The Magnificent Masquerade (22 page)

Lord Edgerton could do nothing but blink in
amazement. After a moment, he silently backed out and closed the door with the
same care Kitty had shown earlier. "Good God!" he exclaimed in a
hushed whisper. "Was that Toby?" Kitty, remembering all the nasty
things Toby had said to Emily at first, did not understand what had caused this
apparent change in him and was still suspicious of his motives.

"He's your brother, my lord," she
pointed out tartly. "You should know."

His lordship looked down at her with one
eyebrow raised. "Even the accident to your mistress hasn't sweetened your
sharp tongue. I warned you to guard against that tendency, didn't I? Haven't
you taken my good advice to heart at all?"

"Oh, yes, my lord," she assured him
with almost convincing earnestness. "Very much to heart. Mr. Naismith
hasn't scolded me once since you lectured me the other day."

"What?" he asked suspiciously.
"Not once?"

Kitty guiltily remembered the butler's last
words to her just a short while ago. "Well, perhaps once," she
admitted. He guffawed. "What a sauce-box you are, girl! If I had the sense
I was born with, I'd send you packing. Have you had tea?"

The abrupt change of subject confused her.
"Tea, my lord?"

"No, of course you haven't. Neither have
I, so I told Naismith to leave a tray in my study. Come along and have a cup
with me."

"Thank you, my lord, you are most kind.
But I don't think I should leave my post."

His lordship shook his head in despair.
"You really are incorrigible. When your master tells you to go, it is your
duty to obey. Can it be that you are unfamiliar with the word obey?

It means to follow instructions, to comply with
orders, to submit to those in authority

"But, my lord, Mr. Naismith said that if I
left this post it would be the finish of me."

"And, knowing you, he was quite right to
say it. But since you've already left your post to my brother, and since my
brother seems in no hurry to desert it, I think it permissible to take a little
time for tea."

"But what if Mr. Naismith should
discover-?" "You can trust me to deal with Naismith if it becomes
necessary. Now, come along, girl, and let me hear no more arguments."

He set off down the hall without further ado.
Kitty, looking appropriately meek, followed obediently. But her pulse raced
with excitement at the realization that he wished to spend a bit more time in
her company. Her inner excitement, added to the necessity of running to keep up
with his long-legged stride (which he made no attempt to slow down to
accommodate her), caused her to arrive at his study door in a state of extreme
breathlessness.

He opened the door and stood aside for her.
"Oh, what a lovely room," she exclaimed, pausing in the doorway.

It was indeed an impressive room. The ceiling was
high, and the three multipaned windows, which covered the entire wall opposite
where she stood, climbed the full height of the room. Books lined two of the
other walls while the third held the fireplace and an awesome array of
paintings. A huge, eight-legged desk, covered with ledgers and papers, stood
before the window, and a library table (on which the tea tray had been set)
dominated the center of the room. Two armchairs before the fireplace completed
the furnishings.

Lord Edgerton gave her only a moment to look
about her. "I'm delighted that you approve, my dear," he said drily,
"but if you insist on keeping me standing here holding the door for you,
we shall never get our tea."

"Oh ... I'm sorry," she murmured,
stepping inside. "Make yourself comfortable, girl." He made a
sweeping motion toward the armchairs near the fire. "I'll pour the
tea."

But she didn't sit down. Instead she crossed
the room and stood studying the various portraits on the wall. She decided that
the portrait right over the fireplace, of a heavyset gentleman in a red velvet
frock coat with gold buttons, had to be the late Earl of Edgerton, for he had
Toby's thick lips and a look of the present Lord Edgerton about the eyes. A
portrait of a slim girl in white was Lady Edith in her younger days. And
another, showing the same girl, now not quite so slim, seated on a chaise with
a baby in her arms and two children standing beside her, was the most
interesting painting of all. "Oh, what a darling little boy you
were," she remarked, staring at the likeness closely.

"1 can't imagine how you recognized
me," he said, coming up to her with a brimming cup. "I couldn't have
been more than ten when that was painted."

Unable to tear her eyes from this
representation of his younger self, she reached for the cup without looking,
jostling it in its saucer. The hot liquid spilled over, wetting the bandage on
her hand and causing a sharp pain on the already raw palm. "Oh!" she
cried out, wincing, and dropped the cup and saucer.

"Good God," his lordship exclaimed in
horror, "what's this?"

Kitty reddened in embarrassment. "Oh
dear," she murmured, bending down and trying desperately to mop up the
spilled tea with her apron, "I'm so clumsy. Please forgive ... the cup
isn't broken, but I'm afraid the saucer-"

"I'm not concerned about the china, you
idiot!" he barked, grasping her arms and lifting her to her feet.
"What have you done to your hand?" Without giving her an opportunity
to object, he took her hand in his and pulled off the makeshift bandage. When
he saw the red, raw, discolored palm he winced. "Damnation!" he
muttered under his breath. "How did this-?"

"It's nothing, my lord," Kitty said,
trying to pull the hand from his grasp. "It's only a little burn."

"A little burn? The deuced wound's almost
festering! I'll have Naismith's head for this!"

"No, please!" she begged, placing her
other hand gently on his arm. "It's not his fault. He doesn't even know
about it." Her gesture softened him a bit. "Very well, we'll talk
about that later. For now, we must do something about this ... this mutilation.
Wait here. I'll be right back." He stalked to the door and then turned
back to her. "You heard me, miss! I expect you to remain right there where
I left you. You are not to leave this room for any reason whatsoever. For once
in your unruly life you are to obey! Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, my lord," she said with a deep,
ironic curtsey.

"Whatever you say, my lord."

Her lack of seriousness made him grit his teeth
in irritation. "I don't know how you managed to reach the ripe old age
of-what is it? Seventeen?"

"Eighteen, my lord."

"Eighteen, then. I don't know how you've
managed to survive so many years. I'm surprised someone didn't murder you long
ago." And he slammed out of the room.

She stared at the door for a moment and then
looked down at her blemished palm. It was indeed an ugly wound. Now that she
knew it was finally going to be attended to, she could admit to herself that it
looked putrid. With a shudder, she thrust the hand behind her back and turned
her mind to other things. She strolled about the room, glancing at his
lordship's books and rifling through the papers on his desk. But nothing caught
her interest until she chanced upon a miniature in a silver frame that had been
placed in a position of importance in the center of one of the bookshelves
(where, she noted, it could easily be seen by anyone seated at the desk). It
was a portrait of a lady whose face bore no resemblance to anyone in the
household. She was tall and graceful, with soft, blonde curls framing a
delicate face. And even in miniature, Kitty could detect that the lady had
long, elegant fingers. She picked it up and carried it to the fire to take a
closer look. But before she'd crossed the room, the door opened. Lord Edgerton
entered, carrying a tray on which he collected two bowls, several rolls of
gauze bandage, some vials and jars, and a pair of scissors. "Ah, you're
still here," he said, placing the tray on the library table. "I must
admit I would not have wagered a large sum on finding you. Come here to me, if
you please."

Hiding the hand holding the miniature in a fold
of her skirt, she gingerly approached the table. Without warning, he lifted her
up and sat her upon it, surprising her so greatly that she dropped the
miniature. He bent down and picked it up.

"What's this?" he inquired.

"I saw it on one of the bookshelves and
wished to take a closer look. I hope you don't mind." She bit her lip
nervously, but kept her eyes fixed on his face. "She is very ...
lovely..."

"Mmmm," his lordship grunted
indifferently, putting the painting aside and sorting through the items on the
tray. Kitty, perched as she was on the table, was face to face with him. She
took a deep breath and looked him squarely in the eye. "Is it your Miss
Inglesham?"

"My Miss Inglesham?" He stared at
her, agape with astonishment. "Wherever did you hear about her?"

"Backstairs gossip." Kitty shrugged.
"One of the maids mentioned her."

Edgerton snorted. "That, my inquisitive
child, is a painting of Lady Matthieson."

"Oh." There was a pause while his
lordship poured some evil-smelling lotion from a vial into one of the bowls.
Kitty knew she should let the matter of the portrait drop, but she could not.
"Was Lady Matthieson someone else you loved?" she asked brazenly.

Edgerton frowned at her in annoyance.
"Someone else I loved? You are implying by that question that I once loved
Miss Inglesham. If your backstairs gossips told you that, it is a perfect
example of the inaccuracy of that sort of information. I may have been taken by
Miss Inglesham at first, but I soon found her an insipid bore. I had to hide
myself abroad for months to disentangle myself from that relationship. And as
for Lady Matthieson, she was my great-aunt Mathilda. She is said to have run
off to America with a captain of the Royal Guard. If my calculations are
correct, and if she's still alive, she is now about ninety-three years of age.
I hope that answers your question."

"Well, almost," the incorrigible girl
persisted. "I would just like to know, if she is only your elderly aunt,
how it is that her picture stands framed in silver in a place where you can see
her every time you lift your eyes."

"Because, Miss Curiosity, it's a
Gainsborough, and I happen to like the work very much. Are you satisfied
now?"

"Yes, my lord," she said, lowering
her eyes meekly. "Good. In that case, we can finally turn our attention to
the more important matter of your hand."

He took her wounded hand in his. She kept her
face turned away as he bathed and cleaned the wound, cut away dead skin, and
painted her palm with a caustic liquid that made her gasp. After that the worst
was over. As he covered the entire area of the burn with a soothing ointment,
he resumed the conversation. "I've answered all your questions, girl, so
perhaps you'll answer mine. How was it that you and `one of the other maids'
were discussing Miss Inglesham?"

Kitty had the decency to blush. "I ... we
... she just happened to remark that you were once ... betrothed to her."

He cocked an eyebrow at her. "Just happened
to remark? Out of the blue?"

"Not exactly."

"Then how, exactly?"

Her color deepened. "The subject came up
when we were . er . . speculating about your ... er ... oh, blast, I can't tell
you!"

"What? The intrepid Miss Emily Pratt
afraid to speak up? Come on, girl, I won't eat you. What were you speculating
about?"

Kitty put up her chin. "About whether or
not you keep a fancy piece in London as your brother does," she blurted
out with bravado.

Edgerton choked. He was in the act of folding a
length of gauze into a thick pad, but her answer so shocked him that everything
he was holding fell from his hand-the pad, the roll of gauze, the scissors, and
all. It took a good deal of restraint to keep himself from guffawing, but he
was afraid that a laugh might be a sign of encouragement to the abominable
chit. "My word," he muttered as he bent to pick the things up,
"is that the sort of thing you talk about belowstairs?"

"Well, you must admit the subject is an
interesting one."

"That's no excuse. Interesting or not, it's
an unfit subject for innocent girls." He reassembled his material and
continued to fashion the gauze pad. "I still don't see how Miss
Inglesham's name came into the discussion," he remarked, knowing full well
that he'd be wiser to let the matter drop.

"It came up when Miss ... when the other
maid said that any gentleman who'd been betrothed to someone as lovely as Miss
Inglesham was not likely to keep a fancy piece."

"Ah I see." He placed the thick pad
gently on her palm and began to secure it to her hand with a long length of
bandage. "I seem to have misjudged you, Emily Pratt. I would have thought
you too innocent even to know what a fancy piece was."

"I'm not a child, you know," she
said, drawing herself up in offended dignity. "It's a mistress, is it not?
Someone to whom a gentleman offers a carte blanche. And that means that she has
a free hand to spend as much of his money as she wishes, in return for favors,
of course. Am I right?"

"Quite right," Edgerton said, biting
back a grin. This is indeed Birkinshaw's irrepressible daughter, he told
himself. There was no mistaking it. But if Birkinshaw were privy to this
shocking conversation, he would no doubt call Edgerton out! Edgerton knew he
should reprimand the girl, but he couldn't do it. He was finding her naughty
innocence completely entrancing.

"You see, I do know a good deal," the
girl was continuing,

"although I didn't know-until that
conversation with the other maid that you gentlemen find your mistresses in
Vauxhall Gardens."

"Oh, not only in Vauxhall, my dear,"
he said, teasing. "'We gentlemen' find them in all sorts of places."