Bath Scandal (15 page)

Bea finished her toilet and went to bed in good spirits. Tomorrow she would have the money for Horatio. Tannie could deliver it and repay her when he heard from his man of business. She might keep the truth from Southam until she had the money to give back. Just before she slept, she remembered Southam’s words that had slipped out in anger: “I was used to envy Leonard.” So he
had
had a tendre for her....

Southam had more difficulty settling down. He quarreled with his conscience, first thinking he had been too hard on Mrs. Searle. Gambling was a disease; perhaps she couldn’t help herself. He vacillated from that tolerant position to one of rage. How could she, a widow, put herself at the mercy of such wretches as that blackleg? She was in her nightdress, alone with him. How had the man got into her room? What would she have done if he had not been there to give her the money?

Was that why she tolerated the attentions of Sir Harold and Reynolds? Were they her bankers? Not without receiving something in payment. He had an idea what a pretty widow would use for coin in that circumstance. She had looked ravishing, with her dark hair streaming over her shoulders, and that white lacy thing she had on. Her green eyes had shone like diamonds when she went after that tout with her hairbrush. A regular hellion.

She had cut up stiff when he tried to make love to her. If she had been in his debt at the time, no doubt she would have been more compliant. Her attitude throughout the entire fracas had been noticeably lacking in either shame or sorrow. The woman was a hardened schemer, accustomed to such degrading exhibits as he had seen this night. Yes, he definitely must remove Gillie from her care. He was by no means sure the duke was all he should be, either. Surely she was not preying on that simple boy! He would have a word with the duke, and if he was involved in any way with the immoral Mrs. Searle, the duke could go to the devil.

Chapter Twelve

Southam, after a largely sleepless night, came down to breakfast late the next morning, pale and limping.

“What’s the matter, Rawl? You look awful!” Gillie exclaimed.

“I had an accident. Bumped into the edge of my dresser last night,” he said curtly. He darted a dark glance at Beatrice, who sat prim as a nun, sipping her coffee.

“You have not forgotten Gillie is driving out with the duke this morning?” Bea said, looking a question at him. The previous night’s hard words about the “whey-faced wretch” left her in some little doubt as to whether Southam would permit this drive, in which case, she must inform him as to Tannie’s and her own true part in the matter of the gambling debt.

“I shall have a word with him before they leave.”

“If you are planning to ask him about his intentions, Rawl, I wish you will not,” Gillie said.

“Why not?” he snapped back. “It is a logical question, when he is in your company for the better part of every day.”

“Because I don’t know whether I even want to marry him,” she replied.

“Then you shouldn’t be seeing so much of him.”

“I didn’t say I would not have him if he asked. I just don’t want him to ask
yet,
till I’m sure.”

“You had best make up your mind, for we shall be leaving this afternoon,” he announced, taking up his cup of coffee.

“Leaving!” Gillie exclaimed. “We were to stay four days. Why are we leaving?”

“Because the place is full of riffraff. I should not have brought you here. Not that Bath is any better,” he added.

Beatrice ignored this ill-natured shot at herself. Gillie complained a little longer, but she was missing Penny. She decided she would not mind so very much leaving Bournemouth. Riding was more fun than watching races.

“Aren’t you going to eat anything, Southam?” Miss Pittfield inquired. She wondered about his bad temper. Did it have something to do with that letter from Deborah? He must have picked it up at the desk before coming to the table.

“I am not hungry.”

“A blow from a wayward dresser will sometimes have that effect,” Bea explained to Miss Pittfield. Southam gave her a quelling glare.

“What had Miss Swann to say, Southam?” Miss Pittfield asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Have you not picked up your letter? There is one for you at the desk. It has been forwarded from Bath.”

“I haven’t been to the desk,” he said. Nor did he hasten in that direction. Indeed, his already bad humor seemed to worsen at the news. Why the devil does the woman have to hound me? he wondered. What new catastrophe has arisen, due to her interference? He knew he was diverting his anger with Mrs. Searle to the innocent Deborah but was unable to prevent it. It was true in any case. She was an interfering woman. He had decided to marry her to smooth the chaotic tenor of his life, but ever since the engagement, life at home had become a series of domestic calamities. Servants fighting, servants leaving, Gillie acting like a sulky child. And why the devil would Deborah not set a wedding date?

Beatrice examined him, wondering at his sullen silence. “You have no objection to Gillie’s driving out with Tannie, then?” she asked.

“Let her have one last drive. We shall be leaving immediately after lunch. I have a little business to attend to this morning, or we would leave immediately.”

Beatrice assumed the “business” was to arrange for the money from the bank. “Then I shall pack this morning,” she said. “I shall just wait to say good-morning to Tannie before going upstairs.” She would arrange to give Tannie the money before leaving town and see when he could repay her.

As soon as Southam had drunk his coffee, he went to get his letter from Deborah. He read it in the lobby, leaning against the desk. It was even worse than he had anticipated. She was “shocked and alarmed” to hear that he was prolonging his visit to Bath and demanded the details of what made this necessary. She was hurt to learn from the Cornstocks that he had not informed them he was unable to attend their dinner party. At least she didn’t know he had gone to Bournemouth. He had not mentioned that but only wrote that he would be staying a little longer in Bath. What would she not have to say about Bournemouth if she ever learned the whole truth?

It was a long letter, written in Deborah’s spidery script, which was an effort to read. His eyes skimmed over various passages. Letter from Princess Augusta, talk of royal gardening, hints of Papa single-handedly solving some parliamentary crisis, and surely a portfolio to be forthcoming shortly. He had heard that before! He skipped down to the end and stiffened in horror.
She was joining him at Bath!
He must not worry about the inconvenience. She knew he would not remain unless some crisis had arisen. Her place was by his side, to help him in his time of trouble. Oh, Lord! That was all he needed! She would be leaving the following day. The letter had been forwarded from Bath, wasting a day. She would be arriving in Bath on the morrow! He crumpled up his billet-doux and tossed it into the cuspidor.

He looked up, his face a mask of frustration, to see Mrs. Searle studying him. She walked forward, her eyes just skimming off the crushed letter in the cuspidor. “Bad news, I take it?” she asked.

“On the contrary. Delightful news,” he said through grim lips. “Deborah is joining me at Bath.”

“Am I to have the pleasure of her company, or has she other friends in the city?”

“She didn’t say. I rather think she means to stay with you,” he said, pink with embarrassment.

“Lovely! I look forward to it.” Her tone was not ironic; neither did it hold any tinge of pleasure. Resignation was the closest he could come to putting a word to it.

“Very likely she has written you, asking if it will be convenient.”

“In that case my servants would have forwarded the letter, I think. It is no matter. As you will be rushing Gillie, and one assumes your fiancée, off to Elmland so soon, a short visit shan’t bother me.”

He feared Deborah would not want to leave immediately. After the expense and bother of the trip, she would want to spend a few days of relaxation. “She will want a good visit with you first—her old school chum,” he said, trying for a hearty air.

“We were never close, Southam. Ah, there is Tannie! I’ll just say good-morning while you tell Gillie he is here.”

This ruse gave her a moment alone with the duke. “I shall have the money in an hour,” she said. “Cut your drive short, and you can take it to Mr. Jones before noon. We shall be leaving immediately after lunch.”

“Where did you get it?”

“A loan from Southam, but I pray you will not mention it to him. It is a—sort of secret,” she said. “There isn’t time to explain now.”

“Why are you leaving so soon?”

“It is difficult to explain, but”—she remembered Deborah’s visit—”his fiancée is going to Bath to meet him.”

“That don’t sound difficult to explain.”

“No.”

The duke rubbed his ear in confusion.

“Hush! They are coming,” she cautioned before he could pursue the matter.

Southam and Gillie came forward. A battle with his conscience made Southam realize the duke was too good a
parti
to cast aside only because Mrs. Searle had got her claws into him. He would see that that sort of thing came to a quick halt. He was as amiable as his present mood made possible. As soon as the youngsters left, Southam headed to a bank. It was no easy matter for anyone, even a lord, to procure such a large sum in cash with a strange bank. He was left cooling his heels for thirty minutes, while his temper mounted steadily higher. When he finally had the money, he went in search of Mrs. Searle.

As it was her last morning in Bournemouth, and as Tannie could not give his uncle the money before he returned, Beatrice decided to have a stroll around the town. Packing would not take a whole morning. She and Miss Pittfield went to look over the shops and gardens. Southam returned to the Royal Bath to learn that the ladies were out. That was how much consideration she had for him! When he was giving her a thousand pounds, you would think she would at least have the common decency to be there to receive it.

He couldn’t even give her a good chewing-out, because he had to keep her in good temper for Deborah’s visit. Why the devil did Deborah want to come scrambling to Bath? No one had invited her. Didn’t she trust him? That, he felt instinctively, was the real reason for her visit. She never had trusted him. Every time he glanced at a pretty girl, she was there, making some snide remark. “A pity Miss Simmons has those gap teeth.” “Miss Lawson would be tolerably handsome were it not for that common streak that pops out from time to time. Always prattling of her sister’s great catch. A mere baronet, really!”

What would she say if she knew he had tried to make love to Beatrice?

His heart shriveled to consider it. He had an overwhelming fear that she would learn of it. Deborah always learned everything. He couldn’t have a drink of ale in the local taproom without her calling him to account. “A man in your position, Southam! You must set a better example. To be idling away an afternoon in a tavern, like some retired Cit.”

His mood did not improve when Beatrice returned carrying a hatbox. Out wasting her blunt, when she was a thousand pounds in hock. The woman had no management.

“Shopping, I see, Cousin?” he said, glinting a reminder of her penurious state at her.

“I could not resist this bonnet, Southam. The clerk told me it made me look young, and you know how folks of our age are always looking for tricks to rejuvenate us. Did you manage to complete your business successfully?”

“Yes, I got it.” Miss Pittfield looked at him, inviting explanation. He could think of no feasible lie, so ignored her look.

Miss Pittfield sensed some conspiracy afoot between the two. She hoped it was of a romantic nature and left them alone, saying she had to attend to her packing if they were to leave after lunch.

“I should do the same,” Bea said when they were alone. “There is time for a cup of tea first, I think. Will you join me, Southam?” She added in a low voice, “It would look odd for you to hand over the blunt here in the lobby. Such transactions want privacy.”

He collared a servant to order tea and followed her into the parlor. “It seems a strange time for you to go on a shopping binge, when your pockets are to let.”

“One bonnet is not a binge. Even two do not constitute a binge. It requires three bonnets to make a binge.”

“You know what I mean,” he said sternly.

“I know you are taking an overweening interest in my money. I am borrowing the thousand pounds for a short time. That does not give you the right to monitor what I do with my own funds.”

“It is a gift, or payment if you like, not a loan.”

He handed her the envelope. She took it with a curt, “It is a loan, and I thank you.” She stored it in her reticule and sat down. “Would you like to see my new bonnet?” she asked, apparently forgetting his huge gift that easily.

“Not particularly.”

“Then you can shut your eyes, for I am eager to see it again.” She opened the box and lifted out a delightful confection of chipped straw, with a wide satin ribbon and a tiny cluster of silk orange blossoms tucked in at the side. She placed it on her head and turned this way and that before the mirror, examining herself. “It will be a definite hit with the fogies in Bath,” she said, putting her old bonnet into the empty box, while he watched, scowling. Though he did, in fact, think it was a very pretty bonnet. “What are you in the mopes about, Southam?”

He decided to try to reason her into common sense. “I cannot like your cavalier attitude about money, Cousin. Gambling can lead to God only knows what. You put yourself at the mercy of men—such creatures as Sir Harold and that Reynolds person, I suppose.”

“Not to forget that Southam person,” she added, smiling ironically. “The worst of the lot.”

“I think you ought to leave Bath, go somewhere that you are not known, and begin a new life.”

“I am very happy with my old life, Southam,” she said unconcernedly. A slow smile crept over her lips and up to light her green eyes as he stared in frustration. “You are too absurd, you know, to think I have no more scruples or common sense than to squander Leonard’s money on horses. I lost one pound; it is the only pound I have ever gambled on horses in my life. Other than whist for a penny a point, I am blameless.”