Unraveling the Earl (22 page)

“A pity indeed,” Carlton agreed, shooting a gloating grin
his friend’s way.

“I wish you were invited, Lord Carlton,” she all but gushed
as she swung her eyes his direction. “I am to wear my new dress and join the
guests for cordials before dinner.”

“I am quite certain you shall outshine all the other
ladies.”

“Oh, I shall.”

“Modest creature, isn’t she?” Clive asked of no one in
particular.

“Off with you.” Fanny made a shooing motion with her hands,
one guaranteed to annoy. “I must save my uncle from your dastardly clutches.
Away now.”

“Hastings, if you can slip away from your illustrious family
before dawn you will find us at Cybil’s,” Clive tossed back as he turned his
horse. “The lady has invited a select few to play cards after the last curtain.
A pity you and your new dress were not invited, Lady Francis.”

“Childish buffoon,” Fanny whispered beneath her breath.

Henry lifted his niece to the saddle he’d recently vacated
and led horse and girl toward the two ladies sitting beneath the shade of a
tree.

“What is the occasion of your mother’s impromptu dinner this
evening?” he asked.

“Mama has made a new friend,” Fanny replied. “Wait until you
meet her. She is ever so clever, though not terribly pretty.”

“Ah,” Henry murmured, recognizing the trap.

“It is to be a small gathering, perfectly proper for a
family in mourning,” she continued. “Just the immediate family.”

Which meant dinner for three dozen, no doubt. And all of
them sizing up the latest lady to be offered up as the future Countess of
Hastings. Unless they’d already had occasion to meet the lady and had been
invited as reinforcements in Olivia’s seemingly never-ending battle to see him
wed.

“How angry is your mother likely to be if I pretend I did
not receive the invitation?”

“Oh, but you cannot.”

“I rather think I can. I need only stay away from home until
tomorrow morning.”

“And what shall I tell Mama when she asks if I saw you in
the park?” Fanny demanded. “Would you have me lie?”

She had him there.

“You may tell your mother I accept her invitation under
protest,” Henry said.

“Don’t look so glum, Uncle Henry,” Fanny replied cheerfully.
“After all, you shall get to see me in my new dress. It is ever so pretty and
sophisticated.”

“There is that,” he agreed as he spotted Charlie on his
knees beside Miss Amherst, his fingers sifting through the grass. “What is your
brother about?”

“He’s picking clover to make a chain.”

“For the future princess’ crown, no doubt.”

“No silly,” she giggled. “To make a necklace for a lady.
Charlie’s in love.”

“Poor sod,” Henry muttered, hoping his nephew had chosen
more wisely than he had.

“Oh, look! There is Penelope Greenpeace.”

A flaxen haired girl about Fanny’s age skipped along the
path before a finely dressed matron and two older girls. “Is Miss Penelope the
object of Charlie’s affections?”

“Do try to keep up,” Fanny replied with a roll of her eyes.
“Penelope is a prissy little shrew who takes pleasure in riling me. She is
forever naming me too intelligent and tempestuous to earn the regard of a baron,
let alone a prince.”

“That sweet child named you intelligent and tempestuous?”
Henry eyed the pretty little girl in her pristine white pinafore over a dress
of palest pink unadorned by so much as a single grass-stain or sagging ruffle.

“Actually she said bookish and wild but only because she
lacks a vocabulary sufficient to offer greater insult.”

“And for that you intend to what? Pull her braids? Spatter
mud over her pinafore?”

“I would never be so childish.” Fanny began to slide from
his mount’s back and Henry had no choice but to clasp her about the waist and
assist her to the ground.

“You are becoming quite the little lady,” he said, wondering
just when she’d matured from tiny termagant to sensible miss.

“Besides, such behavior is not worth the lecture Mama would
hand down.”

“There is that,” he agreed.

“Too, a wise woman recently suggested I pick my battles well
and only engage when I am assured of victory and… What was that other bit? Oh,
yes, plausible deniability.”

“You ought not to listen to most of what Aunt Alice tells
you,” he cautioned, knowing full well he wasted both his words and the breath
it took to form them.

“Aunt Alice is hardly a wise woman,” she replied. “Else she
would not be forever whittling away at Uncle Piedmont’s patience.”

“If Alice did not offer up that particular bit of wisdom,
who did?”

“Charlie, grab up our hoops and climb the hill with me!”
Fanny turned away to holler across the grass to her brother rather than answer
his question.

“But I’m looking for clovers,” Charlie called back, a smile
blooming across his chubby cheeks when he spotted Henry. “Hullo, Uncle Henry.”

“Good afternoon, wee lordling,” Henry greeted.

“I’ll help you to find all the clover you wish after I’ve
made my peace with Penelope,” Fanny promised.

“Is that what we’re about?” Charlie scrambled to his feet
and pushed his booty of mangled and wilted weeds in Miss Amherst’s direction.
“Why didn’t you say so?”

“I just did. Now hurry before she disappears around the
bend.”

Charlie scooped up the two colorful hoops and matching
sticks and tore across the grass, stopping before his uncle only long enough to
offer a crooked smile and a hurried bow.

Henry ruffled the boy’s curls in passing and continued on
toward the narrow bench upon which two ladies sat conversing.

Miss Josephine Amherst was dressed simply in a navy-blue
gown, her dark hair pulled back into a tidy bun. Sunlight glinted off her
spectacles as she turned to watch his approach.

Mrs. Sophia Miles continued chatting away as if oblivious to
his imminent arrival.

“I’m only saying as how I find it odd how Mrs. Bentley has
befriended the lady,” the plump woman said, waving her hands about in apparent
agitation. “I know she shares a bond with the young lord, but is that enough to
occasion tea in the front parlor every day this week? Not to mention her
appearance here today. And what do you supposed she was about, whispering with
Lady Francis that way?”

“I’ve no idea,” Josephine answered in a distracted fashion
as Henry stopped before the bench, his shadow finally drawing Mrs. Miles’s
attention.

“Oh, Lord Hastings!” The children’s nurse jumped up, her
rather wondrous breasts jiggling with the sudden movement. “I didn’t see you
there, my lord.”

“Are we perhaps discussing my sister’s latest choice for the
future countess?” Henry asked.

“Future countess?” Josephine repeated with a giggle.

“I rather doubt it. She is hardly the sort you would take to
wife.” Mrs. Miles looked beyond Henry’s shoulder and he turned to follow her
gaze.

A lady strolled along the riverbank in the opposite
direction, an outrageous hat angled just so on her head, the brim large enough
to cast her face, neck and shoulders into shadow, the crown bedecked with all
manner of ribbons, greenery and fat clusters of…cherries?

Henry had taken but two steps toward the retreating figure
when a high-pitched scream rent the air. Spinning about, he sought the source
of the terror-laced sound.

Two ladies and three girls in a rainbow of frilly gowns
scrambled in every direction as one bright pink hoop rolled down the hill,
gathering speed as it neared the path.

A little girl with blonde hair tripped over the hem of her
pink dress as she backed away from the rolling hoop. She flailed about,
desperately searching for balance before falling on her bottom and tumbling
heels over head.

Atop the hill Lady Francis Gibbons jumped about with her
hands waving in the air. Beside her Lord Palmerton was doubled over in laughter
as the hoop sped past Miss Penelope Greenpeace who lay flat on her back with
her legs in the air, gifting everyone within a country mile with the sight of
her frilly white bloomers.

The Earl of Hastings arrived at Raleigh’s Folly at half-past
eight though Olivia’s invitation had clearly stated he was to arrive on the
hour.

It was a calculated move designed to serve notice to the
lady that he was wise to her matchmaking and his days of kowtowing to a woman,
be she sister, cousin, or marriageable miss, were over.

He would venture down the aisle when he was good and ready
and not a moment before that time. And when such time arrived he would bloody
well find his own wife and she certainly would not be a lady anyone would
describe as ever so clever, though not terribly pretty.

As Davenport had dressed him in a somber black suit of
clothes, Henry had decided that it was time he explained the facts of life to
Olivia. If Beatrice had made the journey from Surrey, he would damn well let
her in on the facts, as well.

And by God, he would come up with a way to let the ladies of
London know he was no longer available to be ridden for their pleasure.

Light shone from behind the lace curtains and high-spirited
conversation drifted through the open windows as he made his way up the path
toward the sprawling red brick house graced with two turrets and a deep,
covered porch.

Before he could lift the knocker the door swung open and the
Bentley’s butler bowed from the waist. “Welcome, Lord Hastings.”

“Pendergrass,” Henry greeted. “I trust you are well and that
the little devils are not driving you to drink.”

“No more than usual, my lord.”

“Speaking of drinking.” Henry stepped into the spacious
foyer done up in shades of yellow and green with landscapes hanging on the
walls, most of them rendered by Beatrice and depicting scenes of Idyllwild. “Be
a good chap and find me a glass of something strong to fortify me for the
coming ordeal.”

The butler nodded to a footman dressed in a simple gray
jacket and black trousers who promptly scampered down the hall toward Bentley’s
study.

“I don’t suppose they’ve already gone in to dinner?”

“No, my lord. Mrs. Bentley insisted upon waiting for you.”

“And the new friend? Would it be too much to hope her mother
came down with the ague or her father only just learned he’d lost his fortune
in a faulty scheme of some sort?”

“Necessitating a hastily scribbled note begging off from
dinner, you mean?” Pendergrass asked, reaching for the hat and walking stick
the earl held out to him. “Alas, there was no note and the lady arrived
promptly at eight of the clock.”

“A real stickler, is she?”

The footman returned, carefully balancing a crystal tumbler
on a small silver tray.

“I would not presume to hazard an opinion, my lord,”
Pendergrass replied without so much as a twitch of his lips or a lift of his
brow.

“Ah, so she is a stickler.” Henry reached for the proffered
glass and took a quick sip. “A bookish type, I understand. And not terribly
easy on the eye.”

“Beauty is as beauty does.” The butler sniffed and stiffened
his spine, no easy feat for a man whose posture was already as rigid as a
board.

“Fancy the chit, do you?” Henry decided the smooth, mellow
liquor was precisely the cure for what ailed him and tossed back the entire
glass.

The burn was instantaneous and welcome.

“Mrs. Bentley has taken a liking to the lady.” Pendergrass
reached for the glass, whisking it behind his back to disappear into the hands
of the footman. “They seem to have formed a fast friendship since meeting last
week.”

“Last week?” Henry repeated around a chuckle that turned
into a cough. “I am to be foisted off on some marriage-minded miss on the basis
of such short acquaintance?”

Pendergrass’ façade cracked, beginning with a decided tic at
his right cheek that pulled at his lips and worked its way up to his eye,
setting the lid fluttering. He lifted his head, staring up at the ceiling, his
shoulders beginning to shake.

“What is it, man?” Henry demanded. “Out with it. She’s worse
than clever and plain, isn’t she? Haughty and horse-faced? Giggly and stout?”

“Henry, you’ve arrived.”

With a final glare at the butler who was making odd little
hiccupping noises, Henry turned toward the front parlor just as Olivia pushed
open the door.

Laughter and excited chatter trailed in his sister’s wake,
the unmistakable sounds of dozens of dinner guests holding half as many
conversations at once.

Olivia strolled through the open door looking lovely despite
the mourning gown of unrelieved black silk and lace that covered her from neck
to ankles. Her dark curls were pulled away from her face and threaded with
matching ribbon.

Gray eyes shining and a pretty flush on her cheeks, she held
out both hands.

Henry smiled as he took her hands and pulled her into an
embrace.

“I’d nearly given up on you,” she said, a soft rebuke.

“Have I missed seeing Fanny in all her finery?” Guilt hit
him square in the gut.

“Fanny was asleep before the first guest arrived. It seems
there was some excitement in the park today.”

“So you heard about that little bit of drama?”

“Mrs. Greenpeace was at my door only minutes after the
children returned from the park.”

“Handed down a lecture, did you?”

“As to that, Fanny denied any evil intent and…well, her
explanation did sound plausible,” she replied, stepping back and looking up
into his face. “Good gracious, Henry could you not bother to shave?”

“I shaved this morning,” he protested.

“You look like that scruffy dog that used to hang about the
stables when we were children.” She reached up to straighten his cravat before
patting at his hair. “Honestly, what is the world coming to when a gentleman
arrives for dinner late and looking as if he only just rose from his bed?”

“Or someone else’s,” Alice drawled, sweeping into the hall
to stand beside Olivia.

Seen together the ladies might have been sisters rather than
cousins. Both possessed delicate features and pewter-gray eyes, though there
was a sharpness to Alice’s gaze, a cynicism that Olivia lacked and always
would.

They were of a height, Alice slim where Olivia was gently
rounded.

Alice wore her sable tresses piled high on her head, braids
and coils wound around like a crown. She’d draped her slender form in jet silk,
matching gems twinkling at her ears and dropping into her décolletage which was
amply displayed by the low cut of her bodice.

“Oh, Henry, never say you have come straight from your
latest paramour’s boudoir to my dinner,” Olivia said, rising to her toes to
sniff at his neck.

“Stop that.” He stepped back lest she start plucking at his
neck cloth in search of rouge stains.

“I so wanted you to make a good first impression,” she
grumbled.

“I would imagine the lady has already formed a first
impression,” Alice said, her voice laced with laughter. “Perhaps even a second
or third. Whether any of them have been good remains to be seen.”

“I suppose there is nothing to be done about your untidy
state,” Olivia said, waving her hand toward the front parlor and the sounds of
laughter and conversation coming from within. “Perhaps now you have arrived,
you can lead my guests in to dinner. Lord knows I’ve had no luck getting them
to budge from the parlor.”

Henry ushered the ladies into the parlor ahead of him,
stopping just inside the room to assess the situation.

By the noise level, he’d expected thirty or more guests, the
immediate family of uncles, aunts and cousins.

Only half as many people occupied the parlor and all of them
were crowded into one corner of the spacious room, their voices raised to be
heard above one another.

Beatrice and Easton flanked Aunt Lucinda, their backs to the
door. Before them Lord Baldwin stood looking off into space, one bony hand brushing
back and forth over the white beard he wore to hide his weak chin and jowly
cheeks. In his customary fashion, he barked out single words with long spaces
between them, making any shared conversation an exercise in frustration.

Beside him Alice’s husband, Lord Piedmont was chatting away
without stopping for breath, his arms waving about as he emphasized some point
or other, the wispy gray hairs combed over his pate trembling with each
movement.

Lady Singleton opened and closed her mouth, obviously wishing
to interject something into the conversation, would her brother only stop
speaking long enough to allow it.

Jack Bentley stood between Lord and Lady Morris, the former
wearing an ill-fitting suit two decades out of fashion while his wife sported a
tent of a dress beneath a lace mantilla.

Mr. and Mrs. Statham were positioned just behind the others,
their gray heads bobbing in time to the tapping of the lady’s cane and the
gentleman’s babble. Beside them Lady White leaned forward with her ear trumpet
raised in an attempt to catch each morsel of whatever gossip had the lot of
them ensnared.

Where were the younger relations? Everett and Lady Heloise
and Lady Margaret? Mr. and Mrs. Connor Simms, the Derby brothers and all of the
others who made up his generation?

Aside from Beatrice and Olivia and their respective spouses,
Alice was the only person under the age of fifty in the room.

“Hastings has finally arrived,” Olivia announced to the
room’s inhabitants, tossing up her hands in frustration when she was ignored.
“Do you see what I mean? I cannot get their attention and if we do not go into
dinner soon Cook’s roast pheasant will be ruined and I’ll have a mutiny on my
hands.”

“Dinner is served,” Henry called out, chuckling when the
conversation died down not at all. “You ought to have a gong about for just
such occasions. What has them in a tizzy?”

“Oh, you know how they can be when someone sends them down
memory lane,” Olivia replied. “I thought to wait until dinner, but Aunt
Singleton recognized her right off and before I quite knew what was happening
they were all crowded around offering up remembrances.”

From the midst of his mostly elderly relations, a soft husky
laugh rose above the prattle.

A feather, fluffy and died a vibrant purple, bobbed over
gray heads.

Bentley looked up from Lady Morris, found Henry standing at
the threshold to the room and winked.

As Henry pondered that sly wink, a single word, a name
tossed out by Aunt Singleton, rose above the indiscernible babble and caught
his attention.

“Miss Connie came from somewhere to the north I believe.”
Lady Singleton proclaimed.

“Shropshire, I think it was.” Lady Morris replied.

“Father was a minor baronet,” Piedmont interjected, “and her
mother…”

“A baroness in her own right,” the Dowager Countess Easton
piped up.

“Surely there aren’t many such baronesses in Shropshire.”

“Right you are. ‘Twill be easy enough to learn their names.”

“I’ve a friend at Westminster who owes me a favor. I’ll have
him digging through the land records by noon tomorrow.” This generous offer
came from Mr. Statham as far as Henry could determine.

“She loved to dance, Miss Connie did.”

“Terribly quiet, she was.”

Henry gave up trying to differentiate one voice from the
next and simply listened as his family provided clues to the identity of a lost
girl’s mother.

“All of Lydia’s angels were shy little creatures.”

“I don’t know that Connie was shy so much as reserved.”

“Forever watching the goings on around her.”

“She had such large eyes.”

“All the better to spot a good catch.”

“Except she left Town before the season was truly over and
never returned.”

“Now we know why.”

“I don’t recall hearing as to whether or not she married.”

“I believe I heard that her father married her off to an
Irish fellow who’d been given a minor title for services rendered to the
crown.”

“Right you are, an older man puffed up on his own
importance.”

“Kildare was his name, if I’m not mistaken.”

“The Earl of Kildare.”

“Not so minor a title.”

“No, no. Kildare married another chit.”

“Might be I am wrong, but it’s worth looking into.”

“It was a tradesman Miss Connie wed, dapper little fellow by
the name of Smythe.”

“I think I attended their wedding, a decidedly shabby affair
in Hertfordshire.”

“Thomas Carlton, who married my nephew Fred’s girl, sits on
the merchants’ guild. I’ll have him poke his nose into things to see what’s
what.”

“There is a woman by the name of Connie Winters who donates
her time at the Foundling Hospital.”

“Wouldn’t that just take the cake, her helping the orphans?”

“She would be about the right age and hails from Shropshire.
Pretty little lady with blonde hair and blue eyes. A spinster she is and
whispered to be the spurned daughter of a baron or some such.”

“I will be visiting the Foundling Hospital tomorrow and
shall make inquiries.”

As if by some secret signal known only to his relations, the
conversation wound down until only Lady Morris and Lord Piedmont were speaking.

“Dinner is served,” Olivia called out, taking advantage of
the lull in the noise level.

Gray heads swiveled, stooped bodies shifted, gnarled hands
grasped available elbows for balance as the aging aristocrats turned, shuffling
and separating much like a curtain falls away on opening night at the theater.

It seemed to the Earl of Hastings that the light spilling
from the chandelier narrowed, pooling over lined faces and sparse gray hair
before settling over the single purple feather that glinted as if sprinkled
with diamonds dust.

Lady Morris was the last to move, slowly stepping back and
turning to face the doorway, her gown making a swishing sound reminiscent of
heavy velvet over boards worn smooth under countless players’ feet.