"I shan't. I shall be going to London and I shall have Ned Coachmen with me, so you see, I shall be perfectly safe."
"London!" The housekeeper and the maid gasped in unison. None of the de Montmorencys, with the exception of Alexander's short-lived career at Oxford before he had been sent down, had traveled further than Norwich, not since 30
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Alexandra's father had won Halewood at the gaming table and brought his young bride to settle into a quiet life in rural Norfolk. Even Alexander, rackety though he was, never ventured more than fifty miles from home, preferring to throw away his blunt at local race meetings and gaming tables. In fact, he was quite often heard to say that so much time spent traveling to the metropolis was so much time wasted away from those gaming tables.
"London," Bessie reiterated, "but whatever for?" Mrs. Throckmorton, who was thankful that Bessie's role as Alex's personal servant allowed her to pose questions that her dignity as housekeeper prevented her from asking, awaited her mistress's reply as eagerly as the maid.
"Well, someone must do something to raise such a sum. After all, Papa won this estate at the gaming table. It must be possible to win it back the same way. Towards the end before he died I began to beat him regularly, so I ought to be able to succeed as well as he." The determined note in her voice warned the others that it was useless to remonstrate. Indeed, as Mrs. Throckmorton recalled the many times she had seen just that resolute set to Miss Alexandra's jaw—riding her father's hunter at a tender age, daring Alexander to swim in the lake, rescuing a litter of baby rabbits—she knew that nothing would stop her from accomplishing what she had set out to do.
"But ladies don't gamble, leastways not the way men do," Bessie protested, still unconvinced.
"Ah, but I shan't be a lady. I shall be Alexander de Montmorency, Earl of Halewood," Alex replied reassuringly. 31
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Somehow this failed to comfort her henchwomen, who stared at her in horror. "Come now, do not look so dismayed. Alexander is not known in London and I feel confident enough of my ability to pass myself off as him even in Norwich. All I need is the proper attire and
voila!"
Alex strode around the room in a perfect imitation of her brother's walk, right down to his air of braggadocio. Then, slumping over, she continued,
"Why, I can even be Alexander as we more frequently see him." She swayed perilously, glancing blearily about her as the earl did when he was castaway.
Her audience looked only slightly less anxious after this compelling performance. "Do not worry so," their mistress comforted them. "No one will have the least reason to suspect in the first place that I am not Alexander, and wearing his clothes, padded at the shoulders, I shall be Alexander de Montmorency, Earl of Halewood and hardened gamester." Alex straightened as tall as she could, tilted her head, and leered at them so rakishly that even Mrs. Throckmorton could not suppress a smile.
"But your hair, my lady," Bessie wailed.
"Will have to be cut." Alex dismissed the thick auburn tresses as cavalierly as though they were not her chief glory.
"Oh no!" The maid gasped.
"What is vanity when our livelihood is at stake," Alex exclaimed airily. "Besides, there is no one to admire them anyway and everyone at Halewood can just remember what they used to look like."
More was the pity, the maid thought to herself. It was a crying shame that a lady as striking as her mistress was kept 32
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buried in the country when by rights she should have been in London in her own clothes, winning admiration, instead of dressed in her brother's clothes trying to retrieve the money he had lost. While it was true that Lady Alexandra was not what was ordinarily considered beautiful, her attractions being quite out of the common way, she was arresting with her masses of auburn hair, her sea green eyes, and her tall, elegant figure.
Bessie wished her mistress would find a gentleman who would rescue her from the humdrum life at Halewood and take her places where she would have a chance to talk to people about all the many things that interested her, where she would hear the concerts and see the plays she read about in the
Times.
But who was there who could possibly do such a thing?
The gentry around Halewood were not so very different from Alexander, what with their hunting and drinking, though they did not gamble to the extent he did. The only two men clever enough for her mistress were Doctor Padgett, who was too old, and the vicar, who was too mousy. To be sure, whenever either one of them wished for intelligent conversation he would trump up some transparent excuse and ride over to visit Lady Alexandra, but intelligent conversation was all they had to offer and someone like her mistress needed more in a man—much more.
At last a longtime prayer of Bessie's now was being answered, or at least partially so. Her mistress
was
going to London. Unfortunately she was going as a man. Bessie sighed and looked over at the housekeeper, who was also shaking 33
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her head. The two exchanged commiserating glances and resigned themselves to the inevitable.
34
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The other person who remained to be convinced in order to insure the success of Alexandra's scheme was the doctor himself. Trevor Padgett presented a far more formidable opponent to such a harebrained idea than either of the two women and he did not bother to mince words, informing Alexandra precisely what he thought of her notion the next day when he came to look in on his patient. "I realize that you have never been the least bit cautious in your entire life, Alexandra. Times out of mind I have known you to court the most ridiculous risk—in fact, one could safely say that despite your quiet existence you always manage to tempt fate in one way or another. But this goes beyond anything you have dreamt up before. Even
you
could not do such a buffleheaded thing." Alex smiled sweetly at him as she had done so many times before when he had been called upon to remedy the consequences of some outrageous act—the broken arm, a sprained ankle caused by a stranded kitten on a weak branch, the dislocated shoulder which had ensued as she wrested a whip from a vicious tinker—oh yes. Doctor Padgett knew that smile. Apologetic it might be, but there was not a hint of capitulation in it. Like Bessie and Mrs. Throckmorton before him, he sighed and gave himself up to the inevitable. "Very well. You might as well outline what my role is to be in this ridiculous escapade."
35
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"Thank you, Doctor. I know that this is a more serious endeavor than anything I have taken on before, but I truly do not know what else to do and I will not let Althea and the children suffer from Alexander's monumental stupidity and selfishness. If it were just for myself, I should never do such a thing, but..."
"Your generous impulses will be the death of you, you know, Alexandra." The doctor shook his head gravely, but he could not help smiling.
Devoted as he was to his work, he had had no time for love and marriage. The family at Halewood had been the only one he had allowed himself to have, and Alexandra, spunky and intelligent, shouldering responsibilities that were far too much for one so young, was his favorite. When the old Earl of Halewood had died, the doctor had done his best to be there for her if she needed it. He would have gladly taken over some of her burdens but she would never accept help, no matter how frequently it was offered. In fact the only weakness she had allowed herself was to confide in him her worries about the dangerously reckless existence Alexander was pursuing. Even then she had not let him assist her in any tangible way, merely thanking him for allowing her to unburden herself every once in a while.
Trevor Padgett shook his head again. "I await your instructions, which I am sure you must have thought out long ago."
Alex had the grace to grin sheepishly. "Well, yes. I was hoping that you would oversee the transportation of Alexander to Mrs. Bates's cottage. No one has gone near 36
Lady Alex's Gamble
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there since she died. She was such a tidy housekeeper that it is in excellent condition. I shall send Bessie and Mrs. Throckmorton to air it out and prepare it for Alexander. Bessie has said she will stay with him and we shall give it out that she has accompanied me to visit Great Aunt Belinda in Brighton."
"And why do you not go to visit Great Aunt Belinda in Brighton? Ask her for some assistance instead of throwing yourself into a ridiculous escapade which has far more likelihood of ruining you than of repairing the family finances," the doctor said. Heretofore he had never heard of any relative to whom Alexandra could apply for help of any kind and he seized upon this one eagerly.
"Because for all I know. Great Aunt Belinda never existed, and if she had, I am sure she has been dead this age. Papa only spoke of her occasionally as the only one in the family who would have anything to do with him after his family disowned him."
The doctor frowned. "I still think you should apply to your father's relatives. Surely a family as rich and powerful as his could spare something to save one of its branches from ruin?"
"His family?" Alex's voice was dangerously quiet. "I would rather die than have anything to do with a family that was so desperate to punish Papa that they even broke the entail to deprive him of his birthright. They would never have anything to do with him and they certainly would have nothing to do with us now. Papa would turn over in his grave at the very thought of such a notion. Why, he even took one of the more 37
Lady Alex's Gamble
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obscure titles so that he would not appear to be connected with them."
She was her father's daughter, the doctor thought irrelevantly to himself. Standing there, her green eyes blazing, shoulders squared, she did look remarkably like the old earl—as charming a man as one could hope to meet, slow to anger, but the very devil when roused. Alex was as fiercely proud as he had been. However, the doctor would not have counted himself a true friend unless he tried his best to dissuade her from something that could be as dangerous to her person as to her reputation. He girded himself for one last attempt, though he knew it would be useless.
"His family might not have wished to recognize your father as one of them any longer or to offer assistance of any kind to him, but I wager they would give a good deal to keep the name of even a minor branch of the family from being bruited about the
ton
in the manner you propose." Alexandra's eyes flashed. "I would never stoop to such a stratagem, nor would I lift my little finger to keep their precious name from being smirched! How could you even suggest such a thing?"
The doctor smiled ruefully. She had grown up into a capable, independent young woman, more than able to act as head of the family and direct the running of the estate, but underneath she was still the same little spitfire who had confronted the rascally tinker and who had demanded a horse instead of a pony for her first riding lesson.
"Forgive me, Alexandra," he apologized, "but I had not the least intention of insulting you. However, as the only person 38
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in your life who dares offer you advice, I had to make an attempt to stop you. I know it will not do the least bit of good, but I could not live with myself if I had not at least tried. Yes, I shall make certain that Alexander is safely conveyed to Mrs. Bates's cottage, that he is cared for, and that the rest of the countryside believes he has gone to London and you to Brighton. We shall have to move him immediately and conceal the carriage for a while so that it appears he has taken it and then sent it back for your journey."
Alex was mollified by his reluctant though genuine desire to see her through in her plan, and in all fairness, she could not blame him for trying to stop her. After all, lying wide awake in bed the past several nights, even she had begun to doubt her ability to carry it all off.
While it was true that she had never been one to refuse a challenge, she had also never been foolhardy, and there were more than a few moments when she had begun to see the entire idea in just that light. However, it could not be helped. There was no other means of raising the money. Even if they were to strip the house and sell off all the paintings and furnishings, she very much doubted they could raise such a sum in so little time. Besides, then where would they be—
living in an empty shell of a house? Desperation could make even as crazy a scheme as hers seem the very essence of practicality.
Watching her closely, the doctor sensed some of the conflict that was raging within her and laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Never you mind, Alexandra. I shall see to it 39
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that they all muddle along in your absence. If Alexander should improve, which I very much doubt, I shall tie him to the bed so that he cannot make any more trouble for all of you. Never fear, you will do magnificently, as you always do." Alex smiled gratefully up at him, laying her hand on his.
"Thank you. You have always been such a good and true friend to us all. I do not know what I would have done without you."
"You would have been desperate enough for company that you would have gone looking for someone who could offer you true companionship instead of a few paltry moments of useless advice in between patients," he muttered gruffly, avoiding her gaze. Those clear green eyes fixed on him saw entirely too much sometimes, and it would never do for her to know how very much she and the children meant to him. It would ruin her confidence in the objectivity of his opinions if she knew how much he doted on them, how he longed to be a rich man so he could truly smooth away all her cares instead of just sympathizing with them.