by Mary Balogh
“Think no more of it.” Sophia was desperate to be alone.
She reached for the teapot as soon as the door had closed behind the maid and she had set down the dog’s dish. She poured tea into the ugly green-and-gold cup that had replaced her dainty pink rosebud one, then sat back and closed her eyes. Alone at last!
Sarah had been thrilled to meet the Horsemen. She always was, of course, when she met new gentlemen, something she had only recently begun to do, as she had been in the schoolroom until her eighteenth birthday just after Christmas. She looked upon every gentleman as a prospective suitor. But she had been excited by her meeting with these four, as what lady would not be? They were all, without exception, extraordinarily handsome men. The women in the Peninsula—women of all ages and social rank and marital status—had often amused themselves with trying to decide which one was the most handsome. Kenneth was the tallest—though they were all above the average in height—and he had the distinction of his very blond hair and aquiline features. Rex had been blessed with very dark hair and dark, compelling eyes and had, in addition to these assets, a devastating charm. Eden had the distinct advantage of very blue eyes, which he knew well how to use to effect, and he had a devil-may-care attitude to life that women always found attractive. Nathaniel Gascoigne had his slumberous gray eyes and his wonderful smile. As one of the women—a colonel’s wife—had once remarked, one could not look at him without imagining his head on a pillow—next to one’s own.
The women had all had their favorite, as had Sophia.
Though they had all been quite unashamedly in love with all four.
They had been so full of energy and humor and dare deviltry. They had always been in the thick of battle with their men, never sending enlisted men into dangers they were not willing to face themselves—and always leading the way. If there was danger in a part of the field that was none of their concern, they rode there anyway. They had been in their commander’s ill favor as often as they were being congratulated by him. They should be thankful that they were officers rather than enlisted men, he had been fond of telling them—and they had been equally fond of reporting to their friends. They would have been almost constantly at the whipping triangles otherwise for failing to follow orders.
It was Walter who had first called them the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. It was ironic that Walter was the one to have so distinguished himself at Waterloo. Not that there had ever been anything of the coward about him. But he had been an unimaginative man, who had fought by the rules, going where he was sent, accomplishing the tasks he had been set.
At Waterloo there must have been innumerable cases of heroism to equal Walter’s. It had simply been a case of his being in the right place at the right time—if one considered fame of primary importance. Or in the wrong place at the wrong time if one considered survival of some significance. Walter had died. The Four Horsemen had survived.
Sarah had been delighted to meet them and severely disappointed to be told that two of them were married and that the other two were perhaps a little old for her.
“Oh pooh,” she had said. “Older gentlemen are so much more handsome, Aunt Sophie, and so much more attractive. Young gentlemen invariably have spots.”
Sophia had chuckled. But none of the Four Horsemen would do for Sarah. She might have felt sorry that she had been forced into presenting her niece to them if she had not been convinced that they would be uninterested in so young a girl. They had all had a great deal of experience with life itself and with sexual matters in particular. There had been an endless stream of Spanish and Portuguese beauties all clamoring to share their beds.
Sophia had refused to stay for a second breakfast at Portland Place. She had been eager to get home, to be alone, to digest the morning’s unexpected encounter.
She rested her head against the back of her chair and closed her eyes. Coming so closely as it had after the events of yesterday ... it seemed that the past was never to be put behind her. All the time she had spoken with them, genuinely—oh yes, genuinely glad to see them again, she had been thinking to herself, How would they look at me if they knew? With disgust, contempt, pity? And she had known that the answer mattered to her. Even though she had not seen them for three years and perhaps would never see them again after two evenings hence.
It mattered.
She might try to convince herself that she had accepted those debts—why did she persist in calling them that?—for the sake of others: for the sake of Edwin and his family, for the sake of her own brother and his family. And it was true. But she had done it for her sake too. She would not be able to bear ...
The feeling of safety at seeing them and talking and laughing with them had been almost overwhelming. Here was safety in solid human form, multiplied fourfold. It had been almost a conscious thought as well as a feeling. But they could offer her no safety, no help. Quite the opposite.
She merely had one more secret to withhold from them. There had always been secrets. Always had, always would. It had become the story of her life. The burden must be carried alone. No one could help.
But there was the illusion of safety when she was with them. She knew that from experience, and it had not always been just illusion. Walter had not been a neglectful husband, but even so, there had been times when danger had threatened and she had had to move quickly from their billet when he was away at his duties—often in adverse weather conditions. She had never done so alone or even with just servants to help. One or more of the Horsemen had always turned up when they were most needed to help and escort her, to point out to her the funny side of the most unfunny situations.
Nathaniel had laughed at her once when they were escaping at reckless speed through a sea of mud and she had fallen from her horse’s back when it had slipped. She had been caked with wet, foul-smelling mud, but Nathaniel had hauled her up in front of him, ruining his scarlet jacket, and held her bracketed in the circle of his arms.
“You know, Sophie,” he had said, “ladies in London and Paris use mud packs to improve their complexions. They would kill to look as you do now.”
She had laughed heartily and tried to mop the mud from her face with an equally muddy glove. “I should be beautiful all over by this day’s end, then,” she had said. “Walter will not recognize me. He will disown me.”
“Never mind, Sophie,” he had said. “We will take you in. My coat is going to need a good brushing after it dries.”
She had laughed again and felt perfectly safe despite the physical discomfort and the very real dangers posed by traveling at speed through oozing mud and of knowing that French troops were somewhere in the vicinity. Kenneth and Eden had been close by too. Kenneth had rescued her horse and was leading it beside his own.
Sophia opened her eyes and reached for her cup and saucer. She was parched and there was nothing more soothing than tea.
It had been undeniably good to see them again. How she would have rejoiced if there had not been yesterday. As it was, she was not at all sure she wished to see any of them again. Would she go to Rex’s evening of friends at Rawleigh House the evening after tomorrow? Meet them again? Talk with them? Meet Rex’s wife? And Kenneth’s?
But she knew she would go. The prospect of such an evening was just too seductive to be denied. Besides, Eden was to take her up in his carriage and she did not know where he lived to send a note to tell him not to come.
Of course she would go. In the meantime she must settle this other thing, this debt—and hope that it would be the end of the matter. It would not be, of course. It would continue for a number of years. It was impossible to guess just how many letters there had been, to be redeemed now one by one. Where was she to find the means ...
“Sometimes, you know, Lass,” she told her collie, who had finished her meal and had come to lie at her feet, her chin resting on Sophia’s slippers, “I wish Walter were still alive so that I might have the pleasure of wringing his neck. Are you shocked?”
If Lass w
as, she gave no indication.
“I played my part to the very end,” Sophia continued, “though it was never easy, Lass.” She laughed softly. “The understatement of the decade. Was it too much to expect that Walter play his part? Apparently it was. Men know very little about self-denial. I am thankful you are female, though perhaps I will change my mind when you present me with a litter of puppies one of these days.”
On the whole, she thought treacherously, she did not really wish Walter were still alive.
“Thank heaven for your presence, Lass,” she said with rueful humor. “You add respectability to the deplorable habit of talking to oneself.”
The next few days were busy ones for Nathaniel. He made what seemed to be endless calls, making his presence known in town, and—more important—the presence of his sister and his cousin, who would need invitations to all the more glittering parties and balls the Season would have to offer. He was only a baronet, after all, as Georgina had reminded him. News of his arrival would not spread as quickly of its own volition as it would have had he been of higher rank. Though it was true that he was a man of wealth and property, and both girls had more than competent dowries.
Some of the calls were more to his liking than others—and not even necessary, perhaps, for the procuring of invitations. Though even at those houses he met other people, and every contact was important. He called upon his friends’ wives, for example, entirely from inclination. He called upon his elder sister the day of her arrival, taking Georgina and Lavinia with him, and nothing would do but he must escort them all to Bond Street without a moment’s delay. Lord Ketterly, his brother-in-law, had been wise enough to withdraw to his club and was not expected home before dinner. And then Lavinia demanded to be taken to Hookham’s Library to take out a subscription. And Georgina remembered that one of her bosom friends at home had told her to be sure to see the Oxford Street shops as soon as she arrived in town—yet two days had passed already. Would dear Nathaniel mind very much ...
But invitations started to arrive, and appointments had been made with various modistes so that the ladies could be suitably outfitted for what lay ahead, especially for their presentation at court. Fortunately Margaret had assured her brother that his presence would not be necessary on those occasions, though he might escort the girls to Ketterly’s town house on each of the appointment dates if he would be so good. Oh, and come to fetch them later, of course.
There was little time left over for more congenial male activities. And life in town after the tranquillity of the country was enormously tiring, Nathaniel was finding.
If he had used his nights for sleeping, of course, he might have found the daytime pace less hectic. But the nights were as busy as the days. Not that he enjoyed the night at the brothel nearly as much as he had expected. Eden had picked out quite unerringly, of course, the very best house and the very best girl for his friend’s entertainment. She was very good indeed. Too good, perhaps. Nathaniel felt dazed and slightly out of control of his own bodily reactions—as well as marvelously satiated—after she had brought him to explosive completion for the third time in fewer hours. He left after regaining sufficient energy, even though he had paid for a full night’s entertainment and the girl was already showing signs of renewed eagerness to earn every penny. It was a treat, she had told him in her throaty voice after the first time, to have a young and handsome gentleman.
He felt enormous relief at having had a woman again—and equal relief at being away from her and the brothel. He felt somehow soiled, though in deference to his servants he did not follow his first instinct, which was to hurry home and demand that bathwater be brought to his room—at three o’ clock in the morning. Instead he joined a card party that he knew Eden had been planning to attend after his own shorter stay at the brothel.
They both wagered modestly and won modestly and drank sparingly. They spent a great deal of time talking and laughing, just being friends together. They went their separate ways well after dawn.
And then the night before Rawleigh’s party they went, the two of them, to the theater, joining Kenneth and Moira, Rex and Catherine in Rex’s box. He did not fancy a brothel again that night, Nathaniel had told Eden over dinner at White‘s, or any other night if it was all the same to his friend. He would prefer to employ a mistress for the Season and set her up somewhere where he could visit her at his leisure. The idea of having a different girl every night had lost its appeal sometime during that orgy they had indulged in after Waterloo.
Eden had laughed at him but had suggested the theater and the green room afterward. There were doubtless several dancers who would take Nat’s fancy, and if he was in luck at least one of them would be currently without a protector. Eden himself had cried off long-term mistresses ever since the last one, who had been with him for over a year and had been devilish difficult to cast off.
“I felt somehow responsible for her, Nat,” he said. “It was almost like trying to shed a wife. It was only by a remarkable stroke of good fortune that I discovered the minx was earning a bit on the side with old Riddings. He is so decrepit with age and riotous living that it is surprising he can still get it up, and maybe he cannot, but he paid well—in diamonds. As far as I know, he is still paying and Nell doubtless does not have to work near as hard as she did when she had me.” He chuckled. “But I am not getting myself into that sort of pickle again. No entanglements is my new motto. None whatsoever. A one-nighter suits me admirably.”
There were some pretty dancers, particularly a tall, lithe, auburn-haired beauty with long legs. And they did visit the green room after the performance—and after discreetly seeing their married friends and their wives drive away in Rex’s carriage, having loudly declared their intention of walking together to White’s. Rex had grinned and Ken had winked at that announcement, of course, but there had been ladies’ sensibilities to consider. A few of the dancers were free, though most of them were in conversation with would-be protectors. The long-legged dancer was one of them, and though she appeared bored when Eden and Nathaniel joined the group of gentlemen surrounding her, she perked up noticeably on sight of them. It was not difficult, Nathaniel found—it was amazing how the old skills came back to one after so long—to cut out the opposition so that soon he was in private tête-à-tête with the girl.
And she was clearly very willing indeed. She had lips his own ached to kiss and a body he unclothed garment by garment in his imagination. She had legs a man would dream of having entwined about his own. She was clean and smelled good. Someone had given her elocution lessons with the result that she did not murder the English language as soon as she opened her mouth. She would be expensive—but he could afford her. She would also be good. She could satisfy all his hungers during the coming months.
He took her hand in his after talking with her for half an hour, bowed over it, raised it almost but not quite to his lips, favored her with his most charming smite—and then saw himself as if from the outside, a mere observer. What was he doing? Why was he trying to recapture an unsavory past he had deliberately and gladly given up some years before?
He bade the dancer good night.
“She said no, Nat?” Eden asked when they were outside the theater. “I do not believe it. She was devouring you with her eyes. Is there already a protector who would cut up nasty if she defected? Hard luck, old chap. We must try again tomorrow after we leave Rex’s. Damn, but I could have sworn—”
“I did not ask her,” Nathaniel said.
“Eh?” His friend frowned at him. “She almost tempted me, Nat, though she is doubtless angling for something a little more secure than one night. I would have at least tried, though, if you had but signaled your lack of interest.”
“I was very interested,” Nathaniel said, “Until ... it is just ... well, never mind.”
“It is just what?” Eden was still frowning.
“She probably has no choice,” Nathaniel said. “She probably came to London with the dream of being a gre
at actress. She finds herself instead a mere dancer in a chorus, unable to support herself sufficiently on her wage. And so she must take the obvious additional employment. Poor girl.”
“Poor girl?” Eden looked quite mystified. “Nat, my lad, I never saw you perform, but I can well remember the besotted looks all your women shared when they emerged from your bedchamber. Any one of them would have gone back for a second session between your sheets without pay. You do not imagine that country living has made you lose your touch, do you? Eva complained last night? Or looked bored? Or tried to get through the night with the least number of performances?”
“They need the money,” Nathaniel said. “We need sex. I am not sure it is a fair exchange, Ede. I suppose I have developed something of a conscience. I am not sure I can do it any longer.”
“Well, devil take it, old man,” Eden said. “You will have to marry, then.”
Nathaniel grimaced. “Hardly,” he said. “It is not a strong enough reason for marriage, is it? The simple need for sex?” They were wandering in the direction of White‘s, he noticed. Good. A safe, male haven. They would doubtless end up playing cards again.
“Why do men marry, then?” Eden asked. “Is there another reason?”
Nathaniel chuckled while his friend grinned. “Probably,” he said, “though I’ll be damned if I can think of a single one at the moment. I’ll not be marrying, Ede. I cannot imagine wanting the same woman living in my home and managing both it and me for the next forty years or so. And to be fair, I cannot imagine any woman wanting to put up with me and my foibles for that same length of time. I have no intention of becoming a monk, of course. There has to be some solution. An affaire de coeur, perhaps? They are common enough, are they not? An affair between equals?”
“A married woman?” Eden said. “I would not advise it, Nat. Pistols at dawn can be injurious to the health.”
“Not a married woman,” Nathaniel said quite firmly. “The very idea, Ede.”