Confessions of a Little Black Gown (17 page)

From the settee, Lord Grimston sat up, blustering as he went. “Don’t tell us you were left to fend for yourselves against this bounder?”

“Yes, Miss Browne,” Lord Cranwich added, always in competition with his good friend. “However did you escape?”

“You must remember, we are American and luckily it was an American privateer who captured the ship.”

Grimston guffawed and coughed over this. “Luck? Those bastards—if you’ll excuse me for saying so—are no better than gutter rats. Take that Dash-wood fellow—”

“Dashwell,” Cranwich corrected.

“Is it, now? Well, that Dashwell devil then. There’s a ruddy fellow who would have sold you to the East Indies and slept well with his pouch of gold under his pillow.”

“Harrumph!” Pippin sputtered and would have
moved forward to defend her lover, but Tally caught her by the arm.

After a slight shake of her head, Tally whispered, “Remember, we are being watched.”

Pippin settled back, but with a look that said she wished she could sell Lord Grimston to Eastern traders.

“But my lord,” Miss Browne said, her voice tinged with a triumph that caught Tally’s attention and rang with a malevolent note that could only spell ill for them all. “It
was
Captain Dashwell who took us captive.”

E
very conversation in the room stopped and nearly all eyes pointed at Miss Browne. Why, she couldn’t have outdone herself with anything less than the announcement that she was carrying Prinny’s bastard.

But Tally’s attention was drawn elsewhere, for utterly different reasons.

The moment the overblown American had made her brazen speech, Tally had immediately turned her gaze toward Lord Larken and to her shock found him not gaping at Miss Browne like the rest of the room, but studying the corner where she and Pippin stood.

More to the point, gauging Pippin’s reaction.

The calculated light behind his spectacles and the measuring weight of his glance sent a chill down Tally’s spine.

What was it Dash had said? Oh, yes.

“…
the Larken who was recalled home isn’t the same man I knew. War can do that to a man…He’s the most determined, dangerous man I’ve ever met.”

She shivered and glanced away from him, but not for long, her gaze flitting back toward him. Wasn’t that exactly how she had seen him the first moment she’d clapped her eyes on him?

Darkly dangerous? Mercurial? A man of mystery and deception?

Was the man who’d awkwardly given her a hastily picked handful of blossoms in the meadow today, truly capable of killing Dash or anyone else who stood in his way?

She shivered, and forced her gaze back to Miss Browne, and listened as the girl regaled one and all with her story.

“Captain Dashwell is quite infamous as you all know, as evidenced by his terrible treatment of my poor, dear friend, Lady Philippa, taking her hostage last winter at the ball where she was very nearly shot.” Miss Browne paused and struck a tragic pose, but lest anyone’s attention turn toward Pippin and not stay riveted to her, she continued quickly. “But I can tell you quite a different story about the man, for
Maman
and I spent an entire sennight aboard his ship, and he quite lived up to his name, for he is a
dashing
sort of man.”

She smiled at her quaint play on words, the Misses Elsfords sighing in unison, while their mother, Felicity, and the rest of the older women in the room frowned with disapproval.

Not so Pippin. Tally glanced over to find every bit of color had drained from her cousin’s cheeks.

“But Miss Browne,” the eldest Miss Elsford said, “he didn’t, he wouldn’t have…” She blushed a bright pink and looked as if she wished she’d never opened her mouth.

“Of course not!” Miss Browne exclaimed. “Being an honorable man—”

Grimston snorted, and Tally would have done so as well, if Miss Emery hadn’t spent three years drilling it into her students that “ladies never snuffle about like hogs.”

Miss Browne ignored him. “Captain Dashwell would never do anything untoward to me. He treated me as a lady. He said he would rather surrender to the British than compromise his principals to use any woman thusly. He once called me his ‘Circe’—”

Pippin gasped, her hands covering her mouth, and Tally thought her cousin was going to be sick right there and then, but her sound of astonishment went unnoticed for it was well covered by another chorus of sighs from the Misses Elsford.

Damn Dash
, Tally thought. Tossing about endearments like ha’pennies to urchins. She didn’t dare look at Pippin, but she could feel her cousin’s outrage, her anger. But whether it was at Miss Browne or Dash, Tally didn’t know.

Miss Browne preened a bit more. “When we came within sight of the English coastline, he set us ashore in the dark of night, with all our belongings and even some gold to see us safely back to London. I daresay I will never forget his kindness as he handed us up onto that lonely beach…” Her hand went to her lips for a moment, as if recalling something so private, so intimate, she didn’t dare reveal it.

Oh, great heavens
, Tally thought.
If Pippin isn’t going to be sick, then I am
.

“How it distresses me so to think of him being hunted, like an animal,” Miss Browne said, shaking her head.

Beside her, Pippin swayed, as if about to faint, but this time it was Lord Gossett who intervened and cut Miss Browne off before she could add to her story.

Or rather, embellish it further.

“Miss Mary, did you not say at dinner you would be delighted to play for all of us, so we could have some dancing?”

The younger Miss Elsford glanced up at the viscount, a bit befuddled. “Why yes, my lord, I did offer.”

“Excellent!” he said, crossing the room in long strides, his tall, elegant figure drawing all eyes away from Miss Browne. “And Lady Philippa, I believe you promised me the first dance, did you not?” He held out his hand to her.

“I don’t believe I—” Pippin began to say, that is until Tally prodded her.

“Appearances,” she reminded her with a low whisper.

Pippin shot her an aggrieved look, but nonetheless took Lord Gossett’s hand, slipping her slim gloved fingers into his broad grasp and favoring him with a smile. “How kind you are, my lord, to remember.”

“It appeared you needed a diversion,” he said softly, so that no one else could hear him.

Pippin blushed, putting some color back in her cheeks, while Tally took another look at the viscount
and considered him closely. He’d seen Pippin’s distress and turned the tables on Miss Browne.

Honorable
and
kind, Tally thought as he led Pippin out to dance and waved at the other gentlemen to claim their partners. As he turned to take both Pippin’s hands, he smiled at her, and Tally thought him quite handsome.

How unfortunate Pippin’s heart was already taken, for the viscount would have made her an excellent husband.

Egads! Whatever was she thinking? Tally shook her head. Matchmaking, indeed! She was getting as addled as Felicity.

Miss Mary, with the able Lord Boyce hovering at her shoulder and turning pages for her, struck up a merry tune.

Sir Robert sought the elder Miss Elsford’s hand, while Grimston and Cranwich jockeyed for Miss Browne’s favor, with Grimston winning the match—he was an earl to Lord Cranwich’s mere barony. Amiable in defeat and unwilling to be left out of the field, Cranwich turned and asked Lady Standon to dance.

Tally dared a glance over at Mr. Ryder, only to find Felicity nodding at her.

Get over here,
her sister was saying silently.

Tally smiled and shook her head slightly.
Not for your life.

What? And have her sister foist the
faux
Mr. Ryder on her as a dancing partner? No, she was going to maintain her cowardly vigil over here in this corner, thank you very much.

Yet when she looked again, it was to find her sister
beside her, taking her by the hand and leading her over to Lady Charles and Mr. Ryder. “You looked so lonely over there, Thalia,” Felicity said sweetly. But her use of Tally’s full name belied that—she only called her “Thalia” when she was truly and thoroughly vexed.

Tally sighed and resisted the urge to bolt from her sister’s grasp, for there was too much at stake over the next day to raise Felicity’s ire. “I daresay I was quite content,” she offered. “But thank you for taking me under your wing, dear sister.”

“Mr. Ryder was just regaling us with tales of…of…” Felicity faltered and it was obvious she hadn’t been listening to a word the man was saying.

“Ornithology,” he offered. “The study of birds. I saw a most engaging lark this afternoon. Why it was so unique—”

“Perhaps you would like to dance, Mr. Ryder?” Felicity suggested. “I know my sister would be delighted to favor you with her company.”

Tally pasted a smile on her face, but at the same time, pinched her sister under her arm.
Hard
.

“I do not approve of such intimate dancing, Your Grace,” he said.

“You don’t approve—” Felicity began.

Suddenly Tally glanced up. Perhaps Felicity was the key to all this. “I didn’t think a man of your convictions would,” she said, jumping into the discussion, “given your fondness for
Fordyce
and all.”

“Fordyce
?!” Felicity sputtered, glancing first at her sister and then Mr. Ryder.

“Yes, didn’t you know?” Tally asked her. “Mr.
Ryder plans on giving a lengthy sermon from
Fordyce
on Sunday, don’t you, sir?”

Lady Charles’s lips twitched and she covered her mouth to keep from laughing out loud.

“Mr. Ryder, I do believe I’ve made an error in judgment—” Felicity began, looking ready to show him the door. Hollindrake cousin or not.

Out of the house and out of our way
, Tally wanted to crow.
Find your way out of this wrinkle, Lord Larken
, she thought, as she glanced up at him, not opposed to letting a sly smile tip her lips.

But the man hadn’t been one of the Foreign Office’s most successful agents for nothing.

“As have I, Your Grace,” Mr. Ryder said. “I fear I should never have come down for dinner.” He wavered on his feet and to Tally’s amazement the man actually managed to look ill.

And Felicity fell for it, leaning forward to steady him.

Tally stood stock-still, with her arms folded across her chest. Oh, the wretched devil! Of all the…

“Dear heavens,” he managed to say faintly. “I fear I must beg your indulgence and allow me to retire for the night. My dyspepsia. I am quite overtaken.”

“Mr. Ryder, no!” Felicity said, as the man looked about to faint. “Please, please, sir, go on upstairs. I shall make your excuses.”

He brightened a little. “Where I will redeem myself to your kind regard by resting up for the rigors of tomorrow.”

“When there will be dancing,” Tally offered, completely unrepentant and for which she received a pinch back from her sister.

“Good evening, ladies,” he said, bowing off-kilter and making a course through the dancers that nearly upended the eldest Miss Elsford.

“Oh, heavens, what am I to do?” Felicity moaned as he left the room.

“Invite more gentlemen,” Lady Charles suggested, leaving the sisters to seek out the company of her son.

“Tally, he is awful! He’s been going on and on about…oh, what it was I can’t recall.”

“Ornithology,” Tally reminded her, though she was only half-listening, for she was busy watching Mr. Ryder going up the stairs two at a time—rather agile for a man with delicate digestion. Too bad his illness was as feigned as the rest of him.

“Ornithology, indeed! Dreadful subject!” Felicity said with a shudder. “And now to discover that he’s dyspeptic! Why, if it becomes known I tried to match Miss DeFisser with such a wretched, dull man, I will be ruined. We’ll all be ruined.”

“True enough,” Tally said with a sad shake of her head. “Too bad he’s just slightly ill and not completely overcome.”

Felicity froze. For it wasn’t hard to see that her sister was thinking exactly what she was. “You aren’t suggesting—”

“Just a slight illness,” Tally said, holding up her fingers just an inch apart. Hadn’t Nanny Brigid done the same thing to their father when he’d been reassigned to the Russian court? It had kept them trapped at the Viennese court for nearly an extra fortnight.

“He’s Hollindrake’s cousin,” she protested, but not
as vehemently as someone who was completely opposed to the idea. “I can’t deliberately—”

“He’s a very distant cousin,” Tally reminded her.
How distant, you have no idea.

Felicity shook her head. “It would be wrong. I couldn’t.”

But Tally knew exactly what that meant. “But I could.”

“If you don’t mind…” Felicity rushed to say. “The blue packets of powders will give him just a slight case of the gripes, Tally. But only two packets, nothing more.”

“Of course. I’ll do it right now, before anyone questions a thing,” Tally assured her, going to move past her sister, her eyes already set on the staircase.

But Felicity stopped her. “Don’t mistake the packets. The other ones are for my megrims. I would hate for you to give him those. Why if he drank too much, he’d sleep right through the entire house party.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Tally told her. “I have no intention of making a mistake.”

Larken suspected that if Dashwell was anywhere, he was in the suite of rooms shared by Miss Langley, Lady Philippa and the as yet unseen Aunt Aramintha. He had his suspicions about this” Aunt Minty” of theirs. He moved silently down the hall toward the wing where their chambers were, smiling to himself that the duchess would keep her sister and cousin occupied downstairs so he could…

Eliminate the man and then get the hell out of here
, he
told himself, steeling his gut against the pang of guilt that prodded him.

Leave and never look back.

Not even to see Miss Langley again.