Smuggler's Lady (23 page)

When he released her, she reverted to her earlier anxieties. “How am I to remain here all day without everyone at Pendennis sounding the alarm? And how is Nan here? In London I may do as I please, I will be known to no one, but can you begin to imagine what my presence in your house—?”

“Yes, I can,” he interrupted. “And I should be glad if you would give me credit for some ingenuity. You are not the only one with a fertile imagination and a certain talent for developing and implementing strategies.”

Rebuked, Merrie kept silent, rearranging herself against the pillows and fixing meekly trusting eyes on his face. “Wretch!” His lips quivered. “You are not at all penitent.”

“I am trying,” she protested. “Only do tell me.”

Damian sighed. “It was not difficult for Walter to gain entrance to Pendennis by way of the secret passage or to locate your chamber by the light burning. You had told me that Nan waited up for you.” Meredith nodded. “Nan deemed it sensible and necessary to take Seecombe into her, or rather your, confidence.” Damian saw the flicker of uncertainty cross her expression and went on calmly. “I gather that Seecombe was not greatly surprised.”

“No, perhaps not,” Merrie agreed. “But I could wish it had not been necessary.”

“Consider who made it necessary.” The reminder was gentle but nonetheless uncomfortable. Satisfied that the point had been well taken, Rutherford continued. “Seecombe will have told the boys that you are not feeling at all the thing and wish to keep to your room, undisturbed for today. Nan will attend you.”

“But I never take to my bed,” Merrie objected. “The boys will never believe it.”

“And why not?” he inquired. “They have no reason to doubt Seecombe's word. You will open your chamber door to them tomorrow, and, since you will be obliged to remain abed for several more days, they will accept your unusual indisposition as fact.”

Merrie sucked the tip of her thumb, examining the plan from every angle. It was simple but it would certainly work. Rob might be alarmed and puzzled, but he would not attempt to defy the interdiction, and if it were only for today . . . “How do I return to the house? ”

“I shall convey you and Nan home once your household, except for Seecombe, is asleep. Seecombe will open the side door.”

The plan worked like a charm. Meredith, dressed in her own gown and cloak, was carried by Lord Rutherford to the ancient barouche that had once belonged to Cousin Matthew. Nan accepted Walter's assistance in taking her place beside Meredith. Damian drove the carriage down the deserted lanes, trying not to think of the possible reaction of his Four Horse Club cronies, could they see him with a dozy cart horse in hand. Seecombe was waiting for them, and the door opened to the crunch of hooves on gravel. Rutherford scooped Merrie off the seat, carried her into the house and up to her chamber, his booted feet making hardly a sound on the oak floors.

“I shall not see you for several days.” He laid her on the bed, smiling softly. “It would look most singular were I to visit your sickbed, and you may not leave it until Nan considers it wise.” Glancing over his shoulder, he received a short, affirmative nod of the gray head.

“You cannot know to what you condemn me,” Meredith murmured in mock horror. “I shall be a wreck after just a few hours' imprisonment at the hands of such a jailer.”

“She stands in my stead.” He pinched the freckled nose. “Only remember that you will answer to me.”

“I tremble at the thought, my lord.”

“You could well have cause.”

Merrie reached for him, ignoring Nan's presence as she pulled him down with a fierce hunger that expressed both her gratitude for what he had done in the last twenty-four hours and the aching promise of what was to come. Damian, guessing at this turmoil, controlled the passion of his own response even as he held her, thankful that she was now safe, that he had until Christmas, a veritable age in which to rid her of an obstinate pride, to draw from her, once and for all, the acknowledgment of the truth.

“Sleep now, my love,” he whispered against her mouth. “You must regain your strength for we have much to look forward to, and you will need your wits about you when you make your plans.”

“I have made them already.” She swallowed an involuntary yawn, saying wistfully, “I wish we could sleep as we did last night.”

“When next we do so, love, you will not be hampered by the exhaustion of the hunted or a wounded thigh.” He kissed her in brisk farewell, deciding that the moment for loving murmurs and tender kisses was past. Meredith needed sleep and it were incumbent upon him to make his departure with due speed and stealth.

“You will send for me, Nan, should your patient prove recalcitrant,” he teased, hand on the doorknob. Nan's derisory sniff dismissed such a possibility out of hand. He blew Merrie a kiss and closed the door softly behind him.

 

 

“There is really nothing to fret about, loves.” Merrie looked at the three anxious faces crowding around her bedside. “I shall be up and about again before you know it.”

“But you are never ill,” Rob said. “When you would not let us visit you, yesterday, I though perhaps you were dying!”

“Well, as you can see, I am not,” she reassured him briskly. “Yesterday, I was tired and I wished to sleep. Today, I shall be very happy if you will bear me company.”

“Lord Rutherford came to call yesterday afternoon,” Theo informed her, helping himself to a plum from the bowl of fruit that the brothers had picked for the invalid. “He was very sorry to hear you were indisposed.”

“That was indeed kind of him,” Merrie replied. Presumably he had made the visit while she was sleeping. It was a clever although surely unnecessary precaution. No one could have suspected her true whereabouts. Then it occurred to her that he had probably been satisfying himself as to the well-being of the boys in her absence, checking to be sure that Seecombe's story was holding together. That would be very like him.

“Here he is now,” Rob said, running to the open window at the sound of hooves on the driveway. “Good morning, sir!” he called down excitedly.

“Merrie is really feeling much more the thing today, but she says she cannot get up yet.”

Damian, remaining astride Saracen, responded suitably to this information. “Would you tell your sister that I must ride into Fowey, and ask her if she has any commissions she would like me to execute?”

“His lordship wants to know if—”

“Yes, Rob, I heard,” Merrie broke into this faithful repetition. “The only business I have in Fowey is with you and Theo and Sam Helford. You must go for your fittings this week, or the suits will not be ready before you return to school. But I do not think I can ask Lord Rutherford to discharge such a business.”

“Oh, fustian!” Rob declared and, before she could prevent him, was hanging out of the window again, explaining to Rutherford how Merrie would like him to take himself and Theo to the tailor for their fitting.

“Rob, I said no such thing!” Merrie called, wishing she could get out of bed and to the window without revealing that there was something the matter with her leg. “Lord Rutherford, pray disregard his nonsense. Of course I would not ask such a thing.”

Damian was shaking with laughter, imagining correctly Merrie's frustration at this telegraph system. “Do not concern yourself, ma'am. I shall be pleased to take them. Only tell me if there is anything further. Do they perhaps need boots, stockings?”

“No,” Merrie choked. “I am most sensible of your kindness, sir, but I cannot possibly allow you to undertake such an errand.”

“Now, you are making a great piece of work out of a trivial matter,” he called, still laughing. “You must not exacerbate your nerves, you know, if you are already unwell. Rob, tell your brother to get ready. I will wait here for you both. No more than ten minutes, mind.”

The boys vanished, exhibiting much more enthusiasm for the excursion in Rutherford's company than they would have with their sister as escort.

“Hugo,” Merrie addressed her remaining brother. “Would you send a message to the stables for the boys' horses. I do not wish them to keep his lordship waiting, and they must change their clothes.”

Hugo went willingly enough. With a sigh of relief, she swung herself gingerly to the floor, hobbling over to the window seat. Both horse and rider were a magnificent sight, both well-groomed and gleaming in the sunlight, both powerful, muscular creatures who seemed to communicate with each other in their stillness. “My lord?”

He looked up instantly, his eyes warming at the sight of her face framed in the loose auburn mass, looking so much younger and more vulnerable than usual. “What do you do out of bed?” he demanded with feigned severity.

“It is quite all right. There is no one here,” she assured him. “You cannot wish to do this.”

He shook his head in exasperation. “I have said that I am more than happy with the arrangement.”

“But Rob is always quite impossible and fidgets so,” Merrie insisted. “It is such a long and tedious business.”

“He'll not fidget with me.” Damian chuckled and lowered his voice. “Be a good girl and get back into bed. I find the sight of you so far out of my reach most tantalizing.”

That made her laugh. She blew him a kiss before maneuvering herself back between the sheets.

The next week Merrie found most tedious. She was obliged to keep to her bed until she could walk almost freely but even then found her movements severely restricted and was reduced to lying on a sofa in the parlor, playing cat's cradle or solitaire when one or other of her brothers was not available to entertain her. One unlooked-for but most satisfying consequence of her forced inactivity was that Hugo took over all aspects of estate business that required her presence outside the house.

“He shows some considerable talent when it comes to dealing with the tenants,” Meredith remarked to Lord Rutherford one afternoon, moving her knight to fork his bishop and rook.

“Then you should perhaps ensure that he has the opportunity to exercise it on a regular basis.” Resigned to losing the bishop, Rutherford retreated his rook. “You play a devilish game of chess, Merrie. As good as your play with the cards.”

“My late husband expected to be well partnered,” she informed him, serenely removing his bishop from the board. “You think, then, that I should employ Hugo on the estate during the holidays?”

“Most certainly. The lad needs to feel useful. You are so damnably competent, he has little opportunity to prove himself.”

“If he proves himself, then mayhap he will not feel the need for self-sacrifice.” Meredith sat back, shifting her leg on the footstool and frowned. “I begin to rely on your wisdom, Damian. I am sure I do not know how I shall go on when you are no longer here to offer it.”

Damian looked at her sharply but could read no hidden meaning in either voice or expression. She behaved as if the impossibility of their marriage was now an agreed and accepted fact between them. It was fortunate he was prepared for the inevitable fireworks when she realized her mistake.

“How will you explain your absence for three months? Have you given the matter any thought?”

“But of course.” She smiled. “Check, my lord.”

He examined his options on the board with a rueful grimace. “And mate in two. There seems little I can do to avoid it.” A long, elegant finger toppled the black king and he held out his hand. “So, how will you explain it?”

She left her hand in his for a moment. These casually acceptable contacts were all they had these days, Merrie not being in a fit condition to scramble through secret passages. “I have received a letter from a distant cousin in Kensington inviting me to go to her for a visit. Maybe she will find me a respectable husband.”

Damian shuddered. “Kensington! Must it be Kensington?”

“But is that area not perfectly respectable?” Her eyebrows lifted in surprise.

“Genteel,” he pronounced with a disdainful curl of the lip.

“I have no greater pretensions, sir!” Her eyes flashed.

“I do beg your pardon.” Rutherford made haste to apologize. “If it must be Kensington, then so be it.”

She looked at him suspiciously. There appeared nothing in the bland expression to justify suspicion. “I will need to furnish the boys with an address so that they may write to me. And Farquarson, also.”

Damian frowned. Somehow he had overlooked that complication. “I leave for London in two days. I will make the necessary arrangements and send you the requisite information before you leave. You will travel by hired post chaise until Okehampton where my own chaise and postilions will meet you. At that point, my love, our contract becomes binding.” His eyes held hers. A shiver, part apprehension, part anticipation, ran down Merrie's spine, seeming to stroke each vertebra to sensitivity.

“I will be ready to leave by the third week of September,” she said slowly. “It will take little more than a day to reach Okehampton.”

“My people will be waiting for you.”

“And you?”

“In London,” he promised. “Straining at the leash.”

“It will be an adventure of another kind.” Merrie smiled. “I am most eager also.”

“You will not be disappointed,” he vowed. Surprised and furious most probably; disappointed, never!

“How could you imagine that I would not help you, Damian?” The Marchioness of Beaumont clasped her hands dramatically and gazed at her brother, making the most of a particularly fine pair of deep-gray eyes.

“I did not imagine any such thing, Bella,” Rutherford demurred, regarding his twin with some amusement. “There is no need for you to look at me in that fashion, m'dear. I am not one of your
cicisbeos
to be charmed into performing some tiresome favor, nor am I poor George to be teased for some indulgence.”

“George is never here to tease,” Arabella said with a pout. “Most of the time, I think he is quite oblivious to the fact that he has a wife.”

“Now there you are quite out.” Rutherford rose from the scroll-ended couch and went over to one of the tall windows giving on to Cavendish Square. “Beaumont is well aware of his wife. But he is more interested in politics than in society. Many a wife faces worse competition.”

“You are so unsympathetic,” Bella grumbled. “You have not a drop of romance in your soul. I am to be glad my husband spends his days giving speeches in the Lords and his nights writing those speeches rather than setting up mistresses and gambling away his fortune—”

“Exactly so,” her brother concurred, turning back from the window. “Pragmatic and unromantic it may be, Bella, but it is the plain truth, nevertheless.”

Arabella was silent for a moment, plaiting the fringe of her silk shawl. “Well, I cannot think, Rutherford, that your sole intention in calling upon me was to give me one of your odious lectures,” she said eventually. “Did you not mention something about a favor?”

Smiling, he crossed the Axminster carpet to take her hands. “Yes, indeed I did. And I did not mean to lecture you. As it happens, the favor I am going to ask may well benefit you, also. You are in sore need of occupation, I think, Bella.”

“Occupation! Whatever can you mean? Why I dare swear I have not a moment to myself. If it is not a ridotto or a card party or an excursion to the Botanical Gardens or a balloon ascension, then there is—”

“Just so, Bella,” Rutherford interrupted. “And you are as bored of the round as I am myself.”

Under the relentless gaze, Bella shook her head in candid resignation. “Yes, you are right. But I cannot disappear to Cornwall in search of diversions.” She cast a shrewd look at her twin's countenance. “Unless I much mistake, brother, you have found some diversion in the wilderness.”

“It is that obvious?”

“According to Mama, you are a changed man. Or, at least,” Bella qualified, “you are changed back to what you were before your wound.”

Rutherford nodded, a little smile playing over his lips. “The answer, I was told, is to find a purpose, a reason for existing. It is something at which my informant is amazingly adept. I learned the lesson well.”

“This—uh—person,” Bella inquired, moving to the fireplace to pull the tasseled bell cord, “is a lady?”

“Sometimes,” her brother replied. “When it suits her.”

The appearance of a footman to draw the blue and crimson curtains and light the lamps against the gathering dusk put a period to the conversation. Lady Beaumont waited impatiently, intrigued by her brother's wordplay. He had, indeed, returned from Cornwall a different man as the Duchess of Keighley had pronounced with such satisfaction. He had still as little enthusiasm for the Season's squeezes as ever but considerably greater patience than previously. His old friends, who had stood by him when irascible and depressed, now welcomed with relief the return of one who was again willing to participate in the Corinthian pursuits even if he avoided social events. Cribb's parlor knew him again; White's and Watier's and the Four Horse also welcomed the prodigal who smiled and joked with the ease of earlier days and proved that he had lost none of his former skills.

The footman left at last and Lady Beaumont was able to give vent to her curiosity. “Whatever can you mean, Damian? A lady when it suits her.”

“Exactly that, my dear.” Rutherford poured himself a glass of claret from the decanter on the satinwood sofa table. “Merrie Trelawney, Lady Blake, Lady Merrie is a woman of many parts.” He grinned at his sister's bemused expression. “Most of the time she is not at all respectable even when she pretends to be.”

“Damian, whatever will Mama say?” Bella breathed, needing no further statement from her twin to underline the look in his eye. Rutherford was clearly head over heels in love. “And to think I said you had not a drop of romance in your soul.” She sank down upon one of the gilt-and-crimson couches, arranging herself artistically. “Perhaps you will pour me a glass of sherry. I suspect I may have need of some fortification.”

Her brother obliged. “To answer your question, Bella, Mama will know only what I decide is fit for her ears. You, on the other hand, will know everything since I must enlist your aid. You will, however, not breathe a word of what passes between us—not even to George, you understand?” The laughter had died out of his eyes and he looked both stern and forbidding.

“Have I ever betrayed you?” she exclaimed indignantly. “Not even when you threw me into the fish pond.”

He laughed and sat opposite her in a deep chair with earpieces, crossing one top-booted leg over the other. “Then listen to my tale, sister, and my plan and tell me if I may count upon you.”

Arabella listened intently, only her wide eyes betraying her amazement. Rutherford had decided that he must take his sister absolutely into his confidence if his plan was to work. Merrie must have neither the need nor the opportunity to concoct some play when she was with Arabella.

“It is quite scandalous,” Lady Beaumont pronounced in remarkably matter-of-fact accents. “A carte blanche, you say? And
she
suggested it.”

“As an alternative to marriage,” he concurred calmly. “My Merrie is a most obstinate creature.”

Arabella's eyes began to dance. “But you do not accept her objections?”

“Absolutely not. Will you help me?”

“Of course.” His sister put down her sherry glass, rising gracefully. “It will be monstrous amusing, and, if it will make you happy—”

“It will,” he corroborated quietly. “Unimaginably happy.”

“Is she a beauty?” Bella asked curiously.

Damian frowned, considering this. “No,” he said slowly. “Not a beauty, but with the right wardrobe and some time spent with your hairdresser she will cause quite a stir, I fancy.”

“And if she is not willing?”

He laughed. “She will not be, make no mistake, Bella. But we have an agreement which she will honor, and I think that, once Merrie has accepted the necessity, she will take much pleasure in the adventure.”

“And—uh—” Belle hesitated, then took the plunge. “The carte blanche. Will it be a part of this arrangement?”

“But of course,” he replied levelly. “If it were not, then Meredith would consider there to be no contract. She is also quite unable to fund herself in such an enterprise, so I must oblige her to accept my purse.”

Arabella paced the long saloon, the embroidered flounce of her gown of jaconet muslin swinging against yellow kid Roman boots. “You know, brother, if Lady Blake is as proud and independent as you maintain, I foresee some obstacles to this plan. I am delighted to attempt it, but, if she should really dislike it and be unhappy—”

“You may safely leave that to me, Bella. I will not permit Merrie's unhappiness. Just play your part. That is all I ask.”

“Most willingly, Damian. I can hardly wait to meet her.”

 

 

Meredith stood in the cobbled yard of the Bell at Okehampton surveying the well-sprung coach bearing Lord Rutherford's arms emblazoned on the panels. It had been here when she had arrived the preceding evening exactly in accordance with Damian's promise.

Now, it was early on the morning of September twenty-fifth, and she had spent a restless night in one of the Bell's best bedchambers. The departure from Landreth had gone so smoothly that she had been deprived of any anxieties to take her mind off the unknown into which she was so blithely leaping. Her neighbors had congratulated her on her good fortune. Hardly a malicious remark had come her way although Patience in particular had been full of good advice and many warnings as to the perils in London waiting to trap the innocent and unwary. Patience, who had once spent three days in the capital when she was eighteen, considered herself something of an expert. Meredith had received advice, good wishes, and warnings with her customary humble gratitude. Stuart Farquarson had exhibited no concern about being required to act for her in all matters concerning the estate, lawyer Donne had sufficient funds for all emergencies, and Seecombe was perfectly happy to hold the reins of the household in his more-than-capable hands.

Nan, of course, accompanied Meredith, as did a trunk containing several new gowns and a riding habit that Nan, an expert seamstress, had produced with some satisfaction. Merrie, herself, was well pleased with the results. They were not of the first style of elegance, certainly, but for genteel Kensington would be surely more than appropriate.

That thought drew her eyebrows together in a perplexed frown. Damian had sent her a poste restante address for her mail, but he had not furnished her with her exact destination. It seemed a strange oversight, but presumably the address was known to the coachman, postilions, and outriders, who were gathering around the coach in preparation for an imminent departure.

Remembering that she had not yet paid her reckoning, Merrie turned back to the inn in search of the landlord. With many bows and smiles, he informed her that the coachman had taken care of everything. That was the way it would be from now on, of course. Damian had said that once she met up with his people at Okehampton their contract would become binding. What was she getting herself into? It was one thing to have Lord Rutherford as a lover on her own territory, quite another to go into his world where she had already agreed to relinquish all control. Oh, it was ridiculous to feel this panicky fluttering of apprehension! If she could trust anyone, she could trust Rutherford. He had saved her life, had taught her the inexpressible delight of bodies joined in love; for the moment, he loved her. And for the last three weeks, she had been lonelier than ever before.

With renewed determination, Meredith walked to the coach where a postilion handed her into the luxurious, leather-squabbed interior. Nan settled herself on the seat opposite, expressing her satisfaction in this improved mode of travel with pursed lips and a short nod. She was grimly resigned to this mad excursion into foreign parts where she was convinced evil awaited around every corner. Merrie's tentative suggestion that she might prefer to remain in Cornwall had resulted in a tirade worse than any Merrie had experienced since she was discovered on the back of her father's hunter at the age of ten. So now, the lesson well learned, Meredith began to chat cheerfully as the coach passed through increasingly unfamiliar territory.

They crossed Dartmoor that day, passed through Exeter, and spent the night at Honiton. From then on, as they left Devon and came into Somerset, everything familiar vanished. Merrie was conscious first of the absence of the sea. She had lived all her life on the narrow peninsula that was Cornwall, where nowhere was far from the water. Now, she found herself fighting an uneasy, bereft feeling as she saw all around her only pretty country villages, peaceful lanes, orchards, neat enclosed fields, and thatched-roof cottages. It seemed tame beside the wild magnificence of her native land, and the people, rosy-cheeked and smiling, seemed overly friendly and ingratiating. Cornishmen only gave their smiles and friendship where they considered it deserved and Merrie could not help suspecting hypocrisy in this easy warmth and acceptance.

By the fifth day, however, she had become accustomed to it just as she had become accustomed to the civil attention accorded the passengers in Lord Rutherford's coach. There was always a private parlor, always the best bedchamber, and dinner was uniformly excellent. These things appeared miraculously without her once having to give an order just as the teams harnessed to the coach at the frequent changing posts appeared miraculously and were always prime animals.

They reached the outskirts of London by early afternoon of the seventh day. By this time, Merrie was heartily sick of the carriage, and, judging by her companion's steadfast silence, Nan also would be glad to be rid of enforced idleness. It was dusk when they reached the city itself. Merrie's heart beat faster at the thought of what awaited her. Surely Damian would be there to welcome her in whatever accommodation he had hired. Would it be a house? Or perhaps, since it was just Nan and herself, he would consider two or three rooms to be sufficient with a landlady to take care of the cooking and housekeeping.

They were passing through wide, elegant streets lined with tall, gracious houses, their long windows already lamplit. Once or twice, Merrie glimpsed an open front door as some supremely elegant creature passed through, bowed inside by liveried footmen. Light town carriages, preceded by link boys carrying torches, frequently passed the heavier vehicle conveying Merrie and Nan. They turned into a quiet square formed by large, imposing houses. A pretty, iron-railed garden stood in the center. The carriage drew up before the sweep of white-honed steps leading to an enormous oak door, yellow light showing through the fanlight above. The door opened on the instant before the postilion, hand raised to grasp the gleaming brass knocker, could reach the top step. A large, black-suited figure stood outlined in the doorway, then another in blue livery came down the steps, opened the carriage door, and pulled down the footstep.