The Wicked Guardian (12 page)

Benedict, however, was a man of considerable intelligence and a certain amount of experience with the female variety of logic. He thought he could discern, now, a deliberately planned ambush, where he might become enmeshed in the toils of accusation and counterattack, and lose his way. That, he vowed, would not happen to Benedict Choate.

“I consider that you have solved my problem. I confess I had not seen my way so clearly until now, but it is just the thing.”

She looked up hastily at the altered note in his voice. Apprehensive about what was to come, she hastened to divert him. “You do consider me a nuisance and a disgrace, you know. Miss Morton said so.”

The sudden revelation came as a shock to him. “She could not have told you so!” he exclaimed.

“Then it is true,” she said. “You do not deny it, I notice.”

Too late he saw the pit beneath his feet. “I did not quite say that, you know. You should not believe all you hear.”

“She was not speaking to me,” said Clare. “But it is clear that you have discussed me, quite unnecessarily, with Miss Morton. And since I know that you have so little honor as to talk about me—long before you were my guardian—I see that I cannot depend upon your setting all straight in London. No, I think I shall not go to London.” She looked absurdly young, under the dignity that she wore like an adult’s cloak on a child. But yet, beneath it all, he could see that the dignity was not something she donned for the occasion. She was a well-bred young lady, old beyond her years in some things. And he remembered with a twinge his own first year in London, acquiring some town bronze while his fond parent believed he was at Oxford, engrossed in his study of Greek.

He had been wrong in talking to Marianna, of course. But he had been mistaken in her, too, if she had repeated his words to anyone else. He must be more careful, and as a prospect for a harmonious married life ahead, it lacked appeal.

But Clare—strangely!—was smiling. “I have the answer, Lord Choate. You asked me what I wanted to do, and I know now. I’m going to go and live with my own old governess. Miss Peek lives with her sister, and I know she will be glad to have me. You can rest assured—”

“Where does this Miss—Peek, is it?—live?”

“It will be such fun, and nobody will care that I am in mourning. For they won’t heed that, you see. Not in Bath!”

Aghast, Lord Choate could only echo, “Bath?”

1
4
.

Benedict took a grip on himself.
“Not
to Bath!”

“Oh, it will be delightful!” she said, as though he had not spoken. “I cannot think why I did not think of it before!”

“Disabuse your mind of the plan,” said Benedict grimly. “It will not do.”

“Miss Peek is quite as good a governess as your sister’s, I am convinced. And surely if I am to have a companion, then I do not see why I am not to have my choice in the matter. She will be glad to see me, and the salary you would give your sister’s companion will surely be welcome to Miss Peek. For I think they are perhaps a little
pressed
.”

“You will not go to Bath,” said Benedict, and she recognized with satisfaction the note of final authority in his voice. “That town is a hotbed of intrigue and even vice, and it is totally out of the question that you set foot there without a better chaperone than a governess.”

“Do you think it is really
wicked
?” she demanded, and then artlessly added, “I suppose you are right, for I am persuaded that you would know about such things.”

He laughed harshly. “You suppose right. Not that I have indulged in all the lower forms of activity, but I know enough to steer my way clear of them. But to go to live in Bath without a woman of some credit in the world to show you how to go on is totally ineligible. Do not think that I will relent, for I warn you, on this point I am adamant.”

She sighed hugely. “And I had so hoped to see Peeky again.”

He reflected momentarily. “I am glad to hear you say so, for I feel that all may be settled comfortably after all. Suppose Miss Peek were to come here to live with you? She has the advantage of having your regard, and until your period of mourning is over, you will wish to lead a retired life.”

Benedict was uncomfortably aware that he was spouting fustian, but if Clare did not feel as he suggested, she
ought
to feel so, and he was not ready to countenance any vagaries on her part.

His ward was just now looking at him as though he had produced a vision of angels for her entertainment. “How marvelous!” she cried. “Just the thing! I wonder how you came to think of that!”

He had an uneasy recognition that he was losing control of the situation. He had had a severely trying few days since Ruffin had come to bring him the dire news of his guardianship, and he had never felt so like a chip adrift on the waves as now when he tried to cope with the ceaseless changing of his ward’s mind and moods.

He thought automatically of the quiet backwater he expected of his marriage. His duty by the family and his duty toward Marianna, who had been promised to him from her cradle, weighed heavily on him, and he had thought that, in wedding Marianna, he could rejoice in the quiet security of duty well done, of heirs assured, of freedom to live, as so many of his married acquaintance did, in the clubs of Brook Street or in the outdoor sports that lay to his hand on one or another of his estates.

He had not truly thought of the quality of such a life. Suffice it to say, he had considered it as inevitable, and with certain advantages. Marianna would not be importunate, bewildering, devious, scheming—as this girl before him clearly was. She was a challenge, this girl, and he would rise to the occasion. She smiled at him, transforming her face enchantingly.

“How good you are to me!”

The sound he gave then could be described as a snort, or even a bark of laughter. It held a wealth of skepticism in it. “I wonder,” he said wryly, “what I have done this time.”

“You have straightened all out for me,” said Clare sunnily.

“I have the strangest feeling that I have somehow blundered. But I suppose that I must await the unfolding of events to tell me where I erred.”

Clare favored him with a sidelong glance, in which he was startled to see a totally mature female peeping out of the kittenish face.

“I cannot understand what you mean, sir,” she said innocently, “but I shall do my best to cause you no discomfort. You will be anxious to return to Miss Morton,” she added, “and I will watch the journals to have news of your wedding.”

“The happy event is to take place in October, I believe,” he said briefly. “I shall convey your compliments to Miss Morton.”

“Pray do!” Clare urged. “I am sure you will do famously together.”

“Thank you,” said Benedict repressively as he took his leave.

His next stop was at the office of Mr. Austin. Mr. Austin was overwhelmed at the dazzling appearance of Lord Choate. Dressed correctly in country buckskins, with high top boots, and a simply folded cravat, he contrived to make all pretenders to elegance fall into the shade.

“Now, then, Mr. Austin,” said Choate, “I must tell you what I have arranged. I have sent for Miss Penryck’s former governess, a Miss Peek, I think. She is to reply to you, and I trust you will send her traveling funds.” He spoke further about salary to be paid, and directions to Purvis.

“Lord Choate, if you will permit me,” said Mr. Austin, beaming upon his visitor, “you have done a magnificent job. I confess I did not see how it would work out, since Miss Clare...” His voice died away. He thought better of bringing forth any doubts he might have as to Clare’s surprising acquiescence in what would be, after all, a dull existence.

“... is accustomed to making her own decisions,” Lord Choate finished for him. “It was a great shame that Lady Penryck was such an invalid. The child has grown up beyond her years.”

“Just so, my lord. But her father was just such another one. Couldn’t wait to spend his money. He had a pair of grays in his stable—not the ones that ran away on the Bath road, but some that were sold after the breakup. They were real goers!”

“Well, we must between us see that his daughter does not have an opportunity to spend her money. I rely upon you, Mr. Austin, to keep me informed of any events that you think I should know of.”

With many an expression of goodwill, Mr. Austin ushered his elegant visitor to the street and stood watching after him as he walked the few steps to the coachyard of the White Swan. He shook his head dolefully. He recognized his responsibility toward Clare’s small inheritance, but in no way was he going to be held responsible for what that young lady did.

As long as her grandmother was alive, he reflected, Clare had done nothing to reflect discredit upon her. In fact, she had often astonished him by her grasp of business details. He had sometimes felt that he was the child and she the efficient director of affairs. No wonder Lady Penryck had judged her mature enough to venture upon a London season. And from all he had heard, she had reflected great credit on the family. At least, no other rumor had reached him.

But he remembered her father, and he shook his head dubiously as he watched Clare’s guardian walking innocently down the walk. But if anyone could make her see reason, it would be Lord Choate. And Mr. Austin envied him not at all.

Miss Peek, leaving Bath behind her without a qualm, rode toward Penryck Abbey. She would be so happy to see her dear Clare again, to say nothing of the abbey, which she had loved during the years she had presided over Clare’s schoolroom. Clare would be quite the young lady now, having the elegance that only London could provide, and it was with great gratification that she touched, inside her reticule, the letter that Lord Choate had written to her: “Miss Penryck tells me that her dearest wish is that you come to share her life at Penryck Abbey...

And she was on her way. Her sister, left behind in Bath, had prophesied mournfully, “That girl always could turn you around her little finger. You had better watch your step with her.”

But Miss Peek knew Clare far better than Sara did, and while Clare had often been unpredictable, yet she had never, never done anything the least
improper
. One phrase in Lord Choate’s letter did lend itself to a feeling of misgiving. “Miss Penryck is to lead a retired life while she is in mourning.” Miss Peek hoped that Clare had agreed. Otherwise...

Her arrival at Penryck Abbey was all that she could have wished. Clare flew out of the door when the carriage stopped, and threw her arms around her governess.

“Dear Peeky! How good of you to come! Here, let Budge take your bandbox—bandbox—Budge! Peeky, I’m sure you will want tea. Come into the living room—no, no, I know you will want to take off your bonnet first You are to have your old room, and I am in mine! What fun this will be!”

“Fun, my dear?”

“Oh, I know I should be sad because Grandmama is gone. But only think how much pain she had, Peeky, and I couldn’t wish her back. But I do miss her.”

“Of course you do. So do we all. But now you must tell me all that has happened since I’ve been away.”

But all did not come out that first day. It was more than a week, and Clare had told Miss Peek about the newest fashions in London—much newer than appeared in the
Lady’s Journal
—and the Greek statues that everyone said were wonderful, but that Lord Elgin was no better than a thief for taking them away from Greece. “But the Greeks, you know, weren’t fond of them at all, not until they thought they were leaving the country. But the government, you know, wants to buy them now, and someone says that they are buying the statues only to take them back to Greece. Which is a great waste!”

“It is a nice question of honor, my dear,” said Miss Peek mildly.

“I confess I agree that it was wrong. But then ... I wish you could have seen them!”

Lady Thane’s house had been described in detail, and the shops in Oxford Street—“that was where Lord Choate rescued me.”

“Rescued you?” said Miss Peek, blinking. “From what, my dear?”

“There was a small boy, and I did not see him. He made away with my parcel, running past me and snatching it and poor Budge—she hated London, you know—stood there screaming, no good at all, and I had to run after the boy myself. I knew I shouldn’t, but what was I to do?”

Miss Peek said with a cough, “Did you get your parcel back? Was that what Lord Choate rescued?”

“Oh, no. I don’t know precisely how to tell you this. But, you see, I stumbled. And fell.”

“Oh, dear!”

“And Lord Choate came along just then, and Budge was still screaming, and my gown was torn...”

“And Lord Choate rescued you. I see how it was.”

“Oh, but you don’t. He was so odious. He told Budge off proper—so she told me later—and read me a scold all the way home. And even after that, he”—her voice trailed away—“said some very unpleasant things.”

Miss Peek could well imagine Lord Choate’s chagrin at seeing his kinswoman stretched her length on the cobbles of Oxford Street. But, glancing wisely at Clare, she held her peace. Clare had already felt the sting of that episode, and it was not needful for the governess to ring a peal over her too.

“Well, my dear, it could have been much worse, you know.”

Clare’s face reflected her unspoken question.

“Why, surely you must see that if Lord Choate had not come along at that precise time, only think what dreadful things might have happened to you. I do know,” continued Miss Peek in her thoughtful, gentle voice that nonetheless evoked a biddable mood in her charge, “that you were mortified beyond belief, but at least—so I collect—your injuries were not serious? And how unfortunate it would have been for you to be at the mercy of a mob!” Miss Peek managed to invest the word with all the horrors of
The Invisible Hand.

“Perfectly gothic,” echoed Clare, slightly subdued. “I do know that I owe him gratitude for his timely rescue. But he didn’t have to trumpet that ... that
accident
all over town.”

“Oh, my dear, he could not have done so!” Miss Peek looked up in horror. “He is of such exalted
ton,
I am persuaded you are mistaken!”

“No? Let me tell you, then, dear Peeky, how mistaken you are in your judgment of that villain.”

She had been in two minds about revealing her disgrace at the regent’s ball. And as to the disgrace, she knew that fleeing in tears would be considered almost as bad as retiring to the shadowed garden with a known rake. But the habit of confiding in Peeky was strong, and in fact she longed to lay bare her guardian’s iniquities. And he had such a multitude of them, Clare believed, that they would serve to occupy her for some time.

She told her first about Benedict’s claiming her for a dance, and taking advantage of her captivity in the set to urge her to travel home again. “Since I was clearly upsetting the world by my
green
behavior.” She eyed Miss Peek severely. But the governess knew her charge well, and allowed not the slightest quiver to appear on her mild face.

“And so, at the first opportunity, I left him.” In an effort to be fair, she said, “He was taking me back to Lady Thane, but there was such a crush that I ... I got separated from him. And then I went out on the balcony for a bit of air, and then...” She fell silent.

She knew full well she had been an idiot to allow herself to engage in conversation with Harry Rowse, to say nothing of allowing him to show her the garden—a transparent excuse, if there ever was one. And she disliked confessing to what after all did not place her in a glowing light of virtue. But, basically honest, she forged ahead.