The Bargain (18 page)

“And as for stealing—when your only other choice is to starve, the morality becomes a bit less clear-cut.”

“There are almshouses, charity schools,” he objected.

“Which aid a tiny part of those in need,” Flora countered.

“Dash it, I've seen these children you talk about running in packs like wild animals. They rip the purses out of old women's hands and beat them senseless into the bargain,” he said hotly.

The fire in Flora's eyes faded to sadness. After a moment, she nodded. “Yes, some of them do that.”

“So they aren't such little angels,” Lord Robert concluded with satisfaction.

“I never said they were. They are human beings, Lord Robert. And they deserve to be treated accordingly.”

“You do remember us.” He seemed rather pleased at the notion.

“Yes,” she admitted.

“We ain't so useless, you know,” he added. “Randolph is a preacher up north. James is captain of a navy ship. Nathaniel's always going on about building a new set of cottages for the tenants at Langford. Alan…” He paused for a moment, perplexed. “Unlocking the secrets of science, and, er, that sort of thing,” he finished, gesturing at his brother.

Lord Alan raised one brow at this tribute.

“And you?” she asked.

“Eh? Oh, well…”

Flora Jennings waited a moment, then turned back to Ariel. Lord Robert eyed her back with startled indignation.

“You must have known Bess Harding rather well,” commented Lord Alan.

Ariel threw him a glance. She had been about to say exactly the same thing.

“We worked together here,” answered Flora Jennings cautiously.

Ariel leaned forward. “I want to know why my mother died,” she said. “Is there anything that you noticed, or that she told you, that might help me?”

The other woman frowned. She didn't answer at once but appeared to give the question serious consideration. “We talked mainly of the work here,” she said slowly. “She didn't tell me of the rest of her life.” She paused. “She would get very, very angry at the plight of some of the children we took in. She could be almost… not frightening… but intimidating at times.”

Ariel nodded in understanding.

“She would pace back and forth in this room and call down vengeance on the people who hurt or exploited the children.” Their hostess smiled slightly. “It was terribly dramatic. I remember one little girl told me Bess was as good as a play.”

Meeting her gaze, Ariel smiled back. It all sounded so much like her mother.

“And then at other times, she would fall into the dismals and insist that nothing would ever change, that our efforts were futile.” Flora folded her hands rather tightly together. “That was far worse.”

“Had she been despondent recently?” asked Lord Alan.

Miss Jennings looked at him. She seemed a bit puzzled by this caller, not entirely sure what to think of him. “Bess was always… volatile,” she replied. “One thing one moment, and something else the next. I didn't notice anything particular. If I had, you may be sure I would have…” She stopped and clenched her jaw for a moment. “I would have done something,” she finished finally. “I would not have sat back and allowed her to…”

The room was silent.

“I'm sorry,” added their hostess after a time. “I would like to help you. But I don't know any more.”

Ariel nodded. It was the same story she heard from everyone. “I would like to be of help in your work as well,” Ariel replied.

“You won't recall the loan then?” was the relieved reply. “I was afraid you might have to.”

Ariel shook her head.

“What backing do you have?” asked Lord Alan.

Both women turned to look at him.

“Support from those who could raise money or use influence in your favor,” he explained.

Flora Jennings grimaced. “I don't have the time, or the stomach, to fawn and beg help from people who don't care,” she declared.

“There are others in the world who care,” he answered quietly.

Their hostess started to answer, then flushed slightly and said nothing.

“My mother would be most interested in what you are doing,” he added.

“The duchess?” was the startled reply.

“She spends half her time on schemes for educating girls with no money,” Lord Robert informed her with a mixture of triumph and defiance.

Surprised by his vehemence, Ariel looked at him and encountered a smoldering glance.

“She does?”

“I'll mention your efforts to her,” offered Lord Alan.

Miss Jennings looked torn between gratification and reluctance.

“Or perhaps you don't want any help,” sneered Lord Robert. “That would prove you were wrong about us.”

Their hostess glared at him. “Not about you,” she snapped.

This was really rather interesting, thought Ariel. They both looked hot-eyed and resentful and very self-conscious. There were things going on under the surface in this room.

“We should be going,” said Lord Alan.

Ariel wanted to protest, but she couldn't think of a good reason. “I'm sure we will see each other again soon,” she said as she rose.

“I hope so,” replied Flora Jennings much more warmly. When she escorted them to the door, she didn't look at Lord Robert even once, Ariel noted. He, on the other hand, threw her a number of defiant glances.

“She has a nerve,” he burst out when they were seated in their cab once more. “She as much as called me a brainless ass!”

“A perceptive woman,” commented Lord Alan.

Ariel threw him a repressive glance. “I believe she was speaking in general terms,” she soothed.

“Do you? You didn't see the way she looked at me when she said it, then. When I think that a chit of”—he paused to calculate, ending up counting on his fingers—“no more than two and twenty would dare to speak to me in that way. It's beyond anything!”

“She is very committed to her cause.”

“Committed!” He snorted. “Fanatical is more like it. And she seems to think nobody else knows anything. I've half a mind to show her that she's mightily mistaken on that score.”

“Do you?” wondered Ariel. She was fascinated by the effect this woman had had on the usually blasé Lord Robert.

“Yes, I do,” he declared. He straightened in the seat. “In fact, I shall.”

“How?” asked his brother.

This stopped him. “Er… I don't know, but I shall think of a way.”

“Go and see Aunt Agatha,” Lord Alan suggested jokingly.

“Eh?” He pulled back as if he had threatened him with a weapon.

“Start with first causes,” was the reply. “She has all the background.”

It wasn't a bad idea at all, thought Ariel. She might have thought of it herself, in another moment.

“I wouldn't go near her for any money,” said Lord Robert. “She's dashed terrifying.” He frowned. “Anyway, what good would it do?”

“She would know Miss Jennings's reasons for doing what she is doing, the basis of her character, how one might, er, impress her,” replied Ariel.

Lord Alan threw her a sidelong glance, then turned back to his brother. He was watching him as if he were an interesting specimen in his laboratory, Ariel noticed. “Of course, older relatives can be difficult,” she added, blithely ignoring her complete lack of experience in this area.

“Difficult!” Lord Robert snorted at the inadequacy of the word.

“I suppose Miss Jennings knows you won't have the, er, inclination to look into the matter deeply,” she added.

“You're saying she won't believe I have the courage to visit Aunt Agatha?”

Ariel wasn't sure how he had drawn this conclusion from her remarks, but she didn't contradict him.

His jaw hardened. “Well, she'll find she's mistaken there.” He faltered slightly. “You wouldn't want to come along, would you?”

Ariel was just nodding when Lord Alan put in, “I would.”

Both Ariel and his brother turned to stare at him. He met their gazes blandly.

Lord Robert let out a breath. “She'll see she was mistaken in me,” he declared, though with a slight catch in his voice.

During the remainder of the drive back to Ariel's house, Alan left the conversation to the others, fully absorbed in his own thoughts. It had been an extremely odd call, he thought. And the oddness had nothing to do with the neighborhood or the unusual household they found there. Why had he suggested that Robert visit Aunt Agatha, he wondered, or offered to bring together Flora Jennings and his mother, for that matter?

For years, Alan had kept to himself, remaining carefully free of the day-to-day entanglements of family life. He had needed to be unencumbered for his work, he thought. He had no time for trivialities. So why then had he put his oar in with Robert? He didn't really care, did he, whether Robert visited their crusty relative or managed to impress the eccentric Miss Jennings?

And yet, even as he assured himself of this, a spark of curiosity and amusement resurfaced. There was something irresistible about the situation. He had seen that in Ariel's sharp glances from Robert to Miss Jennings and back again, in her obvious fascination with their reactions. Ariel's presence changed something.

She was so interested, he thought. She appeared to think these small daily things were important—not trivial at all. She absorbed them with such zest and animation that he was forced to take another look, to reevaluate his long-held stance. Had he missed something? he wondered now.

He glanced at his brother, chatting amiably with Ariel about a horse he was thinking of buying, and shook his head. It seemed unlikely. And yet…

When they returned to Ariel's house, they found Sebastian waiting there, resplendent in uniform, his auburn whiskers gleaming. “There you are,” he said when they came in, surging forward before they were even through the door. “I must have more questions. I've run out.”

His eyes looked a bit wild, Alan thought, as they did when he was in some sort of scrape and needed to be helped out of it. He was only too familiar with the expression. “What sort of questions?” he replied, assuming that his brother spoke to him.

“For Georgina,” answered Sebastian distractedly. “There's a ball tonight,” he added, “and I've run out.”

“Who is Georgina?” wondered Alan. “And why must she be questioned?”

“Lady Georgina Stane,” said Sebastian, as if it were an explanation. “You have to help me.”

“Before I can do so, you must tell me—”

“We agreed that you would begin to think of your own questions,” Ariel said.

Alan turned to her in surprise.

“I know,” replied Sebastian, running one hand through his hair. “But it's dashed difficult. And when she's talking, I forget that I'm supposed to be thinking of new ones. I just want to go on listening to her forever.”

“You
have
been listening then?” inquired Ariel rather severely.

Alan looked from her to Sebastian, mystified.

Sebastian nodded. “She's got some dashed interesting ideas. You know, she said that those idiots smashing power looms in the Midlands are just terrified they're losing their livelihoods. She thinks they ought to be trained to use the new looms and promised work doing it.”

“What do you know about the weavers' riots?” Alan asked in astonishment.

“Didn't know anything until a few days ago,” Sebastian admitted. “But Lady Georgina did.” He took a breath. “She and my mother are going to get along like a house afire,” he told Ariel.

“I will give you one more list of questions,” Ariel conceded. “After that, you have to find your own.”

He nodded eagerly. “Could I have them now?” he asked. “I'd like to get in a good—”

“What the deuce are you talking about?” interrupted Alan, beginning to be annoyed by this incomprehensible conversation, and by the apparent understanding that had been established between Ariel and Sebastian without his knowledge.

Sebastian gazed at him, but he didn't seem to really see him. “Questions,” he said, then turned to look hopefully at Ariel.

“I'll write some out for you,” she responded.

“I don't understand,” commented Lord Robert.

Alan nodded agreement. Someone, at least, was talking rationally, he thought.

“How are a lot of questions going to get Lady Georgina to marry Sebastian?” Lord Robert grimaced. “If he really wants her to,” he added.

“Is this the girl you were talking about at the Coningsby ball?” put in Alan, memory returning. “Are you really serious about marrying, Sebastian?”

“I explained it all to you,” Ariel pointed out to Lord Robert.

“I know you did, but it didn't make any sense.”

“What do questions have to do with it?” wondered Alan.

“Why don't you just go and write a note to your Aunt Agatha?” Ariel suggested kindly to Lord Robert. “You could set an appointment to call on her tomorrow afternoon.”

He went pale. “Too soon,” he replied in a strangled voice.

“Aunt Agatha?” echoed Sebastian. “You don't mean that dragon of a female who used to visit Langford House years ago? About seven feet tall, with six or seven rows of teeth?”

Looking grim, Robert nodded.

“Haven't seen her in years.” Sebastian shuddered slightly. “Do you remember the time she caught us on her window ledge? She has a voice like a steam whistle. I thought she was going to throw us off. And we weren't even going to
her
room.”

Robert was looking even paler. “I'm sure she will be very different now,” remarked Ariel sweetly. “That was a long time ago.”

Alan was suffering an odd dizzying sensation. It was rather like being trapped in a coach with a runaway team and no driver, he thought. Events seemed to be speeding past far too rapidly. “Will someone kindly tell me what is going on?” he said.

Three pairs of eyes turned to look at him, and then three voices spoke at once.

“Complicated,” said Robert.

“It's all very simple,” said Ariel.

“I've got to have the questions first,” said Sebastian. “Have to memorize them,” he added when Alan looked at him. “Takes a devil of a time.”

“I'll go and write them out for you,” said Ariel, untying the strings of her bonnet as she headed for the stairs. “You can explain everything to Lord Alan while I do so.” She went out, leaving the three brothers staring at one another.

There was a short silence. Sebastian looked burdened.

He wasn't very good at explanations, Alan thought. He tended to duck out, leaving them to other people.

But his brother surprised him. “Decided to marry,” he began.

“You astonish me.”

“Astonish myself,” agreed Sebastian. “But there's something about this girl.”

“Just that she won't look at you,” put in Robert. “If you want my opinion, that's the only reason you're after her.”

“Well, I don't want your opinion,” replied Sebastian, “because you're dead wrong. I ain't that pigheaded.”

Alan refrained from expressing his doubt of this statement. “And what has this to do with Miss Harding?” he prompted.

“She's been giving me a few hints.”

“Hints,” repeated Alan.

Sebastian nodded. “Thought it was daft to begin with, but the thing of it is—it's working. I swear Lady Georgina had an eye out for me at the Simpsons' rout, and she gave me a smile the other day that…” His voice trailed off as he lost himself in the memory of it.

“Good God,” declared Robert in disgusted tones.

Alan surveyed his two brothers. “No doubt your fabled charm would have won her over in any case,” he said to Sebastian.

“Well, I don't think it would have,” Sebastian replied. “Lady Georgina's deuced sharp on the subject of compliments and pretty speeches.” When Alan raised a brow, he added, “She don't like 'em. Says that's all hypocrisy and, er, vacuity, I think it was. Ariel's put me on the right track, for certain.”

“Ariel?” echoed Alan, startled at this familiar form of address.

“No joke?” asked Robert, and, when Sebastian shook his head most earnestly, added, “There goes fifty pounds.”

His brothers looked at him, but Lord Robert had become lost in thought. “Say,” he continued then, “I wonder if we ought to present Ariel to Nat?”

“What?” said Alan.

Sebastian looked puzzled, then a dawning comprehension lit his face. “Good notion,” he agreed. “I've been wondering whether he and Violet were…” He gestured, indicating ambiguity.

“That's it,” said Robert. He looked very pleased with himself.

“Were what?” said Alan.

He was treated to another wave of Sebastian's fingers.

“They are to be married in a month,” Alan verified.

Robert nodded, at the same time giving a little shrug.

“I received an invitation to the wedding,” said Alan.

“Oh, aye,” said Sebastian. “It's likely to make Waterloo look like a Sunday picnic, from what I hear. Twice the planning involved.”

“Perhaps that's it, then,” offered Robert. “Violet's taken up with that.”

“Perhaps,” replied Sebastian doubtfully. “Still, did you see them at Almack's last week?”

Robert nodded solemnly. “Bit peaked,” he admitted.

“Blue-deviled,” corrected Sebastian.

Alan was transfixed by these observations, and by the resolution evident in the faces of his brothers. He had never known them to take an interest in how other people were feeling, and still less to want to do anything about it.

“I could bring Nat round tomorrow,” suggested Robert. “See what she says.”

“She?” responded Alan. He looked from one face to another. He seemed to have strayed into a realm where the most outrageous things were taken as commonplace, and where the brothers he knew himself to possess had become completely different individuals.

“Ariel,” replied Robert. “She'll have some notion of what to do.”

“About what?”

“Never seen a gel with so many notions,” agreed Sebastian. “Can't think where she gets them all.”

“Plays,” said Robert helpfully.

The other nodded. “You know, I don't think I've ever properly appreciated the theater.”

In the following silence, Robert nodded a measured agreement. Alan examined his brothers again, feeling a growing fascination. Had Ariel Harding somehow changed them? he wondered. Did her influence extend further than he'd realized? But how? And what would be the result of this revolution? “What time will you bring Nat?” he heard himself asking.

“Oh, twoish,” Robert replied. “He's probably squiring Violet and her sisters to some ball or other till all hours tonight.”

“Two,” repeated Alan. “Very well.”

“You coming?” asked Robert, surprised.

“I believe I am,” was the bemused reply.

***

The three Gresham brothers arrived on Ariel's doorstep promptly at the appointed hour, and she greeted them with cordial curiosity. Lord Robert looked dapper and bright-eyed. Lord Alan, plainly dressed as usual, hung back and watched like a spectator at a play. And their eldest brother, Nathaniel, Viscount Highgrove, looked somewhat sleepy and completely mystified, thought Ariel as she acknowledged her introduction to him. Like all the brothers, he had blue eyes and auburn hair—in his case a darker hue nearer to brown. He was not as tall as Alan or as smartly dressed as Robert. At first glance, in fact, an observer might have set him down as a nonentity. But there was a subtle confidence in his bearing, and a hint of strong character in his face. He looked like a man who was constantly conscious of his responsibilities, and striving to fulfill them to the utmost.

“I had to roust Nat out of bed,” Lord Robert said cheerily.

“I was up until four,” responded Lord Highgrove in his own defense.

“Escorting Violet and listening to her endless pack of relatives prosing on about virtue and duty,” expanded Lord Robert. “Violet is Nat's intended,” he told Ariel, ignoring his eldest brother's pained and somewhat scandalized expression. “Lady Violet Devere, Earl of Moreley's daughter.”

Ariel nodded and smiled, wondering whether she should have agreed to this visit. Lord Highgrove looked extremely uncomfortable.

“They've known each other since they were children,” Lord Robert continued, oblivious. “Always understood they were to make a match of it. The thing was announced last spring, and they're to be married in a month.”

“I am sure Miss Harding is not interested in—” began Lord Highgrove.

“She's the one got Georgina Stane living in Sebastian's pocket,” Lord Robert informed him. “That's what made us think of getting her advice for you.”

“I cannot imagine what you are talking about,” replied his elder brother coldly.

“Oh, come. Everyone's gossiping about the way you and Violet sit like statues, hardly looking at each other. Couple of cold fish, the gossips have it; frosted up to the eyebrows. Only I know you ain't. And if I remember Violet—”

“Robert!” exclaimed Lord Highgrove.

A choking sound emerged from the corner, where Lord Alan had taken his seat. He was finding this quite funny, Ariel thought, meeting his sparkling blue gaze. And he apparently had no intention of helping her with the awkward situation. It was just like him. He was probably viewing them all as some sort of experiment—incompatible chemicals put in a container together and allowed to froth and bubble. “There is no reason why I should be involved in Lord Highgrove's affairs,” she said with determination. “We are not at all acquainted. And while I am most happy to have met him, of course, I wish you will not—”

“No, no, you don't understand,” declared Lord Robert. “She can set it to rights between you and Violet,” he told his brother. “She knows just what to do.”

The viscount's face was scarlet. His mouth was a tight line. Ariel cast her eyes around the room in search of help. Lord Robert gestured at her, urging her on as if she were a pet reluctant to do its tricks. Lord Alan simply clamped his jaw, very likely suppressing a grin, she thought impatiently. “Really, Lord Robert—” she began.