The Infamous Rakes

by Amanda Scott

  Crawley turned toward Thorne, who said, “You’ll have to hold me excused, I’m afraid. I’ve got an assignation at the pavilion near the card room.” Giving the others a mocking grin, he turned away. Then, looking back rather quickly, he caught the look of consternation that passed between his two friends and laughed to himself, sure that they knew he had caught on to their plan and were wondering if he was pleased or irritated by it. Let them wonder, he mused. It would do them no harm.

  Gillian, having met Mr. Vellacott a little earlier than planned, strolled with him across the canal bridge to the Mount Etna exhibit and went inside to take a look at the marvelous display, which depicted the volcano above the cavern of Vulcan, where the Cyclops forged the armor of Mars to music by Handel and Haydn. Smoke thickened, the crater vomited forth flames, and lava rolled down the side of the mountain into a flaming pool.

  There were halos around the garden lights when they came out again, and around the lighted sailboats on the canal, and Gillian realized that a fog was collecting. They would have to leave soon, before the road near the river became too dangerous to travel. But first ...

  She drew a breath and said, “Do you know the time, sir?”

  He drew his watch from his pocket and opened it. “Just on twelve now,” he said. “Do I go with you all the way?”

  “No, but do stay where you can see me,” she said. “I am very nearly certain that I know what they are about, but just in case the matter is completely otherwise ... well, sir, I do not want to find myself alone in the dark with some lunatic.”

  He grinned at her and they moved toward the walk that led behind the exhibit. Just as Gillian was about to take leave of Mr. Vellacott, she heard her name called and turned to see Crawley striding rapidly toward her.

  He did not mince words. “Mongrel must have muffed it,” he said. “Josh is going to the pavilion near the Rotunda card room to meet you, and here you are expecting to meet him—at least, I think you must have known it was going to be him—along here.”

  “So it was your plan,” she exclaimed, “just as I thought!”

  “Well, don’t go congratulating yourself yet,” he said. “If you don’t get along to the right place, Josh will probably call for his carriage and go along home, and that wouldn’t suit us at all. Man’s been like a bear with a sore head for a week, and just when we think we have managed the thing to a fare-thee-well, Mongrel scrawls the wrong damned things on his notes.”

  “Lord Dawlish wrote a note to Thorne like the one I got! But would he not recognize his cousin’s hand?”

  “To be sure he would, but Mongrel didn’t actually write it, you know. Needed a woman’s hand. But look here, m’lady, we mustn’t tarry. Unless of course, you are as miffed by our intrusion into your affairs as Thorne is likely to be if he finds out. What he will tolerate if it goes smoothly is one thing. If it don’t, I don’t even want to think about what he might do.”

  “Do you want to come with me?” she asked.

  But he refused, saying he owed it to Corbin to get back to help him collect the others. The fog was gathering in earnest, and he was sure that everyone would be wanting to get along home within the hour. “Thorne will see to you, though, ma’am, or your uncle will if things don’t go as well as we hope.”

  His last words were not encouraging, but Gillian, shrugging off the shiver of fear that came when she heard them, took her uncle’s arm and fairly dragged him back across the bridge.

  Thorne forced himself to stroll casually along the gravel walk behind the Rotunda and came at last to the path leading past the boxlike card room toward the canal. The walk beside the Rotunda was well lighted, but once he turned into the side walk the light was much dimmer. He knew that anyone watching for his arrival would see him outlined by the lights behind him, but the walk also had hedges bordering it, and he wondered suddenly if Gillian had been foolish enough to come alone to meet him. He would have something to say to her about that if she had.

  He walked past the side entrance to the card room just as the door opened and someone came out. Light from inside spilled onto the gravel walk and radiated a little distance, showing him a marble bench ahead and a flash of rose pink silk.

  She was sitting on the bench alone, still hooded and turned shyly away from him. The sight of her so foolishly alone, so vulnerable, made him want to shake her, but he held his temper, speaking her name in a normal tone so as not to startle her.

  When she did not turn, he was certain that he was right, that she had come because she thought he had asked her to do so, but was still out of charity with him. Still, she was here. The card room door opened in another brief flash of light, then shut.

  “Gillian,” he said again, moving to sit beside her and touching her shoulder. “Turn and talk to me, sweetheart.”

  He saw her stiffen at the endearment, but still she did not turn. Indeed, she seemed to huddle down, seeking some sort of comfort from the thick folds of her domino.

  “Gillian,” he said more loudly, “come now, don’t be foolish. We must talk to each other just as you once said we should.”

  There was a step on the gravel behind him, and as he turned a familiar voice said, “Josiah, is that your voice? Whatever are you doing out here like this?”

  He turned, saw the unmistakable figure of the duke beside another, much plumper and shorter masculine figure, and got quickly to his feet. “It’s all right, sir,” he said with a chuckle. “I’m not creating a scandal this time but merely trying to make all right and tight with the woman I want to marry.”

  “Perhaps you would like to introduce the lady to Mr. Fox,” the duke said lightly.

  “Certainly, sir, though I am certain that he has already met her at our ball. Come here, sweetheart, this is no time to be shy.” The figure in the rose domino stood up, and before he had taken in the fact that Gillian appeared to have grown rather taller, Dorinda swept back her hood and made a deep curtsy.

  “Ah, yes,” Mr. Fox said, making a leg, “Miss Ponderby, is it not? Well met, madam. I shall dance at your wedding.”

  Rising quickly from her curtsy, Dorinda flung her arms around Thorne and said, “Oh, sir, I hadn’t the least knowledge that you wished to marry me, but I am ever so happy to accept your offer! Only I’m afraid you didn’t really mean it, and you will say you didn’t, and I shan’t get to marry you, after all!”

  The duke said grimly, “He will not do that, Miss Ponderby. For that you have my word.”

  Thorne, trying to release himself from Dorinda’s clutches, met his father’s stern gaze and knew at once that it would do him no good at this point to protest. It wasn’t Dorinda’s fault that he had mistaken her for Gillian, though the wretched girl ought to have made herself known to him long before she had. Then, to his horror, before he could collect his scattered thoughts, he saw Gillian standing behind the duke and Mr. Fox, with her uncle Vellacott. Her eyes were as wide as saucers. She stared at the tableau their little group formed for only a moment before she gathered up her skirts, turned on her heel, and fled.

  12

  GILLIAN RAN AND RAN, THE tears streaming down her face, blinding her, her silk domino billowing behind her and her muslin skirts making it impossible for her to run freely. Gravel got into her sandals, hurting her feet, but still she ran, wanting only to put as much distance as she could between herself and the dreadful scene she had witnessed. She was barely conscious of the people she passed, figures who stopped and stared at her, others who jumped aside to let her run past them, still others who did not, who cried out when she brushed past them. Suddenly she was caught in a pair of strong arms, caught, swung around and held. For a brief, joyful instant she thought it was Thorne who had caught her, but to her sorrow, her captor was Crawley.

  “Whoa, there,” he cried. “You cannot run full tilt through these gardens, ma’am. It simply ain’t done.” Then, drawing her off the path into a temporarily deserted side path, he said in a different tone, “What went amiss? Here now, don’t cry
, for God’s sake. I haven’t even got a clean handkerchief.”

  “And I’ve lost my indispensable,” she said, realizing that in one of her near collisions the strings must have broken. “Meggie will say it just goes to show that a proper pocket, tied around one’s waist in the old style, is much more practical.” She sniffled. “Oh, I must be a mess, Crawley. Whatever possessed the lot of you to think you could mend matters?”

  “Well, that is what I was coming to tell you,” he said. “I found Mongrel, and he swears he never told Dorinda to write the bit about the card room, that the meeting was supposed to have been behind the Mount Etna exhibit.”

  “Evidently one thing my sister failed to mention to any of you,” Gillian said bitterly, “is her determination to marry well. She has decided that a marquess will suit her, and Thorne is evidently happy to accommodate her. I saw him with his arm around her, and it was not the first time. He just declared to his father and to Mr. Charles James Fox, who will no doubt tell everyone else in London, that she is just the bride for him. He is welcome to her, I’m sure.” But she sobbed on the words.

  “Well, I don’t believe for a moment that Thorne wants to marry that wench,” Crawley said. “For one thing, he knows perfectly well that Corbin is infatuated with her, and for another it ain’t for the love of the fair Dorinda that our Josh has been acting like a bear with a sore head this past week.”

  “But I have seen how he smiles at her,” Gillian said, “and in any case it will not matter now that he has declared himself as he has, for Dorinda will never agree to cry off, and the duke will not allow Thorne to do so. You know he won’t.”

  “No,” Crawley said, “that’s true enough. Good God, what a coil! That girl wants thrashing, and I’ll be bound she’ll be sorry she ever entrapped Josh if he does marry her. He’ll make her the very devil of a husband.”

  Gillian was able to take small comfort from that, though she told herself quite firmly that she was wrong to hope Thorne would beat Dorinda weekly. She sighed. “It just goes to show that I was right all along,” she said. “If only people would say outright what they mean instead of always wrapping things up in clean linen, the world would be a much easier place to live. If you had not tried to trick us into meeting—”

  “Now, hold on,” Crawley said. “We only wanted to help. If you had been frank with Thorne at the outset, and had told him that you cared for him—”

  “But I could not,” she protested. “I do believe in candor whenever it is possible, but only think of how I would have been perceived, sir, if I had done any such thing! A proper young woman does not march up to a man and tell him she thinks he’s the perfect husband for her.” Feeling heat in her cheeks, she added hastily, “Why, just to say that much to you makes me want to sink right into the ground. Only a truly hubble-bubble person behaves in such a way. What would he have thought of me?”

  “There is that,” he agreed. “Plain speaking ain’t as simple a matter as it sounds. You may be thinking that Mongrel, Corbin, and I ought to have gone bang up to him and said, ‘Look here, Josh, you’re making an ass of yourself by behaving as you are. Just go and apologize or do whatever you must to make things right again.’ A fine scene that would have been. Most likely you would have had to attend our funeral services shortly afterward. He would not have appreciated being told what to do, I can tell you that. And no more would you have liked it, my lady, so don’t try any more of your faradiddles with me.”

  Gillian sighed again, wiping her damp cheeks with the tail of her domino, since she had nothing else to use. “You are right, of course, and so was Thorne when he said much the same things to me. It is a lowering thought that although one always thinks one’s own notions are best, no one ever likes to take advice. But all the same,” she added, “it is not wise to try to manipulate one’s friends like so many puppets either.”

  He grimaced ruefully. “No, you are right about that. I daresay Josh will have a few things to say to us that I for one don’t want to hear. I think the best thing will be to play least in sight for a few days, at least. If we thought he was out of sorts before, it will be as nothing to what he will be like now.”

  Gillian wanted to believe him, but she still feared that Thorne would not find it so difficult to accommodate himself to the notion of marrying Dorinda as Crawley seemed to think he would. There was no time to debate the matter, however, for Crawley had seen Corbin and the duchess, followed by Lady Marrick and his own mother and sister. He called out to them, and they turned down the little path to meet them.

  “Here you are, my dears,” the duchess said.

  Gillian thought she perceived a thoughtful look in her grace’s eyes, but it disappeared swiftly as greetings were exchanged and questions were asked about the whereabouts of those members of their party who were still missing.

  The duchess said, “Corbin was very kindly escorting me to find Langshire. Have you seen him, Crawley?”

  Gillian waited only until Crawley said he had not before she said, “His grace was with your son and my stepsister in the little path by the card room a few minutes ago, ma’am. Mr. Fox was there as well, and my uncle Vellacott.”

  “Goodness, what a party! Oh, but here is my nephew and Lord Dacres. Perry, darling, you may give me your arm to find your uncle, and I daresay Lady Marrick will want to accompany us, since I am told that her daughter is with him in some pathway near the card room. So indiscreet of his grace, do you not agree? And Lord Dacres, here are Lady Crawley and Belinda, who have been wondering where you had got to. I believe her ladyship is ready to depart, and I am sure you will want to escort her. Ah, but Crawley,” she added when Dacres had instantly agreed with her suggestion, “dear Gillian looks as if she would like to go home. Perhaps you will be kind enough to escort her if her stepmother does not object. Take one of our carriages if you must. There are enough for the rest of us, I believe.”

  A little stunned by the duchess’s sudden chatty decisiveness, Gillian looked at Crawley and saw that he was nodding. “But I cannot,” she said. “It would be quite improper of me to let you take me home in a closed carriage, sir.”

  “Fustian,” said the duchess. “Crawley will not molest you.”

  “Certainly not,” Crawley said, grinning.

  Gently her grace added, “He would have to deal with me if he did so and, I think, not only with me.”

  Realizing that the duchess had no idea what had transpired only moments before, Gillian was at a stand. The last thing she wanted to do was to announce Thorne’s engagement to this entire group, for Dacres and his two charges had not gone yet, and even if they had, she did not think she could do it. She was spared the ordeal by the arrival on the scene of Mr. Vellacott.

  “Ah, here you are, m’ dear. Been searching for you. Bad form to have run off like that, you know. Makes a poor impression on the masses to see a young girl running through the gardens.” Seeming to take notice for the first time of the others, who were listening to his words with open curiosity, he smiled and said. “Quite a to-do, there was. Just like a play—or a farce. Can’t say I’ve been so entertained in weeks. Not since the king fainted dead away at Drury Lane and had to be revived by no less than thirty persons, all gathered about him arguing over what was best to be done. Poor fellow came to himself before they’d made up their minds. What was I saying?”

  The duchess, eyeing him in that same sharp manner that Gillian had detected earlier, said, “You mentioned a to-do, sir. What can you have meant, I wonder?”

  “Well, your grace, I ain’t generally a talebearer, but it does appear that that young rascal of yours has gone and got himself betrothed again.”

  “What?” Stunned, the duchess looked at Gillian.

  Gillian looked at her feet.

  “Oh, yes,” Vellacott said, clearly enjoying himself. “Devil of a thing, for he is now betrothed to the lovely Miss Ponderby.”

  Estrid shrieked, “What! Dorinda?”

  “The very same,” Vellacott said. “
A nice catch, don’t you agree, ma’am? And the duke saying in no uncertain terms that there will be no crying off from this one.”

  “No, indeed,” Estrid said. “Oh, I must go to my darling girl at once. To think, she will be a marchioness! Oh, was anything ever so wonderful? You may go with Crawley if you choose, Gillian, though I think you would do better to wait and come with Dorinda and me. Surely, you will wish to offer her your best wishes for her happiness.”

  Gillian remained silent.

  Vellacott said, “What’s this? Go home with Crawley? Oh, I don’t think that is wise, do you, my dear? Much better if I go with you, to lend a touch of propriety to the occasion.”

  The thought of Mr. Vellacott putting himself in the role of chaperon gave Gillian a sudden urge to laugh, but she was afraid to do so, for she had a very strong feeling that if she were to allow herself so much as a chuckle, she would succumb to hysterics on the spot, and no doubt would then be carried away to Bedlam, where she would cease to be a trouble to anyone at all.

  Crawley’s hand on her arm steadied her, and when the others walked away, she watched as if she were in a daze. The fog had drifted down and around, making halos everywhere there was light, and little wisps of it floated through the trees and around the hedges lining the paths. She saw all this in a silent world, for it was as if the noise and merrymaking around her had faded into the distance. Only Crawley’s hand on her arm was real, and she let him guide her farther and farther away, until they had come to the gates and passed through them, and the carriage had been called for. Not until Crawley lifted her into the carriage and she had felt it tip first with his weight and then with her uncle’s did the world right itself again. But even then she had no wish for conversation, and the journey to Park Street seemed to take a very long time.

  She could see both men in the golden glow from the carriage lamps, but it occurred to her that the dense fog outside made it look as though they traveled in some space removed from reality, and she was barely conscious of the fact that a conversation had begun. She took no notice of their words until her uncle said, “That Dorinda lass wants a sharp lesson. Such foolishness!”