A Sister's Secret (24 page)

‘Not between myself and a patron, marm. Between myself and a patron exists treasured integrity.’

‘Treasured integrity?’ She laughed aloud. ‘Oh, I shall never make head nor tail of such absurdity.’

‘A logical sentiment,’ observed the captain, ‘and can I take it that it implies you ain’t now set on making an honest country fellow of me?’

Caroline faced squarely up to him. ‘I vow, sir, that despite my annoyances I am determined to help you turn aside from a life of crime.’

‘Crime?’ Captain Burnside clapped a hand to his brow. ‘
Crime?
’

‘That is what I said, sir, for what else is it?’

‘I ain’t ever thought of it as anything else but a pleasing way of settling my tailor’s bills.’

‘Heaven help you,’ said Caroline. She became serious. ‘Captain Burnside, be careful this evening. I would even recommend that now it is only Cumberland’s pocket or yours – that is, mine – you contrive to let him win. Should you considerably increase his debt, and even though he won’t pay, he may contrive your downfall simply because he’ll be furious that you’ve twice bested him. So take care, I beg.’ She put an impulsive hand on his arm. ‘Cumberland is truly a dangerous man.’

‘Well, I ain’t disposed to provoke him,’ said the captain affably.

Caroline, however, was not so sure that in his airy self-assurance he would take her advice. At the table, he
seemed in no concern about the run of the play, and his voice was as much of an indistinct murmur as the others. He sat at ease, his hands dexterous whenever he was dealing, his quill pen moving swiftly whenever he made a note of credits or debits. Cumberland sat in his own way, dark, lowering and inscrutable. Robert seemed his usual easy-going self, and her friend Mr Wingrove, quite impressed at being at a card table with the duke, was in murmurous, conversational fluency, it appeared. She stiffened as she heard Cumberland suddenly speak in a chilling way.

‘Sir, whoever ye are, for I ain’t taken a note of your name, if I had come for the purpose of listening to your opinions on potted plants and cabbages, I’d not be sitting here with cards in my hand. Ye take me, I hope?’

‘Your Highness,’ said Mr Wingrove in protest, ‘I made no mention of cabbages, I was merely pointing out that a fig tree can be grown in a tub.’

‘So can cabbages, I don’t doubt,’ said Cumberland, ‘so are ye for cards or cabbages, sir?’

‘Oh dear,’ murmured Annabelle.

Mr Wingrove gathered up the cards and shuffled them, frowningly. Captain Burnside regarded the ceiling. Robert cast an eye at Cumberland. The duke was down, mainly to Captain Burnside.

Cumberland acquired the bank. Captain Burnside began to plunge, heavily. Cumberland flipped cards at him, his dark eye measuring his man, reading him, analysing him. The captain lost two successive hands to the tune of seventy guineas and sixty guineas.

The duke, about to deal again, said, ‘I don’t think I know your regiment, sir.’

‘Ninth Dragoons, sir,’ said the captain.

‘The Ninth? Colonel Masterson, ye say?’

‘A commanding officer of distinction, sir,’ said the captain.

‘Ain’t the Ninth in the field?’ enquired Cumberland.

‘Not at the moment, sir.’

Caroline listened to this uneasily. Cumberland suspected something. But he surely could not suspect Captain Burnside was responsible for taking the letter, if he had discovered it was missing. Why should he? It must be something else. Perhaps to do with the unpalatable fact that the captain was an impostor. No, not an impostor: a disgraced officer who had been forced to resign his commission and now lived by his wits. But if Cumberland was aware of that, then nothing would have induced him to sit down again at the card table with the captain or even to acknowledge his existence. And he would have disowned the IOU on the grounds that he had been deceived into assuming he was gambling with a gentleman. So what did his sudden probing into the captain’s military credentials mean if he did not suspect the one thing or the other?

He was dealing the cards now, and accordingly was silent.

‘Caroline, Caroline, do attend,’ said Cecilia, dark hair lush with a softly rich shine, powdered bosom delicately white within the revealing frame of her bodice. ‘You are playing very sketchily, darling.’

‘And I am playing hopelessly,’ said Annabelle.

Caroline attended.

The four men murmured. Cards were given, stakes raised, losing hands thrown in, hopeful hands retained. The bank remained with Cumberland for a prolonged period. Robert revealed a queen and an ace at one stage, but Cumberland matched it and cleaned up. Lady Luck consistently favoured him, and even when
he was eventually forced to yield the bank to Captain Burnside she still remained faithful, and he amassed further credits. Mr Wingrove, who had taken to playing with quiet dignity since being snubbed, staked modestly and kept modestly in credit. Robert, as usual, won some hands and lost others. He had never been known to rise from a card table excitingly enriched. Captain Burnside, having lost most hands while the bank had been with Cumberland, now found the duke’s hands still too good for him. Caroline, ears attuned to the men’s voices, heard him say quite clearly once, ‘Damn me, that’s a painful leveller, Your Highness.’ Was he taking her advice; was he taking care not to put himself on the wrong side of Cumberland? Cumberland’s debt to him of almost a thousand guineas was a vast enough sum as it was, but it had only been a piece of paper when viewed in the context of a negotiation for the letter. Without the need for any negotiation, it represented something that would cause excessive irritation and annoyance to the duke. To add to it tonight would be a dangerous mistake.

Captain Burnside was shuffling the cards when Cumberland clearly addressed him again. ‘Ye’re enjoying extended leave, Burnside?’

‘After extended duty in Ireland, Your Highness,’ said the captain pleasantly.

‘Ireland, b’God,’ said Cumberland, and his blind eye, the colour of curdled milk, was a blankness that made his sound eye doubly penetrating. ‘A land of papist rascals and Jesuit plots, ye’ll allow?’

‘A troublesome place, sir,’ murmured the captain. The cards having been cut, he began to deal, and the duke, accordingly, ceased his further little inquisition. But it had increased Caroline’s uneasiness.

The play terminated at midnight. Cumberland rose
from the table the richer at the captain’s expense by seven hundred and ninety guineas, which reduced his debt to a mere one hundred and ninety. His smile was bleak. ‘I’ll let ye have a remittance, sir,’ he said.

‘Good of you, sir,’ said the captain.

There was a settlement of Mr Wingrove’s modest wins and losses, which left him slightly down. Robert owed Captain Burnside twenty-five guineas, when all was totted up, and he also owed Cumberland seventy guineas.

‘I’m short of the ready on my person,’ he said, ‘so I’ll settle with you in a day or two, Captain.’ To Cumberland he said with a cheerful smile, ‘If you’ll drop in on your way home, Your Highness, I’ll settle with you at my place.’

‘Ye can ride in my carriage, with Cecilia,’ said Cumberland.

He said goodnight to Caroline, thanking her for her hospitality. He kissed her hand. He said goodnight to Annabelle, and in insolent provocation of her sister kissed her on the cheek. Annabelle blushed. The devil lurked in his smile.

To Mr Wingrove, he said, ‘Goodnight, sir, ye may return to your potted figs and cabbages now.’

‘I’m gratified, sir, to have Your Highness’s permission,’ said Mr Wingrove, who may have been bloodied but was, in his acerbic rejoinder, certainly unbowed.

‘Oh, ye have it,’ said Cumberland with royal indifference, and left with Robert and Cecilia.

Mr Wingrove, his handsomeness marred by a frown, stayed a while to offer his opinions on Cumberland’s lack of decent graces. He expressed himself articulately and at length, finding a warm sympathizer in Caroline. Captain Burnside, seating himself again, leaned back and relaxed, expressing his own sympathy with the occasional
nod. Annabelle, smothering a yawn, wondered how to get Mr Wingrove to go home. Caroline found the solution by taking advantage of an unexpected pause and telling him he had stood up very well to the duke, that he could depart with his honour intact and that she would see him out herself. Which she did, although he bade her a very lingering goodnight at the door, and kissed her hand fervently.

Returning to the card room, she found Captain Burnside with his legs stretched out and his eyes closed.

Annabelle, on her feet, smiled. ‘I fear, sister, he has fallen asleep.’

‘The wretch,’ said Caroline.

‘You are surprisingly hard on him sometimes,’ said Annabelle.

‘He has no right to fall asleep when you and I have not yet retired.’

‘But so likeable a man should be allowed some indulgence. He has endured hours of strain battling with the duke at the card table. The duke is always so formidable …’

‘You have said that so often that I beg you to say it no more.’

‘Then I shall at least say Charles sent the duke home in the sweetest temper, for Charles lost heavily to him. Heigh-ho, dearest, I must go up, I vow myself asleep on my feet. Oh, but poor Mr Wingrove, the duke set him down unmercifully.’

‘His dignity was above Cumberland’s rudeness,’ said Caroline.

‘Oh, yes, he is excessively dignified,’ said Annabelle, and yawned. ‘I won’t wake Charles, and shall leave you to kiss him goodnight for me.’

‘Ridiculous girl.’

With Annabelle gone, Caroline shook Captain Burnside awake.

‘Faith,’ he said, starting, ‘is the house on fire, marm?’

‘It is not.’ Caroline seated herself beside him. ‘I wish to say how wise you were to allow Cumberland to reduce his debt.’

‘Well, a little manipulation of a card here and a card there …’

‘I don’t wish to hear about your talent for trickery, Captain Burnside. I prefer to believe you took risks too impossible to come off. But I am uneasy about the questions he put to you. I feel he suspects your standing. He won’t lack to communicate with the commanding officer of the Ninth Dragoons.’

‘Damn me,’ murmured the captain, ‘he’s a very prying fellow considering he ain’t common like the rest of us. It ain’t decent, marm, for a royal personage to put his nose in advance of his dignity.’

‘Cumberland makes his own rules,’ said Caroline, green satin gown lustrous, auburn hair a crown of fiery magnificence. ‘Was your regiment the Ninth Dragoons?’

‘Faith, I hope so,’ said the captain.

‘You hope so?’ Caroline flashed him an angry and troubled glance. ‘I vow you a jackass to answer me so, and worse than a jackass if you’ve attempted to pull the wool over the eyes of a man like Cumberland. It’s worrying enough to know he might find you had to resign your commission; it’s worrying beyond anything to realize he may discover you’ve no connection with the Ninth Dragoons.’

‘Oh, Colonel Masterson’s an old friend of mine,’ said the captain airily, ‘and he don’t have much feeling for Cumberland or any of the Hanoverians. He’s a Jacobite, d’you see, an adherent of the Stuarts. He considers the
Georges are usurpers of the throne. There, don’t look so troubled, marm. Whatever obtains, I ain’t going to have you put on the wrong side of Cumberland. You’re an exceptional patron, and my feelings for you are respectfully affectionate – even loving …’

‘Sir?’ she said, a faint flush appearing.

‘Respectfully loving, I assure you, and I beg you to take no offence,’ said the captain in haste. ‘And should Cumberland find out I don’t own a gentleman’s credentials, I’ll see no discredit attaches to you, dear lady. I’ll not have Cumberland hire some bully boy to spoil your warm beauty, which he’s capable of doing, despite his love for you.’

‘Oh, tush, Captain Burnside,’ said Caroline, ‘Cumberland’s avowed desire to bed me does not mean he loves me. He has no idea of what love is. And I have no idea myself of what respectful love is. Pray have the goodness to explain it.’

‘Ah, yes,’ said the captain, and looked at the ceiling, as if the explanation lay there. ‘H’m,’ he said.

Caroline smiled. ‘You have fallen into a trap of your own making,’ she said. ‘You cannot explain respectful love – no, I declare you can’t, sir.’

‘We’re burning the candles, marm, but perhaps there’s time for me to say it means my respect for you has a noble and unchangeable quality.’

‘Noble?’ Caroline laughed. ‘What nonsense you do talk.’

‘Well, I ain’t always in my best form early in the morning, marm,’ he said. For once during a conversation she had not mentioned Annabelle, so he murmured, ‘I fancy your sister wasn’t quite so taken up with Cumberland tonight.’

She frowned, finding herself unprepared for the comment. ‘I fear,’ she said, ‘that Cumberland is still a dangerous excitement to her.’

‘Oh, she’s coming round,’ said Captain Burnside, ‘and I dare say it won’t be long before she has eyes only for me.’

‘Dear heaven,’ breathed Caroline, ‘was there ever a man in such vast conceit of himself?’

‘It’s professional self-confidence, marm. Shall we retire?’

She did not want to retire. She did not feel sleepy. She felt richly and newly alive. The years of Lord Clarence’s betrayal of every sacred concept of marriage and the years of humiliation had almost destroyed her belief in herself as a wife and a woman. She had felt a failure as a wife and inadequate as a woman. Her emotions had become guarded and reserved. Now there was the wonderful sensation of reawakening to life and all its sweet challenges. Now laughter had been reborn, and she felt young again, with every day a promise of excitement. What had caused such a change? Time was responsible. The two years of widowhood had healed every wound and smoothed away every scar. Her body itself was vibrant with life. Yes, time had been wonderfully healing, and sweetly so. She was even ready to consider marriage again. But the man must be unquestionably right; she must be in no doubt of him at all. Mr Wingrove, for instance: his principles were so sound, his integrity plain to see, his manliness entirely commendable. There was virtuous moral strength about him, and an eminent air of stability. And he was unfailingly agreeable.