The Irresistible Buck

by Barbara Cartland

  Clarinda now realised with a smile that Bates had never before beheld her dressed in a fashionable velvet habit or with her hair arranged skilfully under a high-crowned hat with a floating green veil.

  “I am so glad to be here,” she answered. “Is everything all right?”

  “Everything, Miss Clarinda. We’ve been putting flowers in the rooms so you wouldn’t feel they look as empty-like.”

  “Thank you, Bates,” Clarinda smiled.

  She walked across the hall into the salon. She had forgotten how small and low-ceilinged it was and knew that she was comparing it with Melburne. She also noticed the worn covers and threadbare carpets.

  If she came to live here, the furnishings of the house would have to be replaced in almost every room! At the thought of it she felt a sudden constriction in her throat.

  How could she live here alone? Or even with a husband?

  And who would he be?

  She walked from the salon and in to the study where her uncle had always sat. She could remember reading aloud to him the books he enjoyed and the long evenings when, tired out and ill, he had slept in the big armchair and she had read to herself. She had not realised how lonely she was and how ignorant of any other life outside the peace and quiet of The Priory.

  “What am I to do in the future?” Clarinda asked aloud.

  She went to the window to look out on the Rose Garden and to remember how Julien had put his cheek against hers as he was so unhappy and she had then run away because Lord Melburne had seen them.

  ‘What am I to do?’ she asked again.

  She heard the door open behind her and thought that it must be Bates bringing her some refreshment.

  Then she heard his voice announce,

  “Lady McDougall, Miss Clarinda.”

  Clarinda turned round in surprise until, after just one astonished glance at a vision in blue taffeta and blue floating plumes on a high-crowned bonnet, she gave a cry of recognition,

  “Jessica! What are you doing here?”

  “I thought you might be surprised to see me,” the vision answered, “but I was passing the very gates on my way to London and felt that I must call on you.”

  “It is such a surprise!” Clarinda exclaimed, kissing Jessica’s cheek and noticing, while she was still very pretty with her dark hair and slanting eyes, that she was rather plumper and certainly looked older.

  “You are married?” she questioned.

  Jessica sat down elegantly on the sofa.

  “I have been married for over three years,” she replied. “I should have written to you, Clarinda. It was remiss of me, but my husband, Sir Fingall McDougall, lives in Scotland and we were married in a great hurry because he desired to return North quickly. So I did not ask you to the Wedding. I suppose you did not read about it in The Ladies’ Journal?”

  “No, indeed! Uncle Roderick did not have anything so frivolous in the house,” Clarinda replied with a smile.

  “My relations, whom I have been visiting, tell me that your uncle is dead. I am so sorry, dearest, it must have been sad for you. But you look very smart. Are you still living here?”

  “No, not at the moment,” Clarinda answered.

  Then, not looking at her friend, she said a little hesitatingly,

  “I am staying at – Melburne. You know it – marches with this estate – Uncle Roderick made – Lord Melburne my – Guardian.”

  “Your Guardian!” Jessica exclaimed. “Goodness, Clarinda, you are a lucky girl! I cannot imagine anything more exciting. I used to admire Lord Melburne so much. He was just so handsome and so outstanding. I always longed to meet him.”

  There was a moment’s pregnant silence and Clarinda was very still.

  “I don’t – think you heard me – correctly, Jessica. It is – Lord Melburne who is now my – Guardian.”

  “I heard you clearly,” Jessica smiled. “The Irresistible Buck Melburne! How I longed to make his acquaintance when I was a debutante.”

  Clarinda drew a deep breath.

  “But Jessica, you told me – that he had made love to you and – when you – pleaded with him to – marry you, he refused! You told me – every detail. You told me – how much you – loved him and that he – r-ravished you against your will.”

  Jessica McDougall threw back her head and laughed.

  “And you believed all that fustian! Funny little Clarinda! I remember now, telling you all sorts of nonsensical tales while you sat wide-eyed on my bed, believing every word of them. I used to make up all those stories about every attractive man I met or, as in the case of Lord Melburne, whom I did not meet. But I saw him at balls and thought him devastatingly good-looking.”

  “You mean that – what you told me was not – true?” Clarinda asked stupidly.

  “No, of course it was not true!” Jessica exclaimed. “How could you possibly credit such nonsense? But indeed, if you believed me, I must have told my story well, I always fancied, if I had been born in another walk of life, I would have made my fortune on the stage.”

  “I think you – would,” Clarinda whispered.

  She rose as she spoke and stood for a moment holding onto the back of a chair. She felt that she must hold onto something.

  “Fancy you being a Ward of Lord Melburne,” Jessica remarked reflectively. “Well, all I can say, Clarinda, is that you are extremely fortunate to move with the Bon Ton. If I was not in such a hurry to reach London, I would ask you to introduce me to his Lordship, but it will not be long before we meet because I have already promised to come South for his marriage.”

  “His – marriage?” Clarinda echoed.

  “Yes, indeed,” Jessica replied. “On my way through London I did stay for a night with Lady Romayne Ramsey, she is a relative of my husband’s, and she told me that there had been an understanding between her and Lord Melburne for quite some time and they are to be married later on in the summer. I shall see you there and we then must have a long gossip, Clarinda. At the moment I cannot linger.”

  “You must – go?” Clarinda asked, hardly knowing what she was saying.

  “Yes, there is a party being given for me in London tonight and I am so much looking forward to it.”

  “But will you not – stay and have some – refreshment?” Clarinda enquired.

  Her voice sounded strained and seemed to come from a very far distance.

  “No, thank you, dearest,” Jessica replied. “I had luncheon with some friends a little over an hour ago and I must now be on my way.”

  She held Clarinda in a close embrace. There was a rustle of silk, an exotic fragrance and the softness of a powdered cheek, then as she moved towards the door she was talking all the time, chattering of her children, her husband, her journey to Scotland and her many friends in London. It was almost impossible to take in what she was saying before she had driven away.

  Clarinda stood watching her go as if in a dream. She could never remember afterwards leaving The Priory, she only found herself riding back to Melburne in a daze and feeling that her brain would not work properly.

  She reached the great house, left her horse at the stables and went upstairs through one of the side doors.

  Once in her bedroom she rang for Betty.

  “Did you have a nice ride – ?” Betty asked and then stopped. “What has happened, Miss Clarinda? You look as if you have seen a ghost!”

  “I am all – right,” Clarinda answered.

  “Let me get you some brandy, miss. What can have occurred? You were pale enough this mornin’ in all conscience, but now you look worse. You must lie down. You must rest. It’s been too much for you, all of this junketin’ every night in London and now drivin’ off to The Priory. There are things there I don’t want to remember and that’s a fact.”

  Clarinda hardly heard a word she said. Only when Betty tried to make her lie down did she rebel.

  “I have to go downstairs,” she insisted. “I have to see Lord Melburne.”

  There was so much det
ermination in her voice that Betty said no more. She fetched one of Clarinda’s prettiest gowns from the wardrobe, helped her into it and then arranged her hair in the fashionable manner that had captivated London Society.

  Clarinda was as placid as a doll beneath her hands. Only when Betty had finished did she turn away from the mirror that she had been staring into with sightless eyes, to walk slowly down the stairs, conscious that her heart was beating frantically and her hands were cold.

  Now she felt instinctively that Lord Melburne would be in the library and, as the door was opened for her, she saw that her supposition was right for he was seated at the big flat-topped desk in the centre of the room.

  She stood for a moment just inside the door.

  Then in a voice, which to her own ears seemed quite steady, she began,

  “I wish to speak with your Lordship – if it is – convenient.”

  “It is indeed, Clarinda,” Lord Melburne answered.

  He sanded the paper that he had been writing on and then rose to his feet.

  “I was about to send for you as it happens. I have something to tell you, Clarinda. I have resigned from being your Guardian.”

  “You have resigned?” Clarinda exclaimed.

  “Yes,” he replied. “I have no wish to continue in such a position.”

  She felt a stab of intolerable pain, knowing that it was because he intended to rid himself of all his responsibility for her. It was not surprising, if he was to be married, that he had no desire to complicate his life any longer with her affairs after all the trouble she had given him in these past weeks.

  Then, as he realised that she had not spoken and perhaps sensing her agitation, he said,

  “Your pardon, Clarinda, you wished to speak with me. I should have let you do so first.”

  She came further into the room to stand by the fireplace, twisting her fingers together and looking almost blindly at the long rows of brightly bound books and at the huge vase of hothouse flowers that stood on a table in front of them.

  “You had something to say to me,” Lord Melburne prompted and his tone was curious.

  “Y-yes,” Clarinda murmured.

  “Will you not begin and shall we not sit down? It would be more comfortable.”

  “I w-would – rather – stand,” Clarinda answered. “I have to – a-apologise to you – my Lord.”

  “Again?” he asked with a little twist of his lips.

  “This time it is much – worse than – anything for – I have had to – apologise for before,” Clarinda said.

  “Worse?” he asked.

  “Much – much – worse.”

  “What can have happened, I wonder?” he asked. “We have not been here at Melburne for more than a few hours.”

  “I have been to The – Priory.”

  “It has upset you?” his voice was sharp.

  “Not The – Priory,” Clarinda answered, “but – Jessica Tansley called on me – while I was there.”

  She realised that Lord Melburne was suddenly still.

  “Jessica Tansley!”

  “She is now – Lady McDougall. She was – passing the – gates.”

  There was what seemed to Clarinda a terrifying silence that she could not break. She knew that Lord Melburne was waiting for her to continue, but she could not find the words.

  Then suddenly they burst from her lips,

  “She said that – she had – never met you!”

  “I told you that I had never met her,” Lord Melburne replied.

  “I did not – believe you. How could I – know that she – made it all up? She cried and she told me how she had – pleaded with you – going down on her – knees, begging you to marry her and you – laughed. She made it sound so real – I believed her – of course, I believed her!”

  “And may I ask now what I was supposed to have done?” Lord Melburne enquired.

  “She – said that you had – r-ravished her,” Clarinda answered in a voice hardly above a whisper.

  “And you believed her? And how dare you think such things of me? How dare you insult me? Do you think that I have no honour, that I would seduce a girl or force myself upon a woman who did not want me? I am no Kegan! No wonder you have hated me, Clarinda, if that was the kind of behaviour you thought me capable of!”

  “She was – so – plausible,” Clarinda murmured miserably. “She told me that she always – thought she could have been an – actress.”

  “And so you mean to say that we have quarrelled, fought and that you have raged at me incessantly all because some tiresome, imaginative skitter-brain beguiled you with a load of moonshine?” Lord Melburne asked her scornfully.

  “I thought – I was being – loyal to my friend. I was deeply – distressed by what she – related to me.”

  There was a little sob in her voice and she walked towards the window.

  “I would like to meet this Miss Jessica Tansley or whatever she is called now,” Lord Melburne said grimly.

  “You – will,” Clarinda answered. “She told me – that she is coming – South for your – Wedding.”

  “My Wedding?” Lord Melburne flashed.

  “Yes. She is a – relative of Lady Romayne and she – stayed with her in London.”

  There was a long silence.

  Clarinda found that she was gripping her fingers so tightly together that they were almost bloodless.

  “Let me make one thing absolutely clear before we embroil ourselves any further in the tangle of your friend’s overactive imagination,” Lord Melburne said sternly. “I am not going to marry Lady Romayne Ramsey. Kindly listen to what I am saying, Clarinda, so that there is no mistake. I have never offered for Lady Romayne and I do not intend to do so.”

  For just a moment it seemed to Clarinda that the terrible feeling of constriction round her heart was loosened. It was as if the sunshine had come out and the darkness that had seemed to encompass her ever since she had visited The Priory had vanished.

  Then, as she stared out of the window so that Lord Melburne should not see her face, she heard him say,

  “But I will be frank with you, Clarinda, and say that I do wish to be married. In point of fact I intend to be married very shortly.”

  The sunshine had gone. It seemed hardly possible that in the middle of the day a room should be so dark.

  ‘So there is someone else,’ Clarinda thought.

  That was why he had paid no attention to her in London. He had been in love all the time with another woman.

  A woman she had not met and a woman she was unaware even existed.

  Now she could see all too clearly why he had not concerned himself with her save in his position as Guardian and why he had not been interested enough to seek her out alone or to ask her to dance.

  He was in love, perhaps as she was in love, and this was the end of everything!

  She felt that she must cry out at the misery of it, that she must run to him and ask him to hold her once more in his arms, as he had done that night he had brought her back from the caves or even to hold her hand tightly in his as he had last night when they had driven from Hetherington House to Berkeley Square.

  She had clung to him, knowing the strength and warmth of his fingers, knowing that he was there beside her and knowing that once again he had rescued her from an unspeakable degradation and knowing that even in her terror she had somehow believed that he would save her as he had saved her before.

  He had fought for her honour. She could see his face, savage with his anger, as he had knocked down Sir Gerald and hit him again and again. She had believed that he had done it for her own sake. Now she knew that she was just a woman who had been outraged.

  There had been nothing personal in Lord Melburne’s anger, only a chivalry that she had always known he had possessed and which should have made her disbelieve Jessica’s mad story from the very moment she had met him.

  ‘Once he is married I shall never see him again,’ she thought despairingly
.

  But, as she had some remnants of pride left in her, the same pride that had prevented her from screaming and trying to escape when Nicholas had carried her away to the caves, she was able to lift her chin and say hesitatingly but quite clearly,

  “I must c-congratulate – your Lordship – I hope – you will be very – happy.”

  Even as she said it she knew it was true. She loved him so much she wanted happiness for him even if it meant that she must be miserable and lonely for the rest of her life.

  “Thank you,” Lord Melburne replied quietly.

  She thought that he would say more, but, because she was afraid of bursting into tears or throwing herself into his arms, she said hastily in a very small voice,

  “If your Lordship is to be – married – what is to become of – me if I then have no – Guardian?”

  “I thought of that as I wrote my resignation,” Lord Melburne answered. “As I already told you last night, Clarinda, it is imperative that you should be married immediately.”

  “But there – is no one – I wish to marry,” Clarinda parried quickly.

  “No one?”

  She shook her head. She had her back to him but she felt that he had come nearer and now she heard his voice say,

  “And yet you are in love.”

  “How do you – know – ” she began. “I mean – it is not – true.”

  “Clarinda, turn round and look at me.”

  Again she shook her head.

  “N-no.”

  “Look at me, Clarinda,” he insisted masterfully. “You don’t want me to compel you?”

  She remained obdurate for a moment.

  Then, because she was afraid that he might touch her and her self-control would break, she turned to face him. He was nearer than she had thought.

  She looked up at him and saw an expression in his eyes that made her suddenly tremble.

  Quickly she looked down, her eyelashes dark on the paleness of her cheeks.

  “You promised me once, Clarinda,” Lord Melburne said very slowly, “that you would never lie to me. Let me ask you once again, are you in love?”

  “Y-yes.”

  He could hardly hear her answer.

  “Then surely this makes things easier,” Lord Melburne remarked. “This most fortunate gentleman, whoever he may be, will become your husband and therefore will be your natural Guardian, Clarinda.”