Gail Eastwood (3 page)

“Indeed, Lady Vivian, I am quite comfortable. I find I have almost everything a man could possibly wish for, thank you.” His words were quite unexceptional in themselves. It was the emphasis he placed on the word “almost” and the look he directed toward Venetia that made her think his reply seemed exceedingly rude. She began to wish that the other guests—indeed,
any
of the other guests—would appear quickly.

“What delights have you ladies in store for us later tonight and tomorrow?” Lord Amberton queried. He took a sip of his tea as if he had only just remembered it was there.

“I don’t know about ‘delights,’” Venetia replied, fed up with the pretense of courtesy to the fellow. “You’ll be treated to the honor of dining with His Grace this evening, and as I am sure you know, he will not suffer any sort of idiocy. I believe there is to be mutton, onion pie, and—oh, what else was on the menu, Vivian? Some more of that stringy venison we had the other night?”

Lord Amberton laughed uneasily. “Your sense of humor is well-known, Lady Venetia, ha ha. Stringy venison indeed.”

Venetia summoned her most exquisitely charming smile and turned the full force of her dramatic, dark-lashed eyes upon the poor man. “Oh, but would I jest with you about such a serious matter? Perhaps you were not aware that my father has very simple tastes.”

She paused to let her comment take effect. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Nicholas approaching. “Tomorrow I think the gentlemen are invited to go swimming while the ladies tour the park.”

“Swimming?” Lord Amberton blanched. “I—I don’t swim. Do you not think it is a bit early in the season for swimming? A—a bit cold?”

Vivian joined forces with her sister. “Oh, we do so admire hardy men.”

“As they do admire men with a fine sense of humor,” said Nicholas as he joined them. He darted a telling look at Venetia. “You may judge for yourself, Lord Amberton, my father’s ‘simple’ tastes.” With a broad sweep of his hands he called to their attention the vast expanse of building that bordered the terrace on three sides, and the gardens and park that extended in front of them as far as the eye could see.

“Yes, of course, ha ha,” responded Lord Amberton unhappily. “And swimming?”

“Is not among the plans for tomorrow, as far as I am aware. We do not generally count pneumonia as something we wish to send home with our guests.”

Venetia gave her brother a dark look as she turned back to reach for the teapot. “Not generally,” she muttered under her breath. “Tea, Nicholas? In a cup, I mean.”

“That is how I prefer it, yes, thank you.” He quirked an eyebrow at her and grinned as he reached for the cup.

As a handful of other guests began to filter out onto the terrace, Lord Amberton retreated to the safety of conversing with them. Watching him go, Venetia shook her head. “This could be the longest two weeks we’ve ever survived.”

It was a thoughtless statement, an exaggeration that she hadn’t really meant. Six years ago they had suffered through agonizing weeks that had tested them all and still gave her occasional nightmares. She regretted the words as soon as they slipped out of her mouth, but it was too late to recall them.

“I can remember worse,” Nicholas said, glancing pointedly at Vivian.

The mood between them was suddenly somber, and Vivian spoke up as if to break it.

“I am surprised that your friend Lord Cranford did not come down with you, Nicholas.”

Nicholas sipped his tea. “He is getting settled in his room. I had him put in one of the tower bedrooms. He is likely to become absorbed in studying the design of the place, but I’ve no doubt he will appear soon—Cranford is no slacker when it comes to food.”

Venetia was relieved to have the conversation move on. “He does not look as if he would have much of an appetite. His interest in architecture is far more obvious.”

“Why would you say that, Netia? There is nothing wrong with the way he looks. He is slender but he has lovely broad shoulders.”

How quickly Vivian came to Lord Cranford’s defense! Venetia looked at her in surprise and noticed that Nicholas was looking at her that way, too.

“Did I say there was anything wrong with him, Vivi? He just looks like an underfed Viking. With spectacles.”

“Do not underestimate my friend Cranford, ladies,” Nicholas cautioned. “He is likely to surprise you.”

As if on cue, Venetia’s underfed Viking appeared in the entrance to the terrace, putting an abrupt end to the discussion. Before he could join his hosts, however, he was drawn aside by a matronly woman standing at the edge of a small knot of guests. Venetia noticed that he seemed surprised to be drawn into a conversation.

“Are you pouring, my dear?”

“Oh!” Venetia realized with a start that she had utterly failed to notice the approach of Lady FitzHarris and a few other guests seeking tea. “Yes. Yes, of course, Lady FitzHarris.” She busied herself with the task of filling cups. That was easier than asking herself how she could have been so preoccupied with watching Lord Cranford.

The guests seemed to have become unusually thirsty and Venetia doled out countless cups of tea. It amused her to notice how many people failed to address her or Vivian by name, undoubtedly to be safe in case they had gotten the twins mixed up. She lost track of the minutes and was caught by surprise when she looked up into the face of the next person to discover Lord Cranford. He was smiling and observing her over the top of his small spectacles with his striking blue-green eyes—eyes she had noticed immediately when they had first been introduced in the hall. She wondered if Vivian had noticed them. There had been no time to compare impressions.

“You are very gracious to be doing the honors, Lady Venetia,” he said politely as she poured for him.

She gave him a demure smile that she thought would rival one of Vivian’s. “La, sir, are you certain you are addressing the right twin?”

He studied her for a moment before replying, and she struggled to maintain the look of innocence on her face. Then he leaned over close to her and spoke in the low voice of a conspirator.

“If you wish to pass as your sister, Lady Venetia, you would do well to disguise the look of mischief in your lovely eyes. It must give you away every time.”

His closeness and the intimate tone of his voice startled Venetia as much as his words. She felt her pulse leap and was relieved when he straightened and stepped back.

“I—I will keep that in mind, Lord Cranford.” She had to give him credit for being quite certain, even though he was dead wrong about her ability to masquerade. How surprised he would be if he knew how often she was called upon to use it. “Do you take cream? Sugar? Lemon?” She passed his cup to Vivian even though he shook his head. He had no choice but to follow it and move along down the table.

***

When his plate was fully loaded, Gilbey moved away from the table, prepared to balance his teacup precariously beside his food if anyone approached with whom he must shake hands. However, Nicholas came up to him almost immediately.

“My sister thinks you look like an underfed Viking,” the duke’s son reported. “She should only see you now.”

“Which sister?”

“Venetia.”

“I should have known.”

“Yes, and Vivian seems to be ready to leap to your defense at the slightest hint of criticism. You seem to have made an impression on both of them.”

Gilbey groaned. “That is not good, Nicholas. It would be far better if they had scarcely noticed me at all. What have I done? I’ve barely met them. I will have to try harder to be invisible. I’ll try not to engage in even polite small talk with them.”

Nicholas hardly seemed to be listening. “It certainly makes things interesting,” he said, almost to himself. He gestured toward the stone balustrade at the edge of the terrace and herded Gilbey in its direction, away from the press of other guests.

“You know, my friend, a great game is afoot.” He settled himself against the balustrade, looking out at the gardens laid out below. He waved his teacup back and forth, as if pointing out the opponents in an invisible wrestling match. “On one side is my father, determined that my sisters shall put off becoming betrothed no longer. He has decreed that they shall choose husbands from the lot of suitors at this party or forfeit their right to choose at all. On the other side you have my sisters, who have found fault with every man who has ever tried to woo them and who are highly unlikely to bend to my father’s wishes.

“I want you to know that I am not the only St. Aldwyn who can be stubborn. You are likely to witness a great clash of wills before these two weeks are finished. Throw into the balance each one of the suitors here who thinks he will win one of my sisters, and it makes for an interesting mix, don’t you think? But I confess that I had not anticipated that you might wind up in the middle of it.”

Chapter Three

The task of arranging the dinner seating was a delicate one, fraught with potential disaster. Venetia stood at one end of the vast stretch of table that had been put together in the state dining room, absently tapping the small bundle of name cards she held in one hand against the pages of the guest list she held in the other. She stared at the long rows of elegant, empty chairs in the dwindling daylight and tried to envision the guests seated at dinner.

“Hm, no, I think Lady Upcott next to Lord Whitgreave, instead of Lady Norbridge.”

Advancing to a position halfway down the table, she extracted a name card from those in her hand and exchanged the card with one already set in place on the table. “Yes, better, but then where to put Lady Norbridge?” She paced along the length of the table, studying the cards she had already put out.

She was alone. Most of the guests had obligingly gone off with Nicholas for a tour of the house after satisfying their appetites with refreshments on the terrace. She had insisted that Vivian use the opportunity to rest. The room was full of eyes, but all were unseeing, from the heraldic beasts above the chimney mantel to the plaster menagerie permanently lurking among the leaves in the sculptured ceiling cornice. As Venetia weighed matters of protocol and preference under their fixed gaze, she fought the temptation to turn everyone’s expectations topsy-turvy.

She paused when she came to the place marked
LORD CRANFORD
. She had dutifully placed him at the foot of the table, across from the voluble Colonel Hatherwick and the other unmarried viscount, Lord Newcroft. There was no avoiding the awkwardness of seating the lower-ranked men together—the absence of her aunt and cousin created the dreaded “uneven numbers” of men and women guests at the table.

Of course, much would be made of who had the good fortune to partner the twins for dinner. Venetia had changed her mind at least three times already over which of the four marquesses among their guests would have that privilege this first night.
Would it not be fascinating to see the reactions were she to put Lord Cranford beside her instead? Or perhaps beside Vivian?
Her lips quirked into a mischievous smile at the thought. Now there was a test that would quickly reveal a good deal about their guests. Dare she?

“Ah, Venetia, there you are. Blaine said we might find you here.” The breathless, high-pitched voice of her Aunt Alice, Countess of Colney, arrested Venetia’s hand in midmotion just as it reached for Lord Cranford’s place card.

Venetia withdrew her hand quickly. “Aunt Alice!” She fished momentarily for an appropriate reply. “You’ve no idea how relieved I am to see you.” That choice safely did not specify. “Did you—?”

Her question went unfinished. Lady Colney, still slim and attractive in middle age and dressed in a highly fashionable lavender silk pelisse with a bonnet to match, bustled in and quite took charge of the conversation.

“Oh yes, I’ve a very good idea, my dear. You must have been fretting terribly. Never fear, we are here at last. Never tell me you are only just now arranging your dinner seating? I can imagine you were concerned about our late arrival, but you look to be resetting the places of everyone.” Lady Colney nodded critically at the telltale group of name cards in Venetia’s hand.

The countess sighed dramatically. “If only your poor mother were here, she would have taught you better. This should have been worked out well in advance, Venetia, for tonight and for all the subsequent nights as well. Let me see the list.”

Venetia surrendered the list of names and the place cards along with it, burying her mixed feelings about her aunt’s arrival. Fine. Let Aunt Alice take the responsibility for the puzzle of seating everyone appropriately. There shouldn’t have been last-minute changes. At least there were even numbers now, not counting her father.

She dutifully bestowed a kiss upon her aunt’s cheek. “I hope you did not have a difficult journey.” Aunt Alice meant well, she had no doubt. If at times the woman failed to understand that no one could take the place of the twins’ mother, and if at times she seemed a bit overeager to play her role as hostess at Rivington, that could at least be understood and forgiven. But her total preoccupation with appearances and her attitude toward Vivian was intolerable as far as Venetia was concerned.

“We simply got off to a late start, and some of the roads were terribly muddy and slow,” Lady Colney said mournfully. “I can’t imagine what people will think of us, being so tardy! However, I dare say we are not the only latecomers?” She quickly moved on to another topic of concern. “Where is Vivian? I should have thought your sister would at least be here helping you.”

Venetia knew how to use her aunt’s conversational technique. “Vivian is resting,” she replied and then quickly changed the subject. “How is Cousin Adela? I trust she was not too fatigued from your journey? Where is she? Has she gone up to her room?”

Now that they must each make excuses for someone absent, Venetia felt they were at a draw. She doubted her aunt would still make an issue out of Vivian’s absence, at least for the moment.

The countess sniffed audibly and made a great show of examining and switching some name cards. “Adela felt she needed to rest after our long journey, which is quite understandable. Certainly she did not wish to be fatigued at dinner.”

“No, of course,” Venetia agreed graciously. “Are you not weary as well, Aunt? I can finish this, if you would prefer to be resting.”

Venetia supposed she should have known that her attempt to be civil was doomed.

“Someone has to be certain you don’t make a botch of this, Venetia. Of course I would prefer to be resting, but obviously it will have to wait until we are finished here. Where is the card for Lord Amberton? I don’t see it on the table or in the pile. His name is most definitely on the list.”

“And he is most definitely here,” Venetia replied regretfully. “Let me see. I thought I had seated him between Lady Duncross and Lady Sibbingham, to tell the truth.”

“Between two countesses? You have not seated everyone according to rank, Venetia.” Lady Colney’s cluck of disapproval was too breathless to sound very much like a hen’s.

Venetia and her aunt were too busy hunting for the missing name card to notice when Vivian slipped into the room.

“Aunt Alice, you’re here! Is that my sister under the table? What in heaven’s name are you two doing?”

“Ouch! Dash it!” Startled by her twin’s voice, Venetia forgot where she was for just long enough to crack her head against the underside of the table as she attempted to straighten up. More annoyed than hurt, she backed out and rubbed the stricken spot as she held out the missing name card. “Here, he was on the floor.”

“Who?”

“Good afternoon, Vivian. Your sister somehow misplaced Lord Amberton,” Lady Colney said without any welcoming warmth in her voice. “I can just imagine how the poor man would have felt at dinner.”

“We’re so glad you arrived safely, Aunt. We were beginning to worry!” Vivian replied.

“Were you?” The countess softened visibly. “Well, ahem, we were just a bit delayed, that is all. I’m glad I arrived just in time to sort this all out.” She waved a hand vaguely at the table.

Venetia and Vivian exchanged a glance.

“I trust you are not ill, Vivian?”

“Not at all, Aunt Alice. I was only resting. Shall I help?”

Lady Colney looked from one twin to the other as if weighing the question carefully. Finally she said, “I suppose it will save me from walking miles up and down and around this table if you two would get on the other side and help to place the cards where I tell you. To start with, I think Lord Amberton should sit next to you, Venetia.”

It was only when they had finally arranged all the seating to their aunt’s satisfaction that the twins had a moment to themselves. As the countess departed with a rustling of silk, Vivian whispered, “Did you lose Lord Amberton on purpose, Netia?”

“No, I swear I did not.” Peeking out of the doorway to make sure her aunt was gone, she added, “But I’ll tell you, I am not sitting next to him at dinner.” She returned to the table and deftly switched his name card with that of her brother two seats away.

“I would much rather suffer Nicholas for my partner, to tell the truth!”

“I am partnered with Lord Ashurst,” Vivian said. “I know nothing at all about him.”

“Well, that means you shall have something to talk about during dinner, at least.”

“I noticed that Lord Cranford is near the end, next to Cousin Adela, and across from Georgina Whitgreave.” Vivian did not try to mask her disappointment.

“Aunt Alice switched things about so that he is partnering Lady FitzHarris,” Venetia said with a sigh. They would have to try out other arrangements on another night. “Come, let us escape upstairs before Nicholas’s touring group comes upon us here. I don’t want to hear him pontificate about the ceiling paintings or the ‘original carved chimneypiece dating from 1590.”

“It might be enlightening to see if the members of the group are interested. We know so little about most of them. Although ’tis clear one of them considers himself a poet.” Vivian fumbled for a moment at her belt. Smiling, she withdrew a small folded piece of paper and handed it to her sister. “I found this slipped under the door of our sitting room.”

Venetia held it up to the pale light still coming in the window. “‘N’er did Venus shine so fair / As two stars here residing / Twin suns whose shining golden hair / Lights hearts with love abiding,’” she read, wrinkling her nose. “‘Would that Venus had her twin! / What double glory might have been! / Love’s own beauteous face as two / But still no fairer than are you.’ Good heavens! It goes on for four verses! Who could have written this?” She turned it over. “It isn’t signed.”

“Yes, I noticed,” Vivian answered. “It seems we have a mystery to solve during dinner.”

***

The St. Aldwyns gathered with all their guests in the long drawing room before proceeding in to dinner. The Duke of Roxley finally appeared to greet everyone, and all seemed to be going smoothly. Quite improperly Venetia managed at the last minute to go in on her brother’s arm, and it was only when they reached the table that she discovered she had been outmaneuvered. Lord Amberton’s name card sat at the place just to her left, and Nicholas’s was once again two seats away.

Unfortunately, there was nothing she could do about it now. When could Aunt Alice have switched the cards back? As Venetia took her place, she noticed that although Nicholas was partnering the Countess of Sibbingham, he was across the table from Lord and Lady Marchthorpe’s daughter, Lady Elizabeth. She had a sudden suspicion that the culprit might not have been her aunt at all.

The twins’ father sat at the head, looking distinguished in a splendid dinner coat of darkest maroon velvet set off by his snowy linen and a waistcoat of embroidered ivory satin jacquard. He was a handsome man, with deeply etched features and a thick crop of white hair. He surveyed the table and his guests with the air of a benign ruler.

Venetia surveyed the guests as well, wondering who among them might be the anonymous poet. Her feelings were undoubtedly less benign than her father’s, but she hoped that her fixed smile hid them. She noticed with some small sense of satisfaction that even Aunt Alice had not followed the rules of rank to perfection.

The amiable Duke and Duchess of Brancaster quite properly flanked her father, with the duchess seated on his right as the highest-ranking lady present. Below them Lady Elizabeth’s parents, the very proper Lord and Lady Marchthorpe, sat across from each other, but this meant that the marquess and marchioness were placed above the proud Duke of Thornborough. Then Aunt Alice had risked offending the other countesses in the group by seating Lady Duncross, an elderly Scottish countess who was friendly with the duke, above her station across from him.

As a widower, His Grace was a potential suitor for the twins. Would the old duke dabble in anonymous poetry? Venetia doubted it. Thornborough was notoriously high in the instep. He would never fail to put his name on some creation of his, and he probably thought writing poetry quite beneath him.

The Marquess of Ashurst, Vivian’s partner, was seated below Lady Duncross and directly across from Venetia. She studied him with surreptitious glances as the meal began. He was undeniably handsome, with dark hair and shaggy dark brows over deep-set eyes, but he said little and did not seem to smile easily. He was reputed to be cynical and unsociable. Would such a man indulge in poetry?

The warm, mouth-watering scent of shrimp bisque penetrated to Venetia’s brain and she paused to take a spoonful of her soup before continuing her scrutiny of the guests. So far, none had made any comments that might link them to the poem, either in the drawing room or at the table.

On Vivian’s right was Lord Wistowe, whose notorious reputation as a rake made Venetia wonder what her father had been thinking to include him on the list. He had the kind of roguish good looks and angelic smile that she could imagine many ladies found irresistible. He was behaving quite charmingly to his partner, Lady Elizabeth. Nicholas seemed to be watching them rather carefully, although he was not noticeably neglectful of his own partner.

Venetia let her gaze wander past the many other guests until it came to rest on Lord Cranford at the far end of the table. He was dutifully assisting their neighbor Lady FitzHarris, a widowed baroness who had been invited to help make up the numbers. The viscount turned his attention to the twins’ cousin Adela on his other side whenever she made a remark, and appeared to listen politely to Lord and Lady Whitgreave’s daughter Georgina opposite him, but Venetia thought she could discern a lack of enthusiasm. Colonel Hatherwick seemed to be carrying the conversation. Most of the time Lord Cranford appeared to be busily studying either the dishes in front of him or the splendid mural panels that covered the walls and ceiling.

Could the viscount have written the anonymous poem? Judging by his arrival, he was the bookish sort, but the author of the poem was also clearly a romantic. Was he? He certainly did not impress her as being so. If the poet was not Lord Cranford, then who? She allowed her glance to stray from one guest to another, weighing what she knew of each of them, hoping that her speculations did not show on her face.