Amanda Scott - [Dangerous 03] (17 page)

Gideon stayed where he was until the three riders had disappeared over the rise. He had enjoyed himself enormously and wished he might repeat the experience soon, but he knew he would gain nothing if St. Merryn discovered his daughter meeting the enemy at his gate. Mount Edgcumbe would be soon enough to learn if he could stir the little termagant’s passions.

In the meantime, he enlisted Shalton and a pair of sturdy footmen to help with the chaos in the muniments room, and the four of them attacked the mess with ruthless efficiency, their labors undisturbed since Jervaulx had received word that his presence was required at once at the Abbey and had journeyed post into Gloucestershire. Though Gideon was interested only in the years shortly before his grandfather’s marriage, the records and papers dated back to the fourteenth century, and his orderly nature required that all of them be at least sorted if not catalogued. Even that much proved to be a Herculean task, but before long order began to emerge from the chaos, and he decided that when he returned from Mount Edgcumbe, he would be able to proceed with a more thorough search.

T
HE TARRANT FAMILY ACCOMPLISHED
the fifteen-mile journey to Mount Edgcumbe in four carriages, the first and most elegant one carrying Lady Ophelia, Davina, and Daintry, who occupied the forward seat with Lady Ophelia’s traveling reticule. Their maids and Charles’s valet followed in the next coach, and the enormous amount of baggage required by four members of the
beau monde
for a week’s visit to one of the county’s most fashionable houses more than filled the last two vehicles. Charles disliked being confined and had chosen, despite the threatening skies, to ride.

Rolling thunder accompanied them along the way, causing carriage horses and Charles’s mount to skitter nervously from time to time, but there were no unfortunate incidents, and the rain most generously held off until after their arrival.

The house at Mount Edgcumbe, perched on its promontory at the entrance to Plymouth Sound and surrounded by picturesque parkland, was compact and symmetrical, a golden three-story mock castle with four octagonal corner towers and a broad rectangular central tower at the front. The carriages approached it by way of its gardens. Long considered to be some of the most beautiful in England—though not at their best at this season—they were adorned with temples and a ruined folly, which loomed in turn out of the dusky gloom. Above the sound of the distant thunder could be heard the nearer sound of guns overlooking the harbor as they roared their host’s welcome to arriving guests.

From the east front, they could see across the mouth of the River Tamar to the city of Plymouth, a view touted by many but deplored by more discriminating persons who disliked gazing down upon dockyards. Daintry, who had been to Mount Edgcumbe before, enjoyed the sense of being on top of the world looking down at the ships and yachts, and she particularly enjoyed the lights of Plymouth at night. On a clear day one could see the Eddystone Light, fifteen miles out to sea, a beacon to ships entering Plymouth Harbor, as well as a warning to ships proceeding toward Southampton and London not to venture too near without care. The lamp had been lit early because of the gloom, and looking back as she followed Lady Ophelia into the hall, Daintry could see its friendly, sweeping glow in the distance.

In the lofty, candle-lit front hall, which was as large as a courtyard since it had been built two hundred years before to replace one, the sound of their heels on the tessellated marble floor echoed from the high ceiling and distant walls despite the heavy, magnificent tapestries with which the latter were hung.

Liveried servants scurried to deal with baggage while a pair of tall, handsome footmen led the way to the guest bedrooms in the east wing, one stopping to attend to Charles and Davina while the second went on with Lady Ophelia and Daintry, who were given adjoining bedchambers near the southeast tower.

Though Daintry was curious to know if Deverill had arrived, she knew better than to make a gift to any servant of information that might provide grist for the ever-active rumor mills. Moreover, it was already time to dress for dinner. If Deverill was present, she would see him soon enough.

In fact, he was practically the first person she did see when she and Lady Ophelia joined the other guests in the first-floor saloon, a noble, gilded white chamber with a high, coved ceiling and a magnificent pink and gray Axminster carpet. Judging from Deverill’s expression—and from the way he instantly detached himself from the gentleman he was speaking to—that he had been watching for her, Daintry felt a glow of satisfaction and greeted him with a smile.

“I was afraid this dismal weather might put you off,” he said, then turned guiltily to Lady Ophelia, as if he had just recalled his manners, and added, “Good evening, ma’am. I hope your journey was a pleasant one.”

“It was,” she replied, her eyes twinkling, “but if you consider this to be dismal weather for Cornwall, young man, you have been away much longer than I had thought.”

He chuckled. “I have been away a good many years, but in my own defense, let me point out that we are practically in Devon, where the weather is thought to be considerably more temperate.”

She smiled. “As a recovery, that was not too bad, but close as Devon might be, we are still in Cornwall, where they say sunny days are so few as to be worthy of underscoring in one’s journal, though I rarely bother noting the weather in mine at all. However, I daresay that having spent so many years on the Continent, you are more accustomed to sunshine than we are.”

“It was certainly warmer than England,” he said, “but here is our host bearing down upon us. There will be dancing after dinner, Lady Daintry. May I hope that you will honor me?”

“Certainly, sir,” she replied, wondering what her brother would have to say about it and deciding that Charles, loath as he was to endure dissension, would say nothing whatever, nor would he carry tales of her activities to their father.

Deverill bowed and left them as the Earl of Mount Edgcumbe approached. In his fifty-first year, he was a neat little beau and an accomplished flirt, having been a widower for twenty years. Since his hostess for these occasions was his cousin Albinia Edgcumbe, he did not hesitate to greet Lady Ophelia as if he would like to add her to his long string of conquests. They had known each other for years, and as Daintry knew, her aunt, despite her oft-expressed prejudices against the strong sex, enjoyed these encounters as much as his lordship did. Daintry came in for her own share of winks and compliments, but she was feeling charitable to all men at the moment, and did not mind.

Her pleasure in being at Mount Edgcumbe suffered a slight setback when Davina, whose opinion generally counted for little with her, met her on the way into the dining room and, as the two of them fell back to allow Lady Ophelia to precede them, pulled her to one side in the corridor and demanded to know what she meant by setting the whole company agog.

“I don’t have the least notion of what you are talking about,” Daintry replied, irritated by Davina’s air of criticism but genuinely at a loss to understand her.

“I have heard from at least four persons, including Sally, that you have set your cap for Deverill,” Davina said in an angry undertone at odds with the smile she kept pinned to her face for the benefit of passersby, “so don’t play the coy lamb with me. If you shake everyone by the ears before we have been here a day, only think what a temper your father will be in when we return!”

“Oh, pooh,” Daintry retorted, nodding at an acquaintance who passed them to enter the dining room. “He will hear nothing about it, and even if he did, he can scarcely expect me to be uncivil to Deverill. That really would cause a scandal.”

“Civil? Do you call it civil to run to him the minute you arrive and to stand talking to him, fluttering your lashes and blushing as if he had been the only man in the room? I am only glad I did not actually see you myself.”

“Well, I wish you had,” Daintry said with asperity, annoyed that anyone had described her in such a ridiculous manner. “It was nothing like that, Davina. He came to pay his respects to Aunt Ophelia when we joined everyone else before dinner. We exchanged a few comments about the weather, and then Mount Edgcumbe chased him away so he could flirt with Aunt, just as he always does. Whoever was unkind enough to speak such nonsense to you was exaggerating the situation beyond all reason.”

“Well, it was Sally, so I do not doubt that you are telling me the truth,” Davina said, stepping back as yet another group went by, “but it just goes to show, Daintry, how easily the smallest thing can be made into scandal.”

“Well, you are scarcely one to talk,” Daintry said grimly, “and nor is Lady Jersey. How anyone can call her ‘Silence’ quite astonishes me, for a greater chatterbox I do not know.” She was not on such terms with the fifth Countess of Jersey as to call her Sally like Davina did, but she had decided opinions about the woman. “Her family has provided more than its share of scandal, what with her mama eloping with her papa and her sister-in-law running to Scotland to divorce Lord Uxbridge and marry Argyll, so your precious Sally should not criticize others. She may be a great heiress and a patroness of Almack’s, but she is
not
kind.”

Davina looked swiftly around. “Merciful heavens, Daintry, do not let anyone else hear you! One fatal word from Sally and you will be sunk beyond reclaiming. Your flirting with Deverill merely amused her, for she knew him in Brussels, and of course, everyone knows all about the feud between your two families.”

“Well, if they know
all
about it, I wish someone will tell me what caused it,” Daintry said frankly, “for from all I can learn, it must have been the veriest piece of nonsense. Even Aunt Ophelia does not know how it began.”

“We must go in,” Davina said. “Nearly everyone else has done so. Charles ought to be here to escort us.” She looked around for her husband. “My goodness, there are Geoffrey and Catherine, and Susan, too. I did not know they were coming.”

Daintry had not known they were coming either, but since everyone else had been seated, and since her place was at the opposite end of the long oval table from the others, there was no more opportunity for private conversation, and she turned her attention to her dinner partner, a young man with whom she was slightly acquainted from her visit to London the previous Season.

Lady Ophelia was seated on his other side, and Deverill was across the way beside Lady Jersey, who was flirting shamelessly with him. Not that he minded. Daintry, her attention straying from her dinner partner’s cheerful discourse, could see that much easily enough. Turning back, she batted her lashes at her dinner partner, who was describing a newly purchased horse to her.

The young gentleman swallowed wrong, and for several moments was unable to speak. Finally, however, after being vigorously pounded on the back by the footman behind his chair, he recovered sufficiently to say, “Dashed if I hadn’t thought I must have offended you in some way, my lady, by talking of horses at the dinner table. Glad to know I haven’t. Beg you will honor me with a dance later. A waltz, perhaps?”

A little startled by the result of her casual flirtation, Daintry agreed at once, then glanced back at Deverill to see to her chagrin that he was amused. Lifting her chin, she shifted her gaze down the table toward her sister.

Susan looked up from her plate, and Daintry, thinking she was looking at her, smiled, but her sister stared straight ahead, her gaze unfocused. Sir Geoffrey, farther down the table, was talking with Lady Catherine, but there was nothing in that, for husbands and wives rarely were seated next to each other at such parties. Charles was flirting outrageously with Miss Haversham, whom Daintry had met in London, and Davina was behaving in much the same way with a dandified gentleman whom she also recognized but whose name she could not at the moment recall.

After dinner, the ladies retired with Albinia Edgcumbe to the crimson drawing room, leaving the gentlemen to enjoy their port and what Daintry knew they would describe as intelligent conversation. The crimson drawing room was warm and comfortable with a cheerful fire blazing in its white-marble fireplace, and Albinia Edgcumbe was a comfortable woman of Lady Ophelia’s generation who knew precisely how to involve her guests in amusing conversation. Nonetheless, Daintry noted that she was not the only one who glanced frequently at the door through which the gentlemen would come after they had imbibed enough port.

Lady Ophelia murmured under cover of the general chatter, “Do not look so impatient, my love. Sally is looking this way and is bound to misconstrue your lack of interest in this chitchat. Albinia will have made it clear to Mount Edgcumbe that he must not allow the gentlemen to linger over their wine.”

Daintry, deciding that her great-aunt knew perfectly well she was on the watch for Deverill, collected her wits and said, “I do not know what it is about that man, ma’am, but I confess, he affects me in a way that no other gentleman has ever done.”

“So I have noticed,” Lady Ophelia said dryly. “Do not distress yourself, however, for I daresay it is nothing more than the lure of forbidden fruit, which will soon pass.”

Much struck by the suggestion, Daintry wondered if it were possible that the strong attraction she felt for Deverill had its beginnings in nothing more than that. A second, even less palatable thought followed the first. “Is that why he pays heed to me, Aunt Ophelia, because I am forbidden fruit to him?”

“Very likely,” was the placid response, “though it may be no more than habit with him, you know. He was, I am told, actually a member of Lord Hill’s staff before Bonaparte escaped, and you know the sort of things they said about those young men.”

“I do,” Daintry said, her spirits sinking even more.

Thus, when the gentlemen entered a quarter-hour later, she had herself so well in hand that not even Lady Jersey, who was no doubt still watching closely, could have read anything untoward in her expression. The party adjourned soon after that for dancing in the large saloon at the rear of the house, and Daintry gladly accepted the invitation of her dinner partner for the opening set of country dances.