An Unlikely Duchess (26 page)

“No,” Josephine said. “Sukey is quite strong-willed even though she is only eighteen years old. She advised Mr. Porterhouse to leave her room, and he did.”

“Good Lord,” Mitford said, staring at her. “Can there possibly be two of you?”

“What are we going to do with him?” Josephine asked, leaning on the poker and gazing down at the unconscious body of Mr. Porterhouse. “Leave him there?”

“No,” the duke said. “There may be awkward questions in the morning. I would ask you to take yourself back upstairs, ma’am. I shall see that the man is packed into his own coach and sent on his way. I do not particularly wish to set eyes on him again after tonight. Do you?”

“I shall go and find a groom to help you,” Josephine said.

She found one slim and strong hand clasping her by the upper arm.

“You will go inside,” he said, “and upstairs to your sister’s room. If you are wise, you will go to bed and get some sleep. But wise or not, you will stay in that room. And you will go there now.”

Josephine glowered at him, opened her mouth to speak, and closed it again. “You are just like Papa, only worse,” she said at last. “At least one can reason with Papa.”

“Which presumably means that you can twist him about your finger,” he said. “On your way, ma’am.”

She turned away from him indignantly. But she turned back and grinned before making her way to the inn. “Do you think he will have a headache in the morning?” she asked.

He smiled. “I rather think he will wish he had been born without a head at all,” he said.

***

Sam was holding the ribbons of Sir Thomas Burgess’s newly repaired carriage, that gentleman’s own coachman making a valiant and not entirely successful effort to keep from nodding off beside him.

“I’ll arsk ’ere,” Sam said as yet another inn came into sight. The coachman yawned and sat up.

“Oh, Lordy, yes,” the ostler at the inn said with a look of gloom at the giant who vaulted down from the seat to confront him. It would be fair to wager that he was not to get a wink of sleep that night. He might as well give up the attempt. “He left here not ten minutes since.”

Sam took a not ungentle grip of the man’s lapels. “If yer lying, lad . .

“Oh, Lordy, no,” the ostler assured him, with a sideways glance at the two gentlemen who were descending from the carriage. “It was not ten minutes since, I swear.”

“He is trying to evade us by traveling through the night,” Bartholomew said grimly. “Well, he will find out if a ten-minute start on us is a safe one. Spring them, Sam.”

Sam climbed back to his seat, all eagerness to obey. Sir Thomas took a few steps closer to the terrified ostler.

“You have seen a gentleman’s curricle also this night?” he asked quietly.

The ostler nodded.

“Perhaps I will be too late to kill him myself after all,” Sir Thomas mattered as he climbed back inside the carriage.

If Sir Thomas’s coachman had had difficulty staying awake for the past few hours, he had no such problem for the following half hour. He sat bolt upright in his seat, clinging to it with both hands, staring off into the darkness with eyes that were starting from their sockets. In a night that was not the lightest on record, Sam sprang the horses.

The luckless coachman reverted to sanity only when the blue and yellow carriage came into sight lumbering along the highway ahead of them. Not that its colors could be discerned in the darkness, of course, but who else would be mad enough to be traveling in a private carriage at night?

“Here, here,” Mr. Porterhouse’s coachman protested as the other carriage came thundering alongside him and swerved in toward him, forcing him to stop. His hands reached for the sky. “Don’t shoot.”

Sam did not deign to give him an answer, and Sir Thomas’s coachman looked too baffled to do so. By the time Bartholomew and Sir Thomas had leaped from the carriage, Sam already had the door to the other open and was reaching inside.

Mr. Porterhouse appeared lapels first. Sam held him against the side of the carriage, his feet a good few inches from the ground.

“Where is my sister?” Bartholomew’s head was inside the carriage as he asked. “Where is she, you villain?”

“Answer the question.” Sam gave the lapels a shake. “Where’s the little lady?”

“How would I know?” Mr. Porterhouse said weakly.

Sam shook him again. “ ’ow?” he said. “ ’ow? I’ll show you ’ow.”

“Set him down, Sam, if you please.” Bartholomew was standing in the roadway, his feet set apart, his fists clenched.

Sam reluctantly set his victim down on his feet and stepped back.

“Where is she?” Bartholomew did not raise his voice, but there was quiet menace in it.

“To which sister are you referring?” Mr. Porterhouse asked with weak derision in his voice.

A moment later his head smashed back against the side of the carriage and Bartholomew lowered his fist to his side again.

“Where is she?” he asked.

Mr. Porterhouse’s eyes remained closed for a few moments. “Both sisters are at the last inn we passed,” he said. He looked at Bartholomew with a weary sneer. “Together with Miss Middleton’s protector, Villiers. One female was not enough for him, it seems.”

He was rewarded with another fist to the jaw. This time he kept his head back against the carriage mid his eyes dosed.

“Liar!” Bartholomew said between his teeth. “Where is she?”

Sir Thomas Burgess cheated his throat. “I have reason to believe that he is probably right, Middleton,” he said. “I have been asking along the way and have realized that Villiers and your elder sister were also in pursuit. And they were ahead of us.”

Bartholomew continued to stare stonily at the half-conscious Mr. Porterhouse:

“And if you will look more closely,” Sir Thomas said, “I think you will see that Porterhouse has already been well worked over tonight A pity. I fully looked forward to the pleasure of helping you kill him. But it is hardly gentlemanly to challenge a man who can scarce stand on his feet.”

“Who fought with you?” Bartholomew asked. “Villiers?”

Mr. Porterhouse sneered without opening his eyes. “Someone was cowardly enough to hit me over the back of the head while we were fighting,” he said. “Your lady sister, I believe, Middleton.”

“Jo?” Bartholomew said. “Good for Jo. She and Sukey are both back at that inn?”

Mr. Porterhouse shrugged. “That is where I left them,” he said.

“If you are lying, I will catch up to you again,” Bartholomew said. “Believe me. Sam, you may put him back inside the carriage. He looks incapable of climbing inside himself. And he will certainly be so in another few seconds’ time.”

His fists pounded at Mr. Porterhouse’s face twice each. And then he lowered them in disgust.

“You are right, Burgess,” he said. “It seems almost ungentlemanly. Sam?”

But Sam did not immediately do as he was told. His hands on Mr. Porterhouse’s lapels this time held the man upright. “There is still the small matter of the lady’s jewels,” he said. “You will tell Sam where they are, so Sam don’t ’ave to beat the hinformation out of yer.”

“In my bag,” Mr. Porterhouse mumbled. “Worthless pieces, anyway.”

Sam lifted him inside the carriage and deposited him on the seat. He took the bag from the opposite seat and drew out a palmful of jewels from the bottom. “They’d better all be ’ere,” he said. “Else I’ll be coming after yer.”

Mr. Porterhouse did not answer.

Sir Thomas Burgess was landing in the open doorway as Sam withdrew. “I am more sorry than I can say that my friend Villiers got to you before I could, Porterhouse,” he said amiably. “I will only say this. I spend a large portion of each year in London. I do not wish to encounter you there. Ever. If I do, I shall be sure to find some pretext to slap a glove in your face. And if we should find on our return to the inn that Miss Susanna Middleton has been harmed in any way whatsoever, I shall find you out wherever you choose to hide yourself and slap that glove in your already bruised face.”

Mr. Porterhouse neither replied nor opened his eyes.

“You need not exert yourself,” Sir Thomas said kindly. “I shall close the door for you and instruct your coachman to drive on. Good night to you.”

Mr. Porterhouse did not see fit to return the greeting.

***

The Duke of Mitford could not sleep. For one thing, he was sore and aching all over. And he supposed that it was no small miracle that he did not hurt a great deal more than he did. Only the careful physical conditioning of years had enabled him to get the upper hand in his fight with Porterhouse.

For another thing, he had heard the sounds of an approaching carriage and had seen through his window that it was Burgess’s and that both Burgess and Middleton were its passengers. It had moved off before he could pull on his shirt and go down to them. But perhaps it was just as well, he thought, that they had not found out that the Misses Middleton were at the inn. The brother doubtless needed the satisfaction of dealing with Porterhouse himself. The duke could almost pity the man.

But what if they did not come back again? What if Porterhouse had turned off the main highway, and they did not find him? That left him in charge of two young ladies who were no relations of his. It would be his responsibility to convey them home to their father. A tricky business, indeed. It was not quite the way he would like to meet the viscount.

Not that there was going to be any easy way of meeting the viscount, of course.

And when and how was he to let Miss Middleton know who he really was? He had uncomfortable memories of the poker she had wielded earlier and of the triumph in her eyes as she had stood over the man she had felled.

Then there were her jewels. He had remembered them a full fifteen minutes after sending Porterhouse on his way. He would still have to go after them—and dissuade Miss Middleton from accompanying him.

Mitford stood looking out through the window and sighed. How uncomplicated life might have been. He might have made his way to Rutland Park with all the pomp and comfort that usually characterized his journeys. And he might have discovered on his arrival that Miss Middleton had taken herself off elsewhere. He might have made his way back to London and resumed his life as it had always been—safe, decorous, predictable, dignified, comfortable.

And dull.

The duke smiled unwillingly into the darkness just as Sir Thomas Burgess’s carriage returned to the stableyard.

He pulled on his shirt and buttoned it with hasty fingers. But when his hand was on the doorknob, he turned back and added his waistcoat and his coat.

Bartholomew Middleton was frowning and impatient. He was calling for the landlord, and his fingers were drumming on the counter as the duke descended the stairs. Sir Thomas Burgess was closing the outer door.

Bartholomew snapped to attention when he saw the duke.

“Mitford!” he said, and smiled foolishly.

Ah, yes, of course, the duke thought as he mentally switched persona. He felt for his quizzing glass, which was not there. He gave Middleton a cool stare instead.

“Middleton?” he said. “Burgess? Is one to have no sleep here?”

Bartholomew laughed. “Oh,” he said, “Sir Thomas here was returning to London, and I decided to come with him.”

“I am in rather a hurry,” Sir Thomas said. Mitford caught his eye and looked away again. “We decided to travel part of the way through the night.”

“Ah, quite so,” Mitford said.

The landlord appeared from the nether regions, scratching and yawning and looking somewhat more irritated than he had looked earlier.

“I wish to know if my sister is a guest here,” Bartholomew said. “Miss Susanna Middleton. Ah, with her maid.”

“That would be the fair-haired lady,” the innkeeper said, having disposed of a particularly protracted yawn. “With her sister, as I understand it.”

Bartholomew laughed heartily. “Oh, dear, no,” he said. “That’s a good one. Molly my sister? She does like to put on airs, though, does she not?”

“Upstairs,” the landlord said. “Third door on the left. The door will be locked, though. You will be wanting a room for yourself, sir?”

“Ah, yes, certainly,” Bartholomew said. “I will just go on up to assure my sister that I have arrived safely.” He smiled broadly at the Duke of Mitford. “Always a worrier, Susanna, you know. She is probably not sleeping for worrying about me.”

The duke moved to one side of the stairs and watched Bartholomew take them two at a time.

“What happened?” Sir Thomas asked tensely. “Did he touch her, Paul? Did he ravish her?”

“I gather,” Mitford said, “from what her sister has told me, that she showed him the door in no uncertain terms. He was taking his ease here in the taproom when we arrived.”

Sir Thomas’s shoulders visibly sagged with relief. “You did a good job of work on Porterhouse,” he said. “But you might have left something for Middleton and me, Paul. Most unsporting of you. Sam has the jewels, by the way, and is guarding them with his life.”

The duke rocked back on his heels. “I am mentally bracing myself,” he said. “At any moment now Miss Middleton is going to find out from her brother just who I am. I am not sure whether I should clap my hands over my ears or my arms over my head. Or perhaps both.”

“She still doesn’t know?” Sir Thomas said. “Are you mad, Paul?”

“Oh, undoubtedly,” his friend said. “Pardon me, Tom, but I am about to take the coward’s way out and withdraw to my room, if I can reach it in time. This is best faced in the morning. I shall see you then—if I survive for long enough, that is.”

He turned and climbed the stairs while his grinning friend and the long-suffering landlord stood looking after him.

Chapter 16

The duke had just fallen into a doze some time later—a half an hour, an hour, perhaps, he was not sure—when there was an urgent scratching from somewhere close by. Mice? No, too loud. Rats?

He woke up fully.

“Paul?” A whisper of breath from the direction of the door, and the scratching resumed.

Oh, Lord. There was no way of deferring it until the morrow, then. He might as well have stayed in the taproom and faced it all before trying to sleep for what remained of the night—and that could surely not be too long. It had already seemed a week long.