A Convenient Engagement
Page 7
“It would not be wise for you to continue any further, Miss Howard.”
The gentleness of the man’s voice was in extreme contrast to his countenance. Hannah was speechless for a moment staring up at him.
“I am his lordship’s butler, Magnus.”
Hannah knew who he was. No one in the square could mistake Rhone’s majordomo. She had only seen him from a distance, and the effect of his height and craggy features was even more extreme up close.
“The earl and I had an appointment. I sent a message when he didn’t arrive, but there was no reply.” She wished her voice didn’t sound so timid. “I was waiting in the foyer, but no one came back. When I heard the yelling . . .”
The butler’s eyes had become progressively narrower as she spoke.
“My deepest apologies for this breakdown in protocol, Miss Howard. We are having a difficult morning.” He considered briefly. “Please wait here.”
The butler disappeared into the room the voices had come from. There was a muffled discussion in low voices, followed by a loud cursing. Hannah was beginning to wonder if she had been forgotten again, when a large man in a kilt and rolled-up shirtsleeves exited the room.
“Miss Howard.” The muscular man bowed to her. “Please accept my apology. It’s been a bit hectic this morning.” He ran a hand through his hair—a gesture he had clearly executed many times already.
“So I’ve been told. Would I be correct in assuming you are Lord Rhone’s cousin?” Hannah was at a bit of a loss for protocol herself, under the circumstances.
“Aye, lass. Ewan Dalreoch, at yer service. Just give me a moment and I’ll get cleaned up. Gavan’s a touch under the weather, but I’d be honored to take ye to the dress woman.” He bellowed suddenly, “Bennett! Where are ye!”
A nervous man with a drooping mustache crept out of a door slightly farther down the hall. He approached the Scotsman with hunched shoulders. “Here, sir.”
“Help me get respectable. I dinnae want to bring shame to yon lassie.” He nodded to Hannah as he moved purposefully down the hallway with the smaller man in tow. “None of yer dandy business—just respectable.”
Hannah was about to take herself back down the stairs when she noticed the door to the first room had been left slightly open. Curiosity got the better of her, and she inched forward until she had a vantage point.
The earl was sprawled in an armchair, but his usual indolence had been replaced with tension. It seemed as though his body was trying to curl inward on itself. His skin was pale, with a sheen of sweat. His eyes stared listlessly at the carpet. There was an ugly sneer to his mouth that only disappeared long enough for him to take a swig from the whiskey bottle in his hand. The entire scene was so discordant with her last experience of Rhone that she took an involuntary step back. He looked up and their eyes met.
The depth of misery in his expression took her breath away. Hannah felt an echo of the years after her mother died—loneliness and the slow death of hope that life would ever be like it should. Knowing how she would feel if it were him intruding on her moment of weakness, she nodded and turned away.
As she descended the stairs, Hannah tried to catalog this new information. Despite their mutual agreement and the mind-numbing encounter in her hallway, Rhone was still very much a stranger. There was clearly more to him than the carefree aristocrat he pretended to be. She resolved to find out about her fiancé, beginning immediately.
Hannah sent a message to Jane and Mattie to go ahead to the modiste without her. She would follow behind with Mr. Dalreoch. Hopefully Rhone’s cousin would be willing to tell her what she needed to know.
The Scotsman was as quick as promised, and she soon found herself sitting across from him in Rhone’s comfortably outfitted coach.
“What is the matter with your cousin, Mr. Dalreoch?”
He considered her for a second before answering. “It’s his birthday.”
Hannah assumed more information would be forthcoming. She was at a loss when she realized that was all he planned to say.
“Are you trying to tell me that all that was because the earl got older?” Even Rhone couldn’t be that self-involved. Mere vanity was not responsible for the scene she had just witnessed.
The Scot’s surprised chuckle confirmed her suspicion. “No, although I doubt he’s overfond of that fact.” He smiled at the thought before his expression returned to seriousness. “Has he nae told ye about his parents?”
“He hasn’t told me anything, Mr. Dalreoch.”
“Typical, the blighter. Ye’ve a right to hear it—yer family now.”
Hannah felt slightly guilty about misleading him, but it was outweighed by her need for more information. “Then please tell me. I’d rather know.”
“Aunt Maggie was like a blazing fire in the form of a woman,” he began. “Red Maggie, they called her, before they called her the countess, and she was straight out of a legend.”
Ewan told Hannah about Gavan’s mother, the eldest of the Earl of Rhone’s two daughters. By the time Maggie was of age, she was a wild red-haired beauty and the jewel of the Scottish court. Her father doted on her endlessly.
When Red Maggie turned up pregnant, it was a harsh blow to her father. When it was rumored that the father of her child was the Earl of Courseclay—a man who already had a wife—the old earl was beside himself with rage. He swore he would turn the country red with the blood of Clan Courseclay and their philandering earl.
In an effort to pacify the situation, and keep an already tense Scotland from erupting in further conflict, King William proposed a compromise. He would recreate the Earldom of Rhone to allow Margaret to inherit in her own right. If she married before the birth of her child, the law would recognize it as the rightful heir to the title. The old earl immediately pressed a clansman into service. Seamus Dalreoch married Maggie and three months later legally became Gavan’s father.
While the law recognized Gavan as legitimate, the Scottish court was not as kind to him. The situation became further complicated by the birth of the Earl of Courseclay’s lawful son the same year Gavan was born. When he grew old enough to understand why everyone treated him differently, the hatred for his natural father and his peers was quick to follow. He spent more and more time studying and traveling abroad. During Gavan’s sixteenth year, Maggie died giving birth to a daughter. Gavan became the new Earl of Rhone and stopped returning to Scotland completely.
“He’s got a wee bit o’ a hang up, Miss Howard, about thinking it’d be better if he’d never been born,” the Scot concluded.
“It seems quite serious, Mr. Dalreoch.”
“Och, no. It’s nae so bad most of the time. His birthday is a bad day certainly, and anytime he sees his brother, but most days he’s the way ye know him.”
“Selfish and insufferable?” she asked.
“Aye,” he laughed. “And reckless. And ridiculous. And determined to bankrupt the whole clan giving away money to folk. He’s nae a simple man, Miss Howard, and I cannae yet call him a good one, but there’s still hope for him.”
* * *
Madame Baudette’s was a bastion of femininity and fashion. Mr. Dalreoch had stayed only long enough to arrange for the bills to be sent to the earl. After instructing Rhone’s coach to wait for them and confirming that Hannah did not require further assistance, he left the building in search of a milliner, of all things.
The events of the day had given Hannah much to consider. She was more than happy to let her subconscious tackle the conundrum that was her neighbor while her conscious tackled the acquisition of a new wardrobe. Jane and Lady Hawthorne were already settled onto a sofa waiting for her, sipping champagne and chatting happily over sketches and swatches.
“Is everything all right?” Jane asked quietly when Hannah joined them. Her aunt continued to exclaim over the French-inspired designs.
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��Yes and no. It will keep until later, though,” Hannah whispered. She reassured her friend with a squeeze of her hand.
“What kind of secrets are you two whispering about?” Mathilda asked pointedly.
“I was just telling Hannah what an ordeal it was to get you to put on a corset before we left,” Jane lied.
“It’s true. I almost didn’t come.” The statement was softened by the older woman’s wink and mischievous smile. The tail end of the comment was caught by the stranger that entered from the back room.
“Quelle horreur!” the new arrival exclaimed. “Every woman must visit Madame Baudette! To not come would be . . . une tragédie!” Her hands fluttered like sparrows while she spoke.
Hannah was transfixed. Her mother, Charlotte, had been French, coming back with Sir Thomas after he served in the war there, and she had gestured in just that way. The movements and the familiar accent brought a flood of memories from a happier time.
Madame Baudette pursed her lips and tapped them with a perfectly manicured nail as she looked over the women assembled before her. Her ringlet curls bounced happily when her gaze settled on Hannah.
“Aha! It is you. Eyes of honey and skin like peaches; just as your man says. Jusqu’à. Up.” The woman took her hand and lifted her to her feet. “Mon dieu! So tiny you are, like a little doll.”
She called out and a pair of pretty assistants hurried in. She gestured at Hannah, and they began divesting her of her clothing with alarming efficiency. When Hannah protested, the Madame overruled her effusively.
“You will be a work of art, mademoiselle, but I must know my canvas. Fais voirs.”
Jane and Mattie had gone back to the sketches and did not seem to be suffering from the same alarm as Hannah. She reasoned that this behavior was not considered unusual by her fashionable companions. In no time at all, she was stripped down to just her chemise and positioned on the raised platform in front of a barrage of mirrors.
“You are French!” the modiste exclaimed with elation, clapping a hand to her bosom.
Hannah looked around in bewilderment. “How can you tell?”
“Ah. Ma chère! Le derrière. This is French.” The woman grasped Hannah’s hips and turned her this way and that, making sounds of approval. “English women, they are balanced. Straight up and down, or wide and wide. But the French woman, she is not so predictable. Un mystère.”
Hannah was simultaneously pleased and mortified. The modiste’s storm of appreciation did not end there.
“A French woman, she is made for l’amour. She must have the hips to be grabbed, and la vie, the life, to be born from. But les seins, the breasts. They are subtle, they tease.” Madame Baudette augmented her explanation with gestures that, while not necessarily explicit, had turned Jane an alarming shade of crimson. Lady Hawthorne took one look at her and burst out laughing, drawing the Madame’s attention back to her companions.
“Oh. Je suis désolé. Please, apologies. This is not talk for les filles. We will make dresses now.” And make dresses they did.
When she was not waxing lyrical about the specifics of the female form, the Madame was efficient and organized. Hannah had a hard time finding anything to disagree with. Even Jane, who Hannah thought might disapprove of some of the bolder choices, was in complete accord with the Madame.
“Are you sure about the color?” she asked, holding up the vibrant tangerine silk they had chosen for one of her ball gowns.
“Oh, Hannah. That color is perfect for you. Just look at what it does for your cheeks,” Jane reassured her.
“I thought everyone was wearing pastels this Season. This might be too bright,” she said nervously. She stroked the fabric lovingly. It truly was beautiful.
The modiste stepped up onto the platform behind her and met her eyes in the mirror.
“Mademoiselle. Ma chère,” she admonished softly. She straightened Hannah’s spine with her palm and tilted Hannah’s chin so she was staring at herself in the mirror.
“You,” she said with conviction, “are beautiful. You are strong and fearless. This woman, she does not follow. She leads. Oui?”
Hannah looked at herself in the mirror; really looked. At first all she saw was herself, but as the Madame spoke in her ear, her reflection started to change.
She saw whispers of her mother. A hint in the line of her cheekbones. The curve of her neck. The way her hands met her wrists. Was this what people saw when they looked at her—a woman as beautiful as her mother?
She kept looking and saw her father’s autocratic nose, the stubborn set to her jaw that echoed his. She saw his ability to do exactly as he pleased and damn anybody who tried to argue. Hannah looked back into the eyes of the modiste.
“Oui,” she said. After that, there were no more questions about what everyone else was wearing.
With such decisiveness, the appointment went faster than expected. Dresses and gowns for every occasion were marked up, mostly in rich jewel tones that made Hannah smile just thinking about them. They had enough time left over for Hannah to convince Jane and Mattie to let her buy them new dresses as well. If they were going to take London by storm, all three of them would need to be at the height of fashion. After Hannah took her own turn sitting on the sofa making suggestions, it was time for them to leave Madame Baudette and her assistants to their work.
* * *
The visit to the modiste filled Hannah with a restless anticipation, so after they took Mathilda back to St. James’s Square, Jane and Hannah went for a late afternoon stroll. They didn’t go anywhere in particular, just enjoyed the sights and looked at the pretty shop window displays. They imagined the events that Hannah might wear the different ball gowns to. Madame Baudette had even insisted on a masquerade costume. That wouldn’t be ready for quite some time, as Hannah hadn’t even been invited to anything yet, but just the idea of it set her to smiling again.
“So what happened? Is everything all right with Lord Rhone?” Jane asked once they had exhausted their imaginations.
Hannah chose not to tell Jane about what she had seen or her discussion with Rhone’s cousin. Some things were not hers to tell. “He was extremely unwell when I arrived, but Mr. Dalreoch assured me he should recover soon.”
“That’s terrible that he’s feeling poorly, but isn’t it nice to know he didn’t forget the appointment?” Jane mused with unfailing optimism.
Rhone had forgotten, and he had been drunk, just as Hannah surmised. He had not been asleep, and he had been in residence. Two out of four were not awe-inspiring results in Hannah’s book, but she was prepared to extend him some leeway given the circumstances. Her own recent experience with public disdain gave her some indication of how life must have been for him. Hannah wasn’t willing to judge him harshly under the circumstances.
Speaking of public disdain; people were still giving her a wide berth on the sidewalks. How on earth they identified her so quickly was a mystery Hannah would love to solve. Jane noticed her observing their fellow pedestrians’ distance.
“It will get better,” Jane promised. “Once the new dresses are ready you won’t stand out so much, and after Rhone announces your engagement, people will be clamoring to make your acquaintance.”
“How can you be certain?” Hannah wanted it to be true, but it was hard to imagine at the present.
“Many people snubbed us after father’s investments collapsed. Not our true friends, but the fickle ones.” Jane smoothed the front of her skirts. “Eventually they found someone new to shun, and mere financial troubles paled in comparison.”
Hannah stopped walking. “That’s awful. You had to wait for someone else to become a more popular victim?”
“Unfortunately.” Jane smiled and her tone brightened. “It won’t be like that for you, though. Once you’re a countess, people will decide your behavior was deliciously outrageous rather than snub-worthy.”
As they rounded the corner to enter St. James’s Square, Hannah stopped short again. A familiar bulky figure was loitering in the square watching the doorway to Number Fourteen. She grabbed Jane’s arm.
“What is it? What is the matter?” Jane asked, spinning around at Hannah’s tug on her arm.
“It’s Lord Powell,” Hannah said under her breath.
“Who is Lord Powell?” Jane looked around conspicuously.
She dragged Jane behind the thin cover of a sapling. “He was my neighbor in Suffolk.”
Jane lowered her voice to a whisper. “Why are we hiding from him?”
“The last time I saw him was the day after my father died. I had to have the footmen remove him from my house.” Hannah’s neighbor had never been accused of an abundance of intelligence, but even he should have understood the basic protocols of the mourning period.
Jane’s eyebrows rose into her hairline, registering shock.
If only it had been just that. “He insisted that I must marry him. Despite my ‘unfortunate bosom and unnatural notions,’ he said he would do the honorable thing and take me to wife.”
“How dare he!” Jane said loudly before looking around furtively and resuming her whisper. “What did he do when you threw him out?”
“His father terminated my lease.” Hannah had been forced to accept the hospitality of her housekeeper’s daughter until she could secure suitable lodging.
“How horrid!” Jane’s last exclamation had been a little too impassioned.