A Winter Scandal (16 page)

“A challenge? You mean to a duel?”

He nodded casually, as if duels were an ordinary part of one’s day. “But Myles kept it from going forward. I haven’t talked to Rawdon since.”

“I am sorry. It must have all been very difficult for you.”

His gaze was bleak as he said, “I lost my sister and at the same time I lost my best friend.” He shrugged. “But how I felt wasn’t really important. All I cared about was finding Jocelyn. But she had disappeared completely. She never wrote to tell us that she was all right or to explain why she had left. It is like living in limbo, not knowing whether someone is alive or dead, half the time angry with them for leaving you in ignorance, the other half grieving for them. The more time passed, the more I believed she must have passed on.”

Thea’s heart squeezed in sympathy. “And then I found Matthew.”

He nodded. “Now I have hope. When I saw that brooch, for the first time in a long time I thought I would see Jocelyn again. I thought maybe she was waiting to see what I would do, that she feared I might reject her and the child. So I hoped that she would be nearby, that if I looked for her, I would find her. But now …” Gabriel sighed. “It seems clear she does not want me to find her. She was careful to stay at a distance, to bring the baby to Chesley only to leave him. Jocelyn—or whoever left Matthew—seems to be rather adept at keeping out of sight. I think I shall write to my businessman in London, get him to hire a runner to look into it. I am, frankly, a little at a loss here.”

“What about Matthew?”

“There is scarcely anything I can do but provide for him, is there? If there is the slightest chance that he is Jocelyn’s child, I cannot turn him away.” Gabriel smiled faintly. “And he is rather engaging, isn’t he?”

Thea thought of the baby’s sunny smile, the silky texture of his curls, the way he fell asleep so trustingly in her arms, and her heart melted all over again. “Yes. He is very engaging.”

“Perhaps our time would be better spent making a home for Matthew.” He glanced at her. “I should not say
our,
should I? You may not wish to help me. I need to make the Priory inhabitable for an infant—hire a staff, get a housekeeper, reassure everyone that I am not operating a house of ill repute. And, well, whatever else needs to be done. I fear I am woefully ignorant. That is a good deal to ask of you, I know—”

“Don’t worry about that,” Thea assured him quickly. “I should be very glad to help you. Is there a nursery area in the Priory?”

He looked at her blankly. “I’m not sure. I don’t remember seeing a room with a cradle. I haven’t the slightest notion how to get a cradle, either.”

“There might be something you could use in the attic, at least temporarily. Tom Bryson is a good woodworker; he could probably make you one.”

“Perhaps you could go through the place with me, see what we have, where to put the bed, what we need to do to put everything in order for a baby.”

Thea knew that she ought to refuse. It would not be proper for a single woman to call at the Priory with only single young men in residence. It had been bad enough to do so the other afternoon when she had impulsively stormed over to confront Gabriel. But to plan to go there, to do it with the full realization of what she was doing, was truly flouting convention. She must tell him no.

“I would be pleased to,” Thea said.

Nine

T
he next morning Thea took
the baby and went to call at Damaris’s house, where she persuaded her friend to accompany her on a visit to the Priory. While it would be a bit out of the ordinary for them to do so, the presence of a baby and a widow would provide enough mundane respectability to keep from spelling doom for Thea’s reputation.

They drove to the Priory in Damaris’s stylish enclosed carriage, which made the ride warm and pleasant despite the gloomy gray winter day, and Thea regaled Damaris with descriptions of the preparations for the living Nativity scene.

“We shall have our final rehearsal this evening, with costumes and all.”

“And how is Amelia Cliffe?”

Thea closed her eyes as if in pain. “Hopefully she will suffer enough stage fright that she will not giggle. As long as she is still and silent, it will all go off smoothly enough. But it has been difficult to convince her that Mary should be gazing down at her child in wonder rather than staring all around to spy her family and friends. Poor Mr. Millwood is determinedly long-suffering.”

“That seems apt enough for Joseph.”

“Yes. And while Jem’s collie may be somewhat unrealistic in the manger scene, Jem assures me that he is necessary to keep the sheep in their place. Fortunately the cow is quite placid and has no tendency to wander off.”

Damaris laughed. “Is it worth it?”

“Oh, yes. When it is over, all the arguments and mistakes will be forgotten. Everyone will remember it as absolutely perfect. They missed it the years we did not have one. Father found them rather frivolous, but Daniel is quite happy to have one, and the parishioners enjoy it. It is, after all, a celebration; people should have fun.”

“Of course they should. And you, I think, should qualify for sainthood for doing all the work to make it happen.”

“I would not go that far. Thank goodness Mrs. Cliffe has a whole brood of girls, so we will have an undisputed Mary for a few more years. At least everyone acknowledges that the Squire’s daughters should be first in line for that honor.”

“I had not expected the Christmas season in Chesley to be so lively,” Damaris said. “Did I tell you that I have decided to give a Twelfth Night party?”

“Really? A masque ball?” Thea looked at her friend with interest. Thea supposed it was telling that she enjoyed masques as much as she did, but something about donning the elegantly decorated masks was deliciously freeing, especially on Twelfth Night, when one could play a role.

Damaris nodded. “I know we are not a large society here, but don’t you think it would be fun? I ordered a set of character cards from the stationer’s last time I was in Cheltenham.”

“Yes, indeed. I have never attended one with an actual stationer’s set of cards, only homemade ones—you shall think us sadly provincial, I know.”

“Don’t be silly. I have made do many times with ones I lettered myself.” Damaris smiled. “I plan to open up the doors between the drawing room and the music room to create enough space for dancing. I shall have cards in the library, which should satisfy Squire Cliffe and the Colonel.”

“It sounds delightful.”

They were soon at the Priory. The footman who answered the door was better trained than the one Thea had encountered when she came here before, and he took their coats and bonnets with quick efficiency before showing them to a sitting room that was much smaller and more comfortably furnished than the half-empty great hall Thea had visited last time. Still, she noted, many of the softer, more elegant touches that bespoke a woman’s hand were missing.

Gabriel was seated at a table near the window, paper and ink in front of him, and he looked up when the footman announced the women. A smile began in his eyes, warming their dark depths, before it spread to his lips. He rose and started forward. “Miss Bainbridge. And Mrs. Howard. I am pleased to see you.”

He bowed formally to the women, keeping his voice grave, but he found it difficult to maintain his formal demeanor when the baby let out a happy crow at seeing him and held out his hands. Gabriel laughed and took Matthew from Thea, lifting him up in the air.

“And how are you, young man?” He jiggled the boy above his head, and Matthew erupted with gales of laughter. Gabriel lowered him, tucking him into the crook of his elbow.

Across the room Thea’s cousin had stopped in his lazy tossing of the dice with another young man and was staring at Gabriel in astonishment, as was the man opposite him. A third man was seated on the other side of the table where Gabriel had been sitting, obviously in the midst of cleaning a gun, with rags and various implements lying beside a disassembled pistol on the table before him. Gabriel introduced his friends, and the other men bowed in polite greeting, but only Sir Myles came forward to look at the baby.

“I believe I have not been formerly introduced to this young man.” He reached out a playful hand to the baby.

“This is Matthew,” Gabriel told him.

“Matthew. An excellent name,” Myles said as Matthew wrapped one of his pudgy little fists around Myles’s finger. “I can see that you and I are going to be fast friends.”

“Miss Bainbridge has kindly offered to help me get my household in order,” Gabriel said, guiding the group back toward the sofas and chairs that centered the room. “Make it habitable for a baby.”

“You mean, you’re bringing him here?” Alan’s voice rose, panic-stricken.

“Not just yet,” Gabriel temporized. “We need to do some things first.”

“What do you mean?” Alan glanced around vaguely.

“Add some rugs, I should imagine.” Gabriel nodded toward the floor, where a rather faded Persian rug lay under the central seating group of furniture. “The great hall hasn’t any, and there’s not enough in here, either. Not very good for a baby to crawl on, especially when it’s cold.”

The talk turned to a discussion of such things as housekeepers and maids, the state of the rugs in the house, the presence or lack of a nursery, and the possibility of such items as toys, cradles, and child chairs in the attic. Alan’s face grew more alarmed with each statement, and Ian kept shooting sidelong glances at Matthew, who was sitting in Gabriel’s lap and leaning over to chew on the arm of the chair. The only one of the men who seemed at ease was Sir Myles, who divided his time between flirting with Damaris and entertaining the baby by dangling his watch on its chain.

Damaris offered Gabriel the services of her housekeeper in hiring a housekeeper and maids, then followed it with an invitation to all the men to attend her Twelfth Night ball. Gabriel and Sir Myles were quick to accept the invitation, though Thea thought that neither her cousin nor Mr. Carmichael seemed nearly as eager. She suspected that they were rather disgruntled at having their weeks of unfettered male activity infringed upon by the arrival of a baby … not to mention two interfering females.

When Gabriel suggested that the two ladies might look about the place to give him ideas as to what should be done, Sir Myles was quick to offer to show Mrs. Howard about the kitchens and serving area downstairs, and when Matthew let out a wail of displeasure at seeing the shiny watch he had been reaching for suddenly removed from his sight, Myles good-humoredly scooped him up and took him along.

Gabriel smiled and turned to Thea. “Myles is obviously charmed. I cannot decide if he is more taken with Mrs. Howard or the baby. Shall we go up and try to locate the nursery?” He turned toward the other men. “I assume you would prefer to stay here with your game?”

Alan nodded mutely, still looking faintly confused.

Ian frowned, saying, “The devil, Gabe! Surely you don’t really mean to do this …”

Gabriel stiffened almost imperceptibly. “I am not usually given to saying one thing and doing another.”

“Of course not. I didn’t mean that. It’s just—I am not sure you’ve really thought this through.” Ian glanced at Thea. “Cousin Althea, you must know some worthy group who takes in abandoned infants. A church society or such.”

Before Thea could respond, Gabriel said, “We’re talking about my blood here.”

“You don’t know that,” Ian retorted. “You know nothing about the child. He doesn’t even resemble you.”

“I know who he looks like.” Gabriel’s voice was as brittle as glass now, and his face was as unyielding.

“Of course. Not my place, needless to say.” Ian backed off quickly, giving a shrug and moving away from them.

Gabriel offered Thea his arm, and they left the room. His arm was like iron beneath her hand. She was not sure what to say, so she said nothing as they climbed the stairs. At the top of the staircase, they turned, and Gabriel glanced out the window toward the drive in front of the house. He stopped abruptly and strode over to the window.

“Bloody hell!”

“Gabriel?” Thea’s heart turned cold at the expression on his face. His eyes were black and hard as stone, his face set in lines of fury. He looked, she thought, ready to kill. She took a step toward him. “What is it?”

He did not answer, merely whirled and ran back down the stairs. Thea hurried after him. They had gotten halfway down the stairs when there was a thunderous knock on the front door. The footman sprang to answer it, opening the door to reveal a tall man whose broad shoulders in the caped topcoat seemed to fill the entrance.

The man barged in, rudely shoving past the footman. He swept off his hat and thrust it at the astonished servant, saying peremptorily, “Where is she? I am not leaving until she speaks to me.”

The visitor had a lean, angular face. His cheekbones were soaring and sharp, his nose narrow, with a small outward bump toward the top, as if it had been broken. His mouth, above the square, ungiving chin, was a straight line. The eyes beneath the ridge of his brow were a pale, startling blue, and the hair that fell around his face was a trifle longer and shaggier than was entirely fashionable, and of a blond shade so light it looked almost white in the light through the open door. He appeared sculpted from stone and removed from emotion, his pale, aristocratic face revealing no sign of what he felt.

“Rawdon!” Gabriel growled, and rushed down the remaining steps and across the entry, throwing himself at the man.

They slammed back into the opened door, which crashed into the wall under their weight. Thea winced at the loud crack that sounded as Rawdon’s head hit the wood, but he was clearly not stunned for long, for he shoved back hard against Gabriel. They staggered, barely missing the astonished footman, who quickly shut the outer door before retreating to the farthest corner of the room.

The two men reeled around the entryway, knocking over a chair and bouncing into the walls as they grappled and punched. Gabriel landed a flush hit to the other man’s jaw, and Rawdon fell back against a narrow table against the wall, knocking over a tall candlestick and sending it rolling off onto the floor. Gabriel pounced on him, but the other man slid to the side, quick and lithe as a cat, and brought up his hands to latch onto Gabriel’s jacket and pull Gabriel with him as he fell to the floor.

“Stop!” Thea cried, appalled. She whirled toward Ian and Alan, who had come running from the sitting room at the crash and now stood, tankards in hand, watching the fight. “You have to stop them.”

Alan cast her a derisive glance. “You must be mad! More than my life’s worth to get between those two.”

Thea stared at him. “You can’t be serious! Cousin Ian?”

Lord Wofford gave a little shrug. “Carmichael’s right. Might as well try to stop a runaway horse.” He turned toward Alan. “I’ll put a gold boy on Gabriel. Rawdon’s gloves soften his hits.”

“Done. Gabe’s a bruiser, but I’d never take anyone in a mill over Rawdon. Man never gives in.”

“You’re
betting
on them?” Thea’s own temper spiked, and she reached out and grabbed the large tankard from Ian’s hand.

“What the—” Ian stared, astonished, as Thea marched across to where the two men were rolling across the floor, punching and wrestling.

“Stop that this instant!” she ordered, and flung the contents of the tankard squarely into their faces.

They broke apart, spluttering and gasping. She had hit Gabriel more fully in the face, and he rolled away, his hands going to his eyes. Rawdon, who had caught the ale more on the side of his face and head, pushed back his wet hair and staggered to his feet, not even glancing toward her as he started toward Gabriel again.

Thea dropped the tankard and swooped up the tall candlestick that had fallen to the floor earlier. The fat candle atop it had broken and fallen off when it hit the floor, leaving the sharply pointed end naked. She stepped in front of Gabriel, lying on the floor, and faced his opponent, the long candlestick thrust out toward him threateningly.

“Stop right there!”

The blond man halted abruptly, staring at her. “Who the devil are you? Get out of my way.”

“I am Althea Bainbridge, and I am not moving until the two of you stop behaving like wild animals.”

He blinked at her, nonplussed. One side of his hair was wet and plastered to his skull, and the liquid had dripped down his neck and spotted his coat. A raw, reddish patch spread along his high cheekbone, and his lip was cut, a thin line of blood trickling down from it. And still he managed to look haughty and aristocratic.

Behind Thea, Gabriel rose to his feet, cursing. “Bloody hell! My eyes! What the devil did you throw on me?”

“Whatever was in Cousin Ian’s tankard. Ale, I assume.”

“Did you have to use something that stings?”

Rawdon’s lip curled. “Oh, stop whining, Morecombe. No doubt she was merely trying to save you from your own wretched judgment.” He flicked a cool glance toward Gabriel, then turned the full force of his ice-blue eyes back on Thea. With a stiff nod that managed to in no way lessen the arrogance of his demeanor, he said, “I apologize for disturbing your peace, ma’am.”

Thea had no idea what to say in reply, but at that moment a voice sounded from the hallway behind them. “Hallo, Alec.”

Lord Rawdon glanced past Thea and Gabriel to where Sir Myles now stood with Damaris, who was holding Matthew. Rawdon nodded. “Myles.” His gaze slid over to Ian and Alan. “Wofford. Carmichael. Gathered for Christmas, I take it.”