred, rose, brushed ineffectually at its dusty knees. With this sign of life, the butler recalled his position and his purpose and announced the visitors. “You might help a fellow!” complained Fennel, as he waved the vinaigrette in the direction of the prostrate ladies. Then the impact of the butler’s introduction struck. “By Jove! Valerian Millikin! You’re Angelica’s brother, ain’t you? And mine, too, think on it! Dashed if I ain’t pleased as punch to make your acquaintance!” Energetically he grasped and pumped Valerian’s hand.

Valerian was a great deal less enthusiastic about this reunion, or so it appeared to Simon Brisbane. The deeper Simon was plunged into this situation, the more difficult he found it to understand. What had his so-called Miss Smith to do with this young man who was greeting Valerian so effusively? In search of enlightenment, Simon listened closely to the young man’s utterances, which unfortunately were not of a nature to ease anyone’s puzzlement, containing many vague references to elopements and sapphires and other mysterious things.

“Ah!” said Valerian, who had after all been made aware of the background of these disclosures, and consequently was able to make sense of Fennel’s absurdities. “The little goose!” He glanced at the lady strewn half on the sofa and half on the floor. “That, I conjecture, is what’s-her-name. No, do not revive her! I have no time to indulge in further introductions! It is imperative that I speak with Angelica immediately.”

“You and I don’t know how many others!” Fennel’s brow wrinkled. “But you ain’t been listening, or you would have heard me say Angelica has eloped. Have I said Rosemary’s sapphires have been stolen? Well, they have, right out from under Rosemary’s nose. She accused
me
of sloping off with them, and I don’t deny I considered it, but I decided ‘twould be a shabby thing to do. Rosemary’s already in the River Tick! But there are no flies on Lily, and she saw Angelica filch the necklace, and left us a note.” His frown deepened. “I wonder where Lily’s gone off to! There’s no keeping pace with the little minx! Maybe she’s set out to try and save Angelica from landing us all in the briars.”

Simon Brisbane possessed great tolerance, as befit a gentleman of his vast experience; but he could not remain silent while slurs were hurled at Miss Smith.
He
might consider her a designing female, the slyest creature in existence, but he would not permit anyone else to heap aspersions upon her integrity. “Poppycock!” said he.

Thus reminded of the presence of a stranger, Fennel cast that individual an appraising glance. He approved the many-caped greatcoat and pantaloons, the Hessian boots and curly-brimmed beaver hat; he even approved the gentleman’s sentiment. “You ate acquainted with Angelica, sir? She is the best of
all
my sisters, even though she has taken to acting skitter-witted of late. We had grown used to depending on her for assistance in escaping from our little muddles, but this time she left us at point non plus
.
You look surprised! It’s true, upon my honor! ‘Tis a long story, and one I should not tell you—unless, sir, you already know about the sapphires?”

“Sapphires?” Simon felt more and more remorseful about his misjudgment of Miss- Smith. Confronted with one of the siblings whom Angelica had sought to spare further hardship, Simon began to more fully comprehend Angelica’s nobility. “I don’t know anything about any curst sapphires, but if Angelica wants such baubles I’ll see to it she’s given them!”

“Zounds!” By this vigorous open-handedness Fennel was extremely impressed. “Dashed if that ain’t generous! Especially when she’s run off with an ineligible
parti!
”

“You err!” murmured Valerian, looking diabolical indeed. “Allow me to introduce you to Angelica’s ineligible
parti.”
Fennel’s mouth dropped open. Before Valerian could make further unappreciative comments regarding Fennel’s powers of deduction, lazy husky tones fell upon his ear.

“Gracious!” Marigold rose in a very graceful manner from the sofa and drifted even more gracefully across the room. “Is it—does my imagination play me tricks—can it be Valerian?”

In the most dispassionate of manners, the eldest of the Millikin siblings gazed upon his stepmama. Marigold was looking every bit as lovely as he remembered her, in spite of damp splotches on her gown and various pieces of foliage clinging here and there to her person. She returned the scrutiny, then averted her gaze so that her long lashes lay tenderly against her cheeks. “Oh, Valerian, it has been so many years! I am very sorry—I behaved
very
thoughtlessly— I beg you will forgive me!”

The scheming Marigold, in comparison with her stepson, was a rank novice in the fine art of deviousness. Too, she was a feather-head and Valerian possessed a sharp shrewd wit. Though Marigold was unaware of these factors, Valerian was not. As he plucked away her foliage and dabbed at her damp gown with his handkerchief, he decided he could afford to be generous. “I suppose I must straighten out this tangle since here; it’s clear as noonday that your brats are going on in a very bad way. But you needn’t think that because I get you clear this once you may rely on me to put all square!”

“Valerian!” Marigold looked very, very frail. “How can you speak so to me?”

“Easily, ma’am!” Belatedly aware that his stepmama might misunderstand his ministrations, which quite naturally derived only from the very proper concern of a physician for a patient and had nothing at all to do with the fact that the patient was a lovely lady only five scant years older than himself, Valerian put away his handkerchief. “Depend upon it, these very great calamities of which Fennel has been telling me can be laid at your door.”

“
I
?” Marigold clutched her breast. “You are very stem, Valerian! Have I not for all the years since your father’s death sought to raise my family alone and without assistance? Which I do not scruple to tell you is a thankless task and one that fatigues me to death! When I consider that Rosemary and Lily and Fennel—to say nothing of Angelica, the ungrateful chit!—Well! I am sure I
deserve to
go off in an apoplexy!”

“You may do so with my blessing!” Valerian retorted. “Don’t be grumbling yourself into a fit of the sullens; I shan’t coax you out of them! And don’t be spouting any more fustian about raising your brats alone, because I know very well it’s Angelica who’s dealt with them. You’ve taken a very shabby advantage of her.”

“You are cruel!” Marigold cried feebly. “Cruel! Angelica promised your papa on his deathbed that she would look after us! It’s not as if she had anything better to do—after all, she is the ugly duckling of the family!”

With this blatant misapprehension, Simon had to disagree. “Rot!” said he.

This untimely interruption had the effect of distracting Marigold. She contemplated Simon, his broad shoulders and narrow waist, his well-shaped calf and dissipated face. No less than her daughters did Marigold revere a handsome gentleman; no slower of comprehension, she also immediately recognized a hardened rakeshame. With that comprehension all similarity between Marigold and her daughters ceased; Marigold wasn’t thrown into a pelter at finding herself in conversation with a noted profligate. Quite the contrary, Marigold thought she would like to pursue the conversation. She looked coy.

If Marigold was impressed by Simon Brisbane, and she was, Simon was not similarly stricken with admiration; he believed Marigold at least partially responsible for his Miss Smith’s devilish stratagems. Said he, with quirked brow; “You don’t
look
consumptive!”

“Consumptive?” Marigold was perplexed.

Another voice came to them then, faintly from the couch. “Fennel!” cried Rosemary, as she struggled to a sitting position. “Mama! We must go after Angelica and my sapphires. Chalmers will be home at any moment! What can I say to him? I think I shall go mad.”

Immediately Fennel was at his sister’s side. ‘There, there!” he soothed. “Say Angelica took them! Which reminds me that this gentleman is Angelica’s ineligible
parti
!”

Rosemary propped herself up on one elbow and craned her neck, the better to observe the gentleman who had dallied with the ugly duckling of the Millikin family. Damnably attractive, undeniably dissolute—this rakehell had trysted with
Angelica?
“Good God!” said Rosemary.

Though Marigold’s reaction was similar—to wit, stunned disbelief—she expressed herself much more eloquently and with a great many such phrases as “bound for perdition” and “the road to ruin.” Perhaps, suggested Marigold, the anxiety Angelica had suffered over Rosemary’s little problems had deranged her mind. Conversely, Marigold could think of no good reason why a rakeshame should choose an ugly duckling as the object of his philandering. Since he had done so, queer as it might seem. Marigold trusted that the rakeshame would make amends. Her little Angelica was of good birth and hitherto untarnished character; she must not be made to suffer for what had chanced. Marigold was fully conscious of the incongruity of such a match—Mr. Brisbane was obviously a bachelor of the first water while Angelica was at her last prayers—but Mr. Brisbane should have considered the consequences before he took a spinster off the shelf for purposes of dalliance.

“I trusted her!” Marigold concluded, with a despairing gesture as eloquent as any Mrs. Siddons had ever enacted on or off the stage. “I left my darling children to her care. What must she do but abandon all to dally with you, sir? Though I cannot conceive why you wished to do so, it is obvious you did—which is
thoroughly
reprehensible!”

“This is a tempest in a teapot!” responded Mr. Brisbane, when his accuser paused so that he might defend himself. Since Marigold seemed disinclined to utter any practical remarks, and Valerian seemed disinclined to do anything more practical than thoughtfully watch Marigold, Simon abandoned them. Perhaps the other two members of the party might achieve a greater degree of lucidity.

“Heavy work, ma’am!” remarked Valerian, as Marigold stared in bewilderment at Mr. Brisbane’s retreating back. “I can’t imagine what possessed you to make such a cake of yourself—not that it’s the first time! You were always one to fuss over trifles.”

“Trifles!” Marigold turned an indignant face upon her stepson. Absurd to think of him so; they were almost of an age. In fact, Valerian had grown into a very personable man. A physician, was he not? And probably as poor as a church mouse. Still, Marigold had always considered other things more important than mere wealth. And had there not been a well-heeled godfather? But first things first. “A man of nefarious reputation trifles with your sister and you say I make a piece of work over
nothing?
He may have offered her a slip on the shoulder for all we know!”

“Oh, yes!” Valerian responded cheerfully. “He did! You needn’t go into high fidgets, because first Angelica boxed his ears and then she kicked him in the shin.”

“She
what?”
Marigold gasped, then swooned. Since she did so right into her stepson’s arms, this act failed to attract the attention of the other occupants of the room.

Valerian’s attention it did attract, though not in the precise manner Marigold had planned. He clasped her shoulders, sat her away from him, and said: “I am going to release you, Marigold, so you may either cease your posturing or fall upon your head, I don’t especially care which!” He promptly suited action to word.

Presented with so unpalatable a choice, Marigold opened her blue eyes, which were damp with tears. “You were not used to dislike me so much, in the old happier days!”

“I wasn’t?” Valerian crossed his arms upon his chest and looked interested. “As
I
recall the old days, I thought you were highly capricious, prone to oddities and absurdities and eccentricities! But you don’t like plain-speaking, do you? Now I’ll warrant you’ll threaten to fall into a lethargy.”

Marigold, who had been contemplating precisely that, rapidly reconsidered. “I am entirely crushed,” she said sadly, “that you should hold me in such very low esteem.”

Valerian might have been a devious individual, dispassionate and detached; but he was no more than human and therefore did not even briefly contemplate turning aside temptation. “I might give you,” he said speculatively, “an opportunity to change my mind.”

Whatever Marigold had expected of Valerian, it was not that manner of response. Caught by surprise, she blinked. Then her blue eyes narrowed, she smiled enchantingly, she stepped forward and laid a fragile hand on Valerian’s coatsleeve. “I am flattered!” she breathed. “To think that all these years—Valerian, I had no idea!”

Nor had Valerian, and the notion made him laugh aloud. “You’ll catch cold at that!” he wheezed. “Oh, you’re first-rate, I don’t deny it, but you’re not in
my
style. So stay your distance, if you please, because I have other fish to fry!”