“Call yourself a governess?” he went on, exchanging what had sounded almost like exasperated concern for sarcasm. “I hope you have taught your pupil to be more careful when she crosses the road!”
“Worried about her?” she flashed, her face, which had been as white as her rescuer’s in the immediate aftermath of the near-accident, growing red with vexation.
“What are you doing here by yourself?” the Duke – for it was he who had pulled her to safety - asked peremptorily, ignoring her question.
“Putting myself in harm’s way evidently. And why should I not be here? I am not a child!”
“You don’t seem to have noticeably more sense than an infant. Has nobody taught you to look before stepping into the road? Is it your morning off? Servants do not usually wander alone about the streets of London in the middle of the day.”
Apparently suddenly becoming conscious that he was still holding her arm, he dropped it abruptly and bent to pick something up off the pavement. “What is this that you have dropped?”
She realised with a shock that, in the confusion of her near flattening beneath the carriage, followed without pause by the Duke’s resumed provocation, the parcel containing the diamonds had fallen out of her muff.
“Oh, it is a parcel I was about to – to – post,” she answered, attempting to snatch it from him.
“Addressed to Lord Marklye? Is he a friend of yours?”
“That is none of your business,” she retorted. “Give it to me at once.”
But he, seeing how much she wanted it, waved it above her head, taunting her. “What is it? An unwanted gift that you are trying to return? But it has no address. Are you such a country bumpkin that you assume the post office will know where to find his lordship?”
“No,” she admitted, giving up and wondering if she might put his grace to use. “But I daresay you know it.”
“I do not know it precisely but I can probably find it out. Would you like me to deliver it for you? Where were you taking it if you know neither Marklye’s address nor think the post office will be able to supply it?” As he spoke, he looked around and noticed that they were standing directly outside a jeweller’s shop. “Did he buy it from here? And you were bringing it back in the hope that the shopkeeper would know his direction, is that it?”
“Yes,” she admitted unwisely.
He looked more closely at the parcel, considering its size and shape and shaking it gently. He scrutinised her writing for some time before observing, “Such horridly familiar writing. It gives me quite a turn to look at it. You only wrote to me once. Is this the same sort of letter?”
“Of course it is not. I do not know Lord Marklye at all well.”
“No? Did you think you knew me well?”
“Yes, I did at one time, but it turns out that I was mistaken.”
He was staring at her in what she interpreted as a hostile manner, his eyes hard. She, thinking him so concentrated on his memories and dislike of her that he was barely present in the moment, made another attempt to snatch the parcel from him.
“You say you do not know him well. No doubt he wishes to know you better,” he hazarded, keeping the parcel out of her reach. “What has he given you to try to press his suit? And of what nature is his suit, do you suppose?”
“None of it is any of your business,” she snapped. “But, if it will set your mind at rest, Lord Marklye is not in the least interested in me, except as a friend.”
As she spoke, she realised that it was wholly inaccurate to describe her relations with his lordship as friendship. “In fact,” she amended, “he is not my friend. I met him once, a few days ago, when I was gazing into that window and, I own, admiring some of the jewellery. I do not know why he bought it and sent it to me; he enclosed no note but I think it was because he knew I wanted it and he was rich enough to buy it for me.”
“Indeed? An entirely altruistic gesture? I own I find such an explanation wholly unbelievable.”
“Yes. You think me a fool, but I was certain of it at the time.”
“I try not to think of you at all. It seems I am not the only man to find you mesmerising and to wish to give you all in my power. He will be disappointed to have it returned. Indeed, I should not be surprised if it were to prove a devastating blow to him.”
“I hope not. I have tried to compose a letter which expresses my sense of what I believe to have been the kindness and purity of his intentions whilst, at the same time, making it clear that I cannot keep it.”
“I should think it most likely that you have misunderstood his intentions but then you always were naïve to a fault. What is it?”
“A diamond parure.”
“Good lord! He values you very highly. Does he know that you are a governess?”
“Yes.”
“So when does he suppose you would wear such a thing? When you eat your lonely supper in your room? Beneath your dull clothes, made up to the neck, so that the diamonds will be entirely hidden? Or does he, do you think, intend to change your position to one where he may, with impunity, display his wealth upon your bosom?”
She did not miss his implication but this time, because there was no one in front of whom she must behave with propriety, she replied tartly, “Pray do not impute your own motives to others. Lord Marklye had no intention of insulting me.”
“No, I had not supposed that he had; but I daresay he wishes to seduce you. Did you suppose him to be thinking of marriage? To a governess?”
“I am persuaded no such thought entered his head.”
“You relieve my mind. I should not like you to be disappointed but feel I should point out that a man who buys an expensive present for a woman in your position does not generally wish to offer the protection of his name.”
“What about a man who buys such a low person a silk bonnet?” she asked in a biting tone.
“I should imagine he would have the same sort of transaction in mind. I do not include myself in that general assumption. I hope you did not think I wanted to buy your favours. I am afraid I shall have to disappoint you after all. Nothing would induce me to enter into any kind of arrangement with you, even were I able to purchase you for the price of a silk bonnet.”
“I would rather cut my throat,” she declared, “than have anything to do with you.”
“I am glad we understand each other so well. You decided some time ago to adopt the career you have and, as a consequence, must accept that the only sort of man who might consider marriage with you would be someone like a curate. A Viscount, such as Lord Marklye, is most likely thinking of something more temporary and less respectable.”
“Thank you for your advice,” Sylvia said coldly. “I must be on my way. Pray give me the parcel.”
“I thought you wished me to deliver it for you.”
“I have changed my mind.”
“Indeed? Do you now intend to keep it and accept whatever Lord Marklye offers you?”
“Certainly not, but I will return it myself.”
“And yet you would like to keep the diamonds, would you not? Are you finding the moral high ground slippery? I could have decked you in jewels of every kind and colour if you had married me – and you would have been perfectly respectable. Now, I can only warn you to take care. You may find Marklye the first of many to offer you carte blanche. Will you succumb to temptation, I wonder? I should be amused to see it.”
“That is why I am endeavouring to return it: in order to resist temptation.”
He nodded, curling his lip. “And I only gave you a lavender silk bonnet, but you have not returned it. What am I to infer from that?”
“I tried to refuse; I even tried to throw it into the road, but Lord Furzeby’s arrival prevented me. In any event, your motives, as you just pointed out, could not be more different from Lord Marklye’s. You wanted to humiliate me; he wanted to make me happy.”
“And he has succeeded in putting temptation in your way, something I have never achieved. I take my h
at off to you, Miss Holmdale, if you succeed in resisting the lure of mammon: you are a woman in a million, probably ten million.” He paused before asking, the sarcasm back in his voice, “Or are you, by returning it, hoping to persuade him to offer you his name?”
“No!” she exclaimed, outraged. “I would never marry except for love!”
“Indeed? Was it love that once led you to consider marrying me?”
She started, her eyes flew to his and as quickly turned away. “You know that it was.”
“And was it love that changed your mind?”
“You know why I broke off our engagement. I explained the reasons in my letter. I daresay you thought them absurd and perhaps they were. I was very young and had been brought up in the fear of God; temptation had never come my way and I did not understand the ways of the world.”
“And now you do? Do you regret throwing away a Duke?”
“You were not a Duke then.”
“No. If I had been, would your morals have been able to accommodate my sins, do you think?”
“It is nothing to do with your rank, as you know perfectly well. You seek to wound me at every opportunity. Can the past not remain the past?”
“Unfortunately, not altogether. I find it impossible to feel indifferent towards you. I have carried my anger for so long that I cannot easily lay it aside. You will say that I display a disagreeable degree of pride – and you will be quite right. I have not been able to fall out of love with you and into love with anyone else in all this time; in spite of that, pray be under no illusions as to my feelings.” His voice wavered as he said the last words and he added, when she did not speak, “I would say, if it did not sound absurd and over-dramatic, that I now loathe you quite as fiercely as ever I loved you. May I enquire what you feel towards me?”
“Fear.”
It was not the answer he had expected. He stepped back. “Of what? Pray do not pretend that you fear my tongue?”
“Your tongue – and your actions. You have made no secret of the fact that you wish me ill.”
He raised a hand, almost as though he would take hers, but dropped it again and said, “I just rescued you from almost certain death. Do you still believe that I mean you harm?”
“I don’t know. I daresay you acted instinctively; perhaps you did not recognise me but simply saw a foolish woman not looking where she was going.”
“You’re an idiot!” he said again, almost affectionately. “I would, I hope, have endeavoured to save anyone’s life in the circumstances, but I knew it was you and that knowledge did not stay my hand – nor my legs when I ran into the road. You are a ninnyhammer! Will you not say ‘thank you’?”
“Thank you.”
He nodded, apparently satisfied and said, “Shall I escort you safely to the door of the Sullington residence?”
“Is that where you were going?”
“Yes.”
“I do not think you will find your quarry prepared to receive you. She and her mama had an altercation a little while ago, which resulted in Miss Sullington being sent to her room. Were you on your way to make her an offer?”
“Not yet. I have only met her a few times. I was bringing an invitation and thought I would show my enthusiasm by delivering it in person. What do you want to do with this?” He held up the parcel. “Shall I return it to Lord Marklye for you?”
“Would you? What reason will you give for being, as it were, my emissary?”
“I shall not hand it over in person. I will send a minion whom I shall instruct to give neither his name nor the name of his employer. You can be reassured that his lordship will not know the minion’s principal.”
“Then, thank you; I should be grateful.”
“Are you not afraid that I shall fail or decide not to return it so that his lordship will think you have kept his gift and draw his own conclusions?”
“I do not know why I never thought of that, particularly since you seem prepared to stop at nothing to ruin me. Would you serve me such a mean trick?”
“I thought you believed I wanted to kill you. This would be a less drastic, but possibly more pleasing, manner of revenge, would it not? He will think you have accepted his gift and will no doubt sweep you away in a chaise and seduce you, taking your protests, if you make any, as evidence of your passion. You will, from my point of view, have received your just desserts for you will instantly become a woman of ill repute: a bit of fluff, a lightskirt. That would be a sweet revenge upon a woman who dared to discard me for having dealings with such an immodest woman, would it not? To turn you into one?”
“You have been endeavouring without pause to insinuate that that is what will befall me – or what I already am – and yet I do not think I truly believed that you would do anything so shabby. You would not, would you? You are merely trying to lacerate me verbally, are you not?”
“Try me!”
He pushed the package into his pocket and, before she had an inkling of what he was going to do, had swept her into his arms in as ungentle an embrace as it was possible to imagine and kissed her.
She struggled at first, taken by surprise, but then, as his kiss changed in nature from an assault to something altogether different, she melted against him, just as she had been used to do all those years ago when she was a girl and he barely more than a boy.
The next thing she knew he had turned on his heel, reversing their positions so that she was up against the shop window, he with his back to the street. She heard the blow, and felt him flinch as it struck him on the shoulders, but it did not touch her because she was protected by his bent head and his arms around her.
Chapter 16
Cringing under the blow, he pushed her hard up against the shop window before turning to confront the person who had dealt a stinging blow to his shoulders. It was Lady Sullington. She stood, upright in her phaeton, the whip still trembling in her hand.
She looked as startled as he when she saw who had been embracing Miss Holmdale. The high colour, which the sight of her daughter’s governess locked in the arms of a man had engendered, fled, leaving her face white and horrified. It was clear that she had not recognised the Duke before she raised her whip; his identity had been concealed by his many-caped greatcoat as well as by the high-crowned beaver which he still wore, not having had time to doff it before dragging his former fiancée from the path of the carriage which had almost run her down. The governess had been easy to recognise, dressed as she was in the drab pelisse and old-fashioned bonnet which she had been wearing when her ladyship had had occasion to speak sharply to her, less than an hour previously.
Lady Sullington, accustomed for many years to having her own way and unquestioningly convinced of the rightness of her actions in all circumstances, recovered her aplomb with remarkable rapidity considering that she had just whipped the man she had been hoping would shortly become her son-in-law.
“Pray stand aside, Duke,” she said in her high, grating voice. “That harlot was until this moment my daughter’s governess. I am thankful that I have seen with my own eyes what she gets up to when ‘taking a walk’ - the euphemism she uses to describe her activities on the street.”
But the Duke did not stand aside; he remained in front of Sylvia, one hand restraining her from confronting her accuser. This meant that Lady Sullington’s next words appeared to be addressed directly to him. “You are dismissed instantly. My door will be barred to you and you will never speak to my daughter again. I have employed some execrable governesses over the years but never before one who has sunk to such depths as accosting gentlemen in the street. Step forward at once, young woman; hiding behind his grace will not save you from ignominy.”
As she paused for breath, the Duke spoke in an icy voice, ringing with scorn. “You are mistaken, Lady Sullington. Miss Holmdale is a relative of mine whom I have not seen for many years. I was merely greeting her, perhaps a little over-enthusiastically, but I can assure you that, not only was she was not the instigator of the embrac
e you witnessed, but there was nothing improper to cause you to jump to such an erroneous and insulting conclusion.”
Lady Sullington found herself in a quandary. She had no wish to quarrel with the Duke; indeed quite the reverse, but she had an overpowering desire to be rid of the governess as soon as possible. She had endured a singularly unpleasant scene with her daughter earlier that day when she had informed her, with not a little pride, that she believed his grace to be forming an attachment to her and that she expected an offer to be made within the next few days. Melissa had bluntly refused to consider accepting any such offer and had not only raised her voice in anger to her parent but, on leaving the room, had shut the door with a decided snap. The result of this was that her ladyship had formed the opinion that the governess had failed to carry out her orders; as a consequence, she had had every intention of terminating the wretched woman’s employment later that afternoon.
“Related to your grace? That is the first I have heard of such a connexion. In any event, whether or not she is related to you, indulging in such disgraceful behaviour on a public street is not something that I will tolerate in an employee whose influence upon my daughter has already been pernicious. It was my intention to dismiss her before the end of the day. That is all I have to say.” She had a great deal more she would have liked to say but, self-interest intervening, she folded her lips into a thin line and lifted the reins.
The Duke, however, had not yet unburdened himself of everything he had to say. He delivered his conditions on behalf of Miss Holmdale in a cold voice.
“I should not imagine that anything would induce my cousin to return to your household after such an exhibition, enacted in full view of any interested member of the public who may have happened to be passing. If you do not wish your conduct to lead to a scandal that will undoubtedly scupper your daughter’s chances of making a good match, you will pay Miss Holmdale whatever you owe, in addition to three months’ wages in lieu of notice.
Sylvia Or The Moral High Ground Page 14