Maggie MacKeever (19 page)

Jem, trembling lest his sins catch up with him, and he be stricken down by divine retribution on the spot, looked agonized. “The young lady, sir!” he gasped. “It is a matter of great importance! She begs your assistance, sir!”

Neal’s colonel had come up behind him in time to hear this explanation, of which he thought little; in Colonel Fortescue’s opinion, the gentlemen of Neal’s family were a great deal too much in the petticoat line. He voiced an opinion that for an officer in the prince’s own regiment to be indulging in assignations right under the prince’s very nose was altogether displeasing. Neal protested that the colonel misunderstood; the colonel stated firmly that men prone to misundertstandings did not achieve his exalted rank, and therefore that he had done no such thing. At this point their rather acrimonious exchange, which was inspiring poor Jem with a wish to sink through the floor before the nature of Delilah’s summons was published to the whole of Brighton, was interrupted by a gentleman of such exalted rank that he was second in consequence only to the mad king. Made aware by the colonel of the shocking antics indulged in by the lieutenant, the Regent further demonstrated his genial frame of mind. He knew what it was like to be a young officer, said Prinny, with a knowing glance. By all means the lieutenant must be given leave to deal with his emergency. And if the lieutenant would take a word of advice from his prince, he would keep all knowledge of this little emergency from the lovely Miss Choice-Pickerell.

Somewhat sobered by this amiable exchange, Neal took his leave. From Jem he gained no further explanation— Jem had no wish to bring down upon his own head the lieutenant’s wrath—except that Miss Mannering awaited him on the seashore.

Never had Neal known a damsel so fond of moonlight strolls. He uttered a strong determination to get to the bottom of this accursed affair. To this statement, Jem remained prudently silent. In his opinion, the lieutenant would discover, once he learned the truth of the matter, that he would much rather have remained in ignorance. It stood to reason. Jem would have much rather been ignorant himself.

Therefore, it was in silence that they walked to the beach. The first sight to greet Neal’s eyes was Miss Mannering, bent over a large basket. Surely she had not dragged him away from the Royal Pavilion to indulge in an alfresco party? Actually, the thought of picnicking with Delilah in the moonlight was not unpleasant. However, such things simply weren’t done. So Neal informed Miss Mannering, as soon as he was within earshot. He did not intend, the lieutenant stated sternly, to help Delilah make a byword of herself.

Delilah straightened up to study him, a very easy task in the bright moonlight. “You’re cast-away again,” she said disapprovingly. “You must be, or you wouldn’t be talking like a nodcock! I do think it very hard because I was relying on you for assistance.”

“You are not,” inquired Neal, regarding the basket, “picnicking?”

“At a time like this?” Delilah retorted indignantly. “Of course I am not! Pray don’t be a gudgeon. Oh, why must you be foxed when I need you most? I am at my wit’s end!”

“I am
not
foxed,” Neal responded, with equal indignation. “Merely a trifle bosky. And I don’t understand why that should put you in a tweak, Miss Mannering!”

“How could you? You have given me no opportunity to explain!” Delilah snapped, then looked rueful. “Pray forgive me for ripping up at you—I would not have done so were I not in such a whirl. You see, I cannot figure how to get into the house, and it is getting very late, and the case is desperate!”

From these remarks, Neal achieved no notable enlightenment. Why could Miss Mannering not gain access to the house on the Royal Crescent? Heaven knew she exited it easily enough! In search of further clarification, he glanced at Jem. “It’s the baby, sir,” the footman offered helpfully.

“Baby?” Neal echoed.

“Oh, yes!” With a doting expression, Delilah gazed upon the basket. “An excellent little creature, so quiet and well behaved. See for yourself. But I cannot think he will benefit from continual exposure to the night air, though I have wrapped him up very snugly. That is why I wished your help. You will know how we may sneak him into the house.” Neal said nothing, merely stared. “He will be no trouble at all!” Delilah added anxiously. “I promise you. The poor little thing is mute.”

Convinced that he was victim of some monstrous hoax, Neal bent over the basket, only to learn that for once Delilah spoke the truth. Within, bundled up as to endure an arctic chill, was definitely a baby. It stared serenely back at him. “Good God!” said Neal.

“You thought I was hamming you,” Delilah observed shrewdly. “Now that you realize I was not, you must tell me what to do.”

Neal made an effort to do so. He didn’t know how Delilah had come by this baby, he stated disapprovingly, but there was only one thing to be done with it. It must be taken to a foundling home.

Delilah was horrified by this suggestion, and she was very disappointed that the dashing Lieutenant Baskerville should turn out to be a cabbage-head. So she informed him. “How very disappointing,” she added, as he gaped at her, “that you should turn out to be so very poor-spirited! I am very sorry now that I asked your help. Never mind, I shall figure some way out of this fix myself!”

To this ominous utterance Neal responded with a plea that Miss Mannering refrain from enacting him further Cheltenham tragedies, since her histrionics had already inspired him with the devil of a head. Perhaps he did not fully grasp the situation. Why did Miss Mannering wish to introduce a baby into the duke’s household? And since she
did
wish so, however queer it was in her, why not simply carry the basket in through the front door?

Clever coconspirators, decided Delilah, were at a premium; certainly she’d never been blessed with one. She could not blame Jem for being on pins and needles, starting at a sound, or Neal for dragging his heels; but she wished that one of them would display a little initiative. She opened her mouth to render a full explanation, then paused, remembering Binnie’s advice on the unwisdom of discussing Johann. Of course Jem had deserved to be acquainted with the whole, due to his involvement in the matter; Delilah thought Binnie must agree, were she told of Jem’s endeavors, which Delilah did not intend she should be. The horse had already bolted; why worry about an unlocked barn door?

Neal, however, was an altogether different piece of goods. It was not that Delilah distrusted the young lieutenant; she had great faith in him, and was sure it was through no fault of his own that he’d fallen into foolish ways. As soon as there was time enough, she meant to demonstrate to him that one could, with the application of a little ingenuity and some good common sense, extricate oneself from even the most damnable difficulties. Unquestionably, Neal was in difficulties. Why else should he exhibit so relentless a determination to drink himself under the table at every opportunity? While the lieutenant was not of a sober nature, Delilah did not consider him yet sunk in dissipation. A clever girl, she could even put a name to the source of his difficulties. In a word, or three: Cressida Choice-Pickerell.

Though Delilah trusted the lieutenant, she did not trust him not to try and share with his fiancée a very good joke. Folly, that; Miss Choice-Pickerell demonstrably had no sense of humor; a failing the enormity of which Neal clearly failed to comprehend. Therefore, lest Johann learn that a certain baby had taken up residence at the Duke of Knowles’s house on the Royal Crescent, which would ruin all Delilah’s plans, the lieutenant must be kept in ignorance.

Miss Mannering drew a deep breath and summoned forth a blush. “I will tell you all, although there isn’t much
to
tell! We found this poor little creature, Jem and I, whilst engaged on a little stroll. Just fancy, Neal, he had been abandoned! Left in his little basket out in the cold! We couldn’t leave him to such a wretched fate, and so I decided the only solution was to take him home.” She paused; the lieutenant did not look entirely convinced. “It’s no good telling me to carry the basket in the front door; the duke would only order it carried back out again! You know what he is! And I could not bear that. No one knows better than I how it feels to be abandoned, alone in the world, without family or friends!”

Quite naturally, confronted with a tearful damsel, Neal drew her into his arms and let her weep upon his chest. Tactfully, Jem gazed out to sea. “It would only be for a short while,” sniffled Delilah. “Until I can find the baby a good home. He will be no trouble at all—I don’t know much about babies, but surely nothing so small can create much fuss! We could keep him in the nursery, which Jem says is unused. No one ever goes there, and to make doubly certain we will lock the door. And I will put Caliban up there also, which will make everyone relieved, because there’s no denying Caliban is not a favorite with the household, and I will frequently visit him. As will Jem! So no one will smell a rat and let the cat out of the bag.”

Despite the cool night air, Neal’s head had not cleared, as evidenced by the fact that he attributed his continued intoxication to the large quantities of liquor he’d consumed, and not to the tearful young lady who fit so snugly in his arms. Due to that intoxication, whatever its true source, he did not pause to contemplate the very sketchy nature of Delilah’s explanation, or the drawbacks to her schemes. That Delilah was on the hangout for his cousin the duke, Neal
did
recall. How the introduction of a baby into Sandor’s house would help her to accomplish her goal Neal did not know, but he was quite willing to offer assistance. “What a clever puss you are!” he uttered, with the utmost sincerity.

Delilah drew back to stare, wide-eyed, up at him. “How nice that you should think so! But I must warn you that Lord Knowles will not agree. Oh, Lieutenant Baskerville, you are my very last hope! I throw myself on your mercy! But it would be unfair not to point out that if His Grace finds out about this, he will be
very
angry.”

The lieutenant responded to this noble little speech as might have been expected: he first expressed utter disinterest in the duke’s likes and dislikes; he secondly reminded Miss Mannering that she should call him Neal. What innate worth of character she possessed! he thought, as he gazed into her freckled face. To risk Sandor’s wrath for the sake of an abandoned infant! But of course Delilah would pity the unfortunate creature, having herself been—as she had so sadly pointed out—similarly mistreated. Neal decided that Miss Mannering’s misadventures had gained for her a wisdom and compassion denied more gently reared damsels. Miss Choice-Pickerell, for example, would have passed by an abandoned baby with her ladylike nose firmly in the air. Well, a fig for Miss Choice-Pickerell! Neal would render the assistance required of him. He knew exactly how to gain entrance to his cousin’s house attracting the attention of anyone. Having come of age, he no longer had recourse to it; but he was not of such advanced years as to have forgotten the escape route of his salad days.

Thus the lieutenant pondered, gazing all the time into Delilah’s brown eyes. Lovely eyes they were, he realized; large and luminous. Sandor, if only he could be brought to realize it, was a very lucky man. Succumbing to impulse, Neal reached out and ruffled Delilah’s carroty curls. She smiled at him. And then Neal wondered if perhaps his senses were a trifle disordered. Sour milk and horseradish were not among the scents common to the seashore.

Meanwhile, Jem, as he turned from the seascape to the basket, decided that there were no flies on Miss Mannering. He also decided, as he studied the complacent babe, that the little fellow was deaf as well as mute, since he had exhibited no awareness of the rather long-winded discussion that had raged about his head. Perhaps deafness was a blessing, since the tyke seemed fated to confinement with a howling hound— Caliban did not take kindly to incarceration, as the household had learned. Jem hoped the hound had not chewed through the makeshift muzzle Delilah had tearfully applied before they set out on this night’s expedition, had not made their absence known. Jem had not thought their progress would be hastened by the company of the hound.

Much as he might dread the consequence of what he suspected might be considered kidnapping by the law, Jem did not regret his part in it. On the contrary, he was proud of the deft way he’d pulled it off. Not that it had been difficult, since they had returned to the tinkers’ campsite to find Athalia, Johann, and the horse all absent, and only the sleeping baby left behind in the caravan; but Jem had been prepared to do battle with the tinker if necessary, and though relieved that it had
not
been necessary, wasn’t reluctant to give himself full marks for bravery. In fact, he was feeling distinctly proprietorial toward this babe, who greeted each new adventure with so serene an air. Due to this paternal attitude, Jem—who, due to his young siblings, knew a great deal about babies—had refrained from informing Miss Mannering that, in the case of infants, a great deal of fuss could come in very small packages. He bent over the basket and made a cooing sound.

To this friendly overture, the baby responded with only a blink of its blue eyes. Miss Mannering and Lieutenant Baskerville displayed more animation: they roused from their mutual trance. “What is it?” cried Delilah, rushing to Jem’s side. “Why are you making that noise? Oh, I knew we should not have kept him out in the damp so long!”

Jem hastened to assure Miss Mannering that the babe had taken no harm. As proof, he lifted the child into his arms. “Snug as a bug in a rug, miss!” he said cheerfully.

Lieutenant Baskerville, who had followed Delilah to the basket—Neal, just then, would have followed Delilah anywhere, a sentiment which, had he considered it, he had never in the whole of their association cherished for Miss Choice-Pickerell—gazed upon the baby with interest, infants not generally coming in the way of young gentlemen of fashion. This infant, though deaf and mute, had perhaps benefited from its acquaintance with Johann and Athalia and the devious Miss Mannering; or perhaps some digestive complaint inspired its action, and not instinctive recognition of an easy conquest. Whatever the motivation, the baby stared at Neal, and its round little face broke into an unmistakable smile.