Maggie MacKeever (5 page)

“You’re mighty quiet, miss!” observed Drusilla. “Perhaps you’ve decided we won’t suit.” Before Tabby could demur, Lambchop jumped down from the ottoman and rushed, barking, through the door. “Pa,” added Drusilla, in explanation of the footsteps that sounded in the hall. “Ermy, don’t sit on that ottoman, or you’ll get Lambchop’s hair all over your pretty dress.”

Ermyntrude looked down at the pretty dress, which, apparently, no handsome young viscount would have the opportunity to admire this day. “It doesn’t signify,” she sighed and reclaimed her window seat.

Drusilla grimaced at her sister’s back, then turned to Tabby. “I hope you ain’t taken us in dislike! Although it wouldn’t surprise me if you had. Lady Grey considers us a bit of an oddity, and I suppose she’s right, and we must try to mend our ways, for Pa’s sake. I think I should tell you that Pa has pinned his hopes on you. And so have we all!
Not
that I need a governess, you understand! We’ve tried to rub along by ourselves, but Pa hasn’t the faintest notion of how to go on, and I’m too young, and Ermy—well, Ermy is what she is!” She shot her sister an unappreciative glance. “Perhaps I shan’t grow up. I don’t want to grow up if it means that I must go about acting like I have windmills in my head.”

“Windmills!” In her indignation, Ermyntrude sat up straight. “Just wait! Because you
will
grow up, and you’ll grow up into a beauty just like I did, and
then
we’ll see!”

“I
shan’t
be a beauty!” retorted Drusilla with determination, although her looks already made a mockery of her words. “And if I
am,
I promise that I won’t go about so full of my amours that I can talk of nothing else, and generally make such a cake of myself that everyone around me either wants to wring my neck or fall into whoops!”

The younger Elphinstone was certainly outspoken. It was obvious from Ermyntrude’s expression that this plainspokenness had caught her on the raw. “Pray don’t do violence to your feelings!” Tabby said hastily, because Ermyntrude looked ready to fly into the boughs. Lambchop’s barks and the footsteps drew closer. A gentleman walked into the drawing room. Tabby knew immediately from his resemblance to his daughters that it must be Sir Geoffrey. He was an extraordinarily handsome man.

Apparently Sir Geoffrey found nothing untoward in the fact that his daughters were glaring daggers at each other. “Down, beast! Not you, Miss Minchin,” he added, for Tabby had risen on his entrance. “You
are
Miss Minchin? Good! I am pleased to make your acquaintance, ma’am. You have been having a pleasant little coze with my girls, have you? Good! We wish you to feel quite at home here with us, for we are all very grateful to you for having come to take us in hand!”

Chapter Six

Life in the Elphinstone household was every bit as eccentric as Tabby had feared. Like the rickety job-coach Sir Geoffrey had hired to bring her to Brighton, the household had a ramshackle air. In point of fact, matters were at so bad a pass that Tabby found herself compelled to enlighten the housemaids about, among other things, the introduction of tea leaves to the carpet and damp sand to the floor, with the result that she had little time to spend with the young ladies of the house. Still, though she had not the time she’d like to spend upon either endeavor, some progress had been made. Sir Geoffrey had commented only yesterday upon the fact that, for two days running, breakfast had been on the table at a conventional hour. As for Tabby’s charges, perhaps she had had little opportunity to instruct them in such weighty matters as moral philosophy, but Drusilla had begun to sit more often on the furniture than the floor, and Lambchop was less frequently seen in the dining room at mealtimes, and Ermyntrude had been heard to inform a footman that the proper way to crack the claws of a lobster at dinner was in the kitchen and not between the hinges of a dining room drawer. All in all, thought Tabby, she was growing very comfortable with the Elphinstones. Although, perhaps, considering the oddities of the family, that wasn’t an altogether good thing. Tabby wondered what her uncle would have made of Sir Geoffrey and his offspring, and smiled.

Ermyntrude saw that smile, interpreted it is an indication of Tabby’s pleasure at being at the theater. “I said you would enjoy it!” she whispered now. “As for your being in mourning, nobody knows you, so what can it signify? Myself, I’ve never understood how it befitted the dead if the living made themselves miserable! Yes, and each other also. Look at Pa!”

Sir Geoffrey was in mourning? Confused, Tabby glanced at her employer, who was seated in the front of the hired box. Far from looking stricken, he gave every indication of a gentleman hugely enjoying himself. “I don’t understand,” Tabby murmured.

“Clunch!” said Ermyntrude fondly. “I forgot that you haven’t met Lady Grey. She was to join us tonight, but came down with one of her sick headaches.
She
is in mourning also, but it hasn’t stopped her from leading Pa a merry dance, despite the fact that she’s supposed to be in Brighton because of health. Yes, and the dratted female means to put our nerves in as sad a state as hers are supposed to be, or I don’t know chalk from cheese! Well, I shan’t let her. Oh, look! There is St. Erth.”

Tabby was reminded of her responsibilities. “I don’t think your papa would care to hear you refer to his future wife as ‘dratted,’ “ she said.

“Fiddlestick!” retorted Ermyntrude. “I’ve heard him call her that himself. Yes, and I’ve heard you say worse! So for you to scold me is like the pot calling the kettle black. But you are missing St. Erth!”

Tabby had already heard far more of the viscount than she cared to. Ermyntrude’s constant effusions had inspired her with an acute dislike of the young gentleman. Cravenly, she avoided glancing at the opposite box.        It had been some time since Tabby had been to a play, and despite her reservations, she could not help but enjoy the treat. The theater was crowded, box and galley and pit, with gentlefolk and their servants, tradesmen and cits, and military men. Tabby inhaled that extraordinary compound of odd scents peculiar to a theater, of which lamp oil and stale bodies made up no small part.

“There!” hissed Ermyntrude, and nudged her once again. “Do pay attention! Isn’t St. Erth the most splendid-looking gentleman you have ever laid eyes upon?”

Tabby murmured noncommittally. In truth, she could not see clearly enough to judge more than that St. Erth was tall and apparently well built, with golden hair, and attention fixed firmly on the stage. Tabby would have liked similarly to direct her own attention thither, at a subterranean vault set up complete with coffins, death’s-heads and crossbows, toads and snails. It was not the scenery that had caught the viscount’s attention, she realized. Tabby also stared at the slender, raven-haired actress who dominated the stage. From so great a distance, Tabby could not see the color of the lady’s eyes, but she would recognize that histrionic manner anywhere. The actress placed a hand to her breast. Tabby shuddered and sank back in her chair.

Ermyntrude, too, noticed the viscount’s keen interest. “It isn’t true that St. Erth is on the dangle for that female!” she announced, so shrilly that her papa glanced back at her and frowned. “It is just that she is all the rage right now, and so he follows the example set by his friends. The divine Sara, they call her. I’ll wager she’s not so divine seen at close range. She’s probably thirty if she’s - a day!”

As Tabby recollected, the divine Sara had not looked particularly haggish at closer view. Quite the opposite. And her vocabulary had been awesome, when she recovered from her swoon.

Naturally, Tabby could not apprise Ermyntrude of her acquaintance with the actress. Much as Ermyntrude might enjoy the story, she could not be trusted to keep it to herself, and any employer must consider it an excellent reason to turn Tabby off. Tabby leaned back farther into the shadows, wishing she had the knack of making herself invisible.

The play was quite ruined for her. Tabby was unable even to appreciate Rogero’s long soliloquy and his announcement that “Despair sits brooding over the putrid eggs of hope.” The glimpse of Sara had quite naturally reminded her of a certain rakehell and her own shocking behavior so far as he was concerned.

She was a fine one to chide Ermyntrude, Tabby thought; she who had emptied a water pitcher over a gentleman, and then kissed him and buttoned his shirt. If anyone were ever to find out—

“Miss Minchin.” Tabby started to hear her name. So deep had she been in her brown study that she had failed to notice that the soliloquy had concluded with guitar and a song, the winds had ceased to whistle through the caverns with the arrival of an intermission, and that several people had come to Sir Geoffrey’s box.

One of the gentlemen had spoken to her and was smiling at her now. Behind him, Ermyntrude grimaced meaningfully. “Gracious, but you are one for air-dreaming. Tabby!” she said. “I was wishful of making you acquainted with Mr. Philpotts.”

Ermyntrude did not want for admirers, though St. Erth was not among them. Tabby murmured a polite greeting. Mr. Philpotts was no Adonis, perhaps, but there was a twinkle in his brown eyes and his expression was kind. “Welcome to Brighton, Miss Minchin,” he said. “Ermy speaks highly of you. How fortunate it was that Sir Geoffrey found you—a boon for all concerned.”

“Ermy,” was it? This was no small degree of familiarity to accord to a gentleman. Tabby glanced around for her wayward charge, saw Ermyntrude wriggle her fingers in an attempt to catch the attention of St. Erth. She succeeded. The viscount looked rather astonished at the familiarity, whereas Mr. Philpotts looked bleak. It was clearly midsummer moon with the poor gentleman. Tabby was tempted to suggest he might go on more prosperously if he didn’t wear his heart upon his sleeve.

Ermyntrude turned away, her- expression sulky. Tabby held her breath, anticipating a storm. “May I,” Mr. Philpotts interjected smoothly, “fetch you ladies some lemonade?”

“What a splendid notion!” Ermyntrude was all smiles. “I’ll just come with you, shall I?” She caught his arm and led him out into the hall.

Ermyntrude’s exit distracted Sir Geoffrey from the conversation he was having with a couple of his cronies. Lady Grey wouldn’t like it if Ermy made a cake of herself at the theater, he realized. Nor would she like it if he appeared to be enjoying Miss Minchin’s company. “Better go along!” he advised Tabby. “Appearances, you know!”

Glumly, Tabby rose. She would much rather have remained quiet as a little mouse in a dark comer of the box. But Sir Geoffrey was her employer, and his wish was her command.

She stepped through the door and out into the hall, where various other playgoers visited and strolled. Nowhere did she glimpse Ermyntrude and Mr. Philpotts. Tabby had no notion of where one went to procure lemonade in a theater, and she disliked to draw attention to herself by stopping someone to ask. Helplessly, she moved with the flow of traffic. At least, she told herself, she was unlikely to encounter the divine Sara in this crush.

She was apparently little more likely to encounter Osbert and Ermy. Tabby was soon quite lost. She turned down this corridor and that, and then found herself backstage. There were fewer people here, if further obstacles in the form of trailing ropes and miscellaneous pieces of scenery. Tabby paused to contemplate clouds painted in semitransparent colors on linen stretched on frames.

A hand caught her arm. Startled, Tabby glanced up into bright green eyes and a wickedly handsome face. She supposed she should not have been surprised. Where the divine Sara went, Vivien would not be far behind.

Vivien, however, had not the advantage of Tabby’s forewarning, and he was startled, indeed. “It
is
you!” he said. “I thought for a moment I was seeing a ghost—or a figment of my imagination come to life! I make you my compliments, Miss Nevermind. You look surprised. Can it be you have forgotten me so soon?”

Forget the gentleman who had bestowed upon her her first kiss, and additionally her first glimpse of a bronzed naked chest? Tabby suspected she would remember the wicked Vivien even on her deathbed. But she was here to prevent Ermyntrude making a cake of herself over a gentleman, not to make one of herself. “Why should I remember you, pray?”

So she wished to play games with him? Vivien quirked a brow. “So many gentlemen have made violent attacks on your virtue recently that I am lost among the crowd?”

Tabby couldn’t repress her ready sense of humor. “It is your memory that is at fault. I am the female whose virtue you promised was quite safe.”

“Did I?” Vivien smiled. “I must have been foxed. I am glad to have this opportunity to offer you my apologies.”

How very fine he was, in frilled shirt and knee breeches and long-tailed coat. Tabby was aware of how drab she must look in her dreary dark gown. And then she wondered at herself, for she had never thought much about her appearance.

“Nothing of the sort!” she said briskly, in a last-ditch effort to withstand her captor’s devastating charm. “You refer to the, er, climax of our last meeting, I suppose. It doesn’t signify.”

“Oh?” Vivien guided Tabby farther away from the backstage bustle, between two of a series of shutters or flats that opened centrally and moved in grooves set in and about the stage. “You enjoyed being called a doxy, a trollop, Haymarket-ware? If that is what you like, I shall be happy to oblige you—little jade!”

Tabby remembered all too clearly how Sara, recovering from her swoon, had denounced Vivien for carrying on a squalid little intrigue behind her back. How embarrassed Tabby had been. And how lightly Vivien seemed to regard the episode. Her amusement faded. “You are outrageous, sir!” she said.

“I try to be,” Vivien admitted. “There is my reputation to live up to, you will recall. What a surprise to encounter you like this. When I made inquiries the next day, you had already left the inn. No one seemed to know where you had come from or who you were. Now here you are. Fortune has smiled on me.”

Tabby refused to be disarmed.
“Very
outrageous!” she said. “It is no wonder you have a wicked reputation, sir, if this is how you talk to all chance-met females!”