The Accidental Duchess Page 15

  One morning in autumn by the dawn of the day

  With my gun in good order I straight took my way

  To hunt for some game to the woods I did steer

  To see if I could find my bonnie black hare

  “Make a distraction,” Myrtia whispered to me.

  “What?” I whispered back, as Lady Wainwright launched into the second verse.

  I met a young damsel, her eyes black as sloes

  Her teeth white as ivory, her cheeks like a rose

  “Do something so people will notice you instead of her,” Myrtia said.

  Her hair hung in ringlets on her shoulders bare

  Sweet maiden, I cried, Did you see my bonnie black hare?

  “No,” I said, furiously. “I understand what a distraction is. I mean ‘what’ should I do? And why me?”

  Several masculine voices joined for the third verse.

  This morning a-hunting I have been all around

  But my bonnie black hare is not to be found—

  Myrtia said, “Because you are known to be somewhat—clumsy, on occasion.”

  “I am not.”

  “The rumor is that you spilled your drink down m’brother’s waistcoat this very night, m’dear girl,” Cambourne drawled, from next to me. “Shocking abuse of a fine piece of tailoring, not to mention a fine glass of champagne.”

  “Well, he—” I began to retort, but Cambourne cut me off, his voice low, against my ear, and much more his own, now. “I know this song, Gwen, and we really do not want her getting to the third verse.”

  The baritone voices were swelling through the room, gaining strength by the instant. Apparently it was quite a popular little ditty. Poor Caro had stopped singing, tears running down her face.

  My gun is in good order, my balls are also

  And under your smock I was told she did go

  So delay me no longer, I cannot stop here

  One shot I will fire at your bonnie black hare

  “Do something,” Myrtia hissed, as Cambourne said, low in my ear, “Forgive me, Gwen.” And then with an extraordinarily un-Milburn-like decisiveness, kicked the flimsy leg on my chair.

  I heard it crack, and I felt him surreptitiously grab me so that I didn’t land hard, but that didn’t stop the shock as I fell, in slow time, the chorale thundering in my ears, as I hit the ground.

  Myrtia did her part by screaming, and thus attracting attention to the fact that I was now lying, wedged into the space between our two seats.

  The singers lost volume as heads swiveled with Myrtia’s scream, then quiet fell as Cambourne jumped to his feet, drawling, “Good Lord, darling, are you all right?”

  He did not, however, help me up, but instead stood, looking down at me, to give people plenty of time to transfer their attention to my predicament. “Chair broke! Don’cha know,” he said, very loudly, to no one in particular. People were standing now to try to get a look at the situation, some craning around backward.

  Only Lady Wainwright’s voice was now left, and it was almost inaudible in the growing din as everyone pressed in to see whether I was injured.

  “No, no,” Cambourne drawled. “She’s fine. Just give her a bit of air. Might want to cut back on those sweetmeats a bit, old girl,” he said, lazily, studying me through the quizzing glass he had produced from some flounce or ruffle, and sounding exactly like Milburn. I glared at him as well as my position could allow. Having apparently decided that I had served my purpose, he extended a languid hand and helped me to my feet. “Ah, Hillerton,” he said pointedly, more than a trace of Cambourne apparent in his voice, to the gentleman seated to Myrtia’s right who was craning his neck over Myrtia and staring at my petticoats. “Are you acquainted with my wife?”

  I was also aware of Mrs. Trompington, once again surveying me through her opera glasses, which seemed a wholly unnecessary affectation, since she was all of two seats behind me.

  “Good to see the gel putting a little meat on the old bones,” Violetta stage-whispered. “I told her, I did. Said, ‘a man likes to grab a nice handful of bottom come a cold winter night!’ ”

  “Excuse me,” said Cambourne to the elderly gentleman on his left. “Could I trouble you to let us past once more? Need to escort the wife home. Dreadful mishap, don’cha know.”

  “Mishap!” the gentleman bellowed as I hobbled behind Cambourne, trying my best to smile. “T’whole sorry evening is a mishap as far as I’m concerned and now I can’t even get a decent spot of sleep. M’wife said opera. M’expecting opera. I heard the deuced infernal caterwauling racket, right enough, but I ain’t seen any dancers. Where’s the opera dancers, I ask?” He glared at me, and then a hopeful note entered his eye. “I don’t suppose you’re one, are you?”

  Cambourne grinned back at me, a quick flash of mischief in his eyes.

  “No,” I said, icily. “I am not.”

  “Saw quite a bit of leg, though,” said the gentleman on Myrtia’s other side. “When she fell. Just up to the knee, mind. Vastly disappointed, don’cha know.”

  “Disappointed!” said the elderly man, leaning toward him. “Was it plump? M’self, I like a plump knee with a few dimples. That I do.”

  I promised myself that Cecy would be in debt to me for the rest of our lives. And as for Cambourne, well, the rest of his life was looking to be short indeed.

  Lady Wainwright, having apparently abandoned both her musical efforts and her chair, was advancing on us. She and the elderly gentleman must have been acquaintances, because she said, “Hello, Leonard.”

  “Evening, Lady Wainwright,” he said.

  “Like a plump knee, do you now, Leonard?” she asked flirtatiously.

  He inclined his head. “That I do,” he said, as Cambourne led me away.

  15

  In which my friends provide consolation in a time of distress

  “No one remarked it,” Myrtia assured me, next morning.

  “It’s true, Gwen,” Cecy said, and I loved them both for their dishonesty.

  “Everyone remarked it,” I told her. “Some remarked it with opera glasses. You just didn’t remark it because you didn’t have a good view of things because you were sitting in front of me.”

  “Well, yes, that plus that fact that I had my face buried in my hands.” Cecy managed a smile. “Please tell Cambourne that I am forever in his debt,” she said.

  “And mine,” I reminded her, somewhat less than selflessly. “It was my derrière, remember?”

  “Well, that goes without saying,” she replied. “I wonder, though, and not that I’m not grateful, but”—she looked at me—“would you have done it on your own?”

  “If he hadn’t dumped me off my chair?” I asked, looking at her. “I like to think I would have created some distraction,” I said, “but in all honesty, not that particular one, and probably not so quickly or with such presence of mind. I think he saved you from at least a verse or two.”

  She nodded. “What I really want to know is, what did Cambourne say when you got home, Gwen?”

  “He said—I made my voice deep—“‘You didn’t injure your … posterior, did you?’”

  And we all started laughing with a notable lack of decorum.

  “And then?” Myrtia said.

  “And then, I said, ‘Not so you’d notice, and put away that ridiculous quizzing glass before I am tempted to injure you.’ And he said, ‘Well, I am only trying to behave as Milburn would.’ ‘Excellent,’ I said, ‘then I shall behave as I would were I truly married to Milburn and lock him—you—out of the house to sleep at the club for the next, oh, ten years.’ ”

  They both laughed. “Was that it?” Cecy wanted to know. “Not so much as a word as to how he had come to tell you he had to leave town and then ended up falling down Mathilde Claussen’s cleavage?”

  “Well, no, actually we did get to that a bit later on.”

  What had happened was that I’d asked for a bath. Once the water was ready, Crewes had departed with a sniff (in a
huff because I insisted on bathing myself). And I had crossed the room to the mirror. In the aftermath of seeing Cambourne with Mathilde, it was occurring to me for the first time to wonder how he saw me, what I looked like to him. At the edge of my mind, the notion, why do I care so much? brushed by, but I declined to examine it.

  I peered at myself, looking for some enlightenment, but saw only the same face and figure that had looked back at me for as long as I could recall. How can anyone know precisely how others see them? While I have never shuddered at my own appearance, it is hardly remarkable—not much to attract a man used to such delectable delights as Cambourne, I decided gloomily.

  I am not, and have never been, exotic. Mathilde is exotic, with flaming copper ringlets and smoky gray eyes, set deep above fragile cheekbones. And, I wondered, torturing myself just a little further, what else? Was she wittier than I? Cleverer? More sophisticated? Capable of coming up with incisive repartee instead of finding herself foolishly tongue-tied by Cambourne’s presence? No doubt she was all of those things and more, I decided, glumly, as I turned away from the mirror.

  I climbed into the bath, slid down in the blissfully warm water, and then stuck a leg out and rested it on the side of the deep copper tub. I was hard-pressed to find anything I actually disliked about my foot, but then, I reminded myself, I have never seen Mathilde’s feet. Perhaps they possessed a mysterious ability to make grown men weep with awe. Not that I knew how that might be, but one never knew. Mine was acceptable. Slim and pale with a high arch. My legs were long and slender—but then, I was a bit on the tall side—and I had always secretly felt them rather elegant. Being tall had never before bothered me unduly. I was not precisely a giant and Milburn was tall enough that I had never worried that I would feel like an Amazon beside him.

  That happy attitude, however, was before Mathilde. She was, in a word, tiny. And thus was able to do that looking up a vast distance over the fan thing, no doubt making Cambourne feel huge and masculine and protective. It was hard to imagine him pushing her off her chair, that much was certain. And if he had, she no doubt was possessed of those highly desirable dimpled legs of which gentlemen seemed so enamored. Mathilde wedged on her bottom between two chairs would likely have been quite the crowd pleaser. I lifted my leg higher and examined it as I slid farther down in the water. Not so much as a hint of a dimple. I sighed.

  I ducked under the water to soap my hair. I had just finished pulling on my wrapper and coiling my wet hair on top of my head, when Cambourne himself scratched at the door that connected our two dressing rooms.

  All I really wanted was to yell and scream at him for his odious behavior. For making me like him and want him, while at the same time driving me into a fury and keeping me in ignorance. Not to mention dumping me off my chair. But, I reminded myself, no matter how I felt, I needed to retain my dignity. A calm, ladylike—or better yet, countess-like—air of detachment was what I was striving for. Chilly. Cold, even. No, better yet, completely dispassionate, as though I did not even care enough to bother being cold.

  “Yes?” I said, coolly, in keeping with this decision.

  “Cambourne,” he said, politely.

  “Oh,” I said, as though the identity of the person knocking had not previously occurred to me. Then I paused for effect, the implication being that I was thinking about whether I wanted to invite him in. “Come in, then,” I said, adding, ungraciously, “if you want.”

  In his hand he held a heavy tumbler of something amber. And his hair, like mine, really did not hold a curl, because it had fallen straight again, over his forehead. I had the wayward thought that any children Cambourne and I might have together would have very straight hair indeed, which thought brought a blush at odds with the detached demeanor I was determined to present.

  He had changed into his own fawn-colored breeches and white shirt, open at the neck, with no cravat, and pulled on a robe de chambre over the whole. I yawned, discreetly covering my mouth with my hand, to show my utter boredom with his presence.

  “Would you like to rake me over the coals now?” he asked equably, taking a seat. “I do believe that I did agree earlier to appear in the marital bedchamber for precisely that.”

  “Why on earth would I?” I replied. I would have liked to have stretched and yawned again, to imply that I couldn’t have been bothered to put myself out to such a degree on his account, but I was a bit concerned that my wrapper would not stay entirely closed. “Do be seated,” I said, pointedly, since he was already ensconced.

  He raised a brow. “Thank you, I will,” he said. “You are angry with me?”

  I raised a brow in return. “Angry with you? Why ever would you think that?”

  “It’s no matter,” he replied, sounding most unruffled. “All that is important is that you are not.” He stretched then, uncoiling his long, lean body in such a relaxed way that it made my teeth hurt with the effort of keeping them clenched in a smile. “And in that case it appears that we have nothing we need discuss.”

  “No,” I said, through my still clenched teeth, attempting to sound as though the idea could not have been more foreign. “In fact, I find myself unable to think of a single thing that necessitates discussion.” I forced a gritted smile.

  “I think I shall retire, then. It has been a long day.” He started to rise.

  “Yes,” I said, civilly, the fury starting to race through me to such an extent that I could almost hear it. Despite my best efforts, it began to leak out. “I can well imagine that it has, what with all of the various roles you have had to play today: yourself, your brother, the besotted lover, the caring husband, the gentlemanly rescuer. And all of them to different women! Why, you must be positively wilting with exhaustion!”

  He sat back down. “And which, exactly, of that list has you so angry, Gwen?”

  “Oh, you choose,” I said.

  “Very well.” He looked at me assessingly. “I doubt it was the gentlemanly rescuer.”

  Actually, the gentlemanly rescuer role was the one I had least objected to, but, come to think of it, I did have a few questions on that front. “Would you have shoved Mathilde Claussen on the floor?” I asked, or, well, demanded. So much for my cool, uncaring demeanor. I knew it had deserted me, but at the moment I was too furious to care.

  “I do not know,” he said, after a moment. “It had not occurred to me before the fact that I would be shoving anyone onto the floor. It was a spur of the moment decision, you understand.”

  “I do understand that,” I persisted. “But would you have?”

  “Do you want the honest answer, Gwen?” he asked, slowly.

  “Yes,” I said, although that was likely a blatant untruth.

  “No,” he said. “Likely not. But, then, I thought you a loyal enough friend that you would not object to the affront to your self-respect if it meant sparing Cecy further embarrassment.”

  “I see,” I replied, feeling slightly ashamed of myself.

  “I’m not sure that you do,” he said.

  “But am I so devoid of sensibility—or is it that I am so clumsy that you believe me to be accustomed to showing my bottom in public?” I asked.

  “Oh Gwen,” he said, looking almost sad. “Is that what you believe of me?”

  “I believe that you thought you could coerce me into an unwanted marriage because I always do what I’m told,” I said. “And I believe it because you told me. Isn’t that enough?”

  He stood, then, and crossed to me, setting down his glass on the table next to me. “For what it’s worth, you did not show your bottom.”

  “You think that only because you did not have opera glasses,” I snapped.

  “Actually, I had quite a good view.” He smiled.

  I stood, too, wanting to go, if not nose to nose, at least something closer to it. “I am sorry that you are so tired of this forced descent into dull domesticity that you felt the need to be out playing the bachelor. But the domesticity was not, as you might recall, my idea.”
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br />   It did not escape me that his gaze had slipped to my clinging silk wrapper. “I’m more than aware that it was not your idea,” he said, not lifting his eyes to my face. “And since you persist in reminding me at every opportunity, not likely to forget it any time soon.”

  “Oh?” I replied, crossing my arms, and waiting until he had raised his gaze.

  “And,” he said, letting his gaze fall again and roam over me, and despite myself I once again felt something shimmering between us, “are you implying that you expect domesticity? With me? Because that was not the impression I was under.”

  “I can well imagine that you would not have spared much thought for the subject, given your other … concerns,” I said tartly.

  He looked at my face then, for a long moment, and then shrugged off his robe. With our gazes locked together, he reached for me. We were so close I was able to feel his breath as he slid his robe up my arms and pulled it closed at the front. I sighed at the luxurious warmth of it. And the understanding that the warmth was his, from his skin, sent an involuntary shiver up my spine.

  “Actually, I have given it a good deal of thought. And it seems to me,” he said, quietly, as his nimble fingers tied the sash, “that you have made it extremely clear that you are marking time with me, waiting for Milburn.”

  “No, Cambourne,” I said, in measured tones. “What I hope to have made clear is that I consider myself an honorable and loyal person who has been thrust without my consent into a most untenable situation and who is unable to get anyone to give me the answers I deserve.”

  “We all find ourselves at some point in an unfortunate situation, not of our own making,” he replied in equally measured tones. “It is up to you to decide how you go from there.”

  “But don’t you see? That is precisely what I am trying to do. And you, damn you, won’t cooperate.”

  “Things are at stake that you know nothing about. That I am not at liberty to tell you.” He shrugged. “I suppose making decisions requires a higher degree of maturity than simply going along telling oneself that one is a victim of circumstance.”