by M C Beaton
She awoke in the morning, lying in exactly the same position as she had when she fell asleep. All the cries of London assailed her ears from below the windows. Sunlight dappled the bed, shining through the worn patches in the brocade curtains.
Delphine closed her eyes again and tried to escape back down the corridors of sleep, away from the thoughts of her marriage and the dread of returning to Marsham Manor and of seeing Maria Bencastle’s face.
But someone was selling lavender, someone was determined that the whole of London should awake and buy her lavender. The voice screeched abominably like a rusty farm gate.
And then Delphine became aware she was not alone in the bed.
She struggled up against the pillows and looked down at her husband.
He was sleeping, neatly and quietly on his side.
His hair under his red nightcap was tousled. His face looked closed, secretive. What did she really know of him? thought Delphine in sudden panic.
She decided to dress quickly and go and see her lawyers by herself. They would be shocked enough by the step she had taken. But what if she took her husband along and he started juggling balls or balancing plates?
Besides, she desperately needed to escape from the intimacy of this situation. She longed to be alone.
Since Sir George had never favored the social life, Delphine had somehow never used the services of a lady’s maid, contenting herself by making most of her own clothes and arranging her own hair in simple styles.
She was used to going about the countryside on her own. There could be little difference in traveling about London unescorted.
It was only when she was finally walking out of the square, desperately trying to find a hack, that she began to lose heart. An aged Jehu spat in her direction and continued on his way, his broken-down hackney carriage making a tremendous noise as it lurched over the cobbles.
It seemed as if the hackney drivers of London did not favor single women.
And then a party of bloods came roistering drunkenly down the street. They had obviously been carousing all night.
They saw Delphine, took in her appearance from her modest dress to her fashionable bonnet. They whispered among themselves, and, as they came abreast of her, they unflapped their breeches and began to make water against the railings, tittering and sniggering, avidly watching her face for her reaction.
Delphine picked up her heels and fled down Duke Street, followed by a volley of jeering cackles.
Then she heard them starting up in pursuit. There is nothing your London buck loves more than the discomfiture of a gently bred miss.
It was then that Delphine recognized the diminutive figure of her husband’s tiger coming towards her. He, too, had obviously been celebrating. His gait was none too steady, and he had a knot of pink ribbons pinned at the side of his reprehensible hat.
There were new wine stains on his tattered blue plush livery with its ragged ghosts of epaulettes on each shoulder.
He had a large parcel under one arm.
“Morning, missus,” he said cheerfully. “Got me livery, just like you said.”
The sound of London’s aristocracy baying for the sight of a maidenly blush came closer.
“Charlie!” exclaimed Delphine in despair. “These gentlemen are pestering me, and I must find a hack and get to my lawyers.”
Charlie nipped around Delphine with surprising speed and faced her tormenters. He berated them in a cant so mercifully broad that it was impossible for Delphine to understand a word. Her tormenters tried to retaliate, but it appeared that Charlie was a past master in the art of abuse, and soon she found they had stumbled past and she was left in peace.
“Now, missus,” said Charlie, coming closer to her. Delphine took a quick step back to escape the fumes of last night’s wine and heavily spiced food. “‘Ave you got money or ‘aven’t you?”
“You are presumptuous,” replied Delphine coldly. “Go about your business.”
“An’ leave you alone? Naaah! The guv wouldn’t like it. Shouldn’t ‘ave come out wiffout him. Up to every rig and row in town, the guvner is.”
Delphine raised her chin and tried to walk on.
“Look’ee here, missus,” said Charlie, blocking her way. His voice seesawed between pure cockney and a ridiculous parody of his master’s upper-class drawl.
“It’s a practical question. Ladies wiff money don’t go abaht calling hacks. There’s a livery stable close by. I can git you a slap-up turnout fer the day, coachman and all. Go to your lawyers in style.”
Pride warred with common sense in Delphine’s breast. Common sense won.
“Very well,” she said. “Lead the way.”
Delphine had to admit that the disgraceful Charlie was a great comfort. In no time at all, it seemed, she was seated in a smart carriage pulled by two spanking horses.
Charlie was perched on the backstrap with a blissful expression on his face. It was an open carriage, and so she was able to relax and watch the sights of London as they made their way down Oxford Street in the direction of the City.
“Told the guv where you was goin’, missus?” called Charlie at one point.
Delphine shook her head.
“He’ll think you’ve broken your shackles. Left him a note, did you?”
Delphine fought down a desire to tell Charlie to “know his place.” “No, I did not think it necessary,” she said.
“Bad, that,” said the tiger reflectively. “He won’t be there when we get back.”
“Why on earth not?” demanded Delphine.
“What man would?” replied the tiger.
Delphine twisted her head around and looked at him in surprise, but the tiger had seen a shabby acquaintance in the street and was now showing off to the top of his bent, sitting bolt upright, his hands folded across his chest and his hat tipped at a cocky angle.
Delphine turned back. She wondered how she would feel if this new husband of hers had indeed taken himself off. Relieved, she told herself firmly. The whole thing has been a terrible mistake. Yes, thought Delphine, I should be very relieved.
The Comte Saint-Pierre stretched lazily in bed, remembered his wedding, and stretched out one arm. Finding he was alone in the bed, he sleepily swung his long legs out onto the floor, rubbed his eyes, and stared about the room.
He wondered whether to go and look for his wife while wearing only his nightshirt and decided against it.
There was a clattering of dishes and a smell of coffee from the kitchen, which was on the other side of the living room. That must be Delphine, making breakfast.
He had begun to have several sharp and nagging doubts about the wisdom of this marriage the previous evening, but the sounds of this wifely chore made him smile.
He thought of Delphine’s wide eyes, chestnut hair, and trim figure and began to feel happy.
Whistling cheerfully, he washed himself thoroughly at the washstand and dressed with care, noticing with pleasure that he had managed to remove all traces of his flight across the roofs from his new coat and breeches. There were a few scratches on his new Hessians, but if you have been wearing ones that are patched and mended for quite some time, as the comte had been, a few scratches on a new pair seemed of little matter.
He tied his cravat in the Mathematical, straightened his waistcoat, and, still whistling cheerfully, went off to join his wife for breakfast.
The whistle died on his lips and the smile died from his eyes as he found only the red-handed waif busy in the kitchen.
“Where is her ladyship?” he asked, leaning against the doorjamb.
Although the maid, who was called Marie, had been addressed by him in French, she had always been firmly convinced he was English and essayed to reply to him in that difficult language.
“Gone,” was all she finally managed.
“Gone where, Marie?”
“Do not know, milord.”
The comte wheeled about and went back to the bedroom and looked thoughtfully at his w
ife’s trunk, which had still not been unpacked although she had obviously extracted several garments from it that morning.
His eye fell on the lowboy in the corner of the room. Neatly stacked on top was a small pile of golden guineas.
He poked at them with one long finger, an expression of distaste crossing his face. He knew Delphine had left the money for him, therefore it followed logically that Delphine had gone. She could afford to abandon the few clothes she had brought with her.
He walked slowly back to the kitchen and silently collected a tray with coffee and brioches from the maid.
The vision of a charming Delphine was rapidly fading from his mind, to be replaced by a picture of a querulous and fault-finding Delphine.
The comte ate his breakfast mechanically, half wondering why he felt so bitter.
He had received many slights and snubs during his London career so he could not quite understand why he should feel such a mixture of sadness and resentment.
A knock at the door roused him from his reverie, but he allowed the maid to answer it.
He suppressed a groan as Madame de Manton bustled into the room. Madame de Manton was a middle-aged lady of ferocious energy. She had large, innocent gray eyes in a rouged and painted face. Her thin, wiry figure was briefly covered in the gauziest of muslin gowns, and her hennaed curls peeped out from beneath an enormous bonnet with a whole flower garden on top.
Madame de Manton had only last week relieved him of the few guineas he had saved for his wedding finery. She was an inveterate gambler and always on the point of being dragged off to the nearest debtor’s prison.
“Where is the comtesse?” she asked in French, peering around the room and then at the floor, as if expecting to find Delphine under the furniture.
“Gone out on business,” said the comte laconically. “You are looking very fine, madame. I trust you paid your debts before you bought that ravishing gown.”
“I have. But better than that! I am come to repay you.” Triumphantly Madame de Manton put a rouleau of guineas on the table. “There was this horse running at Newmarket …”
The comte groaned and covered his face with his hands.
“No, chéri. It was Providence!” cried Madame, tugging his hands away from his face.
“I was about to pay my debts with the money you gave me when Armand Duelos told me he was going to Newmarket and there was this horse running called Lucky Peter. Now, Peter is English for Pierre and since you are very lucky, I thought, why not? I won a lot of money on Lucky Peter and was about to leave when what should I find in the next race but a horse called Marriage Vow! Do not groan in that silly way. It won! So here is not only the money you gave me the last time, but the time before and the time before.
“I had hoped to find your wife with you. It is your wedding morn …?”
“The English are not sentimental about such things,” said the comte dryly.
“Vraiment! How very odd. You see, an English friend, Mrs. Brandenbaugh, is giving a breakfast at her home at Richmond which commences at three this afternoon. I have hired a carriage and I thought it would be pleasant for you and your wife to accompany me. Such a beautiful day!”
The comte picked up his coffee cup and gazed straight ahead. Even in sooty, noisy London, he could hear the twittering and chattering of birds. It promised to be that English rarity, an extremely warm spring day. It would be irritating and embarrassing to stay in this dark apartment waiting for a wife he was sure would not return. Had she not gone out of her way to show him that she thought the marriage was a dreadful mistake?
He had worked so long and so hard. It seemed ages since he had had any fun. It seemed years since he had looked at a woman.
Lying celibate next to Delphine’s slim, rounded body had given him a long and sleepless night, and he had only managed to close his eyes shortly before dawn.
He wanted to look at pretty women, flirt with them a little, and get mildly drunk. There would be other callers, friends in the French community coming to pay their respects to the new bride. It would be embarrassing to stay.
The comte made up his mind. “My wife has gone to see her lawyers on business,” he said slowly, although privately he believed Delphine to be well on her way to Bedfordshire.
“She will be away for most of the day and the early evening as well. I will come with you.” He looked at the clock. It was half past eleven. “I shall call for you at twelve-thirty, in an hour’s time.”
“Wonderful!” said Madame de Manton. “We will send the carriage back to fetch your wife. Is it not amazing that the English should call something a ‘breakfast’ which begins at three in the afternoon and goes on all night?”
“I will leave her a note,” said the comte. “My wife has her own carriage,” he added, sure that Delphine had hired a carriage to take her home. He had no intention of leaving a note for a wife who would never see it.
“Of course. It will be wonderful to meet her. I knew Félice, her mother, very well. What a charming, gay, and lighthearted woman she was! I suppose her daughter is the same?”
The comte did not reply.
“Ah, well. À bientôt.” Madame departed in a flutter of muslin, leaving the comte alone. The servant, Marie, was doing mysterious things in the kitchen. No doubt Madame Beauchair would be the next to arrive.
With an impatient movement, he rose from the table and quit the apartment, snatching up the rouleau of guineas as he did so.
Delphine spent a long, hot, and dusty time with her lawyers getting nowhere. All she seemed to do was listen to their wailings and protests over “this ill-advised marriage.” Then she went to her bank to explain the change in her circumstances and name. Reluctant to return to Manchester Square, she decided to visit the Tower and see the menagerie. Charlie, torn between running back to Manchester Square to explain to his master what Delphine was doing and a burning desire to see the wild beasts at the Tower, finally settled for the Tower, comforting his conscience with the thought that the comte would never forgive him should anything happen to his wife, and also comforting himself with a shrewd thought that his master would certainly not be waiting for his wife to deign to return.
Charlie knew the stubborn streak of pride which lurked under his master’s easy-going exterior, better than the comte knew it himself. And Charlie knew that whether the comte did not want to see his wife again was beside the point. The comte still would not forgive him if he abandoned Delphine to the tender mercies of the London streets.
So Charlie enjoyed his day much more than Delphine.
Delphine was beginning to be plagued with a nagging feeling that she was behaving badly.
Had not the comte suggested he would be happy to have the marriage annulled if that was what she wished?
But it was five o’clock in the afternoon before they finally returned to Manchester Square, the Tower of London being much farther from the West End than Delphine thought it was.
“He won’t be home,” said Charlie.
Delphine refused to reply. But when she walked into the flat and found it deserted, she experienced a stab of fear. What if the duns had found him? How would she ever find out? Then she relaxed. Charlie would know.
“His traps are gone,” said Charlie, who had walked into the bedroom without so much as a by-your-leave. “And you didn’t tell him where you was going. Probably he thought you left him.”
“Why on earth should he think that?” demanded Delphine crossly, her curiosity overcoming her desire to give this insolent tiger the setdown he was obviously so badly in need of.
“I watched you coming out of the wedding,” said Charlie. “Face like a fiddle, beggin’ your parding, I’m sure. Looked as though you couldn’t stand the sight of him, that you did, and he noticed it, ‘e did. I knows him, see. Then you ups and orfs on your wedding morn, leaving money for him like he was a demy-rep.”
“And where is this wounded and cut-to-the-quick master of yours now, think you?” demanded Delphine.
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“Probly as drunk as David’s sow, missus. I can see ‘im a-lyin’ on some boozing ken floor with his heart broke.”
“Fiddle!” snapped Delphine. She was beginning to feel guilty and, like most guilty people, she changed the feeling promptly into one of justified anger.
“It is not my fault,” she said and then bit her lip.
What had come over her that she should start apologizing to a shabby servant?
Charlie knew he had gone too far and immediately presented a picture of abject subservience, although he watched her face from under his stubby eyelashes.
“Where do you think he is?”
“Don’t know, my lady,” said Charlie, according her her title for the first time. “Ain’t that servant abaht?”
But Marie had obviously only been there for a short time before returning to her mistress. The living room was clean, and the fire made up.
Delphine shook her head.
“I can find out,” said Charlie after some thought. “T’ain’t hard to find out tings in this area.”
He darted off. Delphine sat down on a spindly chair and wondered what to do.
It was too late to secure a seat on the mail coach. She could always hire a carriage, but that would mean a journey through the night, facing the perils of highwaymen and footpads.
Her nagging conscience was telling her she hadn’t even given this odd marriage a chance. Someone was singing in French in the square outside, his song punctuated by giggles from a female audience. Delphine lit the candles to banish the darkness, which was gathering in the room.
Her eyes fell on a small shelf of French books. She took out a novel and settled down to read, willing herself to concentrate on the words.
An hour passed and still Charlie did not return.
Perhaps he had found out the whereabouts of his master, and both were sitting in some low coffee house or tavern toasting the comte’s escape from this marriage of convenience.
All at once, there came an excited hammering on the door. Delphine went to answer it.
“He’s gone to a breakfast in Richmond,” said Charlie cheerfully. “At a Mrs. Brandenbaugh. I have the direction. I’ve got a carriage outside and grooms an’ all, belongs to a Monsoor Duclos. It’ll take us there, quick as quick.”