Cupid's Dart

by Maggie MacKeever

  She looked up at him, her pretty lips parted, her cheeks flushed. "Damned imprudent," said Garth, and stepped toward her. A knock on the door caused him to reconsider, and Georgie to lean back on the couch.

  The dining room door opened. "Beg pardon, Miss Georgie," Tibble said. A young woman brushed past him, almost causing him to lose his balance, which was even more precarious than usual, due to a certain recent encounter with dandelion wine.

  The newcomer paused dramatically on the threshold. That she was a very beautiful young woman was evident even through the heavy veil she wore. Her voluptuous little body was swathed about in black bombazine. Her gloved hands grasped a jet-beaded reticule. "Oh!" she gasped, in throbbing tones. "I interrupt!"

  She did indeed interrupt. Lord Warwick, no aficionado of dramatic young women with histrionic tendencies, wished her to the devil. As did Tibble, hovering discreetly just outside the drawing room door. Georgie, however, cried, "Marigold!"

  "You were not expecting me!" Marigold flung back the heavy veil to reveal golden hair, periwinkle blue eyes, a bewitching elfin face. "Did you not get my letter? Did it somehow go astray?"

  Would Garth have kissed her again if not for this untimely interruption? Georgie regarded her oldest friend with a somewhat jaundiced eye. Then she winced to recall that Marigold's letter had last been seen in the beak of a seagull, and immediately forgot.

  Lord Warwick cleared his throat. Hastily, Georgie set about making introductions. "Marigold, I make you known to my friend, Lord Warwick. Garth, this is—"

  "Mrs. Smith!" Marigold interrupted hastily, and dropped a pretty curtsey. "I'm pleased to meet you, milord."

  Mrs. Smith, was it? Here was a clanker, thought Lord Warwick as he glanced at Georgie's startled face. "I am de trop," he said, and made Georgie a formal bow. "I will see myself out."

  Silence reigned briefly in the drawing room. Then Mrs. Smith firmly closed the door, causing the lurking Tibble to abandon his attempts at eavesdropping and hobble back to the kitchen, there to inform Agatha that the household was about to be set on its ear by one Mrs. Smith, and if that was her real moniker, he would eat his wig.

  Marigold tossed her bonnet carelessly onto the sofa. "Georgie, I have heard the most astonishing on-dits! Tell me, do you think Warwick murdered his wife?"

  Chapter Four

  The remaining member of Miss Halliday's household strolled along the Brighton streets. Accompanying him was Lump, whose normal exuberance was restrained by consideration for his companion's painful limp, which necessitated a slow progress, and the employment of a cane. Andrew Halliday bore a marked resemblance to his sister—not that his sister had ever attired herself in nankeen trousers, gleaming boots, brown double-breasted frockcoat—he had the same slender build, classic features, gray eyes, and unruly blond curls. Unlike his sister, however, Andrew's expression was discontent. He had come back from the Peninsula a curst cripple, prey to recurrent fevers which necessitated that he drink copious amounts of cool water, and that his body be rubbed all over with cold water-soaked cloths; that he be fussed over and scolded and made to eat such stuff as barley gruel and calf’s foot broth and stewed rabbits in milk. Of course he was grateful to his sister for her care of him, but he knew he could not but be a burden to a household already perilously near point non plus. Andrew sometimes wondered if it wouldn't have been better for all concerned if, instead of being invalided out of his regiment, he had stuck his spoon in the wall.

  Georgie told him that such fustian was further indication that he was not yet entirely well. Perhaps she was correct. Andrew had to admit that he was not plump currant. Most often he felt fagged to death. Damned if he knew how he'd turned into such a milksop. Much as he might wish to put a period to his existence, he lacked the courage to take the necessary steps.

  Carriages and vehicles of every description, drawn by superb horseflesh, thronged the narrow lanes and winding streets, wound their way among the well-dressed crowds. Andrew would have preferred to stroll upon the brilliant white cliffs, or along the sandy beach, but his curst leg would not tolerate such exercise. With a firm grip on his companion's leash, he ventured onto the Steine. Shops with piazzas and benches lined each side of the brick-paved walk.

  Toys, rare china, lace, millinery, ribbons, chintz and cambric, tea and knickknacks—none of these caught Andrew's eye. His destination was the subscription library, there not to read the London newspapers, or to play cards in the back room, but to fetch his sister a new book. Andrew knew he was being a bloody nuisance. This was his way of making partial amends. He paid no heed either to an advertisement of cocking to be fought at the White Lion in North Street, a pair of cocks for twenty guineas a battle, and fifty guineas for the main—nor to the announcement of a bull bait at Howe, or a military review, or a prizefight. It was not that Andrew had no interest in these diversions so beloved of young gentlemen. His thoughts were many miles away ...

  Bussaco. Coimbra. A city in flames. Terrified prison inmates screaming to be released. The ghastly French retreat that left behind ravines, pits, ditches filled with a shocking collection of skeletons and fresher decomposing bodies, some mangled and half burnt by captors in search of hidden food and wine. A pile of kilts that showed where the pride of the Highlanders had been slain. Albuera, with its dreadful carnage, where Colonel John Colborne's Light Brigade was blinded by a sudden hailstorm, mown down and annihilated by the demon lancers of Poland. Cuidad Rodrigo. Gallant Dan Mackinnan blown up by a mine, and General Robert Crawford of the Light Division buried in the breech where he fell. Colonel Colborne wounded so badly in the shoulder, the gold braid of his epaulette driven so far in his flesh, that he could only bear the ball to be dug out five minutes at a time over a period of months. The terrible dead of the Peninsular battlefields, who lay stripped of their clothes by human scavengers and left to burn naked in the sun until the vultures swooped down from the sky, and the jackals from the hills.

  Lump might have liked to investigate a kilt, or chase a jackal; but in their absence, he was bored. Not with his surroundings, which offered countless adventurous opportunities for an enterprising hound, but his master was moving along at a snail's pace. Master Andrew could not be blamed for his lack of speed, for he had come home from his travels done to a cow's thumb, which was why Lump trotted meekly at his heels. But Lump was only a canine, albeit an exceptional one, and could not be expected to continue this forbearance indefinitely. Furthermore, he was growing hungry. He looked around at the bustling crowd.

  Andrew was wakened from his unhappy musings by a sharp tug on the leash wrapped around his wrist. "Fiend seize it!" he growled. But Lump was already off in quest of adventure. Andrew could only stumble along in his wake.

  First Lump inspected the fishing nets spread from one end of the Steine to the other, and caused several promenaders to be tripped up by entangling their feet, and several fisherman to shout most colorfully after him. Then he narrowly avoided collision with a military gentleman in a magnificently laced jacket, decorative yellow boots, and breeches with gold fringe. Persuaded by his master that the fringe was not for eating, he next interfered grievously with a young woman selling gingerbread and apples out of a little basket at her side. Lump especially liked gingerbread. With the basket clenched in his teeth, he led his master a merry chase through the crowd, leaving quite a rumpus in his wake.

  Among that crowd, a particular young lady caught his eye. Not that Lump was a connoisseur of female beauty, though he thought his own mistress was very fine. And not that the young lady was a beauty, for she was taller than was common, and had a generous smattering of freckles across her nose. Nor did Lump care that she looked anxious, or observe the odd circumstance that she appeared to be alone. What intrigued Lump were the tassels dangling from the young lady's reticule.

  Lump was especially fond of tassels. He let go of the basket and leapt forward with a happy bark. The little gingerbread girl, who had been chasing after him, snatched up her basket and sadly depl
eted wares.

  Of no especial interest to Sarah-Louise, either, were such fashionable diversions as toys and rare china, tea and knickknacks. She peered anxiously around, wondered if perhaps she might go unnoticed among so vast a throng. Sarah-Louise would not be easy to overlook, wearing as she was a straw hat turned up round the front, lined with white satin, a bunch of ribbons on one side; and a walking dress of green striped muslin with long, full sleeves tied up in three places with colored ribbons, and a deep vandyked flounce that also had a ribbon trim.

  If only she could be certain Peregrine had received her note! She twisted her reticule in her hands. And then Sarah-Louise gasped, for she espied not a handsome poetical profile but a singularly unattractive hound with a pale young man in tow. The hound was making straight for her, despite the gentleman’s heroic attempt to hold him in check. In but a trice it would be upon her, its great paws on her shoulders, drooling all over her dress.

  Despite Mr. Inchquist's poor opinion of his daughter's mettle, Sarah-Louise did not shriek and run away, or turn faint with fright. Hounds were not among the countless things she regarded with trepidation, for Sarah-Louise had survived considerable exposure to her papa's own hounds, though none of her papa's hounds were so queer-looking as this. "Halt, sir!" she said sternly, and held out a commanding hand.

  It was the hand that held the reticule. Tassels swayed. Lump parted his great jaws. "Galumphus!" snapped his master, at the same moment the young lady demanded, "Sit!" Astonished at being addressed in so forceful a manner, Lump flopped down on the bricks, directly in his master's path. Andrew, too, would have flopped down on the bricks, had not the young lady caught his arm. "Oh!" she said. "Sir, are you all right?"

  Of course Andrew was not all right. He was mortified by his weakness, and embarrassed that he had been saved from a nasty tumble by a female. Granted, the female was almost as tall as Andrew himself, but it still rankled that his rescuer was a member of the weaker sex. In the proper scheme of things, the boot would have been on the other leg. But he had regained his balance, and with it his manners. "Thanks to you, I am, ma'am," he said stiffly, and glowered at Lump, who lay panting at his feet. "You and I shall have a word later, muttonhead." Stricken with conscience by the realization that his master was looking queer as Dick's hatband, Lump meekly wagged his tail.

  Sarah-Louise could not but smile, so ridiculous did the hound appear, with his tongue hanging out of his mouth, and his great plumed tail waving, and his eyes fixed wistfully on her reticule. "You must not blame the creature for following his nature. Tassels are a particular temptation, I have found." Again she peered into the crowd.

  Andrew would not ordinarily have approached a young lady to whom he had not been introduced— would probably not have approached a young lady at all, not being in the petticoat line, and certainly not one who resembled a great freckled Maypole—but Lump had precipitated matters, and now the damsel's anxious demeanor led him to wonder what was amiss. If Lump was unaware of the oddity of a very young lady of obvious breeding strolling about unescorted, Andrew was not. Brighton was a favorite meeting-place not only of fashionable society, and some of those others would not hesitate to take advantage of innocence in distress. Fortunately she was an unlikely candidate for some of the worse fates that might lie in wait for an unaccompanied female, being so freckled and so tall.

  "Permit me to introduce myself," Andrew said, and did so. "That wretched beast groveling before you goes by the name of Lump."

  Sarah-Louise blushed. So deep had she been in her own thoughts that she had not realized the young man still stood by her side. Her aunt, not to mention her papa, would hardly approve of Sarah-Louise conversing with someone to whom she had not been properly introduced. But her aunt, and her papa, approved of little that Sarah-Louise could see, and she didn't wish to be rude. "I cry your pardon. I am not usually so skitterwitted," she murmured, and in turn gave him her name.

  Andrew shifted positions, leaning heavily on his cane. "I could not but notice—are you looking for someone, Miss Inchquist?"

  Sarah-Louise lamented her tendency to blush, even as she felt her cheeks flame again. "Yes! That is, I mean, no. Oh, it is too complicated to explain, and my aunt—"

  Andrew understood perfectly. He was being cosseted and doted upon by his sister's entire household, and allowed scarcely a moment's peace. "Escaped your keeper, did you?" he inquired. The young lady looked startled. "A regular Gorgon, I suppose?"

  What an apt description of her aunt, and supplied by a perfect stranger. Sarah-Louise felt very much in charity with him. "Lieutenant Halliday, you have no idea," she sighed.

  "Sarah-Louise! What are you doing?" snapped a voice behind them. Sarah-Louise started guiltily. Even Lump raised his head. Andrew turned to see a patrician-looking lady of middle years staring icily at him. Her lips were narrow, her nose exceedingly Roman, and her hair blacker than ever nature had intended. "Who is this?" she asked, in tones that made Andrew wish Miss Inchquist's Gorgon were wearing tassels so that Lump might knock the rude creature down.

  What did it look like she was doing? Determined for once not to cower before authority, Sarah-Louise turned to meet her aunt's arctic gaze. "It-it was so close inside that I grew overwarm. You were d-deep in conversation and I did not wish to interrupt, and I d-did not think you would mind so terribly much if I stepped outside for a breath of fresh air."

  The Gorgon was not appeased. The ostrich feathers on her bonnet trembled with the force of her outrage. Lump had no notion what a Gorgon was, but the feathers on her bonnet were very fine. Desirous of a more intimate acquaintance with those feathers, he bounded forward, placed a great, shaggy paw on her shoulder, and drooled.

  She shrieked. Sarah-Louise choked back a giggle and demanded, "Stop this at once, sir!" in the same moment as Andrew drew back sharply on the leash.

  Lump was surrounded by spoilsports. Sulkily, he dropped back down on the bricks. "It was my tassels that he liked, you see," Sarah-Louise explained to her horrified aunt.

  Andrew limped forward. "I should have never brought him—or allowed him to bring me—among so many people." The Gorgon favored his lame leg with a startled glance. For the first time Andrew realized how being a cripple might prove to be of some benefit. "Fortunate it was that Miss Inchquist did step outside when she did. She saved me from a nasty tumble. Lieutenant Andrew Halliday of the 88th at your service, ma'am," he said, and made a gallant bow.

  Chapter Five

  Miss Halliday and her visitor had withdrawn to Georgia's bedchamber and firmly shut the door, thereby foiling the efforts of several interested parties to eavesdrop, a case of closing the stable gate entirely too late, for Tibble had already heard enough to astound his audience, if only he could remember it straight.

  The bedroom was a pretty chamber furnished with a dressing table made in satinwood and decorated with festoons of flowers painted in natural colors and surmounted by a circular toilet-glass; a tallboy chest of drawers veneered with finely figured dark mahogany lined with oak; a reasonably fine wardrobe with matched oval panels of figured mahogany veneer; a tester bed with carved mahogany posts; and a corner basin stand. If the painted flowers had faded, and the veneer pulled away from its backing, and the wood of the tallboy chest had separated at the joint—well, the muslin window hangings were carefully mended and freshly washed, the faded carpet on the floor newly shaken and swept, the grate and andiron dusted and polished with Brunswick black. Pretty embroidered pictures hung upon the plaster walls. If there were no real treasures in this chamber, neither were there cobwebs nor dust.

  Marigold glanced around the room, and then back at Georgie. Although the surroundings were not what she was accustomed to, it would be most imprudent for her to remark, because Georgie's expression was already very stern as she said, "Well, Marigold?"

  Marigold's lush limps trembled. "I'm sure I meant no harm! I merely said all the ton have been whispering about Warwick, which they have, so you needn't glower so. I thought you
would know the truth, because he is practically a member of your family. Or was, at any rate. But I do not mean to flog a dead horse!"

  Georgie wondered how Lord Warwick would respond to this description of himself. "Marigold, you are a goose-cap. Warwick hasn’t murdered anyone. Now we will hear no more about it, if you please."

  Marigold was quite content to speak no more of Warwick. She had not liked the man. Nor had he liked her, which was very strange in him. Most gentlemen took one look at Marigold and responded very differently, at the very least calling her fair fatality, and proffering their hearts.

  She sank down on a stool by the dressing table and gazed at herself in the looking glass, watched a practiced tear trickle down one porcelain cheek. "It is very hard of you to pinch at me when I am in such a quandary. Oh, Georgie, I don't know what I'm going to do."

  Neither did Georgie know what she was going to do, with a household on the verge of revolt. If rebellion wasn't yet in the air, it soon enough would be. Georgie didn't imagine that Janie—even then attacking the guest bedroom with sweeping-brush and dustpan and moist tea leaves—would be overjoyed to learn that in addition to her numerous other duties, she was about to be asked to serve as lady's maid. Agatha was unlikely to appreciate someone whose palate was not sufficiently adventurous to savor such delicacies as eels à la tartare and fried cow's heel. Tibble, though he might be willing, was not sufficiently robust to undertake duties more strenuous than those he already attempted to perform. And Andrew's nerves were not likely to benefit from exposure to a sad shatterbrain like Marigold.

  Still, Marigold was Georgie's oldest friend. There was no real harm in her, other than being dreadfully spoiled, which was not surprising in someone who had been cosseted from the cradle and married three times by the time she was twenty-six. Georgie sank down in the faded wing chair and picked up her embroidery. "You still have not explained this quandary of yours. Suppose you start at the beginning," she suggested.