Patricia Rice (5 page)

“How enchanting!” She laughed brittlely. “Shall I demand
that you accompany me for two turns around the park this afternoon? I daresay
all heads will turn at the sight of two such gallant gentlemen escorting a mere
girl about. ’Twould be most exciting indeed.”

“I’ll gladly escort you to the park every afternoon, Cass,”
Bertie offered exuberantly. “You’d make a deuced fine sight on any gentleman’s
arm.”

Merrick frowned at his thick-headed friend. It was patently
obvious to him that Lady Cassandra had been roasting them for their good
intentions, but then, Bertie didn’t know the full extent of her desperate
straits or deceptive tongue.

“Since we understand your mother is quite ill and unable to
escort you to the proper functions, we thought it might be appropriate if
Bertie’s sister takes you under her wing. She has been wedded this year or more
and would make a suitable chaperone. And she has already proclaimed herself
thoroughly tired of her family’s all-male company. She would be delighted with
a little feminine companionship.”

“How very considerate of you, my lord,” Cassandra said with
mischief in her eyes. “You have thought of everything. She’s Lady Cunningham
now, is she not? I’m sure we’ll get on swimmingly. I can teach her to play
cards and swear, and Bertie and all his young brothers can escort me about
town, and Lord Cunningham can cut Duncan every time he comes looking for me.
Sounds great fun, does it not?”

The horror in Bertie’s eyes made her giggle. “I’m sorry,
Bertie.” She laughed as he tried to stutter some reply. “I should not roast you
that way. Your offer is very generous, but I must stay with Mama. I really have
done nothing to merit your generosity.”

Bertie tugged at his neckcloth and, red-faced, attempted to
be polite. “Dash it all, Cass, you and Christa would get along fine. You ought
to be out and about more. You ain’t still in mourning, are you?”

It was on the tip of Cass’s tongue to say she had never
mourned her father, but she caught Merrick’s eye and bit back the bitter reply.
All this had been his idea, she knew. He wholeheartedly disapproved of her
rackety family. The Howard name and Eddings title dated back through centuries,
but Wyatt’s Puritan antecedents cared little for such things. Perhaps it was
kindness that made him want to rescue her from herself, but she preferred to
believe it was his smug moral righteousness. Experience had taught her kindness
did not exist.

“That’s most thoughtful of you, Bertie, but really not
necessary. Mama will be better soon, and I’ll have a proper come-out then. I
haven’t seen Christa in this age or more. Perhaps someday you could take me to
call. We haven’t kept in touch with our neighbors from Kent very well. Would
you care for some tea?”

She prayed they would not. In all likelihood she would have
to go to the kitchen and prepare it herself, and even then it was doubtful that
she could offer anything more. But it was the only polite phrase she had left
in her repertoire.

Lord Merrick rose and bowed. “I fear we have other
engagements and must be leaving, my lady. If it’s convenient for you, one of us
will be around tomorrow at this time to take you to Lady Cunningham’s. I’m
certain she will be delighted to have the visit.”

He was all that was proper, making her realize all that she
was not. Resentfully she offered her hand and allowed him to bow over it. His
grip was strong and firm and somehow disconcerting. “Thank you, my lord. It has
been good seeing you again.”

“I say, Merrick, let’s not do it too brown. Christa ain’t
exactly the Queen of Egypt,” Bertie objected when Merrick did not immediately
release her hand.

Cassandra immediately transferred her attention to Bertie
and murmured polite farewells. She was uncomfortably aware of his lordship’s
gaze, but she had no wish to decipher what might be behind his observant eyes.

After they left, she sat staring at the lighter-colored
square on the wallpaper where a portrait had once hung. Her argument with
Duncan overshadowed the visit, and her fingers clenched and unclenched in her
palm as she tried to sort out a strategy.

She shouldn’t have been so hasty about declining Lady
Cunningham’s chaperonage. She might have met some decent gentlemen that way,
but Duncan had been right. Her reputation and that of her family would dissipate
any chance she had and potentially harm anyone who supported her.

When she was a child, she had always considered it something
of a lark to accompany her father to places other ladies would blanch to hear
of. She wondered what society would think if they knew she was good friends
with the Cyprian who had been her father’s mistress these past years.
Undoubtedly, she was corrupt beyond redemption, but she hadn’t
wanted
to be that way.

All she had ever wanted was her parents’ happiness and a
decent home. That she had gone about it in all the wrong ways was a difficult
lesson to learn—and not one understood when she was younger. Now that she was
old enough to know better, there didn’t seem to be any way out of the hole she
had dug. She was tarred with the same brush as her brother and father.

Or would be soon enough. She stood and paced the room.
Obviously her reputation hadn’t preceded her yet. Perhaps she had behaved
rather badly at the few social affairs Duncan had condescended to take her to,
but that was because he had insisted on foisting her off on his miserable
friends. She could do better. Her mother had taught her the niceties.

She only had to find a decent man to rescue her from this
morass, and she would be the epitome of all that was proper. She could provide
her mother with a decent home—if she worked fast enough.

It would take a man of immense respectability and wealth,
one who was far above gossip. With a smile as much of spite as decision, she
lifted her skirt and set off in search of the one remaining maid.

The illegitimate daughter of a long-departed parlor maid,
Lotta had been with the Howards literally since her birth. There were some that
said she was as much Howard as the legitimate son and daughter, but Cassandra
and Lotta had decided it was more likely that Lotta’s father was one of the
late marquess’s rakehell friends.

While admittedly Cassandra favored her blond mother and
possessed little of her father’s dark, aristocratic looks, Lotta bore no
resemblance to anyone at all, not even her deceased mother. Her round cherub
face and blond locks had more the appearance of a good yeoman than of any
aristocrat either knew. But both girls were equally certain that Lotta’s mother
would never have given her virtue to a simple farmer. Somewhere out there a
nobleman with a rotund face and a yeoman’s build had a daughter he knew nothing
about.

Cassandra rather favored Bertie’s father as the culprit.
Wouldn’t the new Lady Cunningham be surprised to discover she had a half-sister
scrubbing ladies’ linens in the Howard basement? Reaching the laundry room, she
dodged suds as Lotta took the wash paddle to the kitchen cat, spraying soapy
water across the already slippery floor.

“Lotta, how would you like to put on your best bonnet and go
courting?”

That caught the older girl’s attention. The maid dropped her
paddle and hastily dried her hands on her apron. “Courting? Who’s to go
courting, ye or me?”

“Both. First, you must find out where my beau will be so I
can make certain to be there too. That you can do if you woo one of his
lordship’s men. Surely you must know one or two on Merrick’s staff?”

Lotta’s eyes grew large at the earl’s name, but she had no
reason to question Cassandra’s decision. “If I don’t know them, I soon will.
Will you lend me your old gloves, too, so I can look proper?”

Cassandra smiled in delight. It would be only a matter of
time now.

~*~

Lotta had long since returned with her devastating news
when Cassandra entered her mother’s room with tea. She felt her stomach knot as
she arranged the bed tray. She couldn’t let her mother see how many of her
hopes were pinned on the outcome of this conversation.

“There is entirely too much here for both of us to eat,
child. Are you expecting company?” Lady Eddings arranged her napkin over her
satin bed gown and lifted her large blue eyes to her daughter.

“Of course not, Mama. You must eat more if you are to get
well. Will you have one sugar or two today?” Cassandra settled in the bedside
chair and poured their tea. Her mother really ought to have full-time care, but
good nursemaids did not stay long when their duties were not monetarily
rewarded.

“One, thank you. Lotta said you had gentlemen callers this
morning. I trust they were respectful. It really is not proper to have callers
with no other lady in attendance.”

“You need not worry about the conventions, Mama. Lord
Merrick is everything that is proper. He meant to call on us both, but I had to
explain that you weren’t receiving. You remember Lord Merrick and Mr. Scheffing
from home, don’t you?”

Lady Eddings smiled. “Which Mr. Scheffing? It seems to me
there are dozens of them. A quite respectable family, as I recall.”

“Albert, of course, Mama. He is a little less than Lord
Merrick’s age, I believe.”

The invalid nodded knowingly. “And never been married, now
that I recall. A quite presentable young man. They’re not wealthy, but I
suppose young Albert would come into a competence one day. You could do worse,
I daresay. Will he call again?”

Cassandra looked exasperated at this digression from her plans.
“I don’t know, Mama, he’s just a friend. It’s Lord Merrick I want to talk to
you about. I wish to attach his interest, but he’s to go away and stay at
Hampton Court with some others for a week, and I fear he will forget all about
me while he’s gone.”

Actually, since he had managed to forget her for years, she
was quite certain he would forget. Her urgency was a result of servants’ gossip
that the earl would set a date with Lady Catherine over this next week. It was
expected there would be a wedding before the Season ended. Cass could overset a
betrothal without a qualm, but a wedding would put finished to her plans.

Lady Eddings regarded her with suspicion. “Wyatt Mannering
is much too old and set in his ways for you. His first wife was a mouse who
never spoke a word of her own. That harpy mother of his saw to that. Besides,
haven’t I heard you say that he has become betrothed to Lady Catherine? An
unlikely couple, I admit, but their lands do march together.”

Cassandra had no recollection of Wyatt’s mother or his first
wife, but as a schoolroom miss she could scarcely be expected to make their
acquaintance. Her knowledge of Wyatt came more from his association with Duncan
and the other young men of the area. That had been before the fire, of course.

“He won’t be happy with Cathy. And our lands march alongside
his as well. And we have a much higher rank than the Montcrieffs. I don’t see
why I shouldn’t be the one he weds. Just think, Mama, we could go back to Kent.
It would be just like old times.”

Lady Eddings gazed at her daughter with affection. “Very
well, child, if your heart is set on it, I will write to your Aunt Matilda. She
does not go out much anymore, but she is great friends of the dowager Lady
Hampton. They will enjoy a visit, and I see no reason you shouldn’t accompany
her. Bring me my writing desk.”

Exhilaration swept through Cassandra. She had done it!
Within a fortnight she would be in constant proximity to Wyatt. Surely she
would find some way to attach him. It was just a matter of knowing her cards
and playing them well.

The jackpot would be returning to the safety and
respectability of Kent and providing the home that her mother deserved.

She would worry about the duties of married life later.

The moment Cassandra entered the portals of Hampton Court
with her aunt she had the premonition that she had committed a dreadful
mistake. The elderly butler greeted her great-aunt with respect and did not
deign to so much as announce Cassandra’s presence to the company.

An aging dowager in the sweeping silks and turban of another
generation haughtily bore down on them, taking Aunt Matilda into her protection
and leading her away, leaving Cassandra to trail behind as they were shown to
their chambers.

Unhappily, she listened to the sounds of voices and laughter
from behind all the closed doors of this monstrous edifice, but Lady Hampton
made no effort to introduce her to the other guests. She was abandoned in a
small chamber adjacent to her aunt’s.

Well, she was accustomed to looking after herself. She would
just have to learn to do the same in these strange surroundings. She was the
daughter of a marquess. They could not keep her in hiding forever. Then she
would show Merrick that she was all that she should be. Somehow, she would have
to make him see that Catherine was not what he wanted.

Duncan had refused to allow her any more gowns, so she had
only the emerald and the primrose to choose from as she prepared for dinner.
Merrick had seen both, so she had to decide based on the merits of the entrance
she would make. Without a lady’s maid to advise her, she settled on the
primrose silk. She dressed her hair herself so that the disorderly strands
fashioned into a neat coil on top of her head and only a few wisps spilled
about her face.

At the dinner bell, Cassandra descended the stairs to join
her aunt in the salon. The titters and shocked stares as she entered warned all
was not well, but Cassandra held her chin high and surveyed the room in seeming
search for her aunt. In reality, she wished for a corner in which to hide.

Her
faux pas
was
immediately apparent. Most of the guests assembled were considerably older than
herself, and one or two indiscreetly displayed as much of their bosoms as
Cassandra. But it was obvious even to her that such a display in this proper
household was the exception rather than the rule. In addition, the one or two
young ladies of her own age wore modest muslins primarily of white with
discreet dashes of color in their sashes or ribbons. None revealed more than a
hint of the valley between their breasts, and even this much was concealed
behind a properly draped shawl. Cassandra’s vibrant silk with its daring
decolletage was fit only for the wicked women of Duncan’s world. Why had she
never noticed that before?