A Sister's Secret (20 page)

She discovered him in the library later. He was seated on the little stepladder, reading a volume he had taken from a shelf. He looked as if the book was earnestly engaging him. It was a history of Ireland.

‘Captain Burnside?’

He glanced up. ‘Good morning, marm.’

‘I must apologize for falling asleep last night.’

‘Not at all,’ he said pleasantly, ‘you were game to the end, and it was no effort to deposit you safely in your suite.’

‘Deposit me?’

‘Ah,’ he said, and put the book away and studied the ceiling.

‘What do you mean, sir,
deposit
me?’

‘Well, there you were, marm, claimed by the rosy goddess of slumber and fast in her arms. Since I had to climb the stairs to my own room, I – ah – took you with me.’

‘Took me?’

‘Carried you, marm. You were sweetly dreaming, d’you see, and it seemed a pity to wake you.’

‘I am incredulous, Captain Burnside,’ said Caroline, although she had wondered how she arrived in her suite. ‘Do you seriously say you carried me?’

‘I ain’t given to the crime of dragging a lady up a staircase, marm. If I’m going to be hanged, it don’t signify I’ll risk being hanged for that.’

Caroline stared at him. He asked her indulgence with a smile. She shook her head at him.

She laughed. ‘Captain Burnside, you are lamentable, sir. You carried me up and placed me in the chair?’

‘I did, marm, and as gently as I could.’

‘You did not find me too heavy?’

‘Lord, marm, you were as light as a feather.’

She laughed again. ‘Light as a feather?’ she said. ‘I think not. Am I to thank you for your gallantry? I am not sure. However, to another matter. I have just dispatched my young coachman to Lady Chesterfield’s house with a note, requesting she will permit you to accompany Annabelle to her ball next week. I shall be accompanied myself by Mr Gerald Wingrove. Cumberland will be there and, if you are there too, I will rely on you to prevent him bestowing his attentions on Annabelle. My sister is bound to take on a giddy mood, for a London ball is of all things exhilarating to her. In such a mood she is likely to disappear with Cumberland.’

‘Well, he has a way with him,’ said the captain, ‘but you have my word that if she should disappear, it’ll be with me.’

‘No, I won’t have that,’ said Caroline, ‘for I can no more trust your inclinations than Annabelle’s dangerous giddiness. You understand my frankness, I think.’

‘It’s true she’s sweetly tempting …’

‘Sir?’

‘Assure you, marm, I’d not take advantage.’

‘You are not to disappear with her, Captain Burnside. You are to be a model of chivalry.’

‘Chivalry,’ he murmured, ‘ah, yes.’

‘Now, sir, the cribbage,’ she said. ‘Do I owe you, or do you owe me?’

‘You owe me five and a half guineas, marm. And – um
– I’m a little short of funds. Expenses, d’you see. There’s little left of the advance. I paid the girl Betsy ten guineas for her help—’

‘A small amount of silver would have been enough for any other trollop.’

‘So it might, marm, so it might. But not for a wholehearted commitment and a tight mouth. Most trollops gab—’

‘Gab?’

‘Talk, marm. Chatter. You must pick one you can be certain of.’

‘Oh, never mind,’ said Caroline. She went to the desk, unlocked the central drawer and took out some money. ‘What did you say my cribbage losses were?’

‘Oh, say ten guineas, marm.’

‘I shall say nothing of the kind, since it was, yes, five and a half, I think. Well, I shall give you fifteen, the balance being to augment your expenses fund.’ And she gave him that amount.

‘H’m,’ he said, but nodded and smiled.

‘There,’ she said, ‘now perhaps we can contrive our more friendly relationship.’

‘With pleasure, my dear Caroline,’ he said, at which she gave him a firm look.

‘It means, Captain Burnside, that I wish to encourage you to turn over a new leaf. It does not mean you may indulge in familiarities. What is your programme for today?’

‘I’m driving Annabelle to Vauxhall Gardens, which you’ll know are greatly favoured by romantic couples. There we shall stroll and promenade, and take lunch, and I shall have the sweet girl sighing and languishing in the seclusion of arbours and shrubberies.’

‘Your conceits take my breath,’ said Caroline. She
thought of the secluded arbours and shrubberies of Vauxhall Gardens, and of Annabelle’s obvious liking for Captain Burnside, and it gave her no happiness at all. ‘I shall come with you,’ she said.

‘How very friendly of you, marm.’

‘I do not wish to discourage you in the part you are playing, but I do wish to protect my sister to some extent.’

‘Very right and proper,’ said Captain Burnside, ‘for I own I can be carried away by an excess of enthusiasm on behalf of a patron.’

‘Captain Burnside, you are a wretch,’ said Caroline. ‘I wonder, do you think Cumberland might have discovered the letter is missing?’

‘Not unless he makes a daily check, dear lady, which I doubt.’

‘Move him,’ said Cumberland through grating teeth.

‘Yes, Your Royal Highness, I think that advisable now,’ said Erzburger. ‘And in the long term, silence is also advisable.’

‘On more than one tongue,’ said Cumberland, ‘I fancy I must talk to Captain Heywood.’ Captain Heywood was the duke’s dedicated familiar, the medium through whom he achieved his darkest objectives. ‘Advise him to be available this afternoon. I’ll take no chances that ears didn’t hear and a tongue didn’t wag in curiosity.’

‘We spoke only in a guarded way, Your Highness, so that whatever she overheard had no great substance. Yet it would have aroused her curiosity. So although commoners might take chances, princes cannot.’

‘This prince don’t intend to,’ said Cumberland.

Vauxhall Gardens, patronized by the elite, boasted a summer blaze of colour. Although the most spectacular of
the shrubs, such as the azaleas and the rhododendrons, had shed their blooms, magnificent flower beds were a sunlit radiance. Shady walks and leafy promenades drew the strollers, and the elegant refreshments pavilion was an irresistible temptation to those desiring to quench their thirst or pleasure their palates.

Annabelle and Caroline glided arm-in-arm with Captain Burnside. Ladies needed to demonstrate they were under the guardianship of an escort, for the Gardens were among the more favoured haunts of young and dashing Corinthian bucks, ever ready to catch the eye of sweet things seemingly unattached and to pick up a handkerchief apparently dropped. ‘No, no, sir, it is not mine.’ ‘Egad, then, whose can it be?’ ‘Perhaps, sir, it’s your sister’s.’ It was all done in the politest and most civilized way, for the Gardens clung jealously to their reputation for respectability, and patrons who breached the conventions were requested to leave. Nevertheless, the young bucks were a ubiquitous element, and sweet things knew it and played the game in their own demure way, under the eyes of their chaperones or their parents.

Caroline, right hand on Captain Burnside’s left arm, parasol executing animated little twirls on her left shoulder, was clad in white muslin delicately patterned with green and pink. Its long skirt swayed lightly around her limbs. Annabelle, on the captain’s other arm, a new parasol shading her, was in pale blue silk. It was her first visit to the Gardens, and she was enchanted. She felt herself in romantic Arcadia. The ladies were so elegant in their summer finery, the young men had so much
ton
. And Captain Burnside was all of debonair. Why Caroline did not set her cap at him she could not think. But perhaps it was Mr Wingrove who had recently brought her to life. She was almost vivacious in her enjoyment of this outing.
If Mr Wingrove was a little dull in his conversation, one could not say he was disagreeable, and had he been here he would have supplied a most informative dissertation on every plant, flower, shrub and tree. Caroline, perhaps, had come to favour informative dissertations. Annabelle herself much preferred Captain Burnside’s whimsical qualities.

Caroline detached herself to gaze in admiration at a huge bed of geraniums. After only a few seconds, a voice murmured in her ear.

‘Why, it’s Charmian Merryweather. How very delightful.’

Caroline, turning, found a gentleman in an exquisite silver-blue coat, smiling at her with a great deal of pleasure. Courteously, he lifted his top hat.

At her coolest, she said, ‘I regret having to disappoint you, sir, but I am not the lady in question.’

The gentleman looked convincingly startled, surprised and taken aback. ‘But we met, did we not, at Marlborough’s place no less than a month ago?’ he said, gazing at her admiringly.

Caroline knew precisely what he was about. A week or so ago she would have dealt with him by giving him an icy look and turning her back on him. Now, for some reason, the sweeter aspects of life had been rediscovered, and to have a Corinthian of impeccable dress and appearance attempt to win her favour aroused an impulse to make a different kind of play. ‘Do you mean Blenheim, sir?’ she said.

‘There, I knew it, b’gad I did.’ The gentleman’s smile returned. ‘Blenheim, of course. I’m not making a mistake, am I?’

‘No, you are not making a mistake,’ said Caroline, suspecting Captain Burnside and Annabelle had stopped
to turn and look back. ‘You are proceeding correctly to plan.’

‘Dashed if I’ve any plans at the moment, except to suggest a walk to the pavilion for some refreshing sherbert.’ The gentleman executed a light, inviting bow. ‘You’re from Devon?’ he enquired, attempting to place her accent.

‘I am not, sir.’

‘Ah, I’ve got your home and name wrong?’

‘I am sure you have everything quite right,’ said Caroline, ‘except that in meeting a lady called Charmian Merryweather at Blenheim a month ago, you did not meet me. It is three years since I was at Blenheim in company with my husband.’

‘Then I was out of luck a month ago,’ said the gentleman, not at all put out at the mention of a husband.

‘You are also out of luck now, sir,’ said Caroline. She turned and went on her way, leaving the gentleman sighing that so rare a beauty should have shown so little interest in him.

Annabelle and Captain Burnside were not in sight. They had strolled unconcernedly on, it seemed. Caroline was at once offended. For a gentleman to leave a lady unescorted was a social sin in the Gardens. It was not even permissible. But the captain, of course, was no gentleman. She quickened her steps, glancing left and right. Other paths and leafy walks intersected this path. Really, what was Annabelle thinking about to go off like this with the captain?

She searched the walks without success. She turned to retrace her steps. Before her, a path between verdant shrubs was bright with sunlight. The chatter of visitors was fading. In their twos and threes, they were stepping aside to the very edges of the path, nervously leaving it
clear for a man approaching at a leisurely stride. Tall, powerful-looking, the sun at his back, he brought a darkness with his advance. His coat was dark, his boots were black, his top hat the colour of charcoal. Only his tight, light grey knee breeches were a concession to the bright day. His massive, muscular shoulders cleaved the air unhurriedly. He carried a walking stick of black ebony with a silver handle, and in his natural arrogance he was entirely indifferent to the people stepping aside for him. He neither looked at them nor acknowledged them.

A whisper broke the silence. ‘Yes, it’s Cumberland.’

Behind him two men followed, one in a military uniform, the other in sober dress. Caroline, standing in the middle of the path, and with the sun on her, was a vision. Cumberland, seeing her, did not quicken his pace. His advance remained slow and deliberate. Reaching her, his blind eye peered unseeingly, and his sound eye gleamed. Erzburger and Captain Heywood came to a halt at a discreet distance from him. Erzburger had a parasol tucked under his arm.

Cumberland bowed to Caroline, and his strong mouth twitched in a faint smile. ‘So, there ye are,’ he said, ‘but have ye no companions?’

Out of the rules of etiquette, Caroline curtseyed. ‘Yes, I have companions, Your Royal Highness.’

‘I’ll take ye up if ye ain’t,’ he said.

‘They will appear any moment, sir,’ said Caroline, straight of back and politely proud, though very vexed indeed with Captain Burnside for so discomfiting her.

‘Your sister Annabelle and your friend Captain – ah – something or other?’ enquired Cumberland. ‘I dropped in on your house, y’see, and was informed the three of ye were here. A pretty place for canaries, parrots and
peacocks. Ye’re worthy of grandeur, and a few shrubs and flowers don’t do ye justice.’

‘I am happy, Your Highness, in so pretty a place, and don’t demand a vista of mountains,’ said Caroline, aware that the people who had made way for Cumberland had halted in their promenading. Every eye was on herself and the duke. If she was sensitive to this, he was not. He cared not a fig for what people said or what people thought. The Prince of Wales courted popularity. Cumberland had no use for such nonsense. ‘Have you come from my house, sir, in pursuit of me here?’ asked Caroline.

‘God’s life, would ye make such pursuit worthwhile, Caroline?’ he said, his henchmen standing off in impassive silence. ‘Have ye more liking for me?’

‘My feelings for you are as they have always been,’ she said.

The cloudy eye expressed nothing. The sound eye mocked her. ‘Ye discovered a faultiness in Percival,’ he said, ‘ye’ll discover a man in me. However, since I was coming this way I thought to look for ye.’

‘To advise me you’ll not be coming tomorrow evening for the card game?’ she said in swift impulse, for she immediately thought Captain Burnside had amused himself by spinning a fairy tale, and that he had indeed surrendered the IOU for the letter.

Cumberland laughed. ‘I don’t intend to forgo my revenge, my sweet beauty,’ he said, ‘for I’ve a keen desire to reduce Annabelle’s pretty captain to tatters.’

‘I would not call him pretty, sir, nor would I say he is Annabelle’s.’

‘Come, I’ve heard they’re seen together everywhere, and that her smiles for him ain’t less loving than they are for me.’