Читать книгу Infamous - Laurel Ames - Страница 10

Chapter Two

Rose breakfasted in bed, a luxury she now allowed herself since Alice was not an early riser, and, judging from the hour at which Stanley had stumbled in, she rather thought he would be abed till noon. Of course, at Wall, she would have been up and riding two hours ago, but she was on holiday and should try to enjoy herself. She could enjoy herself now that Varner had expanded her horizons. Rose decided she could like London quite well now that she knew there was such a delightful place to ride.

Cynthie helped her into her green riding habit again, and Rose promised herself that she would buy another if Bennet appeared today. He had said they would ride every day, but it would be just like such a careless fellow to forget and leave her standing in the lobby of Greeves Hotel with Martin on watch in the street.

She spent the remaining hour before ten o’clock writing a long letter to her mother in the comparative privacy of the lounge off the lobby. Rose had just handed this over to be mailed when she saw the horses from the window and looped up the tail of her habit to go down the steps. Bennet leaped to her elbow and helped her to mount Gallant so solicitously she decided she would rumble his lay today. She would, at least, take up yesterday’s argument where he had interrupted it.

They had brought Victor for Martin to ride, and the two grooms kept a respectful distance back from Bennet and Rose.

“No horses for Stanley and Alice?” Rose asked, looking innocently around from her perch atop Gallant.

“Your brother told me Alice does not ride.” Bennet flicked an imaginary speck of dust from his plum-colored coat.

Rose wondered if he had deviated from his usual black riding jacket for her benefit. “Did he also tell you he planned to have such a bad head from staying out late drinking that he would not be able to sit a horse today?”

“No, I surmised that myself,” Bennet said proudly.

“You were with him, then?” Rose asked as she steered her horse through traffic.

“Yes, for part of the evening. I left him around midnight.”

“I cannot say that I like Stanley taking up gambling and drinking. I know all men do it, but that does not make it a safe pastime.”

“If you are worried that he will get into fast company, I assure you my friends would never fleece a guest of mine.” Chaos gave a little jump at a bright red curricle, but Bennet’s grip turned to iron and brought the animal under control. The man’s leg muscles bulged tautly under his buff riding breeches.

“You have a high opinion of your friends, sir. I shall reserve mine until I meet them.”

“Hah, I see. A recommendation from me is worthless, as you have decided to mistrust me.”

Rose stared at him to have her mind read so accurately, then turned her attention back to the last thoroughfare to separate them from their destination.

“I have surprised you, haven’t I?” Bennet prodded as they approached Hyde Park.

“Yes. As I was about to say yesterday when you galloped away to avoid the remark, you are not at all trustworthy.”

“Yes, when you said you could think of one reason we could not be friends. I saw the barb coming so thought I would avoid it until I could think of a rejoinder.”

Rose laughed. “You are a jump ahead of me today, and yes, you did surprise me. It will not happen again,” she assured him as she urged Gallant into a trot.

“That I can believe. Why do you not trust me? And do not waste time dissembling.”

Rose looked at Bennet thoughtfully. He was riding carelessly with both reins gathered in one hand and not paying any obvious attention to his horse, yet the beast was minding his subtle leg signals much better than yesterday. It struck her that Bennet rode as naturally as a soldier, and her experience of soldiers should make her dislike him. But she could not think of a clear reason to do so. She urged Gallant into a canter, using Bennet’s own trick against him. The horses would be used to having a brisk canter as soon as they got to the park, would expect it if they rode here again, she thought. Why did she not trust Bennet Varner? At the end of fifteen minutes and on the other side of the vast park she was ready to bring her mount down to a walk again and answer him, even if it meant never riding here with him again.

“All of this, the horses, your kindness to Stanley, the offer of your ship, why?”

“I did not think courtesy required a reason,” Bennet replied, his dark eyebrows arched in surprise over those innocent blue eyes of his.

“You have been more than courteous, you have been kind in the extreme, and charming enough to allay the suspicions of a brother, who though dense around women, can generally take the measure of a man.”

“Hah. Is that a compliment or an accusation?”

“You decide. It is your motivation that is suspect.”

“I’ll take it as a compliment. My motivation is quite simple. I am, in the general way, bored silly by society and the women thrown at my head by a well-meaning mother and sister who think it is high time I married. To encounter a woman who is no danger to me is refreshing in the extreme. That is why I thought we could be friends, because I am no danger to you, either.”

Rose stared at him and felt herself smiling at those laughing eyes. If he was not telling the truth, his performance at least deserved the compliment of her pretense of belief.

“And something else,” he added.

“What?” she asked, wishing she could really have such a friendship.

“I enjoy jousting with you. Do you know how rare it is to find someone able to hold her own in an argument?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“So there you have it. I am in some need of companionship of the abrasive kind, someone who does not agree with me at every turn just because I am as rich as Croesus.”

“You are not.”

“Not what?”

“As rich as Croesus.”

“How would you know?”

“If you were you would hire a man of business and not be at all involved in trade.” Rose lifted her chin as though his vocation mattered to her.

“It is precisely because I am involved in trade that I am so rich.”

“No matter how much your sister would like it to be otherwise?” she chided.

“Rose, don’t tell me you won’t countenance an acquaintance with a cit I had not thought you so stuffy.”

“On the contrary,” Rose said, deciding to change her tack, “I regard your involvement in trade to be the most stable thing about you. It is your avocation I disapprove of.”

“Gambling? I assure you I—”

“No! Gammoning people into thinking you a charming, empty-headed fellow when in truth...”

“In truth, what?” he prompted with a grin.

“I haven’t figured that out precisely, but I will.”

“I shall anticipate the moment. Bring sweet Alice to tea this afternoon if you wish to extend your study of my character. Bring Wall, too, if you can manage it. Mother wants to meet him, even though he is safely married.”

“Is she looking for a husband for Harriet?”

“Always. I scared off one suitor by challenging him to a duel. The offers since then have not been as forthcoming.”

“I should think not, if they are in danger of being shot.”

“Actually, I was the one who was punctured. It was a pure waste of my claret I should have let him carry Harriet off to Yorkshire.”

“That is a very hard thing to say of your own sister. How old was she?”

“Seventeen.”

“Not old enough to know her own mind.”

“Old enough to know better than to get involved with a man like Foy.”

Rose halted her mount and pretended to be checking the tightness of the girth. Bennet looked back in some concern, dismounted and went to help her down. “What is it?”

“Nothing. Martin, check the cinch,” she called. “I shall walk a little way.”

“I’ve said something to disturb you. Do you find it unnatural that I do not love my sister?”

Chaos followed behind Bennet like a large dog.

“No, of course not. It is I rather who have spoken out of turn. To condemn you for something I know nothing of is ill-done of me.”

“Well, I was going to mention that, but as you have admitted your fault I am left with no barbs to fire.”

Rose managed a brief smile, and she almost told him she knew Foy. But no, he would find out soon enough. Why ruin this day, when Axel was likely to ruin the next?

“Tell me what is wrong,” Bennet begged, looping the reins over his arm and taking her hand between his two.

“The engagement and duel, this all happened years ago.” Rose said, shaking the mental image of Axel’s piercing brown eyes from her mind. “Surely it is past history. Perhaps Foy did not even survive the war,” she said hopefully.

“No such luck. He was wounded several times and kept turning up like a bad penny to cut up our peace. This time when he begs for Harriet’s hand I shall agree.”

Rose became conscious of her surroundings and began walking again, forcing Bennet to surrender her hand. “That might make Harriet like you better, but if you did not think him worthy of her then...”

“It is not that Axel has become more acceptable, but that Harriet has managed to descend to his level. I must get her married off before she causes a scandal that I cannot squelch.”

Rose’s glance flew to his face.

“No, do not ask me what all she has been up to. By emulating her intimate acquaintances she has become very jaded. She may merely be trying to get revenge on me for being in control.”

“Perhaps, if you talked things through with her, there might be a reconciliation.”

“Harriet forgive me? Not a chance. Not with Mother on her side, and Harriet is like Mother in that respect. The catalog of my wrongs never has anything erased from it, but grows with time like the national debt. I doubt I could ever be forgiven for all my offenses.”

“You are joking.”

“Except that this birthday ball may wipe out a few. You should have your invitation by now. You are coming, of course.”

“You make it difficult to say no. But then we must be off to Paris.” She watched the smile fade from his face as he halted again.

“Do not go,” he begged.

“But I must. I must go whenever Stanley and Alice are ready to leave.” She signaled to Martin to bring Gallant, and Bennet helped her to mount.

“Help me convince Stanley to spend the season in London. You can stay in Varner House. Mother and Harriet would love to have you.”

“Now that is an untruth,” she said with her usual pert smile as she watched him swing up onto Chaos.

“Then stay to keep me from boredom.”

“To argue with you? I think you will find that grows stale after a bit.”

“Bantering with you? Never.”

The look in Bennet’s eyes could not be misread. He was not joking this time or making game of her. She smiled sadly and shook her head. One mention of her to Axel and he would revise his opinion about that. She urged Gallant into another canter, and the horse responded willingly to have two such treats in one day. What a strange man Varner was, to trust her with confidences about his family that if repeated would do them a great deal of discredit. She would not repeat them, of course. Rose never gossiped and took pains to say the best of people. She was well aware what careless chatter could do to a woman’s character, how it could mar her very life. Was Bennet Varner naive or merely the first frank man she had ever met? She would have liked to further her acquaintance with him just to puzzle that out

Bennet left Rose reluctantly at the hotel and wondered if he should risk delaying the ball just to buy a few more days. No, a celebration at Varner House would be no particular lure to the Walls, at least not to Rose. They would simply shrug and board the next packet. Just as the promise of a fine ship might not hold them. There was the possibility of making London so interesting for young Wall that he did not mind dallying in town, but Bennet caviled at introducing Stanley to any new vices just to serve his own ends.

He returned to South Audley Street, as he did frequently, to a house in pandemonium. Bennet heard his head groom sigh heavily as Bennet surrendered the reins to him and mounted the steps, prepared to untangle whatever setback was making his mother shriek in that disconcerting way. Had she only known, she could have gotten better work from the servants if she maintained her dignity rather than screaming at them like an angry fishwife.

For all her pretensions to society, Bennet felt his mother’s plebeian tantrums more of an impediment to the family’s acceptance than his involvement in trade. After quieting the seamstress and bribing her to finish Harriet’s gown by the following day, after soothing the ruffled feathers of Mrs. Marshall, the housekeeper, and convincing Armand, the chef, not to pack up and leave, be cornered his mother and sister in the morning room.

Harriet was sprawled on the sofa, crying over the dress, which she pronounced ugly beyond words. Her tears would have been more convincing if she had not been wearing an expensive new blue walking outfit.

“Then wear one of your other dresses.”

“I have worn them all. The only thing that will make the new dress acceptable is a proper necklace of diamonds.”

“And I suppose you know just the ones to set it off. Very well, write down who has them and his direction and I will have Walters pick them up tomorrow. They will be your birthday present. By the way, you have sent an invitation round to the Walls, haven’t you?”

“Well, I have invited them, though I do not see the need.” Edith spoke now, two spots of color still remaining in her sallow cheeks from her recent tantrum. “They are, after all, just country cousins. What if they embarrass us with their dress or speech?”

“They won’t, Mother,” Bennet assured her absently as he picked up the Times. Just to discomfit her he glanced critically at her black bombazine. It was an affectation, this wearing of black three years after his father’s death, when she would have looked better in some other color. But like the dyeing of her hair, Bennet put it down to bad advice from someone.

“I’m inviting Axel, then,” Harriet said in the subdued silence that followed.

Bennet raised an eyebrow, and was about to say “why not?” but decided too prompt an acceptance of her suitor might make Harriet suspicious. “If you must.” He sat and tried to focus on the financial news.

“If you get to invite the wallflower and company, I should be able to ask my friends. After all, it is my party.” Harriet seated herself at the messy escritoire and pulled a list toward her.

“What did you call her?”

“A wallflower. Those dowdy clothes. And can you imagine her playing nursemaid to a young bride? She must be odd indeed.”

“If I hear that title fastened on Miss Wall I will know where it came from, and I won’t forget your maliciousness.”

“In another day you will not have any say in what I do. I shall be in possession of my own fortune and I may marry Axel if I wish.”

“Yes, I suppose you may, but do you not think you ought to shop around a bit first? Tomorrow you become one of the most marriageable young ladies in London, and I should think you could do a great deal better than Foy. Don’t you think so, Mother?”

“Harriet is in love with Axel. Aren’t you, Harriet? Why else would she have run off with him?”

“It has been four years,” Bennet said, trying to bury himself in the paper. “May I point out Axel has made up to several other women since then, every time he lands back in London, in fact.”

Harriet’s blue eyes were ablaze with anger. “It does not seem like four years. It was my coming-out season and I remember every moment of it.”

“I too recall the entire season with nauseating clarity, especially that bullet I took for you.”

“That was your fault, Bennet,” his mother informed him.

“Don’t tell me you favored that havey-cavey elopement.”

“It was better than having you break Harriet’s heart by not letting her marry Axel.”

“Well, I will no longer be the impediment.”

“What if he does not ask me, Mother?” Harriet rose, clenching her hands together dramatically. “What if Axel’s feelings have changed, or he has been too put off by Bennet?”

“Oh, he’ll ask you all right,” Bennet interrupted. “He needs your fortune more now than ever. Oh, by the way, I have made an appointment for both of us to see Barchester tomorrow morning. The reins of your future will then be put in your hands, Harriet. Have you engaged a man of business?”

“Not...not yet.”

“Do you wish Barchester to recommend someone?”

“Certainly not. Is it necessary to have such a person with me tomorrow?”

“Not really, unless you mean to change banks immediately.”

“I haven’t decided yet.”

“Let Barchester know when you do and where you want your monies deposited. He can arrange everything.”

“I don’t want him to do anything. He always treats me like a child.”

“He means no harm by acting fatherly. Most women of independent means do not care to handle their own affairs.”

“Most women do not have such an unreasonable guardian. I suppose you will charge me rent now to stay here?”

“Do not be absurd. You are still my sister, but I’ve no doubt you will be married within the month and off my hands for good.”

“Must you both bicker like this?” their mother demanded. “You give me a splitting headache.”

“I have tried bickering alone and it just doesn’t work,” Bennet quipped, sending his mother charging from the room, grumbling to herself.

Harriet waited until their mother was gone before she giggled. “Why do you bait her, Bennet? She cannot defend herself.”

“And I cannot help myself. If only she realized how much we enjoy arguing. Seriously, Harriet, I will be placing a great deal of wealth at your disposal tomorrow. I hope you have considered that it might be wiser to keep control of it yourself than turn it over to a husband—any husband, including Axel.”

“I know what I am about. I am not the green girl I was at seventeen.”

“No, I realize that. There will also be investments to discuss. You will have to decide how you want to manage those.”

Harriet walked dreamily to the window and stared out at the redbrick residences across the way. “I think once I am married I will set up a proper town house. I consider it highly unfair Papa left you both Chesney and Varner House.”

“Hasn’t Axel some residence other than his lodgings and that estate in Yorkshire?”

“He has a house near Epsom, but I require one in London.”

“I am looking for a house for the Walls to rent. I can have Walters make inquiries for you...if you wish to make use of his services.”

“Why are the Walls looking for a house?”

“To rent merely. They cannot stay in that hotel forever, and Mother has made it abundantly clear she does not want them here.”

“But I thought they were on the point of embarking for Europe, at least before you introduced them to the social whirl of London.”

“One invitation can hardly constitute a social whirl—oh. I forgot to tell Mother I asked them to tea today to make her acquaintance before your birthday ball.”

“She won’t like that.”

“Yes, I know, but perhaps you can tell her for me. A diamond necklace should be worth one favor.”

“Very well, I will tell her,” said Harriet, walking in a businesslike way toward the door. “Just make sure my diamonds and my dress are ready by tomorrow afternoon.”

“I have nothing else to concern me at all.”

“Nothing but that nasty shipping business.”

“That nasty shipping business keeps you both in fine gig.”

“But must you flaunt it?” she asked with her hand on the doorknob.

“The world is changing, Harriet. I and other men like me helped win this last war. Don’t ask me to be embarrassed about that. Didn’t Wellington himself come to dine?”

“One evening.”

“Well, he did have a war to fight. Now go and tell Mother the Walls are coming and I expect you both to be polite to them.”

“If we must. But they are such encroaching mushrooms.”

“You have not even met Stanley and Alice yet.”

“Are we expected to entertain every country dowd we are remotely connected with?”

“Why not?”

“Why not? I have better things to do with my time.”

“Just tell Mother.”

Harriet ducked out of the room. Sometimes, just for a moment, Bennet thought he had got through to her and made some impression. There was sense in her somewhere, but then she would quote their mother or one of her fashionable friends and turn his stomach. No, he did not love his sister anymore. She had changed into some creature he disliked exceedingly.

When the Walls were shown into the elegant gold salon there were already two guests present, enjoying their tea, Lady Catherine Gravely, and her daughter, Cassandra. After the coldly polite introductions it became clear to Rose that the other two women were intimates of Harriet’s and had been invited to amuse her, since conversation with the Walls was not expected to. It was also clear who had tempted Harriet to savage her hair so badly, for both women sported a head of tight curls.

Every time Bennet introduced a topic Rose or Stanley might care to discuss, Harriet changed the subject to some personage they did not know, thus shutting them out of the conversation. Poor Alice took everything in with such wide eyes, Rose knew they would put her down as a simpleton. Lady Catherine and Mrs. Varner were no help. The former stared speculatively at Rose any time she opened her mouth and the latter seemed interested only in her daughter’s gossip. If Edith remembered Rose’s mother at all she never made reference to her.

Rose was annoyed and in the mood to show it, but she liked Bennet Varner and did want him for a friend. She admired the way he had charmed her brother and sister-in-law, no matter how much she suspected his motives. And here he was, sending her embarrassed grimaces because his sister and mother were snubbing them. She could at least enjoy that repartee with him. She gazed about the lovely ground floor salon that was used only for tea. She could imagine the elegance of the rooms that must lie above. And yet she felt sorry for Bennet Varner, always having to apologize for his mother and sister. When Stanley cleared his throat meaningfully, Rose gulped her tea and was about to make some excuse to get them away early. Suddenly Harriet did mention a name they all knew.

“Lord Foy?” Alice piped up. “Wasn’t that the man you were engaged to, Rose?”

Stanley choked on a gulp of tea and Rose paused with her cup halfway to her mouth. Bennet looked at her in inquiry.

“Foy...Foy...” Rose pretended to muse. “Is his name Axelrod Barton?”

“Yes,” confirmed Cassie, her red lips parted in surprise, the bodice of her white muslin gown straining as she turned her plump form the better to stare at Rose. Rose was surprised to discover the look of utter disgust Lady Catherine bestowed on her own child. She knew there were women who hated their children, but she had never actually seen it before.

“Yes, it must be the same man,” Rose confirmed “He was a subaltern whom Father brought home one winter. I believe he was recovering from a leg wound.”

“Shoulder,” corrected Stanley, nervously clearing his throat.

Rose shrugged and silently thanked her brother for his attempt to draw talk away from the engagement.

“By engagement,” Cassie asked playfully, “you don’t actually mean...?”

Rose stared at her as though she had not comprehended. The figured muslin Cassie wore was meant for a younger girl, or perhaps a slighter girl, and did not become her.

“I fear it was just a schoolgirl passion,” Rose said lightly. “You must know how entrancing those red uniforms can be. Was I sixteen or seventeen? I cannot recall, but when I considered seriously marrying a soldier, I thought of all the worry Mother had gone through and I backed out of the engagement. Foy understood.”

This speech damped the interest of the others but failed to appease Harriet, who was staring at Rose as though she wished her to disappear from the face of the earth. Bennet’s gaze was not one of condemnation as Rose expected, but one of sympathy and understanding.

“Then there was that dreadful incident,” Alice said, taking a provoking bite of cake so that everyone had to hang on her words until she had swallowed. Stanley gave one of his impatient sighs.

“What incident?” Lady Catherine finally demanded sharply with more than casual interest.

“Colonel Wall’s untimely death,” Alice replied knowingly.

“Yes,” agreed Rose. “The marriage would have had to be put off for a year anyway, so we mutually agreed to part.”

“How did Colonel Wall die?” Harriet asked, her intense gaze darting between Rose and Alice, “if I’m not being too personal?”

“He was trampled by a horse,” Stanley said without elaborating.

“That is why I never ride,” Alice added. “Nasty, dangerous beasts. I wonder you did not shoot the stallion, Stanley.”

“Perhaps I would have, if I had been there, but Rose was right. It was not Redditch’s fault that Father and Foy decided to ride him when they were in their cups. He’s a little wild around men he doesn’t know, anyway. I assure you he behaves perfectly for me.”

Rose wondered if part of Stanley’s tolerance derived from thinking he had tamed a beast his father could not handle.

“Still, to keep a killer horse...” Cassie shook her head in condemnation as though she knew something about horses, when Rose was quite sure from Cassie’s stout figure that she did not even ride.

“But it was an accident,” Bennet said. “I would never get rid of one of my beasts if it accidently threw Harriet and broke her neck.”

“Bennet!” Harriet cried, incensed. “That is the most unfeeling remark you have ever made.”

“No, I don’t think you can be right there. It comes nowhere near the time I compared you to the opera dancer. Then there was the incident at the East India Docks...”

“If you tell anyone about that I shall—”

“Stop it, Bennet,” his mother commanded. “To upset your sister in this way is very ill-mannered.”

“So sorry, Mother. Sometimes I forget everything you taught me about manners.”

Mrs. Varner had the conscience to look abashed at this. “You must excuse my son,” she said finally to the Walls. “Sometimes his rather misplaced wit takes him beyond the bounds of what is pleasing.”

“Humor is always pleasing,” Rose said, giving Bennet a grateful smile for drawing fire upon himself. “And anyone should be able to take a joke so long as it is made in good fun. And as much enjoyment as we are deriving from the tea, I fear we must be going soon. Alice’s dress is nowhere near completion and I am sure you must have a thousand things to see to before tomorrow night.”

They did not linger over their departure. Bennet would have sent them home in his carriage, but Stanley said they would find a hack.

“What an old tartar the mother is,” he said to Rose in the carriage. “I suppose we must go to this thing, seeing as Bennet has been so obliging.”

Alice stared at her husband, her limpid blue eyes outraged. “Surely you do not mean you would rather not?”

“Not if we are to be subjected to so much frostiness from Mrs. Varner and that other old dragon! Those two chits were not much better. I think they might have spoken to you, Alice, just for the sake of politeness.”

Rose sighed. If Stanley noticed being cold-shouldered, then it was blatant indeed. “Perhaps they will when they know her better. Ten to one she will be so busy dancing tomorrow night she will not even have time to converse with them, but there is no real need for me to go.”

“No, I think you must, Rose. After all, she is your godmother,” Stanley said firmly.

Meaning, Rose took it, that if she cried off, he would as well. That would leave Alice in floods of tears and with her to blame.

“Yes, I suppose I must. After all, an evening can last only so long. Then we will finalize our arrangements for Europe.”

“Mmm,” Stanley replied.