by Jane Feather
“How fortunate,” he said with an unmistakable touch of acid.
Chastity's eyes narrowed. She would not have this man criticizing her friends, however implicitly. She said with deliberate insult, “I'm sure, if you have difficulty paying your share, he would understand.”
He sat up abruptly. “What are you implying?”
That if you're looking for a rich wife, one has to presume you need money to maintain your lifestyle.
“Nothing at all,” she said. “What could I be implying?”
“I have no idea, that's why I'm asking.” His voice was rather quiet and had a note that Chastity didn't like one bit. She was beginning to feel that she'd stepped into a rather hazardous quagmire.
“I wasn't implying anything,” she said, aware of the inadequacy of the denial. She was going to have to watch her step around Douglas Farrell. She'd allowed her secretly formed adverse judgment of him to spill over, and that would never do. “I'm sorry if I offended you,” she said. “I didn't mean to. I only thought that it must be an expensive business setting up a Harley Street practice.”
Now, deny that, she thought. It was exactly what he'd said to the Go-Between.
“Certainly it is,” he agreed readily. “But I don't believe, Miss Duncan, that I've ever given you any intimate information about the state of my finances.”
“No,” she said, lowering her eyes to her lap. Not as far as you know, Dr. Farrell. “I spoke out of turn,” she said quickly. “But you annoyed me by criticizing my friends.”
There was a short, loaded silence, then he said, “I apologize if I gave that impression.” He leaned across the narrow space dividing them and laid a hand over hers. “Can we put this behind us, Chastity?”
She could feel the warmth and strength of his hand through her thin kid gloves. It was oddly unsettling but for some reason she made no attempt to withdraw her hand. She offered a tentative smile in answer to his question and he simply nodded, leaving his hand where it was as they sat in a silence that was both companionable and slightly confused until the carriage drew up outside the Duncan residence. Douglas jumped down and extended his hand to help Chastity alight. There was no overt familiarity this time, but his hand gripped hers firmly until she was on solid ground, when he released it almost reluctantly.
“Good night, Chastity.” He gave her a half bow.
“Good night, Douglas. Thank you for bringing me home,” she responded, and hastened up the steps to the front door.
Douglas waited until she had disappeared inside, then paid the hackney and sent him on his way. It was only a short walk to Wimpole Street and he could do with the air, cold though it was. He was puzzled and he needed to clear his head.
What had Chastity been getting at with that dig about his financial state? There had been something underlying her insult. He could accept that she'd been responding to a perceived criticism of her friends, but he still didn't understand why she'd said what she'd said. He'd certainly not given the impression of being short of money. At least he didn't think he had. There was nothing in his appearance, in his garments, in his manner, to indicate that he was not a gentleman of respectable means. In truth, he was, or would be if all his spare funds weren't swallowed in the great maw that was his slum practice.
Harley Street would redress the balance, once he could get it up and running. But to do that quickly and successfully he needed an injection of capital. He thought of Signorina Della Luca, conjured up the image of her narrow-faced countenance, only to have it superimposed by the Honorable Chastity Duncan's fuller features, glowing hazel eyes, and radiant complexion. She had a sweet smile too when she chose, but an adder's tongue when she chose. There was a puzzle there, a paradox of some kind, and he could not deny that he was drawn to her.
He didn't want to be drawn to her, or to any woman. As he knew from bitter experience, emotional ties merely led to painful complications. He simply needed a rich and suitably positioned wife who would be at least complaisant about his life's work. The Go-Between had offered such a prospect, it was up to him to follow through.
As if coming to some decision, he thrust his hands into his pockets and fingered the crisply engraved visiting cards he'd collected that evening. Contacts were as important as capital, and he'd made a few of those tonight.
Chastity spent a rather restless night. She was cross with herself for indulging her urge to sting the doctor a little, and she also felt miserably uncomfortable at having caused him pain just to satisfy what struck her now as a purely malicious self-indulgence. Avoiding pain to others came naturally to her and in general, despite the quickness of tongue shared by all the Duncan sisters, she went out of her way to avoid slights or unkind remarks. So, what had come over her last evening? She didn't like the man, but that was no real excuse, and he hadn't actually done anything during the evening to stimulate her dislike. Rather the opposite, if she was brutally honest.
She was awake at dawn when Madge crept in to rake out the ashes and rekindle the fire in the grate. “Oh, sorry, madam. Did I wake you?” The girl looked up from her knees in genuine distress when Chastity sat up in bed.
“No, I was awake.” Chastity pushed aside the coverlet. “I'll light the fire, Madge, if you'd be a dear and fetch me some tea.”
“You light the fire, madam?” Madge looked horrified.
“I'm quite good at it, actually,” Chastity said with something approaching a grin. She knelt down in front of the grate. “Are you looking forward to Christmas, Madge?”
“Oh, yes, madam. Auntie—Mrs. Hudson, I mean—she told me all about the servants' dinner.”
“We have a good time,” Chastity agreed, poking the coals until a spark rose. And there would be a child this year, she thought. Sarah's presence would make the celebration even more special than usual.
Madge went off to fetch tea and Chastity remained on her knees in front of the fire, warming her hands as the fire crackled. The wind rattled the windowpanes and the flames spurted. There was something about winter that thrilled Chastity, gave her energy. Prudence and Constance both liked the summer, energized by the heat of a broiling day through which they always managed to remain cool and collected. Chastity wilted in the heat. She thought it was perhaps because her sisters were so much thinner and taller than she was. They were sunflowers. She was some other kind of flower, smaller and closer to the ground . . . a snowdrop that bloomed in the snow. But it was a fanciful metaphor and she gave it up with a little shrug of exasperation.
When she went downstairs later she was surprised to find the breakfast room empty. Her father's place had been cleared and the newspaper, read and refolded, placed at her own plate. Jenkins came in with a pot of coffee. “Good morning, Miss Chas.”
“Good morning, Jenkins. Has my father breakfasted already?”
“He came down early and went out ten minutes ago. He said he had an errand to run.”
“At this time of day?” she questioned, helping herself to toast. “How strange.”
“Yes, I thought so too,” the butler agreed. “Would you like a boiled egg, Miss Chas?”
Chastity thought about it, then shook her head. “No, just toast, thank you. I'll be going to Kensington to see your sister after breakfast, to pick up the post, and then I'll probably visit Prue, so I doubt I'll be back for luncheon, but Prue and Con are coming over for dinner this evening.”
“Yes, so his lordship told me. I gather Mr. Ensor and Sir Gideon will not be joining us?”
“I doubt it. We want to ambush Father into giving a dinner party before Christmas.”
“I see,” Jenkins said. “Then I will check on the cellar. His lordship is bound to want to know what we have.” He bowed and left her to her breakfast.
She finished quickly, skimming the newspaper as she ate, then hurried upstairs to fetch her coat and hat. She would collect the post for The Mayfair Lady and the Go-Between, but she also had another motive for visiting Mrs. Beedle this morning. It had occurred to her that the sho
pkeeper might have some more recent information on Douglas Farrell. Had he left the Kensington area and the insalubrious St. Mary Abbot's, now that he claimed to live on Wimpole Street and practice on Harley Street?
She was standing in the hall, checking the set of her hat in the mirror, when Lord Duncan came downstairs, impeccably clad in a gray tweed frock coat and matching trousers, and carrying a gray top hat. He also carried a large bouquet of chrysanthemums and autumn daisies and a parcel wrapped in brown paper tucked under one arm.
“Good morning,” Chastity greeted him with a smile. “I didn't realize you'd come back. What lovely flowers, such wonderful autumn colors. Who are they for?”
Her father looked just the slightest bit self-conscious. “I promised the Contessa Della Luca that I would lend her that book of engravings that your mother bought when we were in Italy. Unfortunately, I couldn't lay hands on it yesterday afternoon, but I found it last night, so I thought I would call upon her this morning.”
And the flowers? mused Chastity to herself. Her father looked like a man who was going courting, she thought. It would be a good idea to assess the situation for herself, see how he was received by the lady. “If you'd like some company, I'll come with you,” she suggested casually. “I was going to pay a reciprocal call on Laura and her mother one morning soon. Today is as good as any other.”
She couldn't tell whether her father really liked the idea or not, but he was too polite to refuse her company. “Well, that would be very pleasant,” he said. “By all means, join me, my dear. But didn't you have other plans?” He glanced pointedly at her outdoor garments.
“None that were fixed in stone,” she said cheerfully. “Did you send for Cobham or will we take a hackney?”
“A hackney, I believe. We have to become accustomed to managing without our own transport now that Cobham is retiring,” Lord Duncan said. “I understand Prudence has everything in hand.”
“Yes,” Chastity agreed. “Cobham mentioned to her that he was ready to leave London and retire to the country, so she found him a cottage on the estate.”
“Your sister has her own household affairs to attend to now,” Lord Duncan declared, gesturing that his daughter should precede him through the front door. “I must learn not to rely on her as much as I have been doing. Or you, Chastity, my dear. You'll be setting up house for yourself soon enough.”
“I am not looking to do so, Father,” she said. “It doesn't strike me as a matter of urgency.”
“Well, maybe not, maybe not. But it's the way of things, my dear. I used to think I'd have all of you on my hands forever, and now look. Both your sisters married in less than a year.” He shook his head, but he didn't sound displeased.
“Respectably too,” Chastity said with a mischievous smile, linking her arm in his. “That's what I find surprising.”
“It is rather surprising,” Lord Duncan agreed, waving his cane at an approaching cab. “Considering that they are not in the least respectable themselves. Any more than you are. Although, to look at you, butter wouldn't melt, as they say. But then, your mother was the same.” He opened the door for Chastity, offering his hand as she stepped in.
A perfectly ordinary, gentlemanly courtesy, Chastity reflected. Dr. Douglas Farrell could use the example.
They chatted idly as the hackney took them to Park Lane and drew up outside a substantial residence overlooking Hyde Park. The contessa was clearly a very wealthy woman, Chastity thought as she stepped onto the pavement, waiting while her father paid the cab. The contessa had said she had bought the house, not hired it. A mansion of this size and in this location would be worth a king's ransom. Now she was thinking like Douglas Farrell, she realized crossly. Assessing the woman's wealth with all the crudity of a fishwife.
However, the sensible little voice persisted, her father could do with a helping hand when it came to his bank balance, and the Signorina Della Luca would surely have sufficient inheritance to fulfill all the doctor's dreams.
A liveried footman opened the door to them. It was the most extraordinary livery, reminding Chastity of a costume at the opera, all gold braid complete with a cocked hat. The massive entrance hall was filled with Italian statuary and vast paintings in gilded frames. The ceiling moldings had been painted a Renaissance blue and etched in gold leaf. It was all quite dazzling, but what would be perfectly in keeping with a Florentine villa was startlingly out of place in a Georgian mansion on Park Lane.
Chastity glanced at her father and saw that he was looking utterly bemused. “I think our hackney was a magic carpet,” she murmured in his ear as they followed the braided footman towards a set of double doors to the right of the hall. “We seem to be in Renaissance Italy.”
Lord Duncan gave her a look that combined disapproval with amusement. The footman threw open the doors and announced with a thick Italian accent, “Lord Duncan . . . the Honorable Miss Chastity Duncan.”
The contessa, with a warm smile of greeting, rose from a gold and white sofa with gilded scrolled arms. She was dressed in a silk saque gown of dark green with a pale yellow trim, her hair concealed beneath an elegant but old-fashioned turban. She came forward, hand extended. “My dear Lord Duncan, Miss Duncan, how good of you to call so soon.”
Chastity's gaze was riveted to the couple standing beside one of the tall windows looking out onto Park Lane. Laura Della Luca and Dr. Douglas Farrell. They had seemed to be in animated conversation, but now both turned towards the visitors.
“I'm tempted to say, ‘We can't go on meeting this way,' Miss Duncan,” Douglas remarked with a cool smile as he gave her his hand.
Last night they had been on a first-name basis, she remembered. Was he trying to erase the easy familiarity of the evening by returning to social formality? Perhaps he didn't want Laura to think that he'd been on such friendly terms with another woman. If so, that was quite promising and she would follow his lead. “We do seem to keep running into each other, Dr. Farrell,” she agreed, shaking his hand quickly before turning to Laura. “How are you, Miss Della Luca?”
“Very well, thank you, Miss Duncan,” Laura responded with the same formality. “It's so kind of you to call. I was just saying to the dottore that the door knocker hasn't been still this morning. That charming dinner party at Lady Malvern's the other evening has brought us many visitors.”
“Yes, people have been very welcoming,” the contessa said. “Oh, how delightful,” she said as Lord Duncan, with a little bow, presented his flowers. “Laura, my dear, ring for Giuseppe to bring a vase and coffee. Do sit down, Lord Duncan, Miss Duncan.”
“No coffee for me, dear lady,” Lord Duncan said with a wave of his hand. “Never touch the stuff after breakfast.” He sat down on the sofa beside his hostess and laid his parcel on the sofa table. “I found the book of engravings I was telling you about yesterday.”
“Oh, how lovely,” she exclaimed with clear, unfeigned pleasure as she unwrapped the book. “What will you have instead of coffee? Sherry, perhaps?”
Lord Duncan's preferred tipple was whisky but he consented to sherry. Laura pulled an ornately fringed bell rope by the fireplace. “Yes,” she said, “apart from the dottore, we have received calls from Lady Bainbridge, Lady Armitage, and Lady Winthrop.”
“Such charming people,” her mother murmured absently as she turned the pages of engravings.
“You rang, signora.” The braided liveried footman bowed in the doorway. Laura handed him the flowers and gave him instructions.
Douglas said quietly to Chastity, “No ill effects from the jellied eels, I trust.”
She shook her head. “No, none. How about you?”
“Only bad dreams,” he said with a chuckle.
“Oh, do you sleep badly, Dottore?” Laura rejoined them, her question sounding rather eager.
“Only when I eat jellied eels,” he responded.
“Jellied eels?” She stared at him in blank incomprehension. “What are they?”
“A Cockney delicacy,” Ch
astity told her. “And you'd be well advised to stay clear of them. They are quite revolting.”
Lord Duncan looked up from his book. “What's this about jellied eels?”
“Dr. Farrell and I ate them in Covent Garden last night,” Chastity explained.
“Good God, whatever for?”
“A very good question, sir,” Douglas said. “Your daughter challenged me to eat them.”
“Doesn't sound like Chastity's kind of thing at all,” his lordship stated firmly. “You must be mistaken.”
“No, sir, believe me, I am not.”
“No, Father, he's not,” Chastity said. “I did challenge him and he challenged me back, so we both ate them.”
“What a very strange and indelicate thing to do,” Laura said, looking down her long nose. “Jellied eels, how vulgar.” She gave a fastidious little shudder.
“As in food pertaining to the common man,” Chastity pointed out. “As I'm sure your Latin will tell you, Miss Della Luca. You must be very familiar with the ancient language of Rome after a lifetime spent in Italy.”
Laura looked momentarily put out, almost as if she had detected the snub, but the opportunity to pontificate was not to be missed. “But of course,” she said with a decisive nod. “Vulgar . . . vulgaris. You must be familiar with the language of the ancients, Dottore. It is the language of medicine, is it not?”
“Some of the old textbooks, certainly,” he agreed. “But I prefer to use modern texts.”
“For modern ailments,” said Chastity. “Do you think in our modern society we're developing new illnesses, Dr. Farrell?”
It was an interesting question and Douglas had opened his mouth to respond, when Laura cut off his opening words, stepping in front of Chastity so that she was excluded from the conversation. “I am a martyr to insomnia, Dottore. A martyr to it. Is there anything you would recommend? I have tried valerian and belladonna, to no avail. I hesitate to take laudanum, of course—the juice of the poppy, so addictive.”