The Importance of Being Wicked

by Miranda Neville

  She stopped pulling at a plant. Why? Why did she excuse Robert? Did he really deserve it? He had taken all his brilliance and charm and good fortune and tossed it away. Everything he touched had turned to dross. She wrenched out the unfortunate sweet william and hurled it as far as she could. Damn Robert! Damn, damn, damn him! The knot in her heart loosened, letting fury escape, fury at the man she’d defended for so long. As she remembered his many neglects, and his greatest betrayal, she ripped the plants from the soil, taking out her anger and disappointment on hapless flowers because Robert had died before she came to her senses. Before she had the chance to tell him what she thought of his stupidity and selfishness. She railed at him in her mind, voicing the angry accusations she’d never allowed herself to speak, even to think, and letting them out in great dry sobs and the destruction of vegetation.

  Suddenly, she’d had enough. Kneeling on the flagged path, a new serenity possessed her soul. It was time to forget the past. The knot dissolved completely, and, in its place, she discovered joy. As she thought of her husband—Thomas, her husband now and forever—the gay red-and-white flowers blurred. Her tears fell again, but they had changed, no longer a dull wash of lachrymose despair but cleansing and hopeful.

  Thomas was a wonderful man, the best she’d ever known. He loved her, but she hadn’t valued his regard. And she, blind and foolish, hadn’t realized she loved him too. An agony of impatience seized her. How long would he be away? If he didn’t return soon, she would take a carriage to London and hunt him down. She couldn’t wait to throw herself into the security of his arms and tell him how much she loved him.

  “Ahem.”

  She looked up to find a gardener regarding her nervously. She hadn’t met all the outdoor staff, and he probably wasn’t expecting to find the new Duchess of Castleton alone, bareheaded, and grubbing in the dirt. She stood, her white gown soiled at the knees and bodice, and smiled at the man.

  “I am the duchess,” she said. “The gardens are beautiful. I hope you don’t mind me thinning the sweet william. Don’t think I mean to imply any neglect. These garden tasks never end.”

  He bobbed his head and removed his hat. “Thank you, Your Grace. Burton, head gardener, at your service. I was going to put one of my men on the job now the rain has stopped. You’ve saved him the trouble.”

  She looked around at the destruction she’d wrought. There were several bald patches in the flowerbed, and the path and surrounding beds were strewn with horticultural debris. “I think I may have overdone it.”

  Burton scrutinized the flowerbed. “Yes, Your Grace. Perhaps one or two plants should go back in.” He looked again, and his lips twitched. “Or five or six. A little less zeal next time.” She was glad he didn’t flatter her.

  “Do you have time to show me around the garden?”

  They passed a delightful hour together, Burton showing pleasure at her interest and remarkable tolerance of her tentative suggestions considering the mess she’d made. They even toured the kitchen garden, which contained a huge cutting bed filled with summer blooms.

  “Could you send some flowers up to the house?” she asked.

  He agreed with an alacrity that gave her the impression her predecessor hadn’t been much concerned with floral decorations. Her next step was to inspect the interior of Castleton House.

  She wandered through the state rooms and absorbed the history of the house, a marriage of the first duke’s Stuart origins and his duchess’s older wealth. The largest saloon was a gloomy room adorned with second-rate van Dykes of Charles I and his children, and the state dining room was little better, though improved by the Lely of Charles II looking saturnine yet merry, staring down from its place over the fireplace. A pretty lady by the same artist hung to one side. Without a label to identify her, Caro could only guess from her naughty smirk that this was the infamous Mary Swinburne, founder of the house of Fitzcharles.

  Most of the pictures in the long gallery made her shudder. She could imagine what Julian would have to say about them. Not that she was a connoisseur like him. Her reaction to art was largely emotional. An occasional good canvas lightened the dross—a classical landscape, a portrait of two little girls and their dogs, the pair of Canalettos—and she found she started to appreciate them as a collection and a record of a family’s past. The pictures Julian had sold to the old duke were as grim as he’d said and deserved to be consigned to a dark corner, or to bedrooms for unwelcome guests.

  Castleton House wasn’t horrible, she concluded. It merely needed to be cheered up. No wonder Thomas had liked Conduit Street, small and disorganized as it was. Her husband was not a lover of pomp and grandeur. His unyielding public front disguised a man who was simple and modest at heart. The thought made her soft inside. Damn it, was she going to cry again? She needed to stop behaving like a leaky tap.

  How could she improve the house in a way that would please the master? The trick would be to introduce warmth and comfort without disturbing the family tradition and pride that he honored. She commanded the house steward to lead an army of footmen in some serious furniture moving. By midafternoon, she was weary, until tea and a rest with Thomas’s naughty novel restored her.

  “How far is the Grange House?” she asked a servant. “Can I walk, or do I need to order a carriage?” Not for a moment did she consider riding without Thomas. That lesson she had learned.

  The duchess and her daughters received her with more evident pleasure than she would have expected, their delight in her recovery apparently genuine. Sarah and Maria summoned the courage to ask about her gowns and hair—girls were so delightfully predictable—and told her about their studies. She was introduced to a pair of spaniel puppies, new additions to the household. The late duke, she gathered, hadn’t permitted pets indoors.

  The young ladies were her sisters. How delightful! She’d never had sisters, and her elder brother had been a severe trial to her. As for the duchess, she was a much nicer mother than hers. She displayed a quiet yet deep affection for her daughters, in marked contrast to the vociferous disapproval of Elizabeth Brotherton. She wished Thomas could forgive his mother. At least her sin had been one of love, not cruelty. He loved his sisters, and he should love his mother for giving them to her, however irregular their begetting. And she herself was grateful to the duchess for giving her Thomas.

  Her mother-in-law offered not a hint of disapproval or sense of insult at Caro’s efforts to redecorate the big house. “I’m not intending to spend a lot of money,” Caro assured her. “Just change things around. I daresay, after so long, there was a lot you didn’t notice anymore.”

  “My dears,” the duchess said. “I think those dogs need to go out.” She continued, once her daughters had left the room, “I want to thank you, Caro. I may call you Caro?”

  “Of course. Whatever for?”

  “For what you have done for Thomas, and for me.”

  “All I’ve done for him is lose his child.”

  “These things happen. I lost two in pregnancy, between Thomas and Margaret. Then there was a long wait before the twins.”

  The duchess read the knowledge in Caro’s face; perhaps she was looking for it. “I see he shared my confession with you. I am glad. I thought Thomas should know about it, but he was always his father’s son more than mine. He blamed me. Rightly so, I suppose. But I think he now understands, and that must be your influence.”

  “I don’t know,” Caro said. “The matter of the girls’ dowries preys on his mind.”

  “And I made things worse, losing the Stuart Twins . . . Ah! I see he didn’t tell you that part.”

  The duchess related the strange tale of the flawless matched diamonds she’d given to her lover. “Except I lied to Thomas. Partly because he was so stern and unforgiving about my past shame. Also because I couldn’t bear to admit that I had been duped, that my lover and the girls’ father was a thief. He stole them from my jewel case, then left me to face my husband.”

  Caro’s head buzzed
with an unthinkable but entirely plausible idea. She thought about dates and ages and the length of a pregnancy. She was certain she had it right. Lewis Lithgow was the duchess’s lover and the twins’ father. The duke hadn’t expelled the Lithgows for a lame horse, and it certainly wasn’t a paltry miniature Lewis had stolen. Priceless diamonds were much more like it. No doubt he’d taken them abroad and sold them there.

  The duchess concluded the tale. “You can tell Thomas, if you wish. Perhaps he’ll think better of my honesty if not my sense.”

  Caro didn’t think she could do so without voicing her suspicion. Tell Thomas that Marcus Lithgow was his sisters’ brother? He’d been hurt enough. And she didn’t know that it was so. Though her heart shied from keeping another secret from him, her reason told her not to mention the matter. She’d do nothing to spoil the fragile peace between her husband and his mother. And though Thomas would never blame his sisters for their parentage, she didn’t want to cast a shadow over his love for them.

  Besides, it wasn’t her business. If Thomas wanted to know the identity of the man, it was up to him to ask his mother.

  “No,” Caro said. “He doesn’t need to know. The diamonds are gone, and he’s forgiven you anyway.”

  Back in her sitting room, now smelling gloriously of roses, she sat down to write a letter. If Thomas could forgive his mother, she could forgive hers. Her fifteen thousand pounds would contribute to the twins’ dowries.

  At three o’clock, maybe four, Thomas and Denford tumbled from their hackney outside a house in Covent Garden. Thomas was far too drunk to know what time it was, but he had a feeling dawn wasn’t far off. He’d consumed more wine at dinner than he’d ever taken at a single sitting. And then there was the brandy. Dark, evil stuff that ripped his guts out over the dice tables at a gaming establishment in Pall Mall where heavy-eyed men won and lost fortunes. Thomas had lost, of course. Not a fortune. When he was down almost three hundred pounds, he couldn’t bear it anymore. At this, as in so much else, he was a failure. To make up for his faint heart, he took a bottle to go into the carriage.

  The house was brightly lit, and the sound of music poured into the street from the opened door. The tune reminded him of the Pantheon masquerade, the rapid tempo designed to stir the blood. Laughter, uninhibited female mirth punctuated with men’s rumbles, hit him like a wall, along with the scent of cheap candles, cheap wine, sweat, and fornication.

  Struggling to stay upright on legs that seemed to have lost their bones, he leaned on Denford’s arm. Funny how Denford seemed to have no difficulty standing. Must be because he wasn’t as broad in the chest.

  He blinked through the smoke. There were indeed ladies present. Not ladies, women. Definitely women. Women whose state of dress made Caro look like a nun. Women clad in scarlets and oranges, whose bodices failed to contain their ripe breasts. Women with painted faces draped over men in varying states of attire or undress.

  “Denford, old fellow,” he said carefully. “I can’t be certain because I’ve never been to one, but I do believe this is a house of ill repute.”

  “Spot on, Castleton.” He’d become accustomed to Denford’s cynical drawl during the evening, but now he remembered why he hated him. This place was revolting, the women with their exaggerated leers disgusting, the men who pawed them foul.

  “Why have you brought me here? I asked you to show me how Townsend spent his time.”

  “And so I have.”

  “Townsend came here?”

  “Not often. Especially by the end he didn’t have the means to perform.”

  “Are you sure?” It seemed utterly incredible that a man with Caro at home would waste his time in this tawdry company.

  “Quite sure. On occasion I pulled him out and took him home.”

  “Does Caro know?”

  Denford’s voice was almost gentle. “No. And I think it would be better if she never learned.”

  “I would never mention such a place to a lady.”

  “Do you wish to partake of the amenities?”

  “I think I’m going to be sick. And then I want to go home.”

  “Yes,” Denford said. “I think you should.”

  Caro saw the carriage through the wavy glass panes of the big window in the saloon. Behind her, a contingent of sweating workmen labored to shift an enormous carved oak table. As the vehicle passed through the fantastic topiary guarding the forecourt of the house, she recognized the crested ducal traveling chariot.

  Thomas was home, much earlier than she expected, though he’d been indefinite about his plans. He must have left soon after dawn to arrive at this hour. Her heart hammering with joy, she tore downstairs with scarcely a thought for the fact that a man might not be altogether delighted to return to a house turned upside down.

  The front door stood open, and a footman was opening the carriage. He let down the steps and stepped aside with erect back and eyes straight ahead, waiting for his master’s descent.

  Caro ran out with no care for the proper dignity of a duchess. “Thomas!” she cried. When he didn’t emerge, she scrambled in and found the duke splayed on the roomy bench, his clothing disheveled and emitting a loud snore. An empty bottle lay beside him.

  “Thomas?” He stirred, and the snoring evolved into an alcoholic belch. Happiness, tempered by anxiety, turned to resigned disgust. “Lord Stuffy! You are drunk.”

  He opened his eyes, flinched, and closed them again. She took him by the shoulders and shook hard. “You’re home. Time to get out.”

  His strength unimpaired, he tugged her down to him and tried to kiss her. His breath tasted of cheap spirits. “Ugh!” She pushed him away.

  “Caro?” This time he kept his eyes open.

  “I hope you didn’t think you were trying to kiss anyone else.”

  “Stay! I don’t want to move.”

  “You’ll feel much better out of the carriage.”

  “No. My head hurts, and I’m not moving.”

  “I know just the remedy for that.”

  Life had taught her how to deal with the return of a drunken husband. Swatting off a hand that was attempting, not very efficiently, to find her bosom, she backed out of the carriage. “James,” she said to the footman, “the duke will need help getting into the house. Take him up to his rooms.” She glanced at the lanky servant and back at her broad-shouldered husband. “Better have two of you do it.”

  The coachman told her they’d left London at five in the morning. Discreet probing further revealed that the duke had been out all night—no surprise there—and been returned in poor condition to Conduit Street by the Duke of Denford, which did surprise her. Reading between the lines of the servant’s tactful account, she gathered Denford had acted as interpreter of Thomas’s incoherent insistence that the horses be put to without delay.

  Once the duke had been delivered into the care of his valet, Caro sought the housekeeper and gave her the recipe for a potion guaranteed to cure overindulgence. She knew it by heart. She had to force the horrible remedy down his throat. He was already in bed, washed and put into a nightshirt by Minchin.

  “I want to go to sleep.”

  ”You’ll feel much better when you wake if you drink this first. Open wide. There you go.” He looked so miserable, she dropped a kiss on his forehead.

  He blinked a couple of times, trying to focus on her face. “You’re back, Caro.”

  She could have pointed out that he was the one who’d been away, but she understood. “Yes, darling. I’m much better now, and you will be, too, once you’ve slept. What were you thinking, getting yourself into such a state?”

  He groped for her hand. “You love Robert, not me. You don’t love Lord Stuffy, so I tried to be like Robert.”

  The sweet idiot! She felt like weeping again. She began to protest, but he cut her off.

  “I don’t drink and I don’t gamble and I don’t have a mistress. I’m dull. You told me so, the first time we met. So I tried to change.” He frowned. “Not the mi
stress. I’ll never do that.”

  “Good,” she whispered.

  “I’m trying to be like Robert, but I’m no good at it. I drank wine. And brandy, lots of it. I didn’t like it and it made me sick. I played hazard and I lost.” He looked momentarily cheerful and her heart sank. “But I didn’t like that either. If I was a real man like Mr. Fox, or Robert, I’d have lost thousands.”

  The sadder he looked, the more her heart ached, a happy ache.

  “I failed you, Caro. I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I’ll always be Lord Stuffy,” he said, and closed his tortured, bloodshot eyes.

  Caro caressed the stubbled jaw. “I wouldn’t want you to be anything else.”

  But Thomas had passed out and was not to be revived.

  What a fool she’d been, and how cruel. She remembered all the times she’d sung Robert’s praises to Thomas. The way she’d defended Robert’s friends, even when they mocked him. Not that she’d give up her friends. Perhaps Marcus and Julian, though she’d like to know how Thomas happened to be with the latter last night. Thomas wouldn’t expect her to, either. He’d never asked her to change, only to put him first. As he had every right to expect. As she wished to do.

  Robert had been her first love, but her infatuation had been a girlish one. For so many years, she’d refused to acknowledge that he was a deeply flawed man, bound for destruction by his own ungoverned impulses. Clinging to his memory had been her way of denying that she might have made a mistake when she eloped at the age of seventeen. She had the great good fortune to win the love of a much better man. She’d failed to appreciate his worth and in doing so, almost lost him.

  No, not that. Thomas loved her. He’d told her so and showed it in a hundred ways. His character was solid gold and his affection unshakable.

  She wanted to wake him up and tell him immediately that she was in love with him. That she adored him and wanted him exactly the way he was.

  He was sprawled across the mattress. Lord, how she’d missed him in bed, both awake and asleep. Even in this vast house with huge bedrooms for each of them, she swore they’d live in the same state of intimacy as at tiny Conduit Street. She never wanted to sleep alone again.