by Julia London
Anna was so lost in thought that it took her a moment to realize that Mother and Lucy had stopped beside a handsome curricle. She started as she looked up to see who drove it.
Her traitorous lips formed a smile, completely independent of her. It was The Imposter, Ardencaple. And Mr. Fynster-Allen.
“Good afternoon, ladies,” Ardencaple said, tipping his hat and smiling broadly.
“Good afternoon, my lord!” Lucy called. “May I introduce you to my mother, Lady Whittington? Mother, please meet my friend, Lord Ardencaple.”
Anna watched as the Fraud of Ardencaple, charmer that he was, leapt from the curricle and landed lightly on his feet before Mother, leaving Mr. Fynster-Allen to climb down in a much less dashing fashion from the other side of the curricle. He took Mother’s hand, bent over it with a flourish, and straightened again. “It is me great pleasure to make yer acquaintance, Lady Whittington.”
“Oh, my lord, the pleasure is mine,” Mother said with a curtsey, then stepped back, gesturing for Anna to join them. “Might I introduce you to my other daughter, my lord?”
Ardencaple’s gaze slid to his right, landing on Anna. His smile suddenly seemed frozen. “We’ve met. How do you do, Miss Addison?”
“Very well, thank you,” she said, and turned a smile to Mr. Fynster-Allen. “Good afternoon, sir.”
Bless him, but the man turned an appalling shade of red. “Good afternoon, Miss Addison,” he muttered. “Lady Whittington. Miss Lucy,” he muttered further, now bobbing so quickly and often that he looked a bit like a duck.
“Mr. Fynster-Allen! Why, we’ve not had the pleasure of your company all Season!” Mother declared.
“Ah…I beg your pardon, my lady, but we did indeed meet at the Davenport supper,” he said, nervously taking his hat from his head. “Actually, we took a bit of cake together.”
Mother’s smile faded into a hint of confusion. “Did we?” she asked, brushing imaginary lint from her pelisse, then suddenly broke into another wreath of smiles. “Ah, of course we did, sir! You must forgive my abominable lack of memory!” she declared.
“Mother and I were enjoying the glorious weather,” Lucy said, as if Anna was not present. “Perhaps you gentlemen would care to escort us for a time?”
“’Twould give me great pleasure, it would,” Ardencaple said instantly, and smoothly moved in between Mother and Lucy, offering them both an arm, which they took as they beamed up at their handsome escort.
Anna looked at Fynster-Allen. He looked at her, too, his eyes wide with alarm. Anna laughed and held out her hand. “I promise not to bite you, sir.”
“Oh! Of course not, Miss Addison, I never meant to convey that I thought you would,” he said quickly, and after another moment’s nervous hesitation, he thrust his forearm under her proffered hand. Anna did her best to smile at the poor man as she took it, and the two of them fell in behind her mother and sister and the insufferable Lord Deceit, following along like puppies.
As one might have guessed, Fynster-Allen was not much of a conversationalist, and Anna eventually tired of trying to gain more of a response than “Yes indeed” and “Can’t rightly say.” Besides, she was far too distracted by the gay laughter coming from the threesome ahead of her. Even her mother was beginning to look a little smitten, she thought with some disgust, and in a fit of pique for having been left behind—again—Anna asked of Fynster-Allen, “What is it, exactly, that brings Lord Ardencaple to London, of all places?”
Her question obviously startled her companion; he looked anxiously at her from the corner of his eye, his cheeks going red again. “Why… whatever do you mean, Miss Addison?”
Would that she had a pencil and a bit of vellum to spell it all out for him. “I mean, sir, what is it in London that draws the Scottish earl? Is he not missed at home? Surely he must think to return to Ardencaple, or whatever place he belongs.”
“Why Miss Addison, I would never be so…so bold to pry into another man’s affairs,” Fynster-Allen said instantly, apparently shocked that she would.
Anna frowned at his appalled expression. Oh why not? she wanted to ask. Everyone wants to know, and you really shouldn’t pretend you don’t! But instead she said, “I did not mean to imply that you should pry, sir—I just thought that he might have offered his reason for being here, that’s all.”
He glanced uneasily at Ardencaple’s broad back. “He’s not said, really…I mean, other than his desire to find Amelia.”
Find who? How intriguing! “Who, did you say?” she asked politely.
“Oh dear,” Fynster-Allen said instantly. “Perhaps I’ve said too much—”
“Is it a secret, then?”
“Not a secret, I shouldn’t think, as he has made several inquiries, really—”
“Of who?”
“Of who? Why, the Amelias, of course.”
The Amelias? What was Fynster-Allen babbling about? In an effort to help him, Anna suggested, “Do you perhaps mean Miss Crabtree?”
A thin sheen of perspiration appeared on Fynster-Allen’s brow. “Miss Crabtree. Yes. In a manner of speaking. But really not Miss Crabtree at all. Did she tell you so?”
“No. Did she tell you so?”
Fynster-Allen turned red. “She wasn’t offended, was she? I’d regret it terribly if she were, since I pointed him to her. She’s really a very kind girl and not experienced in the ways of the ton—”
“Mr. Fynster-Allen, of what are you speaking?” Anna demanded, a little too impatiently.
The poor man winced. “Oh all right, I can’t suppose it would hurt, would it? Ardencaple is looking for the lost daughter of his uncle, and the only thing he knows for certain is that her name is Amelia. Oh, and that she was acquainted with Lady Battenkirk, and as I said to him, how unfortunate it is that Lady Battenkirk is in Wales just now, for I’m certain she’d clear it all up and point him to his cousin straightaway.”
“Lady Battenkirk?” Anna exclaimed in disbelief. She knew the odd duck, had known her all her life. As it happened, Lady Battenkirk was distantly related to her father’s cousin. For years, upon the conclusion of the parliamentary season, her family would retire to the Whittington country house in Devonshire. Their estate abutted the estates of a number of loosely related relatives, and Lady Battenkirk, who resided somewhere there, had often been in attendance at family functions. Anna recalled that she was forever collecting strange little knickknacks and baubles of questionable taste. Worse, the woman talked so loud and long that one felt as if one could be blown clear across the sea with all the wind she generated.
As Fynster-Allen daubed his head with a kerchief, Anna tried to guess how Ardencaple, or whoever he was, could possibly know Lady Battenkirk.
And as to this ridiculous ruse about a long lost cousin named Amelia? It was preposterous! Patently ridiculous! And terribly, terribly intriguing.
Anna was not personally acquainted with any Amelia save Miss Crabtree, but she did recall that Lady Battenkirk’s niece, Mrs. Merriman, lived near Hampton Court. If Lady Battenkirk was fast friends with anyone named Amelia, Mrs. Merriman would be certain to know it, wouldn’t she?
“Anna, darling, come here, will you?” her mother suddenly called, startling Anna from her thinking. She glanced at Fynster-Allen, who, she couldn’t help noticing, seemed rather relieved, and walked to where her mother and Lucy and the Lying Scotsman had come to a halt.
They were laughing at some tale; Mother’s eyes were shining as she took Anna’s hand and squeezed it playfully. “What a funny little thing to tell you! Do you recall, darling, the spaniel your lady grandmother had?”
“Of course,” Anna said, looking at them all curiously.
“And do you recall that she used to call him Bo? ‘Out the door with you, you little Bo,’ she’d say.”
“Yes, I recall.”
“You will not guess what bo means in Lord Ardencaple’s language!” Mother said, barely able to contain her laughter. “In the Scottish Highlands, it means… cow!”
she cried, and she and Lucy doubled over with laughter.
Anna missed the point of all the hilarity, and looked again at Ardencaple. He was laughing, his green eyes flashing. “I beg yer pardon, Miss Addison,” he said, his green eyes piercing her. “Do ye no’ find it amusing?”
“Not particularly,” she answered honestly.
“What’s happened to your good humor, darling?” her mother chided her. “Just think of it—an old woman who thinks she has made up some precious name for her little dog. And it means ‘cow’!”
The idea was so astoundingly funny a second time, apparently, that Mother laughed with girlish laughter all over again. Even Fynster-Allen was laughing a little. Slowly, Anna slid her gaze to Ardencaple again, watched one brow lift above the other, challenging her, daring her to laugh.
She merely smiled and thought that it was rather time she called on good Mrs. Merriman and inquired about her dear aunt, Lady Battenkirk.
Ten
T hat glorious day in the park was the last sunny one London was to see for a time, for over the next several days it rained relentlessly.
Grif, Hugh, and Dudley endured it like caged animals; Dudley’s gout was inflamed again, and Hugh was developing a rather disconcerting habit of stealing away in the night to gamble away whatever amount of their funds he could get his hands on. Naturally, Hugh’s behavior was a point of contention between Hugh and Grif, and in the passing of those few soggy days, they were locked in a battle of wills that eventually extended to fencing in the ballroom with swords taken from a decorative display.
The fencing solved nothing, however, and Grif knew he had to do something—Hugh’s restlessness was growing. Not that Grif could blame him, what with all the sitting about. No one knew better than Grif that this was not the sort of life Hugh aspired to—he’d always imagined himself a man-about-town, not a lowly housebound servant. Grif’s pleas that they stick to their plan were falling on Hugh’s deaf ears. They had been in London two months now—a month longer than they’d hoped—and Hugh swore he could not abide the idleness a moment longer.
Grif suspected that if he didn’t find an Amelia or the blasted beastie soon, he’d have the mutiny of one wretched valet on his hands.
But Grif’s hopes were growing dim. He posted another letter to Liam, hoping that Liam would know what to do, perhaps where to look for Amelia. And, he hoped, he’d know something of what the devil was about.
The devil being Miss Anna Addison, of course.
Aye, between Dudley’s worsening gout, Hugh’s restlessness, Miss Addison’s provocation, and what seemed like thousands of wrong Amelias, Grif was not having a very good time of it. In fact, he was beginning to fret that they’d run out of funds and be forced to return to Scotland before they ever found the blasted beastie.
And perhaps even without Hugh, by the look of it. Just this very morning, Grif had awakened to find him gone again and was brooding over it when he heard the pounding at the front door.
As Dudley was still recovering from the gout, Grif answered, pulling the heavy door open to see their neighbor, Lady Worthall, her cane raised to beat the door again, standing directly in front of one of her footmen, who held an umbrella over her head. Grif fought a grimace at the sight of her; her flaccid face seemed squeezed too tightly in the confines of that bonnet, and her gray ringlets were popping out.
“Good morning, Lord Ardencaple!” she said, and leaned to her right in an attempt to peer past him. “What a surprise to see you at your door, sir! Has your butler taken ill?”
“May I invite ye in?” Grif asked on a sigh of impatience.
“Why, yes!” she cried, and hopped up the entry and waddled into the foyer, her footman on her heels. “I’ve come to inform you that I’ve been delivered a letter from Lady Dalkeith.”
Grif steeled himself and drawled, “Have ye indeed?”
“Indeed,” she answered as she glanced curiously about. “She is rather determined to stay in Rouen until the end of the summer—”
That, at least, was welcome news.
“—at which point, she declares, she will return to London to open her house in time for the Little Season! I thought that a rather odd thing for her to say, don’t you?”
“Odd?” Grif asked, raising a brow.
“Odd, as her house is already open, my lord!” Lady Worthall exclaimed impatiently.
“I donna find it odd at all, really,” Grif said calmly. “The house is open for a time, ’tis true, but it willna be open as late as the summer.”
“Oh really? So you will not be staying on?”
“I didna say as much as that, did I, then?” he asked pleasantly. “I havena determined my plans as of yet.”
“Ah! I seeeee,” she said, nodding thoughtfully, and made a motion to the footman to open the door. “Then I suppose you won’t mind in the least if I write to Lady Dalkeith and inform her that your plans are, at present, uncertain?”
Witch. Grif walked to the door and opened it. “My dear Lady Worthall, ye may write to Lady Dalkeith and inform her whatever ye like. ’Tis no’ me affair.”
Unfortunately, Hugh chose that precise moment to make his grand return from trawling about all night. His clothes were disheveled, his hair was a mess, and beneath the full shadow of a beard, Grif could smell whiskey.
It was obvious that the sight of Lady Worthall startled Hugh; he blinked several times, unable to find his tongue. Probably because it was still wrapped around a bottle somewhere. Actually, no one could quite find their tongue until Hugh gathered his sodden wits and bowed with a flourish before Grif. “Milord, I have done yer bidding and delivered the post,” he said, rising with some difficulty. “Will that be all, then?”
“Aye,” Grif said through clenched teeth.
Hugh bowed again and strode quickly out of the foyer.
Lady Worthall turned a cold gaze to Grif. “As I said, my lord, I shall write to Lady Dalkeith straightaway and inform her that you and your… valet, is he? That you and your valet have not as yet determined your plans.”
Now Grif could not even muster a smile. “Good day, Lady Worthall.”
“Good day!” she said icily.
Her dull gray skirt had scarcely cleared the door before Grif shut it resoundingly behind her and her footman. He stood there, jaw clenched, staring daggers at the door. And then he turned that murderous glare to the staircase, his imagination already racing ahead to what, exactly, he might do to Hugh.
While Hugh and Grif were arguing loudly about what constituted “valetlike” behavior, across town, Anna had called for the coach and the family driver, Bentley, to take her to Hampton Court.
She’d vacillated about actually calling on Mrs. Merriman. But she was sick to death of listening to Lucy go on about all the gentlemen who esteemed her, and when Bette and her husband had called to announce the happy news that they were with child for the third time, Lucy’s bragging had been Anna’s undoing at last.
Lucy, Anna, and Bette had been looking at gowns Bette could no longer wear when Lucy blithely announced Drake Lockhart had been to call four times since the Valtrain ball.
“And moreover,” she’d said, clipping earrings on her ears and admiring herself, “he has kissed me rather passionately. And he has touched my breast…my bare breast.”
“Lucy Addison!” Bette exclaimed, horrified.
“What?” Lucy asked innocently. “I should think that when a man touches a woman’s bare breast, he intends to make the woman his own. Wouldn’t you, Anna?” she’d asked, turning to look at her sister.
“I would never be so bold as to assume any such thing,” Anna said quietly. “And I should hope I’d not be so easily seduced.”
“What makes you think I was the one who was easily seduced?” Lucy asked with a wicked little laugh.
“Lucy!” Bette cried, putting a hand over her mouth.
Lucy laughed again. “Oh, Bette, really! I’m only teasing!”
It was true that Drake had called on Lucy,
but Anna simply could not believe he’d kissed Lucy, or that Drake had touched Lucy in such a manner. She wouldn’t believe it… all right, if it were true, she could only surmise that Drake had been momentarily distracted by Lucy’s charm. At least that’s what she told herself.
And really, in spite of the tiny little part of her that refused to believe what she’d told herself, certainly Drake had given Anna no reason to believe his esteem for her had wavered in the least. In fact, at the Sotheby tea, Drake had been quite complimentary of Anna, and had even shared some of his private thoughts with her. He’d confided that he worried so about Nigel, and how he hoped to make a good match for his sister, Barbara. He told her he’d rather like to be a physician, and found the study of human anatomy quite fascinating.
No gentleman ever spoke to Anna the way Drake did, as an equal, seeking her opinion. Anna could only believe that such intimacy of his thoughts was reserved for those whom Drake esteemed the most. And as Lucy had not mentioned it, Anna was certain Drake had not confided in her. He had confided in Anna. His attention to Lucy was a temporary blinding, that was all. After all, it happened to most of the gentlemen who met Lucy.
A temporary blinding… but still Anna tossed and turned at night, her mind full of conflicting thoughts and torrid images of Drake and Lucy, his hand on her breast, then his mouth on her breast, then the two of them, naked and copulating.
The disturbing dreams led Anna to believe that her only hope of holding fast to Drake’s esteem was to learn the art of seduction herself, and at the same time, strengthen Ardencaple’s suit to Lucy, which, she was sorry to note, had been less than vigorous of late. But Lucy adored the slightest amount of attention, and therefore, with even slighter provocation, Lucy would charm Ardencaple into her web.
Anna could make it happen.
Only one question remained, and that was if Anna was pushing an outlaw into her sister’s embrace. While that had a certain scandalous appeal, she could not, in good conscience, see Lucy harmed.