Greetings of the Season and Other Stories (5 page)

“Yes, blast it, wrap it. It is a gift. You know, paper and ribbons, that sort of poppycock. Then rouse one of the footmen and have him deliver it to Miss Elizabeth Framingham.”

“Miss Framingham?”

“B’gad, are you going deaf on me, Tuttle? Yes, Miss Elizabeth Framingham, who resides three houses away, in case you have forgotten. Lord Coulton’s fiancée. The footman is to say that it comes with my most sincere apologies.”

“But…but, my lord, it is the middle of the night.”

“I didn’t say he should deliver it to the young lady in her bedchamber, dash it. In fact, I
forbid
him to deliver it to her bedroom altogether. He’s to leave it with the butler or night guard or whatever, as long as she gets it first thing in the morning. Is that clear?”

As clear as the air over London town. Tuttle nodded.

“Oh, and fetch me some ice.”

“Ice, my lord?”

“Ice. These are the 1800s, man, and it’s winter. Somewhere in London there must be an icehouse. I need some upstairs in a bowl. And the good cognac.”

Now the stately majordomo was really shocked. Master Bevin wished to chill the Bouvelieu? Never. Tuttle carried up the ice in a silver bucket and hot coffee in a silver urn. More of the latter than the former.

Lord Montravan sprawled on a chair before the fire, his shoes kicked off, his coat lying in a heap near the wardrobe, his cravat draped over a bedpost, and his right hand soaking in a bowl of cold water.

Life was hard, he lamented. A fellow just couldn’t trust anyone. Not his best friend, not his faithful servant, not his mistress. Bevin was glad he didn’t have a dog; it would most likely bite him. He couldn’t even trust the old family retainer to bring him a brandy, and the bellpull was so confoundedly far away. What good was coffee going to be in keeping infection from the cut Haskell’s teeth had opened across Bevin’s knuckles? What good was coffee going to be in dulling the pain of betrayal?

Hell and damnation, Vincent and Marina. Unless… No, it couldn’t, be. That peacocking twit of a nobody
couldn’t
be tupping Bibi Duchamps while he, the Earl of Montford, was still trying to fix her interest. Life couldn’t be that hard, could it?

No. There was still some softness in the world, some tender honor a man could trust. His mother? If she never played his father false, it was because she was too lazy. His sister? Allissa was growing into another avaricious, manipulative harpy. But there was Petra, sweet and pure. Petra, who had never let him down, never went back on her word.

Bevin laughed at himself. He hadn’t seen Petra since the summer. For all he knew she’d have some local swain just waiting for the earl’s arrival to declare himself. Hell
,
Petra was only a woman; there was no justification for putting her on a pedestal. For all Bevin knew she already had some gent’s slippers under her bed.

*

The next morning did not start until nearly noon. Finster took one look at his master, asleep in the chair, and called for the sawbones. That worthy poked and prodded, only to declare that perhaps the knuckles were broken, perhaps not. As if Lord Montravan could not have figured that out for himself. At least the cabbagehead put basilicum powder in the open cuts and wrapped the hand—in enough linen to shroud a mummy.

He couldn’t tie his own neckcloth. He spilled coffee on the one Finster had fashioned, trying to breakfast left-handed, and had to have the thing done again. At last, in an even more foul mood, the earl was ready to confront his secretary.

According to Tuttle, Mr. Vincent was in the library wrapping gifts. This last was said with a sniff, indicative of the butler’s opinion of such a lowly occupation. Vincent obviously did not mind, for he was whistling in a welter of silver paper, tissue, and bright ribbon. Nothing was quite as bright as his parrot-embroidered waistcoat. Montravan paused in the doorway to let his aesthetic sense acclimate itself gradually.

“Good morning, my lord,” Vincent called cheerfully. “I’ll be finished here in just a bit unless you needed me for something immediately. I heard you had the doctor in to see about your hand, so I wanted to get this done in case you had any additional chores for me. I hope it’s nothing serious, whatever happened.”

“Marina,” Montravan stated, striding farther into the room and skipping all preliminaries.

Vincent’s mouth hung open. “Miss Corbett did that to you? Good grief, what did she do? I mean, pardon me, my lord. None of my affair, of course.”

“Precisely!” Bevin was across the library’s expanse, almost nose to nose with the younger man, and was about to take Vincent by the ridiculously high shirt collar and shake him as a terrier would a rat. Except that he couldn’t bend his swollen, throbbing fingers in their wrapping. “Blast! Have you been seeing Marina, sirrah?”

“My lord?” Vincent took a step back, dropping the scissors. Then he seemed to reconsider, what with his employer running amok right in front of him. Picking the scissors off the table, he cut a length of ribbon.

“Answer me, damn you! Have you been seeing Marina?”

Vincent’s hand started to shake. “I saw her last night in the play. Remember, I told you I was going?”

“And otherwise?”

“I don’t know what you mean, my lord. I took her home that night last week when you had to attend the reception at Carleton House. Recall, you asked me to?”

“And did you see her in?”

Vincent squared his padded shoulders. “Naturally. You charged me with her escort. And she asked me to have a glass of wine,” he said with a tinge of defiance. “She is a very gracious lady.”

“And what about Bibi Duchamps?”

The bow Vincent was tying became knotted around his finger. “Drat.” He tossed the ribbon aside and cut a new one, not half the length needed to go around the box he was wrapping. Sweat was starting to bead on his forehead. “I…ah…have seen Mademoiselle Duchamps only once, outside of the opera house.”

The earl was seated at his desk, hefting the weight of the silver letter opener in his left hand. Vincent swallowed audibly and continued: “The one time when you had me send her flowers after her debut.”

“Send. I said
send
her flowers, not bring her flowers, you lobcock!”

“I…ah…thought she’d be more impressed that way. ’Twould show your interest more personally than having the flower seller’s boy just drop off another bouquet.”

Bevin scowled; Vincent trembled.

“I swear, my lord, I have done nothing without your direction or your interests at heart. Neither lady has cause for complaint at my conduct.”

“Well, somebody does. Something you’ve done has given rise to the most damnable rumors, and that’s a fact.”

“That’s impossible. No one saw us. That is…ah…what rumors, my lord?”

“No one saw you and…? Great Scott! Belinda? You’ve been sniffing around my intended?” the earl thundered.

“No, no,” Vincent cried. “That’s not how it was. I never intended…that is, Lady Belinda is… You see, it was the invitation.”

“No, you miserable mawworm, I do not see. What bloody invitation?” The papers on the earl’s desk went flying, from the gale winds of his rage.

“The…the one to the house party for New Year’s,” Vincent stuttered. “I thought I should deliver it in person, like the flowers. Only no one was home except Lady Belinda. The footman mustn’t have realized, for he showed me into the music room, where she was practicing. I would have given the invitation over and left immediately, I swear. Young lady with no chaperon and all, I knew it wasn’t seemly.”

“Then why the hell didn’t you?”

“Lady Belinda asked me to stay, to tell her about the house party, who else was invited, what activities were planned, that type of thing. I suppose she wanted to know what to pack. I never even
thought
of…of…”

“Yes, I know what you never thought of: what every young man spends every waking hour trying not to think of. Go on.”

“It was the mouse, you see. This mouse ran across the room, and Lady Belinda started to scream and jumped up on the sofa. I jumped up, too, thinking she might fall, and I accidentally dislodged one of the sofa pillows. Did I say we were sitting on the sofa? Well, the pillow hit the mouse and must have stunned the poor thing, because there it was, just lying there, with Lady Belinda starting to turn greenish, so I scooped it up with the coal scuttle and tossed the little blighter out the window.”

“Lancelot to the rescue,” Montravan commented dryly.

“I thought I’d done a neat job of it myself. But then—”

“Ah. The denouement. I am all aflutter to hear the outcome. Do go on,” he urged, rising. “‘But then?’”

“I promise you I never meant to… Lady Belinda was thanking me, and I was looking around for some brandy or something, a restorative, don’t you know.”

“For you, the lady, or the mouse?” Bevin asked sarcastically, knowing full well what was coming.

“Then suddenly she was in my arms, and it seemed only natural, and she didn’t tell me to stop, and suddenly we were back on the couch.”

“And then?”

“And then the butler came in. But Belinda swore he’d never tell a soul. And…and I am terribly sorry, my lord.”

“Sorry? You’re sorry you were caught making love to the woman I am going to marry?” Bevin pounded the desktop in fury, then had to catch himself on the edge of the table as the pain made him almost light-headed enough to faint.

Words failed Vincent. He could only hang his head, staring at the elaborate buckles on his shoes.

When Bevin caught his breath, he corrected himself. “No, Lady Belinda is the woman I
was
going to marry. I’d never have the jade now. By Jupiter, did she think she’d play me false with my own secretary? My God!”

“It wasn’t like that, my lord! Belinda is a lady! We didn’t… That is, the butler…
”

“No? Were you waiting for after the wedding to plant horns on me? Should I be thankful? Or were you going to take up with Marina where I left off once
Lady
Belinda and I were leg-shackled? Or was it Bibi whilst I was honeymooning?”

Montravan sank wearily back into his seat. “No, don’t answer. I wouldn’t believe anything you’d say.” He toyed with the letter opener again, making Vincent anxiously measure the distance to the door while his lordship pondered his fate.

“I would thrash you to within an inch of your life, you know,” Bevin told the other man, speaking conversationally now, “were my hand not already knocked to flinders. Instead I’ll give you until dark to gather your things and get out. If I see you after, or if anything but your own possessions is missing tomorrow, there is no answering for the consequences, for I still have my left hand, by Jupiter. You’ll have no references out of me, not that it makes much difference; your name is already a byword in town. No sane man would ever hire you, not if he had a wife, daughter, or mistress.”

The earl reached into a desk drawer and pulled out a purse, which he tossed onto the table amid the ribbons and wrappings. Standing, he said, “Go as far as this takes you and don’t come back. Consider it an early Christmas gift. Greetings of the season, you bastard.”

*

Vincent hadn’t wanted to be a secretary anymore anyway, he told himself after the library door slammed behind the earl. He wanted to be a gigolo. Now he had the wherewithal. He lifted the purse, thinking. He’d need a new name, of course. Perhaps a mustache for a disguise. Yes, a military-style mustache, with sideburns, maybe even a hussar uniform. Women couldn’t resist a man in uniform, especially if he had a slight limp or a scar for sympathy’s sake. Besides, he would look a handsome devil in the scarlet regimentals, if he had to say so himself. Who’d ever check the rosters for a retired captain? No, a major.

The future was not dim at all, but the present certainly had a shadow over it. This was no way to treat a chap after all those years of faithful service, booting him out on his ear the week before Christmas. Vincent poured himself a healthy dose of the earl’s brandy. He
had
done a deuced fine job for old sobersides. He really was quite good at all the details that made Montravan’s life much simpler, and he never left a task uncompleted. Vincent simply hated to leave a job undone, so he finished wrapping the earl’s gifts, then regretfully locked the unchosen jewelry et cetera away in the earl’s desk. He carefully printed each recipient’s address on the outer wrapping, matching direction to gift, and just as carefully switched all of the cards.

He handed three to a footman to be delivered that very day in London. Then Vincent ordered a groom to set out for Montravan Hall immediately with the rest of the parcels, saying that the earl might delay his departure because of the accident to his hand and wished to make sure the presents reached his family in time.

Now
Vincent was ready to go upstairs and pack.

And greetings of the season to you, too, my lord.

6

Lord, what was he to do now? Bevin could only think of things he
couldn’t
do. He couldn’t write to the Harleighs claiming their visit had to be canceled due to an influenza epidemic or such. They’d be sure to twig that faradiddle. Besides, he couldn’t write at all with his hand all swollen, and he had no blasted secretary to write for him! And Bevin couldn’t let Miss Harleigh’s name be bandied around town—he was a gentleman, after all—as would be sure to happen if he suddenly claimed an emergency at his Scottish property. He’d be lucky if Harleigh didn’t get a hint of the current gossip and come demanding an explanation.