‘As far as you are concerned, my dear, I should imagine that it is certainly all over,’ he said reflectively. ‘Not, of course, that I was privileged to witness your meeting with Rule. But I can guess. I am quite acute, you know.’
She abandoned the sarcastic attitude she had adopted, and stretched out her hand. ‘Oh, Robert, can you not see that I am upset?’
‘Easily,’ he answered. ‘So are my plans upset, but I don’t permit that to put me in a taking.’
She looked at him, wondering. He had an alert air, his eyes were bright and smiling. No, he was not one to give way to unprofitable emotion. ‘What are you going to do?’ she asked. ‘If Rule means to stop the girl –’
He snapped his fingers. ‘I said my plans were upset. I believe it to be quite true.’
‘You don’t seem to care,’ she remarked.
‘There are always more plans to be made,’ he said. ‘Not for you,’ he added kindly. ‘You may as well make up your mind to that. I am really distressed for you, my dear. Rule must have been so useful.’ He eyed her for a moment, and his smile broadened. ‘Oh, did you love him, Caroline? That was unwise of you.’
She got up. ‘You’re abominable, Robert,’ she said. ‘I must see him. I must make him see me.’
‘Do, by all means,’ Lethbridge said cordially. ‘I wish you may plague him to death; he would dislike that. But you won’t get him back, my poor dear. Very well do I know Rule. Would you like to see him humbled? I promise you you shall.’
She walked away to the window. ‘No,’ she said indifferently.
‘Odd!’ he commented. ‘I assure you, with me it has become quite an obsession.’ He came towards her. ‘You are not very good company today, Caroline. I shall take my leave of you. Do make Rule a scene and then I will come to see you again, and you shall tell me all about it.’ He picked up her hand and kissed it. ‘Au revoir, my love!’ he said sweetly, and went out humming a little tune under his breath.
He was on his way home to Half-Moon Street when my Lady Rule’s landaulet turned a corner of the road and came at a smart pace towards him. Horatia, seated alone now, saw him at once, and seemed undecided. Lethbridge swept off his hat and stood waiting for the carriage to draw up.
Something in that calm assumption that she would order her coachman to stop appealed to Horatia. She gave the necessary command and the landaulet came to a standstill beside Lethbridge.
One look at her was enough to assure Lethbridge that she knew just what had happened at Ranelagh. The grey eyes held a gleam of amusement. It annoyed him but he would not let that appear.
‘Alas, the jealous husband came off with the honours!’ he said.
‘He w-was clever, wasn’t he?’ Horatia agreed.
‘But inspired!’ Lethbridge said. ‘My damp fate was particularly apt. Make him my compliments, I beg of you. I was certainly caught napping.’
She thought that he was taking his humiliating defeat very well, and replied a little more warmly: ‘We were b-both caught napping, and p-perhaps it was as well, sir.’
‘I blame myself,’ he said meditatively. ‘Yet I don’t know how I could have guessed… If I had but been aware of Caroline Massey’s presence I might have been more on my guard.’
The arrow struck home as he knew it would. Horatia sat up very straight. ‘Lady Massey?’
‘Oh, did you not see her? No, I suppose not. It seems that she and Rule laid their heads together to plan our undoing. We must admit they succeeded admirably.’
‘It’s n-not t-true!’ Horatia stammered.
‘But –’ He broke off artistically, and bowed. ‘Why, of course not, ma’am!’
She stared fiercely at him. ‘Why did you say that?’
‘My dear, I beg a thousand pardons! Don’t give it another thought! Depend upon it, it was no such thing.’
‘Who told you?’ she demanded.
‘No one told me,’ he said soothingly. ‘I merely thought that the fair lady knew a vast deal of what happened last night. But I am sure I was wrong.’
‘You w-were wrong!’ she said. ‘I shall ask R-Rule!’
He smiled. ‘An excellent notion, ma’am, if it will set your mind at rest.’
She said rather pathetically: ‘You do think he will say it was n-nonsense, don’t you?’
‘I am quite sure he will,’ said Lethbridge, laughing, and stood back to allow the coachman to drive on.
He flattered himself he was an adept at shooting tiny poisonous shafts; certainly that one had gone home. While she assured herself it was a lie Horatia could not help remembering, first Lady Massey’s cruel little smile, and second, Rule’s own words: She did indeed know. And of course now Lethbridge had put her in mind of it she realized that whether the tale was true or not Rule would be bound to deny it. She did not believe it, no, but she could not help thinking about it. She could not rid herself of the idea that as a rival to the beautiful Lady Massey she stood no chance of success. Crosby Drelincourt had been the first to tell her in his oblique fashion that Lady Massey was Rule’s mistress, but it was to Theresa Maulfrey that she was indebted for further information. Mrs Maulfrey had never liked her young cousin very much, but she had made a determined attempt to cultivate her friendship as soon as she became a Countess. Unfortunately, Horatia had no more liking for Theresa than Theresa had for her, and perfectly understood the meaning of that lady’s sudden amiability. As Charlotte had so shrewdly guessed, Mrs Maulfrey had tried to patronize Horatia and when the gay Countess showed plainly that she stood in no need of patronage she had found herself quite unable to resist the temptation of saying a great many spiteful things. On the subject of Rule and his loves she spoke as a woman of the world, and as such carried weight. Horatia was left with the impression that Rule had been for years the Massey’s slave. And, as Mrs Maulfrey so sapiently remarked, a man did not change his mode of life for a chit in her teens. Mrs Maulfrey spoke of him admiringly as an accomplished lover: Horatia had no notion of swelling the ranks of his conquests. She supposed – for gentlemen were known to be strange in these matters – that he would be quite capable of making love to his wife in the interval between dalliance with widows and opera-dancers. However, since she had married him on the tacit understanding that he might amuse himself as he pleased, she could hardly object now.
So the Earl of Rule, setting out to woo his young wife, found her polite, always gay, but extremely elusive. She treated him in the friendliest way possible – rather, he thought ruefully, as she might treat an indulgent father.
Lady Louisa, considering that the state of affairs was unsatisfactory, took him roundly to task. ‘Don’t tell me!’ she said. ‘You’re in a fair way to doting on that child! Lord, I’m out of all patience with you! Why don’t you make her love you? You seem to be able to do it with any other misguided female, though why I don’t know!’
‘Ah!’ said the Earl. ‘But then you are only my sister, Louisa.’
‘And don’t try to turn it off!’ said Lady Louisa wrathfully. ‘Make love to the girl! Gracious heaven, why isn’t she in love with you?’
‘Because,’ said the Earl slowly, ‘I am too old for her.’
‘Stuff and fiddle!’ snapped her ladyship.
When the Earl went down to Meering a week later he suggested that Horatia should accompany him. Perhaps if Lady Massey had not chosen the previous evening to throw herself in his way Horatia might have wished for nothing better. But Rule and she had gone to Vauxhall Gardens with a snug party of their own contriving, and Lady Massey had gone there also.
It had all been mighty pleasant until after supper. There was music and dancing and everything had been very gay, the supper excellent and the Earl an ideal husband and host. And then it had all gone awry, for when she had tripped off with Mr Dashwood, and Pelham, and Miss Lloyd to look at the cascade, Rule too had left the box and wandered over to greet some frien
ds. Horatia had seen him strolling down one of the paths with Sir Harry Topham, a racing crony. Twenty minutes later she had seen him again, but not with Sir Harry. He was in the Lover’s Walk (which made it worse) and standing very close to him and looking up at him in the most melting way was Lady Massey. Even as Horatia caught sight of them the Massey put up her hands to Rule’s shoulders.
Horatia had whisked round and declared her intention of walking down quite another path. Miss Lloyd and Pelham had fallen behind; probably Mr Dashwood had not observed the Earl. She had him away from the fatal spot in a trice so that she did not see her husband remove Lady Massey’s hands from his shoulders.
No one could have been in greater spirits than my Lady Rule for the rest of that horrid evening. Several people remarked on it, and Mr Dashwood thought her more entrancing than ever.
But when Rule visited her room next morning and sat down on the edge of her bed while she drank her chocolate he found her in a wayward mood. Go to Meering? Oh, no, she could not! Why, she had a hundred engagements and it would be dreadfully dull in the country.
‘That is not very complimentary of you,’ Rule said, half smiling.
‘Well, but Rule, you are only g-going for a week, I daresay, and think how tiresome to pack for such a short stay! Of c-course I shall come with you after the Newmarket m-meeting, if we d-don’t go to Bath.’
‘I would very much rather you come with me now, Horry.’
‘Very w-well,’ Horatia said, in the voice of a martyr. ‘If you say I m-must, I will.’
He got up. ‘Heaven forbid, my dear!’
‘R-Rule, if you feel cross about it, please tell me! I d-don’t want to be a b-bad wife.’
‘Do I look cross?’ he inquired.
‘N-no, but I never can tell what you think by l-looking at you,’ said Horatia candidly.
He laughed. ‘Poor Horry, it must be very difficult for you. Stay in town, my dear. You are probably quite right. Arnold will make me attend to business at Meering.’ He put a finger under her chin, and tilted it up. ‘Don’t game all my fortune away while I am gone, will you?’ he said teasingly.
‘No, of c-course not. I will be very g-good. And you need not be afraid that I shall encourage Lord Lethbridge, for Louisa told me all about him and I quite see that I m-mustn’t know him.’
‘I am not afraid of that,’ he answered, and bent and kissed her.
Fourteen
So the Earl of Rule went away to Meering accompanied only by Mr Gisborne, while his wife stayed in London and tried to convince herself that she did not miss him at all. If she was not successful in this, at least nobody could have suspected it from her demeanour. Since the big house in Grosvenor Square seemed unbearably empty without his lordship Horatia spent as much of her time as she could away from it. No one meeting her at all the card-parties, routs, drums, and picnics that she attended could have supposed her to be pining most unfashionably for her own husband. In fact, her sister Charlotte said severely that her frivolity was excessively unbecoming.
Lord Lethbridge she had no difficulty in keeping at arm’s length. They naturally met at a great many parties, but his lordship, finding Horatia was civil but very formal, seemed to accept with equanimity his relegation to the ranks of her merest acquaintance and made no attempt to win her over again. Horatia put him out of her life without much regret. Glamour might still have clung to a rakehell who abducted noble damsels, but no glamour remained about a man who had been pushed into a pond in full ball-dress. Horatia, sorry only that she never had played cards with him, discarded him without a pang, and proceeded to forget about him.
She was succeeding admirably when he forced himself on her notice again in a manner as unexpected as it was outrageous.
A charming entertainment was held at Richmond House, with dancing and fireworks. Never was there so elegantly contrived a party. The gardens were brightly illuminated, supper spread in the apartments, and the fireworks let off from a platform of barges anchored in the river to the admiration of the guests and all the unbidden spectators who crowded every nearby house. At midnight a shower of rain came, but since by that time all the fireworks had been finished, it could not be thought to signify, and the guests retired to the ballroom for the dancing.
Horatia left the party early. It had been pretty to see the fireworks, but she found that she did not care to dance. For this a new pair of diamond-embroidered shoes was partly responsible. They pinched her abominably, and nothing, she discovered, could so effectually ruin one’s enjoyment as an uncomfortable shoe. Her coach was called for shortly after twelve, and resisting all the entreaties of Mr Dashwood, she departed.
She decided she must have attended too many balls, for certainly she had found this one almost tedious. It was really very difficult to dance and chatter gaily when one was all the time wondering what a large, sleepily smiling gentleman was doing miles away in Berkshire. It was apt to make one distraite, and to give one a headache. She leaned back in the corner of the coach and closed her eyes. Rule was not coming back for a week. What if one were to take him by surprise, and drive down to Meering the very next day? No, of course one could not do any such thing… she would send these shoes back to the makers, and let them make her another pair. The coiffeur too – really, he had dressed her head abominably; there were dozens of pins sticking into her scalp, and the wretch should have known that the Quésaco style did not become her at all. All those heavy plumes bunched up made her look forty if she was a day. And as for the new Serkis rouge Miss Lloyd had induced her to use, it was the horridest stuff in the world, and so she would tell Miss Lloyd the very next time she saw her.
The coach drew up and she opened her eyes with a start. It was raining quite fast now, and the footman was holding an umbrella to protect his mistress’s finery. The rain seemed to have extinguished the flambeaux that always burned in iron brackets at the foot of the steps leading up to the front door. It was quite dark, the clouds obscuring what had been a fine moon.
Horatia drew her cloak, an affair of white taffeta with a collar of puffed muslin, tightly round her, and holding her skirts up in one hand, stepped down on to the wet pavement. The footman held the umbrella well over her, and she sped quickly up the steps to the open door.
In her hurry she was over the threshold before she realized her mistake. She gave a gasp and stared round her. She was standing in a narrow hall-way, not in her own house, nor any like it, and the lackey, even now in the act of shutting the door, was no servant of Rule’s.
She turned quickly. ‘There is a m-mistake,’ she said. ‘Open the d-door, please!’
A step sounded behind her; she looked over her shoulder and saw Lord Lethbridge.
‘A thousand welcomes, my lady!’ Lethbridge said, and flung open the door of the saloon. ‘Pray enter!’
She stood perfectly still, dawning anger struggling with the bewilderment in her face. ‘I don’t understand!’ she said. ‘What does this m-mean, sir?’
‘Why, I will tell you, ma’am, but pray come in!’ Lethbridge said.
She was aware of the silent lackey behind her; one could not make a scene before servants. After a moment’s hesitation she walked forward, and into the saloon.
It was lit by a great many candles, and at one end of the room a table was laid with a cold supper. Horatia frowned. ‘If you are giving a p-party, sir, I assure you I was not invited, and d-don’t mean to stay,’ she announced.
‘It is not a party,’ he replied, shutting the door. ‘It’s for you and me, my dear.’
‘You must be mad!’ said Horatia, gazing at him in perplexity. ‘Of c-course I would never c-come to supper with you alone! If you asked me, I vow I never knew of it, and I c-can’t imagine why my coachman set me down here.’
‘I didn’t ask you, Horry. I planned it as a little surprise for you.’
‘Then it was a great piece of impertinence!’ said
Horatia. ‘I suppose you b-bribed my coachman? Well, you may escort me out to the coach again, sir, at once!’
He laughed. ‘Your coach, my dear, has gone, and your coachman and groom are lying under a table in a tavern off Whitehall. My own men conveyed you here. Now, do you not agree that I planned it very neatly?’
Wrath blazed in Horatia’s eyes. ‘I think it was m-monstrous of you!’ she said. ‘Do you m-mean to tell me you had the audacity to overpower my servants?’
‘Oh, no!’ he answered lightly. ‘That would have been unnecessarily violent. While you were at Richmond House, my love, what more natural than that the honest fellows should refresh themselves at the nearest tavern?’
‘I d-don’t believe it!’ snapped Horatia. ‘You d-don’t know much of Rule if you think he keeps a coachman who gets d-drunk! You m-must have had him set upon, and I shall send for a c-constable in the morning and tell him! Then perhaps you will be sorry!’
‘I expect I should be,’ agreed Lethbridge. ‘But do you think the constable would believe that one tankard of beer apiece could have so disastrous effect on your servants? For you see, I didn’t have them overpowered quite as you think.’
‘D-drugged!’ Horatia cried hotly.
‘Precisely,’ smiled his lordship. ‘Do, I beg of you, let me take your cloak!’
‘No!’ said Horatia. ‘I w-won’t! You are quite out of your senses, and if you have not the civility to summon me a chair, I will w-walk home!’
‘I wish you would try and understand, Horry,’ he said. ‘You will not leave my house tonight.’
‘N-not leave your house – oh, you are m-mad!’ Horatia said with conviction.
‘Then be mad with me, love,’ Lethbridge said, and put his hand on her cloak to remove it.
‘D-don’t call me “love”!’ choked Horatia. ‘Why – why you are trying to ruin me!’
‘That’s as you choose, my dear,’ he said. ‘I’m ready – yes, I’m ready to run away with you, or you may return home in the morning and tell what tale you please.’