“Not a surprise,” Maria volunteered. “She wants Lord Morewood for her daughter.”
“Grace, you are not seriously considering marrying this rake?”
“I was until you ruined my chances. Now that he knows insanity runs in the family he will probably have nothing more to do with me.”
“I meant to bring you away from there no matter what it took.”
“Even making a complete ass of yourself?” She clenched the tails of her shawl as though she had her hands around her brother’s neck.
“He’s only after your money anyway.”
“Lord Morewood is much wealthier than I am. He is the only man I have ever met, including you, who didn’t give a damn about my money.”
“Then why has he taken you up?”
“A mutual interest in the theater,” Grace said on a superior note.
“Bah!”
“Come Wallace, just because you have no intellectual pursuits does not mean others are so dull.”
By now they had reached the house and Grace hopped out of the carriage on her own, took out her own key and would have unlocked the door, had a frightened maid not opened it for her.
Wallace inexorably followed her as she started up the stairs. “It is my duty to protect you from men like Morewood.”
“You have no duty where I am concerned and no welcome in this house. I expect you to be gone in the morning.”
“You can’t be serious.”
She spun on the stairs. “Wallace, if I had a gun in my hand at this moment I would not answer for your life. I will never come to see you ever again. I expect you to return the favor by getting out of my life.”
Grace went to her room and managed not to slam the door but she did lock it since she knew he was not above annoying her with a protracted argument. As she readied herself for bed she replayed the last hideous moments of the evening and realized that they might have been less bitter had Brand not taken such umbrage at Wallace but she could not blame him. Well, this would be a test of character for Brand. If he could endure her brother’s gauche accusations then he was made of pretty stern stuff. She did feel a shiver of gratitude that Lady Morewood had been spared such a scene.
As she crawled between the covers she edited the disastrous end of the evening from her mind and focused on William Marlowe. He was both younger and more naïve than she had expected. No wonder Brand had arranged the meeting. Marlowe was no competition to him at all. She tried to picture Marlowe saying or at least penning some of the pregnant lines of his plays but the image seemed out of focus. Perhaps he had one voice as a writer and another as a man, a quite ordinary man. As much as she was relieved that Marlowe did not expect everyone to worship him she could not banish a touch of disappointment that he hadn’t a bigger stage presence.
If a red-coated gentleman swam into her tired mind also wishing to take part in the comparison, Grace realized it was because she felt sorry for Captain Everson, not because she had any attraction to him, though he had defended her in his own way and certainly had a sense of humor.
* * * * *
After Marlowe had departed and Robin had gone yawning to bed Thomas poured himself a last drop of brandy for the night. He glanced at Brand who was nursing a large glass of the pungent liquid. “That could have gone better.”
“What an ill-mannered clod.”
“Brand, you should not have let him get to you. Many an insult is flung that falls flat on its face so long as the target laughs it off.”
“Wallace Montrose would set up the back of a saint.”
“But this is exactly how you were drawn into that unfortunate duel and shot.”
“That will not happen again.”
“You think not?”
“I am a better marksman now.”
Thomas chuckled. “As much as Miss Montrose wanted to strangle her brother tonight I don’t think she will want you to blow a hole through him.”
“No?” Brand looked up at his friend with a lift of his eyebrow.
Thomas drained his glass and sighed. “Well, perhaps she does but it would shock even London society if she then married her brother’s murderer. And you have lately been concerning yourself with propriety. Not to mention the fact that you would both have to live in exile away from your mother.”
“I cannot tolerate the man.”
“You are a writer of extraordinary resource. Fake it.”
“You are right, of course. I wonder if Grace will ride tomorrow.”
“Oh, he would love that, a solitary ride with her.”
“Her groom comes for escort.”
“The deaf one?”
“I know.” Brand sat up and pushed his glass aside. “I shall bring Robin. The boy needs to make himself useful.”
“I am for bed. If you can’t sleep, I suggest you get busy on that resolution scene that Marlowe is still polishing.”
Brand snorted. “Grace attributes much to design that only happens by accident.”
Thomas shrugged. “I’m sure you meant to write a proper resolution.”
“But I got too caught up in vanquishing the villain.” Brand was staring at the blotter on his desk.
“So did Brandon White.”
“I see your point. Did I make a complete fool of myself in front of Grace?”
“Not compared to her brother.”
“What bothers me most is that she thinks William Marlowe is a better writer, a better person than he really is.”
“I think you do not give yourself enough credit.”
Brand looked up and smiled. “But I still want much improvement. Perhaps that is why women are put in our lives, to show us where we have gone wrong and to help mend us.”
“Possibly you are right. In Grace you have found your ideal counterpart, ‘a heart to heal your wounded heart’, as you said in your play.”
“And I did not even know mine was broken.”
After Thomas left, Brand sat thinking of Grace and how easily she saw the flaws in his work. The play had a climax, the duel and the heroine falling into Richard’s arms but without explanation except for protestations of her love. A real woman might indeed expect some reason for all Richard had hidden from her. Odd but now when he thought of Margaret, he saw only Grace. Brand flung open the bottom desk drawer and drew out a sheet of paper. He began to write the scene the way he should have done it in the first place.
Chapter Eleven
“I was afraid you would not come,” Grace said as Brand dismounted in the stable yard the next morning. She was wearing her blue habit again but had ordered a new one made since they were riding nearly every day. She could see his breath making small puffs of cloud in the air and realized it was colder than yesterday but she did not feel the cold now. Robin followed him into the yard and dismounted with a yawn.
“It would take more than your clodpole of a brother to keep me away from you,” Brand murmured as he clasped her gloved hands.
“I am so sorry. Wallace’s words and actions were inexcusable.”
He took her elbow as he guided her toward the mounting block and steadied her onto her mare.
She had no need of such assistance but permitted it and she was not sure why.
“Never apologize for someone else,” he warned. “You cannot protect the world from him. Eventually he will be made to pay for his arrogance and unkindness to you.”
“I have a feeling you are right there. Good morning, Robin. Perhaps your uncle will let you nap later since he has roused you from sleep at this ungodly hour.”
“I doubt it. Oh, I say. Perhaps he will let me sleep this afternoon.”
He was a quick boy. Even half asleep Robin had caught her meaning that napping would give him an excuse to be absent part of the day.
“We are to go to a ball tonight,” Robin continued. “He says I am lucky to be invited at the last minute and they only asked me on his credit so I am not to make a mull of it.” When Robin realized his uncle had mounted and they were about to leave him he scramble
d back onto the cover hack he was riding.
Grace said over her shoulder. “They invited you because unattached males are always at a premium, those who are willing to dance anyway. So if you want to make yourself popular with a London hostess, dance with any girl she presents you to.”
“I can do that. Mother made me take dancing lessons with my sisters.” Robin gripped his reins in a close imitation of the controlled manner Brand used and Grace smiled to think how much he must worship his uncle.
“Careful, Grace,” Brand said. “You will have half the mothers in London on the catch for Robin for their daughters.”
“That will happen sooner or later. The lad is nearly grown and turning handsome.” She glanced back to see Robin flushing. When she turned to her escort she noticed Brand was wearing his usual black riding coat. He looked good in any color but the contrast between his tanned skin and his sparkling white neckcloths always pleased her. “Is this the Montclare ball?”
“Yes, how did you guess?”
“As it turns out, I accepted the invitation as well.”
Brand nodded. “Ordinarily I would suggest we go together in my coach.”
“I know. It will be hard enough to keep Wallace from crashing the affair, let alone have him see me going off in your carriage.”
“So you have not routed him yet?”
“No. Like most unwanted company he is always sure of his welcome. Every brutal thing I say to him, he says I don’t mean. He would try the patience of a saint. You have an inventive mind, Brand. How can I send him packing back to Yorkshire?”
“He seems perverse so threatening or prying at him will do no good.”
“I have already disinherited him and his children, leaving my fortune to the foundling hospitals.”
“Really?” Robin crowed.
“No, not yet anyway but it may come to that.”
“How can we make him want to go back to Yorkshire?” Brand asked out loud. “I don’t suppose there is another sister who might be in need of his protection.”
“No, I am the only person he has to irritate and his children are all too young to have gotten into trouble yet.”
“You could suggest his wife is having an affair,” Brand said.
“He is too arrogant to believe that. Somehow I must dent his thick head with the truth.”
Robin started laughing. “What if he were being pursued by someone. A woman, I mean.”
“Who would want him?” Grace turned to stare at Robin as they road along the northern bridle path.
“A scarlet woman.”
“Be serious.”
“I mean hire an actress to pursue him. If he is as stodgy as he seems he will fly to Yorkshire.”
“The idea has merit.” Grace nodded. “I wonder of Mr. Stone could put me in the way of someone.”
“But Grace,” Brand said, “what if he takes her seriously. You might destroy the marriage.”
“That’s right. For some inexplicable reason, Ellen has a fondness for him. She says he is like a dog you always have to reprimand for chewing your slippers.”
“I do not even want to know.”
A thunder of hooves interrupted Brand as captain Everson galloped up to them. Even at a gallop he had no trouble controlling his horse but Grace imagined the right arm usually held a saber so he must be used to riding one-handed.
“Miss Montrose.” He nodded. “I was afraid I had missed you.”
“Good morning, Captain. We got a late start.”
“I wanted so much to apologize, not just to you but to Lord Morewood as well. Truly this was the only place I thought I could catch you since my cousin is such a stickler for propriety.”
“No apology necessary, sir. You are not the only person to be plagued by relatives.”
“Besides none of it was your fault,” Brand agreed.
“But I should not have laughed,” Everson said with a rueful smile.
Robin hooted. “Why not? We laughed our heads off after she left.”
“Well, just so there are no hard feelings. I don’t exactly know how to tell you this but she has decided to attend the theater party after all.”
Grace chuckled. “I’m not surprised. I have known Lady Charlton for many years.”
“I’m glad you do not take offence for she has me flummoxed. I don’t think I want to come for fear of what she may do next. I was never so timid facing the French guns.”
Brand smiled at this. “Please do come. You can tell your children about it someday.”
“Are you sure?” Everson asked.
“Yes, captain,” Grace said. “Quite sure. We are all mad, here in London. You will get used to us.”
“Until then.” The captain saluted them and cantered away toward the eastern gate. Apparently he had no intention of exercising his mount and had only come to see her or them. But just as he got to the exit, he was almost overset by a barrel of a man who brushed past him and loped a horse up the hill toward them.
“If this isn’t the outside of enough! Wallace, what are you doing to my hack. He’s lathered as though he has been ridden to death.”
Hatless, Wallace looked rather lathered himself with his curly brown locks askew. “This is the crowning insult, a clandestine meeting at dawn.”
“Such imagination,” Brand said. “My nephew is with us, the sun is shining brightly and we are in the middle of Hyde Park. Has anyone ever made any observations on your flair for the dramatic, Wallace?”
“I never gave you leave to use my name.”
“Then stop behaving like a schoolboy. No, I insult my nephew by comparison. Stop behaving like a lunatic. You are drawing attention to yourself. Everyone will think you have ridden to your sister with the news of your wife’s death.”
“No one will think anything but that I am protecting her.”
“Protecting?” Grace said. “The only thing you are protecting is my eighty thousand pounds and I have already told you that you will never get your hands on it. Oh, you have ruined the ride. I am going home.”
Grace nudged her mare into a canter but did not gallop in deference to the tired hack Wallace rode. She had to make sure the beast cooled down gradually, since her brother had no care for it. She brought her mare to a trot by the time they reached the street again and was walking the horse the last two blocks. Brand and Robin had followed them and she could see only bad coming of that. Why had she even attempted to ride?
The glare Hanson bestowed on Wallace would have curdled the liver of most men but her brother was impervious. Grace dismounted and gave the groom instructions about the horses, aware Brand and Wallace were now arguing. “I don’t care if you have to padlock the stalls. My brother is not to get his hands on any of my horses.”
“Robin, carry this letter to Stone at the Pantheon,” Brand said. “Then the day is yours.”
“Do you mean to come in?” Wallace demanded.
“Yes, I want to talk to you in private. It’s what I should have done in the first place.”
Brand took Grace’s arm and escorted her up the steps.
“You may use my library if you promise not to spatter the books with blood,” she offered.
Her brother followed them, huffing his outrage. “Do you not mean to stay and hear this, Grace?”
“Not unless you are in need of a referee. But I remind you.” She shook her finger at him dramatically. “I am a free woman in charge of my own affairs. You have no right to interfere with me at all.”
Brand followed the butler down the hall to a room or the right that looked out on the stable yard. He began studying the watercolors that were arranged on the sections of walls not covered in bookcases and wondered if Grace had done them. There was something familiar about them, all of them. They made him think of the Pantheon. Then it hit him. They were stage sets, in some cases almost exact paintings of the sets of his plays. Was she so enchanted with the work of William Marlowe that she recreated the sets from memory? Or had she purchased the artist�
�s sketches done by the set designer?
“Well?” Wallace demanded.
Brand spun to realize Grace had indeed gone and closed the door. “I am sorry we got off on the wrong foot. Last night must have seemed odd to you but I assure you my mother was with us the whole evening and only went upstairs when the party was about to break up.”
“Is that all you have to say for yourself?”
Brand sighed, fighting for patience. “Only that my intentions are honorable, my ultimate purpose marriage, if Grace decides we will suit.”
“I don’t care. I will never approve the match.”
Brand folded his arms, waiting to see if the man had anything to say beyond bluster. “The marriage does not require your approval. But I am curious as to your objections.”
“Your reputation, of course.” Wallace poured himself some light amber liquor from the decanter and cringed when he realized it was sherry.
“My reputation has been spotless for five years. Has someone in my family done some injury to you or yours? Your objection seems out of all reason. Most would value the connection.”
Wallace threw up his head. “Grace has had her fling in London. I want her to come home to Yorkshire before she creates a scandal.”
“That is an unreasonable expectation. You want her to give up her freedom to live in a backwater, to give up all her friends, her house, her position in society.”
“The house will stay in the family and be used during the season.”
“Oh, I see. You will have the use of it.”
“I think I make myself plain.” He took another drink of the unwanted wine.
“Very plain. You are a selfish prig.” Brand noted that Wallace choked. “And whenever Grace gets tired of you, I will drag your sorry ass to the coaching office and put you on a stage for Yorkshire.”
“How dare you?”
“I would dare anything to protect Grace from an idiot like you cutting up her peace.”
Wallace was still sputtering threats and Brand thought he detected a stutter as he let himself out of the house. Now that he thought about it he need not dispatch Wallace. They had only to get the magistrate to get rid of him. Threat of arrest ought to do the trick nicely. He rode back to his townhouse intent on consulting his law books and seeing what they could charge the man with.
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