A Difficult Disguise (9 page)

At last Fletcher stopped in front of a substantial-looking closed door and twisted the knob. He opened the door and took two steps inside, Billy directly behind him, eager to be rid of her bundles, before a loud male bellow from inside the room stopped them both in their tracks.

“What in bloody blazes! Who is that? How dare you come barging in here without so much as a by-your-leave?”

Billy peeked out from behind Fletcher’s back to see—thanks to the light of a single candle burning beside the bed—the faint outline of a very large, nearly naked man who seemed to be hovering overtop a much smaller, bare-shouldered female figure. Although she had never before been privy to precisely what went on between a man and a woman in the privacy of their bedroom, she had a very good suspicion as to what Fletcher had interrupted—and whom he had interrupted in the act of engaging in it!

“Beatrice.” Billy breathed the name softly, recognizing the barmaid’s blond hair. Now this was sticky. It was one thing for Fletcher to dismiss Beatrice because the woman had become ill, or had belatedly discovered she had morals and had decided to dedicate her life to chaste poverty while serving lepers in far-off Africa or some such tripe, but it was something entirely different to see that the idiotic woman had rejected him for such an obviously inferior, bloated specimen as the man now burrowing beneath the covers.

Billy’s apprehensive gaze flew to Fletcher’s face. She wondered how long it would be before he exploded in wrath, but her employer appeared to be most infuriatingly calm, if not even amused.

Fletcher had immediately upon entering the room recognized the man in the bed to be none other than one James Something-or-other Whittington. Whittington was a thoroughly unlovely man whose major—nay, sole—claim to fame was that he was second cousin thrice removed to the beleaguered Lady Helen Whittington, who was forced by conscience to invite him to at least one small party a Season.

Although his lapse was not deliberate, Fletcher did not at once share this information with his groom, who was still more than mildly concerned that things could get nasty.

In fact, so intrigued was Belden to see the very much married man
en flagrant délit
that he totally forgot his groom for a moment, and only belatedly whispered a quick order for Billy, who had noisily dropped the baggage to the floor in shock, to gather their belongings and remove them and his too-young, innocent eyes from the room.

“A thousand pardons, sir. Please accept my apologies,” Fletcher said to Whittington, not retreating a step. Beatrice struggled to cover herself, but the fat man, who had fleetingly reminded Billy of a newly shorn sheep, had fallen onto his back, selfishly pulling the majority of the sheets along with him.

“You offer your apologies, sirrah?” Whittington bellowed once he had found his voice. “I cannot settle for your apologies. I will not settle for your apologies! I demand satisfaction. Do you hear me?”

Clearly, Fletcher thought, although I recognize Whittington, he is incapable of seeing through the darkness to detect my identity, for, if memory served him correctly, the athletically inept Whittington could not with any certainty be counted upon to maim a wingless fly with fifty blows from a hammer.

“You demand satisfaction?” Fletcher responded, calmly removing Billy’s clutching hands from his sleeve and winking his groom a silent warning. “My goodness. My knees are knocking together at the thought. Do you hear the bones, sir? They’re positively rattling.”

“And so they should be,” Whittington blustered. “But be you coward or coxcomb, I demand satisfaction. It is a matter of honor.”

“Ah, yes,” Fletcher said, nodding. “You are a man of honor, then? But I must ask, are you also a man of moderation? Although I know I have committed a truly reprehensible solecism, sir, do you truly believe it warrants our spilling our respective claret in the innyard?”

“I most certainly do,” Whittington blustered hotly, if not quite so hotly as he had before Fletcher had brought up the subject of bloodshed. “Now, who are you? I am James Smith, sir, and I insist you answer my challenge.”

“Smith, you say?” Fletcher repeated quietly, as if thinking aloud. “There must be an epidemic of Smiths this year in the Lake District. Perhaps this past winter was too mild to kill them all off. No matter. I bid you good evening, Mr. Smith.” Fletcher walked to the bottom of the bed, knowing that his face was now visible in the candlelight, watching as James Whittington’s bulbous blue eyes widened in sudden recognition... and fright.

Beatrice, who had been cowering beneath the sheets, chose that moment to peek out, wide-eyed, from behind her woefully inadequate disguise.

Fletcher casually looked in the barmaid’s direction, bowed low, and inquired silkily, “Ah, and you must be the ever so lovely Mrs. Smith, I presume? Smith, my compliments, sir. Your wife is most lovely—and such a perfect match for you.”

As Billy choked on relieved laughter, her own tension eased, Fletcher spoke again. “Smith, I remain your servant, and I can only hope you might reconsider what you are suggesting, not that I should be so cowardly as to run off, you understand, if you were to remain adamant, but you do have Mrs. Smith here to consider, as well as all the little Smiths. Please feel free to call on me in the morning if you truly wish to renew your challenge. The name is Jones, by the by, Fletcher Jones. There seems to be a rash of ordinary names in the region, doesn’t there? Ah, well, ta-ta for now. I shouldn’t want you to keep Mrs. Smith waiting.”

James Whittington “Smith,” who was in the midst of babbling nearly unintelligible apologies for having overreacted to a simple error, “Ha-ha, such a silly business, and a mistake that anyone could make, don’t you know,” didn’t call Fletcher back.

Once the door to the room was closed behind them, Fletcher looked down at Billy and said, “Let that be a lesson to you, Billy.”

“Never open a door without knocking, sir?” Billy asked cheekily, grinning, for the sight of the occupants of the bed had been more amusing than sordid.

“No,” Fletcher answered, thoughtfully picking up his own pack and heading down the hallway.

“Never believe a barmaid named Beatrice when she says she knows how to give very good service?” Billy persisted, skipping along behind him.

Fletcher peered at the number on the next door, satisfying himself that this time he had chosen the correct one, and placed a hand on the knob.

“No, again, Billy,” he corrected without rancor. “The lesson is this: when trying to hoax somebody, never give the sadly uninspired name of Smith. It is entirely too obvious, which is what got you into trouble with me in the first place. And just think: if I had believed the lie you told me, you might even now have been trying to explain away a possible relationship to that unimaginative buffoon.”

Billy couldn’t help herself. The events of the past few minutes had been too delicious for Fletcher to possibly spoil the moment for her. She walked into the room, dropped her blanket roll on the floor, and collapsed into a chair, laughing until her sides ached. “Did you see his face? It was purple,” she exclaimed, wiping her streaming eyes. “When he finally recognized you, he all but groveled on the floor, which I will be endlessly grateful he did not do, for he was fast losing his fight with Beatrice for the sheet, and we had already seen more of the man than anyone should. It must be above everything wonderful to be so feared, Mr. Jones.”

Stepping over his groom’s outstretched legs, Fletcher picked up a sulphur match and tinderbox in order to light a small brace of candles. “Yes, I suppose it is, now that you mention it. Now, if only I could find either a relative or a single employee of mine that shares Mr. James Smith’s awe, I should be a happy man. But I believe I am doomed to be unappreciated by my own household. Tell me Billy, if you are sufficiently recovered from your unseemly bout of hilarity, would it be asking too much of you to pull off my boots?”

Both Billy’s good humor and her feelings of camaraderie with Fletcher Belden disappeared so quickly it was hard to believe they had ever existed. “Pull off your boots? You want me to pull off your boots? Why? Don’t your knees bend?”

Fletcher was now sitting on the side of the bed, the episode with Whittington already forgotten. But he was still wondering, as he had been doing when he opened the wrong door, why he was so amused to know that his possible romantic dalliance had upset his groom. Fletcher looked across the room at Billy, who was sitting stock-still on the chair, a mulish expression on his face.

“Don’t poker up on me, Billy,” he warned evenly. “I know that we have cried friends this afternoon, and I am aware that you were not really born into this world with the temperament to become the devoted servant of any man, but are, in fact, a young runaway gentleman unaccustomed to taking orders.

“However, you are in my employ at the moment—more’s the pity, for, alas, you are at times a most tiresome brat—and we are going to have to continue to deal with each other until we return to Lakeview and I can prevail upon dearest Beck to take you home. Now, if you would please to come over here and pull off my boots so that I might get into bed, I should greatly appreciate it. Or would you rather I slept beside you with them on?”

Billy closed her eyes in silent agony, for Fletcher had just confirmed her worst suspicions. He actually expected them to sleep in the same bed. Why did he have to be so magnanimous as to refuse to follow through on his threat to have her bed down in the stables? And if he was going to be so bloody generous about the thing, why couldn’t he have laid down the blunt for separate rooms?

Oh, how could she have been so stupid as to rout Beatrice? Worse, how could she have been so completely crack-brained as to tell him she was a young gentleman? If she had told him she was a lowly servant’s son, she still could have been sent to tuck herself up safely somewhere in the stables. What was that saying about tangled webs?

“Billy, I’m still waiting. Or do you think you can accomplish the job from where you are standing?”

Billy searched her fertile brain frantically for some inspiration that would save her from the ignominious task. “Is there no bootjack in the room?” she asked hopefully.

“A bootjack?” Fletcher responded with all the proper horror any well-turned-out gentleman felt toward such contraptions. A gentleman might bed down with his horse when out hunting or in wartime. A gentleman might have to go days without shaving, even wear a shirt a second time. But scratch his beloved Hessians with a jack? Never! “I’ll give you to the count of three, Billy,” he threatened, lifting his right leg out straight in front of him, “and then I will use the jack to remove your ears.”

Knowing she had lost this round, Billy sighed and approached the bed, looking down at the boot. Grabbing hold of it by both heel and toe, she leaned back, praying the dratted thing would cooperate by sliding off Fletcher’s foot. She tugged and she tugged, but the boot didn’t budge.

“If you are through acting the clown, Billy,” Fletcher said at last, “perhaps we can get on with it. Now, turn around, straddle my leg, and let me help you.”

Turn around? Present him with a view of her back? Straddle his leg? Straddle his leg! It was obscene. It was also—Billy knew, cursing him—inevitable. Pulling her loose smock down more fully over her hips, she lifted her right leg and stepped over Fletcher’s, bringing his muscular calf up between her thighs. If it were possible for a person to die of shame, she’d be toes cocked on the floor within moments.

But the worst was yet to come. “All right, Billy, since it is obvious that you have never done this before, I shall continue with my instructions. Place one hand around the heel, if you please, and the other on the sole, just beneath the toe. And for God’s sake, don’t smudge the leather any more than you can help. Good. The leather is most probably already doomed to bear witness to your paw prints evermore. Yes, that’s it. You follow instructions well once you deign to listen. Now, here we go!”

A split second later Billy felt the sole of Fletcher’s left boot firmly against her derriere as that man pushed her forward. Another split second and she was sprawled facedown on the floor, the liberated boot between her legs.

“Oh, dear,” Fletcher commiserated with such a total lack of feeling that Billy nearly flew up to scratch out his laughing eyes. “It seems I somehow forgot to tell you to expect my help, doesn’t it? Ah, well, these things will happen. Are you ready for the second boot?”

She was going to kill him, slowly, so that she could savor every moment of his death. She was going to wait until he was asleep and pour an entire pitcher of cold, preferably dirty, water over his head. She was going to put a burr under Pagan’s saddle and chortle gleefully as the stallion bucked Belden and his shiny Hessians off his back and straight into a mud puddle. She was... good God! She was going to have to feel his stockinged foot intimately placed against her hindquarters.

“I want to go home,” she whined weakly, still sitting on the floor. “Please.”

“The devil you say. An admirable sentiment, Billy, and exactly the one I had hoped this little sojourn through the district would elicit. I cannot express how overjoyed I am to know that I have convinced you to return to the bosom of your family. Aye, you may stare, and I shouldn’t wish it bruited about—most especially to Beck, who is already wondering if I have misplaced my wits—but this entire trip has been in the way of a good deed, for I was determined to gain your confidence so that I might help you. However, we cannot possibly reach Keswick this evening, and, alas, I am still wearing one boot.”

If she were to live to the age of one hundred—which she most probably wouldn’t, for she knew she was going to hang for what she planned to do to the horrible Fletcher Belden—Billy would never again be so embarrassed. This was worse than the stop they had made in the woods, when only her fleetness of foot and carefully averted eyes had kept her from perishing of terminal humiliation on the spot.

Rising slowly to her feet, as if she were already mounting the thirteen steps to the gallows, Billy straddled Fletcher’s outstretched left leg and gingerly placed her hands on his boot. She could feel the warmth of Fletcher’s stockinged foot burning through the thin jersey of her breeches, and discern the imprint of all five of his toes searing a white-hot brand of shame into her buttocks.