The Viscount’s Sinful Bargain

by Archer, Kate

  “You are not old at all!” Cassandra said, and she meant it. Lady Marksworth was a distinguished looking lady of early middle age.

  “I am not old to myself, anyway,” Lady Marksworth said goodhumoredly. “I will have tea sent in. Now, talk away.”

  Lady Marksworth swept out of the room and Cassandra thought her aunt understood her better than she had initially given the lady credit for. She and Sybil would have much to talk of.

  They settled themselves on the velvet cushions of the window seat that overlooked the lady’s charming front garden, fronted by an ironwork gate. The sun shone down, the clip-clop of the occasional carriage sounded softly through the glass as it passed them by, and the distant sound of neighboring front doors opening and closing spoke of a street filled with people coming and going.

  Cassandra preferred this little perch above all others in her aunt’s house, as it so differed from Trebly Hall and its isolation in the countryside. Its excellent view of the street had provided no end of entertainment, including what she suspected was a budding romance between a governess and a butler. That lady was in the habit of pushing her charge’s pram down the street at precisely the time the butler came out for air. As well, there was a gentleman living across the road who bore a long scar on his cheek and appeared always to be serious—she imagined him as having been one of Wellington’s right-hand men.

  “You begin,” Cassandra said, holding her friend’s hands in her own.

  “Very well,” Sybil said. “Ever so much happened, but I will start by telling you of a near disaster.”

  “A disaster!” Cassandra said, very much surprised.

  “Nearly so,” Sybil said. “Mr. Manning was meant to take me into supper, but as we walked toward the dining room, a messenger delivered him a letter. An old aunt in Kent did poorly and her neighbor had written about it. He is ever so kind, as it turns out. He said his aunt would never bother him, not even if she were on her deathbed, and so he was most grateful the neighbor had been bold enough to write. His butler saw at once that it was from his aunt’s neighborhood and sent the message straight to the Bergrams’ knowing his master would not wish to be delayed. He set off for Kent that very instant, not even returning home to pack a case. And so you see, though he apologized profusely, there I was standing alone while everybody else was led in.”

  “Did you make haste to the retiring room?” Cassandra asked. “I have thought of what I should do if I were to be without a partner for supper, and it is the only thing I can think of.”

  “It was very strange,” Sybil said. “I was perplexed about what I ought to do and thought of going to my mama, but then Lord Lockwood appeared by my side and offered to take me in.”

  “How lucky!” Cassandra said.

  “Yes, I suppose it was lucky,” Sybil said thoughtfully. “Though I cannot account for why he did so. He barely said a word throughout. You know how awkward that can be, having to hold up a conversation alone. I cannot imagine what more I could have said about the weather.”

  “At least you were not holed up in the retiring room, praying that no lady would come upon you and stare at you with a pitying gaze.”

  “Very true,” Sybil said. “And perhaps Lord Lockwood was only momentarily tongue-tied, the pact may have weighed heavily on his mind. They must all know it is the topic of the town.”

  Before Cassandra could comment, Racine came in with the tea. The old butler had been known to her as long as she could remember. He’d always been exceedingly kind—delivering her no end of biscuits when nobody was looking. She’d been in the habit, as a young girl, of creeping down to the butler’s closet and pouring out her heart to him whenever she experienced some little upset. He’d always taken her side of things, even when she could see now that he ought not have.

  The butler set down a tea tray with a plate of the cook’s marvelous fairy cakes.

  “You spoil us, Racine,” Cassandra said.

  Racine was a formal sort of fellow when he was not comforting a heartbroken young girl in the butler’s closet. Cassandra still remembered fondly his commiseration with her when the viscount had denied her idea of acquiring another five mastiffs to make a proper pack. Racine had told her it seemed a fine idea and the viscount might change his mind someday.

  Now, he said, “It is a butler’s purview, I think, to show those little considerations that might indicate favor.”

  “Goodness,” Sybil said. “I can hardly convince Merrydon to deliver a bit of dry bread so soon after breakfast.”

  Racine clearly looked askance at that way of going on. He raised an eyebrow in the most delightful disapproving manner and left the room. Cassandra had no doubt he was moments away from informing the housekeeper of Merrydon’s unsatisfactory habits.

  “Now,” Sybil said, “you must tell me of your evening. I know you were to go into supper with Lord Burke, he is an amiable fellow, is he not?”

  “Very amiable,” Cassandra said. “A deal more amiable than was Lord Hampton, both during the opening of the ball and across the table at supper.”

  “Lord Hampton? He did not offend?” Sybil asked.

  “He very much offended me actually,” Cassandra said. “He was all but wordless on the ballroom floor. I thought it rude and told him so.”

  “You did no such thing!” Sybil said.

  “Oh, I most certainly did,” Cassandra said resolutely. She did not see a reason for pretense. Lord Hampton had been rude, and she had informed him of it. “I think,” she went on, “that the lord flatters himself over this pact. He wished to make it known that he was not on the auction block. I made it equally known that I was not bidding.”

  “Goodness,” Sybil said. “But then, you spoke to him at supper too? Was that not uncomfortable?”

  “Terribly,” Cassandra said. And, if she were truthful with herself, that part of the evening she’d prefer to forget. There had been no cause to inform anybody that she liked a wild ride on a horse or, worse, that she’d ever raised a shotgun.

  “Well,” Sybil said, “at least you have no worries over Lord Hampton approaching you again.”

  Cassandra smiled. “I have not the slightest worry over that, my dear Sybil. That gentleman will view me as no more alluring than the plague.”

  Sybil squinted her eyes, appearing to look out the window over Cassandra’s shoulder. “There is Lord Lockwood, going into Lord Dalton’s house.”

  “Lord Dalton’s house?” Cassandra asked. She’d had no idea that the gentleman with the scar was one of the gentlemen named in the pact.

  “Oh! And there is Lord Hampton, himself, just rode up on a horse!”

  Cassandra had no wish to look and could not quite understand why her eyes insisted on doing so. Nevertheless, her eyes would force her head to turn.

  Lord Hampton leapt off his horse and handed it over to a groom. He took the steps two at a time and disappeared into the house with Lord Lockwood. Three more gentlemen arrived in quick succession, all bounding into the house.

  Whatever Lord Hampton’s temperament might be, Cassandra could not deny that he cut a dashing figure.

  “It would not be too difficult to guess who the unknown gentlemen are,” Sybil said. “Dalton, Lockwood and Hampton are all to do with the pact, those other three must be Ashworth, Cabot and Grayson.”

  “I suppose they conspire to thwart their fathers,” Cassandra said. “They must feel they are hunted stags in the forest, with mamas circling round and ready to fire.”

  “You do not think mamas behave so,” Sybil said.

  “I do,” Cassandra said. “Though I do not have the benefit of my own, I have been careful to observe. What does your own mother say to it?”

  Sybil’s expression took on a slight aspect of worry. “She’s delighted with the pact and has discussed the gentlemen in some detail. I have been clinging to the hope that two of them are already struck from the list—Lockwood and Ashworth. My mama told me last night that my father has recently reminded her that he does
not like either of those gentlemen’s fathers. Something to do with a long-ago card game. I am hopeful my father recalls he does not like the rest of their fathers over some other ancient insults.”

  “My aunt approves of the pact very much, and does not seem to dislike anybody’s father,” Cassandra said. “She’s also told me that my own father has had a long connection with Lord Hampton’s grandmother, the dowager, though my aunt does not know if the lady still lives. She hopes I may mention it in conversation.”

  Cassandra felt her cheeks tinge pink. “I failed to mention that it would be unlikely that Lord Hampton and I have any future conversations, much less about any family connections.”

  “Do you recall your father ever speaking of the dowager?”

  “I do not,” Cassandra said, “but my father keeps up a vast correspondence and never talks much about it. He once told me I could read all his letters after he died, and I would find much amusement in them. Though I have begun to wonder if the lady is not the same person that my father has sometimes spoken of—I do not know the details but there was some gentlewoman who helped him out of what he’s termed ‘a scrape’ in his youth. I have always been under the impression that the lady had been a deal older than he at the time.”

  “Goodness, and now you are pressured to pose the connection to Lord Hampton. I see what you say about a mama’s enthusiasm. That is just the sort of maneuvering I worry over,” Sybil said. “When I came to town, I had my heart set on a fellow who would sweep me off my feet, not one who was under contract to secure himself a wife.”

  “We must stay strong and united, Sybil,” Cassandra said. “That is our only way through this muddle.”

  *

  Hampton gazed around Dalton’s library. He’d not been in the house for ages and it was just as disheveled as he remembered it. Opened books lay on every surface, as if Dalton could never decide what he would read, and the dust surrounding them spoke to a lax household.

  Lord Dalton himself, an earl and someday to be Duke of Wentworth, was a tall and muscular man with only a long scar running down his left cheek marring his appearance. He’d got it at the battle of Quatre Bras, a Frenchman coming within range and delivering the blow. His mother claimed it gave him a dangerous and dashing look. Dalton thought that idea was hopeful nonsense—ladies did not flock to damaged gentlemen. On the other hand, that they did not flock to him was a benefit at this particular moment in time.

  Dalton’s butler shuffled in with a tray of glasses and poured out brandy, though it was far too early for it. Considering the servant’s advanced age, Hampton was only thankful he’d managed to set the glasses down without falling over.

  Dalton motioned toward a table with six chairs round it. “To the war room, gentlemen.”

  As they settled themselves, Hampton mused that, as much as he’d thought on it, he still had not devised a plan to counterattack his father’s directive without finding himself on the street.

  Dalton said, “My own opinion is the whole thing hangs on Lockwood. It’s his father that’s got them all riled.”

  “If I could manage His Grace,” Lockwood said, “I’d have already done it. I’ve argued backwards and forwards and he’s resolute on the thing. I think he even wishes me to fail—he said living without funds for a year would cure me of my fondness for gambling.”

  “Why did we even go through this damnable war, if it was not to return home and do what we like?” Ashworth asked.

  “We all know the injustice of it,” Cabot said, “the point of this gathering is to discover what we can do about it.”

  “We are the talk of the town,” Hampton said. “Burke spoke of it at supper last evening as if it were the most usual topic in the world.”

  “Lucky Burke,” Grayson muttered. “I wish my own father belonged to Brook’s. There is no such lunatic talk at that club, it is only at White’s that such bizarre schemes are hatched.”

  “Perhaps we burn White’s to the ground,” Lockwood said hopefully. “Take away their meeting spot.”

  Hampton smiled. Lockwood’s mind always went to the most drastic action possible. “They’ve all gone home to the country,” he said, “and I suppose we cannot stop them communicating by letter without burning down the Royal Mail.”

  “We will not be forced to take rooms in Cheapside, at least,” Dalton said. “I inherited this house from an uncle and my father cannot touch it. If it comes to it, you can all stay here. Though don’t expect good dinners, not much money came with the house.”

  Ashworth looked around and said, “You can sell off some of these books you never finish. That’ll keep us in beef and brandy.”

  This idea cheered the gentlemen no end. They toasted Dalton and drained the brandy already in their hands. Hampton was among those cheered: he had all but resigned himself to living in a garret somewhere. Here, there was a very good wine cellar that would take years to get through.

  “What we need, in the meantime,” Grayson said, “is some bit of new gossip that will knock us out of people’s mouths. The talkers are always eager for the next thing, and to be the first to know it, and then the first to tell it to another.”

  They sat in silence for some moments. Then Lockwood said, “Hampton, were you in jest last evening about Miss Knightsbridge? About her shooting birds?”

  Hampton shook his head. “I was not. She said as much, as well as a penchant for galloping over hill and dale without a groom, in front of both Burke and Miss Danworth. God only knows what else goes on in Surrey.”

  “Well, well,” Dalton said. “That is certainly enough to begin. I’ll send a man to Surrey to find out just that—what else does go on in Surrey in the environs of Miss Knightsbridge? With any luck, we’ll discover some little thing that, combined with shooting birds and riding off without a groom, should set tongues wagging.”

  The rest of the gentlemen at table began to look hopeful. That they would clutch desperately at any idea, Hampton did not doubt. He had begun to doubt the rightness of exploiting Miss Knightsbridge’s ill-advised words. He did not like gossip in general and had never been the means of spreading it.

  Though, after all, without knowing him the lady had informed him she did not wish to know him. In fact, she claimed there might be no end of people who did not wish to know him. Further, nobody had forced her to own that she wielded a shotgun.

  He supposed she could be left to her own devices.

  Chapter Four

  Lord and Lady Sedway’s dinner was to be a cozy evening for only thirty guests. Of all the invitations that had piled up on her aunt’s silver tray in the hall, Cassandra felt most comfortable considering this one. All of her childhood, she’d known Lady Sedway as Anne Hamilton. Though Anne was five years older than herself, the lady being a close neighbor meant that the Hamiltons had been often at Trebly Hall.

  When she had been younger, Cassandra had gloried in Anne coming into her bedchamber and advising her on her hair or showing her the latest fashion. Cassandra might not have understood half of what Anne said or cared much for the parts she did understand, but she was very admiring of Anne’s confidence. Anne had been like an elder sister and, though so unlike herself, dearly loved for it.

  Anne was all hairstyles and clothes and whispers about balls and the gentlemen who could be found at them. Cassandra, being raised in a male-dominated house, rather looked upon her older friend as some exotic creature who was mystifyingly privy to the secrets of an unknown world.

  Now, Anne Hamilton was Lady Sedway, having married an earl. She still wrote her old friend and had been delighted to hear that Cassandra would come for her first season. Cassandra had been promised a dinner and Lady Sedway was as good as her word.

  Cassandra supposed her old friend would be surprised to see her appearance after four years’ absence. Back then, it would be unlikely that she’d manage an entire day without soiling her dress from climbing over a fence or ripping her riding habit on a loose nail in the stables. Now, she was to arrive a pro
per-looking young lady.

  They entered the house and Lady Sedway rushed to greet them. “Dear Cass!” she said, “goodness, look at you. I do not know what I expected, perhaps that you would turn up with mud on your cheek as I was so used to seeing you, but you are positively grown! And Lady Marksworth, how good of you to come. I do not believe I have seen you since that last Christmas at the Viscount’s house the year before I married.”

  Lady Marksworth graciously nodded.

  “Lady Sedway,” Cassandra said, “you cannot imagine how cheered I am to see you.”

  “You must still call me Anne, just as you do in your letters,” Lady Sedway said, laughing. “I cannot be addressed so formally by the girl I used to experiment on with curl papers.”

  As Lady Sedway led them into the drawing room, Cassandra thought her friend had not changed much, only become even more elegant than she had always been.

  The lady’s butler announced them and they went in.

  The drawing room was already peopled with various guests. Cassandra was introduced to Lord Sedway, who she found a friendly sort and surprisingly knowledgeable of her long-standing friendship with his wife.

  She was cheered to see Lord Burke on the other side of the room, talking to Miss Penny Darlington, a pleasant lady she’d met on a call to Mrs. Darlington some weeks ago.

  Cassandra was further cheered to see that none of the gentlemen of the pact were in the room. Now that she’d seen them all go into Lord Dalton’s house, she was certain she could recognize them.

  Behind her, she heard the butler say, “Lord Hampton and Lord Ashworth.”

  Cassandra’s heart sank. Why? Why must two of the pact attend? And worse, why must one of them be Lord Hampton? She dearly wished Sybil to be at her side, but her friend attended a dinner elsewhere. Lady Marksworth did stand next to her, but she suddenly felt very alone.