The Poor Relation (2 page)

“Rubbish,” grumbled the old woman, though once on her feet, it was obvious she was beginning to fade.  “Clean your spectacles, Morley.  Can’t you see I’m winning?  Thought you w
ere my partner?”

“O
h I am, dear lady,” he said, “and though it grieves me to fold the cards now, ‘tis plain you’ve fleeced enough out of these poor people for one evening.” Then with his free hand, he pocketed the few loose coins the baroness had negligently left in front of her.

“You’re a marvel,
Lady Sophia,” he chuckled once they had the baroness on her none-too-steady feet.  “You can’t walk a straight line, but when it comes to cards, demme if you’ve ever been caught playing the wrong one.  Not only is it a pleasure, but I find it extremely profitable whenever I’m your partner.”

Lady Milbanke favored this compliment with something that sounded like a snort as the trio slowly traversed the black and white
, marble tiled floor of the spacious hall, headed toward the main entrance.  While Sir Morley called for the Milbanke carriage, Chloe looked about, hoping to find their hostess to pay their respects before departing.  The Marchioness must have had her eye on the door for Chloe soon saw her advancing toward them.

“Leaving so soon,
Lady Sophia?” Lady Clairmont asked with some concern.

“My niece, you know.”  Lady Milbanke’s answer was made more
enigmatic by a definite slurring of words.

Nodding her head sagely,
Lady Clairmont smiled warmly at Chloe before giving her an arrested look.  She seemed to take notice of the poised young woman’s presence for the first time before turning back to the dowager.  “I have planned a house party at Clairmont Court next week to recover from all the brouhaha organizing Lady Sarah’s come-out ball.”  Waving one bejeweled hand about, she included the crowded ballroom behind her in one sweep.  “Perhaps you and your niece could join us?”

“So kind, Adele,” replied Aunt Sophia, “but
. . . I’ve got Lady Caro to consider, you know.”

“By all means, bring the little darling along.”

Weaving slightly, precipitating Chloe and Sir Morley both to take a firmer hold on her ladyship, the dowager baroness replied thickly, “Lovely.”

“Delightful,” was their hostess’s response, bestowing an exceptionally b
right smile on Chloe.  “I will send invitations around tomorrow.  Sir Morley, say you will also come so we may all be quite gay?”

The old gentleman accepted with alacrity, and the little group soon made their adieux just as Aunt Sophia was wont to become maudlin, reminiscing over old times shared with her
dear deceased friend, the Marchioness’s mother.  Stepping from under the white columned portico to their carriage, Sir Morley solicitously helped Chloe bundle her aunt into the carriage.  Before the coachman had pulled away from the gray stone mansion, the old gal passed out against the coach’s richly padded squabs.

Reclining into the cushions
next to her aunt, Chloe allowed the clomping of the horses’ hooves to mesmerize her as they struck the cobblestones.  She remembered the feeling she had earlier in the evening that something important would happen, and it actually did. How nice a stay at the country seat of the Marquis of Clairmont would be, how exciting, how grand!  There were so many more activities for her to do in the country that were denied to her in Town.

As s
he gazed out of the carriage window on the dark and cloudy night, for some odd reason, the powerfully built figure of the Viscount Camden came to mind.  She shivered as she compared the blackness of the sky with his cold dark eyes.  But she was being foolish, of course, and wondered at her own fancifulness. The Viscount was, after all, just a man and one she would probably never see again.

***  Chapter 2  ***

The late afternoon sun casted long dark shadows as
the old travelling coach turned off the turnpike into the courtyard of the Tudor inn. Chloe nudged Mrs. Hannah Rowes, the baroness’s lady’s maid, to awaken her.  “We’ve arrived, Hannah.”  Then Chloe looked pointedly at the opposite seat to a mound of rich velvet robes and pillows from under which came grumbling. Just in time, Chloe grabbed the shaggy ball of tan and black fluff from her aunt’s lap as it sat up and looked around.

The coach came to a stop and the little Yorkshire terrier
started yapping the moment the groom was heard climbing down from his perch to come around and let the step down.  With the carriage door opened, the little dog’s bark became shriller, and it squirmed to be free of Chloe’s arms.

“Do shut th
at mutt up,” cried out Lady Sophia irritably.  Her mood was generally irascible when she first awoke.

“I will take Lady Caro for a walk, Aunt Sophia,” offered Chloe, slipping
a leash on the tiny dog and stepping lightly down from the carriage.  “Hannah will see you settled before we have to worry about dinner.”

Hurrying to avoid a negative re
sponse, Chloe and the little canine struck out across the busy yard headed for the back of the inn, skirting first a mud puddle, then a mail coach that pulled into the yard.  To her delight, next to the busy Rose and Thistle Inn was a small clearing hedged in on two sides by a sizable wooded area.  Even in the descending dusk, she could make out a well-trodden path through the trees and led Lady Caro toward it.

Returning to the fron
t of the inn thirty minutes later with the terrier prancing on the leash, Chloe was greeted by a rawboned serving girl. 

“There you be, Miss.  They’s said you be late coming along.  Follow me, if you please,” the girl said over her shoulder.  Then the young girl stopped in the middle of the hall and bobbed a curtsey.  “Th
ere’s yer room, Miss, and yer’ll find her ladyship directly across from yers.”  Bobbing another curtsey, the maid disappeared down the stairs without giving Chloe a chance to inquire about dinner arrangements.

Turning to her aunt’s room, Chloe raised her hand to knock. The door flew open, and Hannah Rowes poked her salt and pepper head out
. 

“T
he private parlor’s been reserved and dinner’s ordered.  Now all we need, Missy, is for you to give Lady Caro to me so you can go wash off your travel dirt and change into something more suitable.”

Without further ado, Chloe did as she was bid.  A short while later, she and Lady Milbanke went downstairs to a quaint parlor that had exposed beams in the low ceiling and newly whitewashed walls hung with local hunting prints.  A cheerful fire crackled in the grate, and the ladies were soon served a substantial and well prepared repast.  The dowager baroness, however, barely tasted the poached trout or mutton stew in between the generous sips of the innkeeper
’s wine and passed altogether on the bread pudding with lemon sauce offered for dessert.

Cont
ent to pursue a quiet evening, Lady Sophia remained ensconced in a padded armchair before the fire while chatting about who she expected to see at the Marchioness of Clairmont’s house party.  She continued along this vain, imbibing in several cups of tea, all well laced with whisky from a silver flask tucked in her reticule.  It was all for medicinal purposes, so she claimed, to help relieve the aches and pains in her old bones.

“Mark my words, child.  The C
lairmonts don’t invite just anybody.  Bound to be some good marital prospects for you to look over.”

By the time Lady Sophia was ready to retire, Chloe had to call
Hannah to assist her in getting her tipsy aunt up the narrow stairway.  Together, the two women pushed and shoved, navigating the old lady to her bedchamber where Chloe was not only encumbered with her aunt, trying to keep the dowager baroness on her feet, but also had to use her skirts to keep the dancing Yorky from getting around them and out the door.

“Does Lady Caro wan
t to go out?” cooed Lady Sophia while smiling benignly at the little pooch. 

“
Hannah will prepare you for bed, Aunt Sophia,” Chloe said, reaching down and picking up the dog.  “I will take Lady Caro for a walk.”

“You’ll do no such thing, Missy,”
Hannah replied in scandalized tones.  “Tell the landlord to get one of them stable boys to do it.  Ain’t right for a young lass to be roaming ‘round at night with that silly excuse for a dog.”

“What nonsense, Hannah,” Chloe laughed.  “The moon is up and ther
e is a small clearing in plain view beside the inn, to say nothing of all the activity going on in the taproom and the yard.  I will be perfectly safe.”

“Don’t you go near them woods, Miss Chloe,” Hannah called after her.

With the wiggling pooch tucked under her arm, Chloe hurried down the stairs, past the noisy taproom.  Stepping out into the yard, she stopped for a moment to savor the night with a crisp breeze, bright moon, sparkling stars strewn across an inky black sky.  Unexpectedly, a shudder ran through her, though it wasn’t caused by the coolness of the night air.  Rather a feeling similar to the one she’d experienced at the Clairmont ball, a presage that something was about to happen.  Something that could change her life.

“Hey, look out!” a young ostler cried just as a dusty black and yellow curricle raced in from the main road.

Chloe stepped closer to the shelter of the inn.  She drew the shivering Lady Caro she still held closer to her breasts as the curricle’s driver pulled on his team and swerved away from her.  He drew the curricle to a stop with a flourish and tossed the reins to the stableboy who’d called out to her.  Two high spirited chestnuts were flecked with foam, as was a huge black stallion tied to the back of the rig.

A beaver top
hat, the brim pulled down low, concealed his face.  Because he was a large man, a caped greatcoat gave his shoulders immense proportions.  As if he knew Chloe watched him, the driver glanced over his shoulder and touched the curly brim of the hat with his gloved hand.

Chloe quickly ducked her head and made her way around the corner of the
inn.  Once well away from the carriage wheels and horses’ hooves, she stroked the Yorky’s silky back.  “That was a close call, Lady Caro.  You’ll be safer here,” she said, putting down the little dog.

She cut through a break in the yews that separated the double story Tudor inn from the
field.  There, the stable yard noises were muffled.  The moon’s glow bathed the grassy enclosure in a soft light.  Without a qualm, Chloe slipped the leash off the little dog to let it roam freely.  A slight breeze gently brushed her cheeks, and mesmerized by the evening’s magic, Chloe strolled closer and closer toward the woods.

She was unsure of just when the changes in the night sounds occurred.  But suddenly everything was still.  No crickets chirped, no frogs croaked.  Even the wind had ceased.

Behind the trees that bordered the clearing, someone or something moved stealthily.  Lady Caro stopped meandering, crept closer to the security of Chloe’s skirts, and set up a high-pitched bark just as a large man emerged from the woods.

Startled, Chloe gasped.  She started to call
Lady Caro back to her when she felt the warm, furry body cowering under her petticoats.

In the dim moonlight, Chloe saw the stranger was over six foot in height and wore the same greatcoat as the driver who
’d whipped the fancy curricle into the inn’s yard a short while earlier.  Although he still wore the beaver top hat, upon closer inspection, Chloe recognized him as the infamous Viscount Camden and another gasp escaped her.

“I’m sorry if I frightened you,” Camden drawled.  His deep voice was pitched low, close to a whisper.  He glanced over his shoulder to
the path where he’d emerged from the woods, then asked, “You’ve come from the Rose and Thistle, madam?”  When she nodded her head, he said, “Allow me to escort you back to the inn.”

His offer sounded more like a command.  Before she could react, he
’d grasped her elbow and led her across the open acreage toward the hostelry.  She should have protested or, at the very least, pulled her arm free.  Her sixth sense, however, told her she had nothing to fear in his company.

“It’s late for a young woman to be out by herself,” he said, this time in a more conversational tone.

“I was walking my aunt’s dog,” she replied, glancing down at Lady Caro. The little canine had kept up with them and was now prancing happily beside her.  After nothing more than a few tentative sniffs about the Viscount’s shiny Hessians, the Yorky seemed all too ready to accept the stranger’s intrusion.

The nobleman, in turn, looked down on Chloe.  She met his dark gaze as he studied her for a long moment.  With a disgusted snort, he said,
“Surely, you could have engaged a stable hand for such a task.  It would be smarter than exposing a lady like yourself to untold perils of the night.”

For a moment, she pondered if she ought to be offended by his tone.
Then at the sound of a twig snapping at the edge of the woods, she made to stop and look back.  However, the grip on her arm tightened, and he hurried their pace.  By the time they reached the front of the inn, she was nearly breathless from taking two steps to his one to keep up with him.

Opening the door for her, h
e halted to check behind them.  As she twisted to do likewise, he turned his body in such a way that it effectively blocked her view.