Read Passion's Song (A Georgian Historical Romance) Online

Authors: Carolyn Jewel

Tags: #england, #orphan, #music, #marquess, #revolutionary america, #crossdressing woman

Passion's Song (A Georgian Historical Romance) (7 page)

BOOK: Passion's Song (A Georgian Historical Romance)
2.11Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads


His lordship is expecting you.”
The butler sounded as though the phrase was one he was used to
repeating. He motioned for them to follow him. Isobel kept her eyes
on the floor and listened to the soft tapping of her boots on the
black-and-green squares of marble until they turned a corner and
stopped in front of a door halfway down another hall. She glanced
up at the gilt molding arching up into the ceiling, while the
butler pulled open the paneled doors and took two short steps into
the room. “Miss St. James and Mr. St. James, milord,” he announced.
She followed Edward inside.

The room was large and rectangular, with a
marble-topped desk that took up nearly all of one end. The walls
were covered with dark wainscoting, and had it not been for a large
window overlooking the gardens, the room would have been quite dim.
Nearly all the available space on the walls above the wainscoting
was taken up by portraits, all the way up to the ceiling, and it
gave the room a cramped feeling to have so many faces staring down
from the walls. An intricately patterned blue-and-white rug covered
nearly the whole of the wood floor she had seen at the edge of the
carpet. Her feet sank into the wool and she wished fervently that
it could hide her scuffed boots. She looked up from her feet and
was surprised to see no one. She was about to turn to Edward and
ask him where her father was when she was startled to hear a deep
voice say, “Do come in.” Someone stood up from a sofa that was
turned to face the fireplace. “So, I have finally found you.”

The earl, only slightly taller than average, was a
solidly built man whose eyes were exactly the same dark blue as
Isobel’s. It was at the eyes that the resemblance between them
began and ended. He looked about forty, but she later found out he
was nearer fifty. His nose was aquiline, and his eyes were nearly
overshadowed by heavy eyebrows. His forehead was high and his chin
long. His lips were plump but they stretched tightly over his teeth
when his mouth was closed. His skin was lightly marked from the
effects of the smallpox that had taken his wife and son. He had the
beginnings of a paunch, yet he stood so straight he seemed slender.
His graying black hair was curled at the sides and tied at the back
of his neck with a black ribbon. His neck was covered around with a
snow-white cravat tied into an elegant knot at the front. The ends
of the cravat were tucked into a soberly decorated waistcoat
sporting a heavy gold watch chain across the stomach. One foot was
very neatly bandaged and it rested lightly on the floor. His shoe
was black, and recently polished, with a gleaming gold buckle; his
stockings, too, were black, and they were tucked nicely into the
bottoms of his breeches. He wore a large gold ring on the little
finger of his right hand, and on his left hand two large yellow
diamonds.

Robert St. James, third earl of Chessingham, leaned
on an ivory-handled cane of a highly polished black wood as he
walked toward the girl who stood quietly at his brother’s side.
Except for the unmistakable color of her eyes, he would never have
guessed she was his daughter. She was far too thin, poorly dressed,
plain, and worst of all, she looked like some bloody serving girl,
though he doubted it was her fault, seeing as how she had been
brought up in the wilds of America. He stopped in front of her and
reached out to move her chin to get a look at her profile. He hoped
it would not be an impossible task to make her into a proper
Englishwoman. She did not seem to be ill at ease in his presence,
and he took her poise to be a sign that she might be made into
something. With any luck, Catherine would have given her some
breeding. “You may call me ‘Father,’” he said when he let go of her
chin. “Where did Edward find you?” He turned to his brother.


She was in New York. Both
Catherine and her husband are dead. She was living with the man’s
cousin,” Edward answered.


Was he unable to clothe her
properly? She looks like a deuced chambermaid!” The earl swept a
disdainful eye in Isobel’s direction and addressed his brother, who
only looked uncomfortable and did not answer.


How old are you now, child?” He
jabbed the silver-tipped end of his cane at her.


She is just seventeen,” Edward
answered again.


Does she not speak English?” he
asked coldly, raising one heavy eyebrow to underscore his
sarcasm.


Of course I do, Father.” Isobel’s
voice was soft. “I’m afraid Mr. St. James”—she looked at
Edward—“found me in reduced circumstances.”

He turned to his brother. “I trust there was no
trouble with the cousin?”


Indeed, he did not seem loath to
see her go.”

The earl shifted uncomfortably on his feet. “Come,
child, sit with me. My foot begins to bother me.” Isobel sat on the
chair he indicated when he sat down again on the sofa. She picked
up a cushion and put it underneath his outstretched leg. “Thank
you, my girl.” He looked down to where his foot pressed into the
silk of the pillow.


Does it hurt much?” she
asked.


Damnably.” He winced as he
settled his foot on the pillow.


What happened?” She tucked her
booted feet out of sight under the chair when she saw the pained
glance he gave them.


Gout.”


Why did you bring me
here?”

Edward had to smile when he saw her using the same
forthright glance his brother had used so effectively on him.


You get right to the point, don’t
you?” Lord Chessingham gave her a sharp look. “I think perhaps you
need to learn some English manners.” He thought such American
boldness was entirely unfeminine and that to be plain on top of it
would be nothing short of disaster.


I am sorry, Father, if I have
offended you,” she said contritely, shrugging her shoulders in a
curiously elegant movement that made the earl raise his eyebrows.
“But, less than a month ago I thought myself an orphan, and now I
find I am really the daughter of an English aristocrat.” She was
impatient from wondering what her future was to be, but still she
was surprised to hear how bluntly she spoke.


Your mother was a beautiful
woman,” he said, “and I should have married her had her station
been only a little higher. The second earl did not think the
difference could be overcome. He had already arranged a marriage.
But I did not bring you here to discuss my past.” He rapped his
cane on the floor. “May I see the locket?”


The locket?” It took a moment for
her to understand what he meant. “Of course.” She reached to
unfasten it and hand it to him.


This was the only thing I gave
Catherine that she did not return.” While he held the locket in his
palm, there was an instant when Isobel could believe he had once
been a young man. The moment ended when he looked up and handed the
necklace back to her. “You look a great deal like her.”


You could have married her
anyway!” she blurted out.


It was my duty to obey my
father’s wishes, and my father did not wish for me to marry your
mother.”


Then you must not have loved her
very much.” The words were accusing and bitter.


I loved her enough to bring you
here!” His face was stony and there was a tense moment of silence.
“My wife and children are dead,” he said at last, staring intently
at the carved handle of his stick. Their eyes met when he finally
lifted his head. “I intend for you to marry and provide me with a
grandson.”


Won’t you have a difficult time
marrying off your bastard daughter?” She rankled at his imperious
tone. How could her mother have loved such a cold-hearted
man?


Since I intend to acknowledge you
as my daughter there will be no shortage of young bucks clamoring
for your hand. Damme, there won’t, I own! You might be plain, but
wealth has a way of blinding men to such shortcomings. Edward, ring
for me!” Only after his brother had complied did he turn back to
Isobel. When a servant appeared not three minutes later, he gave
terse instructions. “See that Miss St. James’s things are taken to
her room. And send for a dressmaker immediately. My daughter is in
urgent need of a new wardrobe.” He looked at Isobel. “I am engaged
tonight, but we shall speak further at a later time. Mrs.
Godwaite”—he nodded at the woman who was standing deferentially at
the door—“shall see to it you obtain clothes appropriate to your
new station. You are to follow her advice exactly.”


Of course, Father.”


Tonight, you will do me the
goodness of having a tray sent up to your room, as I shan’t be
dining with you.” He looked steadily at her. “You have suddenly
become a woman with prospects. I hope you are up to the challenge.”
He nodded his head in dismissal.

Isobel followed Mrs. Godwaite down the hall and into
a sitting room, where the woman told her in a tight little voice to
please wait and left her to her own devices. She amused herself by
walking slowly around the room but quickly pounced on a newspaper
she found lying on a small end table. She was more than halfway
through an account of the bills before the House of Commons when
she began to wonder if perhaps she might have been forgotten. She
had just stood up to find someone who might tell her what was
expected of her when the door opened. Mrs. Godwaite came in,
followed by another woman who turned out to be the sempstress, and
one of the housemaids.


Miss St. James will be needing a
complete wardrobe,” Mrs. Godwaite said sternly to the woman, who
nodded and put down her basket. “See to it at least three or four
gowns are delivered immediately.” Isobel watched Mrs. Godwaite
while the sempstress pulled out a dress of a horrid brown color and
waited patiently while the maid helped her into it. “Have
undergarments sent as soon as possible,” Mrs. Godwaite added when
Isobel stood clad only in her shift. Mrs. Godwaite was a
dark-haired woman who looked as though she thought Isobel might
sprout the devil’s horns at any moment. Her tiny brown eyes were
nearly buried in her puffy face, and Isobel was afraid if she were
to smile they would disappear completely. Mrs. Godwaite stood
impassively while Isobel was prodded and poked and generally made
to feel put out. Not one word more was spoken during the entire
ordeal, and she was grateful when at last the sempstress packed
away her things and Mrs. Godwaite silently showed her to her
room.

Her room really consisted of three rooms, a
bedchamber and a smaller anteroom, and there was also a small
lavatory. The walls of both rooms were hung with a golden-yellow
silk, and the hangings of the huge four-poster bed were of a
matching silk taffeta. The chairs were all of the same style of
Chippendale. In the anteroom there was a pair of large oval mirrors
in carved gilt-wood, more of the dark chairs, and a dressing table
of a pretty, light-colored wood. There were gilt chandeliers in
both rooms, and there were lamps and candlesticks scattered
throughout. From the windows in the bedchamber she had a view of
the interior gardens, and from the opposite side of her quarters
she could see part of Albemarle Street, a portion of the gates, and
a bit of the drive.

She was glad to be left alone, for, in addition to
Mrs. Godwaite’s being the last person she might choose to spend her
time with, she was exhausted from the days of travel. Her joints,
not yet recovered from being bounced from one end of London to the
other, were aching, and she longed to lie down and sleep, something
she would have done were it not that her mind was so full of her
new surroundings she was convinced sleep would be impossible.

She stood looking out the window and wondered if it
was her father’s arranged marriage that had made him such a bitter
man. She turned away from the window. Or, had wealth made it easy
to abandon her mother?

Chapter 6

 

 

I

Isobel stayed only one week at Albemarle Street. The
London season was over on June 4, the King’s birthday, and, like
most persons of quality, the earl spent the summer in the country.
They left London together, but when they reached a small estate of
his near the village of Mawbury, he stayed only the night before
continuing on to Bath, where he hoped to obtain relief from his
gout. He left Isobel there with only the servants, her new abigail,
Bridget, and a governess, Miss Agatha Steadly, for company. Her
father had also engaged a tutor for her, but after Miss Steadly
informed the earl via the post to Bath that his daughter knew quite
enough for a young lady, the lessons were stopped. Dresses
continued to arrive from London, and her days generally consisted
of tedious mornings of additional fittings and dull afternoons of
listening to Miss Steadly tell her everything it was essential for
a young lady of position to know. Miss Steadly started every day
with the pronouncement that, as the acknowledged daughter of a
peer, she was exceedingly marriageable and could be expected to
make an excellent match. However, she would add in her sternest
tones, the slightest defect in her deportment would surely prevent
her from making a truly exceptional marriage.

Isobel spent a good deal of rime, after Miss Steadly
was finished with her, reading newspapers and pamphlets, and soon
found herself becoming interested in the English system of
government. How was it, she often asked herself, that it had failed
so miserably in America? She never got the opportunity to discuss
what she read, or much else of interest, for that matter, since
Miss Steadly refused to entertain the notion of a young lady’s
knowing anything about Parliament until after she was married. Her
riding lessons provided some diversion, but it was so terribly hot
that the only comfortable time for riding was early morning or late
evening, and she reserved her evenings for the forte-piano. It
seemed a luxury to be able to play for as many hours as she wished,
and it was several weeks before she stopped feeling guilty for the
hours she spent at the instrument.

BOOK: Passion's Song (A Georgian Historical Romance)
2.11Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

The Concert by Ismail Kadare
Flight by Isabel Ashdown
My Brother's Keeper by Adrienne Wilder
B00AFYX78I EBOK by Harrison, Kate
Open Wounds by Camille Taylor
The Colour of Death by Michael Cordy
Friends and Lovers by Tara Mills
Wolf at the Door by Sadie Hart
The Florentine Deception by Carey Nachenberg