by Burnett, May
***
The sky was overcast when they set out shortly before the appointed hour, and the maid walking behind them was carrying three umbrellas. “The cool weather should make it easier to identify our quarry,” Milla said. When they arrived in the park her estimate proved to have been optimistic. There must have been at least three hundred people in sight, even discounting the children and nannies. Could Chatteris be a nanny? Anything was possible, Abigail supposed, as she walked sedately over the gravel paths.
As commanded, Milla had put aside the veil. She wore the most elegant walking dress she had brought from Dorset, partly covered by a warm black redingote. Her dark locks were mostly hidden by a black satin hat; only the fair face was visible. Against the dull black it drew the eye – those luminous blue eyes under black lashes were out of the common, but Abigail was unsure exactly what made Milla quite so attractive. She walked with her head proudly erect, her shoulders back, and her face reflected a defiance that seemed to hint at underlying vulnerability. Whoever caught sight of Milla looked again, intrigued, and they had not walked very far before people were asking each other who the beautiful stranger in black could be. Abigail was too far away to listen to those conversations, but she could imagine them, word for word.
Would anyone recognize her? She had changed considerably since she had left town in her desperate flight from scandal, but the overall features were still the same. She felt exposed in this open space, so familiar from past times. She had walked in this very spot before her come-out, with her friend Susan – Lady Susan Winthrop, Lord Barton’s sister. He had stopped by once, astride a magnificent bay gelding, and jumped down to talk a few minutes with them. Would he still own that horse? Very likely. It had only been some three years ago, even if it seemed another lifetime.
“Miss Trevelyan!”
Abigail turned her head.
“So it is you! My, you have changed, but you still look like your Papa, the Captain.”
Abigail curtseyed. “Lady Mowbray. You look well.”
“Will you introduce your companion to me?” The elderly baroness eyed Milla with lively curiosity.
“Lady Mowbray – Lady Fenton,” Abigail complied reluctantly. Lady Mowbray was a noted gossip, but if not her, someone else would have stopped to talk to them.
“Lady Fenton?!” the older lady exclaimed in lively astonishment, while Milla inclined her head and drawled, “How do you do, Lady Mowbray.”
“Weren’t you a Northcote before your marriage?” Lady Mowbray avidly followed up on this interesting information.
“Indeed,” Milla said coolly, shooting Abigail a look that she could easily interpret: get this boring, nosy woman away from me.
“I wondered what had become of you,” Lady Mowbray said to Abigail. “You missed the last Season.”
Abigail smiled faintly. “There are better ways to spend the time. I find I prefer country living.”
“Then what brings you to town now?”
Before Abigail could think of an evasive answer, a number of Lady Mowbray’s acquaintances drew near, and the baroness immediately introduced them – Miss Bentinck, Mr. Broderick, Major Featherley, Lady Rompling-Coates. Abigail noted with vicarious pride that their lessons and practice paid off: Milla greeted each of these people with the right degree of politeness, and remembered every name and title. She ignored the curious and admiring gazes she received, and behaved with admirable calm and composure. Abigail craned her neck, trying to look around the small crowd for any mysterious strangers stalking them. There was a massive blond fellow who kept well back – could that be Chatteris? She also looked for any trace of Lord Barton, but unless he possessed a cloak of invisibility, he was not nearby. She felt an irrational pang of disappointment at this conclusion.
Now that the dam had broken, other people came to talk to their new acquaintances, and some drifted away. By the time Milla and Abigail approached the Serpentine, they must have met at least three dozen people, any one of which might lead a double life as B. Chatteris. The blond man was still following at a distance, but he might merely be walking in the same direction at an unusually leisurely speed for a tall man.
“Abigail? Can it be you?” A former schoolmate was air-kissing her cheeks. What was her name?
“I am Lady Maxley now,” the young woman said before Abigail had to expose her ignorance. She smiled weakly.
“You remember those boring French lessons we shared? What have you done since your come-out? You were gone so completely, some of us thought you were travelling with your father in the West Indies.”
“He would never take me. In my father’s view, female family members do not belong on a warship.”
“Quite right,” a young officer who had been staring wistfully at Milla turned his head towards them. “Much too dangerous, and distracting to the men.”
Abigail did not reply; she was still grappling with the notion that people whose name and existence she had totally forgotten claimed to have wondered and speculated about her whereabouts. Maybe she had not been as totally ignored and disregarded as it had felt at the time. She would have to think about that later. Right now Milla needed her help to field the many questions from these new acquaintances. She had let slip where they were staying, probably a mistake – though it would have been ferreted out soon enough, and Chatteris already knew.
A young blonde lady in a high-perched phaeton, seated next to a fashionable buck holding the reins, was looking down at Milla and Abigail with well-bred disdain. Because they were impeding the traffic with the knot of people around them? As the phaeton came to a stop, waiting for people to step aside, one of the gentlemen saluted. “Miss Rowan, your servant.”
Miss Rowan briefly nodded to him from her elevated seat, but then looked straight ahead, signalling that she did not wish any further contact. A few seconds later she was far away, behind those high-stepping greys. The name sounded vaguely familiar, probably from the social pages of the journals Abigail had read in her Dorset exile. Miss Rowan was the very picture of a leading debutante. She well remembered the type from her own Season.
As they were walking back towards the hotel – without the eager gentlemen who had offered to escort them – Abigail asked Milla if she knew the young lady. It was unlikely, as Milla had spent all her life in Cornwall and Dorset, while this Miss Rowan must be a recent graduate from some aristocratic nursery.
“Never heard of her,” Milla said, as expected. “Why?”
“I am trying to remember where I heard or saw the name before. She drove by, but was not interested in getting to know us.”
“Maybe she felt jealous of me.” Milla was unconcerned. “You don’t suppose she could be in league with Chatteris?”
“Unlikely, she is too young. She would still have been a child when I came out, and at the time when you were widowed.”
“No doubt. Do you suppose any of these people in the park was Chatteris? If so, he must have used a different name. Since all of them seemed to know each other, it seems unlikely on the face of it.”
Abigail had to agree. This whole expedition had been a monumental waste of time.
An hour later Lord Barton came to the hotel to confirm this conclusion. It turned out that the blond man she had suspected was an investigator he had hired to ferret out Chatteris. This expert had not been able to identify their elusive tormentor in Hyde Park; he rather thought that Chatteris had not been present at all. In case the walk was only intended to lure them away from the hotel, Hendrickson had placed a guard outside their suite, but nothing had disturbed its quiet. “We are no further than before,” Lord Barton concluded glumly.
Abigail described the throng of new acquaintances they had made in the park, and the interest people were taking in Milla.
“That reminds me,” Lord Barton said apologetically, “I shall not come to call on you again here, now that your identity is known; and if we should meet in public, Lady Fenton – Milla – we should act distant and avoid each other.
”
“Of course,” Milla said after a startled moment.
“I pulled the trigger and shot the bullet that killed the man for whom you are supposedly in mourning,” he spelled it out more clearly.
“I should have remembered that,” Abigail said guiltily. “It is very true, Milla. It would be useless to pretend mourning if you then socialise with the man who killed your husband.”
“Yes, yes, I understood the first time. Nobody must guess that he did me a favour in pulling that trigger.”
“Any suspicion of that kind would be fatal,” Abigail said, appalled at Milla’s frankness. “To both of you. Oh dear.”
Lord Barton bowed. “That does not apply to you, of course, Miss Trevelyan. We are old acquaintances, and, I hope, friends. When you are not with Lady Fenton I need not keep my distance.”
“But until further notice, I shall be with Milla – Lady Fenton. She needs me, and has no-one else,” Abigail stated firmly.
“If there is urgent news, I shall send my brother Barnaby. I have told him all.”
All? Abigail felt hot and cold and opened her eyes wide.
“All that he needs to know and that is my right to tell, I mean,” Barton quickly amended with a reassuring glance at her. “I had better take my leave now, and hope nobody recognizes me downstairs.”
They bade him farewell and looked at each other as soon as the door closed behind him.
“I should have been more careful about involving him,” Abigail said. “Only, I know him as an ally, and Susan’s brother; I did not consider how it would look if his name was linked with yours in any way.”
“Well, so far it has not been,” Milla said optimistically. “Let’s not invent additional problems. We have plenty of real ones.”
Abigail could only agree.
Chapter 8
Quite early the next morning Milla and Abigail were trying to decide over breakfast whether the ordering of new hats or of shoes was of greater urgency, when a loud, furious knock at the door caused them to look at each other in alarm.
Abigail called for their maids and directed the older one to open the door, but not to admit anyone she did not know. Their sitting room was not in immediate view of the entrance to their suite, and both ladies waited in tense silence as the servant followed these instructions.
A tall, familiar form appeared behind the maid. “Milla! Miss Trevelyan! So it is true!”
They exchanged a glance of puzzled dismay. “Hello, Rob,” Milla said with studied nonchalance. “We were not expecting to see you here.”
“Obviously not, or you would not be staying at a common hotel. I do not expect circumspection of you, though you are my cousin’s widow, but had you no thought for poor Miss Trevelyan’s reputation?”
“Just a moment,” Abigail said, “I can take care of my own good name, Lord Fenton. You are not a member of my family, and thus have no say in my actions.”
“And whose fault is that? We could be engaged or married now, had you but said the word. I thought you needed time to forget someone … but I cannot stand by and let you throw your reputation away, Miss Trevelyan – Abigail - merely to abet Milla in whatever nonsense she has taken into her pretty head. I suggest we immediately announce our engagement, and I’ll remove you from here to some more respectable abode.”
“Thank you, but no,” Abigail said coldly, striving to hide her annoyance at this unflattering proposal. “As you have guessed, I do not love you, Lord Fenton, and must decline your very obliging offer.” She did not suppress the sarcasm in her voice.
“Don’t say that,” he entreated, realizing he had truly angered her. “I am sorry if in my dismay I spoke with less than the sincere affection and respect I entertain for you, Miss Trevelyan. But you may not know what led me here. It concerns you both.” Lord Fenton drew a rolled-up newspaper from the pocket of his greatcoat.
“Have some tea, Rob,” Milla said, pulling the Viscount towards the breakfast table. He sank into an armchair, but impatiently waved away the offered cup. “Do explain how you found us.”
“I arrived in town yesterday, around lunchtime. After leaving my luggage in the house of a friend, I immediately went to call upon you at your stepmother’s house, Miss Trevelyan. Imagine my surprise when neither of you was in residence. Mrs. Trevelyan assured me that she was in excellent health, and had been for the past year; she had no idea you were even in town, but was most alarmed to hear of it, and thanked me for alerting her. She expressed her determination to carry you back under her roof.”
“Oh dear. I wish she had remained in ignorance.”
Rob smiled grimly. “No doubt. I returned to my friend’s place feeling like a fool. To distract me from my worry over you, Paul took me to the theatre last night. There I heard the first mention of the beautiful Lady Fenton, during the intermission. Upon learning that I was the current Lord Fenton, a number of impertinent persons wanted to know all about you, and what you were doing in London. In ignorance myself, I fended them off as best I could.”
Abigail could not blame him for feeling aggravated; she even forgave him for the way he had frightened her with that loud knocking. “Did one of these people tell you we were here in this hotel?”
“No. That never came up. I found out your direction from the papers. Brace yourself, Milla, Miss Trevelyan, it is bad. Here, you had best see for yourself.” Rob held out the newspaper, folded to a particular page. The headline read, A Fatal Beauty?
Milla stood stock still, a strange expression on her face. After a glance at her Abigail gingerly took the paper and began to read aloud.
“All of England was shocked when two years ago one of the most peaceable, easy-going young noblemen in fashionable society killed Viscount F. in a duel in Cornwall. The true motive was never disclosed, though a trifling insult offered to Lord B’s fair sister was then taken to be the cause.
To general surprise, Lord F. had contracted a marriage shortly before the unfortunate duel. His young widow spent the mourning period, nearly over now, at his Dorset estate in suitable isolation. Yet now the widowed Lady F. has come to town, and caused an immediate sensation when she recently appeared in the park in the company of Miss T., daughter of the well-known naval hero Captain T. Lady F.’s delicate beauty is described as irresistible.
So far, so good. Persons of delicate sensibility and strict moral rectitude are enjoined to read no further.
It has been asserted by several credible witnesses that Lord B., whose fatal bullet felled the unfortunate Viscount F., has secretly visited his victim’s widow at the Hotel Bonnard. This intelligence throws retrospective doubt upon the cause of the duel between the two Viscounts … illegal and yet never duly punished, for whatever reasons.
Is the beauteous Lady F. a femme fatale? Was it for love of her that Lord B. challenged and killed her husband? Why would she agree to receive, innocently or not, the man to whom she owes her widows’ weeds? Questions that will be asked until satisfactory answers emerge.”
“I suppose it is true Lord Barton was here?” Rob asked heavily. “You might as well confess. Surely you know that I am your friend, and since I have inherited the title and name, it is my responsibility to keep it free of scandal. Whatever trouble you are in, you might have done better to tell me all before you got embroiled in this mess.”
“Lord Barton came to see me,” Abigail declared swiftly, before Milla could open her mouth. “He is an old acquaintance – his sister Susan, over whom he fought the duel with Milla’s husband, is my best friend.”
“You? Not Milla?” Rob did not sound too surprised; flattering really. “Then the paper has got hold of the wrong end of the stick?”
“Entirely.” Milla threw Abigail a grateful look. “I know him, of course, as his sister is married to my brother, but Lord Barton is nothing to me.”
“A gentleman still does not call upon an unmarried young lady in a hotel,” Rob observed. “How did he even know where to find you?”
“I asked him
to come, to discuss a family matter concerning his sister Susan,” Abigail glibly explained. “It was all entirely innocent. I was never alone with him for a moment, Milla was present throughout.”
“I am sure it was innocent as far as you were concerned, but it might have been better to meet him somewhere else. No wonder people are gossiping. What a muddle.”
Rob was back to his normal steady mood. Abigail breathed out in relief.
The Viscount was not done scolding, however. “You do realize you placed the poor man in an impossible situation? If it is believed that he forced the duel on Milla’s husband in order to free his wife for his own benefit, Barton might yet face a murder charge.”
“That is so absurd, none of us could ever have thought of it,” Milla said heatedly. “I don’t even like Lord Barton, he is too much like his self-righteous sister for my taste. And he thinks of me as a child, from the time when we first met. I had nothing to do with that duel.” She defiantly crossed her arms in front of her body and straightened her spine.
“Indeed,” Abigail supported her. “I was staying with Susan’s family at the time. There never was the slightest attraction between Milla and Lord Barton. Any such suspicion is ridiculous.”
“All well and good, but unless this can be straightened out you might as well renounce any hope of being accepted by fashionable society, Milla. You see how quick the paper is to place the blame for the duel on you, though now I consider it more calmly, that has to be nonsense. You are so pretty and rich that many less favoured women will be only too glad to find reasons to ill-speak you. However mistaken in its assumptions, this article is a catastrophe.”
“I cannot help it if stupid gossipmongers jump to false conclusions,” Milla declared with a stubborn jut of her pretty chin.
Rob sighed. “I suppose I had best call upon Barton and see what he has to say for himself. And warn him to stay away from you in future.”