"His name is Angus, Hunty. After fifteen years, you might remember," Lady Thomasina called reproachfully as her son went scuttling after the little thief.
"Quick!" Huntsford shouted to Jarrow. "Someone close the door before he gets away!"
The nearest footman rushed to obey, and Angus dashed under an enormous sideboard. Huntsford, on hands and knees, peered at the terrier, who huddled against the wall and continued to hold fast to his glove while emitting the same disturbing growl.
"Mummy!" He looked back at her. "Can't you do something with this mongrel? I cannot begin to tell you how valuable that glove is. I mean, I have them made to fit only my hands, and it could take weeks to get another pair that color...."
"Angus is keenly intelligent." His mother sniffed. "He must have sensed that you don't like him. He may have been waiting years to have his revenge!"
"Confound it, we're talking about a blasted dog!" Furious, he pushed his own face under the sideboard and glared at Angus. "Give it over, you bastard, or you'll be sorrier than you know!" Then, thrusting his arm toward the animal, he managed to just get hold of the edge of the glove.
"If you touch one hair on my darling Angus's body, it's you who will be sorry." Lady Thomasina had joined them at the sideboard.
"Your shadow makes it impossible for me to see a thing, Mummy! Do let me get on with this!" When Huntsford pulled at his corner of the glove, Angus sank his teeth into his enemy's flesh. The young man screamed, flailing, and felt the seam of his skin-tight coat tear all the way down from under his arm. Uttering a string of epithets, Huntsford withdrew.
Angus snarled, triumphant.
Lady Thomasina shook her head and sent a shower of gray powder over her son. "You really can be the most exasperating child. Do find something constructive to do with yourself, rather than causing problems throughout the house."
"The others are waiting for me in the billiard room."
"We don't have a billiard room."
"We've made the portrait gallery into one. A billiard table was brought from town." Still sulking, he got to his feet. "I ought to go and dust myself off a bit, change this coat, and so forth." Huntsford put on a false smile and strolled to the door. "Oh, Mummy—what's your new companion called? Annabelle?"
"Adrienne, silly child."
He laughed. "Yes, of course. I am silly, aren't I?"
Chapter 6
One of the male guests, Sir Blake Smythe, had decided to pass most of his waking hours at Harms Castle painting. He could be found, with his paints and easel, at various sites outdoors when the weather was fair, and while indoors Sir Blake had taken to sketching cooperative human subjects.
Huntsford Harms was extremely put out by his friend's ill-timed show of independence. While it did mean that there were always just four of them for cards and other games, so one person was not left out, it also meant that no one else could be absent, including Huntsford himself. Barely a day had passed before Blake's pastime created the first crisis for the other guests.
"Where is Clair?" Alistair wondered as he, Huntsford, and Lucy assembled after supper at the card table in the drawing room.
Fresh candles had been lit and positioned in the round corners, the cards were prepared for whist, goblets of claret were poured, and the gentle lapping of the flames in the fireplace helped relieve the evening's damp. The only flaw in the scene was the empty fourth chair.
"I think Clair ate something that didn't agree with her," Lucy murmured, coloring. The two men fixed her with suspicious eyes. "Well, it might have been the champagne at luncheon...."
"I saw her drink three glasses of her own, then two of mine!" Alistair, a romantically thin and pale young man, sighed and shook his head. "We can't play whist without a fourth. Might not Blake join us this once?"
Hearing his own name, Blake glanced up in surprise. He was sitting nearby, absorbed in his work on a sketch of Lucy's dog, Peter. "What, me? I'd really rather not."
"Confound it, old man!" Huntsford pounded on the table and all their glasses jumped so that claret sloshed right to the rims before subsiding. "There—see what you nearly caused? Why must you behave so selfishly? Why can you not think of others rather than your own desires, night and day, day and night—"
"I say, leave off, will you?" Sir Blake eyed the claret decanter, wondering how much his friend had already imbibed that evening. "I hardly think that I am the villain in this piece. When you invited me here, you didn't mention conditions, such as doing your bidding for the duration of our stay!"
Oblivious, Lucy said, "I should like Blake to continue drawing my dear little Peter. That would mean much more to me than a common game of whist."
"Aren't we prosy! Have you forgotten who is the host here?" Enraged, Huntsford stood up and prepared to issue an ultimatum to Blake, when a cloud passed from his beautiful face. "I have the perfect solution. There is someone in the house who can take Clair's place in our little game."
He motioned to the page boy, who waited to obey any order Lord Harms might issue. "Do you know Miss Beauvisage, her ladyship's companion? Of course you do. Go to her room, or wherever she passes her dull little evenings, and tell her that Lord Harms and his guests desire her company in the drawing room. Immediately."
* * *
"May I confide in the two of you?" Lady Thomasina asked suddenly. She looked first at Nathan, then at Adrienne, then down at her cherry profiterole. "I hope that by unburdening myself, I may recover my appetite. I do love this dessert, you know. I'm particularly fond of Kentish cherries."
"Haven't I proven yet that I deserve your trust, my lady?" Nathan wore a compelling expression that he knew to be particularly effective when combined with his spectacles.
Adrienne nodded agreement.
Sipping a generous glassful of port, Lady Thomasina grew teary. "Would you think me a very ridiculous old woman if I were to tell you that I am sometimes small-minded in my hopes for Hunty's future? That I occasionally worry that he might be ungenerous himself in his dealings toward me, his mother?"
"We would not think you ridiculous in the least," Nathan said carefully, "but I am not certain, exactly, what you mean, my lady."
Adrienne chimed in then. "Does this have anything to do with Angus and the blue glove?"
The terrier lay under her ladyship's voluminous skirts, with only his head exposed to the air. In his mouth he now carried, at all times, Huntsford Harms's ruined blue glove. Lady Thomasina bent to pat his little head before replying, "No, I've tried to put Hunty and Angus's quarrel from my mind."
"Excuse me," Nathan interjected, "but am I to understand that your son and your dog have been quarreling?"
"Angus was merely teasing him, and Hunty wasn't very sporting about it."
"I see." He cocked a dark brow. "I think."
"Don't let him distract you," Adrienne said to the old woman. "You'll forget what it was you wanted to share with us."
"Thank you, Miss Beau. I find that I am growing fond of you!" Lady Thomasina's plump, painted face looked both wistful and garish in the leaping candlelight as she paused, considering her next words. "You see, my friends, I find that I don't want Hunty to truly grow up and be a man. I'm afraid that, if he marries, I'll be cast away—"
The door to her sitting room opened then, throwing a beam of light across the small table where the trio sat. One of Huntsford Harms's page boys marched to Adrienne's side.
"I've come to fetch Miss Beauvisage. His lordship says you must come straightaway, miss. Lady Clair is—uh, ill, and they need a fourth for whist."
"How very peculiar!" Adrienne cried.
"That's putting it kindly," Nathan muttered.
"I couldn't be more pleased!" Lady Thomasina clapped her pudgy hands with delight. She told the page boy to wait in the corridor for Miss Beauvisage, and when he had gone, she leaned forward and explained, "It's just as I hoped. You see, that Clair person has her cap set for Hunty. Mothers know these things. I do not like her, even one whit. She is forever
half in her cups, and that is a very bad omen. Now that she's ill from too much champagne, you can come to my rescue, Miss Beau! Hunty will find you far more entertaining, and soon he'll have forgotten about her entirely."
"And what if he transfers his attentions to Miss Beau?" Nathan demanded.
"Don't be silly, dear boy! Miss Beau is a servant, after all. Nothing to worry about, for any of us. And if Hunty should indulge in a mild flirtation, I daresay that Miss Beau would enjoy herself immensely!"
* * *
Sitting at the desk in his bedchamber, Nathan Raveneau lit a fresh candle with the nub of the old one and pushed it into the brass holder.
He treasured his nightly bits of solitude. These hours provided an opportunity to be completely himself without worry about stepping out of the role of Nathan Essex. He could forget about wearing spectacles and frayed clothing and once again become a whole person, with a past.
Reclining in an old stickback chair, he let his mind wander. It was too bad that the Golden Eagle wasn't docked a bit nearer, so that he could visit his ship, his crew, and his cabin, which contained the possessions of Captain Raveneau. The opportunity to soak up the atmosphere of his own truest home would be the best tonic imaginable.
For now, Nathan wrote nightly in the same ship's log that he'd kept for years. Bound in worn dark blue leather and stamped Raveneau in gold, it was crammed with not only the drier details of months at sea but also his own personal history. Here at Harms Castle, he kept the journal hidden in a locked chest under his bed. Often when Nathan opened the brass-bound chest he removed other belongings along with the ship's log. Tonight he wore his signet ring—engraved NR—and one of his own fine linen shirts.
August will be here soon enough, Nathan reminded himself.
Meanwhile, there were plenty of problems to keep both Raveneau and Essex occupied. He ran a hand through his black hair and dipped his quill in the inkstand. Writing in the log was a ritual that helped him find his own center before each night's sleep.
He had a great deal to sort out: Huntsford Harms, Walter Frakes-Hogg, Adrienne, of course.... The scratching of the quill was the only sound in Nathan's chamber until he heard a clock on the landing strike two. Almost immediately other noises commenced.
A man's shouts were quickly joined by a woman's voice, and then a second male chimed in. The shouts turned to wild laughter. Someone else broke into song. Was Adrienne still among the revelers in the drawing room? When Lady Thomasina's bell began to ring from across the corridor, Nathan opened his door just as Adrienne peeked from her room.
"I must go to her," she whispered. "Perhaps she's frightened by the clamor downstairs. They aren't very considerate, are they?"
"Quite the opposite." He couldn't help staring at her sleep-tumbled hair and the delicate lace collar of her nightgown. It was a great relief to find her safe from Huntsford Harms, in her own room. "I'll go down and have a word with them."
Adrienne couldn't resist giving him a shy smile before turning away and closing her door. Even though she was well aware of Nathan Essex's potent appeal, it had been a shock nonetheless to see him looking so devastating at two o'clock in the morning. With rakishly tousled hair, black-lashed eyes exposed without his usual spectacles, and his shirt half open to reveal a hard chest covered with crisp black hair, Nathan might have been a pirate emerging from his cabin on board ship....
Adrienne tried to put him from her mind as she went through the dressing room to Lady Thomasina's bedchamber. She brought a candlestick, and lit the taper on the frightened woman's bedside table.
"Miss Beau! Where have you been? I thought you were still downstairs with Hunty!"
"Oh, no," Adrienne soothed. She pried the bell from Lady Thomasina's fingers and offered her own hand instead. "I began nodding off before eleven o'clock, which didn't make them very happy. But Lady Clair revived just in time to take my place, so I was able to escape."
"Escape? But you shouldn't have left him alone with her!" Lady Thomasina was wearing a sort of turban for a nightcap, and it tilted precariously to one side as she shook her head. "It's just as I feared when I heard them carrying on downstairs. I was certain I recognized that fortune-hunter's laughter! Bring me a glass of sherry. I must have some, or I'll be awake all night!"
"I don't think it's a good idea, my lady." She dared to adjust her employer's headdress, at which point Angus rose out of the nearby bedclothes, clutching his prized glove and growling. "It's only me, Angus. Nothing to fear."
"Get my sherry." Lady Thomasina pouted until her request was granted. "Don't think that you can defy me, Miss Beau. I'll sack you in the blink of an eye if you defy me."
"I hardly think it's fair for you to vent your frustrations at me, my lady. I have only been kind to you." She took her hand again and looked into her eyes. "Tell me now what is bothering you. That will help you sleep far more than sherry."
"I—I had a dream that Hunty and that creature were married, and they were simply horrid to me." All at once fat tears rolled down her cheeks. "I was turned out of my house in Cavendish Square, and that awful girl began tossing out all of my furnishings as well. When I came here, by mail coach, penniless, Jarrow and Mabel told me that I would have to live in an awful little dower house in the woods. It looked like a—a woodcutter's cottage!" Sobs overtook her, and she buried her face in a handkerchief that reeked of stale perfume.
"But, my lady, that was only a dream!" Adrienne said in sunny tones.
"Listen to them downstairs!" She paused, frowning.
"You see, they've already stopped. Mr. Essex went to ask them to be quiet out of respect to you, my lady."
Lady Thomasina was not ready to give up yet. "But only imagine how I felt earlier! When I awoke, frightened out of my wits, all I could hear was the pair of them laughing and singing in the drawing room—and it was as if my nightmare had already come true!" Another siege of weeping sent Angus back under the covers. "Oh, Miss Beau, it is simply beastly to be old and useless, at the mercy of one's children!"
"I think that you'll see this matter quite differently in the light of day," her companion assured her. "Your fears have no basis in reality as far as I can tell. Your son hardly appears to be in love with Lady Clair, nor she with him."
"What makes you think that love enters into such matches?" But Lady Thomasina seemed to be relaxing. She lay back against her pillows and heaved a heavy sigh. "I suppose you think I'm an hysterical old wretch."
Adrienne felt her heart tug. "Not at all." She smiled with genuine compassion. "I am glad to understand you better, my lady."
"You're a good girl." Squeezing her hand again, Lady Thomasina let her eyes close. "Perhaps I'll rest for a bit now."
So much about this woman tried her patience. Her bedclothes were stained with jam and tea and littered with crumbs of every sort. She always smelled as if she were a week overdue for a good hot bath. She was tryingly eccentric, with her Systems, and unbearably spoiled. All too often Adrienne felt as if she were dealing with a slightly batty, gigantic baby who had gotten dressed in an ancestor's rotting clothes.
Yet tonight she warmed toward Lady Thomasina Harms. She felt protective toward her, and suddenly all the other annoyances faded into the background.
* * *
Huntsford Harms was sprawled in his chair at the card table, drinking claret out of the crystal decanter while Lady Clair dealt another hand of rouge et noir. On a nearby sofa, Lucy and Alistair, though slightly less inebriated, were engaged in a giggling display of physical affection that was dangerously over the line.
Sir Blake Smythe and Peter, the dog, were sound asleep together in a wing chair before the dying fire.
"You're not keeping track of my losses, are you, darling?" Huntsford demanded loudly.
Lady Clair's response was a high-pitched trill of laughter.
None of them noticed Nathan when he appeared in the doorway, and he was too angry to care. "I realize that this is asking a great deal of people in your condition," h
e said in clear, glacial tones, "but could you be considerate enough of Lady Thomasina to either go to bed or at least continue your drunken revels in silence?"
"And who the deuce are you?" Huntsford drawled, squinting through his quizzing glass.
"You remember, Harms," Alistair rejoined as he untangled himself from Lucy and stretched. "It's that man who's protecting Miss Beauvisage. Essex, I b'lieve. Good lord, look at the hour! Past my bedtime." He gave Nathan a sheepish smile. "No wonder I'm behaving badly."
"Not so badly," Lucy purred. When Alistair had left the room, she crawled to the edge of the sofa and stared at Nathan. "Are you certain your name is Essex? Clair, doesn't he look familiar without his specs?"
Lady Clair wore a suggestive smile. "If you say so, Lucy. I'd like him to be familiar!"
As the women ran their eyes over him, Nathan was aware not only that he'd left his room out of costume, so to speak, but also that Huntsford Harms was regarding him with growing animosity. It seemed wise to remove himself before any real damage occurred, and then hope that all of them were too foxed to remember in the morning that he'd been there. "I'll be going now. Good night."
Nathan had retreated only a few steps down the corridor when he heard Lucy cry triumphantly, "Now I know who he looks like! It's that wickedly handsome sea captain who was causing such a stir in London earlier this spring. Remember, Clair? They called him the Scapegrace!"
"What's that mean?" she rejoined woozily.
"Oh, you know—a reckless sort of rogue, or some such thing." Lucy waved a hand. "You know the type. Can't remember his given name, but my cousin Fanny was mad for him, not that it got her anywhere. Fanny told me that he only comes to London from time to time, and he refuses to fall in love with anyone, which just makes women want him more—"
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