The Incomparable Countess

by Mary Nichols

  ‘I am not sure that it can.’

  ‘Then I will call on you tomorrow.’ It was a disappointing blow after riding hell for leather to be back in London in time to see her, but he supposed what he had to say could wait one more day.

  ‘I wonder at your risking it,’ she said pertly. ‘Your name has already been linked to mine. Always on my doorstep, so they say.’

  ‘Oh, you have heard it then?’

  ‘The latest on dit? Who has not? Is that not the reason you have withdrawn your daughter from my corrupting influence? And forbidden your son to associate with mine.’ She realised as soon as she spoke she was on dangerous ground, but she hoped Lavinia was well on the way home by now.

  ‘No, it is not. And believe me, I am sorry. I should not have blamed you for my own inadequacy as a parent. Will you forgive me?’

  ‘I forgive you.’

  ‘But can you also forgive me for the slander which has been heaped upon you? I have only just heard the full extent of it and it has appalled me.’

  ‘Oh, it is nothing but malicious gossip. I take no note of it.’

  ‘Do you not? But supposing I do? Supposing it is of the utmost importance to me, that you should understand the truth.’

  ‘Why? You do not have to explain it to me, Marcus. The tattlers will soon find something else on which to exercise their tongues.’

  ‘No doubt they will, but I will have them retract.’

  ‘How will you do that?’

  ‘Prove they are wrong.’ He paused and reached out to take her hand in his. She did not withdraw it. ‘Fanny, have you, by chance, heard something about a lost child?’

  ‘Yes, but you do not need to tell me…’

  ‘Oh, but I do. That child is not my mine.’

  ‘Not yours? But Lavinia’s drawing was so like… You saw it too…’

  ‘Oh, he is a Stanmore, no doubt of that, but he is my brother’s offspring, not mine.’

  ‘Lord John’s?’

  ‘Yes, you met him once, that summer of your come-out, do you remember? He was the bran-faced youth who was forever getting in my way. I had to throw him off more than once in order to meet you alone. I used to swear he did it on purpose.’

  ‘I remember.’

  ‘How is your headache? Is it too much to listen to this?’

  She had forgotten she was supposed to be in pain and smiled. ‘Go on.’

  ‘John had just left Cambridge and had not yet decided what he wanted to do with himself, and he was at home when the news came that the man who had been my head groom, Joseph Poole, had been killed in Spain. I had promised to look after the wives of any of my men who were lost as a result of serving their country and I was foolish enough to ask John to call on her to see if she needed anything. Margaret was very ill at the time and I had been summoned to her bedside and could think of little else or I might have wondered why he needed to go so often. He was a sympathetic sort and I think he only meant to comfort her, but the result was a child…’

  ‘Oh, I see. But how did the child become lost?’

  ‘I did not turn her off, if that is what you are thinking. In fact, I considered insisting on John marrying her, but I knew that would not serve. He was not yet ready for that commitment, even if she agreed, which I knew she would not; at every level they were poles apart. It is well I did not, for it would have been bigamy. I sent John on the Grand Tour which is where he is now and gave her a pension, for all her husband’s years of service, I told her, and she seemed perfectly settled with her child.

  ‘At the end of the war, her husband was reported alive and well and on his way home. He had apparently been a prisoner. Unable to face him, Mrs Poole fled with her child.’

  They had drawn up outside Corringham House, but neither made a move to alight. She maintained her serious attention, but inside she was singing with joy, not only because he was not the rake he was reputed to be, but a caring gentleman who worried about his people, and because it was important to him that she should know the truth. ‘And you are concerned for their welfare?’

  ‘Yes. Poole arrived home, expecting to find his wife waiting for him; instead, he learned about the child and swore revenge, not only on her, but the man who had ruined her. I tried to reason with him. He demanded to know the name of the father, but I would not tell him. He left the area and I assumed he meant to find his wife and punish her.’

  ‘And you must find her first?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Oh, Marcus, I am so very, very sorry. Have you no idea where she can be?’

  ‘No, but Vinny drew the child, I am sure of it, though no one has seen him since.’

  ‘Have you told Lavinia about this?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Don’t you think you should? I think she may have heard some of the gossip and she understands it very well. She deserves to know the truth.’

  ‘I will tell her tomorrow. But that is not all. I believe Poole has seen the child and assumed, like everyone else, that I am its father. I am not afraid for myself, but I fear for Mrs Poole and the child.’

  ‘Oh, dear, no wonder you have been distracted.’

  ‘It is not the only thing I have been distracted about.’

  ‘There is more?’

  ‘Much more. And it concerns you.’ He smiled ruefully in the darkness. ‘In a way the gossips were right about one thing. I did ask you to instruct Lavinia so that I might see you more often…’

  ‘In order to spar with me and look down your aristocratic nose and tell me where I was going wrong.’

  ‘No. If I did that, then I regret it.’ He paused, then deciding he might as well jump in with both feet, added, ‘Because I love you, I have never ceased to love you, all the years we have been apart. And though I dared not hope you had nursed fond memories of me—I had, after all, treated you shabbily, for which I beg your forgiveness—I wanted to see you again, to talk to you. In a way I wanted to prove to myself that my dreams of you had been built on nothing but air, that when we met again, I would see how foolish they had been. Instead, I found myself ensnared all over again.’

  ‘I set no trap for you.’

  ‘Oh, no, that was of my own making. I struggled a little at first, telling myself I would not risk marriage a second time, but the struggles were so feeble, I realised I did not want to escape. Fanny, tell me you understand. Tell me you forgive my boorishness, my bad temper, everything you found so abominable and that you will allow me to try and make it up to you. I love you. I want you to be my wife. I have wanted it these seventeen years. Please tell me it is not too late. Say you will.’

  Her heart was pounding in her throat and she could not speak. He had said he loved her once before and where had that led her? She was no longer a silly chit of a girl, but a mature woman, able to weigh up the consequences of anything she did. And one of the things she had done, only this evening, was to condone his daughter’s prank and send her home in a cab with her stepson, unchaperoned.

  Would his new-found contrition allow him to overlook that? And if she confessed, here and now, he would immediately conclude she had lured him into taking her home in order to accomplish it. He would say she had listened to him unburdening himself under false pretences. She allowed herself a secret, rueful smile in the darkness, imagining his anger and it would be far worse than any that had gone before.

  ‘Marcus, you have taken me by surprise,’ she said, though it cost her dear in self-control to speak calmly. ‘I need time to consider…’

  ‘What is there to consider?’

  ‘Four days ago you were railing at me for my faults…’

  ‘I have apologised for that. And I will not grumble at you again.’

  ‘No? Marcus Stanmore, you should not make promises you cannot keep. You did it once before, you know.’

  ‘I know. I cannot blame you for your hesitancy. Will you at least consider my proposal? If you do not trust my promises, then be assured I shall try not to fly into the boughs quite so often if
we were married…’

  ‘But I should often tempt you sorely.’

  ‘I will bear it.’

  She laughed then, very gently. ‘Oh, Marcus, for seventeen years I have secretly dreamed you would come riding into my life again like a knight in shining armour and carry me off on your white charger, to some heavenly place where we had nothing to do but love each other. But, you know, life is not like that. We have both moved on. You are the Duke of Loscoe, aristocrat and landowner, with all the responsibility that entails, and I am Frances Corringham, portraitist and proxy mother, not only to my stepchildren but numerous orphans…’

  ‘The functions are complementary, Fanny. They go hand in hand.’ He lifted her hand to his lips as he spoke and kissed the palm. ‘But I collect you have the headache and my importuning is not helping. I will be patient and call on you tomorrow.’

  ‘Very well,’ she said, wondering what the morrow would bring. She must send for James first thing in the morning, find out if all went well, before Marcus arrived. ‘I shall expect you, but not before noon. I intend to sleep late.’

  ‘Then, my darling, I must contain myself in patience.’ He opened the door, jumped to the ground and turned to hold his arms out to her. She dropped into them as easily as a young girl and he set her feet on the ground, though he did not release her. He stood looking down at her upturned face, his hands round her slim waist, so close their bodies touched and almost melded into one. Then very gently, very tenderly, he lowered his mouth to hers.

  Her arms flew wide, fluttered about as if she did not know what to do with them, and then wound themselves around his neck, lost to all propriety. She felt gloriously and wonderfully alive. And loved and, for the moment, that was enough.

  The coachman sat upright on his seat, facing forward, his hat pulled down over his eyes, but there was a smile on his face. If his master chose to dress and behave like a yokel and if the Countess found it easier to accept his advances as a serving wench, then why not?

  ‘Until tomorrow,’ Marcus murmured as he released her. He stood and watched until she was safely indoors then climbed back into the carriage and commanded the coachman to take him home and not to spare the horses.

  He was back at a ridiculously early hour. Frances, who had slept very little and was therefore up and clad in a flowing undress gown of peach silk, was sitting at the desk in the library penning a note to James when Creeley announced him.

  Flustered she rose to meet him. Although she had been awake half the night and although she loved him and wanted nothing so much as to be his wife, she had not yet decided how to answer his proposal. Before she could allow him to repeat it, she needed to know if he had found out about Lavinia’s escapade and, if he had, did he know the manner in which his sixteen-year-old daughter had returned home? And if he appeared to know nothing, ought she to let sleeping dogs lie?

  Her self-questioning was brought to an abrupt halt when he appeared before her. His clothing was as fashionable and well-tailored as always, and though she could not exactly say he was untidy, he had obviously dressed with less than his usual care. His cravat was crumpled and his whole demeanour a little wild.

  ‘Marcus, whatever is the matter?’

  ‘Is Lavinia here?’

  ‘Here?’ she repeated, mystified. ‘Why would she come here without you?’

  ‘I don’t know. It was all I could think of, that she was still miffy that I had stopped the lessons and would come anyway.’

  ‘She has not been here. Are you saying you do not know where she is?’

  ‘That is exactly what I am saying.’

  She sank back in her chair, her legs too rubbery to support her, her head full of wild imaginings. ‘What happened?’

  ‘I do not know. She did not come down to breakfast and as I wished to speak to her on the matter we were discussing last night, I sent for her to come down. She was not in her room and no one knew where she was.’

  ‘You have searched for her?’

  ‘Naturally we searched for her. She was not anywhere in the house. Nor in the garden.’

  ‘But she was home last night?’ She desperately needed to be reassured.

  ‘I do not know. That ninnyhammer, Hastings, went to her own room straight after dinner and left Vinny alone in the library. No one has seen her since, not even her maid, for she gave the chit the evening off. If she has got herself into a coil…’

  ‘Why do you think that?’ Frances asked, her head in a whirl of half-formed questions, self-accusation and guilt.

  ‘Because it is better to think that than to imagine someone has taken her.’

  ‘Oh, surely not.’

  ‘I would not put it past him.’

  ‘Oh, he would never do that,’ she said, thinking of James because she could not contemplate anything else but that James must know where Lavinia was. How soon could she get rid of Marcus to go and ask him?

  ‘It would be a way of punishing me.’

  ‘Why would he wish to punish you?’

  ‘Fanny, did you not listen to a word I said last night? Joseph Poole is capable of anything…’

  ‘Poole?’

  ‘Yes, who did you think I meant?’

  ‘No one,’ she said quickly. ‘Is there any evidence? Did someone break into the house?’

  ‘There is not a shred of evidence of that, which is why I am inclined to think that she was up to some rig or other which has gone horribly wrong. Fanny, I beg of you, if she has hinted by any word or deed that she was planning something foolish, then pray tell me.’

  ‘No, she said nothing to me.’

  ‘What about that stepson of yours, do you think she would have confided in him?’

  ‘James?’ She could hardly breathe, let alone speak.

  ‘They have had some discourse, I believe. In fact, they…’

  ‘Oh, no, sir, I will not countenance that. Whatever his faults, James would never do anything to sully a young lady’s reputation and especially one in whom I had an interest.’

  ‘Notwithstanding I mean to go and ask him.’

  ‘Please wait while I dress and I will come with you.’

  ‘Then make haste, please. While we argue, she could be anywhere.’

  Half an hour later, they were waiting in James’s drawing room while he was fetched from his bed. Marcus paced the room in a fever of impatience, while Frances, no less impatient, sat on a straight-backed chair, wondering how she was to climb out of the bumblebath she had tumbled into without forever damning herself in Marcus’s eyes. He would forget he had ever asked her to marry him and who could blame him?

  When James arrived, it was obvious he had been awakened from sleep. He was wearing a burgundy dressing gown over his nightshirt and his hair was tousled. ‘What is this?’ he demanded. ‘Can’t a fellow be allowed a decent night’s sleep?’

  ‘Lavinia has disappeared,’ Frances said, determined to have her say first. ‘His Grace has some crazy notion she might have confided some mischief to you. I told him it was out of the question. Why, you hardly know her.’

  James collapsed into a chair as if he needed its support. ‘When did she disappear?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Marcus said. ‘But if you know anything, then I beg you to tell me. There will be no recriminations, I promise you….’

  James glanced at Frances. She was imperceptibly shaking her head. ‘I know nothing, sir. I was at the ball with Mama last night—you saw me yourself. That is, if it was last night Lady Lavinia disappeared. Could she not have decided to go for an early ride this morning?’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘It was only a suggestion. You know your daughter best.’

  ‘I’ll send to the stables where I hire her hack and check the coaching inns, in case she has taken it into her head to go home to Risley, though why she would I cannot think. I told her I would be back…’

  ‘Wait for me to dress and I will do that for you.’

  ‘Thank you. Much appreciated.’

  �
�I’ll ask Miss Hastings to go to Hookham’s library,’ Marcus said, as he disappeared. ‘And I think, just in case Poole is at the bottom of it, I’ll enlist the help of Major Greenaway. He can be trusted, but I would rather this did not become another piece of gossip to add to the rest.’

  ‘You may rely on James,’ Frances said, while Marcus continued to pace the room.

  When James reappeared in riding clothes, they all left the house together. ‘I’ll be quicker on horseback,’ he said, opening the carriage door for Frances to enter, while Marcus climbed on to the driving seat and picked up the reins.

  ‘You saw her safely home?’ she whispered.

  ‘Indeed I did,’ he whispered back, making a great play of helping to put her skirt into the carriage. ‘But I would not want to be in your shoes when Loscoe finds out about last night. I should confess all, if I were you.’

  ‘If we do not find her soon, I shall have to, but I would rather Lavinia told him herself.’

  ‘Pray we find her quickly,’ he said more audibly, as he shut the carriage door and stepped back.

  They were soon back at Corringham House and Marcus jumped down to help her alight. ‘I think I will pay a courtesy call on Lady Willoughby,’ she told him. ‘If I can contrive to speak to Felicity without alerting suspicion, she might know something. She and Lavinia often talked together, as girls will.’

  ‘Not an elopement,’ Marcus said. ‘Dear God, not an elopement.’

  ‘No, of course not,’ Frances said briskly. ‘Your daughter is far too sensible for that. And I am sure if there had been a young man, she would never have been able to keep it to herself. And these things have to be planned.’

  ‘Then why mention it?’ He paused. ‘Frances, you have been on edge ever since I told you about this…’

  ‘I am concerned, that is all.’

  ‘Frances, I shall shake you, if you do not speak out. My daughter is missing, perhaps even hurt and you prevaricate.’

  ‘I am sorry and I do not think it is relevant, truly I don’t.’

  ‘I shall decide what is relevant and what is not.’