Steeplechase

by Bancroft, Blair

  And then there were the plans that had popped into her head while huddled with the other unfortunate women at the foot of the magistrate’s table. What would happen to them if she suddenly turned herself into a simpering, conformable young wife with nothing on her mind but gowns, bonnets, and the latest on dits?

  Sarah summoned a brave smile for Adrian Chumley who had just arrived to claim the second set of country dances. No one could say that in this crisis she had been deserted by either family or friends. In fact, not a half hour earlier Geoffrey had assured her that the Prince Regent was expected later this evening and would make a particular show of greeting Lady Davenham with approval. Southwaite had winked at her and added, “That should do it, my dear. No matter what the tabbies might think, they dare not open their mouths after that.”

  Which was all well and good for a man, Sarah supposed, but she truly did care what the tabbies thought, even if they did not say it aloud. For it was in the world of women she must live out her life. And thought of the Bow Street episode still hanging over her head when she was old and gray was most horridly painful.

  She was in the midst of a country dance, for heaven’s sake. If she did not pay attention, she was going to go left when she should go right, curtsy when she should be forming a hands across, or completely disgracing herself by measuring her length on the highly polished parquet floor. Oh, goodness! Five seconds late, Lady Davenham joined her hand with the others in the figure, having had to skip to catch up as three spokes of the four-spoke wheel turned gracefully without her.

  Devil it! she exclaimed to herself, borrowing one of her husband’s favorite expletives. She was a hopeless case. Harlan should have sent her to Chesterton, indeed he should.

  “We are a success, I believe,” said a voice close to Lord Davenham’s ear.

  Southwaite. “Your advice was excellent, my lord, I cannot deny it,” Harlan admitted, even if it was rather like a stab in the chest to force himself to say so.

  “Since Lady Davenham will be engaged with Chumley for the next twenty minutes or so, I wonder if we might take a short stroll in the garden?”

  Without a word, Harlan turned and followed Southwaite out through a set of tall doors leading to the gardens of the Farnborough’s house on Mount Street. When the lights of the brilliant chandeliers in the ballroom had disappeared behind a yew hedge, leaving only a faint glow that turned the two gentlemen into black shadows, Lord Southwaite came to a halt. “If you still wish satisfaction,” he drawled, “I thought perhaps a bout at Jackson’s or possibly a few rounds at Manton’s? We do Lady Davenham a grave disservice if we make this a killing matter.”

  “By God, Southwaite, you may be ten years my senior and a friend of the Prince Regent, but you will not presume to tell me how to go on!”

  “My apologies,” the baron murmured, even as the air between them hummed with the obvious. He—Geoffrey, Lord Southwaite—had orchestrated Sarah’s restoration into society. He had taken her to a gaming hell because her husband had, by his own decree, thrust her into the escort of anyone but himself.

  “I hear you have an affinity for the foil, my lord,” Harlan said. “Though it is no longer a required skill for a gentleman, I believe I should enjoy trying my skill against yours.” The implication was clear. Lord Southwaite was old enough to have learned fencing as a necessity, rather than as a sporting skill. Lord Davenham, young and agile, expected to win.

  “At Jackson’s, with buttoned foils.”

  “Agreed.”

  The two men returned to the ballroom with such looks of calm cordiality that Lord Richard and Adrian Chumley, off to procure glasses of ratafia for their dance partners, breathed mutual sighs of relief. Spilled blood would have destroyed their efforts to save young Sarah’s reputation. And might well have deprived them of their best friend.

  “My dear Sal,” Dickon declared grandly after handing a glass to Esmerelda, who was seated between Lady Rotherwick and Lady Marchmont, their husbands chatting together nearby, “I believe, even without the prince’s approbation, we have won. Your credit is restored, and all’s right with the world.”

  “Everyone has been quite wonderful,” Sarah declared, smiling brightly as her husband’s tall, elegant figure, with Lord Southwaite at his side, appeared beside them. “I shall never, ever, be able to thank you enough.”

  “Ah! Here comes the prince,” Southwaite declared. “And heading straight in our direction. The crowning touch, I believe, if you will pardon the expression.”

  Sarah took a deep breath, dropped into a curtsy so low she feared she might topple over. Only at her presentation to the queen had she curtsied in this fashion. Waves of panic shook her. She couldn’t breathe. Could not look up. Heavy cologne assaulted her senses. Her stomach churned.

  A beefy hand lifted her chin. The Prince Regent’s corpulent figure swam before her. The huge round face smiled. “Naughty puss,” said a voice issuing from a cavernous mouth. “I would have been delighted to grant a royal pardon, don’t you know?” Laughing at his joke, the Prince Regent passed on, with an admonition to Lord Davenham to keep a sharper eye on such a charming young wife.

  In his wake was silence as each person surrounding Sarah digested this royal exchange. The Marquess of Rotherwick was the first to speak. “That’s that then,” he declared. “Do you think I might return to my club now?” he added purely rhetorically, as no one, least of all his wife, was about to gainsay him.

  “We have you to thank for this, of course,” Davenham said quietly to Lord Southwaite. “I suppose it is possible that one day we might even discover we have something in common besides my wife.”

  Geoffrey’s eyes gleamed, his lips twitched. Moving quickly away, he put his back to a square column and began to laugh—silently, biting his lip, shoulders heaving. Harlan followed him, lips curling into wry amusement of his own. “Do we still meet at Jackson’s?” Southwaite inquired between chuckles.

  “I would not miss it for the world,” Lord Davenham replied.

  “Why did you not tell me?” Esmerelda demanded of Sarah two days later. “A duel! Such news, and not a word. I thought we were friends, Sally. Why make it a deep dark secret?”

  “Duel? What duel?” Sarah cried.

  “You don’t know?”

  “Know what?”

  Esmerelda leaned into one corner of the drawing room’s scarlet settee and fanned herself, at a loss for words.

  “Is it Harlan and Geoffrey? Tell me this instant, Essy. At once!”

  “Truly, truly, you have no need to fear,” Esmerelda assured her. “They merely fenced at Gentleman Jackson’s salon, but quite everyone was there, Lord Richard says, for there was never a doubt about why they were meeting.”

  Sarah groaned and buried her face in her hands.

  “And Lord Davenham won, Sarah. Is that not splendid? Although Richard—Lord Richard—says he believes Southwaite could have beaten him if he had tried.”

  “You are saying my husband and Baron Southwaite engaged in a fencing duel over me?” Lady Davenham said quite stiffly.

  “What else could it be? They are scarcely regular fencing partners,” Miss Twitchell pointed out. “And both Lord Richard and Mr. Chumley are agreed on the cause.”

  “I seem to be the only person in the haut monde who has not heard of it,” Sarah said, chin high, gazing blindly off toward the far end of the colorful drawing room on Margaret Street.

  “I daresay my vulgar Cit background has prevented me from understanding some basic rule members of the ton pick up in their cradles,” sighed Esmerelda, much chagrined. “No one thought to explain to me that I was not to mention the matter to the subject of the duel. I beg your pardon, Sarah, truly I do.”

  “Nonsense! I am grateful to you. But quite incensed with Harlan and Geoffrey, not to mention Dickon, for being so secretive.”

  “It was not a real duel, you know. No blood was shed, and afterwards everyone trooped off to a tavern for what Richard called a ‘heavy wet.’ I received t
he impression that Davenham and Southwaite are now much in charity with each other.”

  “Men,” Sarah breathed through clenched teeth.

  “Indeed,” Esmerelda echoed. “There is no understanding them.”

  After further desultory attempts at conversation, ending in Sarah’s refusal to join Miss Twitchell’s shopping expedition, Esmerelda once again apologized before driving off in a hackney, with none but her maid to accompany her. Sarah went to her bedchamber, drew the blue silk curtains around her bed and made her way inside, where she plumped herself down in her suitably blue-tinged tent.

  They had stood by her—Harlan, Geoffrey, Dickon, Adrian, her papa, Lord Marchmont, the Regent himself—but they were all men, with a man’s view of the world. With men’s rules, men’s games, men’s honor, men’s infinite misunderstanding of women. They meant well, but she could not trust any of them. They simply did not see.

  The next afternoon, there was a great flurry in a house on Newburgh Place, as a maid went dashing up the stairs at breakneck speed. She burst into her mistress’s boudoir, crying, “Miss, miss, never in all your born days will you guess . . .” She gasped for breath, extending a silver salver on which rested a visiting card.

  Amaryllis LeFay raised one perfectly sketched eyebrow and glanced at the card. She picked it up, read it a second time. “You are quite right, Maria,” she said. “I never would have guessed. Please show Lady Davenham into the front parlor and tell her I will be with her momentarily.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  To discover that one’s husband’s mistress’s house was decorated with far more taste than the house he had chosen for his wife was lowering, decidedly lowering. It seemed that Miss LeFay had been allowed free rein to express her exquisite good taste, while Sarah herself was forced to make do with a merchant’s excessive ostentation.

  Sitting very straight on the edge of a Chippendale chair, hands clasped in her lap, Lady Davenham was well aware of Finella’s disapproving glare, even though the maid had effaced herself to a straight chair in the far corner of the room. Finella, in fact, thought her quite mad and had not hesitated to say so, resulting in a sharp set-down from her employer.

  “Lady Davenham.” La Grande LeFay swept into the parlor with all the aplomb of a duchess, though it is doubtful any duchess in the land could have rivaled her looks. Miss LeFay’s long-sleeved gown of the finest rose muslin, with neckline and hem embroidered in a white floral border, was simple and elegant, as was her coiffure, her waves of black hair tumbling out from under a bandeau that matched her gown. Her dark eyes, however, were unfathomable as she added with the lilt of a question, “A most unexpected pleasure. How kind of you to call.”

  Sarah, whose innate good manners demanded she jump to her feet upon Miss LeFay’s entrance, had never felt more small and insignificant. She, too, had dressed for the occasion in her jade green carriage dress and matching bonnet with a lining of ruched ivory silk that provided a delightful foil for her hair, but Amaryllis LeFay was at least six inches taller, a number of years older, and more experienced in the ways of the world than the Viscountess Davenham would ever be. If this was a contest, both women were aware La Grande LeFay had already won.

  “You are very beautiful,” Sarah breathed. “Even more so than I had thought from seeing you at the theater and in the park.”

  “Thank you.” Ryl, suddenly feeling rather like Gulliver set down in Lilliput, the whole world gone horribly awry, waved her visitor back to her chair, seating herself across from her. “Your husband,” she declared a trifle sternly, “would not approve of this visit.”

  To her amazement, the little minx chortled, laughter bubbling through the parlor and adding to the sunshine pouring through the leaded windows. “Oh, poor Davenham, indeed he would not, but truly there was nowhere else to turn. I assure you I am not here because of my husband at all—well, I suppose that is not so, as I would not know who you are, would I, if he were not . . . if—ah—he were not acquainted with you.”

  Ryl was becoming more fascinated by the moment. “Do go on,” she said faintly.

  With her head cocked to one side, Lady Davenham seemed to be considering her previous words. “In truth, I cannot say I do not mind his having a mistress,” she admitted, “but as you know I agreed to this arrangement, so I am honor-bound to accept it. At least for a while.”

  “As I know?” Ryl murmured. “I fear I do not understand you, my lady.”

  “Oh.” An arrested expression suffused Lady Davenham’s youthful countenance. Slowly, she untied her bonnet and set it aside. “My husband has not spoken to you of our arrangement?”

  “Surely you must be aware that Lord Davenham would never discuss any aspect of his relationship with you with anyone, most particularly not with myself,” Ryl replied with some hauteur. “He mentioned you only when informing me that he was getting married. I assure you that is all. Davenham is the soul of discretion.”

  Of course he was, Sarah thought, with some chagrin, but it made her task harder, for obviously Miss LeFay thought she had come to plead for the return of her husband. Why else would a viscountess visit her husband’s mistress? Or remain in conversation with a mistress who had just given her a set-down in no uncertain terms?

  “You are loyal, Miss LeFay,” Sarah said. “I can see why my husband did not wish to give you up, but I have failed to make myself clear. I, too, have discretion, you see. I did not come here to discuss Lord Davenham. I came here to ask your assistance on another matter entirely.”

  The courtesan’s painted brows rose upward toward the waves of black hair artfully arranged over her brow. “Remarkable. Pray proceed.”

  “There is no one else who can tell me what I need to know,” Sarah declared. “Or no one who would, she amended with a fierce scowl. “You have heard of my night at Bow Street?”she tossed toward Miss LeFay, as if daring her to deny it.

  “I have, but not from Lord Davenham.”

  “I learned a great many lessons that night. Among them that the life of a courtesan can be far less glamorous and far more uncertain than I had ever thought. Truthfully, like most ladies of the ton, I had scarcely thought of it at all. But when I saw . . . when I heard . . . I was moved to help.” Sarah thrust up her hand, palm out, to keep Miss LeFay from interrupting. “I realize you must think me a fool, but some of the women were so young, younger than I, and their stories so sad. They came to London to find honest work and were enticed straight from the stage coach into a brothel without ever knowing what kind of house they were entering. It was appalling, truly appalling, and I wish to do something about it!” Sarah’s passion betrayed her into delivering this last with evangelical fervor.

  “Never!” Ryl exclaimed, startled out of her customary equanimity. “Davenham would not allow it. Look at you, a mere child, sitting there and saying you wish to plunge into a world the most experienced reformers have failed to touch. It cannot be done, you know. Go anywhere near the dregs of my world and Davenham will confine you to the country. And rightly so.”

  Ignoring her warning, Sarah demanded, “Is it true? Do women lie in wait for girls fresh up from the country and steer them into brothels with promises of honest work?”

  “Yes, it is true.”

  “Were you . . . ?”

  “No.” Ryl’s words were flat, uncompromising, making no excuses. “Mine was a case of starry-eyed innocence, a shockingly handsome face, and a great desire to leave behind my father’s tavern in the wilds of Hampshire for the delights of the city. I was sixteen and in love with love.”

  “Did you ever regret it?” Age, experience, and the oddity of their connection forgotten, they were suddenly speaking woman to woman.

  For a moment Ryl leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes, her lashes dark against her porcelain cheeks. “There comes a time, even to those of us who have been fortunate enough to live well in this life, when we think of what might have been.” She sat up and fixed her dark eyes on her visitor. “But is a home and famil
y worth marrying a farmer as fat and vulgar as his pigs? And would the lovely babe I picture be, in actuality, a squalling brood of six or a dozen, with me expected to slop the pigs and muck out the henhouse as well as cook and clean and sew our clothes?”

  “Oh, goodness!”

  “Exactly.” Ryl’s face hardened, aging her undoubted beauty by at least five years. “So I will use my looks and my charm as long as I am able and be as mercenary as I can, so that I may retire in comfort, if not in luxury. I will enjoy other people’s children and never smell the barnyard, never be forced to cook or clean or sew my own clothes. Not ideal, perhaps, but far better than most, I assure you.”

  Sarah nodded. “I understand, truly I do, but would you not consider giving me advice that I may help those less fortunate than—”

  “Have you heard nothing I have said?” Ryl cried. “Davenham would never forgive me. Perhaps twenty years from now, when you are older—for goodness knows the problem will still be with us—but not now. Do you not see, my lady? You would be in danger of being taken into a brothel yourself.”

  “Oh . . . I had not thought of that.” An exasperated silence hung between them as each took a few moments to calm her agitated thoughts. “I wonder,” Sarah said at last, “if some of the money from Davenham’s Aunt Portia . . .” She broke off, lips curling into a wry smile. “How very odd that this should come full circle. That I should be thinking of using Davenham’s inheritance to aid fallen women when, without its existence, I should not be Lady Davenham at all.

  “Not that it matters,” Sarah added with a shrug. “Davenham is as likely to give me a portion of the money as he is to fly to the moon. I wonder . . . yes, indeed I wonder just how ill his Aunt Portia truly is. I understand she was an adventurous woman in her day, to the extent that she developed a rather jaundiced view of the world. Hence, her declaration that she would leave her wealth to establish a home for stray cats and dogs. Surely . . . a home for stray females would be much more to her liking.”