Double Masquerade

by Lucy Muir

  As Lord Edgecombe’s lips covered hers, Catherine steeled herself to allow the liberty, knowing the marquess was within his rights as her betrothed.

  “What are you doing?”

  The high childish voice penetrated Catherine’s consciousness and the marquess pulled away from Catherine.

  “I know,” a higher voice chimed in. “They are kissing, like the scullery maid and the footman at home.”

  “Yes, we were kissing,” Catherine said as matter-of-factly as she could, thinking that never before had she been so glad to see her niece and nephew. “But now it is time for us to go back to the house and you had best return with us. Marie, give me your hand.” So saying, Catherine took her niece by the hand and began walking back toward Rosemont while young John ran ahead. The marquess fell into step at Catherine’s other side and they walked slowly back to the house.

  Catherine lay awake long into the night, trying to sort her thoughts. How could a person be so cold and thoughtless one moment and so generous the next? she wondered, thinking of Lord Edgecombe’s callous dismissal of her pet hare when he had been injured and then his thoughtfulness in presenting her with the exquisite rose brooch. And how could she feel sorry one moment for what she was doing to Lord Edgecombe—for she had indeed sought to bring him to an offer and he had justification for his irritation with her over her sudden reversal of feeling—and hate him the next for his refusal to allow her to have a change of heart and release her from the betrothal?

  She wished there were someone to whom she could confide her troubled thoughts, but there was no one. A strong sense that it was by her own actions that she was now in the position she was prevented her placing a burden on her father or her aunt or even Sarah by confiding in them. She must rely upon herself. All rested on Louisa’s plan and her own ability to draw the marquess into a deep game and win.

  Catherine chose to dress in her most becoming new gown the evening of the card supper at Ellsworth Hall. This was not a time to attempt to persuade the marquess of her inadequacies, but her charms. And it was a time she needed all the confidence that looking well could give her. The gown had a dark green fitted bodice trimmed in ivory lace and a contrasting skirt of rich gold velvet. She had a hat of matching dark green, low-crowned and with the wide brim that was so becoming to her face, but it was not suitable for evening. Flora, ever creative, fixed a modest headdress with two ostrich feathers, adding a touch of elegance to her mistress’s toilette. Catherine viewed her reflection in the glass as she prepared to go downstairs to meet the others, and was satisfied she was at her most attractive. Just before going down to the carriage, Catherine filled both of the pockets beneath her skirt with as much coin as she felt they could safely hold. The plan would fail if she could not manage to stay in the game, however deep it became.

  The autumn air was crisp as the Trevor’s landau rolled toward Ellsworth Hall shortly before seven o’clock. There were only a few other guests arriving for the intimate card party that was planned for the evening, and as Catherine and her aunt made their curtsey to the room she noticed that most of the other guests were young gentlemen, as Louisa had planned.

  “Lady Manning, Miss Trevor,” Lord Edgecombe greeted Catherine as she entered the large drawing room where guests were gathering before the supper. “You are looking exceptionally beautiful tonight.” Lord Edgecombe’s gaze traveled up and down Catherine’s form, his eyes hooded and unreadable.

  Catherine began to fear she might have been better to continue her policy of dressing unattractively, and was glad at least that the cold autumn night would prevent the marquess from suggesting any walks in the shrubbery. She did not wish to tempt him away from the tables.

  “Lady Manning, Lady Ashe will wish your presence at her table, I am certain,” Louisa addressed the older woman as she entered the drawing room from the hall.

  “Thank you, Miss Louisa,” Lady Manning replied, “I shall be delighted to join Lady Ashe’s table.”

  “Lord Edgecombe, Papa asks if you would settle a point of argument on foxhounds with Mr. Stillington-Fyfe,” Louisa continued, turning to the marquess. “They are in the library.”

  “Of course, Miss Louisa Ellsworth,” the marquess agreed, taking his leave of the two women with a bow.

  “I have persuaded Papa to serve some of his best port after the supper,” Louisa said to Catherine in a low voice. “It is to be hoped the gentlemen will drink several bottles before they join us and will be the more ready to wager high when they play cards.”

  Catherine was impressed with Louisa’s organization of the details for the evening, and equally impressed with the younger woman’s toilette. Louisa had dressed in a gown of claret-coloured velvet, a fine lace fichu covering her breasts and heavier lace edging the neckline. Short cap sleeves edged with fur decorated longer under-sleeves in the new fashion, and a matching fur trim graced the lower edge of the bodice. An elaborate necklace of diamonds and garnets lay over her fichu, and matching drops dangled from her ears. Catherine felt she had never seen Louisa looking so fine, and was grateful Lord Woodforde was not among those invited for the evening.

  Supper was soon announced, and at first Louisa’s plans appeared to be working precisely as she and Catherine had hoped, for the gentlemen stayed long with their port after supper, and by the time they joined the women in the drawing room it was obvious several of the party were already well on their way to being foxed. Card tables had been set up in the adjoining smaller drawing room, and Louisa urged the guests to join various tables that were being gotten up for games ranging from commerce to whist.

  But an unexpected hitch in their plans came when Lady Ellsworth tapped the marquess playfully on the shoulder with her fan, saying, “Come, Lord Edgecombe, I must have my best partner for a rubber of whist.”

  The marquess acquiesced with a bow, and accompanied Lady Ellsworth into the card room. Catherine, concerned that this might spell the end of their hopes for the evening, sought out Louisa.

  “What shall we do? I cannot play whist!” Catherine said, keeping her voice low. “Somehow we must persuade Lord Edgecombe to play vingt-un! It is the only card game at which I am proficient enough to have a hope of winning.”

  Louisa glanced through the drawing room doorway to where Lord Edgecombe was now settled at a whist table with her mother.

  “You must start a table of vingt-un not far from my mother’s table, Miss Trevor, and flirt with the gentlemen who join you. I have no doubt Lord Edgecombe will notice and will leave the whist table to join yours as soon as he is able.”

  “But I do not know if I have enough coin to last the whole evening,” Catherine protested. “I assumed I would play only part of evening, after the play got deeper and the gentlemen were more in their cups.”

  “If you run out you must make an excuse to go to the retiring room and I shall give you more,” Louisa said resolutely. “It is worth any amount to me.”

  “Very well,” Catherine agreed.

  “I shall ask one of my brother’s friends to play with you,” Louisa said, scanning the rooms to see who was not yet seated at a table with a game. She approached a slender young gentleman in a powdered wig who stood by himself indulging in a pinch of snuff. Catherine followed.

  “Mr. Hartford. Miss Trevor wishes to get up a table for vingt-un,” Louisa coaxed in the manner of a good hostess. “I am certain you would not wish her to be disappointed. Will you join her in a game?”

  “I am at your service, Miss Louisa Ellsworth, Miss Trevor,” Mr. Hartford said agreeably, pocketing his snuffbox.

  Catherine smiled charmingly at Mr. Hartford as she drew a card from the deck on the table Louisa led them to and held it out to Mr. Hartford to do the same. They displayed their draws, and, Catherine having the high card, she gained the first deal.

  Catherine found the one-on-one game with Mr. Harford very like the play she had practised with Lord Woodforde during his lessons, and proceeded with some confidence, winning as often as did Mr. Hart
ford. But this situation did not continue long, for seeing that their friend had the attentions of a very attractive lady to himself, three other gentlemen soon joined the game. Vingt-un was a game in which money could both come and go with great rapidity when there were several players, and Catherine struggled to manage to flirt and yet play skillfully enough to stay in the game with so many hands to pay off when she lost.

  Every few minutes Catherine dared a look at Lord Edgecombe’s whist table and saw by his hooded glances their way that he had noticed her, as Louisa had predicted. After about an hour’s play, Catherine saw the marquess rise from the whist table and approach. Catherine smiled flirtatiously in welcome, daring anything to draw him into the game.

  “Miss Trevor, gentlemen,” Lord Edgecombe said with a bow, “might I be allowed to join your table? It appears a most stimulating game.”

  The other players agreed to Lord Edgecombe’s addition to the table, and Catherine exhorted herself to play even more astutely. As before, Catherine found her luck to be good when she was the dealer, but when the deal was won by other players she struggled to win hands. Still, with the promise of being backed by more money from Louisa should she run out of guineas, Catherine played more boldly than she might otherwise have played, and managed to stay in the game as time passed. The play grew deeper and deeper, and Catherine noticed that servants watched the guest’s wine glasses closely, smoothly replacing empty ones with full. She suspected Louisa had given orders that this be done in order to encourage more fearless play, but Catherine drank nothing herself, wishing to keep her wits about her.

  After two hour’s play one of the four men at the table excused himself and left, and a half-hour later another gentleman chose to take his winnings and move over to a game of whist. It was now down to Catherine herself, Lord Edgecombe, and a Mr. Reynolds, a young sporting gentleman of Mr. Ellsworth’s age. The deal passed to Catherine with a natural twenty-one, and soon she had half of Lord Edgecombe’s pile of coins and all of Mr. Reynolds’s.

  “Demmed if I am not out of the ready,” Mr. Reynolds said, feeling his coat pockets. He drew out a gold watch and tossed it onto the table. “You will accept my watch as a pledge, will you not?” he asked Catherine.

  “Of course, Mr. Reynolds,” Catherine agreed. She proceeded to win that hand and one other before the deal passed again to Lord Edgecombe.

  This time Mr. Reynolds offered a signet ring, which Lord Edgecombe accepted. For once, Catherine suddenly found herself winning even though she was not the dealer. She won two high-stakes bets, after which Mr. Reynolds excused himself from the game, and then two more hands as well. Catherine’s heart began to beat rapidly. One more winning hand and she would have all of Lord Edgecombe’s money! She dealt and picked up her cards. Eighteen; a good hand. But it was not enough, for Lord Edgecombe had two face cards. Frustrated, Catherine hoped her streak of luck would return after the one loss, but instead her pile of coins began to dwindle. At last she was dealt a natural twenty-one and the deal was hers again. Boldly she raised her stakes, encouraging Lord Edgecombe to do the same. This time fortune was with her and in three hands Catherine had all Lord Edgecombe’s coins before her.

  “You have won Miss Trevor,” the marquess said. “I can play no more unless you will accept my marker.”

  “Come Lord Edgecombe,” Catherine said in a playful tone, giving him her most provocative look. “How daring are you? You have something of great value I am willing to accept as a wager.”

  “And what is that?” Lord Edgecombe asked, a smile playing on his lips.

  “Our betrothal,” she said, taking off the ring. “I know it is customary the pledge should come from you, but I am the one wearing the ring,” she said, placing it on the table.

  Lord Edgecombe’s smile vanished and he looked directly into Catherine’s eyes.

  “Let me be clear upon this, Miss Trevor. Am I correct that you propose if you win this hand I release you from our engagement and if I win you will give your word to become my wife with no more resistance?”

  “Yes,” Catherine said steadily.

  “Shuffle the cards, Miss Trevor.”

  Her hands trembling, Catherine shuffled the cards. She had to win this hand. She would win this hand. She was always lucky when she was the dealer.

  “Come Miss Trevor, deal the cards,” Lord Edgecombe encouraged when Catherine hesitated at the last moment, the deck in her hands.

  Taking a deep breath to help banish her nervousness, Catherine dealt. She looked at her cards. A ten and a nine—excellent! She glanced at Lord Edgecombe. Silently, he tossed his two cards face-up onto the table. A jack and an ace. A natural vingt-un. She had lost. As the magnitude of what she had staked on the hand hit her, Catherine felt the blood drain from her face and she slumped back in her chair.

  “Miss Trevor,” Lord Edgecombe said, a smile once again playing on his lips. “One should not so clearly show one’s emotions upon losing. It is not the end of the world. I am even willing,” he continued, picking up the cards and shuffling them, “to give you the opportunity to win all back.”

  “What do you ask I stake for such an opportunity?” Catherine forced the words from bloodless lips.

  “Your rose.”

  Catherine considered. If she won she would have her freedom, but the marquess was dealer and had an advantage. If she lost she would have agreed to marry Lord Edgecombe and give him her rose. If she refused the wager she would still have to marry Lord Edgecombe but could deny him the rose. Was it worth marrying him to spite him by denying him the rose he coveted? No. Small though the chance might be of her winning, especially when she was not the dealer, she must risk all for her freedom.

  “I accept the wager. Deal, Lord Edgecombe,” she said resolutely.

  Expertly, Lord Edgecombe shuffled, Catherine cut, and the marquess dealt the cards. Catherine’s heat sank as she picked hers up and looked at them. A ten and a four. It could hardly be worse. What should she do? She dared not stay on such a low total, but the odds were high she would go over twenty-one if she took another card.

  “Give me another card,” she said, and Lord Edgecombe tossed a card face-up onto the table. A two. Sixteen. Her heart sank further. She was going to lose again.

  “Another,” she croaked. He tossed her another. A three. Nineteen. She had just lost on a nineteen. Did she dare take another card?

  “I will stay.”

  Lord Edgecombe dealt himself another card. A four. Thank goodness she had not taken it, Christine thought, it would have put her over 21. Lord Edgecombe now had eighteen. He had to take one more card. Her hands clenched under the table as he took it from the top of the deck. A ten. Relief flooded Catherine’s body. She had won.

  Lord Edgecombe toyed with the ring Catherine had put on the table, holding her gaze with his. For a moment Catherine thought she saw a flash of something like regret or even sorrow within the dark depths of his eyes, but it was only a moment and his feelings were once more unreadable as they usually were behind his opaque gaze.

  “I thank you for a most interesting game, Miss Trevor,” Lord Edgecombe stated calmly. “I am sorry you have decided we would not suit, for I believe we should have dealt together most successfully. You have spirit and courage as well as beauty and breeding.” He stood, picking up the ring as he did so. “I will take this ring as it is a family piece, but please keep the gifts I have given you. I selected them from my collections especially for you, and it would be sacrilege for them to go to another. Good evening, Miss Trevor.”

  Catherine watched the marquess walk away, his tall erect figure so like Lord Woodforde’s. She felt a momentary pang that Lord Edgecombe lacked the two qualities she had discovered she required in a gentleman: compassion and understanding of herself. How much easier it would be, she thought through a sudden mist of tears, if only people were all good or all bad! But no, who among us is perfect? When at last Catherine blinked away enough moisture that her eyes could focus she saw Louisa standing at the
door to the room, looking at her questioningly. Understanding what Louisa wished to know, Catherine nodded. She had won. She was free.

  The following day the walls of Rosemont rang with Judith’s remonstrances upon hearing the news that Catherine had ended her betrothal.

  “What can you have been thinking of sister?” Judith expostulated, so upset she failed to comment upon the nursemaid’s tardiness in fetching the two elder children. “You are all of nine-and-twenty, nearly a score and ten years! Think you to find another gentleman of equal breeding and fortune willing to marry a woman of such advanced age? And the scandal of calling it off after settlements had been signed and the first banns called! I shall never be able to hold my head up again!

  “John,” she said, turning to her husband. “Surely it cannot be too late. Lord Edgecombe must listen to you. You have gone shooting together often and must have an ease between you. If you explain Catherine was not in her right mind at the time, that she had been drinking too much, then he must take her back.”

  John looked up from his newspaper in consternation, not approving his sister’s action, but not wishing to become personally involved.

  “I cannot think my interference would be welcomed, Judith,” he protested. “This is a matter than must be settled between Catherine and Edgecombe. It is none of our affair.”

  “None of our affair!” Judith shrieked. “None of our affair when we have a sister of advanced years who has broken a most eligible engagement? None of our affair when we shall be burdened with her support for the remainder of her days? None of our affair when this scandal is all that will be talked about every time we are seen in public?”

  “No Judith,” Catherine said, breaking into her sister-in-law’s tirade. “It is none of your affair, and it would in any event avail nothing for John to speak to Lord Edgecombe. I had nothing to drink last night, and I shall not change my mind about ending my betrothal to Lord Edgecombe.”