Diana the Huntress (9 page)

Confident that she looked every inch a
gentlewoman
, Diana went downstairs with her head held high. What on earth had possessed Lady Godolphin to grant Lord Dantrey an audience?

But it was not Lord Dantrey who was waiting for her in the Green Saloon, but Mr Jack Emberton,
resplendent
in elegant morning dress, his boots polished to a mirror shine and his black curls cut à la Brutus.

Diana blushed and sank into a curtsy. ‘Mr Emberton says he has met you before,’ said Lady Godolphin. ‘He has taken the Wentwater place.’

‘I know,’ smiled Diana. ‘What brings you to London, Mr Emberton?’

‘Because a certain attraction I hoped to find in Hopeworth was no longer there,’ said Mr Emberton, his blue eyes twinkling. ‘I found out that much when I was hunting with your father.’

‘Oh!’ Diana clasped her hands. ‘How did the hunt go? Did Papa catch that old fox that has been plaguing him so?’

‘I am afraid not, Miss Diana, but we had some famous sport, nonetheless. Do you drive with me? I shall tell you all about it. Lady Godolphin has given her permission.’

‘I would be honoured, sir,’ said Diana with a demure curtsy while Lady Godolphin beamed her approval.
Diana appeared to be turning out the easiest mannered of all the sisters.

As Mr Emberton helped Diana up into his phaeton, she could not help noticing that his horses were poor showy things, and charitably assumed he had rented them. His driving proved to be equally showy, but he had such merry eyes and such a deep, rumbling infectious laugh that Diana found herself enjoying the outing as she had never enjoyed any outing before. She could not help noticing the admiring glances thrown at him by the other ladies in the Park. He was so very large and broad-shouldered that he made her feel deliciously small and feminine. Now, Lord Dantrey was tall and broad-shouldered but his bearing was cool and
sophisticated
whereas Mr Emberton had such free and easy manners. He treated her as a lady and yet he treated her as an equal. And he talked hunting. He talked with such fluency and descriptive detail that Diana’s heart warmed to him. Here was a man who would be a
companion
. Here was the masculine friendship for which she had craved. She had been a silly goose to think she had to behave like a man to have the friendship of a man. The glow of admiration in Mr Emberton’s eyes warmed away the humiliation inflicted on her by Lord Dantrey.

For his part, Mr Emberton found himself enjoying Diana’s company. He decided his best plan of
campaign
was an old and tried one which had succeeded before. He would get Diana to fall in love with him. He would propose marriage, and then he would tell that worldly and ambitious vicar that he, Jack Emberton, had neither money nor prospects. The vicar would
then surely raise enough money from his in-laws to pay the dangerous Mr Emberton to go away. That way he would have the money without any loss of reputation. He would be regarded as the injured party and he meant to play his part of being in love with Diana to the hilt. Mr Emberton had never been in love – he loved himself too much to waste that tender emotion on anyone else. But he had to admit, as he looked at Diana’s glowing face, that she affected his senses as no woman had done before.

A vision of the gypsy woman’s face arose before Diana’s eyes. She was not yet in love with Mr Emberton but she knew it was only a matter of time. She thanked God for her deliverance from the rakish Lord Dantrey and for having been forgiven her sins in such a pleasant way.

‘It’s been said you hunt with your father,’ said Mr Emberton.

‘Indeed?’ said Diana. ‘Only look how cold and bare the trees seem. On a day like this one would think summer would never, ever return.’ Diana was not about to tell Mr Emberton of her masquerade. He might prove shocked, and he might form such a low opinion of her morals that he would go away and she would never see him again.

‘Very cold,’ he agreed. So she did not want to reply to his question. That meant she
did
hunt with her father. ‘That Wentwater place is as cold as charity as well,’ he went on easily. ‘I don’t think the building’s been properly fired this age.’

‘Lady Wentwater disappeared some time ago,’ said
Diana, frowning as she remembered snatches of
whispered
conversation which had indicated that Lady Wentwater was not a lady, with or without a capital L. ‘Did you see her when you arranged the rental of the house?’

‘No, it was done through an agent in Hopeminster who was doing it for an agent in Bristol. Mortal cheap it was. I got a bargain,’ said Mr Emberton with unconscious vulgarity.

‘Do you return to Hopeworth soon?’ asked Diana.

He looked at her out of the corner of his eyes in a calculating way. It would be better if he could lure Miss Armitage back to the country. It was silly to pay rent for a house in the country and rent for lodgings in town as well. He meant to make as much profit out of this game as possible.

Just then a black cat ran across in front of the carriage. Diana let out a cry of alarm.

‘I wasn’t within an ace of touching the thing,’ said Mr Emberton.

‘It was not that. It’s very unlucky, you see,’ said Diana earnestly. ‘Some people think it lucky when a black cat crosses their path but I hold the other view.’

‘That’s only superstition,’ laughed Mr Emberton.

‘I think a great number of these old superstitions are very wise,’ said Diana, becomingly increasingly upset. ‘Oh, I do wish that cat had not appeared!’

‘I’m a very lucky person,’ said Mr Emberton. ‘Pooh to all black cats. I shall guard you from all supernatural curses, including the evil eye.’

‘You are mocking me.’

‘Not I. I think that cat was a sign you should return to Hopeworth. We could ride together.’

Diana closed her eyes for a moment as she had a blissful vision of riding before the wind, shoulder to shoulder with this handsome man.

She opened them again and let out a little squeak of alarm. Approaching them, in a smart turnout, came Lord Dantrey and a male friend.

‘Now what?’ demanded her companion, amused. ‘I know. You’ve seen the Witch of Endor.’

‘Not that,’ said Diana in a small voice. ‘I think I should like to return home.’

‘Very well,’ he said, ‘but on one condition. You must tell me when I may enjoy the pleasure of your company again or I shall bring all sorts of curses down upon your beautiful head.’

Diana laughed, suddenly carefree, as the carriage turned about and headed through the Park in the direction of the north gate.

Lord Dantrey watched them go. So Miss Diana had found herself a beau, and very quickly too.

‘Who was the beauty?’ demanded his friend, Mr Tony Fane. ‘I see you were much struck by her as well.’

‘Beauty?’ said Lord Dantrey, not wanting to admit to himself that he had been startled by Diana’s
appearance
. ‘A trifle too bold and gypsyish for my taste. I believe her to be one of the Armitage girls.’

‘Ah, the famous Armitage girls. That explains it. Did you ever see such a stable of beauties? And all different. I might try my luck in that direction.’

Lord Dantrey was normally very fond of the
easy-going Mr Fane but he found himself suddenly out of charity with him. ‘If you are going to chase after every petticoat in London,’ he said acidly, ‘then I fear I must do without the pleasure of your company.’

‘Faith! Your spleen must be disordered. I did not say
every
petticoat in London, merely one very respectable and beautiful petticoat. What could be more
convenable
than a vicar’s daughter?’

‘From what I have heard of the good vicar, he is anything but religious. Ambition and money are his gods. Who was that fellow with Miss Armitage?’

‘Ah, I was coming to that. Jack Emberton is his name and he makes a living at the card tables. He always gets some well-connected weakling to introduce him to other well-connected weaklings and then fleeces ’em at the tables.’

‘Then what is his interest in Miss Armitage? I do not believe the family to be very rich although I suppose they are well-connected by marriage.’

‘You have been away in foreign parts too long. You have forgot the charm of a genuine English beauty. Don’t need to be interested in money to be interested in Miss Armitage.’

Lord Dantrey found himself prey to an impulse to ride to Hanover Square and warn Lady Godolphin of the unsavoury company her charge was keeping. Then he shrugged. A girl who would dress as a man, stamp rudely on his feet, and throw water in his face was no doubt a match for Jack Emberton.

He decided to return to his solitude in the country soon. London was so full of upsetting people!

And she
had
noticed him. But all she had done was to close her eyes as if she had seen some horror.

The Reverend Charles Armitage was dancing up and down on the doorstep when Squire Jimmy Radford opened the door.

‘Charles!’ exclaimed the squire. ‘Come in. Come in. Ram is about somewhere and will fetch us some wine. I have a very good …’

‘I’ll never touch wine again,’ howled the vicar.

‘Oh, dear,’ said the squire. ‘It must be serious.’ He led the way into the library. Ram, his Indian servant, came in, and the squire ordered tea.

The vicar sank into a chair beside the fire and buried his head in his hands. ‘God is punishing me,’ he mumbled.

The little squire, who thought that Charles Armitage often did a very good job of setting up situations to punish himself without any help from his Maker, forbore from saying so.

The squire judged that one of the vicar’s daughters was in trouble and that the vicar blamed himself for that trouble. Charles Armitage, faced with any nasty consequences brought about by parental neglect,
always
started by swearing to give up something – his hunt, his religion, his wine or his food.

The vicar tugged a grimy letter out of his capacious pocket and handed it to the squire.

The squire took it and looked at it with distaste. It was made up of letters cut from the newspapers. It read, ‘Yr daughter, Diana, has been seen dressed as a man
being entertained by an evil-looking rake in
Humbold’s
coffee house. A friend.’

‘But this cannot be true,’ said the squire. ‘A nasty anonymous letter! Diana is with Lady Godolphin. Did you not question your servants?’

The vicar nodded. ‘John Summer said he delivered her right to the door. Sarah saw her in as well, but Sarah was sulky because Diana sent her straight back and would not even allow the girl an hour in London to see the shops.’

‘Then what ails you? It is upsetting in a way to think that someone might know that Diana Armitage has been in the habit of masquerading as a man. The rest is lies.’

‘I know it’s not,’ said the vicar, striking his waistcoat. ‘I feel it here.’ He looked pleadingly at the squire. ‘I can’t sit waiting for a reply to any letter I send to Lady Godolphin. I mean to leave today and travel to London …’

‘And you want me to go with you,’ said the squire gently.

‘Would you, Jimmy? It would be like old times, setting things to rights together.’

‘Of course I will go with you.’ The squire sighed a little and looked out at the steel grey coldness of the day and wished he did not have to leave his
comfortable
fireside.

‘Hey, I feel better already,’ grinned the vicar. ‘You’re a tonic, Jimmy.’

Ram came in and started to lift cannisters of tea out of the teapoy. The vicar watched in amazement.

‘What’s he doing?’

‘Ram? He is merely making tea for us, Charles.’

‘Tea! Pah! When did I ever want tea?’

‘My dear Charles, you did say you would never touch wine again.’

‘Oh, ah.’ The vicar gave an uneasy, baffled look in the direction of the teapoy. Then his face cleared. ‘I didn’t say nothing about
brandy
,’ he said triumphantly.

‘Brandy, please, Ram,’ said the squire. ‘Perhaps you would like to make a call with me, Charles. I feel we should pay a visit to Lord Dantrey. He does not go out much and he is reported to have been ill. He had a somewhat unsavoury reputation as a rake, but that was when he was a very young man. Diana is in London and Frederica safely in the seminary, so you have no chicks to protect from this wicked lord. I think if we left in the morning for London it would be time enough.’

Ram poured a large glass of brandy and set it on a little table beside the vicar. The wind howled in the chimney and rattled the bare branches of the trees outside.

‘Very well,’ said the vicar, beginning to feel all his worries about Diana had been groundless. ‘You know, it’s a pity in a way that I bundled Diana off to London. That Jack Emberton what’s taken Lady Wentwater’s place seems a regular out-and-outer. Seemed much taken with Diana. Said he met her just as she was setting out for London.’

‘Nothing is known of Mr Emberton,’ said the squire cautiously, ‘although I admit he seems a very
straightforward
sort of young man.’

The two friends set out on horseback an hour later, riding across the fields in the direction of the old Osbadiston house.

They were received by the butler, Chalmers, who informed them that his lordship had left for London. He offered them refreshment, which the two refused, being now anxious to return and begin their
preparations
for the journey to London.

They were just turning to leave when Chalmers said, ‘I believe his lordship went to join your relative, Mr Armitage.’

The vicar stood as if turned to stone.

‘What relative?’ asked the squire.

‘Why, Mr David Armitage, sir. He arrived here on the night of the storm, having lost his way.’

The vicar pulled himself together with a visible effort. ‘This David Armitage,’ he said. ‘I can’t call him to mind …’

‘Oh, sir, I overheard the young gentleman say he was visiting you at the vicarage.’

‘Tall fellow, was he?’ demanded the vicar
breathlessly
. ‘Tall with black hair and a sort of girlish look about him – wearing a scarlet hunting coat?’

‘The very same, sir.’