The Devil's Web (43 page)
Authors: Mary Balogh
Now he was talking utter nonsense. But how could she decently refuse? She desperately searched around in her head for some irrefutable argument that would dissuade him. Nothing came to mind, however, that did not seem ungracious, even downright rude. But she would rather travel a thousand miles in a springless carriage than to London in his company.
Why?
Was she overawed by his title and magnificence? She bristled at the very idea.
At his â¦
maleness,
then? She was uncomfortably aware that he possessed that in abundance.
But how ridiculous that would be. He was simply a gentleman offering a courtesy to an aging spinster, who happened to be a friend of his almost-cousin's cousin's wifeâgoodness, it
was
a tenuous connection. But she held a letter from Susanna in her hand. Susanna obviously trusted him.
An
aging spinster
? When it came to any consideration of age, she thought, there was probably not much difference between the two of them. Now
there
was a thought. Here was this man, obviously at the very pinnacle of his masculine appeal in his middle thirties, and then there was she.
He was looking at her with raised eyebrows and smiling eyes.
“Oh, very well,” she said briskly. “But you may live to regret your offer.”
His smile broadened and it seemed to an indignant Claudia that there was no end to this man's appeal. As she had suspected, he had charm oozing from every pore and was therefore
not
to be trusted one inch farther than she could see him. She would keep a
very
careful eye upon her two girls during the journey to London.
“I do hope not, ma'am,” he said. “Shall we make an early start?”
“It is what I intended,” she told him. She added grudgingly, “Thank you, Lord Attingsborough. You are most kind.”
“It will be my pleasure, Miss Martin.” He bowed deeply again. “May I ask a small favor in return? May I be given a tour of the school? I must confess that the idea of an institution that actually provides an
education
to girls fascinates me.
Lady Whitleaf has spoken with enthusiasm about your establishment. She taught here, I understand.”
Claudia drew a slow, deep breath through flared nostrils. Whatever reason could this man have for touring a girls' school except idle curiosityâor worse? Her instinct was to say a very firm no. But she had just accepted a favor from him, and it was admittedly a large oneâshe did not doubt that his carriage would be far more comfortable than the one she had hired or that they would be treated with greater respect at every toll gate they passed and at every inn where they stopped for a change of horses. And he was a friend of Susanna's.
But really!
She had not thought her day could possibly get any worse. She had been wrong.
“Certainly. I will show you around myself,” she said curtly, turning to the door. She would have opened it herself, but he reached around her, engulfing her for a startled moment in the scent of some enticing and doubtless indecently expensive male cologne, opened the door, and indicated with a smile that she should precede him into the hall.
At least, she thought, classes were over for the day and all the girls would be safely in the dining hall, having tea.
She was wrong about that, of course, she remembered as soon as she opened the door into the art room. The final assembly of the school year was not far off and all sorts of preparations and rehearsals were in progress, as they had been every day for the past week or so.
A few of the girls were working with Mr. Upton on the stage backdrop. They all turned to see who had come in and then proceeded to gawk at the grand visitor. Claudia was obliged to introduce the two men. They shook hands, and the marquess strolled closer to inspect the artwork and ask a few intelligent questions. Mr. Upton beamed at him when he left the room with her a few minutes later, and all the girls gazed worshipfully after him.
And then in the music room they came upon the madrigal choir, which was practicing in the absence of Mademoiselle Pierre under the supervision of Miss Wilding. They hit an ear-shattering discord at full volume just as Claudia opened the door, and then they dissolved into self-conscious giggles while Miss Wilding blushed and looked dismayed.
Claudia, raising her eyebrows, introduced the teacher to the marquess and explained that the regular choirmistress was indisposed today. Though even as she spoke she was annoyed with herself for feeling that any explanation was necessary.
“Madrigal singing,” he said, smiling at the girls, “can be the most satisfying but the most frustrating thing, can it not? There is perhaps one other person out of the group singing the same part as oneself and six or eight others all bellowing out something quite different. If one's lone ally falters one is lost without hope of recovery. I never mastered the art when I was at school, I must confess. During my very first practice someone suggested to me that I try out for the cricket teamâwhich just happened to practice at the same time.”
The girls laughed, and all of them visibly relaxed.
“I will wager,” he said, “that there is something in your repertoire that you can sing to perfection. May I be honored to hear it?” He turned his smile upon Miss Wilding.
“ âThe Cuckoo,' miss,” Sylvia Hetheridge suggested to a murmur of approval from the rest of the group.
And they sang in five parts without once faltering or hitting a sour note, a glorious shower of “cuckoos” echoing about the room every time they reached the chorus of the song.
When they were finished, they all turned as one to the Marquess of Attingsborough, just as if he were visiting royalty, and he applauded and smiled.
“Bravo!” he said. “Your skill overwhelms me, not to mention the loveliness of your voices. I am more than ever convinced that I was wise to stick to cricket.”
The girls were all laughing and gazing worshipfully after him when he left with Claudia.
Mr. Huckerby was in the dancing hall, putting a group of girls through their paces in a particularly intricate dance that they would perform during the assembly. The mar-quess shook his hand and smiled at the girls and admired their performance and charmed them until they were all smiling andâof courseâ
gazing worshipfully at him.
He asked intelligent and perceptive questions of Claudia as she showed him some of the empty classrooms and the library. He was in no hurry as he looked about each room and read the titles on the spines of many of the books.
“There was a pianoforte in the music room,” he said as they made their way to the sewing room, “and other instruments too. I noticed a violin and a flute in particular. Do you offer individual music lessons here, Miss Martin?”
“Indeed we do,” she said. “We offer everything necessary to make accomplished young ladies of our pupils, as well as persons with a sound academic education.”
He looked around the sewing room from just inside the door but did not walk farther into it.
“And do you teach other skills here in addition to sewing and embroidery?” he asked. “Knitting, perhaps? Tatting? Crochet?”
“All three,” she said as he closed the door and she led the way to the assembly hall. It had been a ballroom once when the building was a private home.
“It is a pleasingly designed room,” he said, standing in the middle of the gleaming wood floor and turning all about before looking up at the high, coved ceiling. “Indeed, I like the whole school, Miss Martin. There are windows and light everywhere and a pleasant atmosphere. Thank you for giving me a guided tour.”
He turned his most charming smile on her, and Claudia, still holding both his visiting card and Susanna's letter, clasped her free hand about her wrist and looked back with deliberate severity.
“I am delighted you approve,” she said.
His smile was arrested for a moment until he chuckled softly.
“I do beg your pardon,” he said. “I have taken enough of your time.”
He indicated the door with one arm, and Claudia led the way back to the entrance hall, feelingâand resenting the feelingâthat she had somehow been unmannerly, for those last words she had spoken had been meant ironically and he had known it.
But before they reached the hall they were forced to pause for a few moments while the junior class filed out of the dining hall in good order, on their way from tea to study hall, where they would catch up on any work not completed during the day or else read or write letters or stitch at some needlework.
They all turned their heads to gaze at the grand visitor, and the Marquess of Attingsborough smiled genially back at them, setting them all to giggling and preening as they hurried along.
All of which went to prove, Claudia thought, that even eleven- and twelve-year-olds could not resist the charms of a handsome man. It boded illâor
continued
to bode illâfor the future of the female half of the human race.
Mr. Keeble, frowning ferociously, bless his heart, was holding the marquess's hat and cane and was standing close to the front door as if to dare the visitor to try prolonging his visit further.
“I will see you early two mornings from now, then, Miss Martin?” the marquess said, taking his hat and cane and turning to her as Mr. Keeble opened the door and stood to one side, ready to close it behind him at the earliest opportunity.
“We will be ready,” she said, inclining her head to him.
Read on for an excerpt from
The Secret Mistress
by Mary Balogh
Available from Delacorte Press
Chapter
1
L
ADY
A
NGELINE
D
UDLEY
was standing at the window of the taproom in the Rose and Crown Inn east of Reading. Quite scandalously, she was alone there, but what was she to do? The window of her own room looked out only upon a rural landscape. It was picturesque enough, but it was not the view she wanted. Only the taproom window offered that, looking out as it did upon the inn yard into which any new arrival was bound to ride.
Angeline was waiting, with barely curbed impatience, for the arrival of her brother and guardian, Jocelyn Dudley, Duke of Tresham. He was to have been here before her, but she had arrived an hour and a half ago and there had been no sign of him. It was very provoking. A string of governesses over the years, culminating in Miss Pratt, had instilled in her the idea that a lady never showed an excess of emotion, but how was one not to do so when one was on one's way to London for the Seasonâone's
firstâ
and one was eager to be there so that one's adult life could begin in earnest
at last
, yet one's brother had apparently forgotten all about one's very existence and was about to leave one languishing forever at a public inn a day's journey away from the rest of one's life?
Of course, she had arrived here ridiculously early. Tresham had arranged for her to travel this far under the care of the Reverend Isaiah Coombes and his wife and two children before they went off in a different direction to celebrate some special anniversary with Mrs. Coombes's relatives, and Angeline was transferred to the care of her brother, who was to come from London. The Coombeses arose each morning at the crack of dawn or even earlier, despite yawning protests from the junior Coombeses, with the result that their day's journey was completed almost before those of more normal persons even began.
The Reverend and Mrs. Coombes had been quite prepared to settle in and wait like long-suffering martyrs at the inn until their precious charge could be handed over to the care of His Grace, but Angeline had persuaded them to be on their way. What could possibly happen to her at the Rose and Crown Inn, after all? It was a perfectly respectable establishmentâTresham had chosen it himself, had he not? And it was not as if she was quite alone. There was Betty, her maid; two burly grooms from the stables at Acton Park, Tresham's estate in Hampshire; and two stout footmen from the house. And Tresham himself was sure to arrive any minute.
The Reverend Coombes had been swayed, against his better judgment, by the soundness of her reasoningâand by the anxiety of his wife lest their journey not be completed before nightfall, and by the whining complaints of Miss Chastity Coombes and Master Esau Coombes, aged eleven and nine respectively, that they would
never
get to play with their cousins if they had to wait here forever.
Angeline's patience had been severely tried by those two while she had been forced to share a carriage with them.
She had retired to her room to change out of her travel clothes and to have Betty brush and restyle her hair. She had then instructed her drooping maid to rest awhile, which the girl had done to immediate effect on the truckle bed at the foot of Angeline's own. Meanwhile Angeline had noticed that her window would give no advance notice whatsoever of the arrival of her brother, so she had left the room to find a more satisfactory windowâonly to discover the four hefty male servants from Acton arrayed in all their menacing largeness outside her door as though to protect her from foreign invasion. She had banished them to the servants' quarters for rest and refreshments, explaining by way of persuasion that she had not noticed any highwaymen or footpads or brigands or other assorted villains hovering about the inn. Had they?