The Stolen Bride (6 page)

“Lady Sophie, please don’t tease me,” said Beth. “I don’t know what came over me.” But she did, and she could still feel the effects of the claret. A certain lightness in the head and a numbness around her mouth. She prayed earnestly that it wasn’t obvious.

“Aren’t you the slightest bit attracted to him?” asked Sophie, curiously. “He’s wonderfully handsome, and there’s something about a truly wicked man ...”

Beth looked at the young woman with concern. Surely she couldn’t be casting eyes at Lord Randal’s close friend. “He’s a trifle young for me,” she said, adding pointedly, “and I am not a foolish believer in the power of a good woman to reform a rake.”

“Well, I’ve managed to reform Randal,” said Sophie so morosely that Beth was hard put not to chuckle.

Beth decided it would be wise to bend the rules of propriety a little. “I think you’ll find in two weeks, Lady Sophie, that he’s not reformed beyond redemption.”

Sophie colored but looked pathetically grateful for this crumb. “Do you think ... ? But then it will all be settled, won’t it? There’ll be no going back.”

Beth considered the troubled girl. There was no sense to any of this. “Lady Sophie, I know this can be a nerve-wracking time for anyone. If you truly have doubts, however, do not commit yourself yet. I thought he was your choice, but Lord Randal will not be the easiest husband ...”

“Of course I want Randal,” said Sophie, flushing with color. “But he ...” She made a gallant attempt to smile. “As you suppose. It is all just bridal nerves. What do you think of our mysterious guest, then? Perhaps she’s a skillful thief, come to murder us all in our beds.”

Beth let the girl turn the conversation but something was wrong here. She remembered the happy lovers who had danced at Jane’s wedding. Their love and closeness had been a tangible thing, spreading warmth to all around. Now they seemed more like squabbling siblings. She suspected she had not been invited to a sinecure after all.

When Jane came to sit beside her she said as much.

“It is worrying,” said Jane. “Sophie adores Randal and I’d swear he feels the same way and yet they are so awkward together.... But then,” she said with a teasing look at her friend, “they are not the only ones who have me in a puzzle. You’re the first person I’ve heard say a cross word to Verderan.”

Beth blushed. “And I should not have done so,” she said firmly. “I’ll ask you not to put me between the two most notorious men at table again, young lady.”

“But, Beth, I was sure you could handle them,” said Jane, laughing. “And Verderan does present a problem. Lady Stanforth has taken against him because of her child’s misguided devotion. Sophie is inclined to flirt with him, which I think dangerous. The dowager can manage him very well but she wanted to sit by Mortimer and discuss some matter of genealogy. I thought you managed wonderfully. And Verderan will behave himself now, you know. He does keep his word. As long,” she added with a frown, “as he doesn’t lose that dreadful temper, that is.”

“Is he so bad?”

Jane shrugged. “He’s supposed to have taken a whip to someone recently and half killed him, but no one will tell me what for. I really don’t know what to make of him. He certainly has women and there have been duels. Randal swears they were honorable, though, and even the men he killed deserved to die. You know men,” said Jane, who a few short months ago had not known men at all. “Even David has been out, though he’s never injured anyone seriously.”

“I wouldn’t want to have much to do with Mr. Verderan,” said Beth. “With or without a temper, one would never know what he might do next. He is ... uncivilized.”

“Uncivilized?” echoed Jane in surprise. “He’s extremely well educated and has beautiful manners when he cares to use them.” She took a few thoughtful sips of tea. “But yes,” she said. “I do see what you mean.”

“Is Sophie attracted to him?” asked Beth directly.

“No, of course not. She has eyes for no one but Randal. If the silly man would just take her into the garden and kiss her soundly, we’d all be better off.”

Beth choked on her tea on this pragmatic advice. There was no trace of her shy innocent pupil in the Countess of Wraybourne.

“Perhaps you should tell him that,” said Beth.

But Jane shuddered slightly, and looked much like her old self. “Oh no. I tried to advise Randal about Sophie once ... When I think of the things I said I could crawl into a hole. It’s only two weeks to the wedding. We shall all just have to endure.”

Beth looked over to where Sophie was standing alone, looking out of a long window. The two weeks till the wedding seemed a very long time.

Beth’s thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of the gentlemen in high spirits. Or at least, Lord Randal was in high spirits, aided and abetted by Verderan and Marius, without much restraint being applied by any of the rest—though the marquess looked a little disapproving. Beth thought wryly that she was not the only one to have overindulged in drink, but that did not make her offense any the better.

“Do you remember,” asked Randal of David, “the time we sneaked off to the Wem fair and tried to catch the greasy pig? Such a mess we were both in and you got the brunt of the trouble, being older.”

“Feelingly,” said David with a pained expression. “My father believed I was too old to beat but after the tongue-lashing he gave me I’d rather have had the whipping. He seemed to feel I was leading the younger ones astray. And after you had escaped from your tutor and ridden over with the wonderful idea. There’s no justice.”

“Well,” said Randal, the picture of innocence. “It was taking Sophie along that really tore it.”

“Are you seriously suggesting that was
my
idea?” protested David. “What brother has ever desired the company of his little sister?” He accompanied this by a teasing wink at Sophie and settled beside his wife to take a cup of tea.

Randal strolled over to Sophie, warmly smiling. He raised her hand and kissed it just by the diamond ring he had given her. “She cried so prettily to be taken along,” he said, looking into her eyes. “Irresistible.”

“I found her resistible,” said David firmly. “Tangled hair and a snotty nose. Woe to you if you’re going to let her bear-lead you all your life with tears. And she ended up with a black eye, which was what incensed my revered father so.”

“I remember,” said Sophie. “I ran into a tree.”

Beth could see Sophie blossoming under Randal’s lighthearted attentions and her concerns about the pair began to fade.

“Why don’t we go to the fair?” asked Sophie eagerly. “It would be such fun.”

“Yokels and strong ale?” queried the Marquess of Chelmly dismissively. “I don’t think you’d enjoy it now you’re more than five, Sophie.”

“Randal and David enjoyed it at much past five,” Sophie retorted. She looked around for support and fastened on Piers Verderan, lounging in a chair rather apart from the rest. “Would you like to go to the fair, Ver?”

He looked at her and seemed to read her mind. “I always hold that a touch of squalor makes us appreciate our good fortune,” he drawled.

“Is that your excuse?” queried Marius drily. Beth stiffened. The antagonism between the two could be felt. Over her? It was impossible surely that these two men could be bristling like hounds over little Beth Hawley.

“I never need an excuse,” replied Mr. Verderan. “It’s so boringly bourgeois to be forever justifying one’s actions.”

Before Sir Marius could respond, Mr. Verderan got support from an unexpected quarter. “Damn me if you ain’t right,” barked the Duke of Tyne.

“Good,” said Randal, seemingly oblivious to ill feeling. “Then, if we need no excuse for enjoying proletarian pleasures, I vote for the fair. I never did catch the greasy pig, after all.”

Sophie clapped her hands and her brother Frederick let out a whoop.

“You can’t be serious, Randal,” said Chelmly, and Sophie scowled at him dreadfully.

“If I can’t be serious,” said Lord Randal blithely, “then I won’t be. I think I’ll pass on the greasy pig, but I’ll break pots for trinkets.”

He turned to Sophie with a decidedly mischievous twinkle and turned her so her back was to him. He undid the chain around her neck and drew away the pearl and diamond pendant she wore. “Sophie can’t be going around in costly stuff like this,” he said, slipping it into his pocket. “It will quite turn her head. Pinchbeck and glass is what she needs if she’s to be a frugal housewife.”

Sophie turned around and put her hands on her hips. “Indeed!” She moved her left hand and studied the magnificent marquise diamond. “Yes, I see it’s a worthless bauble.”

“What else?” he agreed. “I’m an impoverished younger son.” He took her hand and turned it. The precious stone flashed fire from the candles but he appeared unimpressed. “But I could have done better than this, all the same.” He kissed her hand again. “I shall win you a better, sweeting. Something with more color.”

“Oh, good,” said Sophie, her eyes nearly as bright as the diamond at this delightful nonsense. “I haven’t liked to complain, my dear—I’m sure you were pressed for the ready at the time—but something yellow, perhaps, or red, would be nice. And much, much larger. I can hardly hold my head up in company with this paltry thing.”

Beth saw the two lovers lose themselves for a moment as the world disappeared for them and they gazed into each other’s eyes. Then Randal recollected himself and drew Sophie back into the center of the room.

“Dare I hope they have pistol shooting at this fair of yours?” asked Verderan.

“Of course not,” Randal replied. “Strictly stones thrown at chipped pots.”

“I’ll need to practice then,” said the Dark Angel, with a deliberately wicked look at a display of Middle Eastern pottery in one corner. Beth gasped and Sophie gave a nervous giggle. David got speedily to his feet and stood in front of his valuable collection, but his lips were twitching.

“Some of them
are
chipped,” said Verderan innocently. “Lady Wraybourne, I appeal to you. Do you not have some common pieces we can hurl stones at?”

“Now?” asked Jane blankly.

“Come on, Jane,” said Sophie. “I’m sure the kitchen must be full of stuff they’d be glad to see the back of.”

Beth saw Jane flash a look at her husband, but he must have given his approval for she began to enter into the spirit. “But you’re not breaking pots in here, or anywhere in the house for that matter. In the garden, I think. Nor am I asking the servants to do extra work this time of night. You,” she said, pointing at Verderan, “and you,” she pointed at Randal, “can come with me and carry.”

The party divided in two at this point. The duke, the duchess, the marquess, and the Stanforths decided to return to the Towers and the earl went to see them on their way. The rest, caught in an adventurous spirit, invaded the kitchen in search of pots.

It was perhaps fortunate that the Stenby staff had a parlor to sit in so that the arrival of the ladies and gentlemen in the kitchen did not throw anyone into hysterics. Mrs. Jolley, the cook, soon arrived to protect her preserve but Sophie’s words proved true. She remembered a box in the back of one of the storerooms where her predecessor had put discarded pottery twenty years before. There were bowls and jugs with tiny chips or cracked glazing, and pieces of pottery with awkward handles or dribbling spouts.

“Never could bear to throw a thing out, she couldn’t,” the woman remarked. She turned with a frown. “Now, now, Master Randal,” she said to that gentleman, who was exploring with fascination the line of earthenware pots on a sideboard. “Keep your fingers to yourself, if you please.”

He stopped with the look of an angelic child caught in a rare moment of naughtiness.

Obviously, that was the impression Mrs. Jolley received, for she clucked slightly and lifted down a large crock. She opened it to reveal crisp, golden Shrewsbury biscuits. The ladies and gentlemen, despite having had a perfectly adequate dinner, fell upon them as if starving. The cook shared an indulgent look with Beth, who had not joined in the business. Then she turned to the others.

“Many’s the time you young ones have come here looking for my Shrewsbury biscuits,” Mrs. Jolley said. “Now don’t you eat them all, though, or there’ll be none for tea tomorrow.”

It was in a spirit of hilarity that the party made its way to the graveled driveway, arms full of pots and many a pocket full of biscuits. Even the staid Reverend Mortimer strolled beside Beth, fondly remembering kitchen raids of his youth. Lord Wraybourne caught up with them, stole some biscuits from his sister, and took Marius on a side trip to the kitchen garden to gather stones.

Frederick and Mortimer volunteered to fetch two chairs and a board on which to stand the pots. Jane requested Verderan’s and Beth’s assistance in investigating the ancient box of discards. Beth looked back for a moment at Randal and Sophie, who were left standing alone in the moonlight. Ah well, they’d be better for a little privacy.

“No work for us,” said Randal lightly. “Perhaps we should stay almost-married for the rest of our lives.”

“No, thank you,” said Sophie sharply.

“No,” he said softly. “Not a terribly good idea. ‘If it were done when ’tis done, then‘twere well it were done quickly.’” He turned her head with a finger on her chin and lowered his lips softly to hers. Those lips and that finger were the only point of contact and yet Sophie’s head began to swim. She kept her eyes open and thought she saw an expression of pain in his.

She drew back resolutely. “Do you wish it were not to be done?” she asked.

“What?”

“That quotation. Macbeth doesn’t really want to kill the king.”

“Very wise,” he said flippantly. “Look what happened when he did—ghosts and witches and walking woods.” He moved to join Jane, Beth, and Verderan.

Sophie grabbed desperately at his sleeve. “Were you saying you don’t want to marry me?” she asked.