Page 7 of Escape of the Scoundrel (Escape #1)

L ady Grandison’s people had worked another miracle, providing Harriet with a startlingly lovely evening dress of pastel green gauze over a white silk slip. Her ladyship lent her “my old emeralds” to wear with it. The jewels should have overwhelmed both Harriet and the pale gown, yet somehow did not.

“They unite everything and draw attention to your eyes and your face,” Rose pronounced. “And I have to say, Harry you look lovely.”

Orchid nodded with rather more doubt. “Yes, but you still don’t look like Harry.”

“Yes, she does,” Lily said from the bed, where she had wakened up for the viewing. “More like she used to look.”

This comment seemed to reassure Orchid, who took Harriet’s hand to escort her to the bedchamber door, while the others trooped after them, and Harriet made sure they would nag Lily to drink her willow bark tea before she fell asleep again. In fact, although Lily smiled and lifted a hand to wave her off, the girl’s sleepiness worried her. She had done little but sleep since they had left the inn this morning. Fortunately, the fever seemed to have receded, but surely no one should sleep quite so much?

It was only as she entered the blue salon, where the guests gathered before dinner, that she was distracted from anxiety by the realization that she was alone and being gawped at by everyone in the room.

A thousand trivial fears paralyzed her. Had her hair come loose? Had the children played some trick that she hadn’t noticed and smeared something on her face or her gown? Had Orchid left a muddy footprint on the hem?

Then it came to her with a jolt. Several of the staring faces belonged to the drunken gentlemen form the inn. The two who had dared touch her, two others who had been sitting with Lord Sanderly. They had all seen her enter alone. They had all seen Sanderly kiss her and watched her follow the innkeeper’s wife to his room. Why had she not thought of this before? Why had she not seen or recognized—

“There you are!” It was Sir John who rescued her, presenting her with his arm and a small glass of sherry. She grasped both like lifelines, and the conversation started up again. “Don’t mind the staring,” Sir John said kindly. “Your beauty has drawn all eyes, and no wonder.”

“I wondered if I had a smut on my nose.”

Sir John laughed. “It’s admiration you see, not criticism. Eliza has placed you with Sir Ralph for dinner.”

This was a relief, since Sir Ralph had not been at the Duck and Spoon. She wondered how long it would take chatter about her to reach the ears of the Grandisons. Would they throw the children out along with her? Why had she not told her godmother about the incident at the inn? Because she was trying not to dwell upon it, and it had never entered her head she would encounter such scoundrels here...

Somehow, she got through the ordeal of dinner. The sherry and the wine helped. So did Sir Ralph, of the ready smile and the sad eyes, who made conversation that was both distracting and interesting. To her horror, a gentleman who had been at the inn was placed on her other side. He was apparently Lord Illsworth, who had been playing hazard with Sanderly. But if he recognized her, he gave no sign of it, making merely pleasant conversation with her when he was not devoting his time to Lady Barbara Martindale on his other side. She rather thought he did not really see most people, being too absorbed in himself.

Almost directly opposite her was Sanderly himself. As far as she could tell, he never so much as glanced at her throughout, but then she barely looked anywhere other than her food or the gentlemen on either side of her.

Harriet was quite relieved when at long last Lady Grandison rose to lead the ladies out to the drawing room. Only then she wondered if the gossip had reached the women too and if they would shun her. Mrs. Eldridge certainly sailed past her without acknowledgement, though immediately afterward, Bab Martindale caught up with her.

Taking her courage in both hands, Harriet resolved to find out the truth. “I don’t believe Mrs. Eldridge likes me,” she murmured low to Bab.

“Oh it’s me she doesn’t like,” Bab said carelessly. “She’s afraid I know my brother has—er... moved on. To be fair, I suppose it’s not very flattering to think one’s lover is fleeing to Africa to escape one.”

“Oh,” Harriet said weakly, trying not to look shocked. “Is he?”

“Escaping the lot of us, I should think, but I might have caused him to miss the boat, and that can only be a good thing. Or do you mean, is he her lover? Not anymore and he never goes back. And I shouldn’t be gossiping so scandalously with an unmarried young lady. You are far too easy to confide in, and now you must forget I spoke.”

That, of course was impossible, but it was her own scandals rather than Sanderly’s she wished to discuss with Bab. To her embarrassment, one of the young gentlemen from the inn held the dining room door for them and cast Harriet a far too intimate smile as she passed through.

She must have looked outraged or frightened or both, for Bab said. “Don’t mind Dolt. He’s an inveterate fortune hunter.”

“But I don’t have a fortune.”

“Don’t you?” Bab said vaguely.

“Well, it’s not vast and it’s not mine until I’m five-and-twenty.”

“Or married, I daresay,” Bab guessed.

“Yes, but I won’t be.”

“Then prepare to repel the besiegers. But marriage is fun, you know.” The smile died in her eyes and then on her lips. “Or at least it used to be,” she said, almost beneath her breath.

“Would you like to go to the cloakroom before joining the others?” asked Harriet, distracted from her own troubles.

“I’d rather go for a walk.”

“So would I. Do you need a shawl?”

“No, I need the fresh air.”

So did Harriet. Veering toward the staircase, they slipped away and out of the garden room door. Although darkness had fallen, there was enough light from the hanging lanterns and from the moon to make out the terrace and the garden paths.

“If something troubles you, I will try to help,” Harriet said at last. “But equally, I shall not be offended if you would rather I minded my own business. My siblings choose either course, depending on their mood.”

Bab took her arm. “You must be an excellent sister. I am a poor one, and a worse wife.”

“I’m sure that is not true.”

“Oh, it’s quite true. I let Hugo die, I ignore Snake though I don’t want him to leave, and in less than six months, I have turned my husband’s adoration to indifference.”

Harriet wanted to ask about her brothers but, suspecting this was not the subject currently disturbing her most, she said instead, “I am sure your husband still adores you.”

“Then you have not really looked. Though, of course, you never saw him before when he loved me. He was attentive and spent time with me, spoke of love and brought me flowers... A hundred little gestures of affection every day that I took for granted.”

Harriet considered. “Perhaps one cannot keep up that level of outward devotion. It does not mean it isn’t there inside.” All the same, she had already noted Martindale avoided her touch and, while perfectly civil in his attentions, he did not linger or escort her anywhere unless she demanded it aloud.

“I do not care about those outward things. I care that his eyes are cold, that he never smiles at me, that he does not...” She broke off, blushing and issuing a choked little laugh. “Drat you, Harriet, why do you always have me speaking so improperly? How old are you?”

“Nineteen.”

“So am I. Snake didn’t want me to marry James.”

“Who did he want you to marry?”

Bab blinked. “No one. He just thought James would bore me. Neither of us suspected I would bore him.”

“Lady Bab, he is not bored. He is...that is, he looks to me like...a...a schoolboy in a miff. I don’t believe he is remotely indifferent.”

“Do you think not?” Bab said eagerly. “The thing is, I am a trying person to live with, and I act before I think, which is how I came to flirt with another and even give him...” She trailed off sighing. “And that is another thing. In a moment of spite, instantly regretted, I gave him a cravat pin James had given me, a love token that I wore as a brooch, which I should never have parted with. Anyway, Ills... this man would not give it back. Now I’m sure James notices I no longer wear it and Ill—er... the man I gave it to claims it was stolen from him and he can’t return it.”

“Do you believe him?” Harriet asked when she had disentangled the threads of this.

“Not entirely, but I can’t exactly search his room for the wretched thing.”

“Why not?” Harriet asked.

Bab’s lips twitched upward. “I knew I would like you. Because if I was discovered in his room by anyone at all, the scandal would spread instantly to James, and I would be utterly undone.”

“Yes, I see.” Harriet nodded. “Whereas, I am a silly newcomer who might easily have wandered into the wrong room.”

“But that is even worse since you are unmarried!”

“Oh, I am going away soon in any case, but it would only be gossip rather than true scandal if I did it while he is in the company of everyone else. Let me think... What does this cravat pin look like?”

***

W HEN THE LADIES HAD withdrawn from the dining room and the port and brandy were being passed freely among the gentlemen, Sanderly was glad to discover that Grandison was an informal host. Remarks and jests flew up and down and across the table; men moved seats to avoid shouting and to enjoy deeper conversations. Still, the time would be limited, for Grandison would not wish to take a bunch of inebriates into his wife’s drawing room. Sanderly would have to act quickly, considering the presence of Wriggley, Dolt, and Fool...to say nothing of the newly arrived Wolf, who seemed to be knocking back the brandy with more than usual abandon.

Martindale—dear James—could make pleasant conversation with the best of the ton, but he shone more in formal situations, too concerned, perhaps, with his own dignity—although to be fair, Sanderly’s assessment sprang from the few occasions they had been forced to meet in each other’s houses, including the wedding breakfast. Sanderly rarely went to clubs or to society parties except to escort Bab before her marriage when he couldn’t rope in uncles or cousins to take his place. He preferred the Sanderly estates, only since his return from the Peninsula, the English sun seemed too pale, the colours of the countryside too bland.

When had lush green become duller than parched earth?

Stick to the matter in hand , he told himself severely. He sat somewhat aloofly in the midst of the amiable chatter. Grandison made occasional efforts to draw him into conversation, and he murmured a few words just to be polite. He was well aware people only listened in case he said anything outrageously cutting or shocking enough to pass on as gossip.

But Sanderly had no quarrel with Grandison. He had been perfectly decent about his unwelcome descent upon his party, and he appeared to have accepted the entire Cole brood in the same amiable spirit of hospitality.

Sir John rose and moved around the table to speak to Thornton and Illsworth. Sanderly twisted the stem of his brandy glass between his fingers and regarded James. There were a few vacant seats to his left. Dolt, on his right, was his nearest neighbour at the moment, but Sanderly knew how to scare him off.

Rising with his glass, he strolled around the table and took the empty chair between James and Dolt. Inevitably, Dolt looked outraged before deliberately rising and going to join his friend Fool who seemed to be annoying Wolf at the other side of the table.

“James,” Sanderly said fondly.

To give him his due, James seemed neither alarmed nor irritated. On the other hand, no one could have interpreted his expression as pleased to see his brother-in-law so close.

“Sanderly,” James responded.

“Indeed. I have—er... reared my damned head once more.”

Recognizing his own less than gracious words, James had the grace to blush. He shifted in his seat. “I apologize for my temper earlier. I spoke in haste and much too rudely.”

“Oh, be as rude as you like,” Sanderly encouraged. “You are family, after all. It is the cross you took up by marrying my sister.”

James regarded him with a hint of suspicion, but interestingly, no fear. Most people regarded Sanderly with fear, either of his sharp tongue or the social damage caused by being seen with him. Now that he thought of it, he had never surprised that look in James’s eyes.

The man frowned but clearly struggled for a reply.

“You do remember my sister, don’t you?” Sanderly prompted.

“Of course I remember my own wife! And I am well aware you were always against the match.”

“Not always. I seem to recall consenting and, in fact, I—er... gave you her hand in St. George’s, Hanover Square.”

“Then your memory is as good as mine,” James retorted.

“Better, it seems. You appear to have forgotten why you married Bab despite her obnoxious relation. And why she fought tooth and nail to be allowed to marry you. And she did, you know.”

Involuntarily, James’s eyes strayed across the table to Illsworth, who was rather too carefully avoiding glancing in their direction while he listened to Grandison and Thornton.

Sanderly sighed. “You knew when you married her that she was a flirt by nature. You assured me you recognized the true value of the woman beneath. That is what you have forgotten. She may flirt still, but she remains the same woman beneath. Loyal and true, as they say. If you don’t know that, then you never deserved her.”

From blushing, James seemed to have paled, though it might have been the fault of the candlelight. “Proving you right to refuse my suit in the first place?”

“Only think how everyone would hate that. What did you imagine she would do after a quarrel? Go into a decline until you forgave her? No, she flirted with the first man she saw to make you jealous. And by God, it worked, though not quite in the way she meant. Allow me to call you a complete gudgeon.”

James opened his mouth, but Sanderly had not finished.

“Make yourself miserable by all means, James. But be assured, I won’t tolerate your doing the same to my sister.” He smiled and rose once more, raising his glass very slightly to his brother-in-law. “Dear James. Always a pleasure to talk to you.”

***

L ILY WAS ASLEEP WHEN Harriet looked in on her, but since she was not fevered, Harriet felt no compunction in removing the younger children and negotiating a reasonable bed time with Mildred the nursery maid. She only made it to the drawing room a few minutes before the gentlemen joined the ladies.

So that Illsworth would suspect no collusion between them, Harriet sat well away from Bab, settling instead beside her godmother, who demanded an update on Lily’s health.

Naturally, the arrival of the gentlemen changed everything. The debutantes sat straighter and began to sparkle, whether on their own initiative or prodded—literally—by their mothers.

Mrs. Eldridge and the young matrons were much too sophisticated to be so obvious, but Harriet was sure she knew who was involved with whom. Mrs. Eldridge flicked open her fan and smiled at no one in particular, although her face always seemed to be pointed toward Sanderly. Mrs. Archer, the beauty who had spoken ill of Sanderly at luncheon, made space on her sofa for Lord Wolf—another dice player from the inn.

Bab’s face lit up at sight of her husband who, Harriet was relieved to see, went straight to her. Perhaps he had realized how much his wife truly loved him. So if only she could extract the cravat pin from Illsworth, all should be well.

Such were Harriet’s thoughts when she saw with some alarm that several gentlemen were all but charging toward her . And just when Lady Grandison took it into her head to move across the room.

Worse, two of the men at the front had been at the Duck and Spoon.

“Miss Cole,” the first said breathlessly, bowing and hurling himself into Lady Grandison’s vacated chair. “What an unexpected joy to find you alone.”

“Hardly,” Harriet murmured, watching in bewilderment as another man inserted himself between them, settling on the arm of the first gentleman’s chair. Another moved a hard backed chair to sit directly opposite her, an action quickly copied by a fourth.

Was this to be a repeat of the mob-insult at the Duck and Spoon? Surely they would not dare in such surroundings, when she was under the Grandisons’ protection?

Involuntarily, her gaze sought out Lord Sanderly, lounging alone on the window seat. Impossible to tell if his eyes were open, let alone where they might be focused.

“You know, I can’t help feeling we have met before, ma’am,” said the first man, leaning forward to address her around his friend. “Perhaps it was at Almack’s?”

“No, sir, I have never been to London.”

“What, never?” asked the chair arm man in astonishment.

Were they making fun of her?

“Never,” she said flatly. “You’ll forgive me gentlemen, but I have met so many new people since arriving at Grand Court, that I have completely forgotten your names.”

“Allow me to present Dolt and Fool,” said the man opposite her with some malice.

“My name is Dolton,” the first man said, sparing him a glare before indicating the chair arm man. “And this is Mr. Poole. Some people rejoice in rude and childish nicknames.”

“I am sure they are mere joking nicknames,” Harriet said.

“Hardly, when Snake Sanderly gave them,” said the man opposite with some amusement.

Harriet recalled that Dolton had, in fact, been the man who had tried to humiliate Sanderly at luncheon and been routed. She supposed the contemptuous nicknames made sense of that.

“No one pays any attention to him ,” Dolt muttered.

“And yet the names have stuck,” said the fourth man, leaning forward. “Bennett Wriggley, Miss Cole, at your service.”

“How do you do?” Harriet said politely.

“Why, I am well and deliriously happy to be in your company.”

Harriet regarded him quite carefully, but he was not even joking. He had been at the inn, like Dolt and Fool— Dolton and Poole !—but as far as she could tell, none of them recognized her. Of course they had been drunk as wheelbarrows, which might just have saved her reputation, but the question remained, what were they about now?

For the next ten minutes, they competed to pay her fulsome compliments, to make her laugh, to ensure her comfort by fetching shawls or cushions, and to secure dances at tomorrow evening’s waltzing party and at the upcoming Grand ball next week. Once she stopped worrying, she found them mildly amusing, although she was in no danger of believing a word. No doubt she was the point of some wager, or just a contest she could not understand. Of course it did nothing to endear her to the other debutantes.

As planned, when the tea trolley was wheeled in and placed in front of Lady Grandison, Bab rose, ferried a cup of tea to her husband, and then sauntered away to sit by a small group who included Lord Illsworth. James’s eyes hardened once more, and Harriet wished ruefully that they had thought of another way of keeping Illsworth in sight. Well, it was not as if Bab was engaging in a tête-à-tête with the man.

As soon as Harriet rose, the men around her sprang up too, causing rather more of a stir than she would have liked. Especially as, when she murmured, “Excuse me, gentlemen,” a fifth seemed to materialize from nowhere asking if he could fetch her a cup of tea.

“Oh, no thank you, not at this moment. I just have to...”

“Allow me to escort you, Miss Cole.”

This was getting ridiculous. She looked him in the eye. “Thank you, no,” she said firmly. As she had hoped, he blushed, grasping that he could not escort her to the cloakroom.

Past that obstacle, she had to veer off course to avoid another man advancing purposefully toward her and then all but sprint to the drawing room door, smothering a slightly hysterical urge to laugh. Her exit had hardly been the discreet departure she and Bab had planned, but at least no one was following her.

And there, peering over the banister, were Alex and Orchid. They grinned at her and she hurried toward them, as if that had always been her plan. The footmen below may have wondered why, after a quick exchange of words, she did not sweep them upstairs with her, but left them where they were while she hurried up to the landing. Rose, lurking there with a doll and a vast array of clothes for it, winked at her.

Harriet winked back. “Pay attention,” she murmured, and turned not right toward the family rooms where she was quartered but left toward the guest rooms.

Fortunately, the footmen could not have seen that. She would just have to watch out now for maids and valets.

She counted along the doors according to Bab’s instructions, hoping fervently that they were accurate. She paused an instant outside what she hoped was Illsworth’s room and glanced both ways along the empty passage before trying the door.

It was not locked. Which either meant he had nothing to hide or he was careless. She slipped inside and closed the door. A lamp, turned low, burned on the nearest table. She turned it up and looked around her. Now to begin...