The Marquess

by Patricia Rice

  A second angry shattering of fragile porcelain broke the quiet.

  * * * *

  “I hate leaving you, Blanche, but I don’t know what else to do.” Garbed in breeches again, Dillian paced up and down the floor. The wretched O’Toole had brought only Blanche’s gowns, none of which fit Dillian. She felt quite certain the aggravating footman had known of her presence, but he was more concerned with Blanche enticing the marquess than in seeing Dillian suitably dressed. It didn’t matter. Once she returned to Hampshire, she could find her own garments.

  “I agree with you completely, Dill. You have to go. If you could find some way of smuggling Verity back here, I would be eternally grateful, but your idea of pretending I’m in residence at the Grange is excellent. I just hope you won’t endanger yourself in the process.”

  “I’ll pretend Verity is spending night and day in the chamber, nursing you. She can walk to her mother’s and have one of her family bring her here by wagon. I don’t know how O’Toole will get her in here, but I’m sure he’ll think of a way. Are you sure you’re safe with him? I trust him even less than the beast.”

  Dillian watched her cousin with concern. She knew mentally Blanche denied the possibility of the fire having harmed her vision, but sometime, they must deal with it. The fact that Blanche could see light gave hope. A lump of fear formed in Dillian’s throat at the thought of permanent damage.

  She knew how unfair life was, but she had hoped she could keep her cousin from that knowledge. Words like “virtuous” and “noble” sprang to mind whenever she thought of Blanche. So few people in this world could truly claim heroism. Blanche was one of them. She had to protect her cousin from her own innocence somehow. Leaving her in O’Toole’s dubious care did not lend itself to her peace of mind.

  Blanche tilted her head thoughtfully. “Did you not think O’Toole Irish?”

  “I thought him a rogue and a rascal. That’s close enough.”

  “He didn’t speak like one earlier. He’s much kinder than the marquess, actually.” Her lips turned upward. “I particularly liked the smashing china. He seems to know you very well.”

  “Yes, well, anyone would want to smash china around a tyrant like that. I’m certain he’s had plenty of experience in the matter. Just keep that knife under your pillow. I’ll get Verity here as soon as possible. Are you certain there are no papers from the Grange that I need to send back with her?”

  Dillian didn’t want to add, “Just in case the Grange burns, too,” but they both knew what she meant.

  Blanche shook her head. “I’ve gone over it and over it in my head. Most of the papers are at Anglesey with Neville or with my solicitor. Your father’s journals and things are in London. I keep nothing at the Grange. We’ve been fortunate.”

  Dillian didn’t consider the loss of a house and serious injuries fortunate, but she held her tongue. Clasping her hand around the door latch, she cast one last look back at Blanche sitting in the dying sunlight from the window. She truly hated leaving her. But she didn’t protect just the Hampshire property by leaving, she protected Blanche’s life.

  “Are you certain you can persuade him to take you?” Blanche asked anxiously.

  “He won’t have any alternative.” With a determined set of her lips, Dillian slipped from the room.

  The Marquess of Effingham really had no clue how persistent she could be when she applied her mind to it. He should have realized it by now, but men so easily gave into the prevailing belief of the helplessness of women. Often enough she cursed the celestial irony that had hidden the steel trap of her mind behind a small, soft body. But at times like this, the disguise gave her an advantage.

  She slipped out the side door to the stable. Someone had saddled one of the ancient carriage horses. She wished whoever it was had harnessed it to the decrepit barouche, but the mighty military man evidently meant to make good time. That made her duty tougher, but not impossible.

  She had reason to be grateful for the inferior quality of his stable a few minutes later. She couldn’t have saddled anything more active than the other glue pot the marquess called a carriage horse. Feeding the animal a handful of oats from a sack, she kept it quiet at the sound of boots crunching in the gravel. At least he wore boots when he rode.

  She would have to follow him fairly closely until she figured out where she was. She knew the area around the Grange, but the ride from Blanche’s ruined estate to Hampshire could take a couple of days on horseback, depending on weather and road conditions. She didn’t know where Arinmede Manor was located along that route. She didn’t want to get lost before she even left the county.

  She waited until she heard his horse walking down the drive. She wondered if the beast wore his cloak and hood in the warm May sun or just contented himself with scowling at the passersby to prevent them from looking too closely. Personally, she thought his disfigurement more in his head than on his face, but her opinions didn’t count.

  Mounting her passive nag, Dillian cautiously rode it from the barn. She had never tried riding in breeches and without a sidesaddle before. It made her oddly uncomfortable, but she wouldn’t worry about it. She had to find some way of following Effingham without his knowing it.

  She went over the wall and rode on the field side of the trees, letting the marquess think himself alone on the road. She didn’t know what she would do when she reached planted fields, but his estate seemed to lie mostly fallow. She could see a few sheep in the distance, but no tenant farms. She supposed he had his reasons.

  Dillian caught glimpses of him through the fence row. He didn’t wear a gentleman’s long forked-tail riding coat but what appeared to be an ankle-length canvas coat, similar to a greatcoat without the layers of capes. She’d never seen such an odd garment, but it would successfully keep the dust from the road off him. Instead of a tall beaver hat, he wore a broad-brimmed slouch hat low on his forehead. If he stayed out of everyone’s direct line of sight, they wouldn’t see much of his face. She would expect such a strange outfit on someone like the mad O’Toole, but not on the elegantly aristocratic Marquess of Effingham. Obviously, he was a creature of many disguises.

  Of course, he would choose to ride at night. She couldn’t keep her horse in the field once it turned dark. As the sun gradually lowered in the sky. Dillian nervously looked for some alternative. Neither horse had much inclination for friskiness. They made a steady, even pace but nothing more. She could safely stay well to the rear unless they came across a crossroads. If he got too far ahead, she wouldn’t know which route he took.

  Finding a gate, she waited until the marquess disappeared around a curve before leading her mount back to the road. Trees on both sides threw the lane into premature darkness. That aided her cause, she supposed, but it also made her nervous. Visions of highwaymen, looters, and rioters immediately peopled her imagination. The faceless murderer who had burned Blanche’s home came next.

  She wished she had a better disguise of her own. Boys’ breeches might confuse someone for a brief glance, but no more. She wasn’t precisely built like a boy. She wore the bulkiest coat she could find in the wardrobes, but the outdated fashion and the bright blue silk provided even more cause to stare. She felt like a scarecrow. Perhaps she should have worn the cloak.

  The moon had reached a high point in the sky when she saw the marquess finally take advantage of a small inn to stop and water his horse. Every bone in her body felt as if it had been taken apart and beaten and put back together crooked.

  She waited until he’d gone inside to refresh himself before climbing down and watering her horse at a stream behind the inn. She didn’t dare go inside, although her stomach protested vehemently and her mouth felt like talcum powder. Instead, she tried stretching her stiff muscles.

  The marquess appeared behind her as silently as any wraith, causing her to jump half a foot when he spoke.

  “You’ll have to be satisfied with ale. I couldn’t ask for tea at this hour.”

  Dillian
stared up at the shadow outlined against the trees. He towered over her by a head, easily. In that ridiculous coat he looked at least three feet across the shoulders. She gulped and hesitantly reached for the mug at the end of his outstretched arm.

  “No excuses, I see,” he said gruffly, pulling something wrapped in brown paper from his pocket. “I figured it was almost time for your midnight supper.” He handed the greasy package over.

  She smelled the delicious aroma of meat pie and unwrapped it gratefully. Holding it out to him first, she asked, “Have you eaten? Would you like some?”

  “I have one for later. I just wanted to make sure you were fed before I tied you to that tree.” He nodded to the leafy willow behind her.

  She froze in mid-bite. Fury clogged her throat, and she jerked the pie away, glaring at him through the murky darkness. “I’ll kill you if you try. I swear I will. I’ll come after you with a pistol if I have to, but I’ll kill you.”

  “Nobody raised you to be a lady, did they?” he asked. “How did you fool the very proper, very noble Lady Blanche into believing you’d make a suitable purring kitten?”

  “She believes no such thing,” Dillian spat out, shoving the package of pasty into her capacious pocket. “Blanche isn’t a fool. Neither are you. You know perfectly well you can’t ride up to the Grange and start ordering servants about without some authority. I’m that authority. I can hire the guards we need. I know who should be there and who shouldn’t. You need me.”

  He drifted deeper into the shadows. “I don’t need anyone. But if you want to wear yourself out pretending otherwise, fine. Just stay up with me so I needn’t ride to your rescue if someone takes a liking to your pretty blue coat. I don’t believe in heroics. I’ll let them have the coat, and you, too, if it comes to that.”

  Oh, a fine gentleman he made, Dillian fumed as she remounted—without his assistance. She could well imagine he didn’t believe in heroics. Of course he didn’t think he needed anyone. The Beast of Arinmede Manor could scale the Tower of London and leap burning bridges if necessary for his own sake. He could no doubt terrify a household of servants into anything he desired. Why bother with guards and fences at all? Just set the Magnificent Marquess in the drive like a gargoyle and dare anyone to trespass.

  She was in a towering rage by the time she rode up behind him. She wished she had kept the knife for herself. She could just imagine the pleasure of running it through his shoulder blades.

  “I despise military men,” she informed him coldly.

  “Good.” He rode on without looking at her.

  “I suppose it was a Canadian regiment. The Canadians were useless in the war with the states.”

  “Granted.”

  She glared at him. “The Americans didn’t even have a decent army or navy, and they defeated what Wellington so rashly calls the finest forces in the world.”

  “They did that,” he answered with a measure of satisfaction.

  A niggling suspicion raised its ugly head. “You are Canadian, aren’t you?”

  “Nope.”

  Dillian let her horse fall slightly behind as she stared at his broad back. He claimed to be a marquess. He lived in one of the largest country houses she’d ever seen, even if it had nearly crumbled to the ground. Damn it, he looked like a bloody English aristocrat. How could he be the enemy?

  “What regiment did you fight in?” she demanded.

  “American navy under John Paul Jones,” he replied with gloating satisfaction. “Want to make an issue of it?”

  Chapter Seven

  Dillian utterly loathed, despised, and detested lying, conniving adventurers. Her mother had fallen in love with a feckless soldier who had wed her and left for war, leaving her alone, disowned by her family, carrying a child, and practically destitute. Blanche’s father had done the same, although in his case, money was no matter and her mother had the protection of his powerful family.

  No amount of pleading had ever persuaded either man to stay home and tend to family affairs. Foreign lands and conquests called them more strongly than the trifling responsibility of home and family. And she could just imagine the damage the American navy must have inflicted on innocent civilians along the English coast, which should condemn John Paul Jones and his crew to a soldier’s place in hell.

  Dillian glared at the marquess’s broad shoulders beneath the ridiculous coat. “It’s a wonder you have the nerve to set foot in this country,” she finally responded with irritation. The complete irony of an American navy officer claiming the title of British marquess stunned her, but since she doubted the truth of much of his story, she didn’t enjoy the joke as much as she would have liked. “I wouldn’t bruit that fact about much in society.”

  She could see the motion of his head as he looked over his shoulder at her, but the darkness was too complete to see his expression.

  “I’ll remember that the next time I appear in the halls of Parliament.” He turned around again and for all practical purposes, ignored her existence.

  Her rebellious mind delighted in the image of a black-cloaked Marquess of Effingham sweeping into the staid halls of Parliament, glaring his peers into retreat, and denouncing the entire British navy from his American point of view. She almost laughed as she thought of him confronting Neville and his powerful friends. Stuffy, arrogant, narrow-minded, and inbred, they couldn’t conceive of a society where anyone but those like themselves ruled. What would they do with a man like Gavin Lawrence in their midst?

  She liked the idea so much she could almost forget his military background to entertain the thought of Blanche marrying him and giving him the wealth to go with the power of his title—provided he really possessed it. Even Blanche would enjoy the joke, if marriage weren’t such an intimate union.

  Dillian avoided thinking of the day-to-day details of married life. She preferred the wider scope involved in setting the American marquess loose in polite society, like a rapier in a hothouse full of delicate blooms. It made a much more entertaining topic for her speculations as they rode deeper into the night.

  Apparently suspicious of her continued silence, the marquess allowed his horse to lag until she caught up with him. Not seeing any reason why she should continue riding in his dust, Dillian fell into place beside him.

  “I’ve learned to keep my adversaries where I can see them,” he mentioned enigmatically as he spurred his horse to a faster pace once again.

  “It’s your own attitude that makes all the world an adversary,” she responded. Everything this man did or said set her teeth on edge. “I’m perfectly willing to work with you. You’re the one shutting me out.”

  “What can you possibly do to safeguard the estate except get in my way? And don’t give me that nonsense about knowing the servants. Lady Blanche should know her own servants. She can get rid of strangers when she arrives.”

  He offered the opportunity she needed to explain her plan, but she would much rather take that abominable hat of his and stuff it down his throat. How did women ever endure that sort of stiff-necked arrogance long enough to marry and beget children? They had to be mad. She had yet to meet a man who would listen to a woman long enough to understand her intelligence.

  Instead of answering his question, she asked blithely, “Did you ever interpret the significance of the rose?”

  “Unless you wish to spout the Latin origin of the phrase sub-rosa concerning the secrecy of speaking under the rose, no, I cannot imagine the significance,” he answered curtly.

  Since that was exactly what she wished to “spout,” Dillian found herself at point nonplus. Disgruntled, she manufactured, “Blanche’s family traces her ancestry back to the House of Lancaster, once represented by the red rose.”

  “Hogwash,” he said succinctly. “Or as you British say, fustian.”

  With a sigh of exasperation, Dillian surrendered. She had to drive her plan through his thick skull, and it wouldn’t come about with this nonsensical argument.

  “I want to e
nlist the help of Blanche’s maid, Verity. We’ll pretend outwardly that I’ve just arrived to look after things while Blanche is staying with friends, but at the same time, we’ll convince the staff that Blanche is actually hiding in her room. Then I’ll send Verity back to Blanche and tell everyone that she’s visiting family, while Verity will give out that she’s actually nursing Blanche around the clock. Do you see what I’m trying to do?”

  He didn’t answer immediately, but apparently worked through all the details in his head first before accepting that she’d come up with a viable plan.

  He didn’t glance at her as he replied. “It’s an interesting ruse. Tell them what you want them to give out publicly and let them gossip among themselves about the alternative. The loyal ones will bend over backward protecting their lady, immediately making the disloyal ones believe the gossip. Anyone wishing to harm the lady will believe you’ve hidden her at the Grange and quit looking for her elsewhere. The only drawback being that you are once again placing her estate and servants and yourself in danger.”

  “Yes, but this time, we’re prepared. We’ll pretend you’re just a visiting friend but let it get about that you’re an officer in the army come to guard Blanche.”

  He held up an arm to stop her eager improvisations. “I have no intention of letting anyone in the household see me.”

  Dillian sent him a look of frustration. “Then, how in the name of heaven do you intend to find the murderer?”

  “I don’t. I only intend to secure the premises. I had thought to forward the information to Michael and Lady Blanche so they might hire whatever security they deemed necessary. But if you mean to place yourself in jeopardy by remaining at the Grange, I’ll simply notify you of the actions to be taken. You can act on them as you see fit. It’s none of my concern whether you do or not. Once I return home, I’ll ship the lady back to you. That is the end of my part in this.”