The Counterfeit Countess

by Diana Campbell

  Chapter 13

  Though Rose had not yet learned to knock on closed doors, she was beginning to master the art of dressing and undressing her mistress, and within a quarter of an hour, Selina was ready for bed. Ready to retire, she amended, her cheeks warming with the memory of his lordship’s final comment. Rose curtsied out, and Selina crawled beneath the bedclothes, but, as she had anticipated, she was quite unable to fall asleep.

  Selina could not precisely define “love” either, but she was suddenly, utterly persuaded that she was in love with Alexander Cochran. As he had suggested, one element of her emotion was a superior form of friendship: she had never known anyone whose companionship she more enjoyed. Nor did she believe the Earl would find her lacking in passion, for the merest brush of his long fingers left her weak and aching for greater intimacy. She must have started to love him long ago, she conceded; she could offer no other explanation for her resentment of Miss Bradley. Resentment? No, jealousy was much the better word, and that jealousy had driven her, in part, to agree to the housewarming ball.

  In part, but only in part, for Selina now realized that she had viewed the ball as a way to prolong their charade. Her enthusiastic participation in Wiltshire’s social whirl had been a bit of self-delusion: it had enabled her to pretend that her life with Alex would continue indefinitely. The completion of Worfields had threatened that illusory existence, and she had con-

  sented to the ball because she could not bear the prospect of life without him. In short, she, too, had played for time, though with motives slightly different from the Earl’s.

  If, indeed, those were his motives, she reflected darkly. It was entirely possible that he had played for time so as to lay his hands on Grandmama’s money, but the money had fallen into Selina’s hands instead. Alex had intended to wed Miss Bradley for her fortune; would he not marry Selina for the same reason? He himself had owned to uncertainty on that head, and his “honesty” might well be a clever ploy to lay her suspicions to rest.

  Selina shook her head, ruefully perceiving that she was beginning to think like Mrs. Seymour. Alex could not prove the sincerity of his affection: Selina could conduct a hundred tests, and he could pass them all, and there would remain a shadow of doubt in her mind. And long before the hundredth test, probably before the second, the Earl would lose his patience and pack her off.

  No, if she elected to wed Alexander Cochran, she must do so on his terms, must believe he found her “compatible” and desirable and setde for that. She could do far worse, she reflected; she could be forced to marry a man she did not care for at all. In point of fact, she almost had been: she had nearly wed Sir Matthew Platt. So as long as she loved Alex, did it really signify that he did not wholly reciprocate her feelings?

  She could not quell a nagging notion that it did, but she was too tired to ponder his lordship’s offer any further. She closed her eyes and eventually tumbled into a troubled sleep.

  By Selina’s estimate, she had tossed and turned only a few hours when she was awakened by the clatter of wheels in the coach yard below her window. She struggled up, peered through the draperies and beheld what appeared to be an army of pots and vases marching toward the rear center door of the house. She soon made out the human legs and feet beneath the florist’s containers, and when she glanced at the mantel clock, she discovered, to her dismay, that it was nearing ten.

  She would have adored to rest a bit longer, but any such luxury was clearly impossible, and she sighed and rang for Rose.

  Selina had optimistically believed that the preparations for the ball were virtually complete, but this soon proved not to be the case. She was still gulping down the last of her toast when Winthrop ushered the florist into the breakfast parlor, and the latter demanded Lady Worsham’s personal guidance in the arrangement of the palms and bouquets about the ballroom. In the midst of this task, the caterer appeared and insisted that her ladyship personally decide how the food was to be arrayed in the refreshment parlor. Selina galloped between the two rooms until she was quite exhausted, and just as it seemed that all was in readiness, one of the maids dropped a dozen lusters from the top of the ladder on which she was perched to polish the main chandelier. Following the sweeping up of the shards, there was a lengthy debate as to how the gaping hole in the chandelier could be concealed. Selina eventually decreed that lusters were to be appropriated from the backs of the smaller chandeliers, during the course of which procedure several more were broken, and she shortly began to fear that every fixture in the ballroom would be quite denuded by nightfall.

  “There is one further matter, ma’am,” Winthrop said at last, when the gaps in the chandeliers had been satisfactorily disguised. Selina shuddered to contemplate what new tragedy might have occurred.

  “Yes?” she said warily.

  “It is Master Jeremy, ma’am. He sought out Hastings early this morning to issue instructions about the assembly.”

  Selina could not recollect who “Hastings” was, and she shook her head.

  “Lord Worsham's valet,” Winthrop prompted. “In any event. Master Jeremy advised Hastings that as he— Master Jeremy—was to stand in the receiving line this evening, Hastings must allow sufficient time to dress his lordship and Master Jeremy as well. Master Jeremy

  can not attend the ball, of course, but I felt you should

  be the one to tell him so.”

  “I?” Selina said. “Where is Lord Worsham?”

  “I collect he had business in town, for he requested, last night, to borrow Mrs. Seymour’s carriage.”

  “Very well.” Selina sighed again. “While I am with Jeremy, please have the dining-room chairs brought up and distributed round the edge of the dance floor. We shall need additional places to sit.”

  The butler nodded, and Selina trudged down the stairs to the first story and along the corridor to Jeremy’s bedchamber. The door was closed, and after a perfunctory knock, she pushed it open. Jeremy scrambled up from the floor and rushed forward to obstruct her view, but she could readily see over his head. One of the new footboys, crouched across from Jeremy’s abandoned place, leaped to his feet as well, leaving a pair of dice and a pile of coins scattered over the rug.

  “What do you imagine you are doing, Jeremy?” she asked frostily.

  “We—we are playing,” Jeremy stammered. “Just playing.”

  “You were not fust playing,” Selina corrected. “You were playing at hazard, and you were playing for money. Furthermore, this young man is not supposed to be ‘playing’ at all; he is supposed to be working. What is your name?” She looked directly at the hapless footboy.

  “D—Dick.” He was fifteen or sixteen, she judged, and his teeth were literally chattering with terror.

  “Dick,” Selina repeated. “I intend to excuse your behavior, but you must not presume that I shall forget it. To the contrary, I shall remember you very vividly indeed, and should you again prove derelict in your duties, I shall discharge you at once. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he choked.

  His lower lip had begun to tremble, and Selina gave him a conspiratorial smile.

  “Good. Go down to the dining room now; I daresay Mr. Winthrop is searching for you to help move the

  chairs. Tell him you were tidying up Master Jeremy’s room; I shall confirm it.”

  “Yes, ma’am!”

  He bowed and scraped his way into the hall, and Selina closed the door behind him and turned back to Jeremy.

  “Your conduct is inexcusable,” she snapped. “I am sure you enticed poor Dick into gaming with you, and he cannot afford it.” She glanced at the coins on the carpet. “At the earliest opportunity, you are to return his money—”

  “But it is all my money!” Jeremy protested. “I lent Dick his stake, and if he lost, he was to pay me back from his wages. Just a few pennies at a time, and I was not even going to charge him interest.”

  Selina narrowly repressed a smile. “You are missing the point, Jeremy,” s
he said, as sternly as she could. “To begin with, you are much too young to engage in gaming. In the second place, at any age, one does not wager with those less fortunate than oneself, those who have no funds to spare—”

  “Papa Jack played hazard with the grooms at Seymour Manor.”

  “So he did," Selina conceded. “However, as you will discover when you grow up, adults often make mistakes, too. Papa Jack is not perfect—”

  “Then what am I to do?” Jeremy asked passionately. “Harriet tells me to act one way, and Alex tells me to act another, and Papa Jack does one thing, and you say he is wrong . . .”

  To Selina’s astonishment, he burst into a torrent of tears, and—though she did not know exactly how it happened—she found her arms around him, his own arms clamped about her waist, his face buried in her spencer. So easy to forget, she thought again; so easy to forget that he was an orphaned little boy.

  “You are quite right, Jeremy,” she murmured. Her voice was distinctly unsteady, and she cleared her throat- “You are quite right, and when I can, I shall relay your remarks to Alex and Harriet and Papa. Meanwhile,

  there is the matter of the ball, which is what I wished to talk to you about."

  “I shan’t be permitted to go,” Jeremy said dully. He had extricated himself from their awkward embrace, and he mopped his eyes with one sleeve of his coat. “You came to tell me I can’t go."

  She would not lie to him, Selina decided; he deserved better than a lie. “That is what I came to tell you,” she concurred, “but I have since changed my mind. I shall allow you to receive the guests if you promise, absolutely promise, that you will leave the ballroom at half past ten, return to your room and go to sleep.”

  “Do you mean it, Selina? Do you really mean it?”

  His violet eyes were glowing, and Selina swallowed another lump in her throat.

  “Do you promise?” she countered.

  “I promise,’’ he breathed.

  “Very well. Since Hastings will be busy with Alex, perhaps you would like Dick to help you dress.”

  “Oh, yes, I should.”

  “Very well,” she said again. “Then I shall instruct him to come up at half past seven, and I’m sure I needn’t add that you are not to play hazard. I fancy you could better resist temptation if you were to clean up your room between now and then.” She nodded toward the rug. “And you might wish to nap a bit this afternoon.” Jeremy made a moue of disgust. “Even grownups nap from time to time,” she added.

  “All right; I shall nap.” Jeremy gazed down at his feet, shuffled them a moment, looked back up. “Selina, I—I . . . well, you’re really bang up to the mark, Selina, and I am sorry I—I . . .”

  He stopped and shuffled his feet again, and Selina once more recollected that he was only a child. “Sorry you played hazard?” she suggested.

  “Yes,” he mumbled. “Yes, I am sorry I played hazard.”

  “Well, do not tease yourself about it,” Selina said. “Tidy your room and rest, and I daresay we shall have a—a ‘bang-up’ time tonight.”

  She smiled and opened the door, stepped into the corridor, closed the door and promptly sagged against the nearest ecru wall. It was clear that Jeremy needed more than a permanent roof above his head: he needed a firm, consistent, loving dose of discipline. The sort of discipline she and Alex could provide, with Papa occasionally thrown in as a dear, but bad, example. She realized she might well be seizing on a convenient excuse to reach the decision she so desperately wanted to reach—the decision to marry the Earl. But if their union, for whatever reasons, was best for Alex, best for Jeremy, best for herself, could it possibly be wrong?

  Selina thought not, and she squared her shoulders and proceeded down the hall and the staircase. There remained the question of just when she should announce her acceptance to his lordship. She would have preferred to speak at once, but she remembered that he had gone to town, so perhaps she should wait till after the ball. Or maybe she should do it during the ball: with any luck, Miss Bradley would be watching as Alex’s lavender eyes lit up and he planted an enthusiastic— albeit decorous—kiss on her forehead.

  Selina was still debating the matter when she reached the ground story. She peered into the dining room and observed that approximately half the chairs had been removed; evidently Winthrop and the footboys were en route to the ballroom, in the ballroom or on the way back. At any rate, the preparations for the assembly did, at last, appear to be in hand, and Selina dared to hope that she herself might take a brief nap. She walked back to the staircase,, but before she had mounted the first riser, the doorbell pealed.

  Selina glanced irritably about, but there was not a servant in sight, and she was tempted to ignore the summons and proceed to her bedchamber. Who would be so rude as to call on the very afternoon of the assembly? Unless Grandmama had come to conduct one final inspection . . .

  Selina wearily traversed the foyer, tugged open the great front door and found Sir Matthew Platt standing on the porch.

  * * * ·

  Selina was not certain how long they stood there, staring at one another in mutual disbelief, but eventually Matthew shook his head.

  “■It is true then,” he said heavily.

  “What—what is true?"

  “That you have married Lord Worsham.”

  “Actually I have not ...” Selina realized that she had been about to blurt out the true truth, and she literally bit her tongue. “I have not attempted to keep it any secret,” she finished lamely.

  “But when}" Sir Matthew asked. “It must have occurred very shortly after your arrival in England.”

  There was a pounding of footfalls on the staircase, and, to Selina’s distress, Winthrop and the footboys panted into view. The butler waved his minions back into the dining room while he himself approached the front door.

  “Forgive me, Lady Worsham; I was in the ballroom and did not hear the bell.” He studied their guest with undisguised curiosity.

  “This is an old friend of mine from America, Winthrop,” Selina said brightly. “And as we do not want to i be underfoot, I shall speak with Sir Matthew in the parlor."

  “Very good, ma'am. I shall order tea brought in at

  once.”

  “No!” Selina yelped. The last thing she needed was a horde of servants popping in and out, on the listen for their every word. “No, the ball comes first, Winthrop, and I do not wish any of the staff to be distracted. Indeed, please instruct them that we are not to be disturbed.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the butler agreed dubiously.

  He bowed and returned to the dining room, and Selina led Matthew to the parlor on the opposite side of the stairs. She desperately wanted to close the door, but she judged that any obvious suggestion of secrecy would merely heap fuel on the fire of Winthrop's curiosity. She consequently directed Sir Matthew to the Hepple- white sofa, and she took the matching chair, a position which afforded her a clear view of the doorway.

  “When?” Matthew repeated. “John stated that you desired a proper English come-out, but I collect you wed Lord Worsham almost immediately.”

  Almost immediately? Selina suddenly began to grasp the horrible ramifications of Sir Matthew’s unexpected appearance, and she moistened her lips. “To say the truth, Matthew, for—for various reasons, we have given it out that we were married in Richmond, prior to Alex’s departure.”

  “What reasons?” he demanded.

  “What reasons.” Selina licked her mouth again. “As you have guessed, we wed very soon after my arrival, and you know the on-dits people tend to fabricate when there is a hasty wedding—”

  “Good God, Selina!” He paled. “Is that why you wed him?”

  “No!” she screeched. “You see, you are leaping to the very conclusion we fancied everyone else would leap to, which, as I stated, is the reason we claim to have been married in Virginia. And I should appreciate it if you would advise no one to the contrary.”

  “Very well.”

 
Sir Matthew’s pale blue eyes stole suspiciously to her waistline, and Selina frantically groped for a change of subject.

  “How—how did you find me?” she stammered at last.

  “When John told me of your come-out, he mentioned that Lord Worsham had very kindly furnished a letter of introduction to his brother-in-law and sister, Viscount and Lady Preston.”

  Yes, Selina thought dismally, Papa was ever wont to embroider on his tales.

  “Upon my arrival in London,” Matthew continued, “I went to the Prestons’ home in Brook Street but found it empty. I therefore ventured next door and presented myself to their neighbor, a Lady Worthington. When she learned I was from Virginia, she inquired whether I was acquainted with Lord Worsham’s new wife. She’s a rather forgetful old girl, and she could not recollect your maiden name, but Lord Worsham's new

  American wife seemed a bit beyond the realm of coincidence.” He heaved a great sigh. “In any event, Lady Worthington directed me to Wiltshire, and when I spoke with Lady Preston, she directed me here.”

  “You talked to Harriet?” Dear God.

  “Yes; she was exceedingly pleasant, but she confirmed my dreadful surmise. ‘You are a friend of Selina’s?' she said. ‘She will be so happy to see you, for she and Alex are having a housewarming ball this very evening.’ ”

  “You—you had no further discussion?” Selina asked.

  “No, Lady Preston invited me to stay for tea, but I was most anxious to pursue my quest. I continued to hope I might be mistaken, but it was, of course, a foolish hope: there could scarcely be two women named Selina, both from Virginia, both come to England in the same month.” He emitted another sigh. “I daresay that under the circumstances, it is rather improper of me to express my feelings; but, having traveled so far, I shall nevertheless do so. I fear that when I had the opportunity, I did not press my suit quite as vigorously as I should have.”