“But surely if they see me—”
“They will see what they want to see,” Jason responded grimly. “You must recall even the truth is not all that exonerating. Your Aunt Cass was always considered an eccentric, and there’s no way around the fact you were part of the Sultan Selim’s harem. If Yardley had kept his mouth shut . . . but that’s of no account now. I cannot call him out without making the—”
“Call him out!” Penny cried. “Surely you would not. You could be killed.”
Light gleamed in his lordship’s eyes. “Would you mind, Penelope? Would you truly mind?”
“Idiot,” Penny murmured, lowering her sky blue eyes before they could give away all her secrets. “You must know that once was quite enough for you to risk your life for me.” Abruptly, she turned her attention to pouring out the tea.
Absently, the earl accepted his cup, fixed just the way he liked it. “Very well,” he said at last, “I suggest a compromise. But do not say I did not warn you. You may stay in town tonight. This afternoon we will drive in the park at the hour when at least half the ton takes to Rotten Row in an effort to see and be seen. You may be roundly snubbed, but you will be seen in a setting where we may move on if anyone is rude. And . . . yes, tonight I shall take you to the opera. We will invite Brawley and perhaps one or two others, for there, too, you may be seen for the lady you are in a situation where we can control who enters my box.”
“I trust Mrs. Coleraine will not be one of the party.”
The earl’s temper flared . . . and died, as he noticed his wife’s lips twitch in an effort to keep her countenance. The minx! “She will not,” he said shortly. “And, after that, it is back to Shropshire for the both of us, I think, for, truthfully, I have not the heart to send you back alone.”
At this, Lady Rocksley’s lips trembled with another emotion entirely. “Will you truly come with me? That is all I ever wanted, you know. For you to—” Horrified by what she had nearly let slip, Penny broke off, fixing her concentration on her tea and a tasty almond macaroon.
Lord Rocksley promptly took advantage of this opportunity to study his wife. Her light golden brown hair gleamed in the sunlight illuminating the drawing room through a series of floor to ceiling windows overlooking a fine garden. Her enticing figure was perfectly accented by the cut of the blue gown, so similar in color to the garments once worn by Gulbeyaz. Her lips were full and marvelously pink, though it was plain to see she wore no paint, as had the child-woman in the seraglio. Her lashes dusted cheeks flushed with color not brought on by the heat from the nearby fireplace. And her chin . . . ah, yes, that was as set and determined as ever. Or was it? Was that a quiver he detected?
It occurred to Jason that he had, perhaps, a motive other than compassion for treating his wife with kindness. Possibly even a reason beyond his vague urge to settle down and set up his nursery. Here before him was the woman of the dreams, the one he had feared lost forever. And, surely, she had not come all the way to London and bought trunksful of new clothes merely to please herself?
Tonight, he and the White Rose—he and his wife, he amended—would be alone together in their adjoining suites of rooms upstairs. The perfect opportunity to accomplish what had been so long delayed. Jason’s mind flooded with exotic images. Dancing girls, diaphanous silks, his wife crawling beneath the undulating quilt . . .
“Do you think we might visit Lord Elgin’s marbles?” his countess inquired, eyes shining with an eagerness she had never turned on him. Not even in the seraglio, dammit, where her “acting” had never gone beyond a charming shyness and a startling display of skill.
His married life was doomed. There could be no other interpretation of the cross purposes that dogged their steps.
With considerable effort, the Earl of Rocksley took himself at hand. “Of course, my dear,” he responded coolly. “I believe they are at Burlington House now. I will send round a note to ascertain if we might view them before our drive in Hyde Park.”
Marbles! He had as good as offered his wife a reconciliation, and all she could talk of was Elgin’s blasted marbles.
What, after all, did it matter? He would see she gave him a whole passel of children, as Lady Elgin had done before her lord cast her aside. See if he wouldn’t, by God!
“A sad spectacle, was it not?” the Earl of Rocksley asked his wife, who sat glum beside him as he tooled his way up Piccadilly toward Hyde Park. “I, too, was shocked.”
“So much beauty reduced to a ramshackle shed without so much as a single window,” his countess sighed. “To be forced to peer at the greatest sculptures in the world by lantern-light! Yet at least those in the shed are protected,” Penny conceded, “while the large pieces outside are fully exposed to England’s iniquitous climate. It is a tragedy, my lord. You must urge Lord Elgin to sell.”
“You did not see the marbles when they were in Park Lane? I assure you the shed there was a veritable palace compared to what we have just seen.”
“No.” Penny shook her head. “We made a brief visit to London in the spring of 1808, but Aunt Cass adamantly refused to look at the marbles. I even slipped away one afternoon, with only Noreen at my side, and attempted to get in, but the young men guarding the place were quite fierce. Only serious students of antiquities might view the marbles. They turned me away as if I were a mere fly buzzing about their treasure.”
“Good God, did they really?” the earl murmured. “No doubt you should have gone armed with Miss Pemberton’s lethal parasol.”
“Jason!” Penny chortled. “If only you . . .”
“Yes?”
The Countess of Rocksley squirmed a bit, went so far as to bite a knuckle on one properly gloved finger. “If only,” she said at last, “you showed your humor to me more frequently. You can be so charming to others, you see, but . . .”
“But to my wife I am an ogre.” The earl’s tone was flat, bereft of any hint of humor.
“Here., and in Shropshire as well, you . . . you tend to look at me as if you cannot imagine who I am or what I am doing here. It is very lowering, I assure you.”
Once again, all Jason could see was that blasted white rose! Why the devil women were allowed to hide behind huge bonnet brims while men had their every expression constantly on display? Glumly, the earl decided that was why most men solved the problem by learning never to display any emotion at all.
“I shall endeavor to improve my attitude,” Jason returned stiffly as he skimmed his pair of perfectly matched grays through a gate into the park at a pace that could be matched only by the most skilled whips. In the process he brought to a halt the progress of a portly gentleman on a bay stallion, two stylishly dressed couples strolling toward the gate, and a landau containing two elderly ladies, whose coachman forgot himself enough to toss an outraged epithet at the earl’s rapidly retreating back.
“I do not believe,” said Lady Rocksley, “that scattering members of the ton like chaff before the wind is the way to go about improving your attitude.”
“You have turned into a sour Methodist shrew, my dear,” the earl returned cordially. “Dress as finely as you will, there’s a starched-up Evangelist beneath that bonnet.”
The countess’s fuming reply was cut off, unspoken, as the earl deftly maneuvered his way into the line of fashionable carriages slowly circling the park. They were now much too public for a quarrel, particularly as the eyes of every last soul taking the air that afternoon widened at the sight of the unknown woman sitting up beside the Earl of Rocksley. From those on the bridle path to those taking a leisurely stroll, from the occupants of sporting curricles and high-perch phaetons to the elegant passengers of barouches and landaus, the earl and his companion were the cynosure of every gaze. Was that . . .? Could it be . . .? Surely not. The chit was much too civilized to be the notorious Countess of Rocksley.
Meticulously, Jason nodded to every person with whom he was acquainted—a rather high percentage of those they passed—but he did not chance an introductio
n until they were more than half-way round the vast park. Deliberately choosing a lady of impeccable social standing augmented by a kind heart, Lord Rocksley made her known to his bride. Though visibly startled, the middle-aged matron recovered quickly, welcoming the countess to London with becoming enthusiasm. The earl drove off, well-pleased, as the lady was also known for her ability to chatter nineteen to the dozen, and the identity of his mysterious passenger would soon be known throughout Hyde Park and, within a day or two, the entire ton as well.
Another round of the park, a second well-chosen introduction, and Jason was beginning to be pleased with himself. Perhaps he had been drowning his sorrows prematurely. Perhaps matters were not as bad as he had feared.
And then the atmosphere within the park changed. Nods became perceptibly cooler. Some carriages speeded up as they passed by, the occupants keeping their eyes straight front. Full half the riders on horseback kept their chins in the air, certain ladies going so far as to whisk their full skirts aside, as if they might be contaminated by the proximity of the sultan’s whore. Even those the earl recognized as Fair Cyprians out on the strut seemed to shrink from his wife, as if she were a leper. And then, as if fate were piling disaster upon ignominy, a carriage pulled up beside them and a feminine voice cried out, “Jason, Jason, my dear. Do hold! I wish to meet your charming companion.”
Penny, by this time grateful for any kindly face, proffered an immediate smile across the distance that separated the carriages, even as her hand closed over the earl’s arm in silent appeal, as he seemed about to move on without so much as a glance in the lady’s direction.
“Believe me,” he muttered, eyes fixed on his grays’ ears, “you do not wish to meet the lady.”
“Yes, I do,” Penny returned stubbornly. “It is not as if there are people waiting in line to meet me.”
As it turned out, the decision was taken out of their hands as congestion among the carriages in front of them forced the earl’s curricle to a halt directly next to the stylish barouche beside them. Penny eyed the woman who had called out to them with open admiration and felt a slight quavering of her newfound amour propre. In spite of her new clothes and new attitude, this polished gem of the ton reduced her to the level of a gawk from the country. The lady, of approximately her own age, was garbed in a striking carriage dress of burgundy red kerseymere, sparkling with gold buttons and gold lace in the military style, every inch designed to set off as voluptuously enticing a figure as Penny had ever seen. The plumes on her bonnet were dyed to match, gracefully swirling into the air before curling down to point the way to dark eyes set into a face that seemed to promise a gentleman anything he might desire.
“My lady,” the earl declared through gritted teeth, “may I introduce Mrs. Coleraine and her escort, Colonel Gibbons. And this is my wife, Lady Rocksley,” he added with cool formality.
Mrs. Coleraine. Daphne Coleraine?
But, of course. How could she have been such as fool as not to have thought of the possibility of encountering her husband’s mistress in the park? No wonder he had not wished to make the introduction!
“But, my dear, how charming you are,” beamed the wicked beauty. “So unlike the dastardly rumors. Truly, one would never guess.” With a throaty laugh, which added to Penny’s envy as well as animosity, Daphne Coleraine addressed the earl. “You must bring her to my soirée on Wednesday next, Jason. Indeed you must. I am certain we will all be great friends.”
The congestion eased. With the road in front of him clear, the earl whipped up his horses, leaving the barouche behind with nothing more than an abrupt nod to the woman who had kept him well entertained for the past two years. As he pointed his horses toward the gate nearest Cavendish Square, his inner rage was great. Daphne Coleraine’s temerity in forcing an introduction to his wife took second place to the ton’s treatment of his countess. How dare they? How could they treat the wife of an earl in such a manner?
Yet he had known how cruel the haut monde could be. Though he had not mentioned the matter to Penelope, this was the primary reason he had come to town—to attempt to unravel this mess before she was cast into it, sink or swim. Lord Elgin had dug his own pit with his obsession with Greek marbles, but little Penny Blayne was an innocent, a child wronged, her reputation lost through no fault of her own.
And yet he had taunted her for her propriety. For her obvious efforts to erase the scandal of those few weeks in Constantinople. He was a beast. He should be flayed alive.
Deuce take it, he had, in fact, so successfully avoided the burden of having a wife that he had allowed her to be totally ruined. If he had come back from Constantinople with a bride, nothing more than a raised eyebrow over the age of his wife would have marred their marriage. By now his nursery would be full . . . and his wife looking around for a lover . . .
Hell and damnation! He’d been quite right to attempt to drown his sorrows. There was no proper solution to this impasse.
“We will not go to the opera, I think?” Penny ventured after they turned off busy Oxford Street.
“You would wish to expose yourself to further calumny after what you have just endured?”
Her face was turned toward him, wistfulness plainly written upon it. “I-I have never been to the opera, at least not in London. And I should not care to disappoint Madame Madelaine, who is counting on me to display her fine designs,” she added judiciously.
Incredulous, the earl retorted, “You would risk censure so you may be seen in a new gown?”
“Pray do not be ridiculous, my lord. I love the opera, and I promised Madame her garments would be seen everywhere. Then you tell me I must return to the wilds of Shropshire on the instant. Yet you wonder why I would risk the cut direct from a foolish few in order to be let out of my cage for a single night! You are—”
The earl silenced her with a wave of his palm. “Very well. If you can bear the scrutiny, we will indeed attend the opera,” he consented dourly. “If you have an evening gown as fine as your carriage dress,” he added on a grudging note of satisfaction, “for I should like the devils to get a good look at a true lady.”
“Oh my,” Penny murmured, “was that a compliment?”
“I believe it was.”
“Thank you.”
“You forget,” the earl replied coolly. “I am nearly the only person in existence who knows for a surety how false those vicious rumors are.”
“Again, I thank you, for, truthfully, even you do not know the whole of it,” his wife responded, most obscurely.
“I beg your pardon?” It was fortunate they had arrived at Rocksley House, for the earl came close to dropping his reins, an error of shocking proportions seldom committed by even a rank beginner.
There was no reply, as his countess was descending from the curricle, with the aid of a footman who had rushed out from the house. Jason sat high on the curricle bench, like the veriest idiot, while his wife swept up the walk, up the shallow steps, and through the door being held open by Stackpole. Grimly, he recalled his vow earlier that day to see that she filled his nursery before he let her turn to another man, as Lady Elgin had done.
He could, of course, divorce her. Marry again, start fresh. As Lord Elgin had done.
But he would not. Because he had no grounds. Because thoughts of young Penny and her innocence and of Gulbeyaz, who had been so eager to please, had come back to haunt him, filling his days as well as his nights, reminding him of what he had missed by being so hellbent on his freedom. So self-satisfied with his gallantry in Constantinople that he had smugly slithered out from under his long-term obligations, leaving his bride to wither on the vine.
In the end, he had grudgingly offered her a position at his side, all for sake of an heir. It was a wonder she had not torn a strip off him. Instead, she had seized the reins in her own capable hands and transformed herself into at least a semblance of the woman she thought he wanted. While he embalmed himself in brandy, even as he assured himself he was making valiant efforts
to restore the reputations of both Lady Rocksley and Lord Elgin.
Boiled in oil. That was the punishment Selim the Third might have ordered for the reluctant earl. What a fool he was.
“My lord?” Jason’s groom was standing at the horses’ heads. Slowly, the earl climbed down. Stackpole’s eyebrows twitched as Lord Rocksley walked through the still open door. Today, the earl feared, afternoon tea would have a decidedly bitter flavor.
~ * ~
Chapter Seventeen
The house on Cavendish Square—built outside the bustle of fashionable Mayfair, yet fitted out with every elegancy a noble gentleman’s townhouse should command—had been the sole extravagance of Jason’s father, the seventh Earl of Rocksley. The sweeping staircase, suspended over the entry in a veritable miracle of design was, his lordship decided, the perfect foil for his wife’s stunning beauty as she descended the stairs that evening, garbed in full regalia for the opera. Her high-waisted half-dress of white gauze, embroidered in silver and studded with brilliants, opened over a gown of soft peach. Her hair was dressed high and entwined with silver cord, one softly unwinding curl falling in front each ear. As she caught his eyes upon her, she deliberately—or so he hoped—allowed her silver mesh shawl to droop, revealing a swell of softly mounded flesh considerably greater than she had displayed at sixteen. Though not a whit more enticing, Jason admitted, as heated thoughts of that long-ago bridal night engulfed his mind. Devil a bit! He’d invited Brawley and Dinsmore to join them at the opera when all he wanted to do was rush his wife back upstairs and—
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