by Sandra Heath
“Please do not proceed with this madness!” she cried, taking his hand urgently. “Lord Avenley may not be a finer shot than you, Gerald, but he is capable of any ignominy to win the day.’’
“I’m his match, Emily,” he replied, fondly kissing her forehead.
“Please withdraw, Gerald, I beg of you.”
“This is as much a matter of honor for me as Robert’s confrontation with Canning was for him. I must defend Miss Rutherford’s reputation, Emily.”
Lady Castlereagh studied him earnestly. “You love her?”
He gave a wry smile. “As I’ve never loved before in my life. For her I would face a thousand of Avenley’s kind.”
“Then why on earth did you allow that she-cat countess to stay with you last night?”
“Not for the gratification of my lust, of that you may be sure. No, the truth of it is that her long campaign of lies against her much-loathed stepson has come to light now that said stepson has returned to the paternal fold. The long-suffering Earl of Purbeck has had his blinkers removed at last, and in the time-honored fashion has given his wife her marching orders, and she came to me to try one last time to win me over, but she is now en route to her sister in Northumberland.
“Emily, I have been a fool to end all fools, both in my dealings with Raine and in my accusations toward Emma. I should have known that Emma would never have betrayed me with Avenley, and I should never have allowed Raine across the threshold, let alone to remain overnight.”
Lady Castlereagh took his hand, resting it sympathetically against her cheek. “Oh, Gerald, whatever am I going to do with you? But it is never too late to right wrongs, and if you love Miss Rutherford, then you have to go to her and tell her so.”
He gave a dry laugh. “I did go to her, but I was told she was not at home, even though she most definitely was. I have blotted my copybook, Emily, indeed I have spoiled it beyond redemption, and that is a sad fact that I have no choice but to accept.”
“But, Gerald—”
He put his finger to her lips. “There is no point in saying anything more, Emily, for the matter is sealed.’’ Then he looked at Lord Castlereagh. “Are you ready?”
“As ready as I ever will be.”
“Then let us proceed with the business in hand.”
Lord Castlereagh waited only until the butler had assisted him with his coat, and then he accompanied Gerald out to the waiting carriage.
Lady Castlereagh watched it drive away, and then she turned with sudden decision to the butler. “Andrews, have the town carriage made ready as quickly as possible. I wish to go to Grosvenor Square.”
“My lady.” He bowed and hurried away.
Lady Castlereagh gathered her skirts to run back up the staircase, and she called her maid as she did so. “Kitty? Kitty, I need you immediately!”
Ten minutes later, her face flushed from having dressed in such a hurry, she emerged from the house to climb swiftly into the carriage. The coachman’s whip cracked loudly, and the team strained forward, coming quickly up to speed for the urgent drive across London to the Rutherford residence.
There was much shouting and waving of fists from other road users as the coachman flung his team along St. James’s Street and then across Piccadilly to the narrow, choked confines of New Bond Street. He ignored the curses and accusations, for when her ladyship instructed him to drive with every haste, he was not one to shirk the challenge.
The carriage jolted and bumped on the uneven cobbles, and swung wildly around the corner into Grosvenor Street. Lady Castlereagh held on tightly to the handgrip, oblivious of the breakneck pace. All she could think of was the duel, and convincing Emma that Gerald loved her. Maybe there was nothing to be gained, maybe the foolish chit didn’t return his love, but while there was a chance, then it had to be seized, before it was too late.
The team was sweating as they were reined in at the door of Lady Bagworth’s house, and the carriage had barely halted when Lady Castlereagh flung the door open to clamber down. She wore a fur-edged green wool cloak over the pink velvet gown, and the matching bandeau had been replaced by a wide-brimmed silk hat from which curled a luxuriant white ostrich plume that fluttered and streamed in the cool September air as she hurried to the door of the house.
Saunders almost ran to answer her urgent knocking, and he stood aside in surprise as she rushed inside. “My lady … ?”
“I wish to see Miss Rutherford without delay!”
“I … I will inform her that you have called.” But as he turned to go to the staircase, Emma herself appeared at the top in her leaf-green gown.
Dolly had applied a little rouge to her cheeks, and had tied her hair back with a green ribbon, but she still looked tense and drawn, and there was a sadness in her green eyes as she came slowly down the staircase.
“You wish to see me, Lady Castlereagh?”
“It seems you are at home after all, Miss Rutherford,” Lady Castlereagh replied a little tersely.
Emma reached the bottom of the staircase and paused with one hand on the lowermost newel post. “From which I take it that you are here on Lord Kane’s account?”
“I am, but not, I hasten to add, with his knowledge. Will you answer an important question, Miss Rutherford?”
“If I can.”
“Do you feel any affection for Lord Kane?”
“I … I hardly think that that is any concern of yours, Lady Castlereagh.”
“On the contrary, Miss Rutherford, it is every concern of mine. Well? Do you feel any affection for him?”
Emma didn’t reply, and had to look away.
Lady Castlereagh advanced a little. “If you still harbor doubts because of that wretched Purbeck woman, let me assure you that her stay was only fleeting and that Lord Kane regrets his decision to allow her to remain overnight. He did so because he is a gentleman, Miss Rutherford, and a gentleman does not turn a lady out into the streets at night.”
“I know that that is what Lord Kane says, my lady.”
“I believe him, Miss Rutherford, and I rather think that you should as well.”
There was a discreet cough, and they both turned toward Saunders, who was standing nearby. He looked apologetically at Emma. “Begging your pardon, madam, but there does appear to be confirmation of what Lady Castlereagh says. Master Stephen’s valet has just returned to collect some of his master’s things, and—”
“I had no idea Frederick had gone to see him,” Emma interrupted.
“Oh, yes, madam. I took the liberty of dispatching him this morning. I trust that that was in order?”
“Yes, of course. Do go on.”
“Yes, madam. Frederick informed me that the talk among Lord Kane’s servants is that the Countess of Purbeck only stayed there with his lordship’s extreme reluctance, and that he gave in only when she resorted to tears. He sent her away first thing this morning.”
Saunders cleared his throat, looking very uncomfortable. “Begging your pardon for any offense my next words may cause, madam, but it seems of considerable importance that you should know that the countess slept in a guest chamber, and his lordship in his own room.”
Lady Castlereagh raised a wry eyebrow. “What would we do without servants’ gossip?” she murmured. Then she turned to Emma again. “Does all this make any difference, Miss Rutherford?”
Emma’s lips had parted, and her heart had begun to pound in her breast. She looked anxiously at the butler. “Are you quite sure about all this, Saunders?”
“Absolutely certain, madam. I can send for Frederick, if you wish—?”
“That won’t be necessary.” Emma was suddenly full of emotion, and her eyes shone with tears.
Lady Castlereagh’s face softened, and she went to her. “You love him, don’t you?” she asked gently.
“Yes,” Emma whispered.
“As he loves you, my dear. He told me so himself just before he and Robert set off for Putney Heath.”
“He loves me?” Emma whisper
ed.
“My dear, of course he does. He isn’t fighting this duel because of the Keepsake, or your brother’s gaming misfortunes, or even that unlamented chienne Margot, he’s fighting it for you.”
Lady Castlereagh smiled a little. “We can follow them to Putney if you wish. They left some time ago, and it’s all of eight miles there, but if we make as much speed as my team can manage—”
Emma didn’t wait for her to finish, but was already fleeing back up the staircase to put on her cloak.
Chapter Twenty-four
Shortly afterward, once more to the considerable annoyance of other traffic, the Castlereagh carriage was again to be seen flying along the streets toward Putney Heath. The team’s hooves struck sparks from the cobbles as the coachman urged them down Park Lane, reining them in impatiently at the toll gate by St. George’s Hospital, before bringing them up to speed again to travel west toward Knightsbridge, along the very road Emma and her father had traveled on their way to London barely a week before.
After all the sunshine of recent days, there was now a change in the weather. A breeze had sprung up to rustle through the trees, and clouds burgeoned overhead, bringing the promise of rain. Dry leaves scuttered over the road, and the autumn tints lost their glow on the trees as the wind stirred across the countryside.
The carriage drove over the bridge that spanned the narrow Westbourne stream, which in January had overflowed its banks to inundate the surrounding fields, turning them into a lake. London’s tentacles were beginning to reach out from its present confines, inundating the countryside in the same way, and already there were villas linking the hamlet of Knightsbridge with the capital. As the carriage turned south toward the Thames, it passed along another villa-lined thoroughfare, called Sloane Street.
Soon they reached the large riverside village of Chelsea, where a thirty-year-old wooden toll bridge crossed the Thames. Trees overhung the water, and rolling countryside stretched away to the west.
Sailing barges slid on the river, sometimes so close to the banks that they brushed through the rushes that grew so thickly on either side. The carriage’s wheels rattled dully on the toll bridge as the coachman urged his willing team toward the southern bank and the hamlet of Battersea.
The minutes ticked by slowly, and Emma gazed anxiously out of the carriage window. By her little fob watch she knew that there was still half an hour to go to the appointed time of the duel, and it seemed that there was still an unconscionable way to go before they reached the heath.
Please let them be in time. Please. If she could persuade Gerald not to proceed with the duel, then she would, for nothing was worth risking his life for. All that mattered now was the future, and the happiness that might yet be enjoyed.
At last the carriage turned west again, making the slow climb over several hills, including Lavender Hill, and then passing through the village of Wandsworth. Putney itself lay ahead now, and beyond it the heights of the famous heath, where highwaymen lurked, and duels without number had been fought.
The horses were tired now, and they moved much more slowly as they strained to draw the heavy carriage up Putney Hill toward the open four-hundred-acre expanse of heathland. The skies were now very lowering, with clouds beginning to scud across the heavens. From time to time a spot of rain was dashed against the carriage window, and torn leaves fluttered by.
The whip cracked again as the coachman urged the flagging horses past a wayside inn and then down a narrow tree-lined lane that led onto the heath. There were elegant villas dotted around, among them Bowling Green House, where the late prime minister, William Pitt, had died only three years before. It had been William Pitt who had set the precedent for government ministers to fight duels, for he had faced the Irishman George Tierney here on Putney Heath, and honor had been deemed to be satisfied after the exchange of shots.
The wind blew freely in so high and exposed a place, blustering around the carriage as it jolted along a way that was now rough and rutted. There was a crossroad ahead, and a gibbet to remind all wrongdoers of the fate that awaited them if caught. Both Emma and Lady Castlereagh averted their eyes from the grisly sight as the carriage turned sharply to the left, bumping along a little-used track that led toward the designated spot for the duel.
Heather grew on the hummocky ground, and silver birch trees bent in the wind. The air smelled sweet, as it always does up on a heath, and a small flock of sheep fled into the trees of a small copse.
Lady Castlereagh leaned forward to look out. “We’re almost there,” she said.
Emma glanced again at the fob watch and saw that it was three o’clock. Were they too late?
The carriage halted suddenly, and she flung the door open to climb down, pausing only to shake out the heavy folds of the rose velvet cloak she had hastily donned over her leaf-green gown. The wind snatched at the cloak’s fur-trimmed hood, whisking it back so that her dark hair fluttered in confusion, almost tearing loose from its green satin ribbon as she cast anxiously around for a glimpse of the duel.
The ground sloped away to the right, and there, in a tree-fringed dell, she saw Gerald and Lord Avenley selecting their weapons from the case held out for them by Lord Avenley’s second, a rather foppish gentleman by the name of Francis Teggerton.
She called out anxiously, but the wind tossed her voice away into the wild air, and no one in the dell heard her.
Lady Castlereagh had alighted from the carriage behind her. “You must go to them, my dear,” she said.
Emma needed no second bidding, but gathered her skirts to run down the slope toward the dell, where Gerald and Lord Avenley were; now standing back to back, about to take the obligatory twelve paces.
Lord Castlereagh was endeavoring to reason one last time with Francis Teggerton, who could only shrug, for Lord Avenley had hitherto refused to listen to any advice. With a sigh, Lord Castlereagh withdrew to stand with the surgeon who waited in readiness, and Francis Teggerton prepared to conduct the duel.
“Twelve paces, if you please, gentlemen,” he said.
They obeyed, walking slowly away from each other, their pistols safely lowered. Both men had discarded their coats and waistcoats, and their shirts were very white in the dull afternoon light. The wind ruffled Gerald’s hair and fluttered the costly lawn of his shirt against his lean body as he halted at the end of the twelve paces.
Francis Teggerton looked at them both. “Turn and cock your pistols,” he commanded.
Both duelists obeyed, and the clicking sounds were audible as the wind dropped away for a moment. Lord Castlereagh suddenly saw Emma running down toward them, and he stepped anxiously forward, afraid that she would distract Gerald, who had his back toward her.
Gesturing urgently for her to halt and remain quiet, Lord Castlereagh at the last moment managed to catch her attention, and to his relief, her steps faltered and she stopped, her hair blowing around her face as she stared wretchedly at the scene in the dell.
Francis Teggerton spoke again. “Take your aim, gentlemen.”
Slowly both men raised their pistols, leveling them at each other, but as Teggerton’s lips parted for the order to fire, Lord Avenley anticipated him, squeezing the trigger before a word had been uttered.
Emma stifled a scream, pressing her hands to her lips as she looked anxiously at Gerald. The smoke from the pistol was snatched away as the wind rose again, but Gerald remained standing, and she almost cried out with relief as she realized that the bullet had not found a target.
Teggerton was thunderstruck, and Lord Castlereagh whirled about to furiously face Lord Avenley. ‘‘That was the act of a cur and a coward, sir!”
Lord Avenley’s face had grown pale. “It was an accident!”
But his own second looked uncomfortable, for no one, not even his friend, believed it to have been an accident.
Lord Castlereagh was contemptuous. “You deliberately loosed that shot, Avenley, as everyone here witnessed. Now it pleases me greatly to have to advise you that yo
u must stand where you are while Kane takes aim at leisure.”
Lord Avenley’s tongue passed dryly over his lips, and his face was not ashen. He trembled visibly, and there was terror in his single eye as he watched his opponent take grim pleasure in very slowly leveling his pistol at his heart.
Francis Teggerton prepared to issue the final command, but before he could do so, Lord Avenley sank cravenly to his knees, begging for mercy. “Spare me, Kane, I beg of you! I will do anything you ask, if you will just spare me!”
It was too much for Teggerton to stomach, and he turned in disgust to speak to Gerald. “Take aim as you wish, Kane, and I trust you put an end to him,” he said; then he turned and walked away toward his carriage, which was drawn up together with those of Gerald and the surgeon just beyond the trees edging the dell.
Lord Avenley was filled with abject terror. Gone was the arrogant, ruthless, contemptuous lord who had tampered so callously and viciously with the lives of others, and in his place was a quivering poltroon.
Gerald savored his moment of vindication, making as if he had every intention of squeezing the trigger of his pistol, but at the last moment he lowered his weapon. “I won’t bother to waste a good bullet,” he said.
Lord Avenley was so relieved that he hid his face in his hands, his shoulders trembling as he wept.
Gerald, who still did not realize Emma was close by, walked across to his wretched foe, reaching down to seize him by the hair and force him to look up into his face. “You make me sick, Avenley, and ashamed to be an English lord!”
Lord Avenley could only stare up at him, his lips shaking.
Gerald’s mouth curled back with disgust. “I marvel that Margot was ever interested in you, but one thing is certain, you and she richly deserved each other, for you are both equally worthless. Now, then, I want your full and unqualified admission that Miss Rutherford is innocent of everything of which you’ve accused her.”
“She is innocent, I swear it!” cried Lord Avenley.
“That won’t do, my friend, for I want those present to be quite clear that you are absolving the woman I love from all guilt or complicity in your plotting.”