by Anne Gracie
Somehow Alice had to find a titled gentleman willing to marry this rude, spoiled hedgehog of a girl.
* * *
* * *
Lucy followed the housekeeper up the stairs. Past the first floor—“Reception rooms,” the old woman told her. Past the second floor—“That’s where Lady Charlton’s bedchamber and favorite sitting room are.” She led Lucy up the narrower stairs to the third floor and down the corridor to a room right at the back of the house. Lucy’s lip curled. That’d be right. In with the servants, no doubt.
Mrs. Tweed opened the door and gestured for Lucy to enter.
The ancient butler set down a valise and two bandboxes and trudged off to fetch the rest of her luggage from the hall, while his wife bustled about the room, twitching things into place and explaining things in a familiar, chatty manner. Lucy wasn’t really listening.
Papa had stressed to her that she must learn to treat servants properly, to speak firmly to them when you wanted something and to ignore them for the most part, as if they weren’t there. Because that’s what the aristocracy did.
Most importantly, she was not to allow any cheek or personal references. He’d explained that Lady Charlton had no idea how to treat servants and had allowed hers to get into some very bad habits. He’d added that her butler was a very cheeky fellow in need of a severe set-down.
Lucy didn’t think the butler was the slightest bit cheeky. She found his solemn air of dignity quite intimidating. And now the butler’s wife was being all cozy and motherly. What was she supposed to do about that?
And they were both practically a hundred years old. Their faces were as wrinkled as the skin that formed on warm milk, the housekeeper’s hair was silvery white, and the butler had almost no hair at all, just a thin fringe of white circling a shiny pink pate. She was plump; he was thin and stooped, and he wheezed slightly as he set the last of her baggage down in front of the wardrobe.
It made Lucy a little uncomfortable, letting an old man carry her things up all those stairs. She knew how the aristocracy treated servants. She’d learned it the hard way, and she didn’t much like it.
“Now then, miss, you let us know if there’s anything else you need,” the old woman finished. “Tweed and me’ll do what we can to help you settle in. Nice to have a young lady visiting,” she added warmly and patted Lucy on the arm.
Lucy murmured her thanks and wondered whether she ought to have reprimanded her for that pat on the arm. She was certain Papa would have, saying it was encroaching and overfamiliar and she was not to allow a servant to treat her that way.
But it felt . . . nice. Friendly. Not encroaching at all.
Oh, she was never going to manage this. Marry a lord? She couldn’t even handle servants. What had Papa been thinking?
The comtesse had treated Lucy as a kind of mix between a pupil and maidservant. She was prideful and arrogant and impossible to please, and would drill Lucy mercilessly for an hour or two each morning, rapping out orders in French about how to curtsy according to rank and instructing her in other obscure rituals of the ancien régime. Correcting her accent. Teaching her to behave as ma charmante invitée. Then she would send her off to dust the furniture, scrub the floor, fetch the eggs and chop onions in the kitchen, like a servant. Frau Steiner had been much the same, only with her, it was music, not manners. And all in German.
Would Lady Charlton be any better? She doubted it.
The minute the Tweeds had closed the door behind them, Lucy plumped down onto the bed. Her fists were knotted in frustration, and she wasn’t sure whether she wanted to scream or cry—or both. But what was the point? Papa had done what he always did: appeared out of the blue, swept her away to God-knew-where, for who-knew-what reason, dumped her in a strange place with a strange woman and minimal explanation—and then left.
Lord knew when she’d see him again.
The comtesse had been most put out by the lack of notice, but Papa had ignored the old lady’s ranting. His behavior had been a far cry from when he’d first brought her to the comtesse—then he’d been all over the old lady, as charming and obsequious as a honey-dipped snake. But he’d got what he wanted from her and was barely polite to the old lady now. He’d hustled Lucy away so quickly she had no time to say farewell to anyone. Not that she’d had any actual friends there.
They’d stopped for a few days at Epsom—for the races, of course—and afterward Papa had presented her with several new dresses, including the ugly pink one she’d worn yesterday and the orange thing she was wearing now. She detected the less-than-subtle taste of one of Papa’s ladies—he liked them bold and a bit vulgar—and she’d said so, quite bluntly.
Papa said it didn’t matter, that she was going to London to make her come-out and marry a lord, and that the lady who would sponsor her come-out would take her to the finest French mantua-maker and order her a whole new wardrobe. In the meantime Lucy would wear what he had provided and like it.
There was never any point arguing with Papa. He never listened. And since all her old clothes were faded and a bit tight—it was several years since she’d had anything new—she had no choice but to obey. Though not the bit about liking it.
She flung herself back on her new bed. She felt like drumming her heels on the counterpane, kicking some of her frustration away. But it was quite a nice counterpane, and she was still wearing her new high-heeled half boots, and it wouldn’t be a good idea to have her first act in this house be an act of vandalism.
Besides, experience had taught her that giving way to temper only ever made things worse.
She took ten long, slow breaths, forcing herself to become calmer. There was no point in being upset—she was stuck here in this house with this woman who Papa said was going to get her married to a lord.
A lord! Really, Papa was the absolute limit. As if any lord would be interested in plain Lucy Bamber, of no particular beauty, no fortune, no background and no accomplishments. Another one of Papa’s plans that was bound to end in humiliation—Lucy’s humiliation.
She’d begged and pleaded with him to change his mind, but he’d turned a deaf ear to all her pleas and arguments, and as always, here she was, delivered like a parcel and abandoned.
For two pins she’d run away, only she didn’t have two pins, or even tuppence—and in any case, where could she go? She had nowhere to run to and she wasn’t naive enough to try. She’d tried once, and afterward Papa had made her walk by herself down a grimy, narrow street lined with scantily dressed girls and women, some her age and younger, selling their bodies, calling out their “wares.” It was a terrifying lesson in the fate of unprotected girls, and she’d never forgotten it.
You needed money to run away, and Papa had seen to it that she didn’t have a penny of her own. She’d seen the thick wad of banknotes he’d given to Lady Charlton.
This mad scheme of his. Whatever did he imagine would come of it?
And though she wouldn’t mind getting married, she really, really didn’t want to marry a lord. She’d met enough of them at the comtesse’s to know what they were like, and she’d known several girls from titled families at the various schools she’d attended—horrid, snobbish cows, for the most part.
Those girls had despised Lucy for her accent, her lack of family, her lack of “background”—and Lucy had despised them right back.
Lady Charlton would despise her, too, she knew, even though Lucy’s accent was better now. And those lords of hers would take one look at her and turn up their aristocratic noses. Or slip their horrid, soft white fingers into her clothing, assuming she would be honored by their lordly attentions.
She’d given quite a few lordly types a nice shock when she’d reacted to that kind of attention. Though some of them got quite excited by a slap. Horrid beasts.
No, she really didn’t want to be part of fashionable society, where everyone thought themselves superior t
o everyone else. She had to find some way out of this stupid plan of Papa’s.
She rolled off the bed, made use of the necessary, then washed her hands and face. A marble-topped table held a large jug of water—still warm—a bowl for washing in and a small cake of soap. It was good-quality soap, too, and smelled faintly of roses.
Why was Lady Charlton doing this? Why would a grand lady like her agree to take in an unknown girl and try to find her an aristocratic husband. For money?
It was obvious that Lady Charlton was a trifle purse-pinched—Lucy had noticed the darker patches on the walls of the upper floors where paintings had once hung, and there was evidence that there had once been rugs on the floors. But despite its faded elegance, this house was impressive and right in the heart of fashionable London. It would be worth a mint.
Maybe she was a gambler and was in debt and had no choice. That was a possibility. She didn’t think it was for love. Papa had a way with the ladies, but his taste ran more to vulgar widows—mutton dressed as lamb. Lady Charlton was quietly elegant, not his style at all. Though you never knew with Papa.
She dried her face and hands on a towel.
Had Papa somehow forced Lady Charlton to take her in? It wasn’t as if he hadn’t done that kind of thing before. And whenever Papa coerced people into taking Lucy, they invariably took it out on her.
But this room . . . Lucy looked around the room with a new eye. It was a very nice room altogether, by far the nicest bedchamber she’d ever had. It wasn’t large, but it was spotless. Papered in a pretty pale blue, the room had a large window on one wall that let in plenty of light. As well as the bed—which was large and surprisingly comfortable—there was a tall chest of drawers, a spacious wardrobe, a dressing table with a looking glass attached and, beside it, a full-length cheval mirror.
It wasn’t opulent, but nor was it shabby. It was clean, attractive and comfortable. She hadn’t expected that.
The clock in the hall chimed the quarter hour. Lucy glanced at her reflection in the cheval glass and pulled a face. Oh, how she hated this dress. The sooner Lady Charlton took her to that fancy French dressmaker, the better. If she listened to what Lucy wanted, that is. Not that anyone ever did.
Beneath the window sat a small chaise longue and beside it a narrow shelf of books. Lucy loved to read, and had a weakness for the kind of books that Papa called “rubbishy novels.” Curious, she went to investigate the titles—and then stopped dead. Her room was at the back of the house, and she had expected to look out onto brick walls or a dingy laneway. She stared out, entranced.
Her window looked out into trees. A hundred shades of green in the heart of gray old London. She pressed her face against the glass, looked down and felt some of the tightness in her chest slowly loosen. Between a gently fluttering veil of tender spring leaves, she could make out a smooth swathe of velvety green lawn.
There were neatly edged garden beds, bursting with bright spring colors: golden daffodils, tulips in red and yellow, and something blue—hyacinths or maybe the last of the bluebells. Beneath the taller flowers, a rich floral tapestry in soft jewel tones that she thought might be primulas. Mama would have known; she loved flowers.
It was hard to be sure, to see exactly which flowers were out. Narrow pathways wound between the lavish, exuberant flower beds and disappeared behind a bank of shrubs, leading who knew where.
In the middle of the garden sat an odd, intriguing little building made mostly of glass. She dodged, trying to look through the screen of leaves, but the breeze was making them dance and shift, so it was difficult to see. Was it a temple? A folly? Oh, and was that an arch of wisteria? Who owned this wonderful garden so full of delights?
A heavy bong reverberated from below, startling her and reminding her that she was supposed to go down for luncheon. She hadn’t been able to eat a thing this morning, she’d been so full of dread. And frustration. And anger. Now she was ravenous.
She dragged herself away from the enticing view, tidied her hair and hurried down the stairs. The last house she’d lived in that had a proper garden with flowers had been one she’d lived in with Mama, but that was small, just a few flowers in front and mostly vegetables behind. Now she only had to look out her window to gaze into a magical garden. And in London, of all places. It was an unexpected gift.
She passed a number of doors on her way downstairs. Spare bedchambers, Mrs. Tweed had told her as they’d passed earlier. Any one of them could have been hers. She doubted any of them had a view: they faced the side of the building, so would probably look out onto a brick wall of the house next door.
But Lady Charlton had given her unwanted guest a light, pretty room with a magical view. Why? Lucy couldn’t understand it. If Papa had forced Lady Charlton to take Lucy in and present her to society, Lady Charlton would surely resent her.
If their positions were reversed, Lucy would probably want to stick her uninvited guest in a stuffy closet or some dark little hole. Or a chilly attic room, like the one the comtesse had given her. Or squeezed her into a dusty room filled with old furniture and boxes, as Frau Steiner had. And in the various schools she’d attended, Lucy had always been given the most uncomfortable bed or the dark corner nobody else wanted.
She’d never in her life had such a pretty, comfortable bedchamber, let alone one with such a lovely view. It was quite a puzzle.
Chapter Three
Alice had made a poor start with Lucy, she realized as she washed her hands before luncheon. She’d let her resentment and anger toward Bamber spill over onto the daughter, which was hardly fair. The girl had made no effort to cooperate or even be polite, but then, if Alice had been put into a similar situation, she might feel like being rude and resentful, too.
She wouldn’t have shown it, though. Alice had spent a lifetime being a good, obedient girl. And then a good, obedient wife.
And what had that achieved? Certainly not happiness. Perhaps if she’d rebelled earlier . . . No. Pointless to repine over the past. She just had to get this girl married off, and then she would be free to become the kind of woman she wanted to be.
Whatever that was.
Lucy was just eighteen, and Alice’s memory of that age was that it was full of emotional ups and downs. At eighteen, in a matter of weeks, Alice herself had been betrothed, married and pitchforked into London society. Alone, because shortly after her wedding, Mama and Papa had sailed for the Far East.
It wasn’t all that different from Lucy’s situation now. Left alone to sink or swim.
As the elder, Alice needed to take the lead, because if this scheme were to work, she needed to establish a relationship with Lucy that was, at the very least, civil and cooperative.
Luncheon was a simple meal of clear soup, bread and butter, sliced ham and a green salad. After grace, they drank the soup in silence. Then as they were buttering bread and serving themselves ham and salad, Alice spoke. “Are you happy with your room, Lucy?”
Lucy nodded and continued buttering her bread.
“My maid, Mary, will come after lunch and to unpack for y—”
“I said, I don’t need her. I’ll unpack my own things.”
Alice blinked at the abrupt declaration, but all she said was, “Very well.”
For the next few minutes they addressed themselves to the meal.
“You’re not his usual type.”
The comment out of the blue startled Alice. “I beg your pardon?”
“I wouldn’t have picked you as one of Papa’s fancy women.”
One of his fancy women? Alice stiffened. “Are you implying that there is something—something personal—between your father and me? Because if so, you are quite, quite wrong.”
Lucy quirked a cynical brow. “Really?”
“Yes, really! I met him for the first time yesterday.”
The girl narrowed her eyes. “You never met him before tha
t?”
“Never. I hadn’t even heard of him.”
“Then why . . ?”
“Why did I agree to take you into my home and sponsor your come-out?” It was a fair question and not unexpected.
Lucy nodded. “And go through that—that stupid godmother rigmarole. Mama had me baptized when I was a baby.”
A trickle of relief ran down Alice’s spine. So the girl didn’t know the sordid details of the arrangement her father had made with Alice. “It’s business.”
“So you’re doing it for money.” It wasn’t a question.
Alice nodded, hoping she looked convincing. Money played no part in why she’d agreed to this mad scheme, but she was accepting money from Bamber to cover the costs. But the less Lucy knew about the arrangement, the better.
At least the girl was talking now.
She tried for some more pleasant conversation. “Where do you come from, Lucy?” The more she knew about her background, the easier it would be to introduce her.
Lucy poked at her salad. “Nowhere.”
“What do you mean ‘nowhere’?” Everyone came from somewhere.
Apparently uninterested, the girl lifted a shoulder.
Alice persisted. “Well, where were you living before your father brought you to me?”
“With another woman, a Frenchwoman in Sussex.” Her tone was world-weary.
“And this woman was your father’s . . .” Alice paused delicately.
“No. She wasn’t one of his mistresses. She was old.” She glanced at Alice. “Much older than you.”
Alice was slightly shocked at the casual way this girl spoke of her father’s mistresses. At Lucy’s age, Alice had had no idea that men even kept mistresses. She’d been so innocent back then.
Bamber had implied that Lucy’s mother was dead. Perhaps that’s why Lucy was so knowledgeable about the ways of men, because she’d been brought up by her father.
“How long did you live with this Frenchwoman?”