Don't Tempt Me (2 page)

No one cared about the weather. An earthquake wouldn't drive off this lot, he knew. Waiting for a
glimpse of the principals in the latest high-society drama was quite as good entertainment as a public hanging.

Only someone who'd lived in a hermit cave for the past year would find the uproar surprising.

The nation had spent the winter grieving for its beloved Princess of Wales. To ordinary folk, the Princess Charlotte had been one bright, happy image in the depressing lot that constituted the present royal family. The tale of the Harem Girl couldn't have appealed more to their mood and taste if it had been made up special: Spunky English girl (like the late princess) overcomes impossible odds and outsmarts a lot of heathen villains. Better yet, Zoe Lexham's tale was not only heroic but titillating. Visions of Salome danced in their heads.

By this time His Grace was more fully armed with information, as well as better lubricated with alcohol. Over a bottle or two or three, his friends had repeated all the tales they'd heard. Before coming here, he'd stopped at Humphrey's Print Shop in St. James's Street. He'd had to push through the mob gawking at the pictures in the windows.

One caricature showed a well-endowed Zoe Lexham, arrayed in nothing but a large snake, performing a salacious contortion meant to represent oriental dancing. In another, she gyrated lewdly in transparent veils while a turbaned fellow with the prime minister's face offered her the Prince Regent's head on a platter.

Though His Grace lingered over these, he didn't neglect the less obscene pictures wherein, for instance, Lexham featured as a deluded old fool and
Winterton was shown smuggling the girl out of Egypt in a rug, like Shakespeare's Cleopatra. Several other prints made reference to an incident last year, when a woman led some trusting souls in Gloucestershire to believe she was the Princess Caraboo of Javasu. She turned out to be a nobody named Mary Wilcocks of Witheridge, Devonshire.

Marchmont had no idea who the young woman in Lexham's house might be, and didn't particularly care. All he knew was that he had not looked forward recently to anything so much as he looked forward to unmasking her.

He began to make his way through the crowd, “accidentally” knocking out of his way those who failed to move quickly enough. He didn't have to do this often. The Duke of Marchmont's sleepily ethereal countenance had been caricatured on numerous occasions. It had adorned print shop windows and print sellers' umbrellas. The world knew—or thought it did—all about him. When they saw him coming, sensible people got out of the way.

 

Meanwhile, in the small drawing room of Lexham House, the object of all the excitement sat at a small table near one of the windows, studying the fashion plates in the latest edition of
La Belle Assemblée
.

As she had learned to do in the harem, Zoe made herself the calm in the eye of the storm.

All seven of her siblings had descended upon Lexham House this morning.

All seven had been closeted with her and her parents in the small drawing room since then. All seven
had spent the time ranting and raving. The numbers, if not the noise, had dwindled in the last few minutes, however.

Her eldest brother, Roderick, had been the last of the brothers to stomp out. A moment ago, he'd followed Samuel and Henry downstairs to the billiard room. There, beyond a doubt, they were all sulking, because Papa had told them they were behaving like hysterical women.

Zoe knew they'd rather remain at Lexham House sulking than go home and face their wives. If all of her siblings were angry with her for disrupting their lives, what could she expect from their women?

It was obvious, too, that her brothers were counting on her four older sisters to wear Papa down.

Augusta, Gertrude, Dorothea, and Priscilla remained at the large central table. There they consumed great quantities of tea and cakes, to keep their energy up for the endless complaints, reproaches, and recriminations they deemed necessary on the occasion. The younger pair, Dorothea and Priscilla, having reached advanced states of pregnancy, tended more to tears, sudden changes of sentiment, and occasional swoons than the elder two.

The storm, which had briefly abated with the brothers' departure, broke out again. Zoe let it rage about her, gathering her wits and saving her energy for the crucial moment.

“She cannot remain in London, Papa.”

“You've seen the newspapers.”

“If you could see the prints—”

“Lewd, disgusting things.”

“Snake charmers and such.”

“We are a joke, a circus entertainment for the mob.”

“I was obliged to skulk through Town like a common criminal, and sneak here through the garden.”

“We had to cover the crests on the carriage.”

“Not that there's any point to leaving the house, when one's ashamed to show one's face in public.”

“One certainly cannot visit friends. One hasn't any.”

“Three hostesses have rescinded their invitations.”

“Seven have declined mine.”

“We may be sure that's only the beginning.”

“One cannot blame them. Who wants the London mob on the doorstep?”

“All of the neighbors in Berkeley Square hate us, except Gunter's. They're doing a brisk trade in pastries and ices, I don't doubt. But the Devonshires will cut us, you may be sure. The Lansdownes, too. And the Jerseys.”

“You know what will happen next.”

“Riots, I don't doubt.”

“Lady Jersey
—one of Almack's patronesses—only think what that means. We'll be taken off the list!”

A stunned silence, then:

“Good grief! What's to become of my Amy's birthday ball?”

“Call it off. No one will come.”

“Parker says we must remove to the country. Can you credit it? Now! At the height of the Season!”

By this time, Mama, easily blown by every emotional wind, had given up trying to decide whose side she was on. She'd taken to the chaise longue, where she lay with her eyes closed. Every so often she let out a moan.

Different language,
Zoe thought.
Different clothing. Different furnishings. Yet so like the harem.

Papa stood at the fire, his back to them all. “Indeed, I can think of no greater catastrophe than to be denied entrance to Almack's,” he said to the fire. “Two nights ago you sobbed because the little sister you believed dead had turned out to be alive. Two nights ago you marveled at her courage. Now you can't wait to be rid of her.”

Zoe wasn't sure whether her sisters had wept with happiness or shock or outrage.

She'd entered the house and found them all—parents, siblings, and siblings' spouses—in the entrance hall, like an army braced to repel an invader.

What if they don't know me?
she'd thought.
What if they don't believe it's me?

But all she'd had to do was look up and meet her father's cold, suspicious gaze while she let the hood of her cloak slide from her hair. Papa had stared at her for a moment. Then he'd closed his eyes and opened them again. She'd watched them fill with tears. Then he'd opened his arms and she'd run into them.

“My dear girl.” Emotion had clogged his voice, but she'd understood every precious word. “Oh, my dear, dear girl. I knew you'd come back.” He'd wept, and Zoe had sobbed, too. She was home at last.

Though she'd come back a woman, not a girl, though she'd been gone for so long, he'd known her. They'd all known her, like it or not. Like all of her sisters, she had her mother's dark gold curling hair. But she was the only one who'd inherited Grandmama Lexham's profile and her deep blue eyes.

They couldn't deny she was their own Zoe Octavia.

Then, within twenty-four hours, the trouble started, at which point they all remembered that their own Zoe Octavia was the problem child.

“I don't want to be rid of her,” Priscilla cried. “I'm sure I don't, Papa. But we haven't any choice.”

“You most certainly do,” said Papa. “You can act with courage. You can hold up your head and ignore this foolishness. If we do not feed the rumor mills by hiding and denying, the world will soon find something else to make a fuss about.”

“Papa, I wish I could believe that—”

“If it were an ordinary sort of scandal, naturally, that would be the case—”

“But this is like nothing that's happened before.”

“It isn't like a political scandal—”

“Or even a crim con case or a divorce.”

“A Harem Girl, Papa! When was the last time London had a Harem Girl?”

“They might as well call her Jezebel.”

“Some of the newspapers have called her that—and other names a lady must not utter.”

“If she goes into any public place—a shop or park or theater—everyone will stare and whisper.”

“She won't have a moment's peace, nor will anybody near her.”

“Those dreadful journalist persons will follow wherever she goes.”

“She cannot live a normal life, nor can we, while she is by.”

“Not in London, certainly.”

“But if she were to go away, to a quiet place in the country—”

“Dear Cousin Horatio's, for instance—”

“May he rest in peace, poor man.”

“And if she lived there under a different name—”

“Ooooh,” Mama said faintly. She covered her face with her handkerchief.

“Go away?” said her father. “Change her name? But she's hardly come back!” Papa turned to face them, and Zoe was shocked to see the grief in his face. “My little girl. Twelve years I've spent trying to get her back. Twelve years I've prayed and worried and kicked myself a thousand times for my folly. Twelve years I've raged at myself for not taking better care of her.” He met her gaze then. “I shall never forgive myself, child, for what you've suffered. I shall never forgive myself for all the time we've lost and can never recover.”

“I'm truly sorry for all the trouble I've caused you, Papa,” she said. “I'm sorry for causing everyone so much trouble this time.” She closed the book of fashion plates and folded her hands on top of it. “If there's no other way to make it right than for me to go away, then I shall go away.”

Her sisters' eyes began to dry. Mama took the handkerchief off her face and sat up a little straighter.

“Well, I'm glad you've decided to be reasonable,” said Augusta.

“I shall go to Paris,” Zoe said.

Her sisters screamed.

“Or Venice,” Zoe said. “I've lived shut away from the world for twelve years. I cannot bear to do that again. But these are cities. They have shops and theaters and parks and such. I shall feel alive again.”

“She can't live in
Paris
!”

“What will people say?”

“She has no notion what she's proposing.”

“No morals, you see. No notion of what is fitting.”

“No notion of what is practical, I should say. What will she live on?”

“Where will she live? Who'll look after her?”

“I'm sure these thoughts never cross her mind.”

“She always was the most heedless creature.”

Papa said nothing, but he was studying her face. He'd always understood her far better than any of her siblings had. He waited, leaving it to her.

She took courage from his trust in her. “I shall take my jewels and take a different name, as has been suggested,” she said.

“Jewels?”

“What jewels?”

“She never mentioned jewels.”

“She means some trumpery gewgaws from the bazaar.”

“I mean rubies and diamonds and pearls and emeralds and sapphires,” Zoe said.

The sisters stilled. Priscilla froze with a piece of cake halfway to her mouth. Gertrude set down her cup.

“Gold and silver bracelets and necklaces,” Zoe went on. “
Jewels
is the correct word, is it not? Karim was fond of me, and he was most generous. I thought I must sell all of my treasures to pay for my return home, but it was not nearly as costly as I had supposed. I was glad of that, because I had hoped to share my possessions with the women of my family. But if it is troublesome for me to remain here, the jewelry will allow me to live in another place. I was told that Paris and Venice were not as expensive as London.”

Her sisters were looking at one another.

When it came to jewelry, women the world over were the same. If her future and everything for which she'd risked her life had not been at stake, she'd have laughed, because her sisters behaved exactly like the harem women they scorned.

She kept her expression serene. “I would rather stay here,” she said.

The silence continued while the sisters mulled this over.

Sometimes the wisest course was simply to offer others a strong motive to solve the problem.

“I don't see how it could be arranged,” said Augusta after a moment.

“Even if one were to reeducate her—”

“It won't matter what she does or how she behaves. All everyone will see is the Harem Girl.”

“How could one persuade a hostess to have her?”

“No one will have
us
while she's about.”

“I doubt the Prince Regent himself could make her welcome in the Beau Monde.”

“Unless he married her.”

Bitter laughter at this.

“But he's already married, whether he likes it or not.”

“One of the royal dukes, then?”

“You're dreaming, Priscilla. They must marry princesses.”

“The daughter of a duke is the very lowest they might consider.”

“But for Zoe…Suppose the gentleman was of exceedingly high rank—”

“If he ranked high enough, the hostesses would not risk offending him. They must accept his wife.”