Rakes and Radishes (11 page)

“That’s a statistical improbability,” Henrietta pointed out.

“What the princess means to say,
we
have never beat Lady Bertram at cards—or anything else.” Lady Winslow’s eyes glittered dangerously. “Until tonight. Now, this is how we shall do it, darlings. Wilhelmina and I shall play one rubber and begin the second. After the first game of the second rubber, the one of us who is not lucky, must motion like this—” she twirled her earring, “—and say how very tired I am this evening. That is when you—” she pointed to Henrietta, “— come rushing forward, saying
please may I help you, do you require a drink
—whatever companions do. Then you must finish the hand.”

“This isn’t right,” Henrietta stated.

“I can assure you there is not one lady in this room who would not relish seeing Lady Bertram lose. Not one.”

“Oui!”

Lady Winslow wagged a finger before Henrietta’s face. “Now, when you’re playing cards, don’t make it look too obvious. Be more—more Norfolk. Understand?”

“What is more Norfolk?” Henrietta asked.

“Backwards, be more backwards!” Lady Winslow elaborated.

“I’m not backwards! People in Norfolk aren’t backwards!”

“How would you know, darling? Oh, oh, the table is changing. Come, princess.” The two hurried away, leaving Henrietta to ponder her backwardness.

Lady Winslow and the princess greeted the hostess in the French manner, kissing either cheek. Sitting down, Lady Bertram ran her fingers over her jewelry as if to taunt her card partners. Lady Winslow peeked at Henrietta, the corner of her lip lifted.

Henrietta found a vacant space on a bright shiny sofa beside two elderly ladies. It took two cups of black tea, three biscuits and a lengthy conversation about which apothecaries in London best treated constipation for Lady Winslow and the princess to lose the first rubber.

By then Henrietta had recovered enough good sense to know she should never have agreed to this scheme. However, it was too late, for Princess Wilhelmina was looking about, practically pulling her ear off. Henrietta hurried over.

“You do not feel well, princess,” she said. “I can see you are flushed, perhaps you should sit on the sofa.”

“Henrietta dear, play out the rubber,” Lady Winslow suggested casually. “May I introduce our dear little companion, Miss Henrietta Watson. She is from Norfolk. Isn’t she sweet?”

Henrietta curtsied for Lady Bertram. “I like cards. I play all the time with Papa since there is so little to do in Norfolk. That’s why we’re so backwards.”

***

Lady Bertram considered her, her fingers caressing her diamonds. It was a heavy old necklace, the kind one of Henry the Eighth’s wives would have worn—while they still had necks, of course. The pale gems gleaming in the candlelight matched Lady Bertram’s eyes.

“You may finish the rubber,” Lady Bertram said like an acquiescing queen.

“I like whist. What a jolly game!” Henrietta sat down. “And such pretty cards. Oops! I dropped one.” Henrietta giggled, picked up the fallen jack and restored it to her hand.

Lady Bertram’s partner, an animated matron with silvery gray hair and twinkling eyes, led the game. Henrietta flipped any old card that matched suit, while watching Lady Bertram play. She always rubbed her necklace before choosing a card, as if it were some sort of crystal ball guiding her choices.

“What a beautiful necklace,” Henrietta said. “I can’t help but admire it.”

“Thank you. They are from a dear, dear
friend,
” Lady Bertram said, her voice smooth and low, like a purring cat.

Lady Winslow played a seven of spades. “But you have so many dear
friends,
do you not, Lady Bertram? How can you remember any one friend in particular?”

“This one was the dearest. Oh, how my
friend
made me feel. How I love and cherished that
friend.
” She smiled at Lady Winslow, playing the king of spades over Lady Winslow’s seven. “Some spend a lifetime only wishing they had such a
friend.
”

“Speaking of Lord Damien, I just read
The Mysterious Lord Blackraven,
” Lady Bertram’s partner said, tossing a worthless heart on the pile.

“I adore that book!” Henrietta cried.

“The likeness between Lord Blackraven and Lord Damien was so striking that twice I had to remove myself from the fireplace for fear of overheating.” The graying lady fanned herself with her cards, flushed. “After almost thirty years—”

“Twenty-five,” Lady Bertram corrected.

“—and he still gets me right here,” she said, poking her chest.

“You mean Lord Blackraven is based on a real man!” Henrietta exclaimed.

“Lord Damien was more than a man,” Lady Bertram replied, a smug, knowing smile curling her face. “A mortal god. Like—like—”

“Theseus, Hercules, Achilles,” Lady Winslow supplied. “Looking at Lord Damien was like looking at the surface of deep, dark water. Mysterious and enigmatic. Leaving you longing to know what lay underneath.”

“These young ladies and their dandy rakes.” Lady Bertram’s partner held up a bejeweled finger. “Show me just one rake today who could stand up to Lord Damien’s muster. I feel sorry for these poor young ladies out now. To never know a real rake. I wish Lord Damien would come back from wherever he fled if just to show these tulips how it’s done. Now there was man who could steal your heart and break it in one afternoon, leaving you begging for him to do it all over again the next day. I will never forget our honeymoon—”

“You were married to Lord Blackraven!” Henrietta cried. “I mean, Lord Damien.”

“Of course not. I was married to Lord Travis, so I had to do something,” she said as she played the last card, taking the trick. “Well, my young dear from Norfolk, I’m afraid we have set you two. This may be a fast rubber, despite your love of cards.”

“Yes, please mind the trumps. Do not waste yours if someone has clearly overtrumped you. You will need them for later,” Lady Bertram said like a benevolent mother. “That is a lesson to you. Always remember your cards.”

“Yes, my lady, thank you. We get to play one more time, don’t we? Maybe I can do better.”

“Yes, one more time.” Lady Bertram stifled a yawn in her fist while Lady Winslow shuffled and dealt.

Lady Bertram led with a diamond. Henrietta trumped it.

“Breaking trumps already?” Lady Bertram cried, outraged.

Henrietta gave her a backwards smile.

***

“They took her to Lady Bertram’s?” Mama shouted at their butler. “She’s just a little innocent! She’s never been to London! How dare they! She mustn’t find out about—” Lady Kesseley looked at her son. “You must find her.”

“Boxly, call my horse!” Kesseley’s blood raced through his body. He bolted out the door, never bothering to replace his hat or coat. A shiny black town carriage ambled around the corner. Inside, female voices were singing so loudly, they echoed down the street.

The crested carriage pulled to a stop and a handsome young footman stepped down and opened the door. Henrietta missed the footman’s outstretched hand and spilled onto the pavement at Kesseley’s feet.

He pulled her up. She was laughing, her muscles loose with drunkenness. She clung to him, her warm, plum-scented breath on his face.

“I learned this darling little song. Listen.

Therefore, in jolly chorus now,

Let’s chaunt it altogether,

And let each cull’s and doxy’s heart

Be lighter than a feather,

And as the kelter runs quite flush
—”

Kesseley tossed her into his arms, removing her before the neighbors heard anymore. Lady Kesseley waited in the hall, her face tight and red.

“I beat Lord Blackraven’s dear
friend
at cards.” Henrietta said. She giggled, her whole body shaking in his arms. “She never loses when she wears Lord Damien’s diamonds.” Her glossy eyes widened. “Did you know Lord Blackraven is really Lord Damien?”

“Take her to bed! I do not want to hear that horrid rake’s name in my home,” Lady Kesseley cried, turning away, disgusted.

“Ellie, don’t you dare get angry at our dear little companion!” Lady Winslow warned from the door.

Mama stared at her friend. “Kesseley, leave us.”

In the stairwell, Henrietta started singing again,

“Like natty shining kiddies

To treat the coaxing, giggling brims—”

“Hush now, that’s enough,” Kesseley whispered.

She lifted her arms and put them around his neck, snuggling close until her nose rested just below his chin.

“Hmm, you smell like apple blossoms and leather,” she whispered. Her lips were so close they brushed his skin.

His throat tightened. His eyes started to burn.

He twisted the knob on her door with one hand, then swung it open with his foot. He pulled her into the darkness, then against all decency and manners, held her small body against his. He buried his face in her curls, closed his eyes and rocked her—slowly, tenderly—her touch a balm to all his hurt.

“Henrietta,” he whispered. “Oh, Henrietta.”

She turned her head and took a fistful of his hair, pulling his head to hers.

No, no, I can’t,
he thought.
Not this way.

She raised her mouth, taking his upper lip between hers.

Kesseley couldn’t move. He shouldn’t let this happen. She didn’t know what she was doing.

She released his lip and murmured something he couldn’t understand, then took his lips again, her mouth open, her warm, wet tongue slowly running under his teeth.

He shouldn’t let her. It was against every trust, every gentleman’s code of honor.

Her hand tightened around his curls, and she thrust her breasts against him, straining, her lips moving faster, deeper, tasting him. Clumsy with inexperience, yet driven by instinct. It would be so easy to kiss her back, lay himself on top of her. Feel her softness under his hard muscles, lose himself in her dark cinnamon scent.

His cock was swelling, rising.

He couldn’t.

He wouldn’t.

Kesseley heard the quiet footsteps of a female servant coming up the stairs.

He laid Henrietta onto the bed, letting his hand linger on her waist, one last moment holding her. She drew up her legs, cuddling around him. Her face turned up to his, so pale and beautiful in the shadows. He ran his hand up her body, then brushed her cheek with the back of his palm.

“Edward,” she whispered.

The single word crashed like thunder in Kesseley’s ears.

He stumbled back, colliding with a small bedside table, knocking off its contents. He heard the shatter of glass. She didn’t move, falling into drunken sleep.

He turned and fled.

What the hell had he done?

He sat up on the edge of his father’s bed and hung his head in his hands. He tried to calm his breathing.

Why didn’t you stop her?

He stood up and paced.

Are you so bloody pathetic you’ll pretend to be another man just to get her affection?

He could almost hear his father yelling at him, just like he had on Kesseley’s fourteenth birthday when he’d had taken Kesseley to a brothel to celebrate. “Damn it, be a man, you cully boy!” he shouted at the sniffling adolescent.

Kesseley spun and stared angrily at his father’s portrait. His eyes met his father’s painted ones, evenly, unflinchingly, as they never had in life.

What, Father? Is being a man raping your dearest friend because she loves someone else? Because she could never love you—

His father just stared back.

Something began to turn inside him, years of futility and hurt heaped like leaves, grass and slop upon his manure pile—teeming, decaying, breaking down. Something was emerging, sprouting from the depths. It felt like anger, except colder, duller. Truth.

He had to find someone else, even as he loved her. He was a young man, but his heart was tired, feeble, unable to keep up anymore. He had to let her go.

But how the hell would he explain everything to Henrietta in the morning?

“Miss Watson,” a female voice whispered.

Henrietta opened her eyes. She could just see the fuzzy outline of her crisp maidservant in the morning light. Ughhh, Henrietta’s head felt as if it would burst open and grow new heads. Dizzy, she turned and buried her face in her pillow.

“My lady wants to see you in the parlor,” the servant said.

I’m sure she does.

“She asked that you drink this. Mr. Boxly made it.”

Henrietta carefully opened one eye and peered at the thick, orange substance in a glass sitting on the table, beside the miniature of her mother. The glass was cracked across her mother’s face.

She took the picture into her hand. What had happened?

Having dressed and ingested the vile substance that tasted of anchovies, raw egg and tomato, Henrietta walked timidly into the parlor, not knowing what to expect but imagining the worst.

Lady Kesseley sat at her desk, writing. Calm. The smell of her tea and biscuit unsettled the foul orange drink sloshing about in Henrietta’s belly.

“Good morning, Lady Kesseley.” Henrietta curtsied.

Lady Kesseley didn’t acknowledge her and continued to write, leaving Henrietta at a loss whether to sit, stand, or get on her knees, confess to the crime and plead for a quick, painless execution.

Lady Kesseley returned her pen to the inkwell and set her correspondence aside. “Miss Watson, do you know we are judged by the company we keep?”

“But I thought they were your friends and I thought—I mean—your friends were respectable.”

Lady Kesseley’s head whipped around. “My friends are extremely respectable! What are you insinuating?”

“Nothing!”

The corner of Lady Kesseley’s mouth twitched. “In any case, we are not talking about Lady Winslow and the princess. It is your company that concerns me.”

“Oh.”

Lady Kesseley stood and began to pace, her footfalls reverberating in Henrietta’s ailing brain. “Tell me, how will my son marry a lady of respectable name and prospect when my companion openly gambles and drinks to the point of inebriation in one of the finest homes in London, then stumbles home singing abhorrent canting songs?”

“I’m sorry.” To her own shock, Henrietta burst into violent, hiccupping sobs. “I didn’t mean to hurt Kesseley. I’m so sorry. Edward doesn’t love me. I’m going to leave. I won’t cause any more trouble. I’m a horrid person.”

Lady Kesseley sat down beside her. “Are you ready for the man waiting for you in Norfolk?”

“I don’t know.”

“I think you should know, since I doubt he is a man who will be put off.”

“I feel some affection for Mr. Van Heerlen, but I’m not sure it is enough for marriage.” Henrietta searched Lady Kesseley’s face, hoping for a small scrap of motherly wisdom. Given Lady Kesseley’s feelings toward her, Henrietta doubted she would be so generous, but she had no one else to help her. “Do you think love can grow over time? That you will come to see how perfect someone is for you?”

“No.”

“What should I do?” Henrietta cried. “Please help me.”

Lady Kesseley studied her, some emotion Henrietta couldn’t make out moved over her pale eyes. “Stay here.”

“But no one wants me. And I’m disgraced!”

“Disgraced?” Lady Kesseley said incredulously. She walked to her desk and lifted a large stack of letters. “We’ve been invited to every card party in London.” She gazed down at the invitations and ran her thumb over a blue wax seal. “Your mother welcomed my son into her home and you should stay in mine.”

***

Kesseley made it out of the house without seeing Henrietta. Guilt dragged him down, ruining the beautiful sky stretching over his head. He knew he had to talk to her, but couldn’t bring himself to do it first thing in the morning, when he was still so weak. He needed to get away, strengthen his resolve.

But she had kissed him. And there was something true in that kiss, no matter whose name she had whispered.

Can you let go of your sad, pathetic hope? She doesn’t love you. When will you learn your lesson, you wretched loggerhead?

Kesseley slunk down Curzon Street like a fugitive, his hat low, coat buttoned up. After the comment from Lady Sara and her friends, he was acutely aware of how different he looked from the fops strolling about him in their gleaming white shirts, unblemished, not even the tiniest stain of preserves or butter from breakfast. And their pants! So tight they could scarce walk. Even the skinny ones. Why would they want to advertise their spindly legs?

Their eyes raked over him as he passed, their lips quivered with amusement. Kesseley felt like the human oddity at the fair—comical by simply existing.

He pulled out Henrietta’s list of merchants. Tailors, boot makers, glove makers, hatters. She said he could look better than all of those fops if he tried. And damn it, he was going to try.

Until he got to Schweitzer and Davidson and lost his nerve.

He couldn’t do this. He wanted to go home—really home—to Wrenthorpe. Back to his cows and pigs and fields. To the things that were real, not this flimsily constructed pretend world of Lady Sara and her friends that revolved on the cut of a suitor’s coat or his fancy words.

To hell with it! He was better than that.

He wadded up the paper in his fist, turned and walked back to the end of the block. Then he stopped, cursing himself.

For God sakes, it’s not like you’re turning into your father. It’s just clothes. Don’t you want a lady? Don’t you want to forget Henrietta?

He stomped back and swung open the tailor’s door. On a ladder, a thin pale man with glasses restored a bolt of cloth. He looked at Kesseley, his face pinched with disapproval, as if a vagrant had wandered into his store.

“Pardon, we do not—”

“I am the Earl of Kesseley. I need some clothes that look better than what I am wearing.”

The little man’s gaping mouth let out a shrill sound, like escaping steam from one of those mechanical engines.

“You make clothes, don’t you?” Kesseley asked.

The tailor rushed forward. “Yes, of course. Please forgive me. You see, I am finishing with a client—it will only be a moment, a small moment. Let me call my assistant—my
esteemed
assistant.” He ducked his head behind a curtain. A moment later, a tall, blond man stepped out. He froze when he saw Kesseley, his left upper lip raised like a beastly snarl.

“Ein Mann, ein sehr attraktiver Mann,”
he said, his bright eyes roaming up and down Kesseley’s body with unconcealed admiration. “Magnificent.”

Kesseley felt uncomfortable. “Maybe I should come back some other time.”

“
Nein. Diese ist die perfekte
time. You are my destiny.”

“I need to be leaving now.” Kesseley turned for the door, but the tailor stepped ahead of him, blocking the exit.

“
Nein! Bleiben Sie bitte!
Stay. I will make you desired by
allen Männer und Frauen.
”

“Ladies?”

The man put a strong arm on Kesseley’s shoulder and spun him around. “
Ja,
they will drawn to your
Pracht. Kommen Sie bitte.
I show you.”

“If you’re sure women will be attracted to my—hmm—
Pracht.
”

Kesseley followed the man up a flight of stairs to a paneled room lined with pictures of pugilists, dogs and hunts. The tailor took Kesseley’s hat and gloves, depositing them on the table. Then he removed Kesseley’s coats and cravat, pinching them between his forefinger and thumb—like some infant’s fouled cloths—and draped them beside Kesseley’s hat.

The tailor’s fingers moved with an engineer’s precision, wrapping the measuring tape about Kesseley’s body, then entering numbers into the small ledger, all while he murmured Germanic praise.
Schön. Großartig. Vorzüglich.

When he had finished, he snapped the ledger shut, then gripped the measuring tape in his palm and circled it around his fist. “I will be a moment. Shall I send for
eine Dirne?
”

“A whore?” Kesseley translated.

“Ja.”

Kesseley colored.
“Nein danke.”

The man raised the edge of his lip. “As you wish.”

Kesseley waited, the whole time pondering his tailor’s question. His muscles felt tight, especially after last night. Maybe a girl was exactly what he needed. A sweet, fair thing the opposite of Henrietta, who knew only one word:
yes.
It would make this whole London affair a little more bearable.

He should add it to his list.
Courtesan.
He wagered Henrietta hadn’t researched that one for him.

His tailor returned with two other men hidden under the bolts of fabric they carried. They stacked the fabric onto the table, building a pyramid of tans, blacks and blues.

For two hours the tailor held Kesseley captive, draping fabric down Kesseley’s chest— this blue too yellow, this blue too green.
What the hell? It’s blue!
But after a while, Kesseley just smiled and nodded his head. He might as well have gone to a tailor in Siam for all the sense this man was making.

Maybe he shouldn’t have been so agreeable, he thought, when he got the bill. Somehow he had managed to purchase four coats, three doeskins, three pantaloons, two evening coats and two breeches. He could build a barn for the same cost!

The tailor restored Kesseley to his previous clothes, although it clearly pained him. “I rush your order!
Wir machen
only your clothes! Come back tomorrow for fitting,” he said, as his hands tugged on Kesseley’s cravat. “
Sehr guter Knoten.
Remember.” He stepped out of the way and let Kesseley look at his work in the long mirror.

“How did you do that?” he marveled. His cravat stood straight up with an elegant knot, like those dandies on the street. But it didn’t look so foppish on him. He quite liked it as he looked at it from different angles. Could Baggot and he produce the same between their three hands?

Before taking his leave, he drew out Henrietta’s crumpled list and showed it to the tailor. The German scanned the line with his index finger, saying
“nein, nein, nein.”
He shook his head, crumpled the list and threw it away.

“I tell you where to go.” He tore a sheet out of his ledger, wrote a list of merchants and handed it to Kesseley, pointing with his pen to two names and addresses at the very bottom.

“This is my sister,” he said. “She makes very good shirts. She will make a dozen shirts and cravats for you. This is my brother, Frans. He is very good valet. Send for him.”

Back on Cork Street, the temporary reprieve from guilt was over. Henrietta was probably at home, cursing his name. What the hell was he going to say?

Sorry, I am so frustrated and insanely in love with you that I couldn’t stop myself, even when you called me Edward.

His father would never be so pathetic. For a small moment, Kesseley imagined he possessed the scruples of his late father, and that last night he had pulled up Henrietta’s gown and drove himself into her until all his frustration burst out of him. And then afterward—no remorse.

Everything about last night—about him—was wrong.

He couldn’t face her yet. He unfolded the tailor’s list, read the addresses, then headed to New Bond Street. By four, he had ordered three pairs of gloves, three boots, four hats and a dozen new stockings to replace all the old ones with holes in the toes. He had managed to physically avoid Henrietta all day, even though the memory of her lips and the feel of her breasts pushing against him plagued the entire afternoon.

He required one last item. After that onerous purchase, he would have to face her.

He stopped outside the long windows of Hatchard’s bookstore. He was afraid to ask Henrietta for her copy of
The Mysterious Lord Blackraven.
She just might throw the volumes at him. And besides, she wouldn’t want him to scribble his notes all over her pages.

He took a deep breath, as if to go underwater. Then he lowered his hat, pulled up his coat collar and opened the door.

He found F authors on the third floor. Unfortunately the shop was cramped, and the customers rubbed elbows along the shelves. He couldn’t buy the bloody novel without being seen. He went downstairs and grabbed a copy of Arthur Young’s
General View of the Agriculture of the County of Norfolk,
then returned to the G shelves and pretended to read about plowing depths while slowly inching over to
The Mysterious Lord Blackraven.
He was almost there, one quick grab and—

“Are you buying
The Mysterious Lord Blackraven?
It’s my favorite book!” said a matronly, plump woman in a leghorn hat with flattened, faded roses. “You know, gentlemen usually don’t buy romance novels. My husband doesn’t. Calls them the inferior fruits of a woman’s mind. I daresay he could learn a thing or two if he did, read them that is.”

Kesseley panicked. He couldn’t get away, not without being impolite.

The woman continued. “There is a wonderful chapter in the book where the heroine is tricked by her betrothed into riding a wild horse. It runs away with her, and we think certainly she will die, but Blackraven gallops after her, pulling her onto his stallion. He saves her life, even though he despises her, because he thinks she loves his half brother. I must say, the half brother is a horrible man. He deserved to accidentally fall off that cliff when he was dueling Blackraven!”

Several other ladies within earshot agreed, rushing forward to join the conversation, trapping him against the bookshelf. It became a regular little literary circle. The lady in the leghorn hat felt it appropriate to introduce Kesseley as the gentleman who enjoys romance novels, causing the man two shelves over to snort in derision.