In the Brief Eternal Silence (51 page)

“The door was not latched,” she said in weak
defense, “and I could hardly burst in here and tell you I had
awakened when I did not know if you could fully trust Bertie.
Sorry, Lord Tempton, I am not implying that you can not be
trusted,” she hastened to add.

“Indeed!” Bertie reassured her. “If you had
burst in, I am sure I would have had an apoplexy, so I am most
grateful. I thought I was beyond being shocked at St. James'
activities, but I did not dream of this in my wildest
imaginings.”

“Neither did I,” St. James said with perfect
dryness and Miss Murdock flushed, because of course, for once, he
had had nothing to do with her being so improper, and it had, in
fact, been her idea.

“Steven?” she asked, refusing to allow
herself to be distracted. Effington pulled a chair forward for her,
and she gave him a grateful look as she sat, but then her eyes
returned to the duke.

St. James delayed in answering her by saying
to his valet instead, “Effington, see if you can not rattle up a
change of clothes for Miss Murdock. Something dark, mind you, and
suitable for riding. And a cloak that will not draw attention to
her either.”

Effington left to do this, and Miss Murdock
had a second's wondering wherever he should find these items, and
to whence she should be riding, but then she turned her attention
back to St. James and he answered her with quiet concern. “I do not
know, Miss Murdock. Andrew and Tyler are even now searching, and
have orders not to return without him. I gather that he was not in
your room when they returned to fetch him.”

Bertie said, “I shan't ask what your
messenger boy was doing in Miss Murdock's room, by the by.”

“I would be grateful if you did not!” St.
James returned. “But what is this business of Miss Murdock and
Andrew's elopement?” he asked. “For that is what interests me
greatly. Surely, Miss Murdock, you and Andrew did not intentionally
lead my aunt to believe you had eloped?”

“Certainly not!” Miss Murdock said, very much
affronted. “Though on retrospect, I should have guessed that she
would leap to such a ridiculous conclusion. We left a note in my
room saying that I was quite disgusted with your behavior last
night,” and she paused, letting that sink in, which he infuriated
her by only grinning, “and that I was returning to my father.
Andrew, of course worried about my safety, was accompanying me,
after trying valiantly to change my mind, to no avail.”

“Well, that all seems very simple,” Bertie
admitted. “Ryan did say that Lady Lydia had told him that there was
a note left indicating they were going to Miss Murdock's home, but
she was certain it was only a red herring and that the true
destination had been Gretna Green.”

“Oh, for Heaven's sake!” Miss Murdock
exclaimed, very much irritated by Lady Lydia's penchant for the
dramatic. “I only hope that she is not busy spreading this
ludicrous tale to anyone else she comes into contact with
today.”

St. James seemed to be pondering this same
possibility and with more than the mild annoyance that Miss Murdock
felt if the frown between his brows were any indication. “That
confounded, foolish woman. She may very well have put such an iron
in the spokes—! But what else am I to believe? For Ryan can
scarcely be designated as an intimate of hers, and she saw fit to
tell him—”

But Bertie's exclamation interrupted the rest
of his thought. “Ryan, yes! Egads, St. James, but he rode out just
before noon with his destination being Miss Murdock's home. He
hoped to find Earl Larrimer and Miss Murdock there and warn them of
what Lady Lydia had concluded. It was he who suggested that I
should let you know for he feared very much that you would cause
trouble and did not want you going after them yourself, telling me
to assure you he had it all well in hand.”

“And when he arrives there, and finds no
Andrew and no Miss Murdock, he will assume the worst. Damn it!”

“Not to mention—my father!” Miss Murdock
added, beginning to feel upset. “Oh, Lord,” she fretted. “Whatever
will he think? I leave supposedly engaged to one man and elope less
than a week later with his cousin. Oh, I shall die!”

St. James glanced at her with compassion.
“Indeed, Miss Murdock, I hate to point this out to you, but your
father will not be the only one in a state of outraged shock at
this apparent activity on your part.” He lay his head back on the
top of the pillows and looked at the ceiling. “I can not fathom
what Tyler and Andrew were thinking of to involve you.”

“It was Steven that involved me, milord, and
I ran quite roughshod over Andrew and Tyler's objections, so do not
blame them. And if I had not, I remind you, you would be in a good
deal worse shape than you are now.”

He raised his head to give her a brief grin
and said, “I know that very well, Miss Murdock! But it does not
change the fact that you are in an incredible jam, far worse than I
ever intended by my little show at Almacks. And in the same fell
stroke, my aunt has managed to remove all the pressure that I had
been placing on my adversary, for they will scarcely believe that I
am about to propose to you when you have apparently already eloped
with my cousin!”

“Oh my! I had not thought of that!” she
admitted. And if she had thought his tactics deplorable, she could
still very well understand his frustration at having his plans
wrecked by a feather-headed gossip.

He swore and said, “Well, there is nothing
for it, Miss Murdock. I already knew I must get you out of my rooms
tonight, for I can not hide you here forever, however titillating
it may be for me to try,” he added.

She flushed. “Hush, milord! I haven't time
for your games now.”

“Neither do I, Miss Murdock, which I very
much regret,” he told her. “The only thing that had been worrying
me was where to then stash you.” He turned his eyes to Lord
Tempton. “Bertie, are you up to smuggling a smallish female from my
rooms tonight?”

“Of a certainty, St. James. Must admit
though, never expected to

be smuggling one out!”

To which St. James gave him a quelling
look.

“You intend for me to return home, then?”
Miss Murdock asked, trying to catch up with St. James' mind and
think of where he would logically wish her to be.

“Precisely. You are very quick, Miss
Murdock,” he said with a pleased smile. “If you are where you
stated you intended to be, and of course, neither Andrew nor Ryan
will dispute the fact that you were not there all along, it will
dispel some of Lady Lydia's tale-mongering. Assuming we can either
catch Ryan at your home or intercept him on his return to London. I
only pray he does not get it in his head to chase your phantoms all
the way to Gretna Green.

“But I fear,” he continued, looking at her
with a good deal of concern on his face that warned her she was not
going to like what he was about to add, “that in the end, it is not
going to do very much good at all, for it will be surmised that you
had attempted to elope and that one or the other of you turned
coward and that you are now merely trying to cover your
tracks.”

“Then I can see no reason for me to even
return there,” she answered. “As if my reputation is any reason to
begin with.”

He gave her a very odd, somewhat exasperated
look. “Miss Murdock,” he reminded her, “I seem to recall several
conversations with you in which you did nothing but demand to be
returned home immediately.”

“Oh, do not throw that up in my face,
milord,” she told him with impatience, much to Bertie's amusement.
“For I was trying to keep from becoming involved with. . . all of
this! Now, it is just a little too late for such squeamishness,
obviously.”

“And if you had just done as I asked, you
wretched lass, you would have been entirely oblivious and unmoved
by. . . all of this,” and he paused, “and instead would be enjoying
a very luxurious lifestyle without a care in the world.”

“Be that as it may,” she countered, her words
becoming fast and desperate, “being oblivious and unmoved is now an
impossibility, as it was very much an impossibility when you
offered me your ridiculous proposal, I may add, and what we face
now behooves me to be in London. I can not go to Chestershire when
we have no idea what has become of Steven and when you have some
wild plan of going out on an assignation tonight that may very well
end in your assassination!”

“By God!” Bertie interrupted. “I wager even
you could not say all of that three times very quickly, St.
James.”

“Oh, do shut up, Bertie,” St. James said, but
his eyes did not leave Miss Murdock's as they seemed to be locked
in some contest of wills.

Then St. James began to speak, and where Miss
Murdock's words had been very fast, his were slow and succinct.
“This rumor that you have eloped with my cousin needs to be
dispelled, and if you have no care for your reputation, I do.”

“After that display last night, milord! I
doubt it.”

“That display was to show the extent of my
total besottedness in regards to you, Miss Murdock, and was to lead
up quite nicely to our announced engagement—”

“Which I have not agreed to, and can not
foresee myself agreeing to—”

“Even if you do not, it would hardly be as
damning to you as your perceived elopement, and more damningly, an
elopement that has gone awry.” And he paused before adding in a
dangerous tone, “Unless you and my cousin decide at some point to
continue that particular charade indefinitely, which for my
cousin's sake, I would heartily advise you against doing so.”

She had no quick response to this, only sat
back in her chair feeling a good deal out of breath.

“Now,” he said, “you may rest assured that we
will find Steven, and as for this meeting I have been invited to, I
will be better prepared than I was last night.”

But she was close to tears and could not
resist interrupting again to say, “With stitches not even
twenty-four hours old, milord? And alone?”

He sighed wearily at that, earning a
sympathetic look from Bertie, before continuing with a beleaguered
air, “All of which is of no concern of yours, Miss Murdock, as I
have tried to point out to you repeatedly.”

“And I have tried to point out to you,
milord, that if you see fit to involve me, then you will suffer the
consequences of my involvement.”

“I never intended you to be involved to this
degree, you aggravating child, and Bertie, do me a kindness and
pour me a drink, for I swear I am ready to strangle her.”

“Milord!” Miss Murdock fumed. “You have no
call to be drinking with those stitches in your chest.”

“Certainly, I do, Miss Murdock, for I shall
tear them out, I am sure, if I lay hands on you, which I am tempted
to do. Bertie, damn it! Are you going to listen to me or to
her?”

Bertie still appeared to be hesitating, and
St. James tore his gold eyes away from where they had been
challenging Miss Murdock and pinned them upon his old friend.
“Really, St. James,” that man cried in defense. “You are bedridden
and she is not.”

“But she,” St. James explained with a great
deal of condescension, “does not have a pistol beneath her
pillow.”

“Ah,” Bertie said. “I quite see your point.”
He lumbered up from his seat and went to the sideboard. “I only
hope that you are willing to defend me as quickly as you are
willing to threaten me, for I have every expectation of her
throwing herself at my throat.”

And indeed, Miss Murdock was glowering at him
most intimidatingly. “You are a coward to let him frighten you,
Bertie, you know,” she told that man without mercy. “If you would
but not fetch it for him, he would be cured by the time he were
able to reach it himself.”

“Tut, Miss Murdock! St. James without his
drink is like a baby without his sugar-tit. And whoever wishes to
hear all that crying?” he asked, and he poured into not just one
glass but two, and handed one to St. James and kept the other for
himself. Before drinking, his twinkling blue eyes met hers and he
asked with perfect gentlemanliness, “Care to join us, Miss
Murdock?”

“Indeed, I do not!” she told him. But she
shook her head a little in exasperation and only ended by saying,
“You are both quite abominable, you know.”

St. James drank from his glass with every
appearance of relief, and then setting the remainder of it aside,
said more calmly, “Now, Miss Murdock, you must see that it is quite
impossible for you to remain, so please do not continue to argue
with me.”

“But my letter states quite clearly from the
start that I was going no where but my father's!” Miss Murdock
pointed out. “When Andrew appears and reassures Lady Lydia that I
am there, whether I am or not, surely she will tell everyone else
as well that she was mistaken, and it should not matter.”

“It will matter, I fear, Miss Murdock,” St.
James took pains to explain to her. “For once a scandal is begun,
it takes on a life of its own and nothing will kill it.”

“St. James knows of what he is speaking of,
Miss Murdock,” Bertie interjected with what he believed to be a
reassuring tone.

“Yes. I do,” St. James agreed, unperturbed.
“And I should know also, that if one wishes to dispel it, there is
nothing better than starting a countering rumor that is, although
more respectable, also equally as stimulating.”

Miss Murdock was not following him at all
now. She only understood that where he had been adamant in
preventing her from going home before, he was now as adamant that
she should leave. She grasped the smooth wood of her chair's arms
and turned her head to each gentleman as they discussed her problem
as if it were no more, now, than the rising and falling of the
price of grain.

“You have an idea, St. James?” Bertie
asked.

“I do. However, it will not be one to Miss
Murdock's liking.”