Читать книгу Swept Away - Candace Camp - Страница 9

“Weren’t you scared?” Phoebe asked, leaning forward to peer into Julia’s face as they walked. They were taking their usual morning constitutional through Hyde Park, and Julia had given her sister-in-law a carefully expurgated account of what had happened the night before when she met Lord Stonehaven. “I can’t imagine talking to him. Was he purely evil?”

“Well, no,” Julia admitted. “He was rather charming, actually. It makes sense, of course, when you think about it. If he were obviously wicked, people would have realized that he was lying about Selby. But because he seems gentlemanly and engaging, one assumes he is telling the truth, that he has pure motives.”

“Mmm. I suppose so.” Phoebe looked disappointed. “I guess I had begun to picture him wearing horns and a tail.”

Julia smiled. “Me, too. But you have met him, have you not?”

“A few times. He and Selby were not close friends, not as Selby was with Varian, say, or Fitz,” she said, naming the other two men who had been trustees of Thomas St. Leger’s trust, along with Selby and Lord Stonehaven. “They had been friends when they were younger, and, of course, they met at their club and parties. But those last few years, Selby spent most of his time at home, you know.”

That fact, Julia knew, had been because of Phoebe. Selby had been a little wild in his youth—not only playing pranks such as the ones he had attributed to Jack Fletcher, but also gambling and drinking too much. But after he fell in love with Phoebe, his life had changed. He had settled down at home in Kent, and had become much more serious and attentive to the business matters of the estate. Selby would travel to London sometimes on his own, and occasionally he and Phoebe would go up for a round of parties and such, but, especially after the birth of their son, they lived a quiet country life. Unfortunately, it had been Selby’s wilder, younger times that people had remembered when Stonehaven had accused him of thievery.

“Stonehaven was pleasant enough,” Phoebe continued, her brow wrinkling. “A little remote and stiff, I thought. We never talked long. I always thought he found me boring.”

“Nonsense,” Julia replied stoutly, although she could understand, deep inside, how some could find Phoebe’s sweet personality a trifle insipid. “If he did, then it was he who was to blame, not you.”

“I was always glad when he moved on to talk to someone else. He made me a trifle…uncomfortable.”

Stonehaven had made her a trifle uncomfortable, too, Julia thought, but not, she suspected, in the way he had affected Phoebe. He had unsettled her, brought out strange responses that both puzzled and surprised her. No one had ever kissed her the way Lord Stonehaven had last night—one of the things she had been careful to not tell Phoebe—and the way she had felt when he did so shocked her. Her body had raged with all sorts of wild sensations, and she had wanted, shockingly, to feel more of them. Julia wondered if that made her a wicked person. Was that how “loose” women felt? And was it those feelings that made them abandon all propriety?

What was most disturbing to her was that she had felt those things with Lord Stonehaven. She hated him! Yet when he kissed her, when he crushed her body against his and his mouth consumed her, she had melted. How could a man she despised have made her feel that way?

The only answer she could find was that it was the kiss, not the man, that had made her react so strangely. She had not felt such a kiss before; gentlemen didn’t kiss that way, or at least they did not kiss ladies like that. No doubt it was part of the licentious life Lord Stonehaven lived, sinful knowledge that he had gained with women of dubious repute. It was probably the very sinfulness of the kiss that had rocked her. Their vicar, in his sermons, often warned of the temptations of sin, of the lure that evil held for humans. Julia had not really understood it before, but now she did. That kiss had tempted her, had made her feel and act in a way she would never have dreamed she could, had overridden, at least for a moment, her thorough dislike of Lord Stonehaven. She supposed that if any other man had kissed her in that way, she would have felt the same. She had a tendency toward lewd behavior, apparently.

Well, she knew now what she had to watch out for, Julia thought. Next time she would be prepared for that kiss, and she would stand firm against it. She would not let herself be swept into such a maelstrom of pleasure.

“Will you see him again?” Phoebe asked now.

“Oh, yes,” Julia responded quickly. “I mean, well, I shall have to, of course. Last night was just the beginning. I wanted to catch his interest, that was all. I didn’t expect to gain any knowledge. It will take a little while to get my hooks firmly into him, and then I will begin to reel him in.”

Phoebe giggled. “Honestly, Julia, you do say the funniest things. You make him sound as if he were a fish.”

“Well, and so he is,” Julia responded. “A prize fish, whom I intend to hang on our wall.”

“Are you—will you go back to that place?”

“I shall have to. I have no other way to meet him. Naturally I couldn’t tell him where we live.”

“Oh, no,” Phoebe agreed with a little gasp of horror. “When will you go back? Tonight?”

“No,” Julia replied reluctantly. She wanted very much to return to Madame Beauclaire’s tonight—only because she was filled with eagerness to get the truth out of Stonehaven, she told herself—but she knew that to do so would ultimately work against her. “I cannot let him think that I am eager to see him again. Men like a chase, I understand, and Stonehaven seems to me to be a man who likes it particularly. I have to build up his anticipation, make him begin to worry that he will not see me again. Then, when he does see me, he will be much more enthusiastic.”

Phoebe nodded. “I’m sure you are right. I am merely impatient. I want so much to hear his confession.”

“I think I shall return on Friday. That will give him two days to stew and wonder. How does that sound?”

“I don’t know. I was never much good at that sort of game. The only man I cared about was Selby, and I wanted to see him so much that I could not pretend otherwise.”

Julia smiled at Phoebe’s slightly guilty expression and reached out to link her arm through hers. “’Tis just that you are too honest and good a person to prevaricate, my love. It rather makes you wonder about me, doesn’t it—that I find it so easy to do so?”

“Julia! Don’t say such things!” Phoebe would never allow any negative words about one of those she loved, even from the loved one herself.

“Lady Armiger!” A man’s delighted voice came from the left of them. Phoebe and Julia turned to see a man and woman walking toward them. The man was smiling delightedly. The woman looked frozen in stone. “Miss Armiger,” the man continued. “How wonderful to see you. I had no idea that you were in town.”

“Varian.” Phoebe smiled, holding out her hand. “How good it is to see you. But how can it be that we have become Lady Armiger and Miss Armiger, when before we were Phoebe and Julia with you?”

Varian St. Leger had been a good friend of her husband’s, and he had visited many times at their home. At the time of the scandal, Varian had been one of the few who had not been immediately convinced of Selby’s guilt. “I cannot believe it of Sel,” he had often said. “I know the evidence looks black, but, damme, it just seems impossible.” They had seen little of Varian the past three years, though he had stopped in once or twice when he had been by to see young Thomas. Being Thomas’s cousin, he had taken on the responsibility of visiting with Thomas and his mother as Selby had formerly done.

“Phoebe, then.” Varian took her hand, smiling down warmly at her. “I did not wish to presume. And Julia.” He took her proffered hand next, smiling. “I have been lax this year, I am afraid. I haven’t visited Thomas even once. It is fortunate that he and his mother are in London this summer.”

“Yes, of course.” Phoebe cast a rather timid glance at the woman who was standing stiffly beside Varian, not saying a word. “How do you do, Mrs. St. Leger?”

Pamela St. Leger did not speak, merely gave Phoebe a short nod, her face not softening even slightly. Pamela, Thomas’s mother, had been long and loud in her condemnations of Selby. Julia had heard that she had wanted to sue Selby’s estate for the monies that had been removed from the trust. However, the decision had not been up to her, of course, but to the trustees, and they had not done so—due primarily, Julia felt sure, to Varian St. Leger’s influence. All Pamela had been able to do was cut them socially, and that she had proceeded to do with a vengeance. She had refused to attend any gathering where Phoebe or Julia were in attendance, and had been heard to declare at the slightest provocation that she was sure she did not know how either woman dared to show her face anywhere. She had even gone so far as to move her patronage each Sunday from St. Michael’s in Whitley, the local village, to St. Edward’s in Marsh-burrow, on the other side of the St. Leger estate. Julia suspected that her move had been at least in part influenced by the fact that the vicar’s wife, Mrs. Fairmont, had refused to knuckle under to Pamela’s social edict to shun the Armigers.

“Good morning, Mrs. St. Leger,” Julia spoke up, favoring Pamela with a blazing smile.

Pamela turned and nodded briefly toward her, as well, her nostrils flaring slightly. Julia knew that Pamela had disliked her long before the scandal, and Julia thought that she had seized the opportunity of the scandal to avoid being in Julia’s company. A raven-haired woman who had been considered a beauty in her day, Pamela did not like to be in the same room with Julia. She could perhaps fool herself into thinking that she was more attractive than the quiet Phoebe, but she could not compete against Julia’s vivid looks. Personally, Julia found life much more pleasant without Pamela’s presence, and she and Phoebe had not wanted to socialize the past few years, anyway, but she did resent the fact that Pamela had forbidden her son Thomas ever to fraternize with them. Thomas was quite fond of all the Armigers and had frequently visited Selby. Julia had come to regard him as something of a younger brother. Thomas was the only other person besides Phoebe and Julia and their servants who was convinced that Selby had not stolen the money from the trust. Julia found it cruel that Thomas’s mother had denied him the company of the other people who shared his love and his mourning for Selby.

Of course, Thomas disobeyed his mother, sneaking over to visit Julia and Phoebe whenever he got the chance. He had joined with them in deciding that Lord Stonehaven must have been the real thief and the engineer of Selby’s downfall. Stonehaven had visited him the least of his trustees and was, in Thomas’s opinion, a “cold fish.” It was Thomas who had first suggested that they capture Stonehaven and force him to reveal his criminal behavior, and he had wanted badly to play a part in the seizure. It had seemed a stroke of good luck when his mother had decided to go to London for the Season, and he had begged and pleaded and cajoled until finally Pamela had broken down and agreed to let him accompany her.

He had thought he would be easily able to join Julia in the escapade, but he had found out, much to his chagrin, that he was far more imprisoned in the house in London than he had been in the country. He was under the constant careful eye of the London tutor his mother had hired, and there were no afternoon rides, since he had had to leave his horse in the country. As a result, Julia had seen him only twice since they had come to London. Of course, she was glad now, considering the turn her plans had taken. Thomas, though only fourteen, would probably have gotten terribly male and disapproving about it all.

Her eyes twinkling devilishly, Julia went on speaking to the stony Mrs. St. Leger. “Odd, isn’t it, that we should run into one another here in London, when we never see each other in Kent, even though we live only miles apart?” When Pamela said nothing, merely raised her eyebrows, Julia pressed, “Don’t you think so, Mrs. St. Leger?”

Pamela stirred uneasily, glancing at Varian, who was watching her. “Indeed,” she said through tight lips.

“Phoebe and I were remarking only the other day that we rarely see you anymore. We hoped that you were not eschewing social life, as some matrons do in widowhood. Phoebe thought it was probably that you, as she is, are still in mourning for your husband, but I told her I thought that could not be the reason, for you were frequently at parties after he died, and I was sure that you had put off mourning—oh, within a few months after Walter’s funeral.”

Bright spots of color leaped into Pamela’s cheeks at Julia’s words, delivered with a wide-eyed innocence that did not fool the other woman for a minute. She knew as well as Julia that there had been a great deal of talk about the brevity of her mourning for Walter St. Leger, which Phoebe’s presence in her black widow’s weeds three years after Selby’s death seemed to underscore.

“Yes. Walter never liked black on a woman,” she said in a clipped voice, driven out of her disdainful silence by the need to justify herself.

“Ah, of course.” Julia smiled with understanding. “I’m sure Walter would have been very pleased to see you. I told Phoebe I did not think it was mourning that kept you away from the small social pleasures of Whitley. I was sure it was probably some physical infirmity. I hope not lumbago—that can be a terribly painful thing, I understand.”

Pamela’s eyes shot fire. “No, I assure you it was not ‘physical infirmity’ that kept me away. Indeed, I attend many soirees and balls, Miss Armiger.”

“Indeed? Why is it that we never see you, then?” Julia wrinkled her brow in puzzlement.

“Are you determined, then, to hear it?” Pamela snapped. Julia wondered if she realized how unattractive she looked like this, her features sharp and hawklike, her eyes narrowed, and her lips, never full, reduced to a mere line. “I do not go where you are received, as you no doubt know. No woman of any standing would.”

Varian’s expression of shock and distaste as he looked at Pamela was precisely what Julia would have wished for. But all her satisfaction was wiped out when she heard Phoebe’s sharp intake of breath and turned to see the hurt on her face at Pamela’s verbal slap.

“Phoebe, I’m sorry,” Julia said softly, curling her arm around her sister-in-law’s waist.

“Mrs. St. Leger!” Varian snapped. “Really! I am quite sure you did not mean that.” He glared at her significantly.

“Everyone knows it!” Pamela retorted defiantly, still too caught up in her anger to care that she looked mean and spiteful in front of her son’s trustee.

“Phoebe, please, accept my apology,” Varian went on, turning abruptly from Pamela toward Phoebe. “I assure you that most people do not feel that way.”

Phoebe smiled at him. “You are most kind, Varian. I know that you do not.”

“Indeed not. I hope you will allow me the honor of calling upon you while you are in London.”

“Of course.”

He turned to Julia and made his apologies and goodbyes, adding that he trusted her to “take care of Lady Armiger.” Then he hustled Pamela away.

Julia turned to Phoebe. “Oh, Fee, I’m sorry. I should never have goaded her like that. I was so intent on forcing her to admit what a witch she is that I didn’t even think about you. I should have known it would hurt you. It is simply that I am so thick-skinned, you see. No, please, don’t cry.”

Phoebe shook her head, giving Julia a shaky little smile. Her eyes sparkled with sudden unshed tears. “No. It isn’t that. It was your calling me ‘Fee.’ Selby always used to call me that. Remember? He was so fond of pet names.”

“Yes, I remember.” Julia felt tears clogging up her own throat at the memory. Even Julia he had shortened to Julie, and he had almost never called Phoebe by her full name. “He called you ‘Fee’ and ‘Delight.”’

A little noise escaped Phoebe at her words. “Oh, Julia! How can it still hurt after all this time?”

“I don’t know.” Julia hugged the other woman tightly. “Sometimes I think that it will always hurt, at least a little.”

“I want to prove that Selby didn’t do it,” Phoebe said in a fiercer voice than Julia had ever heard from her. “I want to prove that it was all Stonehaven’s doing and make that dreadful woman eat every nasty word she’s ever said about Selby or you or me!”

“We will,” Julia promised, setting her jaw. “We will.”

Julia was in the sitting room the next day, her fingers busy letting down the hem on another one of Phoebe’s dresses so that she could wear it. Her mind was occupied with her plan to manipulate Lord Stonehaven into confessing to his crime. She knew that she could not allow herself to be distracted again, as she had been last time by his kiss. She had to be firm and in control, and she had decided that the best way to do that was to plan the things she would say and do to lead him to talk, down to every last word and gesture.

The housekeeper, a fussy, plump woman in a white mob cap and an equally snowy apron, was standing beside Phoebe while Phoebe went over the menus for the rest of the week. Phoebe was engaged in another of a seemingly unending series of struggles over what should be served.

“You see, Mrs. Willett,” Phoebe was saying now, “I don’t really like duck.”

“But, my lady, duck was always one of the master’s favorites.” Mrs. Willett had been used to ruling the London house largely unchecked for over thirty years. The butler might go back and forth from the country house in Kent to London with the family, but the housekeeper stayed in charge in London over the long months—and even years, lately—when the family was not there, running a skeleton staff to keep the house in shape. Her guiding rule in any situation was to do exactly as she had always done.

Julia glanced over at Phoebe, who was biting her lip and looking worried, and Julia knew that Phoebe was, as Mrs. Willett had intended, feeling like an unloving, ungrieving widow for not wanting to eat one of her dead husband’s favorite dishes.

“Nonsense, Mrs. Willett,” Julia stuck in crisply. “You and I both know that duck was our father’s favorite dish, and that is why you served it all Selby’s life. Besides, it doesn’t really matter whether Selby liked it or not. The point is that Lady Armiger does not like it. She does not want it on the menu, and I see no reason why it should be there, when your employer does not wish it. Do you?”

A look of hurt that would have crumpled Phoebe’s opposition settled on the older woman’s face. She pushed her spectacles back up her nose and said in a resigned voice, “Very well, Miss Julia—if you want it that way. I do work for your family, have done so for over thirty years.”

“Yes, I know, and an excellent housekeeper you are,” Julia agreed to soothe the woman’s wounded feelings.

“My, yes,” Phoebe agreed eagerly, a tiny frown of concern creasing her forehead. “I did not mean to imply that there was anything wrong with the way you perform your duties.”

“Of course you didn’t.” Julia jumped in before Phoebe could get carried away with her assurances and wind up telling the woman to leave the duck on the list. “I am sure Mrs. Willett understands that you merely want a change in the menu. It is the sort of problem at which she is quite adept, isn’t it, Mrs. Willett?”

“Of course,” Mrs. Willett agreed, smiling. Julia knew that in a few more minutes the menu change would have become her own idea, and woe to any of the kitchen staff who objected to it.

At that moment, there was the rumble of carriage wheels coming to a stop in front of the house. Julia and Phoebe glanced at each other in surprise. A visitor to their house was a rare occurrence—they had had no callers since they came to London three weeks ago, except for young Thomas every now and then when he could sneak away from his tutor. Julia stood up and crossed over to the windows. A sporty curricle had stopped on the pavement, and as she watched, a lad in livery hopped down from the back and hurried forward to take the horse’s head. A man, dressed elegantly and severely in black and white, was climbing down from the open vehicle. Julia’s mouth opened in horror.

“Oh, my God!” she exclaimed, her hand flying to her throat. She stepped back quickly.

Phoebe was on her feet in an instant, hurrying toward her in concern. “What’s wrong? Who is it?”

“Lord Stonehaven,” Julia croaked. “He’s found out.”

“What?” Phoebe whirled and looked out the window, then turned back to Julia. “Oh, no! What shall we do?”

The sound of the front door knocker resounded through the house. Julia started toward the sitting room door, the only thought on her mind to tell the footman not to answer the door. But that efficient servant was already swinging open the front door, and Julia ducked back inside the room.

“Miss Julia, what is it?” the housekeeper asked, concerned by the look of fear on Julia’s face.

“A visitor. Tell him we aren’t home, Mrs. Willett,” Phoebe suggested, her face pleading.

How could he have found out who she was? There had been no one at Madame Beauclaire’s who knew her, except Geoffrey, and Geoffrey would never have told Stonehaven who she really was.

“He must—he must be coming to pay a call,” Julia stated, reason overcoming her initial spurt of fear. “Somehow he’s found out that we are here. That’s all, I’m sure.” But it would still be disaster if he saw her here!

She could hear the footman walking toward the door, Stonehaven’s steps right behind him. In another few seconds he would be here. She glanced around wildly. There was no other way out of the room. Aside from slamming the door in his face, there was no way to avoid his seeing her. Julia’s mind raced.

“Pardon me, Mrs. Willett,” she murmured as she reached over and pulled the woman’s spectacles from her face, followed by her large mob cap. Grabbing her own shawl from the back of her chair, Julia dived behind the chair just as the footman stepped into the room.

“Lord Stonehaven, my lady,” he droned.