Supervising Sally (12 page)

When the man finally departed Zachary went thoughtfully back to Mr Hill, waiting impatiently in the parlour.

‘Well, sir?'

‘Not well, sir. Miss Benton informs me you were aware of the cards she held, and advised her to continue playing even when she did not hold winning cards. Then, it seems, you managed to win the pool whenever it was particularly large. Most of the other players were young and inexperienced, I understand, who might not have understood what you were doing. I don't think you would be welcome in polite society or your clubs if this tale were spread about. In the circumstances I see no need to pay you anything. In fact, I will require you, as a condition of my keeping silent, to return the jewellery you took from Miss Benton.'

‘That's slander!' Mr Hill gasped. ‘I'm no cheat, and I'll thank you to withdraw that accusation or I'll see you in court.'

‘Somehow I doubt it. A man of your years and experience advising a girl who has never before played for high stakes, and advising her to your own benefit, is hardly likely to gain
the approval of the courts. Your direction, sir? I will send a man with you to bring back the jewellery.'

He blustered, but in the face of Zachary's calm determination, finally shrugged.

‘You don't need to do that,' he said, and pulled a small drawstring bag out of his pocket. ‘I have them here. No hard feelings, I hope.'

Zachary opened the bag and tipped out the jewellery. It was all there, so he nodded, crossed to the bell pull and rang for the butler.

‘Bring some sherry, please. And ask Lady Drayton's coachman to come to the library.'

When he had poured Mr Hill some sherry, he excused himself and went into the library next door, where the coachman was waiting. He wished he had his tiger for the task, but he had walked to Brook Street, so had to use whoever he could. Beatrice's coachman was burly and looked sensible. He explained swiftly.

‘I need to know where the man who is about to leave the house lives. Can you follow him for me? Without being seen?'

Luckily the man was quick witted, and nodded. ‘I'll go and hang about on the corner,' he said briefly.

Zachary smiled. ‘Good man. I'll keep him for a few minutes longer.'

Mr Hill, when he returned to the parlour, was pouring himself another glass of sherry. Expansively he held out the decanter and another glass.

‘No hard feelings, my lord. Drink with me?'

Zachary accepted the glass, put it to his lips, but did not taste the sherry. He would not drink with a cheat like Hill, but these few minutes would help the coachman get round to the corner of the street. He would ask one of his own footmen to keep an eye on Hill while he was away, if possible by becoming acquainted with one of Hill's servants, and alert
him if the man did anything suspicious.

Finally, looking regretfully at the decanter, Mr Hill departed. Zachary poured his sherry into a convenient vase, hoping it would not kill the flowers, and went to the library to confront the two girls.

Phoebe sat in a small chair, nervously twisting her hands together, as they waited for the earl to join them. When he entered the room she glanced up at him and was relieved to see a rueful grin on his face.

He tossed the bag with the jewels to Sally. ‘I persuaded him to return these. He knows better than to dun you any more.'

Sally fought back tears of relief. ‘Oh, thank you! I promise I won't be so stupid again.'

‘I'm sure you have learned your lesson. Now, Miss Kingston—'

‘Am I to go back to Yorkshire?' Phoebe interrupted. She thought he had overcome his anger, but she needed reassurance as soon as possible.

He chuckled. ‘I had every intention of sending you back until your appalling brother-in-law told me to do so,' he admitted. ‘I don't appreciate being told what to do by pompous, self-satisfied men like him! Oh, but I beg your pardon. I should not be abusing a relative of yours like this.'

‘I told you that was it,' Sally said in triumph.

Phoebe, relieved, laughed. ‘As far as I am concerned you may abuse him as much as you like. I don't have a good word to say for him. Thank you, my lord, and I promise I will take better care of Sally.'

‘If she permits it! But you have promised to be on your best behaviour, have you not?' he asked, turning to Sally.

She nodded. ‘Do we have to travel with the Bradshaws?'

‘That depends on them. They know when we are setting out, but they will be in another carriage, and there will be other people on the road. The entire
ton
seems to be travelling to Brussels. I am sure we can avoid them.'

Phoebe hoped so too, and when a series of small problems delayed their departure by an hour, she expected that Reginald, with his penchant for punctuality, which had so irritated her in Yorkshire, would be ahead of them.

They bade a fond farewell to Beatrice, who would be travelling back to Yorkshire on the following day.

‘I can never thank you enough for giving me this chance,' Phoebe told her.

‘You deserve it, my dear. And when you come back, if you need another position, I will help you to find one.'

As they drove away Phoebe wondered what she had meant. Of course she would need another position. She had either to earn her living or return to be an unpaid governess at the Bradshaws'. She put aside that thought. It would be months before she need consider it, she hoped.

The two girls, and Annie, were delighted with the scenery, marvelling at the width of the Thames as they crossed over the new Westminster Bridge.

‘No houses,' Annie said. ‘I thought there were houses all along the bridge.'

‘That was London Bridge,' Phoebe told her.

‘Allus thought it were odd having houses on a bridge.'

‘Earth has not anything to show more fair,' Phoebe said dreamily.

‘Phoebe? What do you mean?'

‘Mr Wordsworth's poem,' Phoebe told her. ‘He wrote it here, several years ago.'

‘You're not a blue stocking, I hope? Phoebe, you can't be!' Sally sounded horrified.

‘I like some poetry. But how he can have said it was all bright and glittering in the smokeless air I can't imagine,' she added, looking back at the city and along the river towards the docks, where thick smoke blotted out views of many of the buildings.

‘It's all the fires, using that dirty seacoal,' Annie said.

‘Perhaps he wrote it in the summer. I can't recall. But I was reading about the bridge in a book in Beatrice's library. It was designed by a Swiss, and opened five and sixty years ago. It's three hundred feet longer than London Bridge and—'

‘Phoebe, stop! Who wants to know all that tedious stuff?'

‘Well, all those figures and measurements were boring, but I wanted to know how they managed to build bridges; how they could stop the water for long enough to build the supports.'

‘Well, I don't want to know. It's enough for me that we can drive across it. I wonder what the country is like in Kent? And whether the boat will toss much and make us ill?'

‘Don't, Miss Sally!' Annie said. ‘The very thought of all that water makes me queasy.'

They relapsed into silence which lasted while they drove through Lambeth and took the Canterbury road. When they stopped to change horses Phoebe looked around her at the busy inn yard, then groaned.

‘Oh no! Sally, don't show your face. Reginald and his sisters are just coming out of the coffee room and getting into their coach. If he sees us he'll want to travel on together.'

Zachary forced himself to smile when Mr Bradshaw hailed him. He'd hoped to avoid the tedious man.

‘We thought you'd set out early,' Reginald said, ‘and somehow we'd missed you. My two ladies were late getting ready, but are not all the ladies dilatory? I expect your Sally delayed you.'

‘No I did not!' Sally said, poking her head out of the carriage window. ‘I was ready in good time, and so was Phoebe.'

Reginald laughed, shaking his head. ‘If you say so, my dear. I would never contradict a lady. But we can wait while you have some refreshments. Tolerable coffee they have here. Then we can go on together. I'll just have a word with the coachman.'

There was nothing for it. Zachary escorted a simmering Sally and a Phoebe trying hard not to laugh into the coffee room, and ordered coffee and hot rolls. When Dorothy and Hermione, descending from their coach, came in and joined them, fluttering their eyelashes and asking him eager questions about Brussels, he tried to answer politely.

‘I have never been to Brussels before,' he said, when asked to describe the town. ‘I know no more about the geography and the architecture than you do. No doubt you will soon find your way around.'

‘Are you staying with Sally and her father, or at the embassy?' Dorothy asked.

‘I'm not sure what arrangements have been made for me. There may not be room at the embassy, but they will have found me lodgings somewhere.'

‘So you don't know where. But no doubt we will meet frequently. We hear there are parties every day, and everyone walks and drives in the parks, like they do in London.'

‘Do you wish you were still in the army?' Hermione asked. ‘I do so love the uniforms, they are so smart and colourful.'

‘I can assure you they do not remain so in battle,' he replied.

Zachary happened to glance at Phoebe and saw she was struggling to contain her laughter. What the devil amused her in this situation, he asked himself, and suddenly it dawned on him she was laughing at him and his attempts to evade the sisters' questions. Then Reginald came in and her expression changed, became wary. She really did not like him, and he did not blame her. Having now endured Mr Bradshaw's company for even a short time, he appreciated her desire to get away from his home. The man was an encroaching bore. He was thankful he had not sent her back to the dreadful man's house. She would have found it difficult, no doubt, to escape for a second time, and Mr Bradshaw would soon have returned to Yorkshire. He devoutly hoped so. If he were forced to endure the company of any of the Bradshaws for any length of time, he would find it hard to remain polite.

M
R BRADSHAW INSISTED on leading the way in his coach, to the irritation of Phoebe and Sally, for their chaise was faster, but as Mr Bradshaw's coachman held firmly to the centre of the road they were unable to pass him.

‘I hope Zachary goes to a different inn when we have to change horses,' Sally said, but he was riding ahead and she could not call out to him.

Her hopes were dashed when it was time to change horses and their coach pulled into the next inn yard. Once more they all descended and went to the coffee room, where Mr Bradshaw was loudly ordering the waiters to set extra chairs about a table.

Phoebe found herself seated between the sisters, while Mr Bradshaw claimed Sally's attention. Annie, the two valets, and Ella, the maid the Bradshaws had brought along, were relegated to the far end of the table. Zachary, refusing the seat offered him by Mr Bradshaw, said he had things to attend to outside, some problem with the coach, and escaped.

‘He is so handsome,' Dorothy sighed. ‘I believe he is very rich, too. Do you know if he is betrothed?'

‘I haven't the slightest notion,' Phoebe replied. She doubted it, or surely his sister would have referred to it, but
she had no intention of encouraging Dorothy's manifest interest in the earl. She considered Dorothy. The younger of the two sisters, small and thin, five and twenty years old, and to the best of Phoebe's knowledge, never having had an admirer, she would have as little chance of attracting the earl as would a kitchen maid. She was petulant at home, simpering in company, and appeared to have no interests apart from her clothes.

The earl, Phoebe decided, would eventually have to marry, for all men must want heirs. From what his nieces had said at Ridgeway Park, he disliked his uncle Jonas for some reason and would not wish him to inherit. He would choose as his bride a beautiful, young, rich and well-born girl. He would have had his pick of each year's debutantes, and was clearly difficult to please, for there must be many girls matching those criteria every year.

She sighed. Would she ever marry? Would she find a man willing to overlook her advanced age, her lack of fortune, her birth which was respectable, but no more, and her unremarkable looks?

The sisters were bickering, leaning forward to speak across her.

‘Why did the earl leave the army, Sally?' Dorothy asked. Sally looked puzzled. ‘He had to, when his younger brother Francis was killed at Badajoz three years ago. He had been wounded three months earlier at Ciudad Rodrigo, and was recuperating in England.'

‘But I don't understand. Why did the death of his brother make him leave the army? Was he afraid of being killed too?' Dorothy asked.

‘Of course he wasn't afraid! He's a gentleman!' Sally said. ‘But he has no heir apart from his uncle, and could not risk being killed. None of his family would want his uncle Jonas to succeed!'

Phoebe was wondering what was wrong with the coach that kept the earl out in the yard for so long. Was he deliberately avoiding Reginald? She did not blame him, only wishing that she could find an excuse to do the same.

Sally was looking bored, and Phoebe caught the occasional words. Reginald, it seemed, was telling her about his mills, and how he had built them up, expanded and improved them since he had inherited them from his father. She stopped listening to anyone, lost in dreams of Brussels, still not really believing she was on her way there.

The earl came back just as they were finishing. He said everything was now all right, and standing at the end of the table poured himself a cup of coffee, drank it down swiftly, and turned to leave the room.

‘We will be ready to go in five minutes,' he told them.

Phoebe went outside and stood looking at the busy scene. It was a large inn, catering for the many travellers on their way to and from the Continent, and must have increased its custom enormously since the fall of Napoleon had opened the way for English people to travel once more. Through an archway she could see another stable yard, which looked very new, though the stables there seemed to be fully occupied.

‘Come along, miss,' Annie said, and Phoebe turned to smile at her, then climbed after her into the coach.

Sitting on the seat facing her she saw the Bradshaws' maid, Ella.

‘Where is Sally?' she demanded, trying to suppress a feeling of panic.

‘Mr Bradshaw suggested she rode in their coach,' Annie said, her disapproval plain.

Phoebe turned to get out again. She could not permit this. But the door had been closed, the steps folded, and the coach began to move.

Did it really matter, she asked herself as she sank back on to the seat. The Bradshaws were not trying to kidnap Sally. The two coaches were travelling in tandem, Sally would be perfectly safe, and there was no need for her to make a fuss.

They must have acquired a better team of horses, Phoebe decided, for the coach was bowling along at a much faster pace than before. She put her head out of the window, saw the earl riding some way ahead, but could not see the Bradshaw coach in front. Glancing back, she saw that it was following this time, and dropping further back. How irritating of Sally. Phoebe could have sworn she was thoroughly bored with Reginald and his sisters, so what in the world had possessed her to join them for part of the journey? But for this they might have been able to leave the Bradshaws behind. Now they would have to stop once more at the same inn.

Ella was looking embarrassed, and as Phoebe sat back on her seat began to apologize.

‘I'm sorry, miss, but Mr Bradshaw don't like having to share the coach with the likes of me,' she said. ‘He always tries to send the servants in a separate coach, but it weren't possible this time, with just the two of us.'

Phoebe stifled her indignation. It was not Ella's fault that Reginald now regarded her as a servant and fit only to travel with the maids and valets. Doubtless he considered he was helping Sally by putting her with himself and his daughters.

She was silent until they reached the next inn, then, as soon as the coach stopped and the steps were let down she climbed out and ran back to the archway leading on to the road, looking for the Bradshaw coach. It was nowhere in sight.

The earl had followed her. ‘What were you thinking of, letting Sally travel with the Bradshaws?' he demanded.

‘I didn't. That is, I didn't know she wasn't in our coach until it was too late to stop her. She won't come to any harm.'

‘That wretched girl! I heartily wish I had never agreed to escort the two of you to Brussels.'

‘Where are they?' Phoebe asked, ignoring him. ‘There are so many coaches I can't see if they are coming.'

‘I made sure we had better cattle for this stage,' the earl said. ‘They will take longer, their team was mismatched.'

‘It won't happen again, if I have to tie her to me.'

He laughed. ‘Somehow I doubt young Sally could be held if she didn't want to be. Come and have something to drink. Do you want more coffee or would you prefer some wine?'

Phoebe shook her head. ‘I'll wait here, but I'm sure Annie and Ella could do with something.' The earl was taking this latest of Sally's exploits more calmly than she had expected, she was thankful to see. Really, the girl could come to no harm, but it was irritating of her to behave so carelessly.

He was about to turn away when a man driving a ramshackle gig pulled up beside them.

‘I've a message for some earl,' he shouted, ‘but I can't leave this nag. Do you know if he's here?'

‘I'm the Earl of Wrekin.'

‘Coach broken down a couple of miles back. Snapped pole. They want another sent to fetch 'em. Or a cart. Mighty lot o' baggage they've got.'

‘You can't blame Sally for this!' Phoebe began, but the earl held up his hand to silence her.

‘Have I said I do? Many thanks for your message,' he shouted after the driver of the gig, who was already thirty yards away. ‘Thank goodness it's only a couple of miles. I've a good mind to make the wretched girl walk. Go and tell the others, please, while I organize a rescue.'

Marvelling that he was blaming neither her nor Sally, Phoebe went into the yard where Annie, Ella, and the earl's valet were standing wondering what was happening. Swiftly she explained, then led the way into the coffee room and told them to order what they wanted.

It was an hour before the others arrived. Sally was clearly in a temper, and the earl's expression was grim. Had they quarrelled? Or were they simply annoyed at the delay?

Sally flung herself down in a chair next to Phoebe. ‘That man!'

‘Mr Bradshaw?' Phoebe asked, thinking it was just as likely Sally was referring to the earl. ‘Why did you go with them?'

‘I didn't realize it was their coach until I was in it,' Sally said, glaring across the room to where Reginald and his sisters were talking to the innkeeper. ‘It's the same colour as ours. It looks the same, and Annie was going on and on about how she was sure she would be sea sick. I was standing where I couldn't hear her. It was too late to get out, and your coach was leaving anyway.'

‘Well, you're here now.'

The earl came in, said a brief word to Reginald, then sat down opposite them. Sally looked mutinous, but his expression had lightened.

‘The Bradshaws will have to put up here for the night, while a new pole is fitted. Thank goodness we have booked rooms for the night at Dover, so we will not miss the packet with all these delays. Are you ready to go?'

Sally suddenly grinned at Phoebe. ‘Oh dear, we'll have to go on without them. What a shame.'

The rest of the journey passed without further incident, to Phoebe's relief. She and Sally were entranced with their first
experience of a foreign country, while Annie complained bitterly that she couldn't understand a word of what people said to her. The Bradshaws, Phoebe was glad to see, had missed the packet and would have to come on the next one.

Eventually, as it grew dusk, they arrived at Sir William's lodgings, a small house close to the Grande Place. They were shown into a pleasant drawing-room on the first floor, and the footman who had answered the door said he would fetch Sir William. When he arrived, after a pause which made Phoebe wonder if he was in the house, or had to be fetched from elsewhere, he greeted his daughter coldly, looked Phoebe up and down and frowned.

‘Your mother writes that you have been making a great nuisance of yourself,' he told Sally. ‘She wants me to find some fool who will marry you for your money. I am warning you, if you do not behave as a properly brought up young lady should, I'll wash my hands of you and send you to your aunt Sophronia in Scotland.'

Sally paled. ‘I will behave, Papa,' she said, in the meekest tone Phoebe had ever heard her use.

Phoebe wondered what there was about this aunt to make Sally, for the first time since she had met her, afraid. She had little time for wondering, however, as Sir William turned his gaze on her.