by Joan Smith
“Peabody!”
Peabody stuffed the letters into her reticule and snapped it shut. “Yes, Diana?” she asked blandly.
Her charge looked her in the eye and laughed aloud. “Too late. The damage is done. I’ve already seen Chuggie’s handwriting. Good gracious, how shocking of you, taking me to visit a member of the muslin company.”
Blood suffused Peabody’s saturnine face, lending a livid hue to its usually sluggish complexion. She had leaped to the same conclusion a moment earlier and, for once in her life, was uncertain what posture to take. Rumors of Harrup’s affairs had reached her ears before this. She had been able to overlook intimations of a bachelor’s London peccadilloes, providing they remained rumors and remained based in London. To have pretty convincing evidence that the rumors were true and had strayed so close to Harrup Hall and the Willows was hard to digest. With no one else to take her ill humor out on, she turned on Miss Beecham.
“Fine talk for a lady! Muslin company, indeed! I think I know Harrup a little better than to believe he would give that trollop the time of day.”
“Nonsense, she was a very elegant trollop, and why else would Harrup have written her so many letters if he weren’t her lover? What I cannot understand is why he sent her to Hitchin to rusticate and listen to the grass grow. Peabody, let us see the letters.” A look of genuine outrage leaped to Peabody’s long face. “I don’t mean read them. Let us just see how many and how thick they are.”
“Certainly not,” Peabody said firmly. But before the carriage had gone ten yards, she decided she needed her handkerchief, which just happened to be under the letters so that she had to remove them. It wasn’t her fault if the pink satin ribbon was a trifle loose and came off as soon as she tugged it a little.
A cascade of white squares fell to the carriage floor. Diana picked them up and placed them one by one in Peabody’s lap. “Six,” she said when she had finished. “I wonder how long he’s been carrying on with her?”
Diana narrowed her eyes as she contemplated this puzzle. “I noticed he’s come home very often since winter. I wager that’s when he made this liaison, in late winter or early spring. And now she’s going to join him in London.”
“Harrup always comes home often in the springtime. He and his bailiff have many meetings to decide about rotating crops and things. You know Harrup likes to oversee the planting at the Hall.”
Undeceived, Diana continued this line of talk, which was so distasteful, yet exceedingly interesting, to Peabody. “No, he took up with her at the end of January. You remember he darted home one afternoon and left for London that same night. He spent that night with Mrs. Whitby,” Diana decided.
“He certainly did not. A courier arrived from Whitehall and called him back to an emergency meeting that weekend. It was the second week in March that it all started— that’s when it was. He did not come home at all, but the vicar mentioned seeing him in Hitchin. That’s when the hussy got her clutches into poor Harrup. That setup must have cost him an arm and a leg. Everything so expensive and brand new.”
“And now he’s taking her to London. I wonder if he’ll use the same furnishings. Who can she be, Peabody?”
“Nobody,” Peabody said angrily. She had finally found the villain in the piece. “You could tell by the bold eye in her head and the cut of that gown that she’s as common as dirt. An actress or some such thing—did you see the rouge smeared all over her cheeks? That one would as soon tie her garter in public as she’d sneeze. The very sort of creature that preys on innocent young men.”
“Harrup’s thirty-five,” Diana reminded her, and received a blistering stare for her foolishness. “I know all about his women, Peabody. His own mama complained to me last winter that she despaired of his ever marrying because he had his pick of all the prettiest lightskirts in town.”
Sixty-five years of Christian living prevented Peabody from opening the letters and reading them. Even sixty-five years couldn’t stop her from analyzing the handwriting, the franks, smelling the scent of lavender at close range, and conjecturing wildly as to the current state of affairs. “Why is Harrup so eager to get his billets-doux back that he couldn’t wait for his next visit?” she wondered aloud.
“This explains his wanting me to send one of the footmen from the Willows to Hitchin. He wished to keep the story away from his own home. There is something very odd here, Di.”
“Maybe he’s broken off with her,” Diana suggested, after a few moments’ consideration.
This was balm to Peabody’s spirit. “That’s it!” she exclaimed. “He has given the hussy her congé—and I thank God for it. I wonder…”
“What?” Diana asked, with only mild interest. She was not so keen on Harrup’s doings as her mentor. He was too highly placed to be a suitor to her, and too old to have featured as the hero of her girlish daydreams. As he never stirred a finger to introduce her to any of his eligible friends, he was out of mind as soon as he was out of sight. He had been a fully grown man for as long as she could remember, treating her as a mere youngster. When she thought of him, it was as a friend of her father’s and Peabody’s, and a neighbor who was more interesting than most by dint of his position as lord of Harrup Hall.
“Since he has had the sense to break off with that creature, I wonder if he is thinking of getting married. It is high time for it.”
“That’s probably it,” Diana agreed.
“Who can the lady be?”
With such intriguing material to conjecture, the first lap of the trip passed quickly. Lunch was taken at the Red Lion in Welwyn, and there the conversation continued in their private parlor.
“Harrup will be embarrassed—that might be of some help when Ronald speaks to him about a position,” Diana said. “I mean—well, he can hardly mount his high horse when he is looking so foolish, can he?”
“My dear, we must not let on we know a thing about these letters,” Peabody exclaimed.
“Then we shall have to pretend we’ve suddenly become blind and stupid,” Diana answered, laughing. “Now that we know what Mrs. Whitby is, I realize it was written all over her, and the love nest, too. Everything brand new, and good but not fine. Oh, you know what I mean.”
“He doesn’t know we were there.”
“He’ll know it the next time he speaks to Mrs. Whitby,” Diana pointed out.
“I trust he has seen the last of her. We shall say we sent our own footman. And I’ll wrap the letters in plain brown paper before I hand them over to him.”
“Lying, Peabody? Tch, tch. I, for one, have every intention of ringing a good peal over Harrup.”
Peabody pursed her lips and shook her head. “You are growing a little old to be still playing the hoyden with him, Di. It was all well and good to tease him and play off your tricks when you were a girl. Now he will expect better behavior from you.”
Diana’s smile showed that she did not mean to argue or to give in. “Are you ready to leave?” she asked, glancing at her watch.
“Just let me freshen up. You can go and have the carriage called while I do it.”
Diana went to the desk and sent for their carriage. Several clients were milling about the lobby, and servants carried dishes to and fro in the area of the private dining rooms. She glanced at the newspapers on the desk, waiting for Miss Peabody. The first notion she had that anything was wrong was a high-pitched scream from their parlor. She recognized her chaperon’s voice at once and darted forward. If she hadn’t known Peabody from her cradle days, she would scarcely have recognized the wraith holding on to the table for support. Peabody was as white as paper, wide-eyed and trembling.
Diana flew forward, calling, “Peabody! What’s the matter? Are you ill?”
“Somebody stop him! Stop that man!” Peabody begged in a quavering voice. A shaking finger pointed to the lobby.
“What man? I didn’t see anyone.”
The manager came pelting in to add to the confusion. Peabody had soon recovered sufficiently to enl
ighten him and Diana. “A thief! My reticule has been stolen. Somebody go after him. A tall, dark young fellow.”
“Which way did he go?” the manager asked.
“He didn’t go out the front door. He turned the other way,” Peabody said. “I watched him dart out. I was too overcome to give voice for a moment. One doesn’t expect to be robbed in a respectable inn,” she added blightingly.
They all ran into the hall. “The other way” wasn’t much help. The man might have gone into the taproom, upstairs, to the kitchen, or out the back door. All these possibilities were investigated during the next few minutes.
The other clients came forward to add their observations. One had seen a dark-haired young jackanapes peeking into the private parlor while Diana was glancing at the paper. He had inquired of the clerk if a Miss Peabody or Miss Beecham had hired a parlor and asked which one. This was deemed highly suspicious. Another had seen him hurry out but hadn’t seen the purse. Still another had thought the lad was fair, not dark. After a quarter of an hour it was clear that the thief had gotten clean away on a mount tethered just outside the inn door. While a rumpus was being raised within, he had mounted and pelted away like lightning. The only useful thing learned was that the man had headed off toward London.
Miss Peabody marched straight off to the constable’s office to lay a charge. Constable Shackley agreed to take a ride down the London road, but by then the ladies knew they would never see the purse again, and Constable Shackley knew Miss Peabody’s opinion of his sitting on his haunches while decent ladies were robbed of ten guineas.
“All our money gone,” Diana moaned. What fun was London without money? “How shall we pay for our hotel? It nearly cleaned me out, paying for lunch and the change of team.”
“That is not the worst of it,” Peabody said. Her face was pinched with chagrin and her voice weak with guilt. “Harrup’s letters were in my reticule. I have failed him.”
“The letters! That’s it!” Diana squealed. “You remember the clerk said someone was asking for our parlor. We thought it very odd at the time. He was after Harrup’s billets-doux.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. How could anyone possibly know I had them in my reticule? It was our money he was after. I never can step foot outside the house without something dreadful happening. Ten guineas gone. How can I tell your papa?”
“Mrs. Whitby knew you had them,” Diana countered, and stared at her chaperon with a sapient eye.
It did not take Peabody long to agree with this delightful conclusion. Any possibility that the affair was still in progress was ended now. “I never did trust that sly blue eye in her head. But why would she agree to return Harrup’s letters if she only meant to have them back?”
“She wouldn’t incur his anger by refusing,” Diana suggested. “But Mrs. Whitby has decided she shall be paid when she blackmails him with them.”
Miss Peabody thought she was up to all the rigs, but the blackest idea that had occurred to her was that Mrs. Whitby wished to keep the letters for sentimental reasons, despite her sly blue eyes. A look of surprised admiration lit her face. “I believe you have hit on it, Di. Was there ever such a piece of wickedness in Christendom? And how am I to tell Harrup about it?”
Diana patted her arm consolingly. “Don’t worry about it, Peabody. I shall tell him,” she said with quiet satisfaction. Peabody was groaning into her handkerchief and missed the expression that Diana wore. Had she seen it, she would no doubt have recognized it as being similar to Mrs. Whitby’s conniving face.
Chapter Two
The fates conspired to heap more misery on Miss Peabody’s trip. Roads were full of potholes that delayed their time abominably. A violent megrim took possession of her head, and just outside of London a buck forced their rig off the road in a game of hunt-the-squirrel. It took John Groom half an hour to haul the team out the ditch and make sure the carriage was sound enough to continue their journey.
Informing Harrup of the loss of his letters was so urgent that she had the carriage driven straight to his house in Belgrave Square. In the lengthening shadows of twilight, stately brick homes glared down at their passing, like dowagers at a ball, stiffly disapproving of parvenues.
It was with a tremor of apprehension that Peabody lifted her hand and sounded the brass knocker. She didn’t recognize Harrup’s butler, who looked as imposing as a duke as he stared down his Turkish nose at them and announced in lofty accents that his lordship was not at home.
Peabody cast a stymied frown at Diana, who edged forward and said in a loud, clear voice, “We shall wait for him,” and barged in.
“His lordship has left for the evening,” Stoker informed her.
“I shall fall in a heap if I have to walk another step this night,” Peabody moaned, and sank on to a chair in the hallway. While the butler looked on doubtfully, Diana took charge.
“Please prepare a chamber for Miss Peabody and myself,” she said. “We shall spend the night here.”
“But his lordship—” the butler began, and stopped uncertainly. His lordship had strong views on country cousins battening themselves on him uninvited. On the other hand, there was a certain fiery disdain in the young lady’s eyes that Stoker knew did not glow in the eyes of commoners.
“Pray hurry,” Diana said coolly. “Lord Harrup will not be happy to hear his cousin was kept cooling her heels when she came here at his express request.”
“Yes, ma’am.” This eased Stoker’s mind, and he called for the housekeeper.
Mrs. Dunaway was only five feet tall, but she made up in bulk what she lacked in height. Plump and florid, she ruled the house with an iron fist. As the ladies were being shown upstairs by Mrs. Dunaway, Diana took a peek around her.
The London house was, of course, smaller than Harrup Hall, but in elegance it was equally overpowering. Her eyes scanned the broad expanse of marble hallway leading to a gold saloon. Beyond a wide arch, lamps shone on polished mahogany surfaces and glowed dully on satin-covered sofas. The downstairs maid was just whisking the draperies closed.
Mrs. Dunaway, a cousin of Miss Peabody and a friend, chatted amiably as they ascended. Less charitable persons than Peabody said that Harrup demanded services of all his pensioners.
“His lordship will want you to have one of our good guest rooms, Hattie,” Mrs. Dunaway said as she led Peabody down a carpeted hallway to a door eight feet high. When the tapers had been lit, the room was seen to be fit for a queen. Green velvet hangings at windows and on the canopied bed lent an air of being in a forest. The theme was picked up in the hand-blocked wall covering, where branches and leaves were intertwined against a cream background.
“Oh, my! I hardly think—” Peabody said, and glanced doubtfully at Diana. “But perhaps with Miss Beecham along to share the room with me—Harrup could not put her up in the servants’ quarters.”
“There’s not another guest in the house at the moment,” Mrs. Dunaway said. “We shall put Miss Beecham in the adjoining room. The beds are made up fresh, for we just this day got his maiden aunts from Bath bounced off. What a troublesome pair of barnacles they were. Methodists,” she explained. “Now, will you ladies have a bite of dinner downstairs or shall I have it brought up here to you?”
“We would not want to inconvenience the servants. A cup of tea in our rooms will be fine,” Peabody said modestly.
Diana remembered the countless times her papa’s servants had been sent bustling when Harrup accepted a last-minute invitation to dinner. She was ready for more than a cup of tea. “When is Lord Harrup expected back?” she asked.
“He’s dining with the lord chancellor, so should be home by ten. The Eldons, you know. Very dull little parties Old Bags gives. I know his lordship turned down all his invitations to routs later this evening. He is very busy in Parliament at the moment.”
Diana considered this and took her decision. “You have your tea and go to bed, Peabody. I shall have a bite downstairs and wait for Harrup. I’ll tell him what happened.�
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Peabody’s face eased in relief at avoiding her unpleasant duty, and Mrs. Dunaway’s eyes lit up like a pair of lamps at this tantalizing hint of trouble. As soon as she had Miss Beecham settled in the morning parlor with her cold mutton and bread, Mrs. Dunaway jiggled back upstairs to learn the details from Hattie Peabody.
“Mrs. Whitby, you say?” she asked, creasing her pink brow. “No, she’s not one of his city light-o’-loves. He’s been carrying on with an opera dancer—nothing serious—but even that has dropped off. Now don’t poker up, Hattie. He is a bachelor—and his females are all high-stepping dashers, nothing low class about them, I promise you. Lately it’s all come to a halt. You’d think he was up for canonization the way he’s burning the midnight oil. Work, work, work. You’d be proud of your Chuggie, Hattie.”
“I was not proud of him this day, Agnes. To have such unsavory goings-on in front of Miss Beecham.”
Mrs. Dunaway bit her lip and said, “The chit didn’t seem overwhelmed by it all. She’s not what you’d call a deb, I think? Older than seven.”
“Older than that, but as green as grass. She’s never been outside of the county, except for a few days in London with the family.”
“Ah, well,” Mrs. Dunaway replied, “country gels don’t shock easy, as we well know, eh, Hattie?” On this comforting speech she trundled from the room to try her luck with Miss Beecham below. Two minutes in that young lady’s company told her nothing but that—yes, it was unfortunate about the letters, and Miss Beecham would like to be informed the instant Harrup arrived. In the meanwhile she would like a pen and paper. Very cool was Miss Beecham for a chit who was supposed to be a provincial green-head.
Over her coffee Diana wrote a note to Ronald, explaining that she had been delayed and would call on him tomorrow at his hotel. She then rang for a servant to deliver the message and resumed her wait.