Anne Barbour (7 page)

CHAPTER TWELVE

The day was overcast, which was not unusual for London, and no great deterrent for anyone who wished to take the air. Devon Kincaid did not wish to take the air, but had been driven by a demon of perversity to call at Moxley House and inquire if Mistress Zoe wished to do just that. Mistress Zoe did indeed wish to, as — vociferously — did Mistress Nell. Since Devon had already been regretting his invitation, he immediately seized upon Nell’s presence to protect him from Zoe. As result, neither lady was content.

Nor were either of them silent. Zoe was determined to tell Devon the story of her life — why she should think him interested, he had no notion — while Nell was so impressed with his matched team that she demanded to hold the reins. When Devon told her she could not, she pitched a fit. Devon being unable to control both the horses and the child, Nell ended up on Zoe’s lap. This also suited neither lady until Devon pointed out to Zoe how pretty a picture she presented with Nell perched on her knee. Nell, he consoled with the fable of the Clever Little Tailor, and the promise of a trip to Gunter’s for an ice.

His tale told to her satisfaction, Devon drew up his curricle outside Gunter’s Tea Shop, centered on the east side of Berkeley Square. Customers often ate their confections in the square itself, the ladies remaining seated in their carriages beneath the shady maples, their escorts leaning against the Square’s railings, while waiters dashed to and fro across the road taking orders and carrying them back.

Mr. Kincaid’s curricle garnered no little attention, gentlemen of his bent not prone to frequent establishments where painted pineapples hung above the door. That he had a lovely woman with him was not surprising; Mr. Kincaid generally had one woman or another or several attached; but none of the spectators present had seen him before with a brat in tow. This circumstance led to considerable conjecture concerning the brat’s parentage, and speculation that if Mr. Kincaid had one child that the world had not known about, then he might well have more, and in that case where had he been hiding them all this time?

Mr. Kincaid was, happily, unaware of all this speculation. He was wholly occupied with Nell and her ice, a large amount of which almost immediately splattered his tightly fitting coat, buckskin breeches, Hessian boots, crisp high shirt collar, hitherto flawless cravat, and curly brimmed beaver hat. Zoe — who, since her escort didn’t require that she be virginal, had chosen a blue carriage dress and matching bonnet trimmed with plaited ribbon and white lace — was similarly bedecked.

The confections disposed of, one way and another, Devon took up the reins. Nell having repeatedly expressed a desire for ducks, he directed his team toward the Park.

Would Mina be annoyed that he had taken Zoe on an outing, he wondered, or pleased? Devon was uncertain which reaction had been his intent.

Mina was turning out to be as mercurial as any other member of her sex. Did she or did she not want him to distract her cousin? Was she concerned with Zoe’s best interests, or her own?

Devon scowled. He’d not soon forget the moment when Mina had turned away from him to go and talk with Quin.

Really, reflected Zoe, flirting with Mr. Kincaid was very uphill work. He hadn’t even commented on how fine she was today. Zoe considered her veil an especially nice touch. She was
incognita,
was she not?

She tightened her grip on Nell, who disliked to sit still, and gazed down the tree-lined avenue.

Hyde Park consisted of over three hundred acres appropriated from the monks of Westminster when Henry VIII decided to extend his hunting grounds. James I had hunted here with Jowler and Jewel, his favorite hounds. Now the park was the hunting grounds of those lovely avaricious charmers referred to as Cyprians, or the Fashionably Impure.

Mr. Kincaid was well acquainted with the Fashionably Impure. Or so rumor claimed. A person would never guess it from the way he was treating Zoe. Not that she was an impure. Yet.

Perhaps, like the Black Baron, Mr. Kincaid considered her above his touch. Perhaps he felt he was too old. Well, he
was
too old, but nonetheless—

Zoe glimpsed George Eames, standing in the shade of a distant beech tree. Impossible to clearly see the female to whom he spoke so earnestly, but she wore a sprigged muslin gown trimmed with a frill around the hem, a deep red shawl with a paisley patterned border, and a demure bonnet that boasted neither blossom nor plume. An older woman hovered nearby.

 “Stop the carriage!” Zoe demanded. Devon drew his curricle to a halt. Zoe thrust Nell at him, and stood. Pleased with her new perch, Nell reached for the reins. The groom leapt down from his seat behind the curricle’s main compartment and helped Zoe alight.

Zoe tripped gracefully across the grass. “Hello!” she said, causing Mr. Eames to violently start and his companion to turn her head. Seen closer, the young woman had dark hair and eyes, a prim mouth and rosy cheeks set in a plump face. “I am Zoe Loversall. And you are—”

From Mr. Eames’s direction came the sound of grinding teeth. “I am Lady Anne Stuart,” said his companion, before he could speak.

“I am pleased to meet you, Lady Anne. George speaks of you frequently. Are you having an assignation? Since your papa can’t approve? I wouldn’t let my papa dictate to me, particularly in matters of the heart, but you must know your business best.” Zoe cast George a reproachful glance. “We have missed you at Moxley House. It is one thing if you neglect the rest of us, but it is unconscionable in you to abandon Nell. The poor child has missed you desperately. ” Zoe waved at the curricle. Nell, for once obliging, waved back. The older woman gasped.

Mr. Eames looked like he was about to have an apoplexy. Lady Anne looked stunned. Her companion looked like she couldn’t wait to spread fresh gossip all around.

“But I shall say no more of that! I must return to my companions. We
will
see you soon, will we not, George?” Pleased with this good few moments’ work, Zoe bid her victims
ciao
and returned to the curricle, where Mr. Kincaid was entertaining Nell with the tale of Bluebeard, a violent nobleman with a nasty habit of murdering his wives, no fit tale for a tot, but she seemed to enjoy it well enough.

He gazed suspiciously at Zoe. “What devilment are you about?”

Zoe settled on the carriage seat. “Unfair! I was embarked on a good deed. You really don’t want me, do you? How very odd.”

Mina didn’t want him, thought Devon. She valued him so little that she could hand him off to someone else.

He plopped Nell on Zoe’s lap. “Your cousin will tell you I’m an odd duck.”

“Duck!” demanded Nell.

“Yes, poppet. We’re going to see ducks and geese and swans. Rabbits and squirrels. Cows and deer. We may even see a fox eat one of them. Would you like that?” Nell clapped her hands. Wildlife abounded along the banks of the Serpentine, an artificial lake created by the damming of the Westhaven River at the request of George II’s wife, and so called because of its sinuous shape.

Numerous duels had been fought on these grounds. Devon hoped that, as result of this outing, Beau wouldn’t challenge him to pistols at dawn.

 “I am amazed,” said Zoe, who was nothing if not tenacious, “that you have so low an opinion of yourself, after all those women and all those intrigues. Although you
are
growing older. I have the impression from my father that as a man grows older his fleshly prowess declines. I do not mean to indicate that Beau’s prowess has declined, because I don’t believe it has, but the possibility that it might do so periodically plagues his mind. It is my opinion that when a gentleman’s imagination is thus being exercised, it is to the detriment of his—”

Devon ground his teeth. “Never mind!”

Zoe swiveled toward him on the seat, disarranging Nell, who squealed. “What is going on between you and Cousin Wilhelmina? Don’t say nothing, like she did, because I can tell the difference between chalk and cheese.”

Mr. Kincaid wasn’t encouraged to hear his amatory efforts referred to as ‘nothing’. “What did Mina say?”

“What does it matter what Mina says? You should be more sympathetic, because my heart has been broke.” Zoe scooted closer. “Or maybe my heart was not, because I seem to be recovering nicely. Maybe I have yet to meet my own true love.”

Devon inched himself, and his reins, away from Nell’s grubby, grasping fingers.
“‘
Love is a familiar. Love is a devil. There is no evil angel but love.’ Shakespeare said that, I think.”

 “For someone who doesn’t believe in love, you know a lot about it,” Zoe huffed.

 “One can know about something without experiencing it first-hand.”

“If something doesn’t exist, one can hardly know about it. You are a humbug, sir.”

“Humbug,” echoed Nell. Having decided she liked this new word, she repeated it several more times.

The poet Shelley’s pregnant wife Harriet drowned in the Serpentine. Devon was strongly tempted to introduce his passengers to a similar fate. “I am not
a humbug.”

“Yes you are!” insisted Zoe. “You lust after Mina, and she lusts after you, yet you both deny it, which makes no sense to me. Although Mina’s lovers don’t live long, so it may be for the best.”

Mr. Kincaid muttered something beneath his breath. Zoe added, “You do not want her made unhappy, in any event. Mina would be made
most
unhappy were she to discover I went to Vauxhall without an escort.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

All was quiet at Moxley House, neither Zoe nor Nell being on the premises. The remaining residents were enjoying this brief respite, each in his or her own way. Meg was in the scullery, cheerfully scouring pots. Samson was overseeing the army of servants who cleaned the gaming suite.

Mina had taken refuge in the morning room. Grace the cat lay draped across her lap, while Romeo the goat sprawled at her feet. Romeo had tried to ingest a rhododendron bush and wasn’t feeling well. Mina kept firm hold on his leash lest he revive and try to eat the furniture.

The room stank of goat.

Mina wished people would start redeeming their pledges. The watches and rings she could dispose of, if at a fraction of their worth. An umbrella, in London, could always be put to good use. Romeo, she had come to consider a member of the household. As for Nell—

She wondered what Devon was doing, and what Zoe was doing, and what Zoe was doing to Dev.

And when Abercorn was going to reclaim his hell-born babe.

Mina was annoyed with everyone. Devon, for taking Zoe up in his curricle. Zoe, for wanting to be ravished by every male she met. Beau, for playing least-in-sight. Moxley, for dying and leaving her in possession of his gaming hell. Quin for being Quin.

Romeo raised his head and made a sound reminiscent of a creaking door. Mina rubbed the sole of her slipper along the goat’s back.

She regretted her behavior. Were Devon speaking to her, she would apologize. But his manner, when he came for Zoe and Nell, had been cold as the Thames in winter, when the water turned to ice.

Devon had taken Zoe up in his curricle. Mina didn’t know what to think. Rather, she thought so many conflicting things that her head was in a whirl. Devon was doing as she had asked him; he was engaging Zoe. However, she had also asked him not to engage Zoe, and so he wasn’t obliging her in the least.

Perhaps he meant to please Mina by occupying Zoe’s attention. Perhaps he meant to drive her to distraction, in which case he was succeeding well. And perhaps he wasn’t thinking of Mina at all.

Why
should
he be thinking of Mina, when he was with Zoe? Mina reminded herself he was also with Nell. She found some slight comfort in thinking of Devon at the mercy of Zoe and Nell.

He would charm his guests, of course. Devon Kincaid could charm the birds down from their boughs.

He could have, had he wished, charmed Mina out of her stays.

He might, that very moment, be charming Zoe out of hers.

Not in an open carriage. Not with Nell present to protest, and Nell
would
protest if Devon devoted so much effort to anyone else.

Mina couldn’t imagine much effort would be required.

It would not have been, in her case.

Yet Devon had not expended even that little bit of effort, and Mina sat here brooding, and there was scant consolation in the knowledge she had brought this misery down on herself.

The door abruptly opened. Startled, Grace dug her claws into Mina’s thigh. Romeo uttered a high pitched sneezing sound and scrambled to his feet.

George Eames strode into the room. His coat was creased and his hair rumpled, as if he’d grasped great handfuls of it and tugged.

Mina’s heart sank. The arrival of one’s solicitor in such a sorry state could not herald good news. “Mr. Eames! What has happened to you?” Romeo ambled forward, intrigued by the scent of the newcomer’s pomade.

 George sidestepped the goat and, without waiting for an invitation, dropped into a chair. “I was in the park with Lady Anne, engaged in a serious conversation, when your cousin walked up to us bold as brass. You realize, I hope, that she has maggots in her brain. She said I should make Lady Anne jealous. Jealous! Of
her?”

Was this jealousy Mina
felt, regarding Zoe and Dev? She hoped she was above such petty stuff, and feared she was not. “Surely it cannot be so bad.”

“Can it not? That pestilential pig-widgeon insinuated that Nell is my child.”

“Surely Lady Anne does not believe—”

“Who knows what Lady Anne believes?” George lowered his head into his hands, thereby thwarting Romeo, who was poised to nibble on his hair. “She is too well-mannered to speak her mind. One thing is certain: my hopes are all dashed.”

 There was a lot of that going around. Mina stroked Grace’s soft fur. “What did she say? Lady Anne, I mean, not Zoe.”

George replied, with loathing, “When next I see your brass-faced bacon-witted cousin, I shall have several words to say to her!
Lady Anne was shocked, but only said that she must think. And what she must think is that I am a pretty scoundrel. A complete knave.”

Lady Anne sounded like a paragon, and also deadly dull. Mina did not air this opinion, but asserted vaguely that things would eventually come right. She didn’t believe her own words for a moment, not as regarded Mr. Eames, and not as regarded herself.

Loversalls, alas, had a long acquaintance with matters not ending well. Romola leapt off the battlements; Odo drank a fatal dose of poison; Casimir visited the menagerie in the Tower and got eaten by a bear.

On the other hand, Great-Great-Great-Great Uncle John fell into a fit of choking after eating fruit in the middle of a play at the Theater Royal, and was saved by a prostitute known as Orange Moll, who stuck her finger down his throat.

Ironic, that Mina should realize how much she wanted Devon only after she handed him to Zoe.

She glanced at the window and let out a little shriek, waking Grace, who hissed. Romeo looked up, the remnants of one of the green linen draperies dangling from his mouth.

Mina rang for a servant. Figg and a second footman wrestled the goat from the room. Grace yawned, rearranged Mina’s skirts to her satisfaction, and resumed her nap.

George, during this distraction, regained control of his emotions. He had no faith that everything would turn out right — as a solicitor, George was all-too-well acquainted with instances when everything did not — but realized belatedly that Mrs. Moxley wasn’t in fine fettle. He suspected she had been wrestling with troubles of her own.

 “I apologize for my outburst. Your cousin’s hen-witted conduct is not what brought me here. I recently discovered that Abercorn the younger’s maternal grandmother resides in Bath. The old lady and Abercorn Senior have never rubbed along well together, but she dotes on the son. Senior will think Junior has gone to ask her to haul his coals out of the fire.”

Mina said, “I wonder if she knows about Nell.”

“If not, I daresay she will before this business is done. Frankly, I could care less.” So savage was George’s tone that Grace stirred, departed Mina’s lap, and curled up in his instead.

George eyed the cat. He was unfamiliar with the philosophy that held most troubles could be eased by the presence of a purring feline.

“I am so sorry,” sighed Mina. “About everything. You will be wishing us to Hades, and regretting you ever became involved in our affairs.”

As to that, George couldn’t argue. But his companion didn’t deserve his censure, so far as he knew, and therefore he merely said, “Oh, well.”