Shenanigans in Berkeley Square

by Vivian Roycroft

  Cats. Gossiping, hateful, fault-finding cats. Oh, she should turn and challenge them — no, that would only cause more of a scandal. A yelling match in the middle of Berkeley Square wouldn’t soothe anything, especially not Franklin’s prickliness.

  She refused to stop and scream, much as she wanted to. Instead she grabbed the ring knocker and thumped it, then pushed past the answering footman without a pause. Lissie would be in the morning room at this hour. Past the marble floored vestibule and its cherub statuettes, past the walnut paneling in the corridor, the luxurious carpeting, the staring portraits in their carved frames, then she gathered her skirts and ran up the stairs.

  Lissie sat on the sofa in a sprawl of broadsheets, paper scattered across the cushions and the floor. As her friend glanced up, Coralie finally hesitated. Sharing her society now could damage more than her own reputation. She hoped she knew Lissie well enough to ask—

  Before she could finish the thought, Lissie erupted from the sofa and ran across the morning room, fierce anger turning her eyes hawkish. “I’m so glad you’ve come!”

  Strong arms around her, a lingering embrace, and the anxiety loosened its tight hold from her chest. But she had to be certain. “Your father—”

  Lissie huffed. “—is Scottish, remember, and he’d have some remarkably unflattering things to say to any daughter of his who didn’t support a friend in need. So,” and she squeezed Coralie’s arms, holding her in place, “what can I do to help? Please tell me there’s something.”

  Tears of pure gratitude started in Coralie’s eyes. Friendship. How had she ever lived without it?

  * * * *

  Not even a passing carriage disturbed the heavy hush overlying St. James’s Square; not even a singing bird. It was as if nature itself recognized the weight of blood and prestige inhabiting the neighborhood, the power of the dukes and earls and magnates in residence there. Rainier swallowed. Standing in the shadow of William III’s prancing sculpted Arab, his impulsive idea no longer seemed credible, much less meritorious. Instead, the lèse he intended to commit leaned horribly close to majesté.

  The Cumberland dukedom was a royal honor, a trifle thrown to younger princes in consolation for not being born to the title of Wales. It wouldn’t have been given to just any foreigner — and while Ernst Anton Oldenburg remained in many ways a mysterious character, everyone knew he’d arrived in England from Saxony late in 1806. Some whispered he could claim greater honors in his home country, but only actual close kinship to a reigning monarch could rank higher than a royal dukedom and Rainier could not convince himself that the man he’d learned so quickly to hate carried royal blood in his disreputable veins. Sacrilegious thought, that.

  But of course what he chose to believe was irrelevant. Cumberland might be a rake; but he was doubtless a powerful, distinguished man, close to the Prince Regent and wealthy enough to buy the entire Rainier family on a whim. Considering the town house before him, nestled into the northern corner of St. James’s Square — its brilliant white portico, the bank of five extra-tall pedimented windows, the stone facing, and the black wrought iron fence all spoke of easy money, well spent. Trifling with Cumberland was a fool’s game and unwinnable.

  And yet… her honor outweighed any claim of Cumberland’s. Even if she’d never set foot in that carriage — and he couldn’t believe it of her, he refused to believe it — even if she hadn’t, a meeting was necessary. The gossips had to be silenced. He could see only one way of doing so. He couldn’t do less; Hortense’s spiteful behavior that morning proved his case.

  Rainier squared his shoulders and reached for the brass lion’s head knocker, feeling rather like a goose in the days leading up to Christmas.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Friday, October 29, 1813 (continued)

  “You’re a fool, Rainier, even more than I’d originally thought.”

  A subconscious demon nibbled at His Grace’s thoughts; an evil worry padded relentlessly at his heels. No matter where he prowled in the peaceful courtyard, past the fading snapdragons in the planters, over the paving-stone circles beside the house’s rear door, toward or away from the wrought iron table where stood his unexpected guest — no matter where he went, the demon worry hounded him without pity.

  Over and over, he repeated calming words of common sense in his mind: He hadn’t seen her. He’d seen nothing, a trick of the fog, no more.

  But if anything had happened to Ursula…

  He’d lived in St. James’s Square for almost seven years. It still didn’t feel like home.

  At the white-painted window below the balcony he turned again. Rainier’s elegant hat rested on the scrollwork table and Rainier stood beside it, awkward fists clenched at his sides, brows bunched into a furious knot, and shoulders hunching toward his ears. He’d inched around in a half-circle, tracking His Grace’s aimless stalking rather than merely turning his head, as if he didn’t want such a madman anywhere except in front of him. His Grace snorted; probably more accuracy in that assessment than he knew.

  Strange, how restless he’d felt since arriving home last night. He’d returned to the soiree with the carriage, intending to thank Lady Gower, but had changed his mind — keeping that delightful predator guessing was never a bad thing — and instead he’d walked home through the writhing fog. If he’d let himself be seen again at the entertainment, it would possibly have defanged the scandal before it had well and truly begun. But no, he’d wandered away, pausing at every street corner, peering ahead, half hoping, half dreading, every nerve on the alert. Sunday, the Sabbath, would be All Hallow’s Eve, and the veil between the living and the dead would fray to less than threadbare lace.

  He’d let such nonsense distract him from the game at hand. And this was the result.

  The worrying demon whispered again. Ursula… in wartime, anything could have happened to her.

  Rainier shifted his feet. “The gossips are already cackling and tsking. I cannot let the insult to her honor stand. I demand satisfaction.”

  Blasted fool. “You really think bloodshed will accomplish that? Silence the gossips, I mean? You don’t think it more likely to fan their tongues?”

  A randy soldier, enemy or friend, drunk and uncaring who he insulted—

  “Have you a better suggestion?” Rainier demanded.

  An infectious disease, fed by heroes’ injuries and spreading plague-like through the city—

  He drew in a deep breath, released it slowly. The brooding anger remained, unchecked. Too quick, this scandal had been, too rapidly spread. Someone worked against him. “It’s in all the papers, you say?”

  “All but the Chatterer.”

  Which never carried the harmful gossip, only the innocent and funny doings around town. Someone had known precisely where to start the whispering to ensure his shenanigans received the widest publicity, causing the greatest damage. A cruel and calculated stroke; smoky Coralie had a vicious enemy.

  Despair, loneliness, the unending horror of war and separation driving her sensitive soul beyond its endurance—

  He whirled away from the thought and prowled back to the table. “Have you ever been out?”

  Some of Rainier’s high color faded, and his eyes widened in their fixed stare. He shook his head. “But as we’re both gentlemen, it’s inconceivable that you’d take advantage of my inexperience.”

  Astonishing. The sheer naïveté of such trust startled a crack of laughter from him. “By your accusation, you’ve as much as said I’m no gentleman.”

  The ripple in Rainier’s throat gave away his nervous swallow. “I’ve made no accusation. I don’t believe anything— happened. Although it’s from you that I must seek redress, it’s not from you that the insult arises. Society itself has wronged her, but fighting the whole of Mayfair for her honor is impossible. And that leaves me…” He paused. “…here.”

  His reasoning held a twisted sort of logic: if they both fought for Coralie Busche’s honor, the ton would count it toward her as ri
ghteousness. And if he’d been satisfied to live out his exile in London unencumbered, if he hadn’t created the persona of His Grace and worn it around town like a visible mask, then no one would have believed the worst of her in the first place, no matter who had whispered the first evil rumor. As his alter ego could be considered the base — very base — cause of the situation, then he had no honorable alternative but to give Rainier his satisfaction.

  But this soft skipjack, with his Romantic folded cravat and heavy eyelids, had no true conception of fighting, no understanding of the realities of life and death. Rainier was nervous, but he didn’t know enough to be afraid. And yet… Rainier had intuited the situation better than he had. The young man had realized the implications and come to the only possible, sane conclusion. He hadn’t let his nerves keep him at home.

  At some point during those thoughts, he’d again crossed the courtyard; only a few paving stones separated them. Rainier’s fingers twitched, as if ready to defend himself where he stood. He’d tucked his chin into his cravat, his head drawn back, and the crimp of his hat had creased the brown curls at his temples. He thrummed like a harp string, like piano wire, but he didn’t step back nor withdraw.

  His Grace eased forward, closing the last distance between them. Rainier’s blue-grey eyes widened again. He let the pressure build. Still no withdrawal.

  Finally he nodded. “To first blood only.”

  Relief drove the nervousness from Rainier’s expression. Doubly astonishing: he’d truly been ready to fight as far as necessary for a woman’s honor. Perhaps there was more to this dandy than he’d thought.

  “With sabers.”

  Surprise in turn succeeded the relief.

  “You can fence?”

  Another swallow, Rainier’s nervousness still bleeding through his façade. “Of course.”

  But not as well as he’d like. “And so my second should call upon…?”

  Rainier paused, eyes widening again. His face worked and he looked away; he’d not prepared, hadn’t considered, and it seemed his mental list of friends lacked a military, combative, or Irish stamp. Finally he blurted out, “George Anson.”

  “Ehhh…” Of course; every tragedy needed a jester. “Then my second will call on Anson and arrange the time and place.”

  “Immediately, please,” Rainier said, even as he flushed. “There’s no doubt that she’s suffering under this public humiliation, and letting it drag on would be cruel.”

  “This afternoon at the latest, then.” He raised his voice. “Godric, please show our guest out.”

  A deep breath, a jerky nod, a final swallow. Then the courtyard gaped empty around him, suddenly bigger, more open, and boot heels clicked away across the inner hall’s hardwood flooring.

  A tragedy. He’d actually thought the word, giving that internal voice, that brooding demonic unease the final concept it needed to destroy him. If his love for Ursula was a drama, then the possibility loomed that the plotline had soured, the final act approached, her fate was sealed, and—

  —and he’d remain alone.

  Ernst closed his eyes as the pain broke over him like a waterfall. Ursula…

  * * * *

  Two hours since he’d left the massive elegance of St. James’s Square, two hours he’d had to stretch his legs, breathe, let distance and time work their magic. But still Rainier’s heart pounded like a drum. The blue ice in Cumberland’s pale eyes, glaring across the courtyard, flickering to fire when he approached and scorching him through the cool autumn air… he wouldn’t shiver. He wouldn’t. The last time he’d done that, Trent’s daughter had laid a plump hand on his shoulder and asked him if he’d taken ill. And everyone in the coffee house had peered at him sideways.

  They still watched him, speculating eyes and pursed lips on all sides, surrounding the little corner table where he sat alone. But at least he hadn’t heard his name through the chattering; he’d been spared the indignity of knowing the gossips dissected his errant behavior. So far, at least. And they very easily could be, just out of his hearing.

  “…young and silly.”

  The voice he heard came not from any of the surrounding tables, but from his memory. Culver had said those words during their not-so-important debate in the coffee house — almost at the same table — at the beginning of the entire affair.

  “Love at first sight is manifestly impossible, love on short acquaintance hardly less so, and both bloodshed and self-murder are ridiculous responses to a momentary attraction.”

  They’d debated Romeo and Juliet and Culver had scoffed at the idea of an immediate love so strong, so pure, that neither beloved could live without the other. But Culver could just as easily have derided Rainier, because his attraction for Miss Busche had stirred at her first smoldering glance, blossomed over whist and dancing, surrendered entire when she sang. Within two brief weeks, he’d been entranced. And under her spell, bloodshed seemed a perfectly reasonable response.

  Was he mad? or in love?

  Movement by his table, then George Anson settled into the opposite chair. He shook his head at Trent’s daughter before she reached for a fresh teapot, leaned forward onto his forearms, hands splayed on the tabletop, and whispered in a voice that could carry down Fleet Street, “’man, do y‘have any idea who Cumberland’s second is?”

  He had to have done something truly awful to deserve having Anson as his second. If only he’d spent more time getting to know a redcoat or two. Or if only he could claim more than a passing acquaintance with a graduate from the University of Dublin; word about town said they fought duels every semester, rather like a perilous sort of final exam. But no… and he’d be grateful that Anson even accepted the illegal request. “I neither know nor care. Have you seen the field of honor?”

  Anson blinked. His stare seemed fixed and he breathed fast, as if he’d been running. That couldn’t be a good sign. “Oh, aye, near the Ring in Hyde Park at the birch grove. There’s room enough to get bloody all around. Rainier—”

  “At what o’clock?” He refused to dignify Anson’s near-panic. The man would just have to live with whatever he’d learned; Rainier’s tolerance for punishment had reached its limit.

  “Before dawn tomorrow, half four. Look, are you certain—”

  “Thank you, George. Your assistance has been invaluable. Please show up sober.”

  Anson humphed and rose, affronted. “I’m not the one’s going to be fighting. Or losing. Or maybe even dying. For a woman you barely know.” He stalked from the coffee house with one last frustrated glance over his shoulder.

  The chattering resumed around the scattered tables, redoubled. When had it paused? Had Anson’s indiscreet comments been overheard? They had to have been. Well, actually that was a good thing; the duel solved nothing if done in total secrecy. The entire ton had to know what was going on if Rainier’s actions were to have any meaning at all. Otherwise he might as well sleep in.

  No, it didn’t matter. The die was cast, the Rubicon behind him, the battle ahead. Rainier whispered to his empty teacup, “For a woman I barely know? I wouldn’t dream of it. But for the most exceptional, exquisite woman the world could possibly hold? How could I do less?”

  * * * *

  “Brother, dear, I cannot believe the reports I am hearing of you.” Across the dining room table, above the gleaming pewter dishes, Hortense fixed him with a glare, more censorious than her usual expression. “You must now deny them to me.”

  Rainier didn’t pause in his chewing. Nerves still danced a jig up and down his spine. But he’d come to terms with them; if he paid no attention to their céilidh, they left his stomach alone. All he had to do was survive the meal—

  No, that wasn’t enough any longer. He’d spent years merely surviving the meals in his own home. A number of things in his life were about to change — he could feel the approach, more surely than he felt the chair beneath him or the silverware in his hands — and this cowardice — yes, this lack of courage on his part, this goi
ng along to get along, needed to change, as well.

  Calmly he swallowed before answering. “At least offer the courtesy of informing me of that which I am to deny.”

  Lucia stared at him, aghast. “How can you speak so to your own sister?”

  “Without distress, I assure you.” The steak and kidney pie was so tender, it seemed an insult to wield a knife in its presence. But Rainier managed that, as well. “A report cannot be denied unless it is first recognized.”

  Red touched Hortense’s cheeks, deeper than the usual genteel pink of her splendid complexion, as if she’d made herself up with some ghastly shade of rouge. “Of course I refer to the reports that you are fighting a duel for the hand of Miss Coralie Busche.”

  “Ah. That report.” Rainier paused and finished his pie, chewing and swallowing at his usual unhurried pace before responding. “I do deny it, categorically.”

  Hortense smiled, that purring-cat-with-a-mouthful-of-canary smile she wore when the world fell into place around her.

  Rainier let her open her mouth, then continued. “I fight not for her hand but for her honor.”

  The smile vanished. The red returned. Hortense stiffened. “Her reputation’s destroyed. She’s been compromised by the most notorious rake—”