Scandalous Innocent

by Juliet Landon

  ‘I’d like to know,’ Phoebe said, ‘which particular cook told her about Signor Luigi Verdi giving me fencing lessons.’

  ‘It hardly matters now, does it, love? Though you might have wondered where the case of rapiers came from and who provided the lad’s clothes,’ said Mrs Overshott, picking up a white garment from the top of the mending pile. She held it up for inspection, lifted an eyebrow, folded it again and passed it to Phoebe. ‘This is one for you, I believe.’

  Phoebe took it without comment. ‘Where did they come from?’

  ‘Probably from the Duchess’s own closet.’

  Phoebe stared at the garment for some time and then, instead of replying, shook it out, found the long slit on the sleeve, and proceeded to search for a strip of fine lawn from which to make a patch. There were some questions, she thought, that were best left open-ended.

  About an hour later, a guest was announced.

  ‘Sir Leo? I thought we had agreed…’

  He bowed, and replaced his plumed hat. ‘Mrs Overshott, ma’am. Mistress Laker. We did agree to leave today free, I know, but I’ve found that I cannot do it, after all.’

  ‘Do what, sir?’ Phoebe’s heart began to pound.

  ‘Spend a day without you, sweet lass. I’ve come to your door, you see, begging you to see me, to favour me with a smile. Anything.’ His face, though not exactly smiling, held a twinkle behind the eyes that was not entirely innocent, and his mouth would not keep still.

  ‘Ah,’ said Phoebe, recognising the game with some relief. ‘Are you by any chance the gentleman who said he’d never be coming to my door?’

  ‘I regret to say that I am that man, Mistress Laker.’

  She couldn’t keep it up. Lifting her arms to him, and regardless of Mrs Overshott’s presence, she took his face between her hands and kissed him. ‘Then you are most welcome, Sir Leo. Come and sit with us while I finish mending your shirt. I cannot think what you’ve been doing to tear it so.’

  ‘It happened in a careless moment when my attention was being distracted,’ he said, soberly.

  Stitching away in her corner, Mrs Overshott did not see the blush that stole along Phoebe’s neck. But Sir Leo saw it, his smile full of mischief.

  PART TWO 1803

  Chapter One

  After the bright midsummer sunshine of the garden, the cool hallway of Ferry House was almost black until Phoebe’s eyes adjusted to the dimness. Scooping up the letter that lay on the silver tray of the hall table, she was unable to read its details until, passing into the sun-washed parlour, she saw that it had been franked, sealed with red wax, and addressed not only to her on one side but also on the reverse with that of the sender. The only person to send her franked and sealed correspondence was her mother in London, but this handwriting was surely a man’s, bold, large and stylish.

  She turned it over. “Ransome,” it read. “Greenwater, Mortlake, Surrey.”

  Viscount Ransome. Phoebe’s hand pressed hard against her ribs where a deep resonance had suddenly become uncomfortably loud. Sitting on the padded arm of the nearest chair, she quickly broke the seal, spread out the folds and read the briefest of messages.

  Dear Madame Donville,

  I beg to inform you of my intention to call on you at Ferry House on the morning of the sixteenth day of July, 1803, to discuss a matter of some importance. I trust that this short notice will not inconvenience you.

  I remain, Your Humble Servant, Ransome.

  Phoebe frowned. Yes, my lord. Yes, it will inconvenience me greatly. I’d as lief have my brother Ross and his moaning wife call on me at no notice at all, than you. And that’s saying something.

  Tomorrow. He was to call on her tomorrow on a matter of some importance. Which could surely mean only one thing: the unfinished business of three years ago when she had forfeited her mama’s protection in London to place herself well beyond the reach of men like him, her well-meaning mama having insisted, as she always did, that this time she had found her a suitor who would do very nicely. For various excellent reasons, Phoebe had strongly disagreed, as she always did, and had then snatched at the chance of starting a new life here in the peace of Richmond. In less than a week, she had fled.

  If she had known at the time that Lord Ransome would purchase a house not far from her brother and his wife in Mortlake, she might not have been so keen to move in this direction, Mortlake being only across the bend of the River Thames. But although she had not been by any means penniless, Ferry House had cost her nothing to buy since it belonged to her eldest brother Leon, who had found no use for it and had never visited.

  Studying the handwriting, she could see how close it came to revealing what she already knew about the man, self-confident and aggressively direct, even when requesting to be received. In fact, this was not a request at all, was it? Whether she was inconvenienced or not, he would be visiting her. Yet it was not his habitual arrogance that had once put her off wanting to know him better, but his reputation for fast living in the beau monde, the excesses, the waste, the lack of responsibility. It was a style that had once been hers too, before her widowhood, so she knew exactly what it entailed, what kind of people, what kind of ethics. After that, she had rejected it for a life out of the public eye, more wholesome and private for her grief, and better by far for the young daughter she must bring up alone, Claudette. She had not regretted it for a moment, not even the irksome proximity of her older brother Ross and his sickly but remarkably fecund wife Josephine, who visited too frequently and without warning.

  There was an older sister, too. Mimi, Lady Nateby, and husband George lived in extended family conditions in nearby Twickenham, their brood increasing every two years, their infrequent visits to Ferry House reflecting their unconcern with Phoebe and her young daughter of eight-and-a-half. It barely signified—she and Mimi had never been particularly close.

  Brother Leon, the eldest of them all, had been the one to offer practical help when Phoebe had most urgently needed to escape their mama’s ceaseless matchmaking. Like her, Leon had wanted none of it and, so far, had managed to hold on to his bachelor lifestyle that allowed him to waste his inheritance as if time might run out on him. Once Phoebe had left the family home on Harley Street, her mother and her much younger new husband had moved to St James’s Square, leaving Leon to do pretty much as he pleased, without interference, with what wealth remained to him after his addictive gaming at London’s best clubs. With the family now split apart and Phoebe tucked safely away in his house at Richmond for as long as she wanted it, Leon appeared gradually to have forgotten his siblings’ existence. All of them. Only his mother, Lady Templeman, knew exactly what he got up to.

  For the first two years, he had intermittently sent funds to Phoebe when his winnings were high, but this generosity had dwindled to nothing over the last year, and she had now ceased to expect any more help. Her large well-stocked kitchen garden was, however, a source of income, providing fruit and vegetables for the house, the villagers, and for many of the local inns and coaching houses. Consequently, she was managing to live quite comfortably and to support several dependants and a staff of seven, one of whom was Claudette’s governess. So the very last thing she needed, she told herself, folding the letter up and stuffing it into the pocket of her apron, was a visit from the exquisite Lord Ransome, who apparently laboured under the misapprehension that a twenty-six-year-old widow with a young daughter must now be desperate to know what he had to offer. Even one who had run away three years earlier in order not to hear it.

  Guiding his team of showy chestnuts across the park towards Richmond, Lord Ransome gradually slowed them to a walk as the house came into view. Through the trees he could see that it was more extensive than he’d thought, though the brief information he had received only a few days ago in London was sadly insufficient in every respect. It had been a pleasant surprise to him to learn that this was the house to which Leon Hawkin’s sister had fled three years ago, but the knowledge had also caused him to r
evise his plans, which would now depend, he supposed, on the lady herself. He was under no delusions. She would take more than a little persuading, for she was no innocent chit of a girl.

  Smiling, he recalled the haughty, heavy-lidded dismissive blink of her amazingly dark eyes, refusing even to please him with an answer to his invitation, as if he’d invited her to an orgy instead of a drive in Hyde Park. Any other woman would have blushed, stammered and accepted, but not Madame Phoebe Donville, lusciously dark, aloof and self-contained, daring a man to lay a finger on her for whatever reason.

  Undoubtedly, her personal tragedy had made a big difference to her, placing her at a distance from the frivolous superficiality of the haut ton as if she had just discovered how close life was to death, and how grief afflicted the high-born as well as the lowly. He had seen her before her whirlwind marriage to Claude Donville when she had been willing enough to flirt, to dance all night, to accept every invitation and to reject suitors with a nonchalant laugh. He had not been one of them then. Nor could he have called himself a suitor after her widowhood either, when her pushy mother had pursued every likely candidate on her daughter’s behalf. No, he had never got that far. But neither had anyone else.

  Unlike Madame Donville’s pushy mama, he himself had been able to tell when a young wife with an infant was disinclined to put herself back on the marriage mart so soon, while she still grieved over the terrible events concerning her husband. And although he would have pursued her had not Donville got to her first when she was a lass of sixteen, as a young widow she had eventually put herself beyond anyone’s reach, quite literally.

  The half-smile remained, remembering how his disconsolate friends placed bets on her remarrying, or not, within the year, and how they lusted after her while pretending that she was too hot to handle, too cold, too prickly to bed, too contemptuous of their empty flattery to offer them the slightest hope. Well, it would be interesting to see how La Dame Donville would react to his news, and whether that celebrated composure would show any sign of melting after three years in rural Richmond.

  At last he came upon the large redbrick house behind the iron gates. Stone urns brimmed with bright summer blooms like fountains of colour dripping on to a cobbled courtyard. Through a gate at one side he could see steps leading down to green trellises blanketed with white and pink roses, borders spiked with delphiniums and foxgloves. Without a doubt, he thought, some hard work had gone into the making of a garden like this.

  The house was another revelation, seventeenth century with newer additions, a central porch with a gable, and two wings forming a letter E with the main facade. High walls with double doors and a gateway extended backwards to form a rear courtyard, every part of it neat and clean, its angles softened by trees and topiary. She would not willingly leave such a place, thought his lordship as he drove through the gates into the courtyard.

  His groom ran to the horses’ heads, but already a young coachman man had come rushing from the stable-block, eyeing the chestnuts in silent admiration, if one could ignore the whistle through his teeth. ‘M’lord,’ he said, touching his hat, ‘the mistress is expecting you, but I’ll take you in through the front, if you please.’

  ‘Stay with the horses,’ Ransome told him. ‘I can find my way.’

  The short walk gave him a chance to see the view from the opposite direction: the rise of Richmond Hill at the front of the house and the river close by on the other side, peaceful, secluded and spacious. It was close to paradise here. Pheasants strutted across his path as he reached the front porch, removed his hat and entered, giving the bell-handle a gentle tug in passing. The hallway was dark after the bright sunlight, and she seemed to appear from nowhere before his eyes could adjust.

  He was used to assessing any female at one glance or, at the most, two. This time, while noting the tall slender figure, his eyes were riveted by the perfect oval of her face and the long neck sloping flawlessly into her wide shoulders, her bountiful hair piled high in black silken curls with no widow’s cap to cover it, the huge almond eyes behind half-moon lids and the lofty brows that tapered to fine points on her temples. The full mouth did not smile in greeting, nor had he expected it to, though her voice held no hint of the annoyance she must be feeling. Nevertheless, his bow was punctilious.

  ‘Lord Ransome,’ she said, executing a shallow curtsy with a graceful incline of her head. ‘I have no butler or footman, as you see, and my housekeeper is otherwise engaged. Will you come into the parlour?’

  Their eyes met for a second review, probing for the exact level of remembrance, criticism or approval. As greetings go, he thought, that was probably as good as he’d any right to expect. ‘Madame Donville,’ he said, ‘thank you for receiving me at such short notice.’

  ‘I’m convinced there must be an adequate reason for it,’ she said, leading the way into the parlour. The sun was still on the other side of the house, but the previous day’s warmth still lingered in the pale green panelling and on the polished floor scattered with mellow Persian rugs. Light from the sash windows bounced off an arrangement of ox-eye daisies and sweet peas, mirrored in the table top. ‘Is there some news from London that brings you here?’ she said. ‘My mother? My brother? I have not heard from Lady Templeman for almost ten days.’ Immediately, she could have bitten her tongue, for she had not intended to part with even the smallest snip of information, either about herself or her family. It was as much as she could manage to invite him into her private parlour although, on reflection, she had little choice in the matter. He was not the kind of man to whom she ought to give any personal information, for there was no knowing what he would do with it.

  She watched him as carefully as a cat watches a bird too large for her to catch unawares. He was powerfully built, but he moved as gracefully as a greyhound, every gesture practised and polished, his hands strong and clean. Yet there was no disguising the bulge of calf and thigh beneath gleaming Hessians and tight buckskins. His dark blue coat fitted smoothly over broad shoulders that would not have disgraced a prize-fighter, and not even the folds of his plain white neckcloth could hide the muscled neck and strong square jaw emphasised by trimmed sideburns.

  She sat, indicating that he should do the same and, as he flicked aside the long tails of his coat, she saw the top of his head where thick waves of dark brown hair had been raked back from his forehead to reveal a widow’s peak, which, she thought, was a style few men could manage as well as he. Oh, yes, he was as handsome as she remembered him, and well worthy of his nickname, Buck Ransome, which had not been awarded exclusively for his appearance, either.

  She had debated, during the sleepless hours of last night, whether she ought to ask Cousin Hetty to be present at this interview, but had then decided against it. After all, she was a mature widow in her own home in the company of a mature acquaintance, and he was unlikely to do or say anything to shock her. If it was indeed a proposal he’d come with, she would rather dear Hetty, her companion of many years, didn’t hear it. Arranging the folds of white jaconet muslin over her knees, she folded her hands on her lap and waited, quite unaware of the picture she presented to her visitor. The sun had lightly bronzed her skin, but fashionable peaches and cream were for her a thing of the past, and now she told herself that his detailed scrutiny of her meant nothing. He would do the same to any passable female, of that she was certain.

  ‘You may be sure, madame,’ he said in reply to her questions, ‘that I have good reason for disturbing your peace. I would not have come without one, after our last unprofitable meeting in London.’

  ‘May I offer you some refreshment after your journey?’ she replied, not lifting a finger to convince him of her sincerity. It was not the way a perfect hostess ought to behave, she knew, but she suffered no pangs of guilt. As for his reference to their last meeting, she had banished it from her mind along with many other uncomfortable encounters forced upon her by Lady Templeman, in her zeal.

  ‘Thank you, no,’ he said. ‘Not if it m
eans you preparing it yourself.’

  ‘I do have servants,’ she retorted, letting go of more information.

  ‘I gathered as much. The place is immaculate. Perhaps you’ll show me round before I leave?’

  ‘Unlikely, my lord. I have a house to run. Now, would you mind very much telling me what I’ve done to deserve so much of your precious time? If you have no news from my London relatives, then I cannot imagine what else could interest me.’

  ‘Three years have had little effect on your sharp tongue, madame. My interesting news, as it happens, does concern your eldest brother.’

  For the first time, her eyes widened enough to show him the blue-whites. ‘Leon? Oh…is he…is he all right? When did you see him? Where?’

  ‘The Surrey climate suits you well,’ he said.

  She knew she deserved that. ‘Tell me about Leon,’ she demanded.

  ‘He’s all right. No harm. We met at Brooks’s a few nights ago.’

  ‘Then you’ve come…ah…I see. He was at the gaming tables, of course. And you’ve come to tell me he’s lost more money. How much? Who to? Does my mother know?’

  ‘He was at the tables, as you say, madame. And Lady Templeman probably knows by now, as will a good many other people, that he lost again. How much? He lost the entire Ferry House estate and all its contents.’

  There was nothing for him to see. No histrionics. Phoebe’s composure was uncanny, but he could feel the shock his words had caused, settling deep in her heart and refusing to move, and he was sorry for it.

  ‘To you,’ she whispered, hoarsely. ‘He lost it…to you. Why else would you have come with such news?’

  He nodded, once. ‘To me. I have his note here…’ His hand moved towards his breast pocket, but was halted by her cry of despair.