“Goodness! Does the duke know?” Penelope asked.
“Lord Rivers contrived to have Charles find Poyning and Lydia in a compromising position. Charles caught them in such a state that it left no room for doubt. Charles made Lydia promise that she should cry off their engagement, and in return he promised not to fight a duel with Poyning and spare his life. Charles is the best shot in London.”
“No wonder I never saw them together anymore,” Penelope commented, her heart feeling lighter.
“Lord Poyning trusted Lord Rivers and confided in him his plans of eloping with me. After the duke caught Lydia and him together, he knew that Charles would never consent to our marriage. He needed to act fast, and I never stopped to think and agreed to the elopement. The romance of it all thrilled me, blinding me to all follies. Lord Rivers followed our carriage and met us at the inn. He was the one who suggested the hunting lodge. He didn’t want to air the truth in public. He wanted to protect me.”
“Lord Rivers seems to have gone to a lot of trouble,” Penelope observed.
Anne blushed, “He said he did it because he fell in love with me at first sight. And, oh, Penny, I never even noticed him. ”
“You have now,” Penelope said smiling.
“Change of plans,” the duke announced entering the carriage. “Anne, you are engaged to Lord Rivers. Penelope, you are now my fiancée.”
Chapter 35
Penelope stood at a window in the library of the Blackthorne Mansion. She stared out at the clear blue sky, the harsh sun pinching her eyes.
The duke sat at the desk glaring at her back.
Her voice trembled when she asked, “Why won’t you believe me? I never encouraged Anne to elope with Poyning. I only aided her in attracting his attention. I would have never let things go so far. Why would I warn you and help you find her—”
“I didn’t need your help. Your presence made things worse,” he cut in sharply.
Penelope felt a cold hand clutch her heart. “I see, I…I made things worse. If I hadn’t insisted on accompanying you, then Lady Plasket wouldn’t have seen us,” she whispered. “I made it worse because now, not only is Anne engaged to marry Lord Rivers, but you, too, have been forced to become engaged to me.”
The duke looked away.
“You want to marry me because Lady Plasket saw us, and that’s the only reason, isn’t it? You want to avoid a scandal?” Penelope persisted.
“What else could I do?” he asked roughly.
She stood waiting for him to say something more. Anything more. A long while later when he still hadn’t spoken, she left the room quietly.
***
Madame Bellafraunde rapped the wall and the carriage came to a halt on the Blackthorne driveway.
“Penelope,” she called.
Penelope kept walking, her eyes, ears and nose closed to the world around her.
Madame Bellafraunde exited the carriage and walked up to the girl. She stood barring her way forward.
“Penelope, I am here for your lessons … Penelope? Blasted, girl, look at me.”
Penelope looked at her.
“Where are you going,” Madame Bellafraunde asked, searching her face.
“Finnshire.”
“I see, and how are you going?”
“I will walk.”
“All those miles?”
“Yes.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
“Where is your luggage?”
“I don’t know.”
“What will happen to your maid Mary?”
“She will be alright.”
“And Lady Bathsheba? You are leaving her behind?”
Penelope paled. She turned back to look at the Blackthorne Mansion and let out a tiny sob.
“I was afraid of that,” Madame Bellafraunde muttered. Aloud she said, “Will you go back and fetch her?”
Penelope shook her head.
“You don’t want your goat?”
Penelope nodded.
“You want your goat, but you won’t go back to fetch her?”
Penelope nodded again.
Madame Bellafraunde grumbled under her breath. She then grasped Penelope’s arm and led her back to her carriage.
“I have to go to Finnshire,” she protested.
“Don’t be daft,” Madame said, shoving her inside.
The carriage started rolling again. And all through the ride Madame held Penelope’s hand, afraid she would fling herself out of a moving vehicle.
Penelope tried no such thing. She sat with her eyes closed, an occasional tear leaking down her face until they reached Madame’s home … or rather Lord Adair’s home.
Lord William Ellsworth Hartell Adair, the Marquis of Lockwood, lived on an estate almost as large as Blackthorne. Apart from the size, the two had nothing whatsoever in common. The Blackthorne estate had well-manicured lawns. Lord Adair’s estate, Lockwood, also had lawns, or rather they were now ‘had been lawns’. Blackthorne had two hundred and fifty rooms functional all through the year. Lockwood had two hundred and fifty two rooms, of which only the kitchen, dining room, master bedroom, and a guestroom were usable. Blackthorne employed a large number of staff renowned for their skills. Lockwood employed a cook and a butler, both terrible at their jobs, but renowned for keeping secrets even under torturous conditions.
Penelope thought the wild, rough landscape of Lockwood was in tune with her mood. If one wanted to be truly depressed, then this was the place to be.
Madame gently led her across the hall, up the stairs and into a guest bedroom.
Penelope noticed none of the dust on the beautiful furnishings. Nor did she notice the ornate candelabras, the heavy drapery, or the echoing silence of the mansion. But she did notice the cobwebs on the walls of the guestroom. Her heart ached at the sight, and she wailed into a moth eaten pillow.
Madame let her cry for exactly fifty six minutes. She then went and dragged the girl down to the dining room.
“You are back to being Lord Adair,” Penelope sniffed.
“I am not comfortable in skirts,” he replied, shoving a plate of burnt toast towards her.
“Are you a spy?”
“We are here to discuss you, not me,” Lord Adair said, crossing his legs and taking out his cigar.
“Can I have a drink?” Penelope asked, watching him clip the end of the cigar.
“What would you like? Tea, coffee …?”
“Cherry brandy.”
“I have brandy, but it’s not cherry …”
Penelope started crying.
“Wait, perhaps I can get Jules to find some,” Lord Adair said hastily. He rang a bell and Jules appeared.
Jules was a young, handsome, and sprightly butler. He had a moustache adorning his upper lip.
Penelope looked at the moustache and thought it looked as if a caterpillar had died on his upper lip. Sir Henry would not approve. Her soft sobs turned into a heart-wrenching howl.
Jules departed quickly. She stopped crying.
“Life is complicated,” Lord Adair said, blowing rapid puffs of smoke rings. “Now, tell me what is torturing your soul?”
“I am the duke’s fiancée.”
“A vast improvement from Lady Lydia. I must congratulate him. How did he propose?”
“He didn’t. He informed me.” Her eyes welled up again.
He offered her a smoke. She took one.
“You love him?”
“Yes.”
“Clip the end like this,” he said, taking the cigar and lighting it up for her. “Then what is the problem? You love him and he wants to marry you. You will be the duchess. What more can you want?”
“He only asked me because of Lady Plasket.”
“Lady Plasket?”
“She saw us together at the inn. I was unchaperoned.” Penelope sucked on the cigar.
“I am not going to ask you what you were doing alone at an inn with the duke,” he said when she had stopped coughing. “But, m
y dear, even if he did ask you to marry him because of some gossiping old woman, then how does it matter? You have got what you wanted.”
“But he does not love me,” she wailed.
“He will in time.”
“No, he will not.”
“I think I need to hear all about this inn business.”
She told him about Anne and how they had chased her down and stopped the elopement.
“And then,” she continued angrily, “when we reached home, he once again called me a pastoral nuisance, feral beast, intrusive pest …”
“This was before or after he told you that you are his fiancée?”
“After.”
“Muttonhead,” Lord Adair murmured.
“He said that I should have warned him about Anne the moment I discovered the travelling case shoved under her bed. He then went on to berate me for insisting that he take me along. He was angry that I had accompanied him in a purple quilt and flimsy peach night dress and no slippers. He …”
“He must have said all that because he was relieved …”
“He has often called me all sorts of names. If it hadn’t been for me, Anne would be ruined …”
“He will be nicer after the wedding. Men normally are.”
“He truly thinks that I am an idiot. He will never be happy with me. I am not good enough for him.”
“Has he kissed you?”
“Two chaste pecks. And then the next was … glorious. He said it was horrid.”
“And?”
“Well, two more after that. He didn’t say he liked them.”
He smiled, “But he did not say he didn’t either.”
Penelope bit into the burnt toast.
“Let me see now. You are in love with the duke. He wants to marry you but only because Lady Plasket saw you together. You love him too much to have him marry someone he does not love. He considers you … ah yes, a nuisance, a pest and whatnot. You would rather go back to that ghastly stepmother of yours than live a life of luxury as a duchess. It is all clear now.”
Penelope scowled.
“I had agreed to stay with Madame, not Lord Adair. People talk,” Penelope said irritably.
“I live with ghosts and they don’t talk. Why not stay for a few days? Think things over and then …”
“No,” Penelope said firmly. “I want to leave.”
“This place is suitably morose. No one comes here, and you will not find a single house in London more entrenched in secrets or dust. Cry for some time, sneeze a little longer and within a few days …”
“No.”
“Very well, I will have the carriage ready for you tomorrow morning if you still want to go.”
“Thank you.”
***
It was seven in the morning and Penelope sat on the steps of the grand staircase of Lockwood, her head resting against the bannister.
“I am a spy,” Lord Adair announced looking up at her. “And if you want the details, then follow me to the breakfast room.”
She jumped up and raced after him.
Once in the breakfast room, he pointed at the rubbery eggs and burnt toast.
“Drink your chocolate and eat some breakfast. Then you will learn the truth.”
Penelope eyed him sceptically. “Why would you tell me such a thing? Are you bamming me just to get me to eat?”
“I am not, and until you drink your chocolate, you won’t hear another peep from me.”
“This is chocolate?” she asked, swirling the muddy drink around.
“So I am told.”
She took a sip, made a wry face, and drank the contents in a few big gulps.
He nodded approvingly and said, “Good girl. You deserve the truth for drinking that swill. Go on, start on the eggs.”
Penelope shoved a spoonful in her mouth.
Watching her chew, he said, “In short, I was working on behalf of the king. I had been asked to uncover an assassination plot sponsored by the French.”
Bits of egg sprayed out her mouth as she gasped.
“You are bamming me,” she said, her eyes wide.
“I am not. I am telling you the truth.”
She searched his face for a moment and then asked sceptically, “So that is why you had disguised yourself as Madame?”
He nodded.
“But why choose to be a modiste? And how did you manage it? Aren’t spies shady little whiskered characters that slink through shrubberies?”
He lifted up a hand halting her babbling tongue. A hint of a smile played on his lips. “Slow down, I will answer every one of your questions. To begin with, a few years ago the king informed me of the plot. He had received information that most of his informants were being watched. Therefore, he chose to put his trust in me and asked me for my help.”
“But why a modiste?” she interrupted.
“Because men are fools,” he said passionately. “They think that women have a head full of cotton and pink ribbons. They talk to their wives or mistresses in the small hours of the morning, the smoke sluggishly escaping their lips along with their darkest secrets. And in turn, women hold those secrets close to their hearts until the most opportune moment arrives. I could have bribed the women and discovered the secrets, but it could have alerted the French. I needed the aristocratic women to trust me. And a weakness that most of the ladies in the ton share is vanity.”
Penelope made agreeing noises.
“And that vanity leads a lady to acquire only the most trustworthy modiste in town. A modiste knows a woman’s most embarrassing secrets. When a lady needs a wig for her balding head, who does she go to? A modiste! A modiste sees the sagging flesh, the warts, the moles, the freckles, the spots, and every single unsightly thing about a woman because it is the modiste that dresses a lady. Jewels will not lure a secret out, but the public knowledge that a lady wears a wig will do the trick quickly enough. And so a modiste becomes a lady’s bosom friend.”
“But why only a lady? It could have been a common maid at the palace planning to murder the king.”
“I am telling the story,” he said testily. “As for the answer, we knew it was an aristocratic lord who had gone over to the French side. I needed a persona that would have the finest ladies of the ton clamouring for my attention. I hired a French modiste and paid her a pretty penny to teach me everything she knew. Thereafter, Lord Adair turned recluse and Madame Bellafraunde was born.”
“Why are you telling me all of this? Will it not hinder your investigations? Let me tell you, I don’t do well under torture. I will squeak at the first sign of pain.”
“Two reasons. Firstly, you needed a distraction. You cannot keep thinking of the duke. Secondly, I uncovered the plot a month ago. You are my last student. I was waiting to finish the lessons before retiring Madame for good. The king is going to publicly honour me and reward me for my bravery. The whole of England will know what I did soon enough. You simply know the facts before they do.”
“I can’t believe it,” Penelope said, belching delicately. “And I think after that breakfast I am suffering from collywobbles.”
“If it was believable, then I wouldn’t be very good at spying,” he replied, pouring a cup of tea. “I will ask Jules to fetch you some laudanum. It will help.”
Jules entered at that moment to tell them that the carriage was ready.
But Penelope did not depart that day. The generous dose of Laudanum, along with Lord Adair’s insistence, convinced her to wade in self-pity for a few more days. According to him, the utter heart-wrenching misery of unrequited love should be enjoyed for as long as possible, and Lockwood was the right place to do it.
She sensibly agreed.
***
On the third day, Penelope could no longer impose on Lord Adair. Accordingly, she requested for a carriage and Lord Adair provided her with one.
“Thank you for everything,” Penelope said. She was still uncomfortable in the presence of the handsome marquis, Lord Adair. Oddly, she felt
closer to Madame Bellafraunde, even though the two were one and the same.
“I am glad that you agreed to stay with me for a few days. Even though you moped all over the place, it was still a delight having you around.”
Penelope nodded distractedly, her hands gripping the travel bag. Lord Adair had provided her with a few more dresses. He promised to bill the duke.
“Your lessons are over, and you are almost a lady,” Lord Adair said, uncharacteristically sombre. “I couldn’t take away the Penelope in you. I adore it too much …”
She looked up at him, her eyes shimmering in the morning sun.
“Well this is goodbye, love,” he said, bending to kiss her forehead.
She dropped the bag and hugged him.
“I will miss you,” she whispered.
Lord Adair stood for a long time waving at the carriage and thinking about the last few years that he had spent embroiled in a complicated espionage trying to save the king. And here was Penelope thinking her world had come to an end because the duke thought she was an imbecile. Ah, the trials and tribulations of young love, he mused, shaking his head indulgently as the carriage disappeared from view.
Chapter 36
The shutters of the carriage were open. The duke wasn’t here to tell her to close them, Penelope thought, rebelliously pulling aside the blood red curtains and poking her head out of the window.
The wind played with her hair while she watched London speeding by. She did not see the filth, dirt, or dangerous alleys. What she saw were the vivid colours of parasols, the bustling workers and the smiling, soot faced imps. She felt as if she was leaving behind the sparkle, excitement, and secrets of a chaotic city and entering into the watery grey world of the countryside.
She sighed and softly whispered a goodbye. A moment later a passing wagon dipped in a pothole and splashed her face with dirty water.
She spluttered and hurriedly closed the curtains. It was London’s way of replying to her farewell, she thought, her lips quirking. Anne would have laughed had she seen her. Her eyes closed, her heart clenching in pain. She missed the dowager and Anne, Perkins, Mary … but mostly she missed Lady Bathsheba and the duke.
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