Edith Layton (8 page)

“I prefer the nickname Nell,” she said in a reedy little voice. “No one minded me using it at home.”

“Especially not your poor dear daft mama, I suppose,” he mused. “How could she, after all? My condolences on your witless parent, by the way. I heard all about her from your new friends. But that’s odd too.” He raised his brilliant black eyes to Nell. “She wrote to my mother for years, and her letters were models of clarity. Too clear for your comfort, I imagine. Mama wasn’t terribly fond of her niece—especially after she heard about all the things wicked little Helen was doing. So though I didn’t expect it to turn out this way, I wasn’t surprised to find you were in London after I was told you’d run away from home, almost as surprised as you must have been to discover my existence. Yes,” he said as he saw Nell’s face grow pale, “your poor daft mama wrote to tell me.”

“Then why didn’t I hear about you or any letters from you?” Nell challenged him.

“Unlike my mama, I never write back. I merely send money. After all, I’ve little but blood in common with your side of the family. But there’s not a thing wrong with your mother’s mind. Except that it’s heavy with sorrow over you.”

“Well, I suppose that puts paid to my plans, don’t it?” Nell said, taking a seat. She shrugged. “Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” she murmured. “It was a good beginning, but I can make another. I’m staying in London whatever happens, but I guess I’ll have to move on now. Mama told you everything, did she?”

“Enough,” he said, watching her closely from under his eyelashes, though he kept toying with the pen. “The history of your transgressions wasn’t significant at first—at least, not to me, although they troubled her, of course. They were simple indiscretions that grew as you did. At first, petty thefts from her purse when you were a girl. Later, as you matured, rather more significant ones, of other women’s husbands, not to mention your flings with local boys and men and the scandalous friendship with that courtesan. Speaking of losing one’s wits, your notorious friend must have been the one who was doing that. It was idiotic of her to set up a knocking shop in such a small village. It was a wonder she wasn’t run out of town sooner. I heard she went to Bath and into business with an old friend there, running a doss shop for codgers.”

He looked up and smiled at Nell’s expression. “Yes, I know quite a bit. The lords in the other room aren’t the only ones who have hidden resources. They found me, but they didn’t know about Ruby. I did. The rest? I had to know exactly who I was coming to meet this evening.” He paused. “Why come to
London on your own?” he asked curiously. “Why didn’t you go to Bath with your friend Ruby? She’s doing well.”

“She wouldn’t have me,” Nell said simply. “She got jealous as a green cow when she lost her looks.”

“As well as losing a few expensive souvenirs her old flames gave her—to you, or so she claims.” He put the pen back on the inkstand and looked at her directly. “But none of it was just for the money, was it? You didn’t live in luxury, but you weren’t starving.”

She raised her eyes to his. “But I
was
starving—for fun, for excitement, for adventure. There was nothing to do but grow old and die at home. I needed the money to leave.”

“And the reason you needed all the men?”

She tilted one shoulder. “For fun.”

“You’re that enamored of the act?”

“Oh, the act. That’s like Ruby said: sometimes fun, sometimes nasty, but always good for an extra coin. It’s nice to be wanted too.” She stood up. “Are you going to shame me, have them whip me from the house? Or will you let me leave quietly on my own?”

He studied her thoughtfully for a while before he answered. “What would you do if I let you stay on?”

She studied him as intently. “Make a good connection. Then leave. There are men with more money than they can count here in London. I could end up with a fortune.”

“And some interesting diseases. Silly slut,” he said, “you were running away
to
that brothel you escaped from, weren’t you? Found it lower than you thought it would be, did you? And then you found yourself caught by another villain. But you’d have found a way to escape if Eric Ford had bought you or not. He could have saved himself a beating, poor fellow.”

She shrugged again.

He shook his head, “What a little fool. With your looks you could marry and very well. You do have that connection with Viscount Baynes, though he’d probably set the dogs on you if you tried to actually own it and visit him. Still, it is a blood connection. Times are changing. Men of station are marrying mill owners’ daughters. A woman with beauty and wit can climb high these days, and you have a real connection you could take advantage of. Why settle for being a whore, even a fancy one, when you could marry well and take lovers later if you grew bored?”

“That’s playing the whore too,” she said.

“Yes, but in acceptable fashion. Those in the
ton
can get away with anything.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Why are you telling me this? Why aren’t you crying foul and telling them out there? Come to think of it, why didn’t you tell them right off?”

“I don’t know,” he said. He put his hands behind his back and stared into the fire. “It was just a whim that became an idea. An idea that became
better with every passing moment. Truth can always be told, after all, and the bad news I had for them was better delivered in person anyway. I didn’t want to alienate such powerful people and was curious to meet them. Then tonight, when I did, I had another idea.”

He looked at her again. “I pride myself on being a good judge of people. You’re not a good woman, cousin, at least not in the moral sense. But now that I’ve met you, I don’t think you’re evil. I’d never consider this if I for one moment thought you were. You’re selfish, amoral, and incautious, but not cruel or vicious. You might distress your hosts, but you wouldn’t harm them.”

“Why should I?”

“Exactly.”

He considered her and then came to a decision. “I’ve wealth but no connections,” he said. “My side of the family was solid yeoman class until I came along. I’m the first to earn my living without working the land. Still, though my education is a huge thing in my family, to the
ton
a lawyer is nothing but an expensive servant. And I have ambitions. Intelligence isn’t enough to get a common man into the highest social circles, not even in these changing times. But if he made an advantageous connection, he could instantly change his status.”

“You could change yours by marriage, you mean.”

“That would be a good way, yes.”

She thought a moment. Her eyes widened. “It’s
Camille, isn’t it?” She laughed. “You saw her and your heart stopped? Ho! Pull the other one while you’re at it. Not that she wouldn’t be a good pick for you, mind. She’s no beauty, but she’s related to half the gentry in England and is friends with the other half. And she doesn’t give a hang for titles or convention.” She paused. “Aye, very clever, aren’t you? She’d be perfect. Not so high in the instep that she wouldn’t consider such as you, not half bad to look at actually either. Well-dowered to boot. And you could woo her if you had the excuse of having to watch over me, couldn’t you? I don’t know if I like that, though. She’s nice.”

“So am I,” he said, showing her a bright smile. “And I wouldn’t hurt her. You’re right. I’ve a fancy to court her.”

“She fancies Eric Ford.”

“And I believe he might fancy you. What could be better?”

“I don’t know if I want him or if he wants me.”

Now he shrugged. “Then don’t take him. I don’t care. I only need you to mind your manners and not get into trouble. Remember, I know the truth. But it’s your decision. You can go. Or stay, behave, and obey me.”

He let her think about that for a moment.

“Why tell me any of this?” she asked, eyeing him steadily. “Why not go on as though you didn’t know a thing about me? I wouldn’t have guessed.”

“I wondered the same myself until this very night. If I assumed ignorance of your past, I could
always pretend to be shocked if—when—you betrayed your new friends. But that would present problems, because I’ve no way of knowing how soon you’d do that. And if you nipped your new friendships in the bud, it would ruin a potentially excellent opportunity for me.”

His voice grew cool. “I need you where you are now. I imagine you want that too. But if I’m to keep my silence, you must obey my rules. They are simple enough. No stealing from your hosts or their friends or from anyone while you’re under their roof. And keep your skirts down. If not for my sake, consider your own. You don’t want to spread ill will in what well may become your new family and circle of friends. Because if you don’t make an advantageous connection, I may do it for both of us. Family is family after all. What you do with your body after I’m settled is your own affair.

“And you’re never to speak of this conversation,” he added, as he saw her thinking. “Because I’ll deny it. And I will be believed. Because I have nothing to hide. My only crime is ambition. Yours, I’m afraid, are more tangible—and prosecutable. There’s always Newgate or the Antipodes for you if you decide to try to involve me in any of your schemes. I know a lot of magistrates, Cousin Helen.”

“Cousin Nell,” she said.

“If I’m to remember that, you must forget all I’ve just said, except for the rules.” He cocked his head to the side, waiting for her answer.

She thought a moment and then lifted hers. “I accept.”

He offered her his arm. They emerged from the study. The company fell silent and looked at them.

“I’m happy and grateful for your offer on my cousin’s behalf, Lord and Lady Pelham,” Dana said. “I’ll send for her as soon as I can find suitable lodgings and a proper chaperone. But until I can get our affairs straight, I’ll be visiting Nell often, if that’s all right with you.”

He spoke to Miles and Annabelle, but his eyes were on Camille.

“That’s fine,” Miles said. “You are welcome to our house, Mr. Bartlett, any time.”

Dana smiled at Camille.

Camille smiled back at him.

E
ric’s guests were amazed when he opened the doors to his dining parlor and invited them to a light repast. They stopped on the threshold and stared.

Two sideboards on one wall groaned under the weight of the lavish feast that had been set out. There were platters of carved fowl, ham, tongue, and beef. Other dishes held shimmering moulds of galantines decorated with assorted relishes. A serving man lifted the tops off two silver tureens, sending up steamy scents of a meaty ragout and a simmering lobster stew. Across the room, a sideboard held single dishes of custards and jellies. There were trays of little cakes, as well as a cut-glass bowl of trifle piled high with cream, a bowl of
pudding, and a basket filled with out of season hothouse fruit.

“You,” Miles told Eric with wonder, “have prepared a symphony of food.”

“No,” Eric said, “I couldn’t prepare a radish. But I didn’t just bring in food from a cook shop the way most bachelors would. Do you know who’s in my kitchen right now?”

“A magician,” his sister breathed as she inhaled the savory scents.

“Almost,” he said. “Louis, the chef from my favorite restaurant in the Strand. I wanted to thank you, Bren and Rafe, for all you did for me.”

“But you have,” his sister said, bewildered. “Too many times! You sent us a crystal vase filled with hothouse roses, that pair of Venetian candelabras, tortoiseshell combs for me and a set of silver brushes for Rafe. None of which you had to do.”

“It wasn’t half enough,” Eric said seriously and then added, grinning, “But I wanted to thank you all, and this way I can have some fun too. You know how I love to eat. So take a plate and find a seat, if you please.”

They heard a moan and turned.

“Ohh,” Camille groaned, one hand on her stomach. “Your chef may be French, but I spy Duke of Buckingham Pudding! With sauce. My favorite. I can smell the ginger from here. I had dinner, I’m stuffed. But I’ll just have to force myself.”

“You mean,” her sister-in-law corrected her softly, “I’ll just have to take a taste to please you.”

“No,” Camille sighed. “It’s
Buckingham Pudding,
Belle! You take a taste, I’ll stuff myself.”

Even Belle laughed at that, and then the company descended on the treats laid out before them.

Camille couldn’t remember having a better time, and not just because of all the delicious food. She sat at the dining table beside Belle. But it was Eric himself who finally alighted on the empty chair on her other side.

“Having fun?” he asked.

Her mouth was full. Although Camille didn’t care a fig for airs and graces, she had manners, so she waited until she swallowed to answer. But she managed a grin.

“What an eloquent smile,” he commented, watching her. “Now I know why the Mona Lisa never showed her teeth. She probably had cream cake in her mouth.”

“No,” she said when she could, “it’s damson tart. And it’s heaven. I suggest you never let Louis leave your kitchen.”

“He actually didn’t prepare a thing in there,” Eric said. “There isn’t enough room. He’s only supervising the dispersal of treats. I ordered a ducal feast, but I have merely a bachelor’s kitchen.”

“Still, it was a glorious surprise,” she said, and eyeing Dana Bartlett where he stood by a sideboard talking with Nell. “A surprise on top of a surprise. What do you think of him?”

Eric didn’t ask whom she was talking about. He
glanced at Dana too. “He seems a decent fellow. The adventure turned out well, I think.”

“For her,” Camille said, “but not for you. How is your head?” She glanced away before he could meet her gaze, because she didn’t think she could keep her composure or her secret if she did. They were too close, and those hazel eyes of his were too filled with understanding. She was suddenly so stricken with his nearness she felt close to stupid tears.

She could feel the solid warmth of the man. It felt like sitting next to a banked furnace. Her nostrils fluttered. She could detect his scent: verbena, from his shaving soap, she guessed. She looked down and saw his hand holding his wineglass and had to look away again. That hand was so tanned, broad, with such long fingers and well cared for nails, that the sight of it sent shivers down to her stomach and well beyond that.

She was gazing at her plate, struggling for something to say, embarrassed because she always had something to say. He was so close she was sure if she moved a centimeter she’d touch him.

Then she felt a breeze, the slightest breath at the nape of her exposed neck. She froze, excited and thrilled. Was he daring to touch her neck? Here, in public? Or was he merely bending that noble head to whisper something to her? There would be nothing mere about it.

She raised her head.

And almost bumped noses with Dana Bartlett.

He stepped back, looking even more embarrassed than she felt.

“Excuse me,” he said at once, “I only meant to ask you a question, Miss Croft, but it’s so noisy here I bent to be sure you heard me. I’m sorry I startled you.”

“It takes a lot to startle Miss Croft,” Eric said. “She was probably afraid you were going to steal her pudding.”

Camille froze again, this time in shocked humiliation. It was a jest, she knew that. But it cut her to the quick. Not just because it might mean he thought she was greedy, but because she’d wanted so much more from him.

Dana saw the hurt that sprang to her eyes. “Whatever I might want to steal from Miss Croft,” he told Eric, without looking at him but only into Camille’s eyes, “however sweet it might be, be sure it wasn’t her dessert.”

Camille fought a ridiculous impulse to weep. It was so kind of him, and so unkind of Eric, or maybe merely thoughtless of him. But in his case thoughtlessness was as good as a slap in her face, because it wakened her to cruel reality.

“But right now, I was only going to thank you again,” Dana told her. “What you did for my cousin was noble. More than that, it was unusual. I’ve been talking to everyone about you tonight, and they all tell me that both are typical of you. My cousin was very lucky to have met you,” he said,
bending closer, lowering his voice. “I can only hope that I’ll be as lucky in our friendship too.”

She felt enormously better; her sense of humor came bubbling up again. “Oh, my!” she said, fanning herself with one hand. “I’m not used to such fulsome praise, Mr. Bartlett! But,” she added, grinning at him, “I think I could get used to it.”

“I’d sincerely like to see to that,” he said.

He was bending over her shoulder because he couldn’t sit down next to her, though his words implied that he wanted to. But there was no seat for him. Belle was still engrossed in talking to Miles, and Eric sat at Camille’s other side. Dana looked at him in an obvious silent request for his chair. After all, dinner was over, the desserts were demolished, and the guests were beginning to get up and circulate.

Now Camille turned her head to look at Eric too, because Dana’s obvious attentions made her more confident.

Eric looked from Camille to Dana and then slowly rose from his chair. As he stood, Dana straightened. Camille looked up and saw the two men take each other’s measure, literally. Eric was almost a foot taller than Dana, but oddly, the matter of inches didn’t diminish the smaller man. He was strikingly handsome in his own fashion.

Dark to bright, tall and short, the two couldn’t be more different, but, Camille thought with a shock, it almost seemed as though they were a pair of stags, measuring themselves before combat—for
her. No, not stags, she thought, more like a mighty warhorse and a sturdy pony: one huge, muscled, and combat-scarred, the other prideful, just as strong if half the size, and wily. But these two were men. And what men! They looked like an invading Viking and a defending Roman warrior, squared off to do battle for her.

She wanted to giggle. She wanted to cheer. She wanted one of them to pick her up and carry her off. That, she told herself sharply, as she fanned herself in earnest, is what came from staring at your naked self before you went into company!

It was Miles who broke the tension of the moment. He rose to his feet too. “It’s getting late,” he told Dana. “We must leave.”

“Yes,” Dana said. “So it is. Perhaps we could discuss when I could come to visit Nell.”

Eric nodded. “A good idea. Since she’s staying on with Camille until you straighten out your affairs, we wouldn’t want any conflicts of interest. I did promise to show her the town.”

Pride,
Camille thought as her heart sank,
goeth before a fall.
The greatest pity was that it stayed with her so short a time before she fell.

She hid her hurt, rose, murmured an excuse, and left the table to find someone else to talk with.

But though she spoke animatedly with the earl of Drummond and his lady, Camille eyed Dana as he stood talking with Miles and Eric. Nell’s cousin mightn’t be in Society or titled, but he was clearly
well educated, and his manners were fine. His cousin Nell might hang back shyly, but he was neither presumptuous nor timid. He didn’t act like a servant or as an equal, but exactly as he should, like a man of some means and manners who had just met them. He looked up from his conversation about Nell and, seeing Camille across the room, he smiled at her. It might not have been the smile she had been longing to see, but she lifted her chin and smiled back at him.

There was some food left after all. Eric found half a bowl of trifle under cheesecloth in the kitchen, obviously meant to be put out if necessary and just as obviously forgotten by the departed waiters. He carried it to a table and sat down. He’d said good-bye to his guests, paid the chef and the waiters he’d hired for the night, left his man Watkins to fuss over any remaining clean-up, and was now in his shirtsleeves, scrounging in his larder for something to eat. He couldn’t sleep.

“Oh, good,” a voice drawled. “More food.”

Eric looked up. His high-nosed friend, the seemingly languid, always alert earl of Drummond, stood in the doorway, watching him.

“Watkins let me in,” the slender nobleman explained. “He heard you bumbling around down here, but you didn’t hear me at the front door. Too excited by your party to go to sleep?” he asked, as he came into the room. “That’s just like my Alexan
dria. She drifts around the house like a bat half the night after we have a soiree. Do you have another spoon?”

Eric hunted through the newly washed silver and handed his friend a soupspoon. Then he sat at the table, his own spoon in hand, but only stared glumly at the trifle. “You didn’t come here to eat,” he said.

“Indeed, no, but that looks very tempting,” Drum said as he took a seat at the table too.

“Cut line,” Eric muttered.

“Very well, after some of this.” Drum dipped his spoon in the bowl and took a mouthful of trifle. “Excellent,” he sighed. “But as for my appearance here now, I wanted to speak with you and hoped you mightn’t be asleep yet. Odd, isn’t it? If you’re a guest at a party, you can go home and fall asleep the minute your head touches the pillow. But hosting changes everything. You replay the event in your head, rating, evaluating, and reliving every moment. Responsibility for something changes one’s enjoyment of it. Speaking of which…Your party was splendid. I’m not so sure about the reason for it, though. Rafe and I discussed it. Our ladies think we’re mad. They’re in raptures about the oh-so-suave Mr. Bartlett. In fact, they’re almost as taken with him as you are with his cousin Nell.”

Eric took a spoonful of trifle, brought it to his lips, and then just stared at it. “Am I?” he asked, as though he was talking to his laden spoon. “You think the party was for her?”

“Wasn’t it?”

“I had to call everyone together when I found her cousin. And so I decided to make a party of it.”

“Rafe was the one who found Bartlett, actually.”

Eric shrugged. “And when I heard about it, I asked him here. Why not? I was the one who first found her.”

“Enough,” Drum said, laying his spoon down. “Listen. I don’t go for midnight rambles anymore. I’ve a lovely big bed and a lovelier lady waiting for me in it. But I worry about you, my friend. We all do. And we wonder about little Mistress Baynes and her suave cousin. She’s charming, but her story is simply too much the stuff of Drury Lane for us. It smacks of melodrama.”

Eric looked at him. “So girls don’t get abducted off the streets in London? I’m glad to hear it. And every whore in town is happy with her trade and always willing and was from the first?” He shook his head. “A regular Eden we have here.”

“No and no,” Drum said with a trace of irritation. “And too well we all know it. In fact, when I take my seat in the House of Lords, that’s one of the first things I plan to address. London’s teeming with fallen women, and the more fool he who thinks a man doesn’t fall morally and physically alongside them every time he patronizes one. He endangers his health as well as the welfare of the woman he may profess to love. But that’s from a speech for the House of Lords, not this kitchen. It’s not what I came here to talk about.”

Drum rose and paced the room before he spoke again. “Eric,” he said, coming to a standstill beside his friend, “you’re a clever fellow, honest and true, unquestionably noble, brave as well.” Eric made a face as Drum went on, “You’re strong and wise, and we’re all proud to call you friend. And yet,” he said, holding up one finger, “you’re also vulnerable precisely because you are all those things—and maybe lonely now that all your friends are married. This Nell seems too good to be true. At least to us. All I’ve come to say is that we wish you’d wait on things until you know how true she really is.”

Now Eric’s expression was as hard as his voice. “I’d think you’d be better off giving that speech to Camille, not me.”

“True, she championed the girl from the first. But you’re the one who didn’t leave Nell’s side all night,” his friend said blandly. “Camille passed the time with her brother and sister-in-law and us.”

“Oh, did she?” Eric asked bitterly. “Then why did she seem to have Nell’s cousin grafted to her side? Or didn’t you notice? She could hardly wait for supper to be over so she could stand by him.”