Finessing Clarissa (4 page)

And to think he had liked her immensely! He was rich, he was a bachelor, and this girl who was so unmarriageable that she had been sent away to the Tribbles was trying to entrap him.

He walked round to her side of the bed and jerked back the bed-curtains and shook her roughly by the shoulder.

Clarissa’s eyes opened. They ranged up the long length of his naked body and she opened her mouth to scream. He clamped a hand over it. ‘No, you will not ruin my reputation and make me marry you, you minx,’ he said.

Clarissa struggled and fought and he saw in the candlelight that her eyes were wide with terror. He leaned down and said quietly, ‘I will take my hand away if you promise not to scream.’ Clarissa nodded and he took his hand from her mouth.

‘What are you doing in my bed?’ he hissed.

‘I lost my way to my room,’ whispered Clarissa fiercely. ‘I asked Lady Bella where it was and she showed me in here.’

‘Damn Bella,’ he said, sitting down on the bed. ‘I am very sorry, Miss Vevian. I thought you were trying to compromise me.’

‘And I thought you were going to rape me,’ said Clarissa. He picked up the coverlet and draped it about him and then crossed the room and took his dressing gown down from a hook at the back of the door and put it on.

‘The sooner you leave for London, the better,’ he said ruefully. ‘A pox on my wretched relatives. Do not say a word of this, Miss Vevian. We will let Bella think you found out her trick. Come along, I will take you to your room.’

Clarissa began to laugh. ‘What an adventure,’ she said. ‘You looked exactly like the wicked seducer in a book, except they are never so indecent in the illustrations.’

He held open the door. ‘Come. You are a brave and most forgiving lady.’

He led her back the way she had come to a door beside Bella’s bedchamber. ‘In here,’ he said.

‘Thank you,’ said Clarissa, suddenly shy.

He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it.

‘Good night and sleep well, my beautiful Miss Vevian.’

But Clarissa was so radiantly happy that it was quite an hour before she got to sleep.

She found the leave-taking the next day very hard. Lord Greystone looked tall and elegant and remote. She wanted to ask him if she would see him again, but he simply shook her by the hand and repeated he would make good any losses she had suffered.

‘Thank you, my lord,’ she said sadly. She followed Hubbard into the earl’s travelling coach and sat down. He rapped on the glass and she let it down.

‘Tell the Tribbles I shall be calling,’ he said. ‘We must settle our accounts.’

‘Oh, yes . . . yes, of course,’ said Clarissa, suddenly happy.

The carriage rolled off. Lord Greystone raised his hand in farewell and went into the house with a smile on his lips.

‘Do you see that smile?’ Angela asked her daughter. ‘He must not marry. The money must come to you and Perry and poor Tom.’

‘She couldn’t find her room last night,’ said Bella, ‘so I showed her into his and said it was hers. Perhaps they had a splendid night together.’

‘You little fool, Bella. Why did you do such a thing?’

‘I thought it would give them both a fright . . . create a bit of scandal,’ said Bella with a shrug. ‘Do not worry, Mama, we are going to London ourselves and will make sure they never get together again.’

In the carriage, Clarissa luxuriously wiggled her toes inside a pair of smart and large-enough halfboots, courtesy of the late countess’s wardrobe, as was the fur cloak wrapped about her and the elegant hat on her head. She felt as if all the constrictions of the past, both physical and mental, were slipping away.

She put her head out of the carriage window. A pale shaft of sunlight lit up the road ahead.

Clarissa sat down again. ‘I have left myself behind,’ she said happily.

‘You’re talking nonsense, miss,’ grumbled Hubbard, ‘and what would your poor mama say if she could see you without a lick of paint on your face and all them freckles.’

A shadow crossed Clarissa’s face. But then she brightened. He had called her beautiful, and no one was going to take that wonderful moment away from her.

Napoleon hoped that all the world would fall beneath his sway;
He failed in his ambition, and where is he today?
Neither the Nations of the East nor the Nations of the West
Have thought the thing Napoleon thought was to their interest.

An Unknown Lieutenant-Colonel

Before Clarissa and Hubbard could reach the posting-house where they were to spend the night, the carriage was stopped. They heard the sounds of a great commotion and a voice ordering the coachman to halt.

The maid turned a muddy colour. ‘Not highwaymen again,’ she bleated.

Clarissa put her head out of the carriage window and then turned round and said over her shoulder, ‘Not highwaymen, Hubbard. Redcoats. I wonder what they want. I am too tired to fuss. We’ll wait and see.’ She sat down again and waited patiently.

The carriage door was opened and a colonel bowed low and said, ‘I have instructions to search all carriages on this road, ma’am.’

‘Why?’ asked Clarissa.

‘Valuable government papers have been stolen, ma’am.’

‘We are not French spies,’ said Clarissa, ‘and we are tired and hungry. Please do not take very long.’

He saluted and disappeared from view.

Soon both women could hear the trunks being unstrapped from the back. There was very little luggage, such as there was having come from Lord Greystone – dresses and pelisses, hats and shoes for Clarissa, and uniforms for the servants.

The colonel reappeared. ‘Anything in the carriage, ladies?’

‘Just the jewel box and the lace box,’ said Clarissa. ‘Stop trembling and whimpering, Hubbard, and help me get them out from under the seat.’

Two still smoke-blackened cases were produced. The colonel examined the contents in a perfunctory way as if having already made up his mind that he was wasting his time with this young girl and her maid.

‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘I am most sorry to have inconvenienced you. You may drive on.’

‘Surely we no longer need to worry about French spies with that monster locked up on the island,’ said Clarissa.

‘Napoleon has escaped,’ said the colonel grimly.

He slammed the carriage door and called to the coachman and the carriage lurched forward once more.

‘Oh, he has escaped,’ cried Hubbard. ‘We will all be murdered in our beds, or worse!’

‘Wretched man,’ said Clarissa, meaning Napoleon. ‘Now we shall be at war again and everything will cost the earth. Still, the Duke of Wellington will soon rout him.’

In an hour’s time, they reached The Bell, a prosperous posting-house. The earl’s servant, the one who had ridden ahead to the Tribbles with the news of Clarissa’s delay, had bespoken a room for them, but the landlord regretted they could not have a private parlour.

‘No matter,’ said Clarissa, stifling a yawn. ‘We will eat in the public dining room.’

The posting-house was full of people, fashionable people. Clarissa’s heart sank. Then she remembered the earl had called her beautiful and she straightened her shoulders as she walked down to the dining room after having washed and changed. Clothes were such a help. She was wearing another of the earl’s mother’s gowns. It was of old gold silk with a low square neckline and long tight sleeves, rather like a gown in a Renaissance painting. Clarissa was wearing a simple necklace of seed pearls because her finer jewellery was all smoke-blackened and would have to be cleaned.

Deaf to her maid’s protests, Clarissa ordered champagne, a drink she had longed to try but had never been allowed to touch before, her mother considering it too exotic and heady a drink for a young miss. Clarissa sober was clumsy enough. Clarissa drunk could be downright dangerous.

Hubbard was determined to drink as much of the champagne herself as she could in order to prevent disaster. The maid was being paid high wages – danger money – to see that Clarissa did not set rooms on fire or fall down the stairs.

They had a clear soup followed by
filet de sole à la Orly
and finished the champagne. Clarissa ordered a bottle of Médoc, a St Peray, to go with the raised pie, the saddle of mutton, and the roast pigeons. Hubbard had hardly ever drunk anything stronger than lemonade before. Her eyes closed and she began to snore. Clarissa looked at her crossly. ‘Pig,’ she muttered. ‘You can just stay there until I have finished this excellent meal.’

By the time the floating-island pudding was served – Clarissa decided to eat Hubbard’s as well as her own – people were beginning to leave the dining room. Slowly the long tables emptied.

Comforted by wine and food, Clarissa relaxed. No one was looking at her and she had not spilled a drop or stained the tablecloth. Clumsy Clarissa no more!

She would have been surprised to learn that she had, in fact, attracted a great deal of interest. A Clarissa with her flaming hair covered by a turban, her shoulders stooped, and her face whitened with blanc, crouched by the side of her decorative parents, was one thing, but this new Clarissa, with flaming red hair piled high on her head, in a gold silk gown that revealed the excellence of her bosom, was another matter.

Mr Roger Epsom nursed his brandy glass and studied Clarissa. What a magnificent giantess, he thought, and – gad! – what shoulders. He was feeling elated, not with wine or with the sight of Clarissa, but because of his recent narrow escape. In his bosom reposed a packet of government papers that he was taking to France, where he would be suitably rewarded for them. He had been approached by a certain gentleman when his debts were at their highest. This gentleman had pointed out that General Chomley’s daughter seemed very taken with Mr Epsom. Mr Epsom had laughed and said that he was not interested in marrying or courting any female. The gentleman had said that if Mr Epsom could inveigle himself into the household and find where the general kept certain papers, take them, and then journey with them to an address in Paris, he would be rewarded with a fortune.

Mr Epsom had been paid quite a large sum in advance. He did not feel like a traitor. He felt sure the Duke of Wellington would trounce the French once more whatever he did. It was an adventure and one he enjoyed. He had found that the papers were kept in a safe in the general’s office and had taken a note of the make. Then he had gone to safe makers in Pall Mall and had said he was interested in purchasing one of the same type. While they were demonstrating how the lock worked, he had managed to slip the keys into his pocket. He had taken the keys to a certain address in Whitechapel and had had them copied. Then he had returned the original keys to the safe maker with many apologies.

A ball held at the general’s house was all the opportunity he needed. He slipped away from the guests and into the general’s office. Although the makers of the safe had boasted that each of their products was supplied with an individual lock, Mr Epsom had, quite rightly, not believed them. They were inferior locksmiths, not of the calibre of, say, Chubb. The safe had opened easily. He’d taken the papers giving the details of the strength of the British troops on the Continent, sealed them up in the oilskin packet, and gone back and joined the dancing.

He had not expected their loss to be discovered so quickly and was thankful now he had taken the precaution of carrying the papers in an oilskin packet under his shirt. All roads and inns and posting-houses were being searched and every volunteer regiment and every parish constable had been pressed into the hunt.

He was sure they would not have a description of him – not yet. He had been one of many young men who had called at the general’s home to pay court to his pretty daughter, Miss Kitty, although Mr Epsom had only been there in the first place because Miss Kitty was the fashion.

He and his carriage had been searched. He could relax.

Clarissa was now drinking brandy. She would have a head like the devil in the morning, he thought. And then he heard a commotion outside in the yard. He rose slowly and went to the window.

Redcoats!

Swarms and swarms of them.

Damn. He had chosen the one posting-house that had surely not yet been searched.

He turned around. Clarissa was trying to wake her maid.

He thought quickly. ‘May I be of assistance, ma’am?’ he said, going up to her. Clarissa looked down at him. She saw a pleasant, well-dressed young man with a face like an amiable rabbit. His teeth were slightly protruding and his eyes were prominent.

‘If you would be so kind, sir,’ she said. ‘Do wake up, Hubbard.’

Hubbard at last woke and looked about vaguely. ‘Whassmatter?’ she said.

‘You fell asleep,’ said Clarissa crossly.

‘Perhaps if you will give me the key to her room,’ said Mr Epsom, ‘I could go ahead of you and open the door.’

‘She is sharing my room, the Jupiter Room to the left of the first landing,’ said Clarissa. ‘Here is the key. I shall help her up the stairs.’

Mr Epsom sauntered out, but once outside the door, he darted up the stairs as fast as he could. He opened the door to Clarissa’s room and looked wildly about. Down below, he could hear the commotion as the soldiers began their search. He saw Clarissa’s jewel box and opened it up. He removed the trays of rings from the top, pulled out brooches and necklaces, opened his waistcoat and shirt and took out the oilskin packet of papers and placed it in the bottom, and hurriedly put everything back inside again. He slammed down the lid and then went out to pretend he was nothing more than an innocent helper of ladies in distress.