Amanda Scott (22 page)

“But he has. I received a letter from him today, and I laughed so hard, I well nigh popped the button on my smalls. The fellow’s a damned shamster, Nick. I ought to let Dory tell you himself, for he’s coming down in a fortnight for the Derby—if the widow don’t catch him first—but the tale’s too rich to keep to myself.”

“What happened?”

“Apparently, Dory went back to the Dyke on Friday. You recall that most of us returned to London after the last race, so scarcely anyone else was about by then, but he’s got that female yearning to get her claws into him, so he skipped out and went for another walk. He don’t say so, but it’s plain as a pikestaff he did it to avoid her. At all events, he stumbled bang onto the fellow again, engaged as before.”

“And did the vicar receive more money for the poor?”

“Not exactly.” Tommy grinned. “He asked the fellow how the luck had stood since last they met. ‘Sometimes with me; sometimes against me,’ the fellow replied. So Dory asked if he was at play just then, to which the fellow replied, ‘Yes, sir. My opponent and I have played several times today.’”

“Who did he say had taken the advantage?” Nick asked, trying to imagine what game was really being played with the good vicar.

“That’s just what Dory asked him,” Tommy said, “and he replied that he had won more times than not, and that the present game was just over because, as Dory could see, he had an excellent move to make that would checkmate his opponent.”

“How much had he won?”

“Five hundred guineas.”

“And how did he expect to be paid?” Nick asked, beginning to see where the story must lead.

Chuckling, Tommy said, “Aye, that’s the rub all right and tight. Dory asked him that very question, and the scoundrel replied, ‘God always sends some good rich man when I win,
and you
are that person. Remarkably punctual he is on these occasions,’ he said. Can you credit it, Nick?”

Nick laughed appreciably. “How did the lunatic react when the vicar told him to seek his winnings elsewhere?”

“He didn’t. Dory gave him the money.”

“Where the devil did he get that kind of money?”

“As it happened, he had won the exact sum demanded of him on your horse Quiz not long before, and he had the money in his pocket. But even though he thought it might be a sign from God, like the fellow told him it was, he was by no means convinced. He knew, of course, that the chap might somehow have learned of his win, but when he would have discussed the matter, the scoundrel produced a pistol. He compelled Dory to hand over the money, Nick. Dory, of course, wrote that one way or another it was a lesson from God. He wrote, too, that though he told any number of persons about the first encounter, he won’t tell anyone about this one. Only his conscience, he said, compelled him to tell me. Myself, I think he’s hoping I’ll enlist your aid to go look for that devil in the Dyke, but I ain’t such a fool.”

“You need not tell me so,” Nick said. “I’ve explained my position on the subject of trying to act as one’s brother’s keeper. It is an impossible task. Let us attend to my wedding, instead. My coat, Lisset.”

“You know, Nick,” Tommy said, “I’m not one to stick my oar in where it don’t belong, but do you think you’re doing the right thing in marrying this wench?”

Nick repressed an unexpected surge of annoyance. “Do you think I am being compelled, Tommy—that someone has produced a pistol and is holding it to my head?”

“N-no, of course not. Didn’t mean to intrude. No need to bristle up like an angry hedgehog. Not that you look like a hedgehog,” he added hastily. “In point of fact, you look bang up to the knocker. That is, you’ve got a bit of lint on your lapel, but I daresay Lisset will nip—”

“Silence, rattle! Call for my carriage.”

T
HE DRAWING ROOM AND
two adjoining salons, all of which faced the rain-soaked garden, had been thrown together to accommodate the wedding guests. When Melissa entered on her stepfather’s arm, gowned in pale pink, with a lacy veil that trailed behind her to the floor, the crowd fell silent and parted to make passage for them. The first face she recognized was her father’s, and although Sir Geoffrey gazed at her accusingly, she did not falter in her steps. For once she felt truly safe from him.

She had known he would be there, because Lady Ophelia had said she could think of no acceptable way to bar him from the ceremony. She knew, too, why he gazed at her so reproachfully. He had made it clear that he thought he ought to be at her side. However, when Lady Ophelia agreed with her that under the circumstances she need not feel obliged to accept Sir Geoffrey’s arm, Melissa had chosen Penthorpe.

She saw Vexford beside the rector of St. George’s Chapel, with Lord Thomas and Oliver to support him. All three gentlemen wore ceremonial dress and sported white roses from the St. Merryn garden in the top buttonholes of their coats. At the rector’s other side stood Charley, Melissa’s only attendant, looking unnaturally solemn.

Vexford, like everyone else in the crowded room, was watching Melissa. When she caught his gaze and smiled, his countenance softened. Although he wore even his formal wedding clothes with his customary air of casual grace, she thought him the most elegantly dressed man in the room. When they knelt together on the silk-covered prie-dieu provided for them, his presence beside her seemed to dominate everything else. She could sense his breathing, could feel his arm touching hers, and she felt pleasantly enveloped in the aura of competence and strength that emanated from him. Yet again, he made her feel safe and protected.

When he spoke his vows, he did not sound like a man who was marrying against his better judgment. His tone was firm and decisive. She did not think her voice was nearly so steady, but in what seemed only moments, she had promised to love, honor, and obey him until death, and the rector presented them to the assembly as man and wife. Outside, the clouds parted briefly, and a splash of sunlight spilled across the floor nearby. Melissa realized her hands were trembling.

Charley hugged her, but the next hour passed in a daze. She followed where Vexford led, murmuring polite responses to congratulatory remarks, smiling, even laughing. All the while she felt as if she walked through a fog that echoed with faceless, murmuring voices. Had she been asked to repeat a single exchange of conversation, she could not have done so. Not until they sat down to dinner did she have any sense of reality, and then it was only in knowing how tired she was.

The meal passed swiftly. While servants cleared away the tables afterward, she snatched a few moments to go up to her room with Charley. When they entered the bedchamber, Melissa shut the door, stripped off her white gloves, dropped them onto the dressing table, and reached up to unpin the long veil attached to the back of her headdress. Casting it onto the bed, she said wearily, “They must have invited every member of the
beau monde
today, for every nook and cranny of the house is stuffed full of guests. Even Yarborne is here.” She also had seen the blond woman from Northumberland House again, talking with Yarborne and Sir Geoffrey, and once with Vexford, but she saw no reason to mention her and said only, “I’m almost surprised to find this room empty.”

“Here, sit down,” Charley said, “and I’ll brush your hair. Aunt Ophelia says the house hasn’t been this full since Aunt Daintry’s ball nine years ago. She also said she hopes your father will behave better today than he did then, but I don’t know what she meant by that. No one ever tells me anything of consequence.”

“Well, I don’t know, either,” Melissa said, thinking that for someone who was never told anything, her cousin seemed to know a good deal. “I can tell you, though, the way Papa has been glaring at Penthorpe is setting my nerves all on end.”

“I heard Uncle Geoffrey say Aunt Susan was a fool to show herself in London. He called her a bigamist, too, which I believe means she is married to two husbands, so that cannot be true. She divorced Uncle Geoffrey in Scotland, did she not?”

“Yes, but he told me he never divorced her here in England. This morning, when Penthorpe told Aunt Ophelia that
this
was not one of her knackier notions, I thought he meant my marriage, but perhaps they meant Mama’s situation. To be sure, I didn’t understand all Papa said about the law, but if he wants to make trouble for Mama, I hope Penthorpe takes her home again straightaway.”

“Well, I don’t think Uncle Geoffrey means to make trouble tonight. He is being as charming to everyone as if he were the one paying for this, which, of course, he is not. Aunt Ophelia didn’t ask him to contribute a penny. I heard her tell Penthorpe this morning that, although she is allowing Vexford to repay her for your court dress since his mama will present you, she is paying the reckoning today simply because she does not want to be plagued by bickering over who else ought to do so. In any case, the only one looking down in the mouth at the moment is Oliver. I think he is rather droll, but he does seem to kick up his heels one moment and go right off his feed the next.”

Smiling, Melissa said, “You should not flirt with Oliver, Charley, especially when Rockland is looking on. I think you do it merely to irritate him.”

Charley shrugged. “So what if I do? Rockland teases me one minute, acts the jealous lover the next, and brings me flowers the next. The idiotish man refuses to believe I never intend to marry. It serves him right if just seeing me chat with Oliver makes him livid. Oliver, at least, is not hanging out for a wife.”

Melissa shook her head. “You are cruel, Charley, but I won’t argue with you now. We’d better go back downstairs before someone comes in search of us.”

“Right,” Charley agreed, smoothing a strand of her dark hair back into place and taking a last glance at herself in the glass. Her sapphire-blue gown matched her dark eyes, and the circlet of pink silk roses in her headdress emphasized her rosy cheeks. Standing beside her, Melissa felt like she had as a child, like a pale shadow in the sunshine of Charley’s brilliance. Catching her gaze, Charley grinned and said, “That pink dress makes you look like a spun sugar angel, delicious enough to eat. I’m glad you’ve got someone at last who will know how to protect you properly.”

Surprised by the compliment, Melissa smiled and said as she drew on her gloves again, “I daresay Vexford will protect me, but who will protect me from Vexford?”

Charley laughed, and as they left the room, she said, “Though I never intend to marry, I do confess, I’m curious to know just exactly what happens between a husband and a wife in the marriage bed. You must promise to tell me
everything.”

“Melissa, there you are!” Susan hurried toward them. “Everyone is waiting for you and Vexford to begin the dancing, darling, but no one could find you.”

“I came up to take off my veil,” Melissa said, glad to be spared the necessity of replying to her cousin’s outrageous demand. She would have liked to ask if any real danger existed that Susan could be taken up by the law for bigamy, but neither the time nor place seemed favorable for that discussion.

Not looking at all burdened or distressed, Susan gave her a hug and said, “I do like your husband, darling. I think he will be kind to you.”

Other questions occurred to Melissa then that she would have liked to ask her mother, but there was no more time for talk. They hurried downstairs, and no sooner did they appear than a general cry went up for the bride and groom to lead the dancing. Melissa found her hand in Vexford’s, heard stately music begin for the minuet Lady Ophelia had decreed suitable for the first dance, and stepped onto the floor.

Her husband danced with the same careless grace that she had come to expect in all he did, adjusting his steps to hers with the ease of long practice. His conversation—what there was of it—was casual, too, more as if they were simple acquaintances at a ball than man and wife. When the music ended, Lord Thomas stepped up to take Vexford’s place, and Vexford asked Susan to dance.

The dancing soon grew more lively, and before the bride and groom bade everyone farewell, Melissa had danced not only with her new father-in-law and Oliver but with her stepfather, Sir Geoffrey—who behaved charmingly—Yarborne, Rockland, and later even with Yarborne’s son, a man two or three years older than Oliver. Robert Yarborne, who clearly shared Oliver’s taste in waistcoats, had Yarborne’s brown hair, but his eyes were darker than his father’s. He laughed frequently and danced energetically, but Melissa was relieved when Vexford claimed her hand again.

“Would you like to rest?” he said quietly. “We can get a glass of punch, if you like. Do you know who the coxcomb is, by the bye, who engaged you for that last waltz?”

“Robert Yarborne,” she said. “Is he a coxcomb?”

He frowned. “Young fool was pulling you around as if it were a May dance. You look tired,” he added. “I’ve spoken to Lady Ophelia, so we can leave whenever we like.”

She was tired, but not knowing exactly what lay ahead, she received the news with mixed feelings and was not certain what she ought to say. They passed Sir Geoffrey just then, dancing with the bejeweled blond lady and evidently enjoying a flirtation with her. Melissa said, “Who is that lady with my father, sir?”

Vexford’s gaze followed hers, and a wry smile touched his lips. “That, my dear, is Lady Hawthorne.”

“I do not know her, but I saw her earlier, dancing with Yarborne.”

“Clara always has an eye to the main chance,” he murmured.

“What chance? She seems very flirtatious. What must her husband think?”

“Clara is not encumbered with a husband. She is a widow, and I think we will now talk of something else.” They had reached the punchbowl, and he poured her a cup, then poured one for himself. She wanted to know more about Lady Hawthorne, but even as she searched her mind for a way to phrase another question, he caught her gaze and said firmly, “Drink your punch, Melissa.”

“How did you know what I was going to say?”

“Women always want to know more about a man than he wants to reveal. It is human nature, I suppose. Nonetheless, we will not discuss Clara.”