Cynthia Bailey Pratt (24 page)

Berenice spoke up now. “Oh, but who could object to a quiet family dinner?”

“One cannot be too careful, lamb, as you will no doubt learn. You must forgive me. Miss Massingham. Of course, you are welcome at any time.” Mrs. Clively lifted her spoon, looked sideways at the tiny circle of soup and laid it, untasted, back in her bowl. “I saw that you were acquainted with Miss Fitz-Water. Have you met many of your former...friends in Bath?”

“They were not friends, Mrs. Clively, but guests.”

“Yes, I suppose persons can be one and not the other. Danita, dearest, you are not hungry?”

As though bringing her thoughts back from a long way off, Danita seemed to start and notice, for the first time, that there was soup before her. “I was waiting for it to cool,” she said, dipping her spoon. “It’s your recipe, Miss Massingham.”

“Yes, I know. Why does it taste so much better here?”

“Because someone else cooked it, Millicent,” said her sister merrily.

“Ah, you do not keep a cook, Miss Lucy?” Mrs. Clively asked with a smile that Millicent did not appreciate.

“Not since...not for some little while,” Lucy answered, creditably catching back the words that would have informed against Danita. It had been pressed upon her that she should probably not mention in exactly what capacity Danita had resided with them. Lucy was not certain of the reason for this unusual secrecy, but thought it had something to do with Sir Carleton, though he surely must have realized when he visited that Danita was their servant. Looking down the white cloth toward the girl, Lucy could not help saying, “I am sure Danita is a very fine cook. And what about you, Berenice?”

“My granddaughter is too occupied to slave away in the kitchen,” came the grand statement from the head of the table.

“Oh, but I should love to learn. Grandmamma. Perhaps you can teach me, Miss Lucy. I used to visit the kitchens so often when we lived at Roselands. The cook showed me how to make gingerbread, but I could never keep the edges from burning.”

“One has to truly understand the stove to bake gingerbread,” Lucy said. “You should try to make Sally Lunns instead. They are not as difficult, or do I mean temperamental?”

“Fortunately, living in Bath, we can buy Sally Lunn cakes from the original bakery.” Mrs. Clively gave her a small flashing smile. “Of course, in Damingford, it must be more difficult.”

Millicent said, “We do prefer to be self-reliant.”

The soup was removed in silence and the cold collared eel brought out. Mrs. Clively encouraged them to partake heartily, though it was Miss Massingham’s private opinion that her hostess was not happy with her own choice. Lucy tried to eat some, though eel was not her favorite dish. Millicent was proud of her sister when she swallowed hard and said, “My, how delicious.”

“I received this recipe from the mother of the Duke of Lichoakes. He came to tea the other afternoon. No doubt you recall him?”

“I thought him charming.”

“Did you, Miss Lucy? He is said to be a hard man.”

This was the opening Miss Millicent had been waiting for. “My sister and I never listen to gossip, Mrs. Clively, no matter what the source.”

The oldest two ladies at the table exchanged a glance. Distantly, Millicent heard the clash and ring of steel whipped from the scabbard to meet in the first blow of battle. It was an excellent thing the eel was already cold for no one ate it now. Miss Millicent could not abide waste.

“Yet,” Mrs. Clively said, “one can find out so many valuable things by listening to others. Warnings, for instance. The duke’s reputation is not all that it should be. Is it not fitting that young girls should be made aware of dangers?”

“What dangers?” asked Berenice, but she went unheeded.

“And yet you allow this hardened gentleman into the orbit of your granddaughter and Miss Wingrove?”

“I protect my granddaughter. And as for Miss Wingrove—’’ Millicent did not miss the iciness of the glance sent down the table. “Miss Wingrove had proven she can care for herself.”

“Again, we do not listen to rumor-mongering.”

“But how dull. I’m sure I find out more through my friends than from any newspaper or periodical imaginable.”

Miss Millicent snorted. “Ha, filling the head with stuff and nonsense instead of issues of solid merit. I suppose you read novels, as well.”

“I have never read a novel.”

“Oh, I read a wonderful...” both Lucy and Berenice began.

“You should,” Millicent continued. “I find them useful instruments to enlarge one’s charity of mind.”

“Millie! You read novels?”

“Only those I find hidden in the lower cupboard. Our new maid is not so clever at hiding things as you were, Miss Wingrove.” Only when Lucy put a horrified hand to her mouth did Millicent realize her high-mindedness had carried her too far.

“Danita,” said Berenice, beginning to laugh. “Oh, Grandmamma, you never told me that!”

“I am not ashamed for my work for the Massinghams, Berenice. It was good and honest work. What did your grandmother tell you I did?”

“She said we shouldn’t speak of it. That we should try and be charitable toward you because ...”

“Berenice! That’s quite enough!”

Not listening, the girl went on, “Because you had made some unfortunate choices but that she was willing to give you a chance to redeem yourself. She never said from what.”

Millicent approved as Danita slowly rose to her feet. The girl had gone quite white but her gray eyes were remarkably calm. There was perhaps even a glow of laughter in their depths. “I had wondered how that silly rumor about my past had begun. I had thought it was the consequence of a foolish action on my part, but now I see.”

“If you mean accompanying Sir Carleton to a house where gambling was going on,” Mrs. Clively began.

“Oh, Danita! Did you! What was it like?” Lucy clapped her hands in girlish delight, seconded by Berenice, her eyes shining with hero-worship.

“Very smoky,” Danita said, still standing at the end of the table. There was definitely laughter in her eyes now, as they shone almost blue. “You don’t seem shocked, Miss Massingham.”

“My dear, I knew all about it the second day I was in Bath. Sir Carleton told me himself when I was busily asking questions about these strange stories about you. You see, Mrs. Clively, the tale you told reflects on my sister and myself. I couldn’t allow it to go unchallenged. I find that if one is careful to ask the right questions, it is quite an easy matter to trace who said what in a conversation, even one in which many people take part. I talked to several women who remember your dropping vague hints as to Miss Wingrove’s antecedents. The hints gradually became less vague.”

“But,” Danita asked, the laughter in her voice dying, “I don’t understand. What was your motive for trying to discredit me?”

“Why, to keep you by me,” Mrs. Clively said. Turning, she raised her voice. “Figgs, we are quite done with this eel. Bring in the mutton, at once.”

“Sit down, Danita,” said Miss Massingham. “You might as well eat your supper.” When the butler had departed, she said, “Continue, Mrs. Clively. You do owe her an explanation.”

“Yes. Why did you wish to keep me? You don’t even like me.”

“But I do!” Berenice exclaimed.

Her grandmother turned a blank look upon her. “But you will not stay, lamb. That has been obvious to me for many months. First it was those boys. Then the boys went away but the men began to come. I took her to Bath,” she said, looking once at each woman seated around the table. “It was the same here. She is beautiful and one day soon she will be married. I have tried to delay things, but it is inevitable. How can I be alone?”

Miss Massingham saw her hostess look inward as she repeated, “How can I be alone?” In a stronger voice, Mrs. Clively went on. “I must have someone. Lemuel is dead, but he was never any use to me. I married him because he was dull and would always stay by me and do as I said, but he didn’t. He was always with his nose in some book, shutting me out. My son, he went away. But he sent me you.”

The dull eyes turned once more on Berenice. “You were so thin and pale, I thought, she will stay by me. But you grew up to be beautiful. And the boys began coming around, holding your hand. You were seven when the first one said he wanted to marry you and I knew ...” Someone knocked at the front door, the sound echoing off the silver and crystal on the sideboard, breaking Mrs. Clively’s circling train of thought.

Danita made Miss Massingham even more proud when she rose again and, coming around to the head of the table, put her arm about Mrs. Clively’s shoulder. “Come upstairs. You need to rest. This evening was too much for you, as you feared.”

“Don’t fuss!” Mrs. Clively said with something like her usual vim. The blue eyes did not clear, however, and she kept staring at Berenice. “I knew you’d leave me one day. I wouldn’t let Lemuel send for Danita when he wanted to, when her parents died. I didn’t want her. I wanted you to stay. If they’d seen you beside so plain a girl, you would have seemed lovelier still.
She
couldn’t come. I made myself hate her, thought I always knew I would need her someday.”

The cracked gaze shifted to Danita and something of beauty returned to the waxlike face. Triumph gleamed for a moment in her eyes. “Of course I spread those rumors! Who would marry, or even give house-room to an abandoned woman? You’d never be able to leave me then. I would not be alone.”

Miss Massingham said, “Has Mrs. Clively a maid?”

“Yes, I’ll get her,” Berenice said, shoving back her chair. She almost ran from the room. Her hasty steps were heard clearly in the silent room. Then, she called out in a voice entirely unlike her own, “Father?”

Chapter Thirteen

Sir Carleton Blacklock sat at the tables, trying to be amused by his predicament, and failing. Leaving Danita and her two sovereigns behind, he had gone alone to Herr Grabelein’s establishment in Murfret Street. He would have scorned Lord Framstead’s company even if the young man had been in town. But he had been called to oversee some detail of his new estates, depriving Carleton of the opportunity.

The day had been full. He had bet on horses, and pugilists, and a tennis game. Thus far this evening, he had played hazard, loo,
rouge-et-noir,
and even the lowly
vingt-et-un.
He drank as he played, breaking one of his firmest rules. Try as he might to pick outsiders and impossibilities, Carleton had won and won again. He thought it very unfair of Danita to continue her influence over him even though she was plighted to another.

Tossing down his fan of cards with sudden impatience, Carleton stood up. “That’s all for me tonight, gentlemen.”

“But...but that’s the winning hand,” sputtered one of his opponents, gawking at the revealed royalty.

The large shoulders lifted wearily. “So it is.” Pushing his way through the spectators, Carleton accepted Herr Grabelein’s note of hand without remembering what either of them said. It was early still, only ten or eleven o’clock at night, but he’d had enough. The smoke clawed his throat, the liquor tasted unclean, and the noise was enough to drive a man to distraction.

Outside the club, Carleton asked the footman, “Where’s that other place?”

“Other place, Sir Carleton?”

“Yes, you know. The crooked house, where I can lose this damned money.”

The youngster goggled. “Well, sir, there’s Madame Le Clerk’s on t’other side of the river.”

“Pulteney Bridge?”

“No, Old Bath Bridge. But you don’t want to go there, sir. Nobody never wins there, ‘cept for flats, and that’s just to keep them bettin’ till they’re skint.”

“Go teach your grandmother to suck eggs, boy.” The big man walked away with new purpose in his stride. Stopping, he turned and came back to press a coin into the footman’s hand.

“But, Sir Carleton, that’s...gold.”

“It’s all right. I’ve someone who gives me more than I want. Keep it, keep it.”

Carleton knew he was not foxed, though he dearly wanted to be. He’d won a goodly sum and his conscience would not permit him to just throw it away. He would go home. The drinks were better there, and he could not win without the paraphernalia of play, Danita Wingrove or no Danita Win-grove. If he had managed to leave his house without seeing her, he probably would have lost, he reasoned. He’d done his best. Who could have known she was lying in wait to inflict more good luck on him?

“MacDonald,” he said, entering Number 15.

“Good evening. Sir Carleton. May I inquire as to your success this evening, sir?”

“You may not. But you might bring a man a stiff brandy, or three.”

“Very good. Sir Carleton. This letter came for you and...”

“Give it to me. And then, I want nothing but the brandy.”

Carleton found his way into the front room. He split the letter open with a long knife and read with a frown pulling his brows into an almost frightening grimace. “Damn,” he said thoughtfully.

The letter offered him one hundred and fifty shares in the Bath Gas Works, slated to begin lighting the city in a few months. The shares were exceedingly difficult to find, but the seller was in desperate need of extra money, due to an imminent departure for points east forced upon him by his family. Sir Carleton would be a fool to pass up the opportunity to increase his holdings, yet he felt like that kind of fool tonight.

Nevertheless, he steeled himself to take up a pen and slowly, through the haze of drink, compose a letter of acceptance. It need be no longer nor more effusive than the draft on Hammersley Bank, a draft as acceptable in Paris as in London. Carleton addressed the letter as MacDonald entered with a brandy snifter balanced on a salver.

“Post this, tomorrow,” Carleton said, laying the sealed paper on the desk. He reached out for the stemmed glass but his hand froze in midair. “What...?” he croaked. He cleared his throat. “What the devil are those?”

“Sovereigns, sir. The young lady said you dropped them as you passed her window.”

“Which young lady?” he asked, though he knew.

“Miss Wingrove, sir, from Number 12.”

Half an hour later. Sir Carleton arrived at Madame Le Clerk’s establishment on the far side of the Avon. Though the three-story building resembled the classic architecture of Bath, he could tell by counting the chimneys that this had originally been four houses which were now fronted with a thin shell of stone. The imposing front door was ill-proportioned and off-center.