Gayle Buck (28 page)

Her attention was claimed then by Lord Eddington, and she entered with relief into easy banter with her brother. Though it pained her when, after a few moments, Lord Trilby moved away, she was nevertheless glad of it.

“Caroline, are you quite the thing? You appear somewhat pale,” Lord Eddington said.

“Do I? It is all the excitement, I suppose,” Lady Caroline said. Her brother was satisfied, and finished his conversation with her.

When Lady Caroline slid a glance after Lord Trilby, she saw that the earl was paying gentle compliments to Lady Eddington and politely holding off Mrs. Burlington’s attempts to commandeer his attention for herself.

Lady Caroline turned away and walked over to the grandduchess to inquire whether her grace would like to get up a game of whist. This suggestion was met with gracious approval, and Lady Caroline caused card tables to be set up for any who might be similarly inclined.

The Grandduchess of Schaffenzeits proved herself to be a shrewd and ruthless player, bringing cries of admiration from Lord Eddington, who was her partner, and petulant shrugs from Mrs. Burlington, who was enjoined by her grace to pay closer attention to her hand. The evening passed pleasantly enough in such activity and polite conversation.

It was noticed that Lord Hathaway and Fraulein Gutenberg spent an inordinate amount of time removed from everyone else, but nothing much was thought of it, since it was known both had suffered reverses where they had not expected to.

At the stroke of midnight the Grandduchess of Schaffenzeits proclaimed that she was ready to return to Walmesley
and thence to her bed. It was counted a signal that the evening had come to an end. However, before the guests had the opportunity to begin gathering their wraps
,
Lord Hathaway portentously begged the attention of the company for an announcement he intended to make.

After glancing around to be certain that he had gained everyone’s attention, Lord Hathaway blew out his cheeks in self-importance. “This evening I have the pleasure to make known to my neighbors and acquaintances that I have decided upon a lady-wife. Allow me to formally present my intended, Fraulein Gutenberg.” Fraulein Gutenberg came to stand beside Lord Hathaway, placing her hand in his ready palm. In ceremonious formality, his lordship raised her hand to his lips.

The company was bound by universal astonishment. Fraulein Gutenberg sought and found Lady Caroline’s eyes. She smiled faintly before turning her head to look up at her chosen Englishman.

The Grandduchess of Schaffenzeits gave a loud cackle, at which Lord Hathaway visibly bristled. When the grandduchess walked up to the newly aff
i
anced couple, she said, “My dear Lord Hathaway, I could not be more pleased. I consider you a most worthy suitor to my young protégée’s hand.” As Lord Hathaway reddened with surprised gratification, her grace turned her gaze on Fraulein Gutenberg. Amusement deepened her guttural accents. “Marie, my dear. You have more than fulf
i
lled my expectations for you. I shall be glad to carry back news of your marriage to your dear family, who I know will be most pleased to learn of your new station in life.”

“Thank you, madam. I should like to send letters by you to all my sisters,” the Fraulein said.

The grandduchess cackled again and nodded. “Certainly, my dear. I expect they will be most interested in all you have to convey. Perhaps when I return to England for my grand-nephew’s wedding in the spring, I shall bring with me a few members of your family to visit.” The Fraulein did not reply except with a small smile.

With the grandduchess’s affable acceptance of the match, Lord Hathaway quickly reverted to form. He accepted the felicitations of all present, and by the time he had volunteered to escort the ladies back to Walmesley, he was firmly convinced that Fraulein Gutenberg had been his firm choice from the moment that he had been presented to her.

Lord Trilby urged Lord Hathaway to remain the night at Walmesley, observing the lateness of the hour as well as pointing out the propriety of settling the marriage terms at the Grandduchess of Schaffenzeits’ earliest convenience, since her grace undoubtedly intended to shortly take her leave of England.

Lord Hathaway was much taken with the mention of settlements. The Fraulein, who had her own reasons for wishing to have matters swiftly concluded, added her gentle weight in favor of the notion.

As the grandduchess took her leave, she recommended that her grandnephew remain at Berwicke for the weekend. Waiting only for Lord Hathaway and Fraulein Gutenberg to move past her, she said, “I seek to spare Marie’s blushes, my lord, for naturally she must feel awkward with the speed at which her affections have been redirected.”

Lord Trilby did not think that there was anything at all self-conscious about Fraulein Gutenberg’s departing glance, but he wisely did not say so. “Of course, madam. The delicacy of your concern does you much credit. I shall naturally do just as you think best. That is, if Eddington here will have me.”

Lord Eddington shrugged in an amiable way. “Of course we will put you up
,
Trilby. Dashed good notion, actually. I have been meaning to ask your opinion on a certain estate matter that—
”

“My lord, do forgive my bold interruption, but do you not believe that this matter might wait for the morrow?”

Lord Eddington looked down, startled, at his lady. He easily interpreted the soft expression in her eyes. “That thought did cross my mind,” he agreed.

Lord and Lady Eddington said good night and went up the stairs, leaving to an outraged Mrs. Burlington the task of providing what she considered to be the essential chaperonage
for her niece.

Lord Trilby said, “I do not wish to keep you from your bed, Mrs. Burlington.”

“Oh, pray do not give it a thought, my lord. It is always a pleasure to adjust oneself to the whims of our guests. I hold myself in readiness to arrange everything to your satisfaction, though of course with such an old friend as yourself we may dispense with formality and beg you to make yourself quite at home,” Mrs. Burlington said.

“Then I know that I need not stand on ceremony with you. I shall see Simpson about my requirements, so you must not feel any further obligation toward me,” Lord Trilby said.

He held open the door, his brows raised suggestively
.
Mrs. Burlington flushed. She shot a glance at Lady Caroline, but far from coming to her rescue, that lady said nothing at all. Mrs. Burlington swept angrily out of the room.

Chapter Twenty-nine

Lord Trilby shut the door.

“That was very bad of you, my lord,” Lady Caroline observed. She was very curious why the earl had gone to such lengths to be private with her.

“Yes, it was,” Lord Trilby said. His satisfaction was such that it made her laugh.

“Really, Miles!”

Lord Trilby smiled at her, regarding her for a moment as his thoughts sped swiftly backward.

He had found his thoughts strangely taken up with Lady Caroline all evening. When the Grandduchess of Schaffenzeits had made her surprising announcement, he had heard of her departure with more regret than he would have believed possible. His mixed feelings were puzzling. Certainly he was fond of his great-aunt, but she had also represented a problem to him. Yet he had enjoyed her grace
’
s visit. Surely his uppermost emotion must be relief that at last it was to be all over.

He had felt unusually threatened by the presence of Fraulein Gutenberg, who had the grandduchess’s sanction and had as well proved a formidable factor in her own right. The Fraulein’s potency had less to do with her extraordinary beauty than with her unshakable and absolute assumption that he would make her his wife.

The coincidental arrivals of Viscount Weemswood, Mr. Underwood, and Lord Heatherton had meant a radical reshifting in the scheme of things, and to his benef
i
t. Those gentlemen had indeed served admirably to diffuse Fraulein Gutenberg’s single-minded fixation on himself.

He had been by turns irritated and amused by the problems created by the false engagement, but his greatest feeling had been one of gratitude that he had had Lady Caroline to see him through.

Now that the time had come to end the farce, he was strangely reluctant for his relationship with Lady Caroline to return to what it had been before. His consciousness had teased and wondered at it for several days, but up until this evening, when it became certain that there was an end in sight, he had been able to thrust it repeatedly out of his mind.

“Miles? What is it?” Lady Caroline regarded him with her brows raised in inquiry. A faint amusement lit her eyes and curved her lips.

“I discover myself at a crossroads, my lady, and I hope that you might help me to discern my way,” he said, guiding her to the settee.

Lady Caroline sat down, keeping her gaze on his face. “Oh, dear.
Not
another coil
.
Miles?”

The plaintive note in her voice raised a laugh from him. The earl looked at her, the amusement pronounced in his eyes. “Not precisely a coil, but certainly a dilemma of sorts.” He paused. “Caro, can you not guess what I wish to convey to you?”

Lady Caroline stared at him for several moments. Finally she said quietly, “Yes, I think that I can. But if I am wrong, I shall look all sorts of fool, so perhaps it would be best for you to tell me.”

Lord Trilby smiled. “I suppose that would be for the best,” he agreed. “There has been so much subterfuge and so many hidden meanings in our dealings these last few weeks that I, too, have had difficulty discerning what was true and what was not.”

He had expected to raise a laugh from Lady Caroline with his witticism, but she simply glanced away from him. There was that about her, in the manner in which she tilted her head and clasped her hands, that betrayed she was under the sway of an uncharacteristic tension.

She looked so vulnerable, yet so proud.

Unaccountably, Lord Trilby felt his easy address desert him.

“Dash it, Caro! You are so lovely it makes a man’s bones ache just to look at you,” he said harshly.

She looked at him then, true surprise lighting her eyes, “Why, Miles, you’ve never said such a thing about me before.”

“I believe that I feared to,” he said slowly, as by degrees that which had been teasing his consciousness for days came into focus and at last he began to comprehend certain things about himself.

“I do not understand,” Lady Caroline said. Her voice wobbled and she made an effort to pull herself together. It was just that he had so thoroughly blasted through her defenses. There was something in the earl’s eyes, something that almost frightened her. Her heart began to hammer in an oddly disquieting way and she could not seem to catch a proper breath.

“That does not surprise me, my dear, for I have hardly begun to do so myself.”

Lord Trilby got up from the settee, restlessly pacing between there and the mantel and back. He stopped to stare down at her, but she was not at all certain that he actually saw her. He appeared to be frowning into a middle distance.

“That Season when I saw you again, seemingly for the first time in my life, I thought I had never beheld a more beautiful girl. I tumbled head over heels without truly recognizing what it was that I felt. I do recall thinking that whenever you were not at a function, it all seemed rather flat.”

Lady Caroline’s hands had crept to her face, and she pressed against the sudden warmth in her cheeks. “It was a lovely Season,” she said, tears clouding her vision. She dropped her eyes, no longer able to meet his gaze.

There was a long moment of silence.

“Caro, do you recall a fellow by the name of Swallow?”

Lady Caroline was startled. The unexpected harshness of his lordship’s voice and the abrupt change in topic threw her into confusion. She understood, however, that the sweet reminiscence was done. Blinking away the foolish tears, she said, “No, I ... Oh, wait a moment. I seem to vaguely recall ... He was a friend of yours, was he not? For some reason, I seem to connect the name with some sort of sad tragedy.”

“Yes.” The earl gave a short laugh. “Swallow was a particular friend of mine at Cambridge, though he was two years my senior. After he left Cambridge and went up to London, I saw little of him, but we managed to keep in touch through a few scattered holidays and letters. In any event, at some point I began to realize that Swallow was unusually melancholy. When next I saw him
I taxed him over it, trying to discover the reason behind his odd bursts of emotion, but he insisted all was perfectly well.”

Lord Trilby paused, as though remembering again that time. “Months later I had a letter from Swallow in which he told me that he had at last gained the affections of the lady he had loved, quite passionately, for more than a year. Naturally, this satisf
i
ed my concern. I thought the rocky courtship was behind Swallow’s depression, and thereafter I forgot the matter.”

Lady Caroline had been sorting through her own memory as the earl spoke. “I do recall something now, I think. It happened near the end of the Season, as I remember. The young couple took flight for Gretna Green, but there was a ghastly accident of some sort that killed them both.”

“No accident occurred, my lady, but murderous violence,” Lord Trilby said harshly. He returned to the mantel, and now he was staring into the fire, his expression such that Lady Caroline could have sworn he saw something horrible in the flames.

She stared at the earl. She could not imagine what any of this ancient history had to do with her or with his lordship, but that it was of importance to him was patently obvious.

“Miles, how do you know that? What do you know that you have not yet told me?”

Lord Trilby glanced quickly at her. He sighed wearily. “On the eve of the scandal, I received a missive from Swallow. It was disjointed, incoherent almost, obviously written in the throes of powerful emotion. I gathered finally that his lady had spurned him, and as a result, all of his former love for her had turned to black hatred. Swallow said he meant to have his revenge, however, for he would abduct her that very night and carry her off to Gretna Green.”