The Famous Heroine/The Plumed Bonnet (15 page)

He was outside.

Sitting on a wrought-iron seat like an actor on stage, invisible to the audience until the curtains were swept back and all eyes focused on him. Or, in his case, until the doors were thrown open and the light of hundreds of candles streamed outward to illuminate him to the interested gaze of several dozen members of the
beau monde
, among whom was the Duke of Bridgwater.

Sitting on a wrought-iron seat, apparently in close embrace with Miss Cora Downes. With nary a chaperon in sight.

“Oops,” Cora Downes said, startled out of her laughter and dropping her arm from about his neck with what could only be interpreted as guilty haste. “Oh, dear.”

Lord Francis behaved even more foolishly. He lugged his arm awkwardly from about her, smiled idiotically at no one in particular, and muttered to no one in particular, “I escorted Miss Downes outside for some air and privacy.”

Well! He recovered both his famous ennui and the handle of his quizzing glass a moment later and got to his feet with his usual elegance to bow over Miss Downes’s hand and inform her that he would escort her to her grace’s side.

But it was very much too late, he feared.

“H
AYDEN IS RETURNING
from Vienna in September,” Elizabeth announced calmly at the breakfast table just as if the fact did not concern her personally. “Lady Fuller received a letter from him yesterday. He hopes to celebrate our nuptials before Christmas.”

Jane sighed and looked back at the announcement in the
Morning Post
for surely the two dozenth time since
they had sat down. “I do hope so, Lizzie,” she said. “I cannot marry before you, but Charles would marry by special license if he had his way. He is that impatient.”

“Special licenses are vulgar,” Elizabeth said. “And so is calling your betrothed by his given name, Jane. I would not dream of addressing Hayden by his even after our marriage.”

“But then Charles and I
love
each other, Lizzie,” Jane said gently.

Which was a decided hit, Cora thought. She sighed inwardly. She wished that one day she would be able to say that too.
But then So-and-so and I love each other. So-and-so would marry by special license if he had his way. He is that impatient
.

She was envious of Jane. Not jealous—the Earl of Greenwald was a gentle young man, a type she could never fall in love with herself even if he was in her own social milieu. But she wished she could fall in love too. She was beginning to despair of ever doing so. There had been those three worthies at home. There had been Mr. Bentley and Mr. Johnson here and she knew without conceit that there would be others. She could feel nothing except gratitude and a little irritability for any of them. But she was one-and-twenty already. She was on the shelf.

She sighed again and smiled.

The duchess was smiling too—at her daughters. She must be well pleased. Both of them settled and so well settled, Elizabeth with a marquess and Jane with an earl. Neither was married yet, of course, but then a betrothal was as binding as a marriage, especially when settlements had been carefully drawn up and signed by each of the prospective grooms and the Duke of Bridgwater.

How pleased Papa would be to draw up such a settlement for her, Cora thought. Perhaps she would never be able to give him that pleasure.

The duchess was looking at her. “Have you finished your breakfast, Cora?” she asked. “I would like a word with you in my sitting room if you have.”

Not another marriage offer already
, Cora thought in dismay. She always found it so painful to say no even when she knew that it was only Papa’s wealth that had provoked the proposal—though one of her suitors in Bristol had been a very wealthy man in his own right, she must admit.

“Yes, your grace,” she said, getting to her feet.

But it was a scold she was being taken aside for. Very gently expressed, but a scold nonetheless. They had been very late home last night—or this morning rather—and they had all been very tired. Jane had been marvelously happy over her betrothal, and all of them had been abuzz with the brief appearance of the Regent and his kind condescension in speaking with Cora and congratulating her on her bravery in saving little Henry’s life.

Her grace had left any unpleasantness for this morning, Cora guessed now.

“It is of course quite understandable that you would be overcome with awe at being singled out by the prince,” her grace said when Cora had made her explanations. “I can see that you would want to escape for a while to collect yourself. But you really should have sent for me, my dear. Or Lord Francis should have done so. I find it strange that he would have behaved so thoughtlessly.”

“It was really not his fault,” Cora said, hastening to his defense. “I told him I was going to faint or
vomit
. He acted promptly. It would have been unspeakably embarrassing if I had done either in public. Especially with the Prince of Wales
still there
.”

The duchess smiled for a moment. But only for a moment.

“Cora,” she said, looking closely at her charge. “You
have not developed a
tendre
for Lord Francis, my dear? He is the brother of the Duke of Fairhurst, and while you are very ladylike and your father owns Mobley Abbey and you are an acknowledged heroine, we must still be realistic. It would be unwise—”

But Cora interrupted her with a merry laugh. “Have a
tendre
for Lord Francis?” she said. “Oh, no, your grace. That would be remarkably foolish.” Did not her grace
know
? “I like him excessively but there can be no possible thought of anything else.”

The duchess looked at her in silence for a moment and then nodded. “And what about him?” she asked. “He could never think of you in terms of matrimony, Cora, brutal as I might seem in putting it to you thus baldly. I have never known him to behave improperly—quite the contrary, in fact. But you are extraordinarily attractive even if your face is not classically pretty. I do hope—”

But Cora’s eyes had widened. Her grace did
not
know. How droll. “Lord Francis is quite unaffected by my charms, I do assure you, ma’am,” she said—though of course she had no charms for him to be affected by even if he were so inclined, despite what her grace had just said out of her kindness. “And he has been nothing but a perfect gentleman to me.”

“And yet,” the duchess said gently, “you were seen to be in close embrace with him out on a dark and deserted balcony, Cora.”

Cora giggled despite herself. “We were laughing,” she said. “I had been badly frightened and then I had fainted. I reacted by making a joke of it all and Lord Francis found it funny too. We were merely laughing and holding each other up.”

It sounded remarkably foolish in the retelling. But shared laughter was a wonderful thing. She and Papa and Edgar sometimes did it, all three of them together. Not often, it was true, because Papa was a sober businessman
and Edgar was a dignified lawyer. But when they were alone together and got started on some topic that amused them all, they could work it and tease it and exaggerate it until they were all holding their sides and wiping the tears from their eyes.

It had never happened with anyone else—anyone outside her own family. Until last night with Lord Francis. She felt an enormous affection for him. She would never see him again after the next week or so. How she wished he were her brother too. He and Edgar both. She pictured herself tripping along a street in Bristol or Bath between the two of them, an arm linked through each of one of theirs. Edgar and Lord Francis would like each other, she believed. Though perhaps not. Men like Edgar did not always approve of men like Lord Francis. The thought saddened her.

“I believe you, dear,” the duchess said. “But perhaps it should be remembered that decorum dictates that one should carefully avoid even the appearance of impropriety. When a man and a woman are discovered alone together and in each other’s arms, it is unlikely that most people will conclude they are merely sharing a joke.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Cora could appreciate the truth of that. “Have I disgraced you? I am so very sorry. And sorry too if I have compromised Lord Francis. Though I do believe that most people will not misconstrue his behavior.” Surely most people must know.

Her grace smiled. “Gentlemen are not compromised, dear,” she said. “Only ladies. This can be smoothed over, I am quite sure. After all, everyone was very sensible of the fact that you had just been singled out for congratulations by the Prince Regent himself. And even apart from that you are riding high in the esteem of the
ton
at present. But you must be careful, Cora. The
ton
is a fickle body.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Cora said.

“You are to go to the library with Jane this morning?” her grace said with a smile. “I do believe there is to be an accidental meeting there with Greenwald. Run along then, dear. And do stay by her side, will you not? You will not chase after windblown hats and leave her alone?”

Cora flushed. It seemed that her grace saw and knew far more than was apparent to either her daughters or her protégée.

“No, ma’am,” she said and fled the room.

She had been indiscreet. She would never understand the world of gentility, she thought. But then it did not matter. She would not be in that world for much longer. Soon she would be back in her own, where the rules and expectations were not quite so strict and where people did not spy on one another in such gleeful expectation of catching one another in some misdemeanor. But for the sake of the Duchess of Bridgwater, who had been kind to her, she would be careful of her behavior for as long as they remained in town.

She was longing to see Lord Francis again, though. She wanted to tell him what people thought and what her grace had said. He would appreciate the joke no end. They would have a good laugh over it.

Oh, dear, she thought, she was going to miss him dreadfully when she left town and returned home.

L
ORD
F
RANCIS
K
NELLER
called upon the Duke of Bridgwater when the latter was still at breakfast. He was shown into the breakfast parlor and invited to partake of the contents of the dishes displayed on a sideboard. He grimaced slightly and seated himself empty-handed at the table.

His grace set aside the
Morning Post
, which was opened to the page of announcements, looked shrewdly
at his guest, and nodded to his butler, who quietly left the room.

“Well,” Lord Francis said, picking up the napkin the butler had set beside his empty place and tapping the silver holder with one fingernail, “give me your candid opinion, Bridge.” It was the first time he had used the shortened form of the duke’s title that his closer friends used. But he did so unconsciously. “Do I owe her an offer?”

“Good Lord,” his grace said, his fork suspended midway between his plate and his mouth.

“You are not her father or her brother or in any way her guardian,” Lord Francis said. “And I believe she is of age anyway. But you have chosen to take on some responsibility for her. Well, then, do I owe her an offer?”

The duke set his fork down, the food impaled on its tines untasted. “It had not occurred to me that you would even consider making one,” he said. “You have
not
given the matter serious consideration, have you?”

“I had her alone,” Lord Francis said. “In a dark place where there was no one else to lend even the semblance of propriety. I had my arms about her. She had hers about me. We were seen by a shudderingly large number of the
ton
, yourself included. I certainly cannot blame anyone for concluding that we were embracing, especially in light of the first asinine words I uttered.”

“Were you
not
embracing?” his grace asked faintly.

“We were
laughing
,” Lord Francis said. “But that seems woefully irrelevant at the moment. I believe I owe her the protection of my name.”

“Good Lord,” the duke said. “I was coming to see you after breakfast, Kneller. To instruct you in no uncertain terms that I would not have my mother’s protégée offered carte blanche. I assumed that was your intention, perhaps even already your expressed intention. She is after all extremely—well, beddable. But my business
this morning was to tell you that it just would not do, that you would have to go through me before effecting it.”

Lord Francis scraped back his chair with his knees as he stood abruptly. He felt a return of last evening’s fury. “Carte blanche?” he said. “Me to Miss Downes? Are you out of your mind, Bridgwater? She is a lady.”

“Ah,” his grace said quietly, “but she is not, is she?”

Lord Francis had never seen red. But he knew now what was meant by the expression. “I could call you out for that,” he said through his teeth.

The duke looked at him, raised his eyebrows, and laid his napkin unhurriedly on the table. He set a finger and thumb on either side of the bridge of his nose. “Sit down, Kneller,” he said. “Let us not become farcical.”

“There is nothing farcical about suggesting that Miss Downes is the sort of woman to whom one might offer carte blanche,” Lord Francis said. But he sat down again when the duke merely closed his eyes and rested his elbow on the table.

“Good Lord,” his grace said, “you are in love with her, Kneller.”

“Nonsense,” Lord Kneller said. “Stuff and nonsense. But she has character and charm and courage, Bridge, and does not deserve to be discussed between us as someone who might or might not agree to be my mistress. The very thought!”

“I would certainly meet
you
before I would allow such a thing,” his grace said. “Her father allowed her to come here under my mother’s sponsorship and protection. Under
my
protection, in other words. You cannot marry her, Kneller. It would be a disaster for both of you.”

“Yes,” Lord Francis agreed after thinking about it for a moment. Though he had thought of nothing else all night. He had tried to imagine the interview he would
have with his brother after making the announcement and had succeeded all too well. Besides, she would never be comfortable in his world. Look what had happened last evening when old Prinny had put in an appearance. “But what will happen to her if I do
not
offer? Was she irrevocably compromised?”