The Gathering Storm (The Jacobite Chronicles Book 3) (44 page)

“Why didn’t you tell me?” whispered Beth as the guests moved from the dining room to the drawing room, where card tables had been placed in readiness.

“Tell you what?” Sir Anthony said, carefully removing his wife’s hand from his sleeve, and enfolding it in his own gloved one. “Please, my dear, you must remember, this velvet marks so when one touches it. I really regret having purchased this outfit. It was most remiss of the tailor not to warn me…”

“Stop trying to change the subject,” she hissed. “The visit to Prince Frederick. Why?”

“I had no chance to. You spent all the time between me coming home and dinner either with Caroline, or droning endlessly on about the place settings and your worries that Richard was a murderous lunatic. Don’t do it, by the way.”

“Don’t do what?”

“Warn him that if he touches her he’ll be sorry, or tell him you think he’s a gold-digger and that you intend to make his life hell.”

“I wasn’t going to!” she lied.

“Yes you were. I know you.” He drew her carefully to one side, on the pretext of discussing the arrangements for the buffet. “If you do he’ll take it as a challenge, and he’d be more likely to hurt her just to prove he can. Although to be honest, he seems quite fond of her, if not of the child she’s carrying.”

“So he hasn’t fooled you completely then,” Beth replied huffily, put out that he’d read her so well, and unwilling to admit that in spite of past experience his comment on Richard’s attitude to Anne seemed to be well-founded.

“Not completely, no.” He smiled and fussily rearranged a wayward strand of her hair, tucking it carefully back into place. Isabella and Clarissa, passing behind them, smiled at the intimate gesture and went to take their places at a table. He slid his arm around her waist and drew her towards him. She stiffened.

“Don’t,” she whispered.

“Why not?” he murmured into her ear. His breath was warm and soft against her neck. “You’re my wife. We are allowed to embrace in public.” He kissed the delicate earlobe and she shivered.

“You’re being cruel,” she whispered fiercely, maintaining her rigid posture and look of boredom with difficulty. “You know how hard it is for me. If it wasn’t for that horrible cologne you wear I wouldn’t be able to keep up the pretence that I find you distasteful. I’d leap on you and tear all those stupid clothes off you, and then you’d be sorry.”

He smiled delightedly, and a mischievous look flickered in the blue depths of his eyes.

“I’d be sorry? You really think so?” he said quietly, his voice laced with seductive promise.

“Yes,” she said more loudly, putting her palms flat on his chest as he attempted to draw her closer. She was aware of several pairs of amused or sentimental eyes observing them as they stood in the doorway. “Really, Anthony, you just warned me not to touch your outfit and now you’re in danger of ruining it entirely!”

To stay in character he had no choice but to release her immediately and bemoan the spoiling of his coat, which was really too bad. What would the guests think? He would have words with his tailor the very next day. And more than words with her later, his eyes, warm and sensual, promised. She turned, intending to enter the card room.

“Wait,” he said, taking her arm and drawing her to one side. “I haven’t finished talking about your brother. I agree with you that he hasn’t married Anne for her beauty, or because he’s genuinely in love with her. I think his fondness for her is based on the fact that she’s submissive, and has given him what he wants. If Anne tries to thwart him, she’ll be sorry, I’m sure. But she won’t. You’ve warned him that you have great influence with Cumberland, I’ve warned him that I have great influence with George, and your accomplice Caroline has warned him that she has great influence with his general’s friend. He understood it. Leave it at that. Ah, Lord Thistlethwaite! So delighted you could make up our numbers! I am but a sorry player myself, and as the host of this little soiree…” He drifted off and Beth was left alone with all her senses tingling deliciously and the realisation that he had anticipated a barrage of questions about the prospective visit to Prince Frederick and had cleverly managed to deflect her from asking them.

She took his advice with regard to Richard and left it at that. Alex was right. To confront her brother head on would not be wise. The last thing she wanted to do was to provoke him into an act of violence. She looked across the room. Richard was sitting at a table, awaiting his deal of cards. Anne stood behind him, one small hand laid proudly on his shoulder. Even as Beth was watching them he beckoned to a servant, who hurried off and returned with another chair, so that Anne could sit down. Maybe she
was
worrying about nothing. She had changed a lot herself in the past two years. Maybe he had, too. Perhaps all he needed was someone to love him and indulge his every wish, as his mother had. If that was the case, Anne would be perfect for him.

“No,” said Alex, observing Beth through the dressing-table mirror as she took the rose-pink velvet dress out of the wardrobe and laid it carefully on the bed. “Not that one.”

“Which one, then?” she asked. “The green is dirty, and I can’t wear the blue silk. If Prince Frederick’s house is as poorly heated as St James’s Palace, I’ll freeze to death.”

He put the hairbrush down and turned on the stool, his hair falling in soft burnished waves on his shoulders.

“The moss-green wool,” he said. “Or the brown. Aye, the brown.”

She stared at him in disbelief.

“I can’t wear the brown to visit the Prince of Wales, even if he is a usurper!” she protested. “The skirts aren’t full enough for a court hoop, for one thing. Wool is out of fashion, and it’s too plain. It’s more the sort of thing I’d wear to visit Caroline.”

“It’s warm and comfortable though, is it no’?” he said.

“Yes. Which is another reason why it’s not suitable for a Court visit.”

“The brown, then,” he said, turning back to the mirror and deftly plaiting his hair.

“What are you wearing?” she asked suspiciously.

“The grey wool,” he said, tying his hair and reaching across for the pot of white paint.

“The grey?!” exclaimed Beth. “What’s going on? That’s one of Abernathy’s outfits. Sir Anthony never wears grey!”

“Today he does. Ye dinna ken the prince, Beth. He’s no’ like his father and brother.”

“Maybe, but I still can’t be introduced to him for the first time dressed like a tradesman’s wife. Are you trying to insult him, so you won’t be invited back?”

“Not at all,” replied Alex, slathering white paint across his face. “I havena visited him for two years. He intends to punish me for it. I ken the man well. Trust me, the brown.”

“Punish you?” said Beth, alarmed. “In what way?”

“I have an idea, but I’m no’ telling ye,” he replied mysteriously. “It’ll be better that way. Ye’ll act more naturally. Wear your riding gloves, too.”

“What? Alex, you’ve got to tell me…”

“No, I havena,” he interrupted. “But I will tell ye this. You’ll enjoy yourself more than you’re expecting to, I promise ye that.”

Beth could not imagine how she could possibly enjoy herself visiting any member of the Elector’s family. Particularly when she was dressed like a servant and had no idea what to expect. They drove along a tree-lined avenue, drawing up outside the house, and were greeted by a footman as they stepped down from the carriage.

“You see now my dear, why it is known as the White House,” said Sir Anthony, taking her arm. She could. It was impressive, with its many sashed windows and newly refaced white stucco Palladian facade. The footman led them, not as Beth had expected, to a cavernous drawing-room or a gloomy salon, but along a path which ran round the side of the house to the gardens. He crossed the lawn, stopped at the top of some winding stone steps flanked by tall ruthlessly shaped evergreens and yelled at the top of his voice:

“Sir Anthony and Lady Elizabeth Peters!”

There was a short pause, and then a small, swarthy-skinned, somewhat grubby man dressed in brown woollen trousers and jacket came trotting up the steps. Presumably this was one of the under-gardeners, thought Beth, who would lead them on to a summer house of some sort in the gardens, where the prince and princess would meet them.

To her utter astonishment, her husband immediately made a deep and courteous bow.

“Your Royal Highness!” he declared.

For a moment Beth stared at the amused countenance of the man standing below them. He had a smear of dirt on his forehead and a hole in his stocking. Then a tug on her arm shook her from her stupor and she sank into a curtsey. When she rose, the prince had mounted the rest of the steps and was standing in front of them.

“Sir Anthony,” he said, smiling. “I see you have come prepared after all. I cannot fool you.”

“You would be disappointed if you could, Your Highness,” the baronet replied, smiling.

“True, true. I see you have prepared your wife as well.
Enchanté,
Lady Elizabeth,” said the prince, wiping his hand on his breeches before taking hers and raising it to his lips.

“I have only advised her as to the appropriate attire for the occasion, Your Highness,” said Sir Anthony. “Nothing else.”

“Ah,” replied Prince Frederick, his eyes sparkling. “Well then, my lady,” he reached past Sir Anthony and took her arm, tucking it familiarly under his and leading her down the steps, “we are in the process of transforming our little garden, and intend to plant a great many exotic plants, which even as I speak are making their way across the ocean to us. Of course there is a great deal of preparation to be done before they arrive.”

They reached the bottom of the steps and the evergreen canopy finished, revealing the ‘little garden’, which stretched away into the distance. A series of rudimentary paths had been marked out with string and sand, and one had been half-laid with slabs of grey stone.

Beth looked around her with interest, and realised immediately why Alex had told her to wear the brown. Dotted about the garden were numerous courtiers of both sexes, richly clad in bright silks and velvets which were completely inappropriate for the tasks to which they had been assigned. Their faces wore expressions ranging from mildly disgruntled to positively outraged. All of them were armed with garden tools.

“As you see,” continued the prince, leading Beth across the muddy, freshly dug soil as though he were showing her the paintings in his richly carpeted gallery, “the soil must be thoroughly turned and sieved for stones before being finely raked. It is a wearying task. But luckily I have a great many friends who have kindly agreed to assist me today, the weather being so clement.”

The courtiers gathered around seemed neither to be particularly friendly or kindly disposed towards Frederick, but Beth did not think it politic to mention this.

“Now, I had thought to ask you to assist Lady Philippa in digging over this plot, but now I see how delicately built you are, I think it would be better if you start by raking the spot over there, which has just been cleared of stones.” He gestured to a distant square of land. “Whereas you, Sir Anthony, with your magnificent physique, would be far more suited to laying the path, I think. The stones are quite heavy but that will pose no problem for you, I trust.”

“Indeed not,” smiled the baronet, who had followed his wife and prince. “Fresh air and exercise are always welcome. So invigorating! To be close to the soil is to commune with God himself!”

“You haven’t changed at all, Anthony,” said the prince warmly. “I will find you a rake, Lady Elizabeth, if you give me a moment.”

He wandered off.

“I presume you’ve used a rake before, my dear?” asked Sir Anthony.

“Yes. I used to help Graeme sometimes when he was preparing the vegetable beds. And I had my own little plot when I was a child. You knew this was going to happen. Why didn’t you warn me?” She looked up at him.

“I suspected something of the sort, when Frederick told me he wanted me to see the garden. But I knew he would prefer it if it came as a total surprise to you. Are you very unhappy at the thought of a little gardening?”

“No, not at all,” she replied. “I’d much rather do that than make small talk with a lot of people I have nothing in common with. It’s the last thing I expected, that’s all.”

“It was the last thing most of the others expected as well,” her husband replied. “Frederick loves this sort of joke. It sorts out the sycophants from the friends, and brings those with too high an opinion of themselves down a peg or two.”

“Why don’t they just leave?” she asked, eyeing a very pretty woman about twenty yards away, who had obviously never used a spade before in her life and was struggling to push it into the soil. The hem of her pale yellow gown was covered in mud. She looked across at them and scowled. Sir Anthony smiled.

“You must place your foot on the spade and put your weight on it, my dear Helen!” he called, demonstrating by lifting his foot into the air and driving an imaginary spade into the soil. “Horrible woman,” he continued under his breath. “Malicious. You’ll see her in action later, no doubt. They don’t leave, because one day Frederick will be King, and it’s worth no end of humiliation to them to have the favour of the future monarch.”

“But surely if Frederick knows they’re sycophants he won’t favour them anyway when he comes to the throne?” she said.

“
If
he comes to the throne,” Sir Anthony said in a very low voice so as not to be overheard. They both watched as the man whose father they hoped to drive from the country came striding back towards them.

“Here you are,” he said, handing Beth a rake. “Now Anthony, if you will just follow me. The stones must be laid out in a particular way…”

It took Beth a few minutes to establish a comfortable rhythm, after which she worked automatically, pulling the rake through the fine soil and making her way slowly and methodically along the plot. She let her mind wander, remembering the pleasant childhood afternoons when she had worked with Graeme, watching carefully as he showed her what to do, then copying him with the small rake he had made especially for her. Sometimes she would make wavy patterns in the soil, pretending it was the sea. And once, when she was very small, she had used a twig to demonstrate proudly that she could write her own name in the freshly-raked earth. She breathed in deeply, inhaling the loamy scent of the rich soil and felt a wave of nostalgia wash over her as she remembered that smell clinging to Graeme’s well-worn leather waistcoat, along with the fresh green scents of the plants he grew. She missed his dour affection and wondered how his rheumatism was.