When a Scot Loves a Lady (35 page)

K
itty did not speak to her mother about Viscount Gray's suspicions of Lord Chamberlayne. She simply did not know where to begin.
Mama, I have had an affair—and it seems that perhaps I still am having it—with Lord Blackwood, whose fellow spies believe your beau is involved with persons planning sedition, and they have asked me to assist them in acquiring information about Lord Chamberlayne's family and possible illegal activities
. No, that would not do. But she could not do what Lord Gray asked and conceal it from her mother either.

Standing by her bedchamber hearth, she drew her letter to him from her pocket and placed it on the grate. She must have time to consider, especially to understand how important Lord Chamberlayne was to her mother in truth.

The following day she joined her mother in paying calls. The day after that passed much the same, including a drive with Lord Chamberlayne in the park. The days crept into a week. Leam did not return.

“Kitty, you are fidgeting,” her mother said to her as the carriage halted at the curb on Berkeley Square to collect Emily and Madame Roche.

“I am not. I never fidget.” She untangled her fingers from her reticule strings. “Mama, where were you when you did not come home in the evening a sennight ago?”

The dowager met her placid look with a glimmer in her eye.

“I wondered when you would ask that.”

“I was waiting for you to make an announcement. I expected you to. Where were you?”

“There is no announcement to be made. I was at your brother's house. Serena was feeling poorly, and you know I am the only mother she has now. You might have asked me at any time.” The dowager folded hands gloved in the finest kid on her lap of striped taffeta.

“I am sorry Serena is unwell. I will call on her tomorrow.” She exhaled sharply. “But this is ridiculous. When will Lord Chamberlayne make an offer?”

“He already has.”

She stared, a tangled mess of relief and disappointment inside. “You did not accept him?”

Her mother reached across the seat and took her chin into her hand as though she were a child.

“Kitty, I spent nearly thirty years married to a man who ill suited me. I am tempted, but I shan't dive into another marriage quite so swiftly.”

Kitty nudged her face away. She
must
make certain.

“But you have had ample time. He has been courting you for months.”

“And what of your suitors, daughter? Several have been calling on you for years.”

Kitty looked out the carriage window. Emily and her companion were descending the steps of their house. Her mother had never asked her this. Never pressed her. Why now?

“They do it mostly for the novelty of it,” she said. “None of them have a sincere attachment. It is the image of cool, reserved inaccessibility in the face of rumor that attracts them, not I.”

Her mother's thin brows dipped into a V.

“Katherine, I never wish to hear you say such a thing. You disrespect a gentleman by judging his attentions in such a manner.”

Kitty's head snapped around. “Mama, you cannot be serious.”

“Your pride has outrun you, daughter. You have become far too comfortable dismissing any man you don't feel lives up to your exalted idea of what a gentleman should be.”

Kitty's cheeks flamed. “And what precisely is that?”

“He must be extraordinarily learned, well placed in fashionable circles, an exceptional conversationalist, titled, wealthy, a man of taste and elegance, as loyal as yourself to his loved ones, and I daresay handsome as well.”

“I never said such a thing.” Her heart beat very swiftly.

“You needn't. You live it. But you will not find such a paragon, daughter. Men like that do not exist. Most of them are rather more like your father.” There was no bitterness to her mother's voice, only the clean, uncluttered sense Kitty had always admired. But, even so, this was not honesty.

“Mama, I must know something. Why did you never—”

The carriage door opened.

“
Bonjour
, Katrine! My lady.” Madame Roche was all gracious smiles, black and red and white fluttering with frills. Emily tucked her slender frame into the seat beside Kitty and placed a book in her hand.

“Here is the one I promised you. It is not nearly as tumultuous as the Racine play Lord Blackwood lent me, but I think you may like it, and you said you had seen
Phaedra
before, in any case.”

“It was such a
plaisir
to encounter His Lordship again so soon. What a kind gentleman!”

“We saw him yesterday at Lady Carmichael's drawing room,” Emily supplied.

“
Hélas
, with the large dogs.” The elegant widow sniffed.

“I did not know you were acquainted with Lord Blackwood, Kitty.” Her mother's gaze sharpened.

“A little.”

“Quite a lot, I should say,” Emily commented. “But that was to be expected given the circumstances.”

Kitty's heart thudded. Her mother studied her. The carriage rumbled into motion.

“I have been thinking about that duel, Kitty, the one in which his brother died.” Emily's lips pinched together. “It was insensibly tragic.”

“It is men, dear girl,” the dowager said.

“I don't think I understand them very well,” Emily replied.

Kitty felt her mother's regard on her. She was wrong. She did not hold all gentlemen to impossibly high standards. Perhaps, like Emily, she simply did not understand them.

T
he exhibition opening spread through three high-ceilinged chambers of the British Museum. It was a spectacular show, a display of oil paintings of the Italian masters of the late Renaissance. Thick-muscled Masaccios competed for position on the wall with delicate Botticellis and dark, brooding Caravaggios.

Kitty had attention for little of it. Once she would have enjoyed such a display. Now her distraction, apparently, knew no bounds.

“Kitty, you are not yourself. Lady March remarked on it recently and I daresay she has the right of it.”

She clutched her reticule to hide her distress. “Then, Mama, that simply must be.”

“Give me your arm.”

“No. I will take Emily's.” She searched for her friend in the crowd.

“Do not frown, Katherine. It causes wrinkles.”

“I needn't have any concern over wrinkles. As you so kindly pointed out in the carriage, I apparently have no interest in securing a gentleman's notice.”

“You are twisting my words.” The dowager studied a graceful portrait of the Virgin and child, the chubby babe reaching negligently for his mother's exposed breast, pacific grace etched on both their glowing faces. “You have notice, only little interest.”

But she was interested. More than she could bear.

The dowager reached for her arm, but she turned away. If she had told her mother the truth years ago, perhaps she could confide in her now. But it was too late. She must bear this uncertainty and confusion alone.

She searched for Emily again and found her by a portrait of a peasant girl sitting beside a brace of soggy birds tied with twine.

“It is quite lifelike, don't you think?” Emily said pensively.

“Too.” Kitty took her arm and drew her away, sucking in steadying breaths. “What have you been doing this past sennight back in town, Marie Antoine?”

“I have finished with that name, Kitty,” she replied. “I am resolved to find another.”

“I am certain you will come up with something lovely, as always.”

Beneath her hand, Emily's body went stiff and she halted. Kitty followed the direction of her attention. Several yards away through a parting in the crowd stood a young, darkly handsome gentleman with a striking beauty on his arm. Mr. Yale with Lady Constance Read, Leam's cousin.

“Why look, Emily. It is Mr. Yale,” she said quite unnecessarily, but her thoughts had scrambled. “Have you seen him since Shropshire?”

“No.” Emily's lips were tight. Kitty's heart thudded. The gentleman and his companion were looking quite obviously at them. If she spoke with them, she might hear something of Leam. He had made her no promises. She didn't even know if he remained in London. Apparently he had found the ability to resist her after all, but that certainty made no difference to her aching heart and the warmth in her blood each night when she lay awake thinking of him. Thinking of him and wishing she lived another woman's life, a woman who needn't regret and remember and fantasize, yet never truly live.

“He has seen us. We must say hello.” Kitty drew her friend forward.

Mr. Yale smiled quite pleasantly. Emily slipped her arm from Kitty's, turned completely about, and disappeared into the crowd.

“Lady Katherine, how do you do?” He bowed. “Allow me to present to you Lady Constance Read.”

The sumptuous girl smiled and made a very pretty curtsy. She was taller than Kitty by an inch or two, all golden tresses, fashionable attire, and vibrant blue eyes.

“Lady Katherine, I am delighted to make your acquaintance,” she said with a soft northern lilt. “My friend here has told me such diverting stories of your holiday sojourn in Shropshire. My cousin is rather more close-lipped about it, but you know how Scottish men can be rather taciturn.”

Kitty's hands were damp. Abruptly she felt …
studied
. Both pairs of eyes watched her, it seemed, the sparkling blue and the silver rather too acute for a chance meeting.

“I know very little of Scottish gentlemen, in fact, Lady Constance,” she said quite honestly.

“But your mother's beau, Lord Chamberlayne, is my countryman, of course, although from quite farther north than either Read Hall or Alvamoor,” she said with a lovely smile that looked perfectly genuine. “You are better acquainted with Scotsmen than you know.”

Kitty met Mr. Yale's quick gaze.

“My intended spurns me, it seems,” he only said, glancing into the crowd.

“Then I am to understand Lady Constance knows of your charade at Willows Hall?”

“She does.”

“It had the desired effect, you know. Her parents have left off with their plans to betroth her to Mr. Worthmore. Did she thank you?”

“A terse word or two.” He smiled slightly. “And speaking of charades, my lady, have you come across our other mutual acquaintance recently? This week, perhaps?”

Kitty struggled for words. “I think you must know I have.”

“More recently than in the park with our worthy viscount? By the way, neither of them told me of that meeting or I would have been there to throw down my gauntlet on your behalf, before both.” He bowed. “I was obliged to learn of it through other channels.”

She could barely think. “I don't know what you mean to ask me.”

“He means, Lady Katherine—Oh, may I call you Kitty?” Lady Constance said prettily. “I do so dislike excessive formality.”

Excessive?

Kitty nodded.

“He means to ask, Kitty, if you have seen Leam in the past several days since he re-donned his farmer's garb and began going about ladies' drawing rooms with his dogs again?”

“Slow down, Con. You are bewildering the lady, I imagine.”

“Thank you, sir,” Kitty replied with more composure than her racing pulse recommended, “but I am not such a slow top as all that.” Lady Constance was involved in the secrets, clearly.

“Of course you aren't. Pray, forgive me, ma'am.”

“Do cease all this bowing, sir.” The visitors to the exhibition seemed to flow about her like a quick creek, she in the center of it with her feet sunk in icy water. She
was
bewildered, and yet her skin prickled with excitement. They were speaking to her as a confidante, as if they knew she knew everything. But, after all, they were spies. Or not quite, if Leam was to be believed. “If he did not tell you about the meeting with Lord Gray, then does he know you are speaking with me like this now?”

Mr. Yale shook his head slowly.

“Why are you? Isn't this all secret information?”

“In point of fact, we are no longer at it, my lady. We've all quit, except Gray, which makes it all the more worrisome that Blackwood has returned to it. He was the one who most wanted out.”

“More to the point, Kitty.” Constance laid a gentle hand on Kitty's arm. “My cousin trusted you.”

In Shropshire it had all gone too fast, their coming together like a sudden storm. It felt the same now, the rush of the unreal carrying her away. But, just as before, she welcomed it. She
longed
for it.

“He said he intended to abandon that role and return to Scotland. Why is he doing this?”

Lady Constance lifted slender brows. “We thought perhaps you might know.”

“Did you come here today to speak with me, then?”