A Sister's Secret

by Mary Jane Staples

  ‘Well, I’m not quarrelling with you yet, since I’m not too dissatisfied with results.’ His Grace permitted himself a slight smile. ‘Damned if I wouldn’t like to see Cumberland’s face when he discovers nothing comes out of tomorrow except an empty silence. There’s no chance he knows the four papists are under lock and key?’

  ‘Not unless he’s put his nose inside the Tower,’ said Captain Burnside.

  ‘And you are sure the Protestant fellow will hold his tongue? While he remains at Aldgate South, there’s the risk he’ll wag it whenever Erzburger calls on him.’

  ‘He ain’t without wits, sir. It wasn’t too difficult to guide his mind into taking hold of the strange fact that Cumberland hadn’t had the papists apprehended. Acting in my assumed capacity as a guardian of the law—’

  ‘You’ve a talent, sir, for making yourself sound damned self-important,’ said His Grace brusquely.

  ‘So-so, when required,’ said the captain. ‘I assured him, as a guardian of the law, that I knew no such arrests had been made. On our behalf, he’ll hold his tongue. He sees the danger he’s in without our help. But to have moved him would have alerted Cumberland, and I believe what you believe, Your Grace, that Cumberland deserves the chagrin and discomfiture of the empty silence.’

  ‘So he does, damn him. By this time tomorrow his plot will have collapsed like an empty sack.’ His Grace paused to make a thoughtful study of the captain. ‘So then, you now have no need to continue your association with Lady Caroline. You may pack your bags, sir, and leave tomorrow, counting yourself fortunate she has not found you out.’

  Captain Burnside rubbed his chin. ‘I thought to ease myself out of her life in more kindly fashion,’ he said, ‘coming to it gradually.’

  ‘Kinder fashion, sir? What’s this, you blackguard, what are you up to with Lady Caroline?’

  ‘I can only tell you she is frankly not in the mood to allow me a sudden departure.’

  ‘Not allow you?’ His Grace’s countenance darkened. ‘What the devil does that mean?’

  ‘Ah – she considers friendship has obligations.’

  ‘Friendship?’ His Grace simmered. ‘By God, sir, have you permitted yourself the damned liberty of rising above your role?’

  ‘My role, sir, and my accomplishments—’

  ‘Accomplishments?’

  ‘I am quoting Lady Caroline. They have resulted in arousing her excessive gratitude, and a wish for an enduring friendship.’

  ‘Good God,’ said His Grace.

  ‘And I repeat, sir, she considers friendship has obligations. Beg to point out she’s American and owns the proud blood of the founding fathers of the United States. She don’t take friendship lightly.’

  ‘Don’t she, by God. Well, sir, you’ll take it in no wise. You’ll pack your bags and leave tomorrow, first thing. I’ll not have you risk the inevitable by lingering. She’ll come to have her suspicions, if they ain’t already stirring in her mind now, and you’ll come to a confession. I’ll not risk having that lead to me. You’ll depart, by God, without a single word of confession.’

  Captain Burnside looked as if self-dislike had come to plague him. ‘I ain’t precisely happy about it,’ he said, ‘but at least, while she’s still unaware she’s been deceived, I’ll escape without having her take my head off.’

  ‘Be in no doubt, Lady Caroline would not forgive either of us,’ said His Grace, frowning. ‘This evening, by the way, you and your atrocious friend Carter will see to it that a sergeant and a corporal are placed with Maguire to ensure his safety, for the first thing Cumberland will do, when he finds nothing has come out of Maguire’s information, will be to send an executioner to Aldgate South. Oh, and put the fear of death into the man who’s watching Maguire.’

  Caroline, restless, was standing at the drawing-room window that gave a view of the street. She conceded her feeling of upset might be unreasonable. She really had no right to expect him to ask permission of her whenever he needed to go out. But where had he gone? And on what little business matter? Was he conducting one of his affairs with an innocent young lady who owned a few trinkets? He was always coming and going without ever being specific about what he was up to.

  The palms of her hands were hurting. Her fingers were clenched, her nails biting. Dear heaven, her feelings bore not the slightest resemblance to those she had experienced when infatuated with the handsome and amusing Lord Clarence Percival. She understood now the difference between what was the shallowness of infatuation and what was the torment of love. But after Clarence, how could she have come to love a smooth and plausible trickster?

  She saw him then, coming along the street, walking slowly, top hat at a slightly rakish angle and a cane in his hand. He nearly always carried a cane. It complemented his debonair façade. But beneath that façade, he was surprisingly strong. As a man who engaged in such disreputable fashion with life, he had no right to be so physically fit.

  He turned in at the house.

  Caroline was seated when he entered the drawing room a minute or so later. He did not know the giddy turn he gave to her heart when he smiled at her.

  ‘Why, there you are,’ he said.

  ‘And here you are,’ she said lightly. ‘Where have you been?’

  ‘Oh, a little business appointment.’ He was as light as she was.

  ‘Really?’ Caroline did not want to make the mistake of examining him censoriously, but she could not refrain from asking, ‘What would have happened if we had not returned today?’

  ‘I should have disgraced myself,’ said the captain, looking down at her. She was gowned in rich peach, fashion dictating the revealing lines of her décolleté, and the application of comb and brush had burnished her hair. He acknowledged her peerless looks with another smile. ‘I should have been considered unreliable. Extremely damaging to a professional’s reputation. I did inform Annabelle I had to go out. Where is the dear girl?’

  ‘The dear girl is in her room, resting from her exertions in Sussex and basking in relief now your friend Mr Carter is no longer around to badger her.’ Caroline forced a smile. ‘I’m afraid that until supper you will have to put up with me. Do you remember we spoke yesterday of how you were to wind up any outstanding business affairs?’

  ‘I think there was a suggestion that honest endeavour should take the place of dubious activities,’ he said, standing with his back to the tapestried fire screen and making an abstract survey of the carpet. ‘I was deeply touched.’

  ‘You surely were not,’ said Caroline, ‘you spent much time wriggling. It made no difference, of course. I am uncontradictably determined. May I ask if you have just come back from winding up an affair?’

  ‘Is that a shot fired in the dark, or a question emanating from acute perception?’ he asked. ‘I was indeed engaged, and still am, Your Ladyship, in—’

  ‘Caroline, you wretch.’

  ‘I am attempting, Caroline, to wind up the affair concerning Cumberland,’ he said. ‘It’s one thing to have taken the edge off Annabelle’s infatuation, it’s another to put an end to Cumberland’s pursuit of both of you. Although Annabelle may no longer wish to be drawn into his bed, nor you—’

  ‘I have never wished that,’ protested Caroline.

  ‘But who can tell how Cumberland may contrive seduction of the unwilling? I intend to ensure he leaves both of you permanently alone.’

  ‘You are jesting,’ said Caroline. ‘We are not going to have another conversation full of absurdities, are we?’

  ‘No, much too dull,’ he said.

  ‘But they aren’t.’ Caroline shook her head at him. ‘I am addicted to absurdities. They are very engaging. But were you serious about Cumberland?’

  ‘Indeed I was, and am.’ Captain Burnside looked sober. ‘After supper, you’ll permit me to go out again?’

  ‘Again? You are going to desert us again?’

  ‘Only to continue my campaign to take Cumberland out of your private lives.’

  �
�You can do that? To Cumberland?’ Caroline was disbelieving. ‘He in his devious majesty will give you best?’

  ‘Oh, a devious professional, Caroline, ain’t always less than devious majesty.’

  ‘You surely do hold your accomplishments in—’ Caroline checked. ‘Wait, you are not going to put yourself in danger, are you? I beg you won’t. Cumberland is wickedly omnipotent, and Annabelle and I will quarrel bitterly with you if you intend to run recklessly at him. You are quite up to forcing a duel on him, I know, whether he is the King’s son or not. I won’t have it, nor permit it.’

  ‘I ain’t going to be reckless,’ said the captain, ‘I’ve all the virtues of a coward and never place myself in danger.’

  ‘I do not believe you,’ said Caroline. ‘The virtues you do have are those that most appeal to Annabelle and me.’

  ‘Saints and angels, what virtues are these?’

  ‘The virtues of never being boring,’ said Caroline, wishing he would sit with her, close to her. ‘I shall let you go, but please take care. When you return, I shall have a promissory note ready for you. It will be drawn in your favour on my bank, and for the agreed amount in respect of your accomplishments.’

  Captain Burnside looked distinctly unhappy. He grimaced. ‘Perhaps, under the circumstances, we should agree it was all accomplished in the name of friendship,’ he said, ‘and it was really very little.’

  Caroline stared at him. He had haggled at the beginning, he had bargained, and he had made it very clear he was short of funds. ‘You are asking for nothing?’

  ‘I am happy to have been of service, and am glad you agree no payment is necessary. I should now like to have a bath, if I may.’

  ‘Not yet, sir. I do not agree. You have proved an invaluable help and a protective friend. You must not put me down unfairly by refusing to accept what you have earned so well. Your purse is threadbare. You have said so, and I won’t have it.’

  ‘Your Ladyship—’

  ‘And I won’t have that, either.’

  ‘Caroline, allow me to say that in coming to know you and Annabelle, I’ve been adequately rewarded for my insignificant endeavours.’

  Caroline said softly, ‘That is very sweet of you, dear Captain Burnside, but how can I not pay you? It was an honourable contract. Why do you look so uncomfortable about it?’

  ‘I ain’t too keen on discussing money with friends,’ he said.

  ‘Very well, I shall say no more. I shall simply pay you.’

  ‘I’ll take my bath,’ he said. ‘Ah, I must return to my lodgings tomorrow, of course.’

  ‘Lodgings?’ Caroline felt shock. ‘That is ridiculous. Annabelle will tell you so at supper. You are our friend and our guest. Why, we need you here, to stand between us and Cumberland. And we – we hold you in affection. How could we not when you have been so caring in our behalf? And you have a little affection for us, don’t you?’

  He moved to the door, looking as if he found it difficult to respond. Then he said, ‘Why, of course.’

  His swift exit gave her no time to say more.

  After supper, when he had gone out again, Caroline was quiet, Annabelle fidgety.

  ‘Annabelle, what is the matter with you?’ asked Caroline eventually.

  ‘I am bored. Nothing is happening.’

  ‘What should be happening, pray?’

  ‘Oh, something, anything,’ said Annabelle, getting up and swishing about. ‘Charles isn’t here, no one is here. It is all dreadfully dull and quiet.’

  ‘Well, there is Lady Repton’s reception tomorrow, and your visit to Almanack’s with Lily de Vere the day after.’

  ‘But there is nothing this evening, not one gentleman in sight,’ sighed Annabelle. ‘Oh, I surely do wish for company.’

  Caroline wished for Captain Burnside to return, and unscathed. ‘I wonder if I should have asked Mr Jonathan Carter to stay on?’ she murmured.

  ‘Merciful heaven,’ breathed Annabelle, ‘that low, trashy creature? I don’t wish his kind of company.’

  ‘I think he thought you quite sweet and amusing,’ said Caroline.

  ‘He is bumptious, conceited, patronizing and boring,’ said Annabelle. ‘He is also a brute.’

  ‘All that? Dear me. Annabelle, shouldn’t you think about returning home? Mamma is anxious you should marry and settle down.’

  ‘Oh, I declare,’ said Annabelle fretfully. ‘Mamma is just as anxious about you. She said in her last letter she hopes you won’t remain a widow for ever. She would just as much like you to return home. Oh dear, I am sure she has found husbands for both of us.’

  ‘Annabelle, my roots are here now,’ said Caroline. ‘I will pay a visit home next year, perhaps, in the spring, but only a visit. I have come to love England.’

  ‘But to live alone, Caroline, that is so dull. Don’t you wish to marry again?’

  Caroline hesitated, then quietly said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘Oh.’ Annabelle quickened with interest. ‘Caroline, are you in love?’

  Again Caroline hesitated, then again said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘Mr Wingrove?’

  ‘Such an agreeable gentleman,’ said Caroline with a faint smile.

  Thomas, the footman, knocked and entered. He announced that a young person had called and was asking to see Mr Burnside.

  ‘I think he must mean Captain Burnside,’ said Caroline. Young person, she thought. That suggested Thomas did not consider him a gentleman. An ill-visaged gambling associate of Captain Burnside, perhaps? ‘He is not a gentleman, Thomas?’

  ‘Not as I can make out, Your Ladyship,’ said Thomas. ‘It’s a young woman.’

  Caroline had a sudden, dreadful suspicion the caller was either a trollop or the latest in the long line of Captain Burnside’s infatuated young victims. And in some way or another, she had discovered he was living here.

  Suppressing the wretchedness of suspicion and jealousy, she said calmly, ‘Show her in, Thomas, and I will see if I can help her.’

  Thomas brought the young woman in. She was quite prettily gowned, even if the muslin material was cheap, and her equally cheap bonnet sat not unattractively on her brown hair. Her bosom had a buxom fullness, and she was as pretty as Annabelle.

  Normally, Betsy’s eyes were pert and inquisitive. Now they bore a perceptible look of anxiety. She stared at the elegant splendour of Caroline’s drawing room, her mouth agape. ‘Oh,’ she said, then hastily dropped a curtsey, for the haughty footman had told her to.

  ‘Good evening,’ said Caroline, and rose, while Annabelle looked on in curiosity.

  ‘Oh, good evening, madam,’ said Betsy, and because Caroline was all of a queenly vision, she dropped another curtsey. She stared around again. ‘Oh, be this the Lord Chancellor’s house? Be you the Lady Chancellor, madam?’

  ‘I was advised that you were enquiring after a Mr Burnside, not the Lord Chancellor.’ Caroline was distant, having quickly made up her mind that the wench was pretty enough and bosomy enough to be a trollop. ‘This is my house.’

  ‘Oh, yes, it be Mr Burnside I wish to see,’ said Betsy, and glanced at Annabelle. At once her eyes fluttered into innocence. ‘Only to ask his advice, madam.’

  ‘Come with me,’ said Caroline, who realized she did not want Annabelle to hear anything that might point to the fact that the captain was not quite the gentleman her sister thought he was. She took Betsy to a semicircular room with glass-panelled doors that opened on to a small conservatory, which in turn led to the garden. ‘You may sit down.’

  ‘Thank you, ma’am – Your Ladyship—?’

  ‘I am Lady Clarence Percival. Who, pray, are you?’ Caroline’s tall magnificence intimidated Betsy.

  ‘Oh, I be Betsy Walker, Your Ladyship.’

  ‘What is Mr Burnside to do with you?’

  Betsy, seated, looked at her peeping slippers. The situation was not one she favoured. Gentlemen were easy to deal with. Ladies were shrewder, and didn’t give a fig for the way a girl could use her eyelashes. Als
o, they were terrible hard on their own sex. ‘Mr Burnside, Your Ladyship?’

  ‘Yes. Does he bed you?’

  Betsy lifted her face and showed the genuine blush of shock. She didn’t mind kissing, cuddling and petting, but she was keeping herself for a nice gentleman who would set her up. She would willingly give herself to Mr Burnside if he would do so. ‘Oh, Your Ladyship, I be a respectable serving girl, and never would let Mr Burnside—’

  ‘Wait.’ Caroline remembered. ‘Did you say your name was Betsy?’

  ‘Yes, Your Ladyship.’

  ‘And do you have a position on the household staff of His Royal Highness the Duke of Cumberland?’

  ‘Yes, except His Royal Highness—’

  ‘So you know Captain Burnside very well.’

  Betsy’s brown eyes opened wide. ‘Captain Burnside? He be a captain, Your Ladyship?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Caroline, and wondered if she really knew precisely what he was. ‘You have been intimate with him?’ The accusing question was compulsive.

  ‘Oh, Your Ladyship,’ protested Betsy.

  ‘Has he seduced you? Is that why you have called to see him? Answer me.’

  Betsy quivered. Oh, what a fierce lady this Ladyship was, green eyes on fire, body vibrating, hands clenched. ‘Oh, I daresn’t hardly know what I’m at, I’m that upset,’ she gasped. ‘Your Ladyship, I never would, and there be his wife and all.’

  ‘His wife?’ Caroline became rigid. ‘His wife?’

  ‘The lady in the other room, is she his wife?’ asked Betsy. ‘She be so like her, the lady he pointed out to me one day. Only she were on the other side of the street, and I never did see her close.’

  Caroline stood in torment. Oh, to have done this to her. To make her love him out of all reason, and then utterly to destroy her. Such anguish was not to be borne. She spoke mechanically. ‘No, the lady in the other room is not his wife, but my sister. What is it you wanted of Captain Burnside?’

  ‘Oh, just to see him, thinking he be kind enough to give me advice on a matter, Your Ladyship. I be in a little trouble, and him being as kind as he is, I thought it be best to come and see him.’

  Through her pain, Caroline said, ‘I will tell him you called.’