Lady Windermere's Lover

by Miranda Neville

  “It’s not my fault that his ancestors and yours bought adjacent houses back in the Dark Ages.”

  “It has proven most convenient for you, however. That gate between our gardens shall be walled up.”

  She folded her arms and raised her little pointed chin. “What’s that to me?”

  A huge depression settled over him. “I saw you, Cynthia,” he said softly. “I came home that night and stood in the dark library, watching you return from Fortescue House. I saw you kiss him.” He wished desperately that he had not.

  Her indignation evaporated and her shoulders slumped. “Oh.” She pinched her lips together and fell into deep thought, looking for an excuse, an explanation. He wished there was one.

  “Damian,” she said on a deep breath, sincerity painted over her beautiful, lying features. “It’s true that I went to Julian’s house that night. I went because I was angry with you. I confess that for a short time I contemplated breaking my vows. But I changed my mind. I swear that Julian and I have never been lovers, only friends. The kiss you saw meant nothing.”

  If any man other than Julian were involved, he might have accepted her story. He had too much respect for Julian’s appeal, his cunning, and his desire for revenge to believe he would have failed. He paced over to the fireplace, staring sightlessly at the array of ornaments on either side of the big gilt clock. There was a gap in the arrangement where he had removed the censer the night before. Blinking, he tried to regain the spirit of optimism and forgiveness with which he had begun the day and this conversation. He wanted confession, pardon, and absolution to dissolve his black melancholy.

  Of two things he was sure. Julian Fortescue would not have her. And the day after an arrangement was reached over the damnable Falleron collection and that idiot Prince Heinrich of Alt-Brandenburg, he and Julian would settle their differences once and for all.

  Diplomacy would not be involved.

  She stood with the light behind her, a little gold and white angel. Only the convulsive fisting of her hands betrayed anxiety. She met his eye shamelessly, defiantly.

  “For God’s sake, Cynthia,” he cried. “Won’t you admit what you have done and promise not to see him again? After last night I know we can be happy together. Let us make a fresh start starting today. I’ll forgive you and I swear we will never speak of the past.”

  “You may forgive and forget, Damian,” she said with a terrible bitterness, “but I don’t think I can. Not yet. Now, if you will excuse me, I have things to do.”

  She swept out of the room like a queen, leaving him wondering how the morning had ended with him feeling obscurely in the wrong.

  Chapter 14

  Behind the crumbling brick façade of Hamble & Stoke’s Warehouse of General Goods in Long Acre lay a treasure house worthy of a gothic romance, if a slightly dusty one. Cynthia always forgave the soiling of her skirts as she explored the crowded aisles of the three-story building, poking through the holland-covered furnishings and stacks of oil paintings. She owed the knowledge of this out-of-the-way emporium to Caro and Julian, both of whom did business with Mr. Hamble from time to time. At first she’d merely found it an entertaining alternative to the more fashionable warehouses farther west. Then Mr. Hamble—she had a feeling Mr. Stoke was no longer in the picture—had accommodated her in a matter of business that required discretion. A business that would be hard or even impossible to continue now that Windermere was back.

  “What do you think of my latest buy, then, m’lady?” The elderly proprietor found her staring at an ornate secretary desk of exaggerated proportions. “From the estate of a military gentleman. His widow didn’t like it.”

  “She had better taste than he, then,” Cynthia replied. “It’s deliciously hideous.”

  “Not fine enough for the nobs with big houses and too big for them that would appreciate it.”

  “In other words, perfect for me.”

  Hamble used his apron to polish the folding front, revealing intricate but crude marquetry. “I bought it for a song and I can give you a good price.”

  She envisioned the monstrous piece fitting between the windows in the drawing room, where it would clash vilely with a boule buffet she’d bought in June. After the morning’s confrontation with Damian, any compunction about her purchases had dissipated along with her plan to buy him a Christmas present. Regretfully she shook her head. “I’m sorry but today I think I need something a little less noticeable. Something small but expensive.”

  “Like that pair of incense burners with the naked lady satyrs. ’Orrible they were.” He noticed her blush and put it down to embarrassment of the wrong sort. “Very fashionable, they are. Nothing to upset a lady’s husband. I heard His Lordship was in London,” he continued, not to her surprise. The secondhand trade in luxurious goods required an intimate knowledge of the activities and movements of the capital’s notables. “You needn’t worry, my lady. There’s nothing fishy looking about the bills and invoices.”

  “I am afraid His Lordship will wish me to curtail my expenditures. At the very least he may wish to impose his own tastes on my household purchases.” She’d noticed him look askance at some of the more outrageous items of furniture at Windermere House. “I hope you didn’t buy this piece with me in mind.”

  “Morris over in Soho has a lot of new rich customers. He’ll take it off my hands.”

  Hamble’s dismissive sniff made her smile. Julian always said the old Cockney was as hoity-toity as a dowager duchess. She had often wondered why he didn’t move his shop to a better address. He certainly had the knowledge to cater to a more exclusive clientele.

  “I am glad, Mr. Hamble. I am grateful for all your help.”

  “I hope I can continue to assist you,” he said, nodding his grizzled head. “I don’t often see your class of lady in my warehouse.”

  Engrossed in their conversation, neither had noticed the front door open. “And that, my dear Hamble,” said a deep voice, “is entirely your fault. You could open up in Bond Street but I daresay you lack the requisite level of obsequiousness.”

  Cynthia jumped and spun around. “Julian!”

  “Your Grace.”

  “Fancy seeing you here, Cynthia.”

  “Did you expect me?” she said warily. He was the last person she wished to meet today, especially under circumstances that could be interpreted as clandestine.

  “I came to see if Hamble would like to take some bad paintings off my hands. Your presence is a delightful bonus. Come to think of it, one or two of the pictures would suit you very well. How convenient that we should all meet like this.”

  “I’m not buying pictures today.”

  “What a shame.”

  “My lady has expressed an interest in smaller objects.”

  “I know where you keep them. Let me take Lady Windermere up to the first floor while you have a look at the pictures my servant is bringing in.” He offered his arm in a manner that brooked no denial. “My dear Cynthia,” he said, as they climbed the bare wooden stairs. “Why do I have the impression that you aren’t pleased to see me? I am crushed.”

  “We shouldn’t be meeting like this. I am not comfortable.”

  “And after I accepted my dismissal with such grace too, just so that we could avoid awkwardness.”

  It was the first time they’d been alone since they’d parted in the garden the night of the theater, but that wasn’t what she meant. She could have changed the subject, or changed her plans and gone downstairs again. Wiser still, climbed into her carriage and driven away. But she was tired of secrets and discretion. She felt free to say anything she wanted to Julian precisely because he wasn’t her husband and she didn’t ultimately care what he thought or believed. She stopped on the landing, dropped her arm, and stepped back. She always had to tilt her head to meet the duke’s eyes, which reflected their usual cynical amusement.

  “We shouldn’t meet like this. Damian accused me of having an affair with you.”

  “If o
nly it were true.”

  “Stop it.”

  He rested both hands on the silver knob of his cane and stared down his large nose at her. “I don’t see why you are upset, my dear Cynthia. Isn’t that what you wanted him to think?”

  “No. Yes. I suppose so. When he was away I wanted him to hear rumors and be sorry.”

  It had started as an amusing game, shocking the members of the ton, the people of Damian’s world who had ignored her. She wanted her husband to see she didn’t give a damn about him and his neglect, and to show him that another man desired her, even if he did not. She clenched her fists. “I feel tawdry.”

  And worse. A knot had been forming in her stomach since she’d swept out of her husband’s presence that morning in a state of high indignation. By choosing Julian for her instrument of “showing” Damian, she might have ruined her chances of repairing her marriage.

  “You used me,” he said, with a one-sided grin. “You trifled with my affections.”

  Through her distress, a smile tugged the corner of her mouth. “And you used me in the same way.”

  “Of course.”

  “So we are even.”

  “Certainly not! I am a big bad duke and you are a poor little girl from the country, not used to the wicked ways of town.”

  “True. Caro always warned me you were up to no good and I was too trusting to see it.”

  “It’s really quite remarkable that you resisted my best seduction and confounded my expectations. But it is not too late to change that lamentable state of affairs. I know a place we can go to be alone and no one will know. Unless, of course, you decide to tell Damian all about it afterward. I do wish you would. You could break the news in the garden while I watched through the gate.”

  Julian always amused her and today she needed it. “Thank you for the kind offer, Your Grace, but I believe I must once again decline. Instead you can advise me on the purchase of some small objects for which Hamble can overcharge me.”

  Julian opened the dusty glass doors of a baroque cabinet and removed a malachite vase with gilt handles and a black marble plinth. “It would make a splendid Christmas gift for dear Damian. It’s a poor substitute for having you in my bed, but I’d like to inflict this brute on Windermere. I wonder how much Hamble would have the gall to bill him for it.”

  “You are a wicked man, Julian, though you make me laugh, against my better judgment. I must ask you to stop speaking to me about my husband, unless you do it with respect.”

  Julian raised a hand to fend off her fierce demand. “Where’s the fun in that?”

  “The only thing I want to hear from you about Windermere is what happened between you.”

  She’d asked about the cause of their quarrel a dozen times before and expected to be turned off with another meaningless evasion.

  “Come,” he said, and guided her across the room. He removed the dust sheet from a low settee, not unlike the one in her morning room, but covered in a gloomy tapestry.

  She sat down gingerly, finding it surprisingly comfortable. Julian sank down beside her. Though he leaned back and stretched out his long, black-clad legs, she felt his tension. “Don’t say you are finally going to tell me?”

  “I think it’s time.” She had rarely heard him speak so gravely. “It started on his twenty-first birthday. Robert and I took him to dinner to celebrate. We all drank too much and went on to Cruikshank’s.”

  “What is that?”

  “A gaming hell.”

  “Oh dear.” Cynthia knew all about Townsend’s addiction to play that had ended by leaving Caro almost penniless.

  “We drank, we played, we drank some more.”

  “Damian did? I know he wasn’t always as sober as he is now, but still.”

  “He drank. We all drank. We played hazard and drank some more. Damian lost.”

  “How much? Was it a lot?”

  “Not how much, but what. He’d come into possession of his mother’s estate that day.”

  Cynthia gasped and covered her mouth. “Beaulieu! He lost Beaulieu. Did he lose it to you?”

  “I dropped out of the game because I couldn’t afford the stakes. He lost it to Robert.”

  “Robert was his friend. Couldn’t he get it back?”

  Julian’s voice dropped to a croak. “Damian passed out dead drunk after the losing hand. Robert joined another table. By the next morning he’d lost everything he had on him.”

  “Beaulieu,” she whispered.

  “His inheritance from his mother gone in one mad night. He was never the same again.”

  “I understand why he changed after that, and why he broke with Robert. But why you?”

  “He blamed me.” His voice was soft and emotionless. “When he passed out I dragged him into a hackney and took him home. He said if I’d been there I could have stopped Robert.”

  “Could you?”

  “Yes.”

  She laid her hand over his. “I don’t see how it was your fault. It sounds like you only did what you thought was right.”

  “Damian lost Beaulieu and I lost Damian. Bloody Robert.”

  “Did he stop speaking to you, just like that?”

  “He went north, to Amblethorpe to break the news to his father. When he came back to London he took up with the government set.”

  How tragic for both young men. Damian had been the greater loser, but she sensed that the loss of their friendship had been hard for Julian too. She’d always felt deep waters flowed beneath Denford’s brittle cynicism. His hurt must have been deep indeed that he would seduce his former friend’s wife in revenge. In fact, the retaliation seemed excessive to the offense.

  “What did he do to you?” she asked.

  “I was in discussions about a collection of pictures. It was the most important purchase I’d ever made and vital to my future as a dealer in Old Masters. I had patrons ready to fight over the most important works. Damian ruined it for me.”

  “Are you certain? Would he have been so petty?”

  “Ask Sir Richard Radcliffe about the Poussins that hang in his gilded Grosvenor Square saloon. Ask Radcliffe how he found out about a collection that belonged to a friend of the late Lord Windermere. Damian and I were the only ones that knew about them until somehow, by a strange coincidence, his new patron made a better offer. Ask Radcliffe how he was able to buy them from under my nose.”

  “I’d rather ask Damian.”

  “You want to believe him and not me?” Julian was showing ragged edges that were new to her.

  “All I want is to hear both sides of the story,” she said sharply. “Don’t you think I have the right since I’ve been brought into your quarrel like a bone between a pair of snapping dogs?”

  “An infelicitous image, not least because you, my dear Cynthia, are the farthest thing imaginable from a dry bone. You are a much more luscious prize.” His cynical façade was back in place and his drawl made her want to slap him.

  She struggled up from the low seat. “I must find Hamble and conclude today’s business. Then I’m going home.”

  He tugged at her wrist and she tumbled back, almost landing in his lap. “Don’t go off in a huff. I apologize for calling you luscious, though I refuse to take it back.”

  “You’re impossible.”

  “I don’t have so many friends that I can afford to quarrel with you.”

  “Are we friends?” she asked, twisting free of him.

  “Apparently it’s what I have to settle for.”

  She stared at him. Never for a moment had she thought Julian had any feelings for her beyond a mild affection. She had no illusions about his motives in pursuing her. Her fear had always been that she would fall in love with him, never the other way around. Yet he looked at her as though he really cared.

  “I’m sorry there can be nothing more.” she said. “You are a much better man than you pretend to be.”

  He turned his head and addressed a plant stand sitting next to their sofa. “Next she’s goi
ng to tell me that one day I will find a woman I can truly love.”

  “I wish I could fall in love with you. Or I would if I wasn’t married. But only because you always make me laugh.”

  “Does he make you laugh?”

  She thought about the bhang and giggled.

  “He doesn’t deserve you.”

  “No, but I wish he did.”

  The confrontation with his wife ran through Damian’s mind as he sat in the library waiting for Bingham. Nothing seemed amiss with the latest batch of reports from his London agent, beyond the excessive amounts Cynthia spent on clothes and furnishings. Her household decorative purchases made him shudder. He must tell her not to buy any more furniture or pictures without consulting him first.

  However, he couldn’t quarrel with her efforts at the dressmaker. She bore almost no resemblance to the young woman he had wed. The fact that he’d failed to recognize her at Drury Lane bore testament to her transformation from dowdy provincial to ravishing London beauty. Too bad that her morals had made the same journey.

  The hypocrisy of the thought scratched his conscience. Did he not wish for a fashionable wife who would help advance his career? There had never been a chance that his marriage would become a love match like that of his parents, an ill-matched but curiously happy pair. He would settle for shared ambitions and compatibility in the bedchamber.

  His breath shortened. Why wouldn’t she agree to give up Denford? All she had to do was admit her sin, accept his forgiveness, and they could be perfectly happy together.

  Bingham, a partner in a respected firm that had handled the Lewis family affairs for half a century, was announced “Tell me,” Damian asked, once the formalities had been observed and a new series of reports delivered, “how did it come about that Lady Windermere occupies this house? I expected it would be let once I left the country.”

  “In the hurry of your departure, you forgot to leave instructions. When Lord Morton inquired as to its availability this spring, I wrote to Markham at Beaulieu to see if you had mentioned the matter to him and he asked Her Ladyship. I understand she decided to come to London to visit the warehouses for the redecoration of the manor, and to consult a physician.” He looked anxiously at his employer. “I saw no reason why she shouldn’t use the house under the circumstances.”