The Baron’s Betrothal: An On-Again, Off-Again, On-Again Regency Romance (The Horsemen of the Apocalypse Series) (36 page)

“I’m not running away with you. I’m not running from anything. I am running
to
someone,” Elizabeth explained patiently. “As I said, I appreciate your escort as far as Basingstoke, but there is the end of it.”

Mr. Wilder was annoyed by this, not to mention put out by the anticipated costs of an expensive private coach and several changes of horses and drivers on Christmas. Only the prospect of her dowry to defray this initial outlay eased his mind. Even so, he began to calculate the ready required to feed three of them, engage a private parlor and underwrite rooms at inns along the way to Scotland.

Unbeknownst to Elizabeth, Mr. Wilder believed that spiriting her away to Gretna Green would be as much for her benefit as for his own. He fancied himself her Lancelot. In any event, it wasn’t an abduction, not really. She’d come of her own volition, with her maid. And hadn’t Lady Clun already made clear to half the
ton
her betrothal was doomed? The baroness even hinted Lord Clun’s interests lay elsewhere. Lady Elizabeth faced certain humiliation if Clun contracted a new alliance before she did.
 

Once in Scotland, Mr. Wilder concluded, she would appreciate his thoughtfulness. Or face certain scandal.

A few hours into their journey, the afternoon sun beamed into the coach.

“Let me close the shade for you, my lady,” Mr. Wilder leaned to the window, attempting gallantry.

“Do leave it,” Elizabeth replied. “I like the light.”
 

This gave her pause.
 

The sun came through the half light on the left. How odd.
 

She puzzled over this before she understood and rued the efficacy of candied ginger, which had eased her discomfort so well she’d nodded off.

They traveled north not west. Had they been on the road to Basingstoke, the carriage would head toward the sun as it dropped in the sky, in which case, sunlight would not stream through either window.

One might suppose this discovery would distress a sheltered noblewoman being conveyed north for who-knew-what purpose. Instead, Elizabeth felt calm and extremely pleased with her foresight. Then again, one was so much better prepared doing anything a second time.
 

Her second flight from London was considerably more comfortable than her first in numerous ways. For instance, Elizabeth brought Washburn along for propriety. She wore her own, comfortable walking dress under her warmest, kerseymere pelisse with a sable tippet about her neck, sturdy nankeen half-boots, a sensible yet attractive velvet bonnet and one of two pairs of York tan gloves. Her reticule was brimming with chunks of candied ginger. She also brought with her a great deal of money, stowed in a fastened pocket in the lining of the oversized sable fur muff on her lap. She’d learnt her lesson about firearms, too, and had with her a handier little pistol than the bulky, long-barreled dueling pistol she’d taken in haste previously. She’d kept it close at hand, tucked in her capacious fur muff.
 

“Are we traveling north, Mr. Wilder?” She asked in a blithe manner, as if merely curious.
 

“Well, yes,” he answered cautiously, “I wanted to demonstrate that I am in earnest about my feelings for you, even to the point of risking my own life.”

“Risking your life?” She wondered if he knew about her pistol.

“Until you cry off, Clun has made perfectly clear he will shoot anyone who dares come too close to you. Defined ‘close’ in absurdly broad terms, I might add. According to him, ‘close’ encompassed most of fashionable London geographically as well as escorting you in to supper and waltzing with you at a ball. Ever. Looked deranged when he said it to me, hissing and spitting through clenched teeth like a Bedlamite. So you see, I must be dashed serious to whisk you off to Gretna Green despite his threats.”
 

One might now assume her mind seized at Mr. Wilder’s shocking talk of Gretna Green and all it implied. Again, no. Elizabeth’s train of thought derailed over something else the cad said: that Clun had threatened to kill him. Over her. On absurdly slim pretexts. That was actual possessiveness, not merely the hypothetical sort.
 

She smiled broadly, which Mr. Wilder mistook for encouragement.

“You will come to love me and I you,” he said, still making his case. “Already we are fond of each other.”

Washburn snorted and Elizabeth quelled her with a sidelong glance. “You don’t love me any more than I love you. We are friends. It will never be more, sir.”

“I don’t believe you.”
 

“I assure you it is so, Mr. Wilder.” Rather than humor him any longer, she said, “Please tell the coachman to stop at the next inn.”

“I will not, my lady, if you would only consider where you are, and what I offer. It’s much too late to avoid a scandal. I have not been discreet, shall we say, about our destination during the changes of teams. Besides, you enjoy my company, you’ve said so yourself. I pledge to care for you. Why, haven’t I done all of this for your sake?” He gestured around at the coach. “I can spare you the humiliation of being unmarried when Clun arranges his next match, or haven’t you heard? Clun has singled out another and awaits your refusal.”

She shook her head, “I won’t believe it until—”

“The Honorable Horatia Mangold. Heard so myself from an unimpeachable source.”

“Lady Clun? Ha. I have more reliable sources, Mr. Wilder,” Elizabeth huffed. “You will stop this coach, sir.”

“No, my dearest.”

“No?” She asked quietly, her green eyes sparking dangerously.

Unfortunately Mr. Wilder paid no attention. He leaned back against the squabs opposite her, smiled and said, “Much as it wounds me to refuse you, pet, I will not.”

“And much as it would wound me to wound you,” Elizabeth said, withdrawing the dainty pistol from her muff, “I must insist.” For emphasis, she cocked it and aimed at him.

“Is that loaded?” he cried, scrambling into the farthest corner. “Your finger’s on the bloody trigger! We might hit a bump. Are you mad? ”

“No. I am a dead shot, ask Clun. Tell the coachman to rein in. Now!”
 

Chapter 33
 

In which our hero misses our heroine.

C
lun overslept on Christmas. Long after he intended, the baron set out to call on Elizabeth.
 

In the wake of the Haverford near-disaster, he’d realized something, several things actually. He enumerated them so as not to forget them in his rush to lay himself bare and beg her pardon. First, he should not have spurned her proposal at Mr. Soane’s townhouse. He refused for altruistic reasons and he meant well but…Second, he was not only a lard-witted lummox but also a
selfish
, lard-witted lummox, who must renege on his refusal. He wanted more than anything to marry her, come what may (and he still shuddered to think what may come of it). Third, he must rush their nuptials, that is, if she didn’t want to club him over the head and leave it at that. And fourth, if she would have, he would resolve in the future to be less pessimistic if she would show him how.

Lord Morefield’s butler Nettles bowed the anxious baron into the foyer, took his lordship’s tall beaver hat, gloves and stick and put them down carefully. Clun asked to speak with Lady Elizabeth. The butler accepted his lordship’s calling card on a sterling salver and crept at a snail’s pace down the hall, scratched at a door, waited an eternity and finally disappeared. When he crept back to the foyer, he showed Clun down the hall and into the earl’s library.
 

The earl greeted him and bade him sit by the fire. No matter how impatient Clun was to speak with Elizabeth, he forced himself to engage in the earl’s jovial small talk. Nettles entered once again, crept to the earl’s side, leaned by infinitesimal degrees down to whisper in his ear, slowly righted himself, turned and left at an excruciating, glacial pace.
 

“Thank you, Nettles.” The earl tapped his fingers on the arms of his wing chair and finally said, “Lord Clun, Elizabeth is not at home. She and her maid have gone to Devonshire. I must apologize for her absence and for her intransigence. Lady Clun has already expressed your understandable dismay. You’ve been most patient. Rest assured, my daughter will end the betrothal with no recriminations, just as you wish.”

“As
I
wish?” Clun reached up to pull his hair out, but Fewings had trimmed it again for this visit. “Make no mistake, Lord Morefield, I will contest any alteration to the arrangement. It stands unless the lady herself wishes to beg off.” And with that he shot to his feet.

The earl regarded the agitated baron carefully. “You find me at a loss.”

“That, my lord, is a mental state to which we who love Elizabeth must become inured. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go. Happy Christmas.”

“And you, Clun. I wish you the best.”
 

On a hunch, Clun dashed from No. 1 Damogan Square and went round to the stable. There he learned from the head groom that the earl’s travel carriage wasn’t in use; in fact, it wouldn’t be in Town till the morrow.
 

She was on the run.
 

He threw himself on Algernon and cantered to the elegant establishment in Jermyn Street where Lord Seelye kept rooms. Seelye himself was strolling down the pavement, immaculately turned out, swinging his walking stick.

“Hallo, Clun, I’m off to the Duke of Bath’s Christmas do for family and friends,” Seelye said and looked askance at his stern friend astride a fretful Algernon. “How can you be so bloody grim on this, the day of our savior’s birth?”

“Stubble it, Seelye, I need your help.”

Two days later, lounging in White’s bow window overlooking St. James Street, Seelye entertained Percy over glasses of port with a faithful narration of what transpired on Christmas.
 

He and Clun rode neck or nothing from London only stopping at tolls and inns to determine Lady Elizabeth’s direction. Just before the post road splits to go west toward Banbury and north to Northampton, an innkeeper recalled a tall lady of quality with her maid and brother taking tea at his establishment. They were on their way home, so said the brother. The innkeeper’s description of her sibling matched Wilder. What’s more, the inn’s ostler recalled the so-called brother telling him with a wink they were headed for Gretna Green.

This, according to Seelye, inspired such growling and profanity from the baron, that he feared the man’s impulses would land him up on charges for murder when they caught
 
Wilder.
 

“Was it a duel? Or did Clun ride him down and run him through?”

“He nearly drowned Wilder, but I’m not there yet, Percy,” Seelye huffed. “You’ll ruin the whole tale, if you make me jump ahead.”
 

Percy waited, drumming his fingers on the club chair’s arm.

Seelye resumed his narration. Now, Clun rode like a Horseman of the Apocalypse in truth. His greatcoat flew like the Grim Reaper’s own cape, his face a death mask. He terrified everyone in his way.
 

Percy yawned and made an elaborate show of resting his chin in his hand.
 

Offended, Seelye cut to the chase.
 

Not two leagues farther on the north road, they came upon the Hon. Henry Wilder in a pathetic state, cooling his muddy heels at a modest inn. His beaver hat was battered, and he sat covered nose to rump in road dust. Most noteworthy, Wilder sported a shiny, purplish bruise around his swollen eye and a clotted bloody nose. When questioned, he complained bitterly ‘that Damogan she-devil’ blackened the former and broke the latter in the process of stranding him by the side of the road on their way to Scotland. He also objected strenuously to being forced to walk, thus injured, to the nearest shelter serving decent ale, which on bloody Christmas was no mean feat. The shocking assault on his person made Wilder heedless of what he said and to whom he said it.

“You know it’s dashed difficult to make out Clun’s mood in the best of circumstances,” Seelye said. “Well, at that moment, it was impossible to know what Clun would do, what with Wilder’s attempted abduction and his bacon-brained complaints.” Seelye shook his head and took a sip of port, leaving Percy perched on the edge of his chair.

“Damn it, Seelye, what in blazes happened next?”

“Oh. Right. Clun was so amused, he forgot all about killing him. Ordered a tankard of ale instead.”

“No,” said his dumbstruck friend.

“God’s truth, I swear!” Seelye said.
 

But that was not the end of it. Seelye went on to explain that Wilder wailed about how Lady Elizabeth punched him in the face and chucked him from the carriage
he
had hired. Then, feeling the full force of his abuse afresh, Wilder whined even louder that she’d used her
foot
on him. Kicked him right out the blasted coach door. And threw his kit at him with such energy, she broke his nose. Then, she forced the coachman at
gunpoint
to drive off without him.
 

“That’s when Clun nearly drowned Wilder in ale. Spat in his face, he laughed so hard. Didn’t mean to, Wilder caught him off guard, mid-swallow.”
 

“So, he survived.”

“Even
that
was not the end of it,” said Seelye. “Being a gentleman, Clun gave Wilder his linen pocket square and told him he was lucky to be alive. To which the stupid prattlebox blurted out, ‘So she said herself! A dead shot, said she. Ask Clun, said she, waving a loaded pistol under my nose all the while. You are welcome to that nasty, headstrong handful, Clun, but you’d be a fool to take her at any price.’”

“And?”

“Clun took exception to that last bit and punched Wilder’s good eye,” Seelye concluded. “And took back his pocket square to wipe his fist dry.”

Percy cried laughing now, “By Jove, I’d give anything to have seen that.”

Seelye briefly recounted how he kept Clun from finishing the fool off with his bare hands by reminding him of the season, goodwill toward men and what not. In that spirit, he even prevailed upon the baron to front the blunt needed for the saphead’s coach fare back to London, but only after Wilder pledged his silence on pain of death.