The Courtesan's Daughter (8 page)

“Yes.”

“You know of my remedy to relieve him of them?”

“Yes.”

She cast him a sideways glance of inquiry. He matched it with an easy smile.

“You know of the refusal?” she said.

“Yes.”

“Then, your grace, in this small list of knowable things, we are of equal understanding.”

“As you say, it is a small list. Hardly enough to comprise a man,” Calbourne said calmly.

“But, your grace, this small list is all that matters to me. I do not care to know more.”

“Now, Lady Dalby, that I cannot believe for it is well known that you are a woman of rare energy and imagination,” he said, his voice slipping down seductively. “Surely, in knowing more, you would increase your odds of winning.”

“You want me to win?”

“I want him to win,” he said.

“Even if it goes against his own schemes?” she said, turning to face him slightly.

“Even so,” he said, taking her hand in his and raising it to his mouth. He brushed the lightest of kisses upon her gloved hand, his breath warming her skin. Sophia smiled. “Are you not working against your daughter’s schemes for her own good?”

“Your grace, I like you better and better, and I liked you well enough from the start.”

Calbourne grinned and kissed the tips of her fingers before releasing her hand.

“Then Countess Dalby, we all win.”

Ten

“NOW, Anne, throw off every polite and practical instinct you possess and tell me the truth. Do you have any interest at all in a proposal of marriage from Lord Staverton?”

Anne looked into Sophia’s black eyes and felt every shred of common sense tumble off her and land on the carpeted floor.

“No. I don’t. I’m a fool.”

“A fool is someone who doesn’t know her own mind. You are hardly a fool,” Sophia said. “Now Caro, she might be a fool yet. All this courtesan idiocy. Only a fool, a fool with a good roof over her and healthy food in her, would talk so ridiculously.”

“Thank you, Mother,” Caro said sarcastically.

The evening had waned into morning and still the party roared with energy. True, Lord Dutton was drunk and snoring by the fire, but if one discounted snoring drunks at a party, it could hardly be counted as a party at all, at least according to Lady Dalby. Anne had learned to pay attention to what Lady Dalby said about things and events and people. Lady Dalby saw things that other people didn’t. Lady Dalby was shrewd, and that was the least of it.

“You are certain?” Sophia asked her. “It would be a good match. He’s ridiculously wealthy and sweetly generous, and he would make you a viscountess.”

“Mother, he’s ancient and has that … eye,” Caro said. “Anne is a beautiful young woman in her prime. It’s a ridiculous match.”

Sophia cast a dark look in her daughter’s direction. “For a woman who’s announced her intention to be a courtesan, you are remarkably ill-informed. And spoilt. I’d begun to wonder if it might do you some good,” she said softly. “This latest remark quite decides it.”

“If you think I should marry the viscount, of course I will,” Anne said. She couldn’t stay with Caro forever, especially if Caro actually pursued a courtesan’s life. Unless she pursued it at her side. The thought niggled into her heart and settled there, coldly and heavily.

“I would never presume to tell you what to do, Anne,” Sophia said, giving her hand a squeeze. “I only feel it is my duty to point out a good match when I see one. It is your choice to make, as it is your life to live. You have a home with me for as long as you wish it, even after Caro moves out to pursue her life’s goal.”

“Excuse me?” Caro said. “Move out?”

“Well, I can hardly have a known courtesan living under my roof, can I?” Sophia said. “Think what it would do to my reputation.”

“Mother, you can’t mean to say that you would … throw me out to make my way on, on the streets, do you? Would you?” Caro said, her elegant features wreathed in shock and disbelief.

“Darling, just where do you think a courtesan begins, if not on the streets?” Sophia said sweetly. But there was iron beneath that sugary coating; Anne could feel it. Could Caro?

“When I said I wanted to be a courtesan—”

“Darling, what you said was that you were
going
to be a courtesan,” Sophia interrupted.

“Yes, well,” Caro stuttered, “it was in the hope of finding a man who would want me for myself and to do that, to achieve that goal, it’s going to take time to find the right man. I am not going to rush. I am not going to allow just any man to … to, well, to …”

“If you can’t say it, Caro, how on earth are you going to do it?” Sophia said with a sarcastic smile.

“Whatever I allow him to do,” Caro rallied, “it will be because
I
have chosen him, not because I am
desperate
or any such low thing.”

“Yes, darling,” Sophia said. “I quite understand your thinking. Your plans are quite clear. Unfortunately, they have little if anything to do with the way things truly are.”

“I understand how things truly are!” Caro flared.

As much as Anne adored Caro, she had to side with Sophia. Caro was very protected and very pampered. She had no idea what the world was like outside of the shelter erected by money and position.

“Caro, being a wife is much preferable to being a courtesan,” Anne said solemnly.

“I’m less than certain of that,” Caro said stiffly.

“You should listen to your mother,” Anne said. “She’s been both, you’ve been neither. Perhaps it’s not too late to accept the arrangement with Lord Ashdon. He certainly seemed … interested in you earlier.”

“Interested? He wanted to break my neck,” Caro said. “Besides which, any interest he had in human companionship fled his mind the minute the gaming tables were set up. The man’s a remorseless gambler. I will not—”

“Yes, darling, I think we are all well aware of the many things which you
will not
. Let us not discuss it now. I must go and tell Staverton the bad news regarding Anne, you
are
certain, Anne, that a match with him is not to be?”

Anne was less certain of everything the longer she listened to Sophia and Caro argue, but she nodded, letting the die be cast as she cursed herself for a sentimental idiot.

“Very well,” Sophia said. “No woman should be forced to marry a man not to her tastes and inclinations.”

“
Exactly
,” Caro snapped, her eyes gleaming in righteous fervor.

“But what a woman who is a courtesan is forced to do,” Sophia snapped in reply, her own dark eyes gleaming ruthlessly, “is an entirely different matter. You, my darling daughter, have set a course for yourself. As of tomorrow noon, you must be prepared to make your way in it.”

“What? Wait a minute, Mother—”

“A clever woman would use every hour and every man available to her, beginning now, when the hour is late and the men are well into their cups, to find herself a protector. A silly woman would argue and whine until the hour of noon tomorrow until she found herself deposited on James Street considering the loveliness of Green Park. I leave it to you, Caro. Use that famous intellect of yours. Now, on to Staverton.”

And with that, she left them in a quiet corner of the yellow salon, where both young women stared at each other in complete shock.

“She can’t mean it,” Caro said.

Anne didn’t reply since it was blatantly obvious that she did mean it, every word of it. Sophia, always smiling and pleasant, had a will of steel and was not shy in inflicting her steel on others.

“Can you not find it in you to make amends with Lord Ashdon ? ” Anne asked. “It would be a good match for you.”

“Only until he killed me,” Caro said wryly. “And you speak to me of good, wise matches? Run, and tell my mother you have changed your mind about Staverton and I will do the same about Ashdon.”

“You would?” Anne said softly.

Anne knew the answer, of course.

Caro leaned her shoulders against the wall and sighed. “Absolutely not. I hate him. He is a vile man, horrible, ill-mannered, and ungovernable.”

“Ungovernable?”

“Did he not gamble his way onto the marriage block? Did my mother not buy him for me?”

“What is it you hate, Caro, that your mother bought him or that he allowed himself to be bought?”

“What is the difference between the two? He was for sale and the sale was made. Or almost made. He disgusts me.”

“And he ruined your gown,” Anne said wryly.

“Add clumsy brute to his list of faults. I should make him pay for it, just to add to his financial burdens. He should be made to, you know. A gentleman would offer, would make some effort at gracious apology. He really should be made to pay.”

Caro’s gaze slipped to the fine turned leg of the small sofa nearest them. They were almost alone in the room, except for the soft snores that marked the location of Lord Dutton.

“Caro?” Anne said.

Caro looked at her with the light of inspiration, devilish inspiration, surely, in her eyes. “He really
should
be made to pay, shouldn’t he?”

Oh, Lord.

“Caro, what are you thinking?” Anne said, just a bit desperately.

Caro looked up at her, her dark eyes gleaming with just a hint of malice. “I’m thinking that a little revenge would be in order. And so well deserved, too.”

“Revenge? Because he made an offer of marriage for you?”

“Was that what it was? I thought I was merely the means to cancel his debts.”

“Caro, marriages are made on just such a foundation every day. Why are you so very insulted?”

“Because,” Caro said softly, her voice coming out in a hiss of anger, “I have spent my whole life learning to be the perfect woman, and for what? So that some man who’s never even
seen
me before should make an offer for me, merely to clear himself of debt? I want to be wanted, and I will be. Being a courtesan, being wanted by absolutely hoards of men, sounds completely wonderful. I won’t have a husband who must be bribed and bought for me. I want to be wanted, for myself, no matter who my mother is.”

“Caro,” Anne said in frustration, “that is all beside the point at the moment. You are about to be tossed out onto the streets by your mother. You must find a haven. Is there anywhere you can go, anyone who will take you in?”

“Markham will never allow it,” Caro said.

“I am sure that is true, but Markham is not in Town and hardly able to help you by tomorrow noon. Is there anyone to help you? Have you no friends? No relatives in Town?”

Caro lifted her chin and said, “You are my friend, Anne. I … well, I am not very well liked, I’m afraid. I don’t have many friends, and my father’s relatives are all deceased. My mother’s family, aside from our guardian, has little to do with us. I am quite alone. Except for you. I quite understand,” she said, voice quivering just slightly, “that my mother bought you for me as she tried to do with Lord Ashdon. I know that, unless destitute, you would never have lowered yourself by coming into my mother’s house to befriend me. I have chosen to believe that you have come to actually like me, in spite of everything.”

Caro’s dark eyes, so large and expressive, were filled with un-shed tears, yet she looked anything but cowed. In spite of admitting herself friendless and without hope of succor, she had the look of a warrior set to face his final battle, unafraid and clothed in honor. It was one of the most endearing aspects of Caro and one of which she was entirely unaware, this stalwart warrior in silk and pearls, dark blue eyes unblinking.

“You
are
a complete idiot,” Anne said, taking her by the hand and leading her past the still snoring Lord Dutton and to the doorway of the salon that opened onto the dining room at the rear of the house. “You know I adore you, for one. And for another, there are things you don’t know about me, things which your mother kept from you out of kindness on my behalf.”

“What don’t I know about you?” Caro said as Lord Dutton’s snores slipped into drunken mumbling.

“Dear Caro,” Anne said. “You know nothing of the life I lived before coming to live with you.”

“You’re a widow. Your husband died at sea.”

“Yes, true, but how did your mother find me? I’ll tell you how. She and my mother were friends of a sort. They were both courtesans, though my mother did not fare as well as yours.”

“What? I don’t believe it!”

“Believe it,” Anne said crisply. “Also believe me when I say that the courtesan’s life is not what you imagine. Not at all.”

“I don’t believe a word of it. You’re just saying this to try and change my mind.”

“I am trying to change your mind, that’s certainly true, but all the rest is true as well. You think being a courtesan is easy? Try your hand at it now, while they are gaming. Try and find a man who will pay a month’s income for the promise of your kiss. If you cannot, beg on your knees to your mother that she will forgive you your willfulness. Marry the next man she buys for you. Do anything to avoid that life. I beg you, Caro. ’Tis no fit way to live.”

“You don’t think I can, do you?” Caro said. “You don’t think any man
would
want me that much.” And with that dire pronouncement, Caro sailed into the dining room.

Anne followed nervously behind her, murmuring, “That is not at all what I meant!”

When the yellow salon was empty and all hope of further conversation dashed, Lord Dutton stopped snoring, sat up, and said to the sparkling crystal chandelier above him, “Sophia really does provide the most delightful entertainments.” And with that, he straightened his cravat and sauntered into the dining room.

Eleven

CARO surveyed the dining room like a seasoned general, which spoke more to her determination than experience. Unfortunately, she had no idea how to seduce a man, but it couldn’t be that difficult, could it? Richborough
had
to have been some sort of horrid abberation, mustn’t he?