The Wicked Guardian (4 page)

Marianna intended that the connection remain unnoticed. Looking sidelong at Benedict she thought better of broaching the subject to him. He had taught her, politely but with decision, that opposition could in no way alter his mind. She resolved, not for the first time, to tread warily until after their wedding. He would not cry off now, she knew, but still ... forty thousand pounds a year was not a sum to take the least chance on.

She could not help but say, however, “Such a charming child,” in an interrogatory tone of voice.

There was a frown between Lord Benedict’s black brows. Absently he reached a finger up to smooth his left eyebrow. Suddenly he laughed. “Imagine! Being recognized in London only because I resemble a portrait in Dorset! And not even I, in fact, but my eyebrows!” he said, genuinely amused.

“I believe they are considered very distinguished,” said Marianna, adding, “although of course, it is not the thing to discuss such a personal matter.”

“But, knowing my friends, I am assured that it is done. But rarely, I will admit, with such frankness.”

“I wonder,” ventured Marianna, “how she will take.”

“At the rate she has started,” said Benedict, “I dread the thought of further association with that child.”

“I feared,” said Marianna, “that she was going to make a claim upon you.” She added archly, “And if so, I should be very jealous.”

“Jealous of a child, Marianna? I confess I thought better of you than that.”

“I trust your honor, Benedict.”

With that not-quite-subtle reminder, Marianna tugged gently at the silken rein by which she led Benedict Choate in the ways she wished him to go.

Dutifully Benedict bowed. “Your servant, my dear, as always,” he said automatically. “But not, I fear,” he added in quite a different tone of voice, “as far as your
plumassier’
s. I see Lady Courtenay approaching, and I have remembered that I must meet friends at White’s.”

“At eleven in the morning?” protested Marianna.

“Pray give Lady Courtenay my best duty,” he said, ignoring her protests, and, tipping his top hat with grace to her, and a bow to the fast-approaching Lady Courtenay, who, he had time to notice, had her plain, eager daughter with her, Benedict vanished with all possible speed in the direction of St. James’s Street.

4
.

If Clare believed Lady Thane’s comfortable assurance that the recent interview with Miss Morton and Lord Choate had already been forgotten, she could agree at least so far as those two were concerned.

But as for herself, she found that as they drove away from Leadenhall Street the eyebrows engrossed her to the exclusion of all else.

It was unsettling to see the portrait come down from the wall of the long gallery and walk about the streets of London. And while she must be perfectly honest, knowing that the portrait of Lord Benedict Choate himself did not hang on the gallery walls, yet the family resemblance to their mutual great-grandfather was more than striking.

She was finally able to put Lord Choate out of her mind, when Sir Alexander Ferguson and his aunt, Lady Warfield, made up a party to see the Tower of London. Sir Alexander was knowledgeable about the ghosts and the executions and the famous and ill-fated prisoners, but his prosy gloom vanished from her mind when she saw the snowy bear from Greenland with his coal-black nose, and the lions, and the improbable zebra—what was once called a painted ass—and the strangest of all, the two kangaroos. Never before, had she seen such marvels!

Clare was gratified, during the next few days, to know that she was becoming more and more acquainted in the circle of her godmother’s friends. As well she might, since Lady Thane was invited nearly everywhere, and Clare was of course invited too.

At length came a day, three weeks after her arrival in London, when Lady Thane came in search of her in the small back sitting room, called, from the color of its furnishings, the Yellow Room. It was now a favorite retreat for Clare, not so grand as the Blue Saloon or the green brocade drawing room, or even the somber-hued back room.

She had with her this day the second volume of
Bewildered Affections
,
or All is Not Lost
, a novel of some years
past, but Clare had much reading to catch up on, for Grandmama had not subscribed to the latest novels.

Lady Thane opened the door and hurried in, the swish of her taffeta underskirt marking her progress. “My dear, there you are! I will not stay long, for I know that I hate to have my own reading interrupted, but I just have had a revelation.”

Clare promptly put away her book, secretly noting the page number so as not to be delayed when she could take it up again. “What can that be?”

“I have just been counting up the parties we’ve attended, my dear. Routs, and afternoon teas, and a card party at the duchess’s, although I fear that must have been a very dull evening for you, since you do not play cards. And Lady Warfield’s invitation to the Tower, and Lady Courtenay’s being so good as to invite you into her barouche last week Friday in the park...”

“Your friends have been most kind.”

“Well,” said Lady Thane complacently, “I do have friends, and I fancy that I still have credit in society, even though dear Harriet has been married these two years, and rarely comes to London now. But my idea, Clare, is to have a ball.”

“A ball?”

“We owe so many people. I thought we could open up the ballroom—you know, it hasn’t been used since Harriet’s last ball. I remember it was such a sad crush!” Lady Thane’s eyes sparkled. ‘Two hundred and fifty cards...”

That was the beginning of what Clare could only regard as pandemonium. There was system in it, somewhere, she was sure. But she could not discern the pattern. Lady Thane, far from being the indolent, lackadaisical woman that Clare had thought her, responded to the challenge she had set herself as an artillery horse hearing the trumpets.

There were lists, and tradesmen, and Darrin the butler dealing with ever-increasing details, and Lady Thane in a blissful state of confusion.

Clare was allowed to do nothing—and in fact, she would not have known where to begin. Berry Brothers were consulted for wine, and Gunter’s for the ices they were famed for—at a most" reasonable price, too, said Lady Thane, for a new shipment of ice from Greenland had just arrived and been buried beneath the cellars of their establishment in Berkeley Square.

At length Clare decided she needed some new ribbons to run through a new skirt, and with Lady Thane’s permission she set out with Budge for Oxford Street. It was the first time that Clare had been shopping alone, and the unexpected sense of freedom was exhilarating.

But Budge did not share her feeling. Budge did not like London, and Budge was vocal enough about it so that Hobbs had been quite sharp with her in the servants’ hall. “Be it that you don’t like it, that’s you that’s not up to snuff. But don’t come cracking to us about it.
We
didn’t invite you here.” And Budge continued with a darkling feeling about the perils of the streets of the wicked city. For, she reasoned, if you can’t count on friends where you live, then where are you?

Her grumbling finally gave out after Clare had finished her shopping. “Never mind, Budge,” consoled Clare. “We’re done now and we’ll be back home in a trice. I’m sorry I ever brought you to London, Budge. I shouldn’t have done so had I thought you would be so desperately unhappy.”

Budge tucked the parcels under her arm and, mollified, grunted, “But I’d a been worrying all the while about who was taking care of you, Miss Clare, and that’s a fact. But we’ll be going back before long, won’t we?”

“You mean back to Dorset? I should hope so.”

Budge reached to clutch her shawl closer to her chin. Even though the air was mild, she had a fixed impression that the air of London was full of evil. Her gesture loosened a parcel, and the brown paper object fell to the pavement Clare exclaimed, and turned back to aid her maid, when a small ragged urchin darted out of the crowd, snatched the parcel from the pavement, and took to his heels. Clare, instantly indignant cried out “Stop, thief!”

Her only thought was pursuit. The boy must not be allowed to escape. She feared to lose sight of him, in the mill of people, and ran after him, heedless of the passersby, ignoring the comments of surprised onlookers.

But the boy was too fast for her, and disappeared within a few yards, and Clare, intent upon seeing where he had gone, did not notice the uneven cobbles beneath her feet. She felt her smooth-soled slipper skid, and instantly fell to her hands and knees, her breath knocked out of her by the impact.

Budge, at her heels, saw her mistress felled by what in Budge’s alarmed fancy could only be foul play. Her nightmare fears at last realized, she dropped the rest of her parcels and opened her mouth. The screams she omitted at first had no shape, but within seconds, as a curious crowd gathered, she was able to form the word “Murder!” which she expressed in one long, high-pitched note.

“Budge!” cried Clare, but due to her position, still on the cobbles, and a sharp pain in her knee, the sound came out as a whisper, far too faint to reach Budge’s ear.

Clare’s heart sank. Of all things, a scene in Oxford Street was the worst possible thing that could befall her. She tested her knee, but decided, as pain shot through, that she was not ready to try it.

“Ah, the lady’s down. Somebody shoved her. Stop that caterwauling! Did someone really stab her?”

It was the sense of the crowd that murder had indeed been done, and although Clare was sitting up, clearly still alive, she wished she were dead. But if she could just get Budge shut up, and on their way home without anyone seeing them...

It was a vain hope.

Clare watched, as in a dream, the crowd melting away. As in a vision, Budge closed her mouth and fell silent, her ruddy cheeks an unwonted pallor.

A strong hand under her elbow and a note of concern in his voice, as Lord Benedict Choate said, “Are you much hurt?”

Of all people to come to her rescue! But Clare managed to say, even though a little shakily, “I think not. My knee, I think, will be all right.”

She stood erect again, and tested her knee, holding to Benedict’s hand. “It will serve,” she said at last. “I must thank you, sir, for your assistance. It was a foolish accident—”

“What happened?” said Benedict. “Your maid has some idea that murder is done?”

Clare looked up at her rescuer. In his dark eyes she could see a queer mixture of amusement tinged with something else she could not identify. Suddenly the enormity of her action came home to her. To run shouting down Oxford Street after a thief, for all the world like a penny-pinching greengrocer—she could not have done anything more vulgar!

“A small boy ran into me,” she improvised hastily. “I trust he was not hurt.”

“It would seem no more than he deserved. But I cannot believe murder?”

“Budge dislikes London.”

“As you do, I think. If memory serves me, you have already told me as much.”

He offered her his arm. “It is but a step to Lady Thane’s house,” he pointed out. “Perhaps you can walk that far?”

“Oh, yes,” said Clare. “Truly I was not hurt. Only mortified.”

“As well you might be,” he observed. He said nothing more until they were admitted to Lady Thane’s house. He desired Darrin to bring tea, and he stood over her until she had downed a cup of the restorative.

“Now, then,” he said, “I must point out to you that certainly to cause a scene in Oxford Street is folly.”

“I am to blame for a small boy?” she countered.

“No matter how it happened. Doesn’t Lady Thane have a carriage you can use? Doesn’t it suit your country ways to have a little decorum?”

Clare was recovering rapidly from the jarring fall. She had expected—and received, temporarily—sympathy, but suddenly Benedict had changed. “I truly am grateful to you,” she said with effort, “for rescuing me from my accident. I do not see, however, how one is to go on and never fall afoul of the least mishap. Surely London is not so well-regulated as that?”

Benedict was prey to more than one emotion. He had been alarmed when he thought she might have been hurt, and he was fully aware that he was unjust to blame her for what could, after all, have happened to anyone. But still another piece of information had reached him recently, in response to his seeking it out, and it was paramount now in his mind.

“I can’t think what you are doing in London, at your age,” he said with crisp disapproval. “At fifteen, you should still be in the schoolroom.”

“And how do you know my age?” she said with rising anger.

“I’ve made it my business to know,” he said savagely. “At fifteen, it is folly to come out in London. I am totally surprised at Lady Thane for bringing you out when you haven’t the least notion—”

“Lord Choate,” said Clare in a shaky voice, “I have said I am grateful for your assistance. I am grateful for your bringing me back to this house. I am, in addition, grateful for your ordering tea, although I do feel that my years in the schoolroom have prepared me for such a task as desiring a servant to attend to my wishes. But I do not think that by your assistance in the street you have earned the right to read me such a riot act!”

She had not finished, but she dared say no more, for tears lurked just behind her eyelids.

“Someone should,” continued Benedict inexorably.

“I perceive you do not approve of me,” said Clare.

“You perceive correctly,” said Benedict.

“I must be sure to tell my grandmama,” said Clare, “for she will be glad of your opinion, I am sure.”

Benedict now realized he had perhaps allowed his rage to overrule his extreme good sense. He had carefully fostered an attitude in his life of allowing no emotion to overrule him. The oldest of a brood of half-sisters and half-brothers, he had learned early in his life that emotion was wearing. And since nothing he had experienced so far in his life had led him to change his opinion, he was overset as much by the intensity of his rage as by his strong opinions themselves.

This winsome child, to his surprise, was possessed of a will of steel. And he had been trapped into fencing with her. But his pride would not let him admit defeat at the hands of a mere slip of a girl.

This child who now said to him, “I must beg you to enlighten me, sir. I had thought that my grandmama’s approval was all that I need concern myself with. But now, I seem to be required to gain yours as well. But really, Lord Choate, I fail to understand your concern with me.”

“I thank God daily,” said Benedict, savagely, “that I am no longer concerned with females. My sister Primula is married and off my hands, and my youngest sister is just out of the nursery.”

Clare turned away, more upset than she would have thought by his strictures. She found a great deal to think about in the pleating of the fringe on the golden damask draperies—except that she could see them only dimly through her tears.

“If I had to deal with such a female as you,” Benedict continued, “I would—”

Clare had had enough. Her pride, of which she had a good deal, prodded her now, and she took a shuddering breath and turned to face him.

Eyebrows or not, Penryck or not, he had no right to scold her as he did. And she would not allow it. She forced a smile, and crossed the room to stand before him, the marquetry table between them. Leaning forward, hands on the table, she told him with all the sweetness at her command, “But you don’t.”

A tiny muscle worked at the corner of his mouth.

“You do not have to deal with me, Cousin,” she said, “and believe me, you never will.”