A Scandalous Countess: A Novel of the Malloren World (29 page)

She angled her face to the light and he took the opportunity to study it. “No. But dawn’s touching the sky and a few people are coming out to see it. We could join them so you don’t have to face the light.”

She looked around, assessing everything. “Very well. I think I see the Harringays.”

They were indeed in one corner, half hidden by an urn. As he and Georgia came closer, they saw they were enjoying a kiss.

“Mad for each other,” Georgia said.

“A blessing.”

“Is it? Never to want to be apart?”

“
It seems a pleasant image of marriage,” he said, “unless it becomes an obsession.”

The Harringays emerged, grinning with pleasure, and weren’t at all abashed to know they’d been seen.

“The perfect way to greet the day,” Babs said, but sobered. “How are you, Georgia?”

“Ready to greet a new day,” Georgia replied, “though with no great hopes of it.”

Babs hugged her. “All will be well. But what are you going to do? Will Miss Cardross leave here, do you think?”

“Lud! She may not. I can’t exist beneath the same roof.”

“Come to Town,” Babs said. “You can stay with us.”

Dracy watched the struggle, knowing better than to offer her refuge in Devon. Would Georgia really choose to plunge into the lion pit?
No, rat pit,
he amended. Of course she would.

“Very well,” she said. “I already promised Portia Malloren that I’d oversee Danae House. But I’ll stay at Father’s house.”

“I suppose that would be best,” Babs said. “But we can visit frequently. The Arbutts are there, so you will have some other friends.” Bab’s bit her lip on that unfortunate comment but at least had the wit not to make it worse by apologizing. “The Torrismondes have already left,” she said. “Lizzie looked for you.”

“We were inspecting the lights on the pond,” Georgia said. “It’s cleverly done.”

“Truly? Come, love, we must go and see.”

She dragged her husband away, and Georgia gave Dracy a rueful smile. He couldn’t resist. He took her hand, interlocking their fingers as they turned to watch the pearly light begin to break into orange and pink.

Georgia should free her hand but lacked the resolution just now. She gave thanks for something to concentrate on that gave a degree of anonymity amid the company.

Men took her hand in the dance, or to lead her in a formal way, or to kiss. They didn’t intertwine fingers like this, imparting warmth and strength.

When she remembered that he would leave soon, she wanted to weep for loneliness and vulnerability. So tempting to hide away, even to run back to Herne, but nothing was more likely to condemn her in the eyes of the world. The only way was to be bold, and that she could do.

“The end of night,” he said.

“Which is always welcome.”

“Night can be full of pleasures, you know.”

She slid him a look. “There’ll be no more wickedness in the night, my lord.”

“I can be as wicked by daylight, I assure you.”

She shook her head at him.

“Doesn’t it say somewhere in the Bible that the devil works at noon?” he asked.

“It says the devil never sleeps.”

“But then, nor do the brighter angels.”

She bit her lip.

“Now what did I say to amuse?” he asked.

“Only a silly joke about the Angel Gabriel and the Annunciation. Ah,” she said, as the sky flared. “Perhaps the angels dance at sunrise.”

“Perhaps they do,” he said and she felt an angel-wing kiss against her hair.

When the sun was up, they wandered back into the house, among the last to do so, which on Georgia’s part was deliberate. She’d managed to avoid the worst of the gauntlet after all. Carriages were rolling to the front of the house and yawning guests were piling into them. Some were going down to the river to catch the last of the tide.

“How do you travel?” Georgia asked Dracy.

“I came by boat but have been offered a place in a returning carriage. I should seek my benefactor.”

Georgia prepared to take a calm farewell but wondered whether she’d see him again. He’d said he’d seek the truth of the duel, but he’d also spoken of his duty to his estate, and presumably the matter of Fancy Free would be settled now.

“Ah, there you are.” Her mother came up to them. “A word, if you please. Apart.”

Georgia sent Dracy an apologetic look, but her mother said, “You too, Dracy.”

Bemused, Georgia followed her mother inside.

“How you could cause
more
talk, I do not know,” her mother said. “Not only ridiculous stories about a letter, but you were seen out in the garden, kissing!”

Georgia flushed with shame as if she were sixteen, but she rallied. “By whom?”

“By Eloisa Cardross. Who will not hesitate to speak of it.”

“Oh—” Georgia managed to bite back a curse, but of course Eloisa would seek some way to strike back.

“Lady Hernescroft—” Dracy said, but was cut off.

“Don’t try to take all the blame, Dracy. I know my daughter. There’s only one thing for it. We will put it around that you were sealing a commitment.”

“What?” Georgia exclaimed, turning to Dracy. Had he somehow contrived to compromise her, acting in the same way as Sellerby? But he looked as stunned as she was.

“Lady Hernescroft…,” he began again.

“Of course nothing need come of it, but we will make it known that such a union is under consideration.”

“So then soon I’ll be a jilt,” Georgia objected.

“Not when matters were never certain. I assume you will play your part, Dracy?”

“I will serve Lady Maybury in whatever way
she
requests, ma’am,” he said.

His words mollified Georgia. In any case, he couldn’t have planned this. She’d been the one to ask for that kiss. There was no one else to blame.

“
Very well, Mother, though I doubt many will believe it.”

“On the contrary,” her mother said, looking grim.

Of course, it was the same point she’d made herself—the beau monde would assume that having been caught out in her wickedness, she’d accepted the only man who’d have her. She wanted to pick up a nearby vase and hurl it at the mirror. Dracy took her hand with great firmness, as if warning her, and then raised it for a kiss.

“It will be an interesting diversion, Lady Maybury.”

“A great imposition on you, my lord.”

He smiled. “You know it’s not.”

“Then it should be.”

“Georgia,” her mother chided.

Georgia spread her hands. “It seems I have no choice. We should give the froth more substance, my lord. I’ll escort you out to your carriage.” As soon as they were away from her mother, Georgia said, “This is intolerable!”

“We should have expected Miss Cardross to try to pay us back.”

“Yes, and I deeply dislike being stupid. Don’t feel you must linger in Town because of this. I can act out my misery at your absence.”

“Remember, you’re a poor liar. I can stay a little while, and I do want to investigate the letter and look into the matter of the duel. I sense that is the root of everything.”

“Of course it is,” she said impatiently, “but there’s nothing new to learn about it.”

“We’ll see. I hope you’ll tell me what you know.”

She hated talk of the duel because it cast Dickon in such a bad light. Drunken and foolish. “My brother Perry knows as much as can be known, for he investigated it at the time. I assure you, if he hasn’t dug up a detail, it’s not to be found.”

“A fresh eye often spots something new, and an outsider can see things that others don’t.”

“Then I wish you well with all my heart. I dearly long
to be proved innocent.” She realized she was turning the mourning bracelet and stopped.

“If there’s any way in the world,” he said, “I will prove the letter false and you a virtuous wife. And I will stand by your side.”

“Dracy, you mustn’t.…”

A footman hurried over to say that Lord Dracy’s coach awaited.

He kissed her hand again. “Until we meet again, Lady May.”

She watched him go, beginning to dislike that name.

Dracy returned to his lodging at the Crown and Cat off the Strand and rolled into bed. By the time he rose, fashionably late to the noon bells, Tom Knowlton had been out and returned.

He shook his head to see Dracy eating breakfast so late. “Ruin your constitution,” he said.

“This is not my normal regimen, I assure you, Tom. Sorted out your legal business?”

“Going well,” Tom said.

Dracy suspected his friend’s main purpose in traveling to Town was concern over him. Knowlton’s lawyers were in Exeter.

“How was the ball?” Tom asked, taking a seat.

“Much like any other,” he lied, hoping Tom wouldn’t get a sniff of Georgia’s new scandal. With luck he’d return to Devon before he heard about the spurious betrothal. “An elegant small house, illuminated gardens, a tolerable supper.”

“And Lady Maybury?”

“Splendid in a peacock gown. The main business, however, was political.”

Tom had country opinions on politics, mostly irritation about the mishandling of everything in Westminster, so that set the conversation off on a safe track. When Dracy had finished his breakfast, they went out to stroll
about St. James’s—palace, square, and park. They eventually dined at an excellent chophouse for a modest amount at a long table with good company.

Dracy wanted to plunge immediately into his quest to vindicate Georgia, but all the same, he enjoyed such a normal day and Tom’s steady company. He’d put the matter so out of his mind that he was startled to hear “Maybury” from a little way down the table.

He turned that way and heard a pinch-faced man in shabby clothing say, “Up to her old tricks. Or rather, her old sins return to burn her.”

What business is it of yours, you devil?

“A great beauty, I hear,” said a younger man.

“So was Delilah,” said the crow.

That set up a debate about the appeal and peril of a beautiful woman. Dracy found Tom giving him a very eloquent look.

“Later,” he said, and mentioned a new type of Thames wherry to distract.

When they left the chophouse to stroll back to their inn, Dracy said, “It’s only a matter of someone stoking the old fires. And nothing to it either.”

Tom held his silence.

“Look, none of it’s true. I know it. You might trust my judgment.”

“My brother almost married a gypsy girl, convinced she’d make an honest wife.”

“Perhaps she would have done.”

“Filched his silver spoons before the knot was tied.”

“Very well, I take your point, but up until that duel Lady Maybury was a respected wife. Flighty, perhaps, and inclined to mischief, but I’ve not heard anyone suggest a prior sin. It’s the duel, Tom. Everything else flows from there. If Maybury had killed himself in that carriage race, she’d have lost her husband and her homes, but she would have been a tragic widow, not a scandalous one.”

“
But he didn’t,” Tom said. “He was killed in a duel with a man some believe to have been her lover.”

“But why? Why believe that? If…” He’d been about to say “Annie,” but that would be too close to the bone, so he chose Lady Swanton, a virtuous wife of a Devon neighbor. “If Sir James Swanton were to get himself killed in a duel—yes, I know it’s unlikely—would anyone believe for a moment that they’d fought over Lady Swanton, still less that she’d been sneaking into the victor’s bed?”