Rushed to the Altar (21 page)

“Clarissa left home just over a week ago. She told her household that she was coming to stay with you and visit Francis. She’s been very anxious about him. I understand her letters to him have gone unanswered.” Danforth continued his steady rocking, his shrewd eyes fixed upon his host.

“I explained to my niece that her letters upset Francis. His tutor agreed with me that it would be best to withhold them from him initially until he had settled down.”
Clarissa was supposed to be here with him? So where was she now?

Danforth nodded slowly. “I would very much like to see Clarissa. She left in such a hurry and without a word to anyone but her own household. Her friends are somewhat concerned. It’s most unlike her to be thoughtless where her friends are concerned. She would know we would be worried.”

“I daresay she was only thinking of Francis,” Luke said, feeling his way with growing confidence. “She arrived in some agitation . . . indeed, she came very close to accusing me of ill-treating her brother and deliberately keeping her away from him.” His smile was benign. “Of course I understood the natural agitation of a recently bereaved daughter, and took no offense. She visited Francis and I gave permission for them both to accompany his tutor, with his family and Francis’s fellow pupils, to Bath on an educational visit. Roman history, I believe, is considered a most necessary part of a classical education.”

The lawyer scratched his head, then the tip of his nose. He could fault none of this, but unaccountably he was still uneasy. It went so against the grain for Clarissa to give no thought for the anxiety of her friends. She had been too well schooled in the courtesies for that. Even if she felt no affection for her father’s old friends, she would treat them with respect. And Master Danforth knew perfectly well the degree of affection in which Clarissa held both him and Doctor Alsop. They took the place of her beloved father, although the lawyer would be the first to acknowledge that they were inadequate substitutes.

The bond that had existed between father and daughter had been extraordinarily strong, more so than the one between Clarissa and her mother. Lady Lavinia had been too anxious that her daughter make the kind of marriage suitable for an earl’s granddaughter to spend
time on actually getting to know the girl. If she had, Danforth reflected, she would have given up trying to mold her daughter in her own image. Clarissa was, and always had been, very much her own person.

Maybe they had failed her by not taking her worry about her brother seriously, but surely she would have pressed them harder if she had really thought something was wrong. He looked around the parlor again, looked at his host, could see nothing amiss except the sense of a certain hand-to-mouth existence . . . the servant’s less-than-pristine livery, the meager accommodations on Ludgate Hill, the stale coffee.

“When do you expect them to return, Master Astley?”

Luke offered a vague wave of his fan. “I do not interfere in my ward’s education, Master Danforth.” There had been an unmistakable emphasis on
my ward,
clearly intended to remind the lawyer where the power lay. “Clarissa, also, is my ward, as you know.” He laughed, gave a little shrug. “But I would not consider it right to curtail the freedom my brother, her father, accorded her. I might disagree with its scope, but . . .” Another shrug. “She will be her own mistress in a little under ten months.”

“Quite so.” Danforth frowned at his feet. “Well, I must ask you to forgive me for disturbing you, sir. I hope you will trust the natural anxiety of your wards’ friends.” He allowed his own slight emphasis to weight the description. Master Astley must not be allowed to consider he had no observers.

“But of course.” Luke rose to his feet, prepared to escort his visitor to the door. “When Clarissa returns I will ensure she understands the unnecessary journey her lack of thought obliged you to make.”

“I beg you not to make too much of it.” Danforth waved the issue away as he was ushered rather swiftly to the front door. “I had other business in town anyway.”

The waiting servant had the door open as he reached it and he stepped out, bowing to his host with a politely doffed hat.

Luke bowed, stepped back, and the door closed. Only then did he allow himself a deep breath of relief. But it was only temporary. He’d managed to get rid of the troublesome lawyer, but where the hell was Clarissa? She hadn’t shown her face at his door, hadn’t written to him for weeks . . . in fact he couldn’t remember when he’d received her last letter. He’d simply consigned them to the fire instantly, the ones to him and the ones to her brother. He had a little under ten months to ensure he inherited the Astley fortune and estates. But if that wretched girl was snooping around somewhere . . .

How could she be? She knew nothing of London. She couldn’t take care of herself here, and obviously she hadn’t sought the help or protection of friends. So if she managed to make the journey alone without coming to grief, she was somewhere lost in the depths of the city. And if that was so, she’d be no trouble to him. She was probably lying in an alley with her throat cut, or worse.

Luke felt somewhat restored. He’d handled the lawyer
well, he thought. Clarissa was unlikely to be a problem. If somehow she managed to turn up on his doorstep he would deal with her then. She could disappear without a trace and everyone would assume an accident had befallen her in the lanes and alleys of this dangerous city. But to settle the last niggle of anxiety he yelled for the manservant as he reentered the parlor.

“Send a message to the livery stable at the top of the hill . . . fetch that stableman, Ed, down here. I need him to do something . . . oh, and tell Clara to make me breakfast . . . sirloin, bread, eggs.”

“Aye, sir.”

Luke kicked a fallen log back into the hearth.

He was at his breakfast half an hour later when the servant brought Ed into the dining room. “You wanted me, sir.”

“Yes, I did.” Luke buttered a slice of bread. “Help yourself to ale.” He gestured to the jug on the sideboard.

“Thankee, sir.” Ed filled a tankard and drank deep. He was a youngish man, with the shoulders and huge hands of a prizefighter. The muscles of his thighs swelled against the leather britches, and the buttons of his leather jerkin strained across the breadth of his chest.

“I want you to go back to the house in Wapping . . . check on the boy. Find out how he is. You told me he’d not last above a month. I need to know how long it’s going to be.”

The stableman nodded slowly. “If’n ’tis takin’ too long, sir, you could always send ’im up the chimbleys.”

Luke shook his head. He couldn’t do that; the risks were too high. Chimney sweeps died all the time, it was true, but it was always possible the death of a child would cause an inquiry if it happened in the house of some nosy do-gooder among the gentry, and the trail could lead back to him. It was unlikely but not worth the risk. Whereas a quiet death of infection and malnutrition could not be laid at his guardian’s door. He’d have the child in a closed coffin before anyone could question the cause of death. There’d be an elaborate family funeral, and it would all be over.

But where in hell was Clarissa? He couldn’t be totally easy until he knew. He took a draft of ale and said through a mouthful of sirloin, “Ask around, too. Find out if anyone unusual’s been seen . . . anyone’s been snooping. Understand?”

“Aye, sir. ’Tis clear enough.” Ed set down his tankard. “But I’ll be needin’ the fare. Costs a pretty penny to get to Wapping, even on the river. I’ll be needing a shilling.”

Luke grimaced. “A shilling, that’s daylight robbery.”

“ ’Tis what it costs.” Ed regarded him steadfastly until Luke fumbled in his pocket and finally laid a shilling on the table. He pocketed it with a brief nod. “I’ll be back later.”

“See that you are.” Luke dipped some bread into his egg yolk and waved an irritable dismissal.

Jasper escorted Clarissa to the door of 32 King Street after their visit to the milliner. “I will return for you at three o’clock, Clarissa. It’s the hour when fashionable London is walking and driving in the park. One must, after all, see and be seen at least once a day.”

A touch of scorn had entered his voice but when she gave him a curious glance he continued blandly, “So we’ll join the throng on a drive in Hyde Park, but we’ll not stop for conversation and introductions, however anxious people seem to be for them. The object of this exercise is to arouse curiosity and set the gossips’ tongues wagging.”

“Hence my new gown,” Clarissa murmured.

“Hence your new gown,” he agreed. “And it becomes you, my dear,” he added. “As I believe you are well aware.” An amused smile accompanied the comment and she couldn’t help an answering chuckle.

“It is a particularly fine gown. And I thank you, sir.”

“Oh, you’ll earn its price,” he said lightly. “I have no doubt about that.”

Clarissa contented herself with a raised eyebrow. “I applaud your confidence, my lord.”

He laughed, tilting her chin for a quick kiss as the steward stood waiting in the open door. “At three o’clock sharp. Mind.”

“I’ll be ready.” She hurried past the steward, giving him a quick smile of thanks as he closed the door behind her. She had reached her own chamber and was struggling with the laces of the new gown when someone
knocked at the door. She had no desire for visitors, and most particularly not Nan Griffiths, and went to open it with ready excuses on her tongue. Maddy and Emily stood on the threshold, a group of young women behind them.

“We have to know the story . . . oh, what a beautiful gown.” Maddy bubbled into the room and the rest came after her. “Mother Griffiths won’t tell us a thing, and she’s normally quite happy to discuss the girls’ good fortune.” She perched on the bed, swinging her slippered feet. “Come on, Clarissa, tell all. What’s he like, the earl? Is he good? Gentle . . . rough? What kinds of things does he want?”

Clarissa shook her head in momentary bewilderment. How was she to answer any of this? They were all exclaiming at her gown, feeling the material, discussing it as if it were on a dressmaker’s dummy instead of a living person.

“Yes, Clarissa, you can’t keep anything from the rest of us,” Emily chimed in. “What’s the earl like in bed?”

Clarissa took a deep breath. She had no idea how to invent a description that would satisfy these women who knew all there was to know about men and their proclivities. She said, “I don’t know, because it hasn’t happened yet.” An astounded silence fell over the group. They gazed at her in awe. “You . . . you refused him?” Maddy said eventually.

“No . . . not exactly. I asked him to wait a little . . . to . . . to court me.” It sounded so unlikely, even to her
ears, that she was not surprised when as one they burst into gales of laughter.

“Oh, give over, Clarissa,” Em exclaimed through her laughter. “Of course you didn’t. Tell the truth now.”

“I am,” she said calmly. “Would one of you help me with these laces?”

A rather mousy-looking girl stepped forward at once and swiftly unlaced her gown. Clarissa stepped out of it and shook out the folds. “It is pretty, isn’t it?” she said with a mischievous smile.

“Far too pretty for a gift from an unrewarded lover,” one of the other women declared. “We don’t play games here, girl. You’re new and we make allowances, but there are rules, and one of them is we share what we know about clients. It gives us all a degree of protection. The more you know about a man, the better able you are to deal with him and the whole tribe of ’em. So, tell us the truth.”

Clarissa wondered if there was a hint of menace in the demand. The woman was something of an Amazon, a rather brawny, freckle-faced woman with big hands. Before responding she put on her own chamber robe, taking her time as if completely unthreatened by her audience. “As it happens, this is the truth. I decided I would fix the interest of the earl more securely if I made him wait. If I played the game of a little now, a little later, but always the promise of everything in the end.”

“And he agreed?” There was a universal wide-eyed gaze of astonishment.

“Apparently,” Clarissa said calmly.

“Probably he can’t get it up anymore,” the Amazon hazarded. “No red-blooded male would contract with Mother Griffiths for a girl’s services and then not use them. He must be trying to hide the fact that his sword’s lost its steel by pretending to have a mistress.”

Clarissa wondered how Jasper would react if he could hear this matter-of-fact discussion of his manhood. She felt rather as if she had betrayed him in some way, which was absurd.

“I don’t have that impression,” she said. “He seems red-blooded enough to me. I think he enjoys the game . . . the suspense of it. I’m going driving with him later this afternoon.”

“Well, if you really are keeping him dangling, you’d better not push him too far,” the Amazon said. “Things could become nasty . . . take a rough turn. We’ve all been there.”

“I’m on my guard,” Clarissa said. “But I thank you for the advice. It’s well heeded, I promise.” It seemed to placate the woman and she gave a short nod of acknowledgment.

“Does Mother Griffiths know the game you’re playing?” Maddy asked.