The Scandalous Deal of the Scarred Lady: A Historical Regency Romance Novel

by Hamilton, Hanna

  This was the elegant world of the ton, small as it was here in Hull. Most of society was in London, at far grander theatres than this, she knew. But even so, the few dozen people assembled here gave her a taste of what she had been missing, and now as she stood just inside the door, she could not get enough of it.

  Almost without realizing it, she let the cloak fall away, taken by skillful hands that would remove it somewhere to be retrieved later. As she shook out her own skirts with shaking hands, she reminded herself that her dress was every bit as fine, that the silver and gold that sparkled at her neck and wrists spoke of jewels every bit as fine as what the ladies here wore.

  Hardly aware of her aunt, or even of the Duke who still stood at her side, she took a step, her foot sinking into the plush carpet, and then another until she stood in their midst, eyes shining, as she tilted her head back to study the chandelier above, still lit by candles proving that not everything was gas light after all.

  The flames flickered casting a thousand reflections on the pieces of mirror cleverly spaced around the ceiling of the room, tucked within the mural painted above depicting Greek Gods and Goddesses in all their radiant glory.

  “The mural was done only a year or two ago. The artist was quite clever, do you not think?” the Duke asked, his hand at her elbow.

  Helena turned to look at him with shining eyes. “I think it simply marvelous,” she said softly, wondering what song she would compose that would describe this place, this feeling of excited happiness that welled up within her.

  “Helena!”

  Her name, uttered in such a way by her aunt, broke the spell completely. Helena turned to look to see what Phoebe wanted and realized then how utterly quiet the lobby had grown. Around them, the bright and glittering crowd had fallen still. Pale faces staring. One woman turning away with a cry as Helena gazed upon her face.

  It was everything the coming out ball had been, but more. The looks were more brazen and just as unfriendly. The confusion with which many gazes turned upon the Duke bespoke of what this outing must cost him, he could afford too little censure at such a time when it was crucial that he rebuild his fortune.

  Helena wavered on her feet, wondering if she would faint. What have I done? Have I been so selfish as to ruin this man for my own pleasure?

  Chapter 24

  The spell did not last long although it seemed like forever. It was a young man who came forward, his expression curious and without animosity.

  “Your Grace, it is ever a delight to see you.” Bravely he came forward to clasp the Duke of Durham’s hand as though there were nothing amiss. His action broke the spell, a quiet murmur rising up around them, but lacking the gaiety. There was a harshness to the whispers spoken behind the fans of the ladies present.

  Helena found herself drawing nearer the Duke who tucked her hand in the crook of his elbow again as though it were the most natural thing in the world to do and with a bow introduced his friend though the title flew over Helena’s head, the name vague in her ears. Barton or Marwood or some such.

  She curtseyed when Phoebe did, murmuring how it was a pleasure to meet him, all the while wanting nothing more than to turn and run. But the Duke held her hand fast and so it was she had no recourse but to see this through, moving with relief when he did, as he led them into a long hall with many doors and a handful of other theatre patrons likewise seeking out their seats.

  “Hold your head high. Remember you are better than they are, My Lady,” he advised so softly she was unsure whether she even heard him correctly.

  Helena gave him a startled glance but did as he bid, forcing a smile upon lips that felt cold and numb, nodding pleasantly as they passed someone walking the other way.

  Phoebe was on her other side somewhere slightly behind them. Even without seeing her, Helena knew she would be walking stiff, her spine, straight and unyielding. How disappointed her aunt must be to have this outing spoiled in such a way. Helena took a breath and resolved to see this through, to make the evening as pleasant as possible for her aunt. Did she not owe her that much?

  They stopped before a door, opened by a uniformed attendant, revealing a box, a tiny balcony all their own that was placed just above the main floor, away from the crowds. The seats were plush and exquisitely comfortable as Helena discovered when she sank into one gratefully.

  Was this where the Duke normally sat for theatre performances or had he been as thoughtful as this, to provide a small space away from the prying eyes of those around them? She had little time to think on it for she was distracted by the first instruments singing out in the discordant concerto of that seemed so much noise that came of tuning instruments and preparing to play.

  The lights dimmed, gaslights turning low, as the crowd around them quieted, until there were only soft rustles of clothing from those attending and the occasional cough.

  What followed should have been the pinnacle of everything that Helena had witnessed thus far in her life. The music was exquisite, the pieces familiar but played in such a way that they transported her outside of herself. More than once she felt tears upon her cheeks, as some particular refrain coaxed some deeper emotion from her.

  But she could not forget the censure, the glances. By the time the intermission came, she could not think at all now that it was time to socialize. The lights came up, and the musicians sat back to shuffle sheet music and talk. What she would have given to be down there upon that stage, cradling the harp against her, using it as a bulwark against all this unpleasantness.

  Phoebe had relaxed considerably, talking comfortably with their neighbor in the next box, a matronly lady that Helena remembered as coming to their house for the literary discussion group, though she’d never attended.

  She wondered what such a fine lady as that would think to know she had been observed in her comings and goings by one lonely girl, half-hidden by the curtain at the window every week.

  Would she, being one of Phoebe’s friends, turn such an unpleasant gaze upon her?

  “What do you think of the music?” The Duke asked, and she realized with a start that he was asking this a second time, so caught in her wool-gathering that she had not been aware of the question the first time.

  The music. This she could answer honestly enough. Perhaps he had not noticed the unfriendly looks. Men were often not aware of the subtleties of expression that women employed to express their displeasure.

  “I found the piece by Beethoven inspiring, did you not?” she replied with certain enthusiasm. She wanted him to know she appreciated this evening, despite how it had begun. “Were you not simply in awe of the violins in the second movement?”

  He chuckled, sitting leaned back comfortably in his chair as though he had no care in the world. “I have never in my life been in awe of violins until this moment,” he said with a smile that she felt all the way down to her toes.

  “Are you mocking me, Your Grace?” she asked but could not help laughing with him.

  “I am every bit as serious as you, if not more. I too found the Beethoven to be a better rendition than I had heretofore expected, though I think if you were left inspired by the music here, you would be doubly so in London, were you given a chance to listen to it played there.”

  “Is London so grand then?” she asked wistfully, for she knew now how far out of reach such a place was to her, with her face being as it was.

  “I think that is a question best answered by your own self, once you have gone. Am I correct in understanding that you have never been?”

  “Once. We went once for my coming out.”

  There was a world of things she didn’t say in that answer, as brief as it was, but he seemed to understand all the same. His eyes left hers, moving instead to pass over the crowd below. “You should go again, My Lady,” he said finally, but even as he said it, the neighbors on the side opposite from where Phoebe sat in deep conversation returned from stepping out into the hall and settled again in their seats.

  “D
id you see that hideous girl? I wonder at what her family was thinking, to allow her out in polite society like that.”

  A woman tittered. “On the arm of that Duke as well. I suppose though there is not another as would touch him. I heard he has lost his entire fortune. Imagine!”

  The lights flickered, the musicians settling again in their places, a soft swelling of sound from the stage as Helena sat staring hard at her gloved hands in her lap. Her face itched. Her arms itched. Everywhere itched and all she wanted was to rake her fingernails over her flesh.

  “I…I need some air I think,” she said suddenly and rose. Her skirts rustled around her, the soft whisper of butterfly wings carrying her aloft to whatever escape she could find. She could not breathe…could not get another bit of air into her body so long as she stood here thus.

  But he rose with her, one hand coming to capture her trailing hand, to draw her back to the seat next to his even as the lights went down and the music commenced, a powerful piece by Bach, that left a queer ache in her chest as she heard it.

  “Stay,” he said softly. “Stay and listen with me. Stay and…”

  There were no more words to say. Already they were drawing attention from the nearby boxes, Phoebe hissing at her to sit down. She was causing a scene, must always be causing a scene.

  She sank in the darkness to her seat, stifling a sob. There was no escape after all for curses. Worse, by the very act of being here, she was hurting her aunt whom she loved with all her heart. And the gentleman that she was fast thinking that she could love had any of this courtship been real.

  The music rose and fell, following a rapturous progression of chords that should have swept Helena far beyond the pain of overhearing such crass words. Had they known she was there and directed their comments to her in this way simply to be brutal and unkind? Had they known he was there?

  She idly scratched at her leg through the fabric of the dress, sad and miserable and wishing only that they might go home. Three visits? Four. What did it matter in the grand scheme of things? Let the brooch stay in his hands forever, she cared not what happened to it anymore.

  A hand found hers in the darkness, warm and masculine, so large it seemed to engulf her own. Fingers squeezed her own, a comforting gesture that brought a gasp to her lips, and a quick turn of her head to study his profile, but his gaze was fixed on the stage, not upon her even as the hand slipped away as though it had never been there at all.

  Three. That was three times tonight he had touched her. Her hand tingled from the sweetness of it, that comradely gesture, that showed he had heard and understood, though he himself must have been upset as well, to hear such terrible things said about him.

  They were both outcasts then. Helena thought about this as the music changed and shifted to another piece, the final one of the night. She tried to concentrate on the notes, but in the end, all she could do was wonder at that brief touch and what he had meant by it. The others had been a polite leading she knew, to get her through the crowd, and keep her from being scared.

  The Duke of Durham was truly a very kind man.

  As the music ended, Helena could only sit in the darkness waiting for the lights to come back on, wondering at the strange spell that had fallen over her. She rose from her seat in something of a daze, hardly noticing when the Duke spent some time looking for a glove that wound up having been under his own chair where it must have fallen from his pocket.

  She thought little of it until they reached the lobby and she saw how empty it was. The gloves should have been in his coat, not in the pocket of his jacket. He had carried them with him then, in case there needed to be a delay. He had planned this then, to stave off further embarrassment.

  She, Helena, had caused this.

  Helena ducked her head, thankful when she was helped into her cloak that she might draw the hood up again and hide.

  Chapter 25

  The Duke of Durham hadn’t been able to reach her once that night. There had been that bright, beautiful moment when she’d come down the stairs, her slippered feet, an angel upon the stairs, flashing in and out of view from under the ridiculous cloak and long purple skirts.

  How he envied those feet, their dance, for they seemed happy as she skipped lightly toward him, a hint of laughter in the eyes peering brightly from beneath the hood that almost hid her face completely.

  But something had happened there and between the parlor. Had he been forward in offering her his hand, in teasing her so indelicately? He simply did not know. But from that moment on, she had withdrawn though he’d tried to tease out a reply or two in the carriage.

  She held the eagerness of a child, peering through the curtains while they drove, fascinated by the view of the city at night. James had seen that much in the way she tried so hard to pretend she hadn’t been looking at all.

  Still, her quietude might have been taken as shyness, or even a ladylike modesty, had he not seen a much more boisterous side of her already. He missed his companion from the tea that had taken only days before. He’d looked forward to the mischievous smile and the delight with which she’d confronted the world.

  But when he saw her within the lobby, seen the way others had looked upon her, James had thought then that he’d understood. Lady Barrington had been uncomfortable with the scrutiny, though he’d seen no true harm in it. The ton was every watchful for new faces, and Andrew at least had come forward, his usual cheerful self.

  It wasn’t until the intermission and the half-overheard conversation from the next box that he’d understood her heartbreak and even fear. Never had he felt such anger toward another soul, and he longed dearly to let the two ladies in the next box understand just what he thought of their snide remarks, only they’d attacked him in the next breath.

  And James had come to realize just how badly in shambles his own reputation was.

  He barely heard the music, though he stole a touch of her delicate hand, squeezing her fingers gently to let her know that he was there, and despite the strangeness of their arrangement, he had come to care about her, and, in fact, he wanted to care for her, if he could.

  But how could he when he could not even care for his own household?

  At the end of the performance, he subtly dropped a glove under his chair, glad that he’d taken them with him though in truth he’d been so flustered by her beauty unveiled when the cloak had finally been removed, that he’d quite put them in the wrong pocket entirely.

  How could the world not see that Lady Barrington was a vision? That anyone could have so much to say about a few blemishes upon her skin when faced with such a radiant smile or bright eyes when her hair had such luster and her dress such charm…the world should have seen her as he did, and it confounded him that they had not.

  The search for the glove gave him an extra moment with her, a chance to hear her talk though she’d answered his questions in monosyllables, as though she were already a hundred miles away.

  Now James watched her disappear into that confounded cloak as being swallowed by magic he could not begin to comprehend, much less know how to defeat. Those eyes faded from sight, nervous fingers pulling the hood until it created a cavern from which she could regard the world carefully, as if from very far away.

  My Lady, if you only knew how beautiful I find you.

  Miss Barlowe had no such compunction to hide though and chattered about how pretty the music was as though it were nothing more than the song of a bird or piece played in a drawing room. To her perhaps it was, as she seemed to have no fineness of soul where music was concerned.

  “I found the violins particularly inspiring,” he said finally, with a glance toward Lady Barrington who stood to the side fussing with her reticule, never once looking in his direction.

  “Inspiring?” Miss Barlowe frowned a little then found a smile all the same. “I suppose one could call a violin inspiring,” she said, though there was a doubtful tone to the words as though she still could not entirely come to an understanding
as to why he would use that word.

  James sighed for he was fully able to engage the guardian but not the girl. He glanced around the lobby, unable to find an excuse to delay the journey home, which would be over far too soon

  So, it was as he escorted them out to the carriage his attention was on the girl at his side. He desired to steady her with his hand as they descended the stairs, but he had already touched her far too many times to be proper tonight, though he longed to feel her tiny hand resting against his sleeve again.

  He never saw the footpads until they were upon them.

  The coachman was preoccupied with the horses, who stood restless and anxious to be off in the freezing drizzle that stung James’s exposed face. The footman was hastily handing Miss Barlowe into the carriage, out of the bluster and cold when the two craven cowards came tumbling out of the darkness.