Improper Ladies

by Amanda McCabe

  “We did not look in the garden.”

  “You can see almost the entire garden from here.”

  Indeed she could. One wall of the conservatory was made of windows, and through them was the whole vista of the garden, sloping down to the sea along a gentle incline.

  Caroline leaned back to survey the scene laid out before her so perfectly. It was a magical night, with the moon shining down on the manicured gardens and the wild sea beyond. The water shimmered in the silver-capped darkness.

  It would be so easy to sit here in silence with Lord Lyndon—Justin—watching the scene of perfect beauty as it shifted and changed all through the night. It had been a delightful evening, and he had lulled her into a dangerous comfort with his presence.

  Dangerous because if she lost her wariness, her ever-present knowledge of the secrets she had to keep, she would be so vulnerable to the spell he wove.

  The spell he was weaving about her so seductively right now, just by sitting quietly beside her. She was acutely aware of his warmth, of the spicy scent of his soap.

  A warm lassitude stole over her, wrought by the beautiful night, the wonderful normality of the party—and the man beside her. She wanted to turn to him, to put her arms about him and draw his lips down to hers. If she could only feel his kiss, the safety of his arms about her, holding her close....

  What was she thinking of!

  Caroline sat straight up, trying to shake off the sweet, seductive thoughts that wound around her. Her sister was missing, probably off getting into some mischief, and all she was doing was sitting here, dreaming of kissing the man who could expose her past and cause them ruin.

  She stood up quickly, obviously startling Lord Lyndon, who looked as moonstruck as she felt.

  “Per-perhaps we should search the garden anyway,” she said swiftly.

  He rose to his feet, as well, standing next to her. “Of course, if you like, Mrs. Aldritch. I am sure they must be someplace close by.”

  “I do not know what else to do. What if they—” She was interrupted by the faint but unmistakable sound of a scream coming from outside the conservatory.

  It sounded to Caroline’s panicked ears like Phoebe. She looked about frantically for a door, but Justin was there before her, throwing open the glass door and hurrying out into the night.

  Caroline followed and saw Phoebe running up the slope from the seashore, her pale green gown a flash of light against the darkness.

  “Phoebe!” she cried, running toward her sister.

  Tears streamed down Phoebe’s face, and her hair fell disheveled from its pins and ribbons. One lace ruffle was torn on her sleeve.

  Caroline’s first, fierce thought was that Harry Seward had somehow hurt her sister, and she was going to have to kill him for it.

  Phoebe reached her and threw herself, sobbing, into Caroline’s arms.

  “Caro!” she wept, her cheek wet where she pressed it against the silk of Caroline’s dress. “You have to fix it!”

  “Fix what, darling? What has happened?” She looked at Justin over Phoebe’s bent head and saw that his face was tight and angry in the moonlight.

  Obviously, he was thinking the same thing that she was, and he was utterly furious. Perhaps she would not have to kill Harry after all; his brother would do it for her, most handily.

  Caroline shook Phoebe lightly by the shoulders. “Phoebe! Stop this now, and tell me what has happened.”

  Phoebe shook her head wildly, sending the rest of her curls tumbling free over her shoulders. “He is dead!”

  Chapter Twelve

  “Tell me, Harry. Is your brain still in your head, or did you somehow leave it behind in London?”

  Harry, seated across the library desk from Justin, slouched down deeper into his chair and pouted. “Really Justin, I don’t know what you’re saying.”

  Justin, completely exasperated, planted his hands firmly on the desk with a loud slap. “I am saying that anyone with a brain, with half a brain for that matter, would never have taken two young ladies down to the shore in the middle of the night. Anything could have happened! One of you might have been killed or seriously injured.”

  Harry held up his bandaged hand. “I was injured! And I am in far too much pain for your hectoring.”

  “Pain! You merely got your hand caught between two rocks, where you had no business putting it in the first place. Then you had such hysterics that you almost frightened poor Miss Lane to death.”

  “I certainly never meant to frighten her at all,” Harry said sheepishly. “I would never hurt such a sweet angel. I merely wanted to show her and Miss Bellweather the, er, smugglers’ treasure.”

  “That part makes it even worse. If that ‘treasure’ did indeed belong to smugglers’, they would have shot you on sight. And God knows what they would have done to the ladies.”

  Harry’s gaze slid away. “Actually, Justin . . .”

  Justin sighed. “What now?”

  “There never was a treasure of any sort there. There wasn’t anything there but seaweed.”

  “You mean to say you took those girls out there just to show off?”

  “I would not put it exactly that way.”

  “I would. You have hardly been living in a wilderness all your life, Harry. You know how deeply improper your actions were, not to mention dangerous.”

  “It won’t happen again!”

  “You are damn right it won’t. I intend to watch you very closely from now on, Harry. And if I so much as see you dancing with Miss Lane without her sister’s permission, I will send you off to India.”

  “Now, really, Justin! You can’t treat me like I’m in leading strings. I am an adult.”

  “Show me you can behave like one, then, and I will treat you as one.”

  “Justin—”

  Justin held up his hand in a sharp gesture, stopping the flow of protests. “I don’t have time for this now. I have a call to make.”

  “What sort of a call?”

  “Not that it is any of your business, young Harry, but I am going to call on Mrs. Aldritch.”

  Harry’s demeanor cautiously lit up. He slid to the edge of his seat. “Mrs. Aldritch? Perhaps if I could go with you and apologize in person . . .”

  “I do not think so. Mrs. Aldritch was very upset when she found her sister missing, and I doubt she would want to see you today.”

  Harry looked crestfallen. “Oh.”

  Justin’s anger faded, and he relented just a bit. “Perhaps tomorrow Mrs. Aldritch and Miss Lane would agree to go with us on our picnic with Mother and the Bellweathers.”

  “Oh!” Harry cried. “Do you really think so?”

  “I will ask her.”

  “I never meant any harm, Caro. I promise!” Phoebe sat next to her sister on the settee, her hands pressed to her tearstained cheeks. “I would not have worried you for all the world.”

  Caroline sighed. “I know you meant no harm, darling. But did they not teach you of the proprieties at Mrs. Medlock’s? Of common sense, for heaven’s sake! You must know better than to go down to the shore in the middle of the night. Why, there could have been any sort of criminals about! Not to mention what could have happened to your reputation.”

  “I know, I know! It was silly of me, I know, but when Mr. Seward said something about a treasure, I simply had to see it. It was just like Secrets of a Windswept Sea.”

  Caroline knew then that she was going to have to go through Phoebe’s chamber and dispose of every horrid novel. She pressed a handkerchief into Phoebe’s trembling hand, and said, “You must never leave a party, or anyplace else, without telling me first. I was very worried.”

  “But I was not alone with Mr. Seward, Caro! Miss Bellweather was with us.” At Caroline’s stern glance, Phoebe subsided again, and said meekly, “I promise I will not do it again.”

  “I do hope not. You know that Wycombe is a very small place, darling. It would never do to have people think you are, well, less than proper. A young l
ady’s reputation is so very important, you know.”

  Phoebe wiped at her eyes and nodded. “I know you are depending on me, Caro, and I will not fail you. I would never do anything to demean our family.”

  “I know you would not. Just, please, be very careful in the future. Especially where Mr. Seward is concerned.” Caroline leaned over to kiss Phoebe’s cheek, then gave her a reassuring pat on the hand. “Now, why don’t you go upstairs and wash your face? Perhaps we could go out for ices this afternoon.”

  Phoebe smiled. “I would like that,” she said, and left the room quickly, obviously relieved that the scolding was over.

  When she was gone, Caroline tucked her left foot beneath her right knee on the settee and rubbed at the scar on her ankle wearily. How very complicated chaperonage was! Not at all as simple and enjoyable as she had thought it was going to be. Never could she have imagined a scene such as the one she faced last night.

  She closed her eyes as she recalled rushing down to the shore with Lord Lyndon and the hysterical Phoebe. The sight of Mr. Seward flailing about with his hand caught between some rocks, shrieking fit to raise the dead, had been so very comical she had had to fight to keep from laughing aloud.

  Worse, she had seen the same sort of repressed laughter on Lord Lyndon’s face as he worked to free his brother’s hand.

  She did laugh now, alone in her drawing room, at the memory of that absurd tableau.

  But she knew very well that it would not have been in the least comical if the entire company had witnessed the scene. No, it would have been very embarrassing, and it would surely have given rise to gossip.

  Thank the stars for Sarah Bellweather. She was certainly a cool and calculating thinker, unlike her silly mother. She had concocted a plan for Lyndon to slip his brother up the back stairs and get him tidied up before taking him back to the party, and for Caroline and Phoebe to go back home through the garden. She then told the guests that Phoebe had a terrible headache, and her sister was now taking her home after she had spent an hour in the retiring room with Sarah. Crisis neatly averted.

  Phoebe was lucky to have a friend like Sarah, if she was going to insist on being so featherheaded.

  But would the next disaster be so easy to avoid? Caroline rubbed her hand on her ankle. Running the Golden Feather had never been as complicated as this.

  Mary came into the room, interrupting Caroline’s whirling thoughts.

  “There’s a caller, madam,” she said, waving the silver tray that held one card.

  A caller was the last thing Caroline wanted to deal with just then. She had far too many things to worry about as it was without having to make polite conversation over tea.

  She supposed she had to be civil, though, if she wanted to be accepted into the center of Wycombe’s little society.

  “Who is it, Mary?” she asked, swinging her foot back to the floor and smoothing her skirt over her legs.

  “It’s that Lord Lyndon,” Mary sniffed. “The one that came to call in London.”

  “Mary!” Caroline cried, horrified. “You aren’t supposed to even mention London. What if he heard you?”

  “He could hardly hear me, madam. He’s out on the doorstep.”

  “You left Lord Lyndon out on the doorstep!”

  “Well, where else was I to put him? There’s no foyer to speak of in this little place.”

  “Show him in, Mary, at once. And have some tea sent in, as well.”

  “Very good, madam.”

  Mary left in a huff, and soon reappeared with Lord Lyndon behind her. He seemed none the worse for having been left standing on the doorstep. “Lord Lyndon, madam,” Mary announced, then promptly ran off again.

  Caroline smiled at him, hoping that her hair was not mussed. She had scarce had time to even look in a mirror all day. “Good afternoon, Lord Lyndon. Won’t you please be seated?”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Aldritch.” He sat down in a chair placed directly in a beam of sunlight, and Caroline saw that his face looked rather pale and drawn, as if he had not slept much last night.

  He looked as weary as she felt.

  “I have come to apologize for my brother’s behavior,” he said.

  “Apologize? Oh, Lord Lyndon, it is hardly your fault that your brother did something . . . less than advisable.”

  “I feel that it was. I knew that Harry’s behavior of late has been quite unpredictable, and I failed to keep a strict eye on him last night. As a result, your evening was ruined, and things could have ended much worse.”

  “The evening was hardly ruined,” she protested. “I had a delightful time at your mother’s party. And if you are to blame for not watching your brother, then I am also to blame for failing to watch Phoebe.” Caroline realized then that what she was saying was true. After a long night of self-recrimination, she saw that she could not possibly be responsible for every action of Phoebe’s. Any more than her parents could have been responsible for Caroline, once upon a time. “We are not their nursemaids.”

  “That is true.” He nodded slowly, obviously still not completely convinced. “I would still like to say I am sorry, though, and promise you that it will not happen again. I gave Harry a scolding this morning. One that I hope he will not soon forget.”

  “Apology accepted, then, if it will make you feel better. And I also gave Phoebe a few things to think about. I am just glad that the smugglers did not appear last night! Now that would have ruined the party in truth.”

  Lord Lyndon laughed. “As to that, I can assure you that there was never any danger of smugglers showing up.”

  “Really?”

  “Really. Harry told me he made up the entire corker about smugglers’ treasure just to impress the young ladies.”

  Caroline stared at him, feeling laughter of her own bubbling up. “He . . . made it all up?”

  “I fear so.”

  “The rascal!” She did laugh then; she could not seem to help it. The whole thing was so richly absurd. “Phoebe would be so angry if she knew. She truly feared for Mr. Seward’s life.”

  “Oh, his life was never in any danger, though he certainly carried on as if it were. I hope this entire situation has taught him a lesson.”

  “I am sure it has.” Caroline wiped at her laughter-damp eyes.

  “And now I can come to the second, and much more pleasant, reason for this visit.”

  She looked up at him curiously. “A second reason, Lord Lyndon?”

  “Yes. Mother wanted to see the Roman ruins outside of town and is organizing a picnic there tomorrow. The Bellweathers are coming, and Mother and I thought you might care to accompany us as well.”

  Hmm. Another invitation. Caroline felt a warm, satisfied, nervous feeling blossom deep inside of her. What could it all mean? Was it simply Lady Lyndon being kind to the daughters of her old friend? Or could it possibly be something more? Could the invitation be Lord Lyndon’s idea? Could he ... admire her?”

  She forced down a silly giggle, and studied him closely, searching for any signs of admiration at all.

  Sadly, he merely looked polite.

  “I have heard the ruins are quite picturesque,” she said.

  “Indeed. I believe they are an ancient bathhouse and villa, or at least parts of them.”

  “I take it Mr. Seward will be along, as well.”

  “If he is not sulking in his room, yes. But you need have no fear that he will lure your sister away, Mrs. Aldritch. I promise you that I will tie him to the picnic hamper if I have to.”

  “Then you do not think he will suddenly discover ancient Roman smugglers’ treasure?” she teased.

  Lord Lyndon gave a startled laugh at her little joke. “Let us hope not.”

  “Then I should like to go, and I am sure Phoebe will as well.”

  “We shall call for you tomorrow morning at ten, then, if that would be convenient.”

  “I will look forward to it.”

  Oh, yes, I certainly will, her mind whispered.

 
Chapter Thirteen

  Mrs. Aldritch looked most lovely in the afternoon sun. Like a portrait of a fairy queen examining her forest domain.

  Justin shook his head ruefully at his fantastical thoughts. He had never been at all prone to being poetical, had always scorned men who went about spouting verses about ladies’ eyelashes and such.

  But he had to admit that if he were to start composing rhymes, Mrs. Aldritch would be a most delightful inspiration.

  She sat on a large, flat rock overlooking the villa ruins, watching her sister and Miss Bellweather scurry about, examining the mosaic floor. She held a white, lacy parasol over her head, and the sun filtered through the patterns of the lace, casting shifting shadows on her face and the skirt of her sky-blue gown.

  The short waves of her pale hair, though bound back neatly with a wide blue ribbon, shifted and shimmered in the breeze.

  But her expression was far too serious for such a beautiful day, such a fetching pose. She was frowning a bit, her gaze far away even as she looked at the girls. She looked as if she did not see the pretty scene before her at all, but something invisible to everyone else.

  Something worrisome.

  He had the strongest urge to go to her, to take her hand and make her tell him what it was that worried her. He wanted to erase that frown and hear her laugh again, as she had when he told her of Harry’s fib. She had a wonderful laugh, warm and rich, though seemingly a bit rusty from misuse.

  It appeared that whatever her life had been since Larry Aldritch died, it had not involved much laughter. She usually looked much as she did now, worried and distant.

  Justin found it brought out the latent white knight in him. The one with the irresistible urge to make unhappy fair damsels smile.

  She looked up and saw him watching her. A smile did appear on her lips, albeit a small one, and her brow smoothed.