The Courtesan's Secret

by Claudia Dain

  Though she didn’t suppose he had to know about it, did he? Let him worry about his mistress. His daughters would, could, and did take care of themselves.

  “Of course not,” Eleanor said. “I’m not so foolish as all that. I went with Amelia and two footmen. She didn’t want to accompany me, of course, but as I told her rather directly that I would proceed with or without her, I suppose she felt compelled to attend me.”

  “I suppose she did,” Louisa said crisply, sitting back down on the sofa next to Eleanor. It might have been better said that she collapsedupon the sofa, not that it mattered. It was patently obvious that she could keep no secret from Eleanor. “I don’t know where you get these schemes, Eleanor, to go running about London, spying on your only sister.”

  “That bit I suppose I do borrow from Shakespeare,” Eleanor said. “So much running about in his comedies. It did sound like fun.”

  “I trust you found it wasn’t.”

  “Not really, no,” Eleanor said with a grin. “Following you about was very entertaining, not that Amelia shares my opinion. She was shocked beyond words when you walked past St. James Street. According to her, there is no more efficient way to ruin a woman’s reputation. Of course, that was before you went to visit Lady Dalby. What did you do there, Louisa? Is your reputation ruined now?”

  “Hardly,” Louisa said, tucking a foot underneath her and sprawling against the arm of the sofa. “In fact, if all goes as it should, it might be the making of me.”

  “Really?” Eleanor said, leaning forward and putting her book down once again. “What happened? Was Lord Dutton there?”

  “No, he was not. You do know, Eleanor, that not everything revolves around Lord Dutton.”

  To which Eleanor, the imp, only laughed.

  Yes, well, perhaps that was the only response possible to what could only have been termed wishful thinking.

  “What are we laughing about?” Amelia said, entering the library.

  Lady Amelia Caversham, only daughter of the Duke of Aldreth and only sister to the Marquis of Hawksworth, was cousin to Louisa and Eleanor through their Aunt Mary. Mary had been the oldest of a trio of girls who had, according to gossip, taken London by storm twenty-five years previous.

  Martha, Amelia’s mother, had acquired herself a duke in the form of Amelia’s father. Margaret had done just slightly worse in acquiring for herself the Marquis of Melverley. But of course, that was the tale as the public told it. Louisa knew without a doubt that her mother had done very much worse in finding herself saddled with Melverley.

  Both Margaret and Martha were dead now, leaving their children in the care of less than diligent fathers and leaving Mary, their sister, the field. Mary, to hear her tell it, had married for love. Mary had married badly, a mere baron who had died ten years ago leaving his wife without children and without funds. Marrying for love had not been the wisest course for Aunt Mary. Louisa was going to do much better at it when she married Lord Dutton. Marrying for love was not a bad idea if one married the right sort of man. Lord Dutton was precisely the right sort of man. To start, he was a marquis, a very much better sort of man than a mere baron.

  Eleanor did not agree with such sound and logical reasoning, however. She loved to read Shakespeare, and who knew where he had gotten his rather odd ideas about love and marriage. Amelia, on the other hand, agreed with her completely. Amelia was possessed of an entirely practical frame of mind about things romantic. Louisa rather liked that about her.

  She also rather liked the fact that Amelia cared absolutely nothing for Lord Dutton. For that reason alone, Amelia could not possibly have been a more delightful companion.

  “We are laughing because Louisa just announced that not everythingrevolves around Lord Dutton,” Eleanor said with a chuckle.

  “After the day you’ve had?” Amelia said, sitting down on a well-padded chair and stretching out her legs. “That takes cheek, Louisa. Now, tell me everything. What did you discuss with Lady Dalby? Was Lord Dutton there?”

  “No, he was not there, nor did I expect him to be,” Louisa said, coloring it just slightly. It would not have been at all amiss if he had been there, though since she had not expected him to be there she did not think it at all amusing that everyone assumed she’d gone to Dalby House looking for him. It was a fine point, but in a courtship such as the one she was almost having with Lord Dutton, fine points became excruciatingly important.

  “I must say, I think it’s for the best that he wasn’t there,” Amelia said, brushing a hand over the back of her golden hair. “It’s scandalous enough that you paid a call upon Lady Dalby without an escort. It would be altogether worse if you’d been closeted within with Lord Dutton.”

  “It was hardly scandalous,” Louisa said. “After all, I’ve paid more than one visit to Lady Dalby in the past.”

  “Yes, but always with a chaperone or escort and always when she was hosting a party. To plop yourself upon her doorstep in the middle of the afternoon . . . well, I must tell you that I tried to stop you, or to at least accompany you, but Eleanor prevented me.”

  Louisa raised her ginger brows and looked at her sister in surprised curiosity.

  “I thought you should have a go at her,” Eleanor said, shrugging. “At Lady Dalby, I mean. They say she’s very clever about things, and very wicked as well. But then, I don’t suppose it is very unusual to be both clever and wicked. Based upon my reading, I should say it was rather unlikely to be one and not the other.”

  “Don’t be absurd, Eleanor,” Louisa snapped. “Of course a person may be both clever and good.”

  “Name three,” Eleanor countered with a straight face. “And don’t bother naming Lord Dutton as I am completely certain he is as wicked as the worst rake in Town should be, though I’m not at all certain he is clever in the least.”

  Into a silence that stretched rather uncomfortably as they each tried to think of someone, anyone, who was both clever and good, Amelia said, “One thing can be said for Dutton; he is remarkably clever at avoiding—”

  “Louisa?” Eleanor chirped.

  “Marriage,” Amelia said instead, her blue eyes betraying not even a hint of amusement, which was another reason why Louisa so appreciated Amelia. She was incapable of malice, which, as everyone knew, was nearly impossible for the daughter of a duke. “Now, what happened at Lady Dalby’s? Did she receive you?”

  “Of course,” Louisa said, although, truth be told, she had experienced a flutter of nerves the second before she knocked at the door. One never knew how Sophia would respond, most especially since Sophia Dalby was entirely capable of malice. “We had a lovely conversation which was cut just a bit short by the arrival of the male members of her family and the Lords Penrith and Ruan.”

  Upon which, Eleanor dropped her book; it landed awkwardly on her foot and flopped onto the floor. Amelia’s mouth was just slightly agape and her eyes unblinking. All in all, it was a rather satisfactory response.

  “Lord Penrith?” Amelia finally sputtered.

  “What do you mean male members of her family?” Eleanor said as Amelia spoke. “Is there more than the Earl of Dalby?”

  “Much more,” Louisa said smugly to her sister.

  “Are Lord Penrith’s eyes truly green? Did he speak? Is his voice all that they say?” Amelia asked.

  “Why should you care, Amelia? He isn’t in line for a dukedom,” Eleanor said. “I want to hear about Sophia’s family.”

  “His eyes are very green,” Louisa said to Amelia, “and his voice is very . . . very . . .”

  “Very what?” Amelia breathed.

  “Very,” Louisa said on a sigh of breath.

  “Oh, my,” Amelia said, standing up to walk behind her chair. She looked a bit flushed. Lord Penrith was entirely worthy of a healthy flush. It was just possible that Louisa herself had flushed upon seeing him for the first time; she was quite certain that she would not flush upon meeting him again. Quite certain.

  “Did you blush like that whe
n you met him?” Eleanor asked, her elegant brows raised quizzically.

  “I’m not blushing,” Louisa said, banishing all memory of Penrith’s rather startling green eyes and languid voice to their proper place in her thoughts, namely, the thinnest sphere of consciousness. Only Dutton deserved a maidenly blush from her. How Penrith had got hold of one was beyond speculation. “Do you want to hear about Sophia’s family or not?”

  “Definitely,” Eleanor said. “There are her children, Caroline and Dalby, though don’t they call him something besides Dalby?”

  “Markham, I believe,” Amelia said, sitting back down upon her chair, her color restored to its normal flawless ivory. “A childhood name, according to Aunt Mary.”

  Louisa refrained from stating that Sophia’s son looked anything but a child. Given that she was devotedly in love with Dutton, it was not at all appropriate for her to notice the particulars about any other man. Even if she did notice them, the particulars, in other men. Highly and completely inappropriate. She did not quite know what was wrong with her.

  It must be something to do with having spent time with Sophia Dalby. It just proved how wicked influences were so completely wicked. She had never looked at another man since first seeing Dutton. Now it seemed that she couldn’t stop herself from looking.

  Wicked.

  “But do tell us about Sophia’s family,” Eleanor said, sitting up completely, her thin arms crossed, her pointed chin resting in her hand, eyes alight with mischief and avid curiosity. “Are they as wicked and clever as she?”

  “They are,” Louisa said dramatically, “Indians.”

  “From America?” Amelia said in awe, to which Louisa nodded, smiling.

  “Truly?” Eleanor said dreamily, her eyes going to the ceiling, and then she jerked her gaze back to Louisa, jumped up off the sofa, and said, “I want to meet them. How many of them are there? Are they all men? Are they all grown men? Where’s my shawl? Louisa, help me find my shawl. Amelia, didn’t I have my shawl while we were out walking?”

  “You are not serious,” Louisa said, knowing full well that Eleanor was completely serious. This was just the sort of thing to titillate her, which was absurd as sixteen-year-old, well-brought-up young ladies should not be titillated by anything, and certainly not the thought of meeting savage Indians from America. George Grey, in particular, had been particularly savage, dimple and all.

  “Were they . . . savage?” Amelia asked, her own gaze going dreamy.

  Eleanor was lifting cushions and pillows and books, looking with frantic eagerness for her shawl, but she stopped at the question and stared at Louisa.

  “They were, weren’t they?” Eleanor said on a hush of breath. “Savage and wicked and—”

  “And they were,” Louisa interrupted, slyly kicking Eleanor’s rather nice cashmere shawl underneath the nearest bookcase with her foot, “the blood relations of Lady Dalby.”

  She had meant it as a rebuke. It was not received as such.

  “Blood relations,” Amelia mused softly, “that explains quite a lot about Lady Dalby, doesn’t it?”

  “They must certainly be very savage and very, very wicked if they are related to Lady Dalby,” Eleanor said with a very wicked gleam. Things were not going at all the way Louisa had hoped. When did they ever? “But why are you certain that these men are her blood relations?” Eleanor continued. “Perhaps they are only related through marriage.”

  “And perhaps not even by that,” Amelia said somewhat wickedly.

  Louisa shrugged over Eleanor’s shocked gasp. “As different as they are, they bore a resemblance to each other, particularly between Markham and John the Younger.”

  “John the Younger?” Eleanor said. “That sounds rather dynastic. But stop all this empty chittering and tell us about them and about your visit and about Lady Dalby. Everything, Louisa. Try to push Dutton out of your thoughts for just a moment or two, if you would.”

  Actually, now that she looked at it, she hadn’t thought about Dutton for a full five minutes. Remembering all those unimportant men littering Lady Dalby’s white salon had quite distracted her.

  And so she told them, but while she was rendering a rather rushed version of the events and men that had occasioned Sophia’s salon, she avoided mentioning that, by express instruction from Lady Dalby, her attendance at the supper at Hyde House that evening was nearly compulsory. Amelia, for all her pleasant manner and easy temper, was altogether ruthless when it came to invitations to a ducal residence. Amelia would not at all enjoy knowing that anyone else at Hyde House that evening had important plans of her own to put into play. At least, Sophia had implied there were important plans in play.

  At this beginning stage of events, Louisa supposed she could allow Sophia some measure of trust. Some small, unimportant measure, certainly. After all, she had planned to attend the dinner before even discussing her pearls with Lady Dalby. There was nothing Sophia could do to disrupt her evening at Hyde House.

  She was almost certain of that.

  “And of course, she didn’t explain to me how she happened to have a brother who is an American Indian,” Louisa said, hopefully in conclusion.

  “How utterly fascinating,” Eleanor said. “Do you suppose I could meet one or two, perhaps if I loitered about in front of Dalby House? I suppose it’s not entirely unlikely that I should stumble over one or more of them.”

  “You shall do no such vile thing!” Louisa said.

  It was quite more than enough that she was called upon to loiter about Dalby House in her quest to attain Lord Dutton and her pearls. She did not suppose she should be called upon to sacrifice her sister to any such low endeavor. Though, to judge by Eleanor’s face, it would not be much of a sacrifice.

  “Will they be attending the Hyde House affair tonight?” Amelia asked. “I should so like to study them up close.”

  Louisa squirmed just the slightest bit and said, “I do not think they care to be studied.” Though it was just possible that George might not mind in the least. “Anyway, I am not at all privy to the social schedule of Lady Dalby’s rather unusual relatives.”

  “Pity,” Eleanor said with an altogether unattractive snap. “I do think that had I been dallying about all afternoon in Lady Dalby’s salon I should have come away with rather more information than you have done, Louisa.”

  “I rather doubt it,” Louisa said stiffly, running a finger delicately over her right eyebrow.

  “In fact, had I any money at all,” Eleanor continued as if Louisa had not spoken, a habit of hers that Louisa found inexpressibly irritating, “I should wager that you spent your entire afternoon with all those compelling and interesting men talking only of Lord Dutton.”

  At which point Amelia giggled in an entirely unattractive and uncalled-for manner.

  “If you had any money to wager you would lose it all,” Louisa said, rubbing her eyebrow with slightly more than delicate vigor. “I did not speak of Lord Dutton at all. I spoke exclusively about my pearls and how to reacquire them.”

  “I suppose it is a coincidence that Lord Dutton is in possession of your pearls, which would mean that they are his pearls now,” Eleanor said.

  “Only until I get them back,” Louisa said.

  “And did Lady Dalby suggest a means to get them back?” Amelia said.

  “Not . . . precisely,” Louisa said, rising to her feet. Really, this conversation was becoming entirely too uncomfortable and she did not see any reason why she should endure another moment of it.

  “Then you truly have wasted your time, Louisa,” Eleanor said. “When I think of how you must have squandered all those wonderful men—”

  “There was nothing at all wonderful about them,” Louisa snapped.

  “That,” Eleanor said, “is something I should like to determine for myself.”

  “So would I,” Amelia said as Louisa crossed the library.

  Which, it must be noted, was the entire trouble with women in general: they were prone to lose sight of
the proper man whenever an improper man made an appearance. Louisa prided herself, not unjustly, with having risen above that tendency entirely.

  “But, admit it, Louisa, Lady Dalby is advising you,” Amelia said softly, her eyes betraying a most avid and unattractive gleam.

  “On how to attain Lord Dutton,” Eleanor finished, gleaming in perfect partnership with Amelia. It was most unattractive.

  “Don’t be absurd,” Louisa stated. “She is merely advising me on how to reacquire my pearls.”

  “She should be quite good at that,” Eleanor said with a sage nod of her red head.

  “Lord Dutton has your pearls, Louisa,” Amelia said with a very smug smile.

  “That is hardly the point,” Louisa said grimly. Really, it was bad enough that she rather suspected the ton found her pursuit of Lord Dutton profoundly amusing; she didn’t have to tolerate ridicule in her own library, did she? “Melverley might have the right to sell my pearls for a horse, but he hardly has the need. I want my pearls. They are mine and I’m going to get them back.”

  “Even if you have to tackle Dutton in a dark alley to get them, is that it?” Amelia said, grinning.

  “I rather think she would prefer it that way,” Eleanor said.

  Eleanor was, without qualification, the most annoying person Louisa had ever had occasion to know, and that included her acquaintance with Sophia Dalby, which, it must be admitted, was saying quite a lot.

  Five

  THE Marquis of Dutton sat in a quiet corner of White’s and considered his options. Caroline, a bit of a tempest, though a beautiful one, was cheerfully saddled with Ashdon. Why she would choose such a dour fellow, one so given to the sulks, was beyond what little comprehension he reserved for other men. He much preferred giving his thoughts, and his attention, to women.

  Which put him in mind of the devious and desirable Anne Warren. She had turned into one surprise after another. Though surprises could be delightful, too many at once and they became tedious. He decided that Anne Warren had become tedious.