Devil-May-Dare

‘Have these already been bespoken, my lord?’

‘Indeed yes, my man came on ahead. And you?’

‘Arrangements were made before we left home, though I collect we were meant to go a little further before nightfall, but what with the bad roads and the accident…’ She paused for another look out of the window for her brother. ‘I do hope Tom has been able to find somewhere for us to stay while the carriage is fetched and repaired.’

‘Ah, your brother…’

The tone of his voice brought her up sharply. Surely he did not think she was travelling unescorted and had invented a brother? Or did he think Tom was not her brother, but her lover? If he thought that of her, what else was he thinking? Oh, how she wished she had braved the darkness and waited by the damaged coach. ‘I do hope he has not encountered some difficulty,’ she said, trying to remain calm.

‘You will soon see; we will be at the King’s Head in a matter of minutes.’

And if Tom is not there, she thought, what then? What would she do? What would the Marquis do? She glanced sideways at him beneath the brim of her silk-ruched bonnet while pretending to be looking out of the window. He looked decidedly uncomfortable trying to keep his long legs tucked out of the way of her skirts, but apart from that he seemed entirely composed. His well-fitting coat of blue superfine seemed not to need padding at the shoulders and his waist had no need of stays. She supposed him to be about thirty, though it was difficult to tell because his features were tanned and there were tiny lines running from the corners of his eyes, as if he had spent long hours out of doors screwing up his face against the sun, but he was certainly old enough to be married and have a brood of offspring. She fell to wondering what kind of a husband and father he made — probably very cool and distant, except when roused to anger. She did not think she would care for his anger, though perhaps it would not be any worse than his present indifference. He had resumed his thoughtful expression with his chin resting on the folds of his impeccable neckcloth between the points of his collar, almost as if he had forgotten she was there. What was he thinking of, apart from what a devilish inconvenience she was to him?

It was not so much the inconvenience of having unexpected passengers which had put Jack in a browse but the notion that fate had taken a hand in his affairs and was conspiring to prevent him reaching his destination. His own travelling carriage had overturned the first day out from home and, though his horses had not been injured, thank God, he had been obliged to buy this antiquated coach to continue his journey. And now to find himself not alone in this particular misfortune was the outside of enough. He only hoped the vehicle was sturdier than it looked and would convey them all safely to the next posting inn and even more sincerely trusted that his passenger was telling the truth and there really was a brother to take charge of her; he had enough on his hands as it was.

As Captain Jack Bellingham, he had returned from service with Wellington’s army at the end of the war, expecting some respite from continual fighting, only to be faced with another kind of conflict at home. In the six or seven years he had been out of the country his father had grown prematurely old and even more inclined than before to take refuge in the bottle. He had let the estate go to ruin. And his heir, Jack’s elder brother, far from helping to set matters to rights, had made them worse by drinking, womanising and gambling. His death on the hunting field when in his cups had left Jack, who had never regarded himself as a future duke, as heir not only to extensive land and property but to all the debts and problems as well.

One of these latter was a neighbour called Ernest Grimshaw who had taken advantage of the general neglect and encroached on woodland which most certainly belonged to the Longham domain. He had cut down any number of fine trees and sold the timber so that, where before the war there had been a fine stand of oaks, larch and elm, there was now nothing but an ugly scar of stumps and bracken, and, what was worse, the game had naturally disappeared with the trees. The man had had the temerity to show him some ancient map on which the wood was clearly marked but the devil of it was that it was not shown inside the Longham boundary. He had defied his lordship to turn him off or deprive him of the not inconsiderable revenue the timber provided. Jack was on his way to meet the lawyers, but he had a feeling in his bones that he was going to need all his wits about him to win through. It would have been easier and certainly a great deal cheaper to have let the fellow get away with it and concentrated on the rest of the estate, but that was not Jack’s way; he would be blowed if he would let some land-thieving cit get the better of him.

It was not that he was particularly in want of funds; his personal fortune, inherited on the distaff side, was more than adequate, even setting aside the fortune in gold and jewels he had brought out of France with him. It was plunder, of course, but, since he had found it in a French sergeant’s knapsack after the battle of Toulouse and it had obviously been plundered by him in the first place, the finding of its original owner, so his one-time batman and now his valet had told him, would be well-nigh impossible, even if he or she were still alive. He ought to be grateful to the unknown Johnny Blue-coat and lose no sleep over something which, in Tewkes’s opinion, was a stroke of good luck. Jack intended to make a push to discover the true owner of the cache, but that would have to wait upon the business with Grimshaw being satisfactorily concluded.

He had said nothing of it to his father, who would, he was sure, take the same view as Tewkes, that anything acquired on a battlefield was a fair prize and meant to be used. His father, who had never cared a straw for his younger son, was, now that he was the heir, insisting on him marrying and continuing the line. Jack had had little time and even less inclination to marry while he was a serving soldier; following the colours was not something he would subject any wife to and leaving her at home seemed to defeat the object of the exercise. He had seen too many marriages fail because of long separations to take the risk. He was home now and, while he owned he ought to be thinking about marriage, to do so simply to produce an heir went against the grain. He would not stand in line, fawning over eager débutantes, just to please his profligate father. He grinned as the old coach jolted over a particularly bad rut; arriving in town in this dilapidated conveyance would certainly not endear him to the fortune hunters. He smiled to himself; if he were to allow the gossipers to think his pockets were to let, he might gain the breathing space he needed.

He lifted his head to find Lydia surveying him with wide violet eyes and a tiny twitch to the corners of her mouth which might have been the beginnings of a smile. In his experience young ladies usually fell into a swoon or burst into floods of tears when confronted with a mishap of this magnitude; that she could smile made him feel a deal more comfortable. ‘We are slowing down,’ she said. ‘You will soon be rid of us.’

Chastised, he said, ‘I apologise, Miss Wenthorpe, I am afraid I am poor company. Please forgive me.’

‘Oh, it is I who need forgiving for the intrusion.’ They were pulling up in the yard of an inn and the driver was shouting to one of the ostlers who had run out to meet them. ‘If we can find my brother, I am sure he will add his thanks to mine.’

But Tom was nowhere to be seen. On enquiring after him, she was told that he had been there but as there were no spare horses or carriages of any sort he had gone to a farm along the road in the hope of borrowing a cart.

‘A cart?’ She could hardly believe it and she knew that the Marquis, who stood immediately behind her, was laughing at the picture thus created in his mind of her and her maid sitting atop their luggage on a farm cart! ‘Whatever was he thinking of?’

‘Better than walking,’ the innkeeper said, with a shrug. ‘And he could bring on your luggage, not to mention the broken wheel to be repaired.’

‘Eminently sensible,’ commented the Marquis. ‘But we did not meet him on the road, so where is he?’

‘The horse he rode was lame and he had to walk to the farm — all of two miles further on, it be — and if the farmer were not at home or the cart loaded and needing to be unloaded it would take time. Ten to one he’s still there.’

‘Could you not have lent him a horse?’ Lydia asked.

‘Ma’am, we have no spares, as I told the young gentleman.’

‘I thought I saw two looking over their stalls in the stables when we came into the yard.’

‘They are bespoke for his lordship.’

‘Oh.’ She turned to the Marquis. ‘You have taken the last two horses. How are we to go on?’

If this was a hint to relinquish the animals to her, he did not take the bait. ‘I’ll lay odds your carriage wheel will not be ready by tomorrow,’ he said. ‘And by the day after your own horses will have been rested.’

‘One of them is lame; you heard the landlord say so. What about the ones you brought today?’

‘They go back to Longham,’ he snapped. ‘I do not leave prime cattle like that for any Tom, Dick or Harry to spoil.’

‘But we must go on — my aunt is expecting us tomorrow evening at the latest; she will be very worried if we do not arrive.’

He did not see that it need be any concern of his but he could no more abandon her now than he could when he’d first come upon the overturned coach, especially as her brother, if he truly was her brother, seemed to have left her to manage on her own. Confound the pair of them! ‘I will deem it a privilege to convey you and your brother on tomorrow,’ he said, then, turning to the innkeeper, ‘Have you a room for Miss Wenthorpe?’

It seemed the Marquis had also bespoken the only spare room but he gave it up with every appearance of cheerfulness, saying he would do very well on a settle in the parlour. By the time Tom arrived, it was quite dark and Lydia was being entertained by her rescuer to an excellent supper of fish in oyster sauce, boiled beef and apple flummery.

Tom was cold and wet and dismal and not inclined to be gracious when he discovered that Lydia had arrived in the village in comparative comfort, had washed and changed, and was sitting unchaperoned in the dining-room with a man to whom she had not been introduced. It really would not do, and he told her so in no uncertain terms when, at last, they left the dining-room to retire for the night and he was able to speak to her alone.

‘What would you have had me do?’ she retorted. ‘Sit under the broken carriage and freeze to death while you took your time bringing a farm cart? His lordship has been kindness itself…’ Kindness was not really the right word, she decided; he had been vastly entertaining, sarcastic and charming by turns, while remaining unfailingly polite. He had been solicitous for her comfort and sent the inn servants scurrying to please her, and then sat without speaking for several minutes watching her eat, as if he had never seen a woman with a hearty appetite before. Her concentration on her plate had not been so much hunger as a reluctance to raise her head and find those searching eyes on her.

‘You need not have dined with him,’ Tom said, unconvinced. ‘It is hardly the thing. He is a stranger.’

‘But he gave up his room for me, and a very fine room it is too; I could not be so ungrateful as to refuse his company, and we were not alone — the dining-room was full.’

‘We should have gone on to Watford where our rooms were booked.’

‘How?’

He had no answer and gave her none, but turned to grumbling that he had been obliged to dine on left-overs and was to sleep with Watkins and Scrivens above the stables and if he did not catch his death of a chill then he would be more than surprised. She made light of his catalogue of complaints, saying he would feel more the thing after a good night’s sleep and, taking her leave, went up to her bedchamber where Betty was waiting to help her undress.

It was a squeeze for them all to pack into the Marquis’s chaise the next morning, even though they left Watkins and Scrivens behind to see to the repairs of the coach and follow on when these had been completed and the horses rested. Tom, still sulking a little, sat beside his lordship facing Lydia and Betty and it seemed to Lydia that the Marquis was having even greater difficulty with his long legs. By the time they stopped for nuncheon they were all glad to get out and stretch their cramped limbs. The inn was the one where she and Tom would have stayed the previous night but for the accident, and their fresh horses were waiting for them; but now, of course, they had no carriage to harness them to. Tom was all for riding one of them but he would not leave Lydia alone in the carriage with the Marquis, especially as they were approaching London and might set the tongues wagging with unfavourable gossip about her before she had even set foot on its flags. It would not be a very auspicious start to her come-out. Jack, seeing and sympathising with his dilemma, decided he, too, would prefer to ride, even if the mounts were a couple of mediocre carriage horses and he was hardly dressed for it, and thus the calvalcade entered the metropolis and pulled up at the door of Wenthorpe House in Portman Square.

Mrs Agatha Wenthorpe, widow of Lord Wenthorpe’s younger brother, had arrived from her own home in Edgware a few days previously and had immediately set about opening up the house, which had remained unoccupied, except for a handful of servants, for years. She had engaged more staff, ordered all the windows opened and fires lit in every room. The dust-covers had been removed, the carpets beaten, floors scrubbed, furniture polished and flowers brought in and arranged in vases on every table and ledge big enough to receive them so that overriding the lingering fusty smell of disused rooms was the scent of soap and beeswax, narcissi and pansies.

It was some years since Lydia had seen her aunt and in that time the lady had become even more eccentric in her appearance. She was sitting in one of the small downstair parlours with her feet on a footstool by the fire, reading one of Miss Austen’s novels through a very thick quizzing glass, when they were announced, but rose quickly to greet them. She was a short, dumpy woman, made even broader by the caging she wore in her very old-fashioned gown of coffee-coloured brocade with its wide over-sleeves. Her face was heavily powdered and a patch on her cheek disguised an ugly pockmark. On her head she wore a startling red wig. Lydia had loved her as a child and she saw no reason now to change her opinion. She hurried forward and allowed herself to be embraced. ‘Dear Aunt, such an adventure we have had,’ she said, after Mrs Wenthorpe had released her and held her hand out for Tom to kiss, which he did, thankful that she could not see his smile at her extraordinary dress.

‘Aunt, may I present the Marquis of Longham?’ Lydia said, turning to Jack who had been prevailed upon to come in to meet Mrs Wenthorpe. ‘He has been a prodigious help, for without him we would have been delayed for days and days.’

‘Indeed? Then I must add my gratitude to my niece’s,’ she said, putting up the quizzing glass and eyeing him up and down with great candour. ‘You will stay for supper?’

Jack, without a trace of discomfort, bowed low over her plump, bejewelled hand. ‘Alas, I have pressing business, ma’am.’

‘Then you must call when you are not so pressed. We cannot let you go unthanked.’

‘I have been sufficiently thanked, ma’am,’ he said. ‘And now that Miss Wenthorpe is safely in your hands, I must take my leave.’ He bowed again to Mrs Wenthorpe and then to Lydia and, with a, ‘Good evening, Wenthorpe,’ to Tom, left the room.

‘Well!’ said Aunt Aggie, letting out her breath in a long sigh. ‘There’s a top-lofty male if ever I saw one. He could not get away fast enough. What have you done to him, Lydia?’

‘I, Aunt? Why, nothing. I do believe that is his usual manner. I really think he did not want to rescue us and now he is glad to have us off his hands.’

‘Why should he not wish to help? Is there something wrong with him?’

‘I hardly know, Aunt, but his carriage was worse then ours. If it had not been drawn by the most beautiful pair of bays I have ever seen, I would have taken him for an impostor. And, you must admit, his manners leave much to be desired…’

‘I expect he took a leaf out of your book,’ Mrs Wenthorpe said in mild rebuke. ‘But we can soon put a town polish on you and then you will have any number of offers. Tomorrow we must shop for clothes…’ She stopped because Lydia had barely been able to conceal a smile at the thought of her outrageously dressed aunt Aggie selecting clothes for her. ‘I do not pretend to be all the crack myself and I am too old to change my ways, but I know someone who will see that you are dressed properly. I shall take you to my great friend, Lavinia Davies. Tonight we will sup quietly and go to bed early, for we have a busy day ahead of us.’ She turned to Tom. ‘What had you planned, young man?’

‘Oh, I shall amuse myself, never fear,’ he said. ‘A visit to Weston’s for a new suit of clothes, a few hands of cards at White’s, a ride perhaps. And don’t you think we had better buy a new town carriage? Even supposing our travelling chaise can be repaired, it is as old as the ark. Not having ridden in it since before I went to Cambridge, I had not realised how old-fashioned and unsound it was. It is hardly suitable for town use; Lydia cannot go to balls and routs in it, nor to the park, and expect to be noticed by the ton — unless it be for being a frump.’

‘I am not a frump!’

‘I did not say you were, but I am sure that is what the Marquis thought when he saw you looking as though you had been tumbled in the hay. And as for our equipage…’

‘Damn the Marquis!’ his sister said with feeling. Was that why he had looked at her so hard and long?

‘Lydia!’ Mrs Wenthorpe was shocked into reaching for the glass of claret at her elbow. ‘That is not the language of a lady.’

‘I am sorry, Aunt, but if I have to weigh up every man I meet with nothing but marriage in mind, then I would as lief not marry at all.’

‘But you must, child! That is what you are here for and why I am here, to make sure you come out in a manner fitting your station and wealth and to make sure you are not gulled by unsuitable offers.’ She smiled and laid a hand over Lydia’s. ‘You will enjoy it, my dear, and I am sure you will find someone to suit before the Season is over.’

‘And if I don’t?’

‘Then I will have failed your dear papa, and so will you.’

Lydia fell silent on the subject. It would do no good to argue and she would have to pretend to be enjoying herself, even flirt a little, but that did not mean she was committed. Unless, by some miracle, she fell in love, she would put off making a decision; that was — and she smiled to herself — if anyone offered for her, which was not at all a certainty. She was too tall and not especially beautiful and she was certainly outspoken, none of which would endear her to would-be husbands who, for the most part, only needed a breeding machine. It was not that she was against marriage and having children, but she had, in her growing up, had plenty of time to observe the disastrous marriages of her acquaintances and compare them with the loving relationship of her own parents, and nothing less than that would do.

CHAPTER TWO

THERE could not have been a greater contrast between Mrs Wenthorpe and the modishly attired Mrs Davies, but neither seemed to pay any heed to that, and after a cosy exchange of the latest on-dit they took Lydia to visit a dressmaker where Mrs Davies bespoke dresses for morning wear, for walking and for carriage rides, dresses for assemblies, for breakfasts, for the opera, for balls, and a dark blue velvet riding habit with a jacket frogged in the Polish style, to be worn over a white silk shirt with ruffles at throat and wrist. From there they went on to buy a tall beaver hat with a curly brim and a peacock feather to go with the riding habit, bonnets, caps and shawls, underlinen, mantles and muffs, shoes, dancing slippers and half-boots of crimson jean.

Lydia sincerely hoped the expense her father was being put to would be worth his while and was beginning to feel guilty that she had no intention of allowing herself to fall into the marriage net simply because he though it was time she was wed. If he wanted grandsons, let Tom produce them. The idea of Tom as a father was so amusing, she was still laughing when he joined them for luncheon at three o’clock, having taken a leaf from her book and decked himself out in the latest fashion.

‘Why do you laugh?’ he asked, affronted. ‘These pantaloons are the latest thing and I spent a devilish long time tying this neckcloth.’

‘It isn’t that,’ she assured him. ‘You look bang-up. I was wondering if you might enter the marriage stakes instead of me. After all, you are the one who has to produce Wenthorpe heirs, not I.’

‘But you are the one Papa has fixed his mind on and you ought not to disappoint him. The whole thing must be costing him a prodigious amount.’

‘And I wish that it did not,’ she said. ‘I do not like being groomed like some thoroughbred to be paraded in the selling ring.’

‘Oh, my dear, it is not at all like that,’ protested Aunt Aggie. ‘You will enjoy it and I am persuaded you will be the belle of the Season and have any number of offers to choose from. It is the young gentlemen who are being paraded, not you.’ She rose from the table and smiled at them both. ‘Now, as I have not spent such a fatiguing morning in years, I shall go and lie down. Tom, you will look after your sister.’

‘But Aunt, I am going to choose a new carriage.’

‘I’ll come too,’ Lydia said, rising quickly. ‘It won’t take above a minute to fetch a bonnet and mantle.’

Since her aunt did not object to this, a footman was sent to bring a hackney to the door and brother and sister set off for Mount Street, where the coach-builders, Robinson and Cook, had their premises.

Tom was torn between ordering a barouche which would have been suitable for Lydia and her aunt, and a high-perch phaeton, a showy vehicle which had enormous wheels and high seating which was known to be unstable in inexpert hands. He wanted to show off his driving skill and Lydia, who considered herself a good whip, was also tempted, but she knew her aunt would disapprove on the grounds that young ladies who drove high-perch phaetons were considered fast. While they were thus debating, the Marquis of Longham arrived on the same errand.

He was wearing splendid riding breeches of soft buckskin and well-cut riding boots which emphasised his long, muscular legs. His corded coat with its high collar covered a yellow brocade waistcoat and a neckcloth of moderate dimensions; the whole effect was discreetly modish. Greeting them cheerfully, he bowed over Lydia’s hand and then, with those hazel eyes twinkling with mischief, looked about him at the vehicles on display, some of which were only half complete, and enquired if it had not been possible to repair their carriage after all.

‘Not at all, my lord,’ Lydia said, affecting a haughtiness which was so unlike her that Tom turned to her in surprise. ‘A travelling chaise is hardly the thing for town; even you must admit to that. We have come to bespeak a light carriage.’

‘Surely not this one?’ his lordship said, pointing at the high-perch phaeton Tom had been admiring.

‘What is wrong with it?’ Lydia demanded, annoyed that he should question their judgement. ‘It looks a very handsome carriage to me.’

‘Oh, no doubt of it,’ he said calmly. ‘But surely you were not intending to buy it for yourself, Miss Wenthorpe?’ He looked her up and down as if measuring her up for the vehicle in question, though, in truth, he was thinking how attractive she looked and how the colour of her costume set off the deep colour of her eyes.