Midnight Masquerade (25 page)

Pronto was surprised to hear her say, after a longish pause, “Actually, Mr. Pilgrim, I am very happy you are here. It will be best to have a gentleman in the room when I meet Bessler. One cannot call a guard from Newgate a gentleman. Odd that I did not think of it myself, but we have been very much at sixes and sevens, with this business of turning off young Belami, and of course finding a replacement.”

He disliked the sharp, appraising gleam in her eye as she said the last. By the living jingo, the harpy was sizing him up! This was a difficulty never in his wildest fears foreseen.

“Don’t look at me!” he warned her.

But it was Deirdre’s spontaneous giggle that relieved his mind. A glass of watered wine was served, to wile away the remaining eight minutes. This was considered even a worse cheat than stuffing a pair of kings up your sleeve, but he drank it anyway, and held his glass out for a refill. You didn’t have to try to talk when you were drinking. At last the long-awaited knock at the door sounded.

Pronto’s job now was to remove Deirdre and the guard from the room, but how was this to be accomplished when the duchess had just said she was happy to have him present? Why should she fear Bessler, when he’d run tame in her house any time these two years?

The duchess did not arise from her seat. She sat like a queen, pointing with one finger to the chair Bessler was to occupy, directly facing her. When he was seated, she pointed the finger to the door, and nodded her head to the guard, who took up his spot there.

“I little thought, when I invited you into my home, and made a friend of you, that we should one day meet under such circumstances,” she began.

There was a good deal more to come. After the “insult to injury” passage of her rant, Pronto began to feel she wouldn’t notice if he sheared off. On the other hand, she was supposed to notice it, wasn’t she? Or was it only Bessler who had to notice?

“Believe I’ll just be toddling along now,” Pronto said softly, and arose form his chair, tossing his head wildly to Deirdre to follow him.

She took her cue and began to tiptoe from the room. “Deirdre, sit!” her aunt called without ever removing her accusing stare from Bessler.

“I—I’m getting water for Mr. Pilgrim, Auntie,” Deirdre replied, looking to see if this excuse passed muster.

Bessler, cagier than the others, went into his performance to distract the old lady. “Duchess, what can I say in my own defense? Nothing. My conduct is inexcusable,” he began humbly, his head falling on his chest.

“I must agree with you, sir,” Charney agreed, loud and clear, and completely forgot her fleeing niece and Pronto.

The next obstacle in their path was to lure the guard from the door. When Deirdre was informed of this by Pronto, she took over the project. “It will be best to allow my aunt a moment’s privacy with Herr Bessler. There is no escape from the saloon. Why don’t you have a glass of wine while you wait, sir?” she asked politely.

“Watered,” Pronto warned him from the corner of his mouth.

“If she’s watered, I expect I could handle a drop without losing the use of me wits,” the guard said happily, and trailed into the hallway. He was seated at a table with a glass and a decanter.

“Why are we here?” Deirdre asked Pronto. “Dick didn’t tell me.”

“No secret to it. At least he didn’t say so. Old Bessler’s agreed to mesmerize your aunt, and make her agree to Belami and you getting shackled.”

“No!” she gasped.

“Are you against it?” Pronto asked. “By jingo, I’ve failed again. It was
you
I was supposed to get mesmerized. Maybe I could do it myself. I must have a touch of animal magnetism like the rest of them. Got something to do with putting your thumbs in the person’s eyes—or is it the temples?”

Deirdre was not listening. She was not laughing out loud, but there was such a gleeful smile on her face that Pronto, for the first time in his life, found her not only pretty, but demmed pretty.

“Listen,” he said suavely, “what I said in there about not angling for me after turning Belami off—well, if you really think we could make a go of it, wouldn’t mind giving it a shot.”

She was not quite listening. Another difficulty had occurred to her. “Pronto, what if Bessler mesmerizes Auntie into not pressing charges against him? He might, you know.”

“We know it. Dick says it’s just a chance he has to take. He’ll go along with whatever old Charney decides to do on that score.”

Within seven minutes, they knew what she had decided to do. She came to the door with a smiling Bessler. “I’ll do what I can for you, Doctor,” she promised, “but you were naughty to steal my diamond. You can’t expect to get off scot free.” That he was again “Doctor,” as before being discredited, was a good omen for him. Doctor Bessler had been a greater
pet even than Herr Bessler.

“You are too kind. An angel,” Bessler said daringly, and lifted her age-speckled hand to his lips. As his head arose, he winked broadly to Deirdre and Pronto.

The guard hopped up to put his hand on Bessler’s elbow and usher him to the waiting carriage. “Back to the cell for you, mate,” he said cheerily.

Pronto, referring to a slip of paper he carried in his pocket, rehearsed his next line. “Lord Belami is upset with the broken engagement,” he said, then read it again and added,
“most
upset, actually. Sorry, Deirdre. Easy to fall into the habit. See how it happened to you.”

“Good-bye, Doctor. Or perhaps it is only
au revoi revoir,”
the duchess said with unaccustomed benignity. “What’s that you say, Mr. Pilgrim? Belami upset over the broken engagement? He is not the only one. Truth to tell, we are all upset. I believe I shall give that young man another chance. I shall drop him a note, and tell him he may call on us. Say, four this afternoon, Deirdre, if that suits you?”

“Noon would be better,” Deirdre said quickly. She was not sure how long the mesmerizing would last.

“I’ll tell him. It happens I’ll be seeing him the minute I leave here,” Pronto told them. “I’ll nip along to his place right now,” he said, peering at his note. “Yes, that’s right.
Go directly to my place,”
he read. “Well,” he said, wiping his brow, “seems I did something right for once. Dick will never believe it. Er—what are you going to do about Bessler, Duchess?”

“I shall not press charges against him. The law will demand some payment, but without my urging, retribution will not be so severe as it might have been. Perhaps I shall recommend he be returned to Austria. Each country must handle its own wrongdoers.”

“It’ll be for England to handle Bidwell, then,” Pronto said with satisfaction. Then he rammed his curled beaver on his head, smoothed his jacket, and headed for the door. “And if it don’t work out with you and Dick, Deirdre, remember what I said.” With a theatrical bow, only slightly marred by bumping his head against the door, he was off.

It was still only ten minutes before twelve when Belami was admitted to the mustard saloon. “Your Grace,” he said with a wary smile as he was shown in. “So kind of you to permit me to come and make my apologies.”

“Faith, hope, and charity—the three
virtues, and the greatest of these is charity. I seem to hear those words running through my mind like an echo. You would not have heard, Belami; I have decided not to press charges against Doctor Bessler. Of course, a report has been filed, and once the law has gotten hold of him, he cannot expect to get off free. I have decided to deal charitably with you as well, my lad. Do you still want this niece of mine?”

“Very much, ma’am,” he said with a glowing glance to Deirdre.

“Very well, then, here is the bargain we shall strike. No more women, no more gambling—beyond what is gentlemanly, I mean—and no more investigating. Is it agreed?”

“Auntie, you didn’t say anything about the investigating!” Deirdre exclaimed, casting an apologetic look to her reinstated fiancé

“It has a low touch to it that is undesirable, dealing with all manner of person,” Her Grace insisted.

Deirdre looked to Belami, who smiled innocently, then turned his charms on the duchess. “You are absolutely right, as usual. I shall send a note off to the Prince of Wales this minute, telling him I will be unable to find time to handle his case.”

“The Prince of Wales! You never mean it! What is he up to that he requires your services, the rogue?” Charney asked, eyes alight.

“It is extremely confidential, as you may imagine. I don’t know what will become of him, poor man.” He shook his head sadly and looked up through his long lashes to see how this was taken. The whole town knew Charney doted on Prinney.

“No, no! Naturally you must help the Prince. That is another matter entirely.”

“Why, Your Grace, I do not place his case higher than your own,” Belami told her.

Seeing he was laying it on with a trowel, Deirdre spoke up. “When you stop to think of it, it was Lord Everton’s daughter that Belami first helped. It is really shocking how so many respectable people are requiring assistance.”

“Very true,” Her Grace said sadly. “And there will be no objection to your lending a hand to our own sort, Belami.”

“I had no intention of hanging up a shingle,” he assured her.

“I expect you youngsters would like a few moments alone now, to make up. Five minutes, that is all I can allow,” she said severely. But as she hobbled beyond their view, a genuine smile lit her face.

“One of her virtues is slipping,” Belami said when they were alone. “She doesn’t place much faith in my behavior.”

“Dick, tell me all about it,” Deirdre said, going to join him on the sofa.

“There’s nothing to tell. When I learned the duchess was through with me, I had the notion of using Bessler’s mesmerism.”

“Not
that!
I mean about Prinney being in trouble. I wager it is over a woman.”

“But don’t you want to hear how I struck the bargain with Bessler, to help him if he would help me?”

“I heard all that from Pronto long ago. Is it his wife, Princess Caroline?”

“I didn’t say it was a woman.”

“What else could it be?”

“Miss Gower, we have five minutes to be alone together. You’ve already wasted one.”

“I suppose you want to make plans for the wedding.”

“No,
ac
-tually, I wanted to do
this,”
he said, pulling her into his arms.

Beyond the door, the duchess sent the butler off for champagne, before bending down to peek in at the keyhole. She revised her minutes to three when she saw how little Belami had reformed his libertine character.

Copyright © 1985 by Joan Smith

Originally published by Fawcett Crest in February, 1985

Electronically published in 2004 by Belgrave House

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

No portion of this book may be reprinted in whole or in part, by printing, faxing, E-mail, copying electronically or by any other means without permission of the publisher. For more information, contact Belgrave House, 190 Belgrave Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94117-4228

     http://www.RegencyReads.com

     Electronic sales: [email protected]

This is a work of fiction. All names in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to any person living or dead is coincidental.