Three Heroes (23 page)

She covered the housekeeper’s fluster with some idle comments about Brighton’s beauty, wondering where their chaperone was.

“Ah, you’ve arrived,” a brusque voice barked. “Come into the front parlor. We’ll have tea.”

Clarissa turned to the woman standing in a doorway. It couldn’t be!

She was middle-aged, with a weather-beaten face and sharp, dark eyes. Her graying hair was scraped back into a bun unsoftened by a cap, and her gown was even plainer than Clarissa’s simple blue cambric.

“Don’t gawk! I’m Arabella Hurstman, your guide to depravity.”

The ELK must have run demented. This woman could never gain them entree to fashionable Brighton!

“I’ll bring tea, ma’am,” said Mrs. Taddy to no one in particular and hurried away. Clarissa felt tempted to go with her, but Miss Hurstman commanded them into the room.

It was small but pretty, with pale walls and a flowered carpet, and Miss Hurstman looked completely out of place. This was ridiculous. There must have been a mistake.

The woman turned and looked them over. “Miss Greystone and Miss Trist, I assume. Though I can’t tell which is which. You”—she pointed a bony finger at Althea—“look like the heiress. But you”—she pointed at Clarissa—“look like the simmering pot.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Don’t starch up. You’ll get used to me. I gave up trying to act pretty and pleasing thirty years ago.

Someone described Miss Greystone as a simmering pot, and I see what he meant.”

“Who?”

“Does it matter? Sit. We have to plan your husband hunt.”

Clarissa and Althea obeyed dazedly.

“I gather you’re a protegee of the Marchioness of Arden,” Miss Hurstman said.

Clarissa didn’t know what to do with that statement.

“Lady Arden was a teacher at Miss Mallory’s School,” Althea said, filling the silence. “She was kind to Clarissa last year in London.”

Clarissa supposed that summed up a very complex situation.

“That explains Belcraven, then,” said Miss Hurstman. “He must be thanking heaven to see his heir married to a woman of sense.”

Mrs. Taddy hurried in then with a laden tea tray and put it in front of Miss Hurstman.

“London,” continued the lady, pouring. She handed Clarissa a cup. “Lasted all of two weeks there, and got yourself engaged to marry Lord Deveril. At least you ended up with his money, which shows some wit.”

“He was hardly my choice,” Clarissa stated, wondering what would happen if she ordered the woman out of the house. She had a burning question first. “Why would anyone describe me as a simmering pot?”

A touch of humor flashed in the dark eyes. “Because a simmering pot needs to be watched, gel, in case it bubbles over. ‘Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble’? Oh, I expect trouble from you two.” Miss Hurstman switched her gimlet gaze to Althea, who almost choked on a cake crumb. “You’re a beauty. Here to catch a husband?”

“Oh, no—”

“Nothing wrong with that, if it’s what you want. If you don’t like your choices, I can find you a position.

One where you won’t be abused. Bear that in mind. There are worse things than being a spinster.”

“Thank you,” said Althea faintly.

“What about you?” Miss Hurstman demanded of Clarissa. “You want a husband too?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Why should I? I’m rich.”

“Sexual passion,” said Miss Hurstman, causing Clarissa and Althea to gape. “Don’t look like stuffed trout. The human race is driven by it, generally into disaster. If you wait long enough, it cools, but in youth, it simmers.”

Clarissa felt her face flame. Surely whoever had said she was a simmering pot could never have meant that.

Who could it be? The duke? Hardly. Lord Arden? She didn’t think so.

Major Hawkinville?

That thought proved her mind was spinning beyond reason.

“There’s all the romantic twaddle as well,” the astonishing woman continued. “That alone can turf man or woman into an unwise marriage.”

She surveyed the plate and chose a piece of seedy cake. “I was young once, and reasonably pretty, though I doubt you believe it, and I remember. I decided early not to marry, but I was still tempted a time or two. And I wasn’t fool enough to visit Brighton in the summer, where romantic folly is carried on the breeze. What’s worse,” she added with a look at Clarissa, “you’re an heiress. You’ll have to fight ‘em off.”

Clarissa eyed the woman coldly. “Isn’t that your job?”

Miss Hurstman gave a kind of snort. “If you really want me to. You probably won’t. You’ll probably scramble after the most rascally ones around. Young fools always do. I’ll have no scandal, though. No being caught half naked in an anteroom. No mad dashes to Gretna Green. Understand? Now, you two go off and settle yourselves in. There’s nothing we can do today.”

Clarissa found herself on her feet, but regrouped. “Miss Hurstman, my trustees employed someone”—

she emphasized the word—“to gain us entree to the highest circles. I appreciate—”

“You think I can’t? Don’t judge by appearances. If there’s a member of the ton here I’m not related to, they probably have shady antecedents. And though I don’t spend much time in their silly circles, I know most of ‘em, too. If you want to waltz with the Regent at the Pavilion, I can arrange it. Though why you’d want to is another matter.”

“Even though I’m the Devil’s Heiress?” Clarissa challenged.

“Stupid name. Concentrate on the heiress part. That’ll open every door. A hundred thousand, I understand.”

Clarissa heard Althea gasp. “More. It’s been well invested, and I’ve been living simply.”

“Obviously.” Miss Hurstman looked her over. “With a fortune to hand, why are you dressed like that?”

“You are,” Clarissa pointed out sweetly.

“I’m fifty-five. If you want to be a nun, enter a convent. If you want me to introduce you to Brighton society, dress appropriately.”

Clarissa desperately wanted to state that she’d wear plain gowns forever, thank you, but she could see a pointless rebellion when it was about to cut off her nose. She admitted to the clothes waiting for her at Mrs. Howell’s.

Miss Hurstman nodded. “Good. We’ll go there first thing tomorrow and hope no one of importance sees you before you’re properly dressed. You should have borrowed something from Miss Trist. Off you go.”

Clarissa longed to sit down again and refuse to be removed, but that was pointless too. As she went upstairs with Althea she muttered, “Intolerable!”

“Perhaps she’s able to do what she’s supposed to do,” Althea suggested.

“If so, she can stay. Otherwise, out she goes.”

“You can’t!”

Clarissa wasn’t sure she could either. Moving Miss Arabella Hurstman might require the entire British army and the Duke of Wellington to lead it. But could she endure much more of Miss Hurstman? The woman was going to turn this delightful adventure into misery.

She went into the front bedroom that Mrs. Taddy indicated, finding their luggage already there and a sober-faced maid beginning to unpack.

“Who are you?” Clarissa demanded.

The woman dropped an alarmed curtsy. “Elsie John, ma’am. Hired to be maid to Miss Greystone and Miss Trist.” She, too, was clearly having trouble deciding who was who.

“I’m Miss Greystone,” said Clarissa, beginning to lose patience with this farce. “That is Miss Trist.”

The maid rolled her eyes and turned back to her work. Clarissa sucked in a deep, steadying breath. She had failed to stand up to Miss Hurstman, so she was taking out her anger on the innocents.

Then Althea said, “Would you mind if I lie down, Clarissa? I have a headache.”

“No, of course not. It’s probably because of that dreadful woman.”

Clarissa knew, however, that it was as much her fault as Miss Hurstman’s. She reined in her temper, and even found a smile for the maid. “Elsie, you may go for now.”

She helped Althea out of her gown and settled her in the bed with the curtains drawn, but then didn’t know where to go. She couldn’t stay here and be quiet. She didn’t feel at all quiet. She needed to pace and rant.

She left the room, closing the door quietly. There were supposed to be three bedrooms, and there were three doors. What if the third was the housekeeper’s? She crept downstairs, but she suspected the only rooms below were the front parlor and the dining room. She headed for the dining room.

“Ah, good!”

Clarissa jumped.

Miss Hurstman had emerged from the parlor like a spider from a hole. “Come back in here.”

“Why?”

“We have things to discuss. Believe it or not, I’m your ally, not your enemy.”

Clarissa found herself too fascinated to resist.

“You’re strong,” Miss Hurstman said, as Clarissa reentered the room. “A bit of brimstone, too. That’s good. You’ll need it.”

“Why?”

“You’re the Devil’s Heiress. And you’re a Greystone. Even under my aegis, you’ll receive some snubs.”

“I don’t care, except if it hurts Althea.”

“It’ll hurt her if people are cruel to you. She can’t take any fire at all, can she?”

“She doesn’t like discord, but she can be strong in fighting for right and justice.”

“Pity we don’t have lions to throw her to. She might enjoy that.”

Enough was enough. “Miss Hurstman, I’m not at all sure you will suit, but if you are to be caustic about Miss Trist, you certainly won’t.”

The woman’s lips twitched. “Think of me as your personal lion. Now sit down. Let’s talk without a delicate audience.

“I like you,” Miss Hurstman said as she returned to her straight-backed posture in her chair. “Don’t know what fires you’ve been through, but it’s forged some steel. Unusual in a gel your age. Your Althea is doubtless a lovely young woman, but tender lambs like that give me a headache. They can always be depended on to say the right thing and to suffer for the stupidity of others.”

“It wasn’t stupidity that killed her fiance.”

“How do you know? War is stupid, anyway. Do you know we lost ten times as many men to disease as wounds? Ten times, and a regiment of women with sense could have saved most of ‘em. Enough of that.

I want to have things clear. We’re to find her a good husband, are we?”

Clarissa imagined that Wellington’s troops must have felt like this before battle, and yet there was a starchy comfort in it. Miss Hurstman, despite her unlikely appearance, radiated competence and confidence.

“Yes.”

“Any dowry at all?”

“A very small amount.”

Miss Hurstman humphed. “The right man will find that romantic. What’s her family?”

“Her father is the vicar of Saint Stephen’s in Bucklestead St. Stephens. He’s brother to Sir Clarence Trist there. Her mother is from a good family, too. But there’s no money and seven other children.”

“Where did the fine clothes come from, then?”

“I gave them to her.”

“Why?”

Clarissa considered her answer. “Do you know Messrs. Euston, Layton, and Keele, ma’am?”

“Only by repute and a letter.”

“Thorough,” said Clarissa. “Conscientious. Determined to pass over my fortune when I’m twenty-one with scarcely a nibble out of it.”

“Very right and proper.”

“Carried to ridiculous lengths. I can buy what I want and they will pay the bills, but they allow me virtually no money to spend on my own. They would never have let me hire Althea to be my companion—and you have to admit that having her here will be much more pleasant than being here alone.”

“You have me,” said Miss Hurstman with a wicked smirk.

Clarissa swallowed a laugh, and suspected it showed.

The truth was that she was beginning to like Miss Hurstman. There was no need to pretend with her.

With Althea, dear though she was, Clarissa always felt she had to watch herself so as not to bruise her friend’s tender feelings. With Miss Hurstman, she could probably damn the king, pick a fight, or use scandalous language and stir no more than a blink.

“Clothes,” Miss Hurstman prompted.

“Oh, yes. The ELK didn’t object to my bringing Althea as a friend, but she needed fashionable clothing.

They’d not pay for that, but they’d pay for new clothes for me.”

“Shady dealings, gel.” Miss Hurstman waggled her finger, but the twinkle might be admiration.

Clarissa was surprised to feel that Miss Hurstman’s admiration might be worth something. “It wasn’t a noble sacrifice. I would never have worn those gowns again. They were bought for me to parade before Lord Deveril.”

“Ah. And that shade of blue wouldn’t have suited you any better than the one you’re wearing now. Hope you chose better this time.”

Clarissa looked down at the tiny sprigged pattern that had been the best material Miss Mallory’s seamstress had to hand. “So do I. I chose rather bold colors.”

“Bold seems suitable,” said Miss Hurstman dryly. “If they don’t suit, we’ll choose again. Won’t make a dent in your fortune. So, Miss Trist needs to marry money. And generous money, at that.”

“What she needs is a man who loves her.”

Miss Hurstman’s brows rose. “When she can’t love him back? She’d go into a decline under the guilt of it. And if she doesn’t marry money, she’ll feel she’s let down her family.”

Clarissa wanted to object, but the blasted woman had clearly taken Althea’s measure to the inch. She needed to be of service to all.

“I want her to be happy.”

Miss Hurstman nodded. “She’ll be content with a good man and children, and plenty of worthwhile work to do. You, on the other hand, need a man who loves you.”

Major Hawkinville, Clarissa thought, and reacted by stating, “I don’t need a man at all. I’m rich.”

“You’re obsessed by your money. Guineas are uncomfortable bedfellows.”

“They can buy comfort.”

Miss Hurstman’s brows shot up. “Planning to buy yourself a lover?”

“Of course not!” Clarissa knew she was red. “You, ma’am, are obsessed with… with bed! My trustees cannot have known your true colors.”

Despite that, she could see the wicked twinkle in Miss Hurstman’s eyes, and felt its reflection in herself.

She’d never known anyone so willing to say outrageous things.

“Why are you my chaperone?” she demanded. “You are clearly a most unusual choice, even if you are well connected.”