Beth Andrews Read online

  ‘Did you explain to Reverend Jenkins how you came to meet your betrothed?’ Rosalind asked him, when he arrived at the abbey with his good news.

  ‘I did not,’ he answered simply. ‘I am not a complete nodcock, you know. I wanted the man to marry us, not send me to the Devil!’

  * * * *

  One of the strangest incidents over the course of the next fortnight was the return of Julian’s uncle. Having now been fully informed as to the extent of his involvement in the whole sordid business which had brought Julian and St George into their small circle, it was with mixed emotions that Rosalind, Cassandra and Mr Woodford anticipated his introduction. It could not now be avoided, but it could yet be dreaded.

  Julian arranged all by persuading his uncle to invite the party from the abbey to dine with them at the lodge one evening. That it would be awkward was beyond question; but, as the saying goes, “What cannot be cured, must be endured.” The man was to be connected to them whether they approved of him or not, and, as Rosalind pointed out with her usual common sense, if they could forgive the nephew for his part, they could hardly refuse to pardon the uncle for instigating the affair. After all, his was only the suggestion; the performance depended upon others, who might easily have refused if their pride had not eclipsed their morals.

  To everyone’s surprise, they found Sir Jasper’s charm to be quite irresistible. It was clear that Julian had inherited the most disarming qualities of his relation; Rosalind could only hope that the younger Marchmont was more respectable. She could not help but be entertained by Sir Jasper’s wit and engaging manners, but suspected that his morals were rather less firm.

  After dinner, she enjoyed an unexpected few minutes of private conversation with him, while Julian and Cassandra flirted and whispered on a sofa and Mrs Plummer distracted her uncle with more outrageous tales of her late unlamented husband.

  ‘It seems, Miss Powell,’ Sir Jasper commented, eyeing the young couple with a kind of detached approval, ‘that all’s well that ends well.’

  ‘Even if it is not precisely the outcome which you anticipated,’ she remarked with gentle sarcasm.

  ‘On the contrary.’ He turned his gaze back towards her with a twinkle in his eye. ‘This is very much what I expected, with one notable exception.’

  ‘And what is that?’ She could not help but be curious.

  ‘That you are not yet engaged to my old friend, Richard St George.’

  She stiffened immediately. ‘I cannot conceive what you can mean by such a remark, sir.’

  ‘Come, come, my dear child.’ His look was far too knowing for her taste. ‘It seems to me that you are just the sort of woman who could bring that hound to heel. I have been awaiting the announcement these three weeks or more.’

  ‘Then you wait in vain, sir.’

  ‘Would you care to wager on that?’

  ‘You are far too apt to wager, Sir Jasper — particularly upon the lives of others. Are we merely pawns in some game?’

  If she meant to discomfit him, she did not succeed. He smiled slyly and, if anything, seemed to take her remark as some kind of compliment.

  ‘I must admit,’ he said, ‘that my fellow creatures provide me with endless amusement.’

  ‘And if someone should be hurt in the course of your schemes?’

  ‘There is that, of course.’ He shrugged carelessly. ‘But we must all take our chances in the game of life. Some win, some lose, and some make fools of themselves to no purpose. I am a mere spectator, and I think that observing you and St George will provide me a pleasant diversion for some time to come.’

  ‘Forgive me if I do not find it quite so droll as you do.’

  ‘You are angry.’ He shook his head in mock sadness. ‘But remember that the game is not over yet. As in a horse race, my dear, many come from behind to pass the finish line in first place.’

  * * * *

  Rosalind did not feel like a winning entry. She felt sad and lonely and hopelessly confused. How could she harbor tender feelings towards someone like Richard St George? It was madness. Yet something had gone out of her life along with him. He had stolen her peace of mind, tricked her into compromising her deepest convictions, and now fled with a rather large portion of her heart. Why was it that something inside of her still cherished the absurd belief that he was not what he seemed: that there was yet a heart beneath that carefully contrived exterior of cold calculation? Even after his vindictive appraisal of her that last day at the abbey, there was something — not precisely hope, but not entirely divorced from it — which taunted her with foolish fancies which were all but impossible to be true.

  Cassandra could not help but notice her long-time companion’s want of spirits. Nor did it require the genius of Isaac Newton to discern its cause. She could not stay silent on the subject, but confronted Rosalind with it at the earliest opportunity.

  ‘If only,’ she said wistfully, ‘we could find someone for you, Lindy: a man who would value you as you truly deserve.’

  ‘But where to hunt for such a mythical beast?’ Rosalind attempted to disarm her with humor.

  ‘I cannot be put off with witticisms,’ Cassandra said, refusing to be placated. ‘It pains me to know how you suffer for someone unworthy of your affection. Do you not remember how you always praised Elinor Dashwood as the only sensible heroine in any novel, when she declared that it was not possible for one’s happiness to depend entirely on any particular person?’

  ‘Did I do so?’

  Cassandra sighed heavily. ‘How often,’ she mused aloud, ‘we have talked late into the night of the books we were reading. The words of great writers have been our companions more than any flesh and blood humans.’

  ‘We have been cut off from society almost all our lives,’ Rosalind acknowledged. ‘I am still undecided as to whether that were a good thing or not.’

  ‘If Christ commands us to carry His gospel into all the world,’ Cassandra argued, ‘how can we do so if we lock ourselves away from it? How can we shut it out and still reach it?’

  ‘You are right, Cass. For all your youth, you are wiser than I. My tongue may be clever, but my heart is as foolish as the most idiotish of heroines in all those absurd romance novels we have read.’

  ‘So you are no longer inclined to agree with Elinor Dashwood?’ Cassandra asked, sliding along the edge of the sofa and placing a sympathetic arm around Rosalind’s shoulder.

  ‘In theory,’ Rosalind answered, ‘I must still agree with her. My head tells me that she is right. But, as Shakespeare so rightly said, “There was never yet philosopher that could endure the toothache patiently.”’

  ‘Our hearts so often sabotage our heads,’ Cassandra agreed. ‘I do not wish to see your heart broken.’

  ‘You shall not.’ There was, perhaps, a degree of grim determination about this brave statement. ‘My heart is bruised, certainly, but not so gravely that it will not recover. In time, I shall be myself again. I still have much to be thankful for, after all.’

  ‘But it is so hard to be thankful when one is so dreadfully blue-devilled.’

  ‘Whatever their color, my devils will be banished at last.’

  ‘I had rather they were banished at first.’

  So their discussion ended. Neither was quite satisfied with the outcome. On the one hand, Cassandra doubted her friend’s resilience. Despite her protestations, she felt that Rosalind would not recover so easily from this affair. Rosalind was more determined than ever to show no signs of her hurt and disappointment. She could not allow her own mortification to dim the brightness of Cassandra’s happiness. Cassandra deserved to enjoy these halcyon days as much as any young bride. Who, in fact, deserved it more?

  No, Rosalind resolved, she would not be a blight on the joyous preparations, but enter into them with an enthusiasm which she hoped she would be able to feign better than she had done so far. Had not St George himself commented upon her acting abilities? But then, he had been quite wrong. That night in the garden
had probably been the one time in their acquaintance when all pretence had dissolved in the heat of a passion of which she had never dreamed. Now it was over and she must accept the role which had been handed to her.

  ‘I shall not repine,’ she whispered to herself. If she repeated that often enough, she might even begin to believe it.

  Chapter Nineteen

  While Rosalind was nursing her wounds in the country, the man who had inflicted them was adopting another course of action entirely. She might be totally unaware of it, but Richard St George was not the heart-whole rake he had professed to be when he accepted Sir Jasper’s wager. While she languished in Buckinghamshire, he was enjoying a season of unrivalled profligacy in London. He found out every cockfight and prizefight, winning or losing enormous amounts without the least interest in either. He attended masked balls and lavish house parties thrown by the most exalted members of the ton. He was seen at the opera with a ladybird of dazzling plumage, and even graced the hallowed halls of Almack’s with his presence — though the patronesses fixed eagle eyes upon him the entire time, lest he overstep by one inch the strict social boundaries observed there.

  On one particular evening he visited Honoria Inchwood’s establishment for the first time since the night when Sir Lester Malmsbury had demolished the ceiling. The damage had been repaired, and all was much as it had ever been.

  Honoria herself greeted him with genuine affection. He had pulled her out of the River Tick on at least one occasion, and was one of the few gentlemen she regarded as more than a client: as a friend. She had heard tales of his exploits these past three weeks or more, but had dismissed most of them. Seeing him now, though, she confronted him with the latest on-dits which were titillating the town.

  ‘Everyone’s talking about you, Richard,’ she said, looking him over with a critical eye. ‘And it looks like they ain’t fibsters either.’

  ‘Let them talk.’ He shrugged carelessly. ‘Much do I care for them, either their praise or their censure.’

  ‘There’s talk of orgies and all sorts of goings-on.’

  This coming from the abbess of a Covent Garden nunnery provoked a smile from him in spite of himself.

  ‘Preaching morality, Honoria? Have you become an Evangelical?’

  She ignored this slur. ‘I only want to know what’s the matter with you, that’s all.’

  ‘Nothing at all is the matter with me.’ He downed a glass of wine in one gulp and collapsed on a chair in a dark corner of the room, eyeing with dull contempt the other occupants engaged in their usual debauchery.

  ‘You’re drinking too much.’

  ‘I always drink too much.’

  ‘Not you, Richard,’ she contradicted with the casual assurance of an old friend. ‘Oh, I’ve seen you drink your share, all right,’ she conceded, ‘but you never entered or left this house looking like a seasick sailor.’

  ‘Things change, my dear.’ His mouth twisted into something which might have been mistaken for a smile, but was not. ‘I am indulging in a giddy round of unending pleasure.’

  ‘You don’t look to me like a man who’s enjoying himself. And I ought to know, if anyone does!’

  ‘And just what do I look like, Miss Inchwood?’

  She looked him up and down for a moment, her eyes narrowed. It was a penetrating stare, and behind it there was a world of experience with the foibles of the opposite sex.

  ‘I’d say,’ she pronounced at last, ‘that you have the look of a man who’s been crossed in love. In fact, if it was anyone else, there’d be no doubt in my mind that a woman is behind all this wild carousing of yours.’

  ‘I’ve also done my share of carousing before, I believe.’

  ‘This is different,’ she said confidently.

  ‘Do you really think that a woman could ever have such power over me?’

  She nodded sagely. ‘It would have to be a very special woman. I’ll grant you that.’ She gave a somewhat wistful smile.

  ‘But, supposing that such a unique creature actually existed,’ he said, his eyes narrowed, ‘what would you suggest that I do about it?’

  ‘Well, if you’re as mad for her as you seem to be,’ Honoria said bluntly, ‘you’d best marry her — if she’ll have you. Not but what she’d be a fool if she didn’t!’

  ‘Thank you, my dear Honoria. You make me feel not quite so worthless as I had assumed myself to be.’

  * * * *

  He might not admit as much, but there was no doubt that Honoria was right. Later that evening, lying fully clothed upon his bed, having flung a boot at his valet’s head for daring to enter his bedchamber, he faced the demon (or, more accurately, the dragon) which had been pursuing him these many weeks.

  He reflected that he had been serving in India at the time of Waterloo; now he wished that he could have been there, so that he might have been blown to bits by Boney’s damned artillery. Anything would be better than this unbearable torture. And all because of a silly chit of a girl! No, that was not quite true. She was not silly, and, though she looked younger than her years, she could not precisely be described as a girl. Rosalind Powell was a woman — a woman of strength and beauty and wit — and lips of which even now, if he closed his eyes, he could taste the sweetness. Damnation! She had no right to make him feel this way.

  He should have known that night in the garden that he had gone too far. His tactics seemed to be working all too well as he drew her into his arms and pressed his mouth to hers. Though she hesitated at first, her response had startled him with its passion and promise. He had felt his desire rising, carrying them both along. He wanted her so desperately that he completely forgot the wager and everything else. There in the moonlight, it was he who was losing control, acting like a lovesick schoolboy. He had never allowed his emotions to overrule his judgement — not since his salad days, at least. Perhaps not even then. But Rosalind made him feel things he had never felt before.

  That day on the pond had been his moment of truth. When she fell into the pond and he saw her floundering and sinking, it needed no cry from Cassandra to propel him into the water. The thought of her lying cold and lifeless was like a living death. From that day onward, there was no denying the truth — at least to himself. He loved Rosalind Powell with every sinew of his soul. It was a development so unexpected, so unprecedented, that he was caught quite off guard. How had this happened?

  From the beginning he had found her captivating. But he pushed his feelings aside with an inward smirk of self-derision. It was lust, that was all. He was accustomed to lust; he understood it. Lust was comfortable and familiar to him. But what he felt now was new and unfamiliar, and anything but comfortable: It was agony! To be desperate for the sound of one particular voice, the sparkle in a particular pair of eyes ... it was maddening. To desire someone else’s happiness above your own, to feel ashamed of everything in your past and unworthy of even a touch from the one whose touch you craved more than life itself. What kind of lunacy was this?

  At least on that day he had been assured that she felt desire for him, even if she could not esteem him. It was not enough, of course. He hungered for her good opinion, thirsted for her to trust and admire him when she had every reason not to do so. Then, when Julian returned and explained to him that the two women had known of their plans all along, he was stunned.

  He was angry to think that all along it was they who were being duped by two clever young misses. And he was hurt: as mortally wounded as if one of Miss Powell’s arrows were embedded in his very heart. For now he could only assume that the passion Rosalind had displayed had been all an act. She cared nothing for him. She despised him. That he deserved her ill opinion was beside the point. It was unendurable to think that she held him in contempt.

  When he confronted her in the garden that last day at the abbey, he was all bravado, determined to show her that it had been nothing more than a diversion to him as well. He wrapped himself in unconcern as in a cloak. Her cool reception of his words confirmed his
suspicions. She was glad to see him go, no doubt. He had lost his wager and his heart, but never would he let her guess her ultimate victory over him.

  He fled back to London, prepared to fool everybody just as he had Rosalind. Apparently, though, he was fooling only himself. Honoria had sniffed out his heartache like a trained hound after a scurrying fox. Did anyone else guess his secret shame?

  Two days later, he was at his club, morose and not inclined for company, when a familiar voice hailed him cheerfully.

  ‘Well met, my boy!’ Sir Jasper Marchmont dropped into the chair facing his own. ‘Had enough of rustication, I take it?’

  ‘It is all a waste of time,’ Richard answered bleakly.

  ‘Come now! You must admit that you enjoyed the thrill of the chase while it lasted.’

  ‘To no purpose, however,’ was the response. ‘The quarry managed to escape, thanks to your own efforts.’

  ‘You cannot blame a man for trying to tip the odds in his favor,’ Sir Jasper reasoned, not in the least contrite.

  ‘Some men would have called you out for less.’

  ‘Fortunately, you are too wise and too respectful of your elders.’

  ‘Well, I suppose we got what we deserved.’ St George tipped half a glass of brandy down his throat, not batting an eyelid.

  ‘Julian is getting a wife out of the adventure,’ Sir Jasper commented. ‘How did you benefit?’

  ‘Believe me, sir,’ St George said, ‘I have learnt a lesson which I shall not soon forget.’

  ‘Your dear mama will be most disappointed to learn of the outcome,’ the older man mused aloud.