Miss Treadwell's Talent

by Barbara Metzger

  “Her friends are bound to know something,” she said loudly enough for the duke to hear, hoping to give His Grace some reassurance. Max might have given up, but Maylene had not.

  Lady Tremont nodded. “And who knows? Perhaps Max will think of something next time.”

  “There will not be a next time if I have any say,” Hyatt told Maylene. “Can’t you see what this is doing to Mondale? How can you be so cruel?”

  “As cruel as giving him no hope at all? As sitting back and waiting for Lady Belinda to waltz in the door herself? I told you, my lord, this is not an exact science, with guaranteed results. His Grace knew that and was willing to chance having his hopes dashed. But Mama still seems convinced that the girl is not in peril.”

  Her mother, he thought to himself, was also convinced that she’d been chatting with an immortal mutt.

  She was smiling again in that softer way reserved for Max. “We have one last inquiry tonight, dear. This is a complicated situation that needs your assistance. Nine years ago an infant was put out for adoption. His name was Francis. Yes, I know the new family would have changed it; that’s why we need your help. You could track the boy down for us. You see, his true mother wants to make sure he is well provided for.” Lady Tremont opened her eyes to look at each of the guests at her round table. “Let us all imagine the anguish of a young woman, forced to part with her flesh and blood, thinking she was doing the best for her child. But a mother never stops loving her babies.” She glanced toward Mondale. “Nor a father, either, I suppose. In any case, the dear mother is now in a position to help her boy if he needs it, to smooth his way in life as no one helped smooth hers. Think about her search, my friends, and focus your mental energies on Mademoiselle Lafontaine, so Max can guide us to her son.”

  Try as she might, the only mental picture Maylene had was of Fleur’s jewel-draped décolletage. Heaven knew what Hyatt pictured, but he was smiling.

  After a minute more of silent concentration, Lady Tremont wiped a tear from her cheek. “Such an affecting story, don’t you think, Max? Can you help? What’s that, dear? Alex smells water? Bah!”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Never doubt a good dog’s nose. Alex just might have had more bravery than brains, more grit than gray matter, when he tore into that fire after his master, but he could smell water.

  Lady Belinda was not aboard a ship of white slavers, as her father feared, but she could hear the waves washing ashore from her room at the humble inn outside Brighton.

  Joshua Collins, meanwhile, was being soaked by his wife’s tears as he lay on his sickbed, barely conscious of the basin of water she was using to bathe his fevered brow. Her wedding ring was all she had left to sell now, to pay for his care. “You have to recover, Josh, you simply have to. I couldn’t live without you. Why, I’ll throw myself into the ocean if you die, see if I won’t.”

  As for Lord Shimpton and his search for the perfect dog…he spent the entire next morning trying to find members of the new Kennel Association, to ask about water dogs. In the afternoon, he was promised to Lord Hyatt, to see about a carriage and horses. Hyatt was annoyed he’d agreed to bear-lead the bone-head, and Shimpton was terrified of the imposing earl. Thankfully, the transaction at Tattersall’s took no time at all, for Sir Howard Whitten had overplayed his last hand the evening before, and was down to his last shilling. Hyatt got to spend less time in the chinless clodpole’s company, and Shimpton got a yellow-wheeled landau, two highbred bays, and the unemployed driver, for a song. Frederick thought his mother would be proud.

  Shimpton also thought he’d drive round to Treadwell House to invite the ladies for a spin. Now that he had the carriage, perhaps Lady Tremont and Miss Treadwell would put their minds to finding him a bride. Acquiring the carriage had been easy as pie, the viscount told himself. How hard could it be to acquire a wife?

  Harrison, the new driver, though, advised him that the horses were too fresh for a sedate stroll through the park. After standing so long, they needed to run before facing city traffic. So Shimpton agreed to ride out along the Richmond road for a bit before calling on the ladies. He quite enjoyed having eyes follow his handsome equipage as they left London behind. Of course, he’d be more pleased to have a companion sitting beside him on the burgundy leather seats—a four-footed companion.

  Once they left the metropolis, traffic grew thinner, and no one was around to admire the landau and its new owner. The scenery grew boring, one tree looking very much like another, and the back of Harrison’s hat was even less entertaining. Shimpton thought he’d take the reins. Harrison scratched his head. He’d been hired on to drive the bays and see they were groomed proper-like. That swell Lord Hyatt had made sure he understood. But the toff hadn’t said anything about handing the ribbons over to any flap-eared flat in a puce waistcoat. Then again, the coxcomb was paying Harrison’s salary; the Corinthian wasn’t. “Can you drive, m’lord?”

  “Of course. All gentlemen can drive. It’s in the blood, don’t you know?”

  Harrison knew the nobs’ blue blood was so thin they had to keep their snoots elevated so they didn’t have nosebleeds all the time. He pulled up at a small inn and waited for his employer to climb up to the bench. Then he got down. He might be crazy to hand over the bays, but he wasn’t stupid enough to put his own neck on the same line. “I’ll wait here, m’lord, and order yer nuncheon.”

  “Food? Excellent, idea, Harrison. Wouldn’t have thought of it m’self. I can see we’ll rub along fine. You do like dogs, don’t you?”

  For lunch? Harrison tugged his cap, slapped the nearest rump, and headed into the inn.

  Now this was more like, Shimpton thought, as the bays stepped out smartly. The breeze ruffled his neckcloth and a dairy maid waved to him. As be guided the horses around a corner, though, waving back gaily, he realized the girl hadn’t been waving her greetings; she’d been warning him that her cows were coming behind her along the road. Shimpton tried to slow his cattle. Unused to his hand on the reins, the bays did not respond, so Shimpton tried to pull them over to the side of the road. But the breeze caught the end of his poorly tied cravat and flapped a square of linen in his face. Shimpton jerked on the ribbons. The cows were getting closer. The horses whinnied. Shimpton whimpered. The landau’s wheels ran off the roadway.

  The uneven terrain unnerved the frightened bays even more, so they thought they’d run away from it. Then one wheel hit a rock. The landau tilted, tottered, then tipped Shimpton right out into the ditch at the side of the road. The horses kept going.

  With all the rain they’d been having, the ditch was half filled with water—murky, muddy water, not improved by the cows’ passing. Even Lord Shimpton realized this immersion did not count as his monthly bath. He tried to pull himself up, but the steep banks were slippery, and his boots were filled with muck, so he kept sliding back down into the thigh-high water.

  What would his mother do? Shimpton wondered, sitting in the ditch. She’d yell at him to stop being a nodcock, that was for sure. He tried to consider what Lord Hyatt would do, but could not quite imagine that out-and-outer ditching his carriage, much less appearing in his dirt, and that of Richmond. The incident in the park had to have been a freak accident, undoubtedly Miss Treadwell’s fault. So he decided to take Lady Crowley as his example. She never seemed to give up nor to lose her composure. She wasn’t impatient with him, either, unlike Miss Treadwell, who was so competent she’d likely build herself a flying machine to get out of the ditch. Lady Crowley would just keep on, the way she did when that husband of hers never came to talk with her at Lady Tremont’s. Inspired, he decided that he’d walk back to the inn, in the ditch, once he figured out which direction to take.

  After he’d waded for a bit, though, the viscount heard a pitiful whimpering. It wasn’t coming from him, he was sure, so he looked around. And there, on a half-submerged rock, shivering and sodden, clinging with its last ounce of strength, was his dog! Alex had said he smelled water, and here was water, sme
lly at that. And here was the most pathetic little creature on earth, waiting for him, Frederick, Lord Shimpton. No other being had ever needed him, no other life had ever depended on him. Shimpton reached out and lifted the tiny infant animal, then tucked it under his own wet coat, babbling words of comfort. He used the rock to boost himself out of the ditch, the sooner to reach the inn and warmth for his new friend.

  As he trudged the last few yards, he rejoiced. The spirits hadn’t lied! Lady Tremont and Max had to be smarter than anyone he’d ever known, wiser even than Mumsy. “I’ll call you Neptune,” he told the wee beastie that trembled against his chest “The god of water—at least I think he was. Miss Treadwell will know. But you won’t care, will you, Neptune, now that you’ve got me to care for you?”

  And Lord Shimpton’s new dog, Neptune, agreed in the only way he knew how. He meowed.

  *

  Once he’d seen the simpleton Shimpton off in his new rig and checked on the repairs to his own curricle, Lord Hyatt met up with Mondale. It was all he could do to keep the duke from heading down to the docks to question everyone he could find about recent sailings of the brigand brotherhood.

  “You cannot believe that claptrap about water, can you?” Hyatt asked. “Granted the lady did a masterful job with Nelson, but to suppose that a dog that’s been dead for over ten years can sniff out a young woman on a merchant ship is preposterous.”

  “Preposterous, but I have nowhere else to turn. The Runners have no new reports, and the longer their search takes, the colder the trail.”

  Hyatt couldn’t argue with the duke’s reasoning, only his results. “Perhaps Miss Treadwell will be able to gather a few more hints from Belinda’s friends.”

  “Ah, then you have come around to thinking the young woman might be helpful after all.”

  “One or two of her ideas seemed reasonable,” the earl conceded. “I still think she is a conniver and an adventuress, but, yes, she might turn up some information the Runners have missed.”

  “And you’ll help her get close to the gels at the Belvedere do?”

  Hyatt nodded. That chore could not be much worse than towing Shimpton through Tattersall’s.

  “Good, good. And don’t look so downpin about it. I’m sure you’ll find the baroness and her daughter as delightful as I do if you stop looking for chicanery. They are kind, caring women, Soc, if you could but see it. And deuced attractive, too, both of them. You hadn’t used to be so cynical.”

  He hadn’t used to be conversing with dead dogs, either.

  Leaving the duke to his cabinet work, Hyatt decided to visit the jewelers, to buy a parting gift for Aurora Ashford. He hadn’t been to call on her, hadn’t invited her to meet him at his Kensington hideaway, and hadn’t missed her at all. Obviously her charms had palled on him, so it was time to let her find another lover, if she hadn’t already. He’d stop in at Drury Lane’s Green Room to find a replacement mistress, he supposed, as soon as he got around to it. There was no hurry. Perhaps his concern for Belinda had dulled his appetites for other women. Something had. Socrates refused to consider that that something might be a prickly spinster with a poodle’s topknot and a card shark’s conscience.

  Diamonds for the dashing widow, of course. Hyatt nodded at the first tray of bracelets the shop owner showed him. The most expensive of them would be cheap, if it saved him a scene of tearful recriminations. He took the cowardly way out and signed the back of one of his cards, for the messenger to deliver along with the gift. As he turned to leave the shop, a strand of pearls on one of the counters caught his eye. They were small but perfectly matched pearls, with coral beads separating each, and a coral and diamond chip fastener. They’d look lovely, his treacherous mind whispered, with shell pink crepe.

  He doubted the silly baggage had any jewels to wear to the Belvederes’. She’d have had them on the night they all came for dinner, he reasoned. A duke, an earl, and a viscount surely demanded a female’s finest folderols, even if the duke was nearly old enough to be her father, the earl was nearly engaged, and the viscount was nearly as bright as a green bean. And the duke was correct: Miss Treadwell ought to have some finery for the ball so no one would question her right to be there. Socrates knew he couldn’t purchase the pearls for her, of course. Oh, he could present her with a filigree flower holder, a fan, or some other trifle, but nothing more, not without setting the cat among the pigeons. But the duke could. Mondale was going to escort the Treadwell ladies as an old friend of the family, and as such he could give the daughter of the house a birthday present, belated or early. His Grace would be pleased to reward Maylene for her efforts on his behalf, and he seemed to like the chit, besides.

  Did Mondale like her too much? Socrates wondered, letting the pearls sift through his fingers. Could His Grace be thinking of marrying again, a younger woman who might still give him the son and heir he never had? Socrates felt as if he’d been punched in the stomach—worrying about his friend, of course. Jupiter, what a dance the minx would lead him! But no, Mondale was no fool, even if he was half convinced Lady Tremont had some influence with the afterworld. He was merely concerned with getting his daughter back, Socrates told himself.

  He had the clerk wrap the pearls and send the bill to Mondale, then he picked out a pretty fan with mother-of-pearl inlay on the sticks. Hyatt decided he’d sign Shimpton’s name to the flowers he’d select for the ladies, for the whopstraw would never think to do it. Satisfied, Socrates left the shop, whistling. Now he wouldn’t be embarrassed to be seen dancing with the chit.

  *

  With all of the investigations they were undertaking, and all the preparations for their attendance at the ball, Maylene had to make lists of her lists. Her mother and her great-aunt were out shopping again, taking Nora to help with the selections. Campbell’s nephews were out checking with shipping offices, in case Mondale’s Bow Street Runners had missed something. His Grace had provided a miniature for them to carry, in hopes someone would recall such a pretty young woman.

  Lady Belinda was so pretty, Maylene thought, no one would ever forget her, especially no one destined to be her husband. She compared the heiress’s features to her own wayward curls—the combs never stayed where Monsieur Vincente said they should go—and her not quite straight nose. And her all too straight chest.

  Lady Belinda might lie near water, but Maylene was drowning in self-pity. She decided to go for a walk.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Deuce take it, did the wretched female never have a care for her own reputation? There she was, strolling down Oxford Street, merry as a grig, with neither maid nor footman in attendance. Hyatt recognized Miss Treadwell’s outdated straw bonnet instantly, and the way she carried her head, as if eager for life’s next surprise. Yes, his pearls would suit her—Mondale’s pearls, of course.

  Socrates would have kept going on his way to his sparring match, but Miss Treadwell turned down the next corner. It was one thing for her to wander alone through the busy streets where she might be subject to rude stares and lewd suggestions. Only her reputation would be damaged. But for her to venture down narrow, less populated avenues was foolish beyond permission. His hands clenched into fists at his side, just thinking of some varlet waylaying the silly chit in an alley. Dash it, if Miss Maylene was going to be insulted, accosted, and manhandled, he was the man who was going to do it, none else.

  He crossed the street and followed her, calling out as she paused in front of a doorway to check the number against a piece of paper in her hand. Another of her infernal notes, Hyatt supposed. Why couldn’t she be at home with her embroidery like every other wellborn woman? Then again, Belinda wasn’t sitting with her tatting either.

  “Miss Treadwell, good afternoon.”

  Maylene hadn’t been walking fast; why, then, was she suddenly out of breath? Not because of his lordship, of course. She’d seen many more attractive men this morning, well, one or two, she supposed. Most were dressed in the same biscuit pantaloons and midnight superfi
ne, though few of the Bond Street strollers could match Hyatt’s broad shoulders or raffish tilt to his beaver hat. Few of them had looked at her as if she’d crawled out from under a rock, either. She curtsied, offering a reluctant, “Good day to you, too, my lord.”

  Hyatt pretended to look back and forth along the narrow street. “Odd, I did not see your maid duck into one of these closed doors, but she must have, mustn’t she?”

  Maylene sighed. Of course his lordship would have to be at hand when she was bending Society’s strictures. He was right to find fault, however, only if her behavior was any concern of his. It was not.

  “Oh, my maid twisted her ankle,” she fabricated. “Since I had a mere few more blocks to go on my errand, I left her on a bench outside the lending library.”

  Hyatt could not picture Miss Treadwell leaving an injured servant to suffer while she traipsed about Town.

  “Oh, she was not badly injured. Nora merely needed a rest.”

  “Nora? Isn’t she your mother’s dresser? The iron-haired woman with the rheumatics in her joints? I could swear I passed her in Bond Street not twenty minutes ago, along with your mother and Mrs. Howard.”

  “Yes, well, I have an appointment, my lord. If you’ll excuse me?”

  “No.”

  “Pardon? I thought you said no, you would not excuse me.”

  “For once you heard right, Miss Treadwell. With any luck you will even understand. I cannot in good conscience leave a gently bred female alone on the streets of London. Who knows if whatever befell Belinda is still at large, to say nothing of the average cutpurse or footpad.”

  His jaw was clenched; he was not going to be budged. Maylene inclined her head. “Very well, you may accompany me, although such a sacrifice on your part is entirely unnecessary, I am sure.” She opened the door without knocking and stepped into a cluttered hallway filled with desks, filing cabinets, and clerks at long tables. “You can wait here in the outer office.”