Martha Schroeder (10 page)

“Tell Lady Amelia what I said, and that it is Gideon’s advice as well as mine.” He looked at Jane soberly for a moment. “There are threats to the rich and wellborn, you know, not just to the poor. Amelia may be in danger.”

“Do you think she is?” Jane asked bluntly.

“Gideon does, and over the years I have learned to trust his instincts.”

“She saved his life. If the sun were too strong on her face, Gideon would shoot it out of the sky if he could.” How absurd all that emotion was! her smile said.

“Just deliver the message if you would. Knowing the lady, I am sure she will ignore it and continue to conduct her life exactly as she chooses, but I am duty bound to convey it.”

They stood slightly closer together than propriety decreed, neither of them aware of anything but the tension between them. He had better leave. This was no place, and she was no woman, for the heir to a marquessate, no matter how reluctant the heir might be. Sir Richard took her hand. “Good afternoon, Miss Forrester.”

“Sir Richard.” With queenly disdain she inclined her head. “I will tell Amelia when she returns.”

* * * *

Eustace was still certain that if he could just play long enough, he would come about. He had secretly pawned two elaborate silver candlesticks, Doncaster family heirlooms, for enough guineas to stake him to a game at one of the lesser hells where he was not known.

Like all confirmed gamblers, Eustace was sure he couldn’t lose. But the cards continued to favor other players. He looked around at the others in the room. A young man who announced he had been sent down from Oxford, a sleek-looking article Eustace knew for a Captain Sharp, and an older gentleman in outdated clothes whom Eustace instantly decided was a lamb for the fleecing.

He introduced himself as “Mr. Mannering,” and asked the gentleman, whose name was Undershaw, if he would care to play piquet.

“Why, yes, indeed I would sir,” the gray-haired Undershaw replied with a frank smile. “ ‘Tis my favorite game. I am accounted quite a dab hand at home in West Runton.”

Eustace gave his rustic friend his very best smile and sat down, ready to win enough to keep the wolf from the door for a few more weeks at least.

An hour later when he arose, his money was gone. To add insult to injury, Mr. Undershaw refused to accept his vowels, saying that such things were not done among friends in West Runton.

“Damn West Runton!” Eustace burst out. “Are you telling me you will not accept my promise to pay a debt of honor? You insult me, sir!”

Suddenly Mr. Undershaw’s eyes did not seem quite so guileless. “I shan’t be here in two days’ time. Your Grace. Can you pay up by then?”

Eustace stared at him. This was no country flat. Undershaw knew his title—and his reputation. “Never mind,” Eustace said abruptly. “I have played enough.” As he shrugged into his greatcoat, ready to brave the December cold, he chanced to look back into the room. He saw Captain Sharp and Mr. Undershaw grinning at each other as they stood in close companionship in front of the fire. Fellow sharps! He had been taken by the oldest trick of all. Seeking to avoid one professional gambler, he had fallen victim to his partner.

Eustace slammed the door as he left. As he stalked down the street, he angrily thought that losing tonight was another misfortune to be laid at his damned cousin’s door. The time to act had arrived.

But what to do and how to do it? Never one to think strategically, Eustace found himself without a plan. His steps slowed as he cudgeled his brains. When he chanced to look around, he could see someone behind him, a man who was hurrying toward him. Damn! He had no money, but he might have a very bad time before he could convince this thief of the truth of that.

“’Old ’ard, Yer Grace!”

“Blakeley!”

“None other. ‘Ow about ‘avin’ a glass wiv me?”

Blakely’s sharp fox  face wore a thin, avaricious smile. His look was far from friendly, but Eustace badly wanted a drink. Ungraciously he accepted the invitation.

Once seated at a nearby tavern where Blakeley appeared to be well-known, Eustace decided to lay his problem on his companion’s shoulders. After all, he was the one who wanted to be paid. Let him work for his money!

Before he could speak, Blakeley said, “When are you fixin’ to get riveted to yer pretty cousin?”

“She won’t have me,” Eustace said, and swallowed his brandy in one swallow. “Damned awful stuff, Blakeley! Can’t your friend get any better drink than this?”

“Not for them as aren’t payin’. Now, let’s talk of ’ow yer goin’ to get the lady to see it yer way. A ’op to Gretna mayhap?”

“I am not going to spend days shut up in a carriage with Amelia.” Eustace shuddered. “She was a dreadful hoyden as a child. She would spend the entire time telling me of my sins. She might actually fight to escape.”

He sighed. Marrying Amelia was going to cause him a great deal of trouble, and trouble was something Eustace tried to avoid at all costs. Hortense dealt with the realities of life for him, and he took the easy way out of every situation. Now he was faced with an impasse—if he didn’t act, terrible things would happen; if he did, he would have to deal with Amelia forever.

“Yer ’ouse in the country,” Blakeley said. “ ’Ow far away is it?”

“Not far. Several hours’ drive only.” Eustace brightened. “Do you think we could take her there?”

“Not ‘we.’ Me. You stay in London until she’s safely ’id. Then you tell every bleedin’ person you know that you and ’er ladyship is spending the ’oliday season together. Real cozy time.”

Eustace looked at the tall, cadaverous man with admiration. “All right. But what about my mother?”

Blakeley looked at him with what might have been scorn— but was not of course. Moneylenders did not scorn peers of the realm. “Tell ’er to stay ’ere and go to parties. Or tell ’er the truth. Just be sure the world knows you and yer lady cousin are there and yer ma’s ’ere.”

For a moment Eustace toyed with the idea of emigrating and leaving the title and his debts behind. One look at Blakeley’s eyes changed his mind. He had a feeling that he would not be safe from the man no matter where he went.

“Very well. Better do it soon. We’ve only two weeks before Christmas.” He had already turned the problem over to Blakeley.

“Once yer there, it’s up to you, Yer Grace.” There was a threat in every word. “We ’ad better see a marriage announcement by Boxin’ Day.”

“Yes, yes, you will.” Eustace tried to back away from the cold light in those dead-looking eyes.

“ ’Acos if we don’t...”

Eustace waited, but Blakeley said nothing more. Eustace could feel himself begin to shake. He would persuade Amelia. He had to.

* * * *

Amelia went to take tea at Lady Maltby’s with several old cronies of her father’s, hoping as always to detach them from some of their fortunes to aid her charities.

As she left, she looked around for a hackney. When she saw the familiar carriage with the Doncaster crest on the door panel begin to slow to a stop beside her, she smiled. What good fortune that Cousin Hortense should happen along at this moment.

She was taken completely unawares when a strange groom hopped down and opened the door for her. Some sense of danger made her hesitate, and the man lifted her by her elbows and flung her into the coach. She landed on her hands and knees on the floor as the vehicle took off at a spanking pace.

“ Afternoon, yer ladyship.” An unfamiliar voice. Before she could respond, someone held her nose and a sharp tasting drink was poured down her throat. Sputtering and coughing, she struck out blindly. She knew a brief moment of satisfaction when her foot made sharp contact with some part of someone’s body and she heard a grunt of pain. Then darkness descended, and she lost consciousness.

She knew immediately she was no longer in the carriage when she awoke. Her head ached abominably, and she had a raging thirst. Her mouth was so dry she could hardly swallow. She shivered and became aware that her dress had been removed and she was wearing her petticoats and camisole and stockings. Her shoes were gone. The room in which she found herself was dark. Still, her body was free, though she was in a prison of some sort.

Dizziness overcame her, and abruptly she slid down to the floor. Drawing her knees up, she rested her head on them and tried not to let terror swamp her. She bit her lip hard and clenched her fists until she could feel the sharp sting of her fingernails in the skin of her palms. The tiny pains seemed to help clear her head, but fear still beat like a wild thing at her mind. She refused to let it in. Gideon never said that he was afraid when he’d run away from the fighting man and lived on the streets or when he’d gone into battle, but she’d always known he had felt it. Yet he had never given in to it. He had conquered it, and she could, too. He would expect it of her.

She took a deep breath and tried to slow her heartbeat. In, out, deeply and slowly. Thinking of Gideon, she could feel some of his courage flowing into her. It was almost as if she could hear his voice. Whether it was the thought of Gideon or the act of breathing itself, Amelia found her panic ebbing.

She tried to think. Eustace was the only person she could think of with reason to kidnap her, but the voice she’d heard in the carriage sounded rough and slum-bred. Where would Eustace go to rind someone like that? He would take no chances himself—he was much too great a coward. The
only reason for him to take such desperate action was to force her to marry him. If they were on their way to Scotland, she could not understand why they had stopped. Surely it would be hard to force an unwilling woman in and out of a carriage even on the road to Scotland. So if not a kidnapping disguised as an elopement, what was it? Why was she traveling with an unknown ruffian instead of her despicable cousin?

She tried but could think no further. Her
head was pounding, and her thoughts seemed to be coming from inside a reverberating drum. She closed her eyes and rested her cheek on her knee. For a few minutes, she dozed sitting upright on the floor. Even that short nap did her good, reducing her headache and the lassitude in her limbs.

Yawning and stretching, she stood and looked around. Slowly her eyes became more accustomed to the dark. She could make out the outline of windows, high above her. They were a lighter gray, and she harbored a hope that they would let in a bit of light when day came again. She began to move through the room, hands in front of her, scraping her feet forward, feeling even flooring, not dirt or stones. Her fingers scraped a wall, and she ran her hand down it, over material that was smooth and cool, like marble or finished stone. She moved around the room, feeling the walls and the floor until her knee struck what seemed to be an iron bedstead.

She touched the thin, lumpy mattress. She patted the bed and discovered a rough blanket at one end. She was as excited as if she had found an open door. Fearing that she would lose her courage if she sat down and thought about what had happened, she wrapped the blanket around her and kept moving, hoping to discover something else, something that might help her escape. After a thorough search, she realized that the room contained nothing except the bed. If there was a door or a window she could reach, she had failed to find it. Disheartened, her head still aching abominably, she groped her way back to the iron cot and lay down.

Now she could no longer control her thoughts or her fears. Was it Eustace who had seized her? What did whoever it was intend to do with her? What arguments, what strategy could she use to defeat him? And behind these thoughts, one plea dominated her mind.

Gideon, where are you? When will you come for me?

Chapter Eight

Gideon called on Sir Richard, only to hear that Amelia had been out when the colonel had visited and instead Sir Richard had seen only “that termagant” Miss Forrester. Gideon paced a little, fingering the small iron ball in his pocket, growing more and more uneasy about Amelia’s safety.

If he and Sir Richard had not had business at the Horse Guards that afternoon, he might have called at Miss Forrester’s and seen Amelia before she left to visit Lady Maltby. But they did, and it had taken the entire afternoon, and they had accomplished absolutely nothing. What Wellington needed in the Peninsula was not more military second-guessing but more supplies and firmer support from London.

Gideon arrived back at his rooms in a foul temper. Relieved that he had no engagement—Amelia had told him she was going to spend a pleasant evening reading—he threw himself on the bed and wished himself back with the duke in Portugal. At least then he knew himself to be useful. Although his unusual sponsorship in his regiment had caused talk, his superb horsemanship and sangfroid in battle had provided the only credentials necessary with his fellow officers.

He loved the cavalry. All his anger and fear, his burning sense of injustice could be channeled into action. When faced with the enemy, Gideon had fought as if the chimney sweep, the fighting man, and the gypsies had all been facing him instead of merely French soldiers. He fought with a sort of joyous rage that had made him legendary.

Now he was faced with another kind of enemy entirely, one he felt peculiarly unfit to deal with. He couldn’t charge at Eustace Mannering or outflank Percival Sturdevant. All he could do was stand guard and glower at any threats to Amy— threats he sometimes thought he alone perceived. He felt like an aging, useless bulldog, unable to protect his beloved mistress from harm.

He grinned at his own fancies and prepared to spend a solitary night dining at a tavern and reading in his room. It was after nine when he returned from the tavern to find a message waiting for him from Jane and Sir Richard. He hastened to the house in Hans Crescent.

Amelia had not returned from her afternoon visit, and Jane had begun to worry. She sent a note to Lady Maltby. When the reply came that Amelia had left hours before, Jane immediately contacted Sir Richard. She had not asked herself why she turned to him instead of Gideon, but when Gideon joined them at Jane’s house, disheveled and glaring, it was the first thing he asked her.