The Wicked Guardian (18 page)

20
.

Clare was not sorry to see the last of the cramped quarters of the Misses Peek’s lodging. At first she railed against the fate that had decisively removed Uncle Horsham and substituted a wicked, selfish, arrogant,
unfeeling
man like Lord Choate.

But stepping inside the foyer of Lady Thane’s rented house on the Crescent, Clare insensibly began to think that life had not treated her quite so badly, after all.

“And I don’t know what you thought Choate should do,” said Lady Thane, passing a cup of tea to Clare in the narrow drawing room upon her arrival. It was papered in maroon, and not at all to Lady Thane’s taste, which ran more to gilt and ivory, but the owner of the house was a gentleman advanced in years, and he had no wish to change the furnishings merely to suit a tenant. The heavy hangings at the windows succeeded in shutting out a view of the street below, and swallowed up the candlelight from the candlesticks on the mantel and on the long table, leaving the room in wavery dimness.

“I don’t know,” said Clare in a small voice. The entire drawing room, she reflected, was as large as the apartment over the milliner’s, and she realized with a pang how thoughtless she had been to quarter herself and Budge upon the Misses Peek.

“Surely you are better off with me,” said Lady Thane comfortingly, “and I must confess it will be good to visit with many of my old friends. I have heard that Lady Courtenay is here, and the Duchess of Argyle, and Margaret Strawn. And even some eligible gentlemen, and while it would not do to encourage their addresses quite yet, I always say that it never hurts to enlarge one’s acquaintance.” She seemed struck with thought, and then decided she might be misunderstood. “Among quite proper people, of course,” she added.

The reference to Harry Rowse was clear to Clare, but she did not respond. She had used Harry Rowse to bring Benedict to Bath, and it had worked as she had planned. But then what? Nothing more except that she would now be housed in luxury, a prisoner just the same. She was restless in her mind, her thoughts in turmoil. She did not know what she expected of Benedict, but she knew that she disliked him excessively, and her rebellious spirit chafed under the yoke she considered too heavy.

Lady Thane prosed along, and Clare murmured responses she hoped were appropriate. When Clare at length was taken upstairs by Mrs. Bishop, the housekeeper, she entered a room that lifted her spirits more than anything. It was yellow, with gold brocade at the windows, and a sunny carpet; the mantel was painted yellow to match; and the chair before the hearth was deep and comfortable. If she were to be a prisoner, she thought, she might as well enjoy it.

“The master’s daughter had this room, miss,” said Mrs. Bishop, “and her maid next door. I put Budge there. I thought it would suit you, having heard that a young lady was to come. Lord Choate was particularly concerned that you be made comfortable, miss, so if this room does not suit, I shall try to ready another.”

Mrs. Bishop looked anxiously at Clare. Clare turned to her with a sunny smile and said, “Thank you so much, Mrs. Bishop. I shall be very comfortable here, thank you. You have made a very good choice for me.”

Mrs. Bishop, gratified, took her courteous leave, and Clare sank into the deep yellow chair and stared mournfully at the black grate, contemplating her future.

Her future, as it went along the next weeks, was not what she had expected. Lady Thane, mindful of Clare’s mourning, turned down the cards that came her way as soon as it was learned that she was staying in Bath—that information having been current from the time that her traveling coach lumbered in on the Bath Road.

But she managed to visit the Pump Room on a regular basis, and daily took tea in the Assembly Rooms, and required Clare’s constant attendance. Lord Choate had been more exercised than Lady Thane had ever seen him the day he came to call on her in her house in Grosvenor Square.

Fortunately he had caught her as she was about to close up her house and retire to the country. Her daughter, Harriet, had been most importunate that she come to visit her, and since Lady Thane knew from past unpleasant experience that a visit to Harriet entailed endless conversation about her son and heir, about her servants, and the great damage done to woolen blankets by the moth, Lady Thane had resisted as long as she was able.

Lord Choate’s request—really an intimidating request, given in strong terms by an agitated man—that she come down to Bath and take Clare under her wing was most welcome, and Lady Thane had agreed with alacrity.

She saw now that Clare was dressed demurely, and behaved with meek propriety. And above all, she saw to it that Harry Rowse kept his distance.

To tell the truth, she did not remark any particular glance from Clare to Rowse, and she detected no undue attention to Clare on his part. But she too knew the danger that Choate spoke of, and while she had not been made privy to that disastrous event in the gardens of Carlton House, yet she was wise in the ways of the world, and what she did not know, she could shrewdly guess.

And Harry Rowse was not allowed within speaking distance of her goddaughter.

It was a different matter with Sir Alexander Ferguson. Impeccable of manner and most unexceptionable of reputation, Sir Alex provided escort from time to time. And Lady Thane eyed Clare watchfully, trying to detect a spark of regard for him, in vain.

Clare, dutiful at first, soon found the rigid routine chafing, and longed for the company of Evalina Courtenay. At length, seeing Clare far from the rebellious miss that Choate had described, Lady Thane allowed her to go with Evalina and a maid to visit certain shops.

“The lending library,” said Evalina. “I know that Mama is so much better now that she has taken the waters, and it is felt that in another two weeks she will be well enough to travel home. But in the meantime, I am sadly at loose ends.”

“I wish I had brought with me Lady Melvin’s basket,” said Clare. Seeing the blank look on her friend’s face, she hastened to explain. “Lady Melvin brought over a great number of library books that she had finished with. I had Wisby send them back when we came to Bath, but I regret the ones I had not read.”

“Then,” said Evalina promptly, “let us get some more.”

The lending library was on a side street just off the promenade, and it was not long before both girls were engrossed in the latest shipment from London. Even Lowry, Evalina’s maid, peeped over their shoulders when she thought she was not observed, for she knew that sooner or later she would get her hands on the selections, and read the night away by a flickering working candle.

There were such agonizing choices to be made. Whether to take
Leonora
or to indulge in
The Inheritance.
A reprint of
Camilla,
an old favorite due to be read again, or Charles Robert Maturin’s new tale called
The Fatal Revenge.
At length, flushed with anticipation of long, pleasant afternoons ahead, they emerged from the shop. Lowry was bowed down with a basket full of books, and the two girls were laughing as they stepped onto the sidewalk, directly in front of two well-dressed gentlemen.

“What a happy accident!” said the older of the two, lifting his hat in salute. “Miss Penryck, Miss Courtenay, may I be permitted to present to you my good friend Fanhope? Come, Fanhope, make your bow.”

Harry Rowse turned to his companion, an inarticulate young man with high points and a masterfully tied cravat. With acute embarrassment Fanhope bowed and with an effort managed a few strangled syllables by way of acknowledgment of the introductions.

“We should like to escort you back to Lady Thane,” said Rowse. “It seems meant that we should do so, does it not? Meeting you by accident?”

Clare did not know precisely how it happened, but she was soon walking with Harry Rowse at her side and a head full of chaotic thoughts. Evalina, behind her, was doing her best to set Fanhope at ease, without notable success.

Clare hurried along the street, anxious to regain what she knew was the haven of Lady Thane’s presence. She should not have left it, even with Evalina, and Lady Thane’s permission.

“Must you hurry so?” complained Rowse. “One would get the opinion that you did not want to be seen with me.”

“How right you are!” agreed Clare cordially. “I wonder at you, really, Mr. Rowse. Surely you must know that I have no wish to talk to you.”

“It wasn’t always like that, was it, Miss Penryck? But I see the thought of the past distresses you. Believe me, I am on my good behavior, and you have nothing to fear from me. But I truly cannot believe you prefer Sir Alex to me?”

He dropped his voice, and entered into a remarkably apt imitation of his rival. “And on the left there, you see the Roman baths. One must wonder how great the Romans would have been had they not succumbed to the indolence engendered by the warm water, although, on the other hand, surely the taste of the waters must result in an eschewing of frivolity and a return to a world filled with mayhem as an agreeable alternative. But on the other hand...”

Clare giggled. He was Sir Alexander to the life! But she was fast becoming aware that were someone to see her on such easy terms with Rake Rowse, she would be hard put to erase the stain on her reputation.

The carriage moving across the end of the street caught her eye, and her heart sank. Of all people to see her, even though properly in company with a maid! She wished Lady Melvin had not passed by just then. In moments Clare and Evalina were restored to Lady Thane’s protection, but Clare was still anxious over the accidental encounter with Harry Rowse.

While Harry Rowse had been on his good behavior, which was in fact very agreeable to her in her world, which seemed predominantly leaden, yet she realized that she was well out of the encounter. And she was not worried about her own person anymore, for Harry had been most correct in his behavior. But she was worried about her reputation. And although Benedict did not care about her—and since if he did hear that Rowse was paying her marked attention, he would simply put her into a closer confinement than he had already done—she did not wish to put his reaction to the test.

She had not believed she could feel so low in her mind. Even Lady Thane, not a noticing person in general, spoke bracingly to her a few days later. “I must say I had not believed you would fall into such a decline. Whatever will Choate say?”

“Nothing, Lady Thane, I am persuaded.”

“You have not eaten above half your dinner, and I know that you had only a mouthful of soup at luncheon, and Mrs. Bishop makes the most delectable cream soup. I think she puts sherry in it,” said Lady Thane ruminatively. “Or perhaps a port? No, even a teaspoonful of port would make it quite a different color. I am sure it was sherry.

But then, child, you did not like it? Perhaps I had best send for Mr. Potsworth.”

Since Mr. Potsworth, Lady Thane’s man of medicine, had only one cure for anything at all, and that was a course of the nastiest waters on the face of the globe, Clare shuddered and assured Lady Thane that she was fine—just a little tired, that’s all.

“Well,” said Lady Thane at last, “I shall hope to see an improvement, or I shall indeed see that Mr. Potsworth has a look at you.”

The air of gentle melancholy that descended upon Clare pervaded even her solitary hours, of which there were few indeed. Lady Thane, whether warned by Lady Melvin or not, now vowed she could not do without Clare at her side every moment. And Clare was glad enough to abide by the rules. Nothing suited her. She even lost interest in the perils of Julia and the uncommon wickedness of the Demon of Sicily. It reminded her too much of her complaints against Choate.

A part of her insisted upon being fair to her guardian. What else was he to do with her? She was in .great comfort, with a lady to give her countenance and who cared about her, and she had all the freedom that could be used by a young lady in mourning.

But, said her impish other self, he trapped her on the matter of the ceiling. How had he known that Tom was watching her? She knew that Tom talked to anyone who would listen, and Benedict was eminently underhanded when he took advantage of her servants.

Her thoughts revolved more than she liked around Benedict. But they always returned to the point where they began—what was she to do?

She missed her grandmother; there was no question about that. Even the abbey was not the same, and she had no wish to return to the home she had known when the hub of it was no longer there. But of course she could not wish Lady Penryck back, now that she was out of her pain.

She would be seventeen soon. And that meant, according to Mr. Austin, eight more years during which she must obey the whims of Lord Choate. Not until she was twenty-five would she be mistress of her own money, of her own life. She would not live that long, she was sure, for melancholy thoughts could prove fatal—at least, they often were within the boards of Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels.

There was of course one other way open to her. She had not given it as much thought as it deserved, regarding her own marriage as simply a vague arrangement that would have pleased her grandmother.

She had been sent to London to effect such an arrangement, but it did not truly have reality to her. Now she began to devote considerable thought to the subject.

And almost as though to help her along on her conjectures, a caller was announced. “Lady Thane begs you will come down at once,” said Budge. “Sir Alexander, Ferguson has come to call.”