Fallen Angel (48 page)

"No. And he's not going by road. There's a boat that does the run from the docks at Wapping to Leith," she said, remembering Mr. Scott's stated preference of travel. "That's how he'll make the journey. Of course," she mused, "he can't go alone. Perhaps Willie or one of the grooms can go with him." She wondered how she could afford it, and thought she might ask Deveryn for the money.

Mr. Lloyd surprised her by saying, "Then I'd better give you his purse. I've had it locked away for safe keeping."

He excused himself and returned within minutes.

"What's this?" asked Maddie, accepting a plump leather bag which the head groom held out to her.

"Duncan's winnings. Be careful. There's as much as five hundred
pounds in that
wallet."

For a moment she was speechless.

"He earned this much in just one fight?" she asked. A school mistress earned less than one hundred pounds per annum.

"Not quite. Some of it is from wagers he made on himself. There's good money in fighting if you have talent."

That there was also a good chance of ending up as witless as a widgeon, Maddie forebore to point out.

She devoted what was left of the day to Duncan, even going so far as to eat her meals with him. Her aunt looked in once and accepted Maddie's desertion with good grace. Willie was assigned by the head groom to keep an eye on the big man and call one of the grooms if it proved necessary. The task was not onerous, nor did time hang heavily on his hands for Miss Maddie told one story after another, all Scottish in origin, of strange creatures called banshees and kelpies and selkies whose malevolence towards unwary mortals made his straight hair curl into ringlets. He was sure he would not sleep for a week for nightmares, but could not drag himself away from the hushed accents that told the horrible tales with such relish. Intermittently, she spoke of the old days, and of a place called "Drumoak," and promised Duncan that he would soon see and smell the familiar sights of home. Surprisingly, at one point, Duncan laughed. Willie turned to look at Maddie, a grin of relief lighting up his small, square face. She turned her head away, and he knew that she wept silent tears.

"Miss?" he asked in an urgent whisper. "Is Mr. Ross . . .

She answered with a vigorous shake of her head, and, much to Willie's discomfort, she covered her face with her hands and wept in earnest.

By the time Mr. Lloyd had returned with the intelligence that passage had been booked for Duncan on the schooner that sailed from Wapping to Leith on the Friday, Maddie had fully recovered and since Duncan had fallen into a deep sleep, she was persuaded to return to the house.

She was back early the next morning and was greeted with the news, given with excited impatience by Willie, that Duncan was up and about and had spoken a few words. This stunning revelation did not produce the effect he had hoped, for though Miss Maddie laughed, he remarked the flash of tears before she turned away.

But her tears proved to be only temporary, for Duncan was more like himself and almost childishly happy when told that he would set sail for Scotland on the Friday. Maddie covered her sadness well. One part of her wished that she too might make for home, the other desired to be only wherever Deveryn was.
A heart divided,
she thought, and wondered if she would ever be whole of heart again.

Melbourne House was the home of Lady Melbourne and her daughter-in-law, Lady Caroline Lamb. The former was the wife of the Viscount Melbourne, confidante of the Prince Regent, and a Whig hostess of considerable political influence in her own right. Though she shared her home with her son, William Lamb, the heir to the title, and his wife, Lady Caro, it was widely known that there was little love lost between the two women.

Miss Spencer proposed to Maddie that they make a call on this unusual household. Though it was only a short walk between Curzon Street and Whitehall, the sky was overcast and she wisely ordered the carriage, overriding Maddie's protest that she be allowed to remain with Duncan.

"You need to get out more, Maddie, and enlarge your circle of acquaintances. Oh, not that Caro Lamb's society is going to make a jot of difference to you. She's almost ruined her chances of being received in the best drawing rooms. Still, Lady Melbourne suggested that your friendship might be a salutary influence on the girl. It seems that Caro Lamb has taken a liking to you. But be careful, dear. Her affections are known to be fickle."

"Are you an intimate of Lady Melbourne, then?" asked Maddie.

"Not particularly. But your grandfather regularly supports Whig causes. William Lamb, so he seems to think, has a future in politics, or he would have if his wife could be constrained to temper her excesses. She may very well turn out to be the
proverbial millstone around his neck."

Both ladies were at home when Maddie and Miss Spencer presented their cards, and whilst Miss Spencer was shown to Lady Melbourne's drawing room on the ground floor, Maddie followed the footman to Lady Caro's upstairs suite of rooms.

Maddie could not be other than gratified by the effusive welcome she was given. Lady Caro, it seemed, was in one of her 'spritely' humours. She presented a young gentleman of decidedly foppish dress and manner whom she introduced as a young cousin, Jack Ponsonby.

It seemed that they had just partaken of tea and sandwiches. A cup was soon procured for Maddie, and she accepted one of the small, bite-sized cucumber sandwiches for which, she had observed, the English had a passion.

Her eyes followed Lady Caro as she moved about the room. Although the girl was as graceful as a dancer, there was nothing restful about her. On this particular occasion, she seemed to burn with an inner excitement.

"In another week or so," she said in her peculiarly breathy voice, "I'll have my busybody of a mother-in-law exactly where I want her. I'm going to make her sorry for every vicious lie she's ever spread about me."

Maddie did not know how she should reply. Though she found Caroline Lamb as appealing as she was unpredictable, these frank confidences always left her at a loss for words. Her mind groped for some suitable reply, but she was saved from her embarrassment by the interjection of Lady Caro's cousin.

"Take a damper,
Caro.
The old dame has been more than generous to you and William. You have your own suite of rooms here at Melbourne House and the use of Brocket whenever you want to rusticate in the country. What more could you want?"

Though the words were addressed to his cousin, it was on Maddie that he trained his lorgnette, lazily and quite brazenly giving her the once over.

Dandy, thought Maddie, and affected an interest in the cup and saucer which she balanced in her hands. She wondered how soon she could make her excuses.

"Revenge is what I want," said Lady Caro, her eyes taking on a fanatical glitter. "And I've found just the way to set the old harridan back on her heels, yes, and pay off old scores on every last one of my enemies."

The quizzing glass swivelled to Lady Caro as she did a little pirouette before falling gracefully into an overstuffed armchair where she convulsed in giggles. Her lightning changes of mood, thought Maddie, were fascinating to watch, but she had no doubt that to live with them would drive any sane person to Bedlam.

"Do tell, Caro," droned the young fop as he sprawled inelegantly, one arm thrown along the back of the satin brocade settee. "Byron, I presume heads the list?
"

"Need you ask? But my mother-in-law comes a close second. Then," she mused, "there's William."

"William? You mean your husband?"

"The same."

"Good God! That's shocking! William Lamb is a paragon! He must be. He tolerates your indiscretions which, I may add, are legion."

Lady Caro stamped her foot. "Fustian! William does not 'tolerate' my indiscretions. He's completely indifferent. And if it had not been for the fact that he keeps a string of women, there would
be
no indiscretions."

"A string of women? What has that to say to anything? A wife shouldn't trouble herself about such things," said young Ponsonby negligently.

Maddie, who had just calculated by the ormolu clock on the mantel that her courtesy call had lasted no more than five minutes and that it would be impossible to extricate herself from this painfully embarrassing conversation for another ten minutes, suddenly turned to confront the unsuspecting gentleman. Her voice was chilling when she addressed him.

"That attitude, sir, went out with panniers and hooped skirts. Why should a gentleman take more liberties than he is willing to permit his wife? That would be rankly unjust."

Again the quizzing glass was raised and an indolent perusal made of the indignant young lady. "True," drawled Ponsonby. "But men have nothing to lose. An unfaithful wife runs the risk of being divorced."

"In Scotland," gritted Maddie with a becoming flush across her cheekbones, "an unfaithful husband runs the same risk."

Young Ponsonby's eyebrows shot up. "Barbaric!" he murmured dismissively.

"Well, I think it's capital," exclaimed Lady Caro. "In England, however, a woman has to be more inventive if she wants justice. And I," she intoned, "I have found the perfect method of exacting retribution."

"How?" asked Ponsonby bluntly.

Lady Caro's voice dropped to a whisper. "May I rely on your discretion?"

Young Ponsonby gave her the nod, but Maddie could only stare and listen with horrified fascination.

"I've written a novel," confided Lady Caro. "All my persecutors are in it, and easily recognizable, though I've had to change their names, of course. My publisher thinks it will be sold out as soon as it comes off the presses." She clapped her hands looking, thought Maddie, like a child who had just been given a treat.

"Have a care, Caro. You'll be the butt of vulgar gossip and ridicule when the book comes out," said the cousin.

"Much I care for that! Besides, what more can they do to me? I'm already banned from Almack's. My mother-in-law has tightened the purse strings. William doesn't take me anywhere." She slanted him a speculative look. "Come to think of it, Jack, you're the last person to talk of ridicule and gossip. Do tell what really happened at Grantham. I've heard a dozen different versions of the story." She winked at Maddie before continuing in the same bantering tone. "Is it true that in a fit of jealousy you broke into Deveryn's room and tried to take Dolly Ramides away from him?"

Jack Ponsonby emitted a vulgar expletive and threw a glowering glance at his cousin's laughing face. "No," he answered with ill-concealed temper, "and if Dolly Ramides was anywhere near Grantham that night, my name is not Jack Ponsonby."

"Then who . . . ?" asked Lady Caro.

Maddie had to bite back the very same question as it sprang involuntarily to her lips.

"That," said young Ponsonby with a secretive smirk, "would be telling. Suffice it to say that if my friends and I had known that Deveryn was entertaining a lady—a real lady, that is—in his chamber that evening, we would not have subjected him to our silly prank. Still," he said thoughtfully, "he wasn't much of a sport. I was lucky to get away with a whole skin."

The conversation with Lady Caro and her cousin burned in Maddie's brain long after she had taken her leave of Melbourne House. She reminded herself, over and over again, that she had made up her mind to shut out the past and make a new beginning with Deveryn. She'd known, after all, that he'd had a woman with him at Grantham. Only now she was almost certain that it was Cynthia Sinclair. The wound, she discovered, was far more devastating than when she'd believed that Dolly Ramides was the woman in question.

By degrees, she managed to control the pain of her discovery, and she decided that she would never refer to it. The past was forgiven. She only hoped that one day it could be forgotten. She was to remember the irony of those thoughts some hours later when her grandfather returned from Canterbury.

She was in the drawing room making notes on the text of
Medea
for the paper which she was to present on the following Thursday at the meeting of Lady Rossmere's Bluestocking Brigade. By and large, her paper was ready. All it lacked was a little polish. She was not averse to the task since she found that it deflected her thoughts from more disturbing channels.

From time to time, she answered her aunt's quiet monologue as that lady sat meditatively at her tambour frame, occasionally setting the odd stitch in what was to be a needlepoint cushion cover.