by M C Beaton
Speculative eyes and jealous eyes watched them. The duke in black evening coat and black pantaloons so tight, they looked painted on his long, muscular legs, and the girl in silver and white. Lady Fortescue, dancing with a general, contrived to keep the couple in sight. What was Wardshire about to encourage the social pretentions of that dreadful family?
And the duke had done his work well, for no sooner was the waltz over than both the Bliss girls were besieged by partners.
Lady Fortescue found the duke at her elbow and said, “Chasing children, Wardshire? The pretty one is surely only seventeen, and the elder, about nineteen.”
“And both very pretty,” he said. “Shall we dance?”
She smiled at him. “I thought you meant to cut me.”
“Never,” he said. “You are the most beautiful woman here, and none can hold a candle to you.”
Lucy, dancing with the energetic Mr. Anstruther, reflected dully that the duke and Lady Fortescue—for she had made a point of asking who the lady was—were very well suited, the duke with his harsh, demonic looks, and Lady Fortescue with her overblown beauty.
At least, thought Lucy, Belinda is safe.
But it transpired that the duke had asked Belinda for the supper dance, and so Lucy, sitting next to them at a long table with Mr. Graham, had leisure to notice the way the duke was expertly teasing Belinda and flirting with her. And Mr. Graham noticed that the duke was flirting with Belinda while casting sidelong looks along the table at Lucy to see how she was taking it.
That drawing of Lucy’s must really have irritated Wardshire, he thought.
As supper drew to a close, Mr. Graham noticed Mr. Bliss rising to leave the room, and Lady Fortescue going up to his wife. Lady Fortescue was fanning herself slowly and talking to Mrs. Bliss, and Mrs. Bliss was puffing herself up in the pouter pigeon way she did when she was angry.
The rest of the ball passed in an exhausting whirl for Lucy and Belinda, and it was five in the morning before they made their way home.
“Well, that went very well,” said Mrs. Bliss complacently. “Mind you, I confess I was thrown when that Fortescue creature had the temerity to tell me she was as good as affianced to Wardshire, but he only danced the one dance with her and did not take her in to supper.”
“I think,” said Belinda cautiously, “that the duke favored us because, Mama, society was determined to cut us, and he is a contrary sort of person.”
“Fiddlesticks!” said her mother.
Mr. Bliss spoke suddenly. “There is his reputation to consider, Mrs. Bliss. Such a dissipated rake often finds the idea of corrupting the young titillating.”
“He cannot have a bad reputation!” exclaimed Mrs. Bliss. “He is a duke!”
And as far as she was concerned, that settled the matter. Her busy mind turned to what the girls should wear at Almack’s opening subscription ball, and they arrived at the house with her voice remorselessly beating on their ears as she discussed muslins and taffetas, ribbons and silks. There was no respite when they were indoors, for she roused the servants and ordered the tea tray so that she could further turn over the triumphs of the night and plan gowns to wear to Almack’s.
Feeling mentally bruised and battered, Belinda and Lucy finally crept up to bed. “Come into my room, Belinda,” urged Lucy. “I want to talk to you about the duke.”
“You, too,” sighed Belinda. “All Mama does when she is not going on like a haberdasher is to talk about the duke.” She plunked herself down on Lucy’s bed and yawned.
“If he asked you to marry him, you would not accept him, would you?” asked Lucy.
“I might,” said Belinda. “I have to marry someone, you know, and he does seem kind.”
“Think of his reputation!”
“I think perhaps all the stories about him are made up,” said Belinda cautiously. “In fact, it would not surprise me at all if he were really something of a puritan.”
“You are such a kind innocent,” said Lucy fondly, “that you think everyone is the same. It is a good thing I am here to protect you. But I have a beau! Mr. Graham asked Mama if he could take me driving tomorrow. Today!” she corrected as a shaft of dawn sunlight crept between a chink in the shutters.
“Then if you approve of Mr. Graham,” pointed out Belinda, “you must approve of the duke, for they are the best of friends, and I think Mr. Graham a very fine man.”
“You do? Then come driving with us!”
“Not I. It was you he asked. I shall sleep all day long if Mama will let me. Why do you not ask Mr. Graham about the duke’s black reputation? If anyone knows the truth, it is he.”
“And if I were to find out that he is not so black as he has been painted, would you be interested in becoming his bride?”
“Perhaps. It would be a very fine thing to be a duchess.”
“But what of love?”
Belinda giggled. “Silly! I am in London to find a husband, not to fall in love. That’s what you do after marriage.”
“Belinda! You shock me!”
“Lucy, sometimes I think you are the younger.
You are so romantic. I do not really mind who I wed so long as he is kind and will take me somewhere far away from the sound of Mama’s voice. I would have my own household, my own servants, my own—”
“Babies,” said Lucy. “What of babies? One every nine months until you die young.”
“Too many novels, Lucy, that’s your problem. Whoever marries me will wait until I produce an heir or two and then take himself off to his club and his mistress. People do not live happily ever after.”
Lucy looked distressed. “How did you come by such cynicism?”
“I watch. I look. I observe.”
“But is there not something inside you that cries out that for you it will be different?”
“Of course,” said the ever practical Belinda. “But I pay it no heed. I have one ambition in life, and that is to have my own home, and that’s a very comfortable ambition to have. If I have any more days of Mama’s voice, then I shall marry the very first man who asks me.” She smiled slyly at her sister. “And that may be the duke… unless, of course, you want him for yourself.”
“Don’t be nonsensical!”
Belinda rose and gave her sister a hug. “Do not let your imagination play you tricks, Lucy. It will have you believing a saint a villain, and a villain a saint. And you must not fuss so about me. I am well able to take care of myself.”
“Girls! Girls! Are you awake?” Mrs. Bliss’s approaching voice.
Belinda ran from the room while Lucy tore off her headdress and, fully dressed, dived under the blankets and pulled them over her head.
A few moments later she heard her mother’s voice quite close by. “Are you asleep?”
Lucy pretended to snore. “Tch!” said Mrs. Bliss. “Gone to sleep and left all the candles burning.” She moved about, extinguishing them. She bent over the bed. “I was very proud of my girls tonight,” she said. She drew the blankets gently down from Lucy’s head and noticed she was lying in her ball gown. “Good heavens. She can’t sleep like that.” Mrs. Bliss rang the bell furiously until Feathers, cross and yawning and dressed in her nightgown, answered its summons.
“Just look at Lucy,” cried Mrs. Bliss. “Gone to bed in her good ball gown. Rouse her this minute, Feathers, and get her washed and changed. I will stay here and keep her company.”
Lucy reluctantly pretended to awake. Feathers fussed over her while Mrs. Bliss talked and talked as the sun rose higher outside and London came to life. When Lucy at last fell asleep, Mrs. Bliss was still sitting by the bed, talking and talking.
Chapter Four
The next day Lucy wondered for the hundredth time if her mother ever slept. Somewhere between dawn and the time when Lucy was to go out driving with Mr. Rufus Graham, Mrs. Bliss had contrived to find out all about that gentleman.
“Five thousand a year,” she told Lucy, “and most of it in consuls. A tidy estate in the south of Sc
otland. Pity it’s in Scotland, but he doesn’t seem to spend much time there, and therefore neither will you. ’Twould amaze me if you were to wed before Belinda, but there it is. Don’t go shaming me by giving Mr. Graham a disgust of you by making those outspoken remarks. Gentlemen like silent ladies.”
“Indeed, Mama? Was that what attracted Papa to you?”
“We managed things better in our day,” said Mrs. Bliss, unaware of the sarcasm in her daughter’s voice. “His parents picked me out and approached my parents, and our lawyers settled the rest. So dignified. Remember to lower your eyes becomingly. Don’t slouch. Sit bolt upright in his carriage and do not let your back touch the back of the carriage seat. Several gentlemen who danced with you and Belinda will call this afternoon or send cards. Wardshire has already sent his card, which means he don’t mean to call. Irritating man. Your hair looks too soft. Feathers, the curling tongs. It must curl under her bonnet.”
A footman appeared in the doorway at that moment to say that Monsieur Farré had called for Belinda’s latest fitting, and Mrs. Bliss hurried out.
“Oh, put the curling tongs away, Feathers,” said Lucy wearily. “I really do not want to go out today. I want to sleep and sleep.”
“It will only be for an hour at the most,” said Feathers soothingly, “and Miss Belinda will take up most of Madam’s time, for the milliner is to call later.”
Lucy hoped her mother would be too busy to be present when Mr. Graham called to collect her, but Mrs. Bliss was there when he arrived, praising Lucy to the skies with all the fulsome compliments she usually reserved for Belinda.
Mr. Graham had an open carriage, because it would have been bad form to be closeted with an unchaperoned lady in a closed one. He was driving himself, with a tiger on the backstrap. The tiger was a small, evil-looking boy with a pinched white face, a wet mouth, and a knowing look. London, thought Lucy sadly, was full of such working children, children who had really never known the joys of childhood at all.
The carriage, a phaeton, was drawn by two splendid white horses, and Mr. Graham handled his whip like an expert. He pointed out various buildings and talked in a light, easy, and undemanding way. When they turned in at the park gates, Lucy decided to take Belinda’s advice and ask Mr. Graham about the wicked duke.
“I have heard some shocking tales of the Duke of Wardshire,” said Lucy, glancing nervously at the sky, which was becoming darker by the minute. She was enjoying this brief respite from her mother’s voice and was not anxious to be driven back to the house too soon.
“Oh, yes?” Mr. Graham sounded cautious. The duke had left for his country estates that morning and had been strangely displeased when he had learned his friend was engaged to take Miss Lucy on a drive. His last words had been “I did wrong to encourage you to pay court to the Bliss girls. The mother is beyond the pale. Do what you can to depress their ambitions.” Mr. Graham was sure that neither of the Bliss girls had any ambition to marry the duke, but he was growing increasingly fond of Lucy and did not want her to show any interest in Wardshire whatsoever, and had not Wardshire expressly told him to keep up the fiction of that black reputation?
“Are the stories about him true?” Lucy asked.
“I am afraid they are,” said Mr. Graham solemnly.
“Then I am surprised you have such a friend!”
“I hope and pray he will settle down,” said Mr. Graham.
“But surely some of the stories were exaggerated? I mean, black masses and things like that.”
“I fear not, Miss Lucy. I could tell you… but I dare not!”
Her curiosity sharpened, Lucy said firmly, “You must tell me.”
“The sad fact is that… Oh, I did so hope he had reformed!” Mr. Graham was beginning to enjoy himself. “But he has gone down to Sarsey for the express purpose of holding a black mass on Sunday in the family chapel. Of course, there was some hint of a human sacrifice, but that, I am persuaded, my dear Miss Lucy, is all a hum.”
“This is dreadful!” Lucy’s back was stiff with outrage, as straight and rigid as her mother could have wished. “To think we have had him in our home. To think I danced with him. He should be stopped!”
“Well, you know,” said Mr. Graham amiably, “dukes are dukes. I mean, they’ve a lot of power and can do what they like.”
“That is because no one ever dreams of reporting them to the authorities,” exclaimed Lucy.
He shot her a nervous look. “I say, don’t do anything silly.”
“I have no intention of doing anything silly,” said Lucy. “But Mama must be told or she will have Belinda married off to him.”
“Don’t think he wants Miss Belinda, and that’s a fact,” said Mr. Graham. “If you ask me, Lady Fortescue’s the love of his life.”
But this welcome piece of news, strangely enough, appeared to make Lucy angrier than ever.
Large, heavy drops of rain began to fall, and Mr. Graham turned smartly in the direction of home. But for once, Lucy could not wait to see her mother.
Mrs. Bliss listened aghast to Lucy’s tale of the black mass and actually remained silent for two whole minutes after Lucy had finished speaking. Then she found her voice. “Fustian!” she said. “We have met Wardshire and he is a fine and noble gentleman.” She took a deep breath and then went on and on until she had talked herself back into a comfortable state of mind.
Lucy escaped and went up to her room. Sunday was only three days away. He must be exposed for the villain he was. But how to do it?
She thought hard and then hit on the idea of telling the Morning Bugle, a paper of radical traditions which delighted in exposing the sins and follies of the aristrocracy. Too determined to feel nervous about going out into London on her own, she made her escape while her mother was closeted with the milliner and hired a hack to take her to Fleet Street. At the offices of the Morning Bugle, she demanded haughtily to see the editor, and because of the richness of her clothes and the determination in her voice, she soon found herself in a small, inky cubbyhole which served the editor, Mr. Witherspoon, as an office.
He listened intently to her story and then said quietly that he would see what could be done. Lucy left, feeling a weight lifted off her mind. The newspaper would send someone to that black mass, and soon all London would read about it.
After she had gone, Mr. Witherspoon sat for some time in deep thought. He could not simply publish her story and perhaps risk a libel action from the duke. He eventually rose and put on his coat and made his way to Bow Street. He would tell the Runners and see what could be done. If the Runners decided to investigate, then it meant he could send along a reporter, and the reporter would have every reason to be there.
The magistrate at Bow Street listened uneasily to the editor’s story. He felt he could not ignore it. All the social columns in the newspapers had already hinted at the duke’s devilish goings-on down at Sarsey when it was known that Wardshire planned to attend his first Season.
“We must be there,” he said. “Wardshire cannot blame us for checking if it should prove to be a hum. There are many dark stories about him circulating London.”
Lucy, for her part, returned home and contrived to signal to Belinda that she wanted to see her alone. Mrs. Bliss took them that evening to a musicale, and after the concert when she was busy talking to the mothers of eligible sons, Lucy drew Belinda aside. “I must take this opportunity,” she whispered, “to tell you what I have done.”
She briefly outlined what Mr. Graham had said and her own visit to the newspaper office.
“Oh, dear,” said Belinda when Lucy had finished. “This is all wrong. You know, Lucy, duke or no duke, if Wardshire had been up to any villainy, then he would have been arrested long before this. If he plans to hold a black mass in his private chapel, then that is his affair. But think, dear sister. Just think. We have met Wardshire. Can you imagine such a grand gentleman holding a black mass? He would find it all too undignified.”
Lucy felt something cold li
ke ice forming in the pit of her stomach. Then she rallied. “If nothing wrong is going on, then he does not have anything to worry about,” she said stoutly.
“But perhaps you might find you have something to worry about.” Belinda looked at her sister anxiously.
“I? Why?”
“Let us suppose it is a normal morning service. The Runners and the press burst in. Explanations are demanded. How did you come by this ridiculous story? The editor is approached. He will reveal that he sustained a visit from one Miss Lucy Bliss.”
“But I have heard that the gentlemen of the press never reveal the source of their information.”
“When faced with an angry duke, I cannot see any editor putting himself out to protect a green girl.”
Lucy turned a trifle pale. Belinda squeezed her hand and said practically, “Never mind. Let us just pray it is a black mass. Oh, here comes your Mr. Graham!”
Lucy gave him a warm welcome and asked him if there was somewhere they could be private. Gratified, Mr. Graham looked around him. He could not take Lucy off to a room somewhere in the house: that would cause a scandal. But over in the corner was a bank of hothouse palms. He led her behind them.
“I am much concerned about Wardshire,” began Lucy.
Mr. Graham felt a stab of pure jealousy. Wardshire! Always Wardshire.
“What about him?” he asked huffily.
“Is he… is he really such a monster? Belinda says that such as he would find a black mass too undignified.”
Mr. Graham was about to say that Miss Belinda had a great deal of good sense but then reflected that Wardshire had actually asked to have his reputation blackened, and besides, pretty Miss Bliss should not be thinking about him so much.