Eloisa James - Desperate Duchesses - 6 (12 page)

"It was sitting around in the nursery," Tobias said. "They haven't had any children there in a long time. Everyone knows that Lisette won't have any."

"She is Lady Lisette to you," Villiers pointed out. "Why won't she?"

"She loves babies. But her father says she needn't marry until he dies. You aren't thinking of marrying
her,
are you? Is she the one?"

"Yes," Villiers said decisively, putting Eleanor out of his mind. "She is."

"She's potty," Tobias said. "Cracked. They all say so."

"Who says so?"

"Her old nanny. The maid said the same. And Popper said that once she starts that screaming, there isn't anyone who can stop her. Except you, I guess. He said you picked her up and she settled down just like a baby with a bottle of gin."

"Babies don't drink gin," Villiers said, pretty sure that he was right about that.

Tobias shrugged. He obviously had about as much interest in baby care as Villiers did.

Lisette had been surrounded by children from the orphanage. She clearly adored children, and even more importantly, his children's illegitimacy wouldn't disturb her. It was unlikely that any of those orphans had parents whose domestic arrangements could be termed regular.

By now Finchley had reappeared. "Would you like the young master to return to the nursery now?"

he asked as he pulled off Villiers's boots.

Villiers glanced over at Tobias. The boy was listening, of course, though he was pretending to read.

"He doesn't look as if he'll be shocked by the sight of my pump handle."

Tobias's face didn't even twitch. Passed on my poker face, Villiers thought with some satisfaction.

And without further ado he dropped his breeches and stepped into the bath.

"I don't think you ought to marry someone who's cracked," Tobias offered a few minutes later.

"Lisette is not mad," Villiers said impatiently. "She was just afraid of that ugly little pug belonging to Lady Eleanor. She was terrorized by a dog as a young child."

"The maid told me all about it," Tobias said. "It wasn't so long ago."

"That explains it, then," Villiers said. "The fear is still fresh."

"The maid said that Lisette insisted on jerking a puppy away from its mother, and the puppy was nursing. So the mother dog bit her. Then her maid—not the one who was telling me, but another one—tried to drag Lisette away, and she got bitten as well. And

she—the maid—lost her finger. Or maybe two fingers. The nanny said that her hand is just disgusting looking now," Tobias said with relish. "She has to work in the kitchens because it turns Lisette's stomach just to look at her."

"Come back in ten minutes," Villiers told Finchley. Normally he never spared a thought for conversation in front of his servants. In fact, he'd once boasted that his servants were so well trained that he could tup a woman on the dining room table and they wouldn't turn a hair.

But chatter about the future duchess was another matter.

The moment Finchley closed the door, he said, "Get over here, you turnip, so I can see you while we talk."

Tobias came around. "I'm not a turnip," he said. "My name is Juby."

"Juby, juicy, that sounds like a garden vegetable. Your name is Tobias."

"I've been Juby since I can remember. It's too late to change over now."

"It's never too late for anything," Villiers said. "More to the point, I think I'm going to marry Lisette, so you need to stop telling stories about her, particularly ones that are obviously untrue." He raised a hand as Tobias opened his mouth. "And if it wasn't untrue, it was definitely unkind. I'm sure that Lisette had no idea that the mother dog might attack her."

"Even the most buffle-headed fool knows that," Tobias said scornfully. "Welcome to the world of well-bred ladies," Villiers said, sinking a little farther down in the bath. "What they know and don't know will never cease to amaze you." "I don't like ladies," Tobias said. "Neither do I," Villiers agreed. "It's too bad you have to marry one, then." "It's part of being a duke." "Getting married?"

"Yes."

"Good thing I'm not a duke." Villiers was queerly glad to see that Tobias's eyes looked clear as he said that. "I'll never get married, not if it means you have to marry a cracked lady who doesn't know beans about anything," Tobias continued.

"Lisette is beautiful."

Tobias curled his lip. Villiers was startled: over the years he'd caught sight of that precise gesture on his own face a time or two. 'You don't like beautiful ladies?"

'You should marry the one with the dog," Tobias said firmly. 'Why?"

'Because she's got a dog. And she's not
too
pretty." 'Actually, she is beautiful, in her own way."

'Lady Lisette looks like one of those missionary ladies. All clean and gold-spun. You'd never know where you are with her because nobody is really like that. Not inside."

"I wouldn't?" Villiers was suffering from a terrible fascination. Even though his water was cooling and he knew he should cut off the flow of unsolicited advice, he couldn't bring himself to. "Why not?"

"Likely no better than she should be," Tobias concluded. "Aren't you tired of sitting in all that dirty water?"

The truth was that he was used to Finchley handing him a towel. He stood up and plucked it off the back of a chair. "It's not dirty water. It's clean bathwater."

"Once you're in it, it's dirty. Better get in and out quick." He said it with the tone of a boy who had never bathed more than once a month before coming to Villiers's house and had taken to the practice only reluctantly.

Finchley slipped back through the door with the wounded look of someone barred from the family home on Christmas morning. "It is time to dress, Your Grace. The pale rose or the black velvet?"

"The rose," Villiers said at the same moment Tobias said, "The black."

"Why the black?" Villiers asked.

"Because you look a proper fright in those fancy coats," Tobias said. "Even if you decided on Lisette

—and I'm not saying you should—she'd never take you looking like that."

"Like what?"

"A posy. You look like a blooming posy. Like you don't care for your bag." "My
what?"

"Your potato-finger. Your holy thistle!"

Villiers was aware that Finchley had stopped feeling insulted and was trying to suppress a smile.

Finchley never smiled. "If I understand you, you're saying that my pizzle doesn't show to best advantage in the rose coat."

"Not if you're talking about that pink one, no." Tobias pointed at the offending garment. "Only a man who had a withered pear would wear that."

Finchley snorted, and Villiers cast him a glance. "There's nothing withered about me," he said, pulling on the rose-colored coat over his sleek, skintight breeches.

"I'm not the one you need to convince of that," Tobias said, plopping down into his chair again. "It's your wife who's going to wonder if you're a molly or not." He turned back to his book.

Villiers felt his lips twitch. No one had ever called him a molly. Or implied he had a limp potato-finger.

Finchley looked at him sympathetically and, quite wisely, kept his mouth shut.

"You look exquisite," Anne said, popping into Eleanor's bedchamber. "The color suits you better than it does me. The woven silk is beautiful. And the lace accents..." She kissed her fingers.

"Exquisite!"

Eleanor looked down at her skirts. The fabric was rose-red silk, with trails of white flowers woven throughout. The bodice and sleeves were edged with a splash of rose lace sewn with tiny spangles.

"The bodice doesn't fit properly." She gave it an irritable pull.

"Don't touch it," Anne gasped. "You'll tear the lace. Look, there are gold threads among the silk.

Father swore I bankrupted him with that one gown alone. You shouldn't do more than breathe on it."

"My breasts are almost entirely exposed. Maybe you haven't noticed, but the only thing between the open air and my nipple is a mere inch of lace!"

"I did notice," Anne said happily, "and more to the point, so will every man in the room."

"I'm thinking about Mother."

"She ordered you to wear my clothing."

"Yes, but what looks merely saucy on you looks utterly debauched on me," Eleanor pointed out.

"Are you implying that's a disadvantage? Believe me, you should thank God for every inch you have. Where's the dog?" Anne said, cautiously dusting off a chair before she sat in it.

"Willa took him to the kitchen for the evening. She'll bring him up the back stairs later." Anne wrinkled her nose. "He sleeps with you?"

"Yes." Eleanor was unapologetic about that. "He's a puppy. He's lonely at night." "Are you planning to wear some lip color? You look like the ghost of Lady Macbeth." "I never wear face paint,"

Eleanor said."!—"

"You are so lucky that I'm your sister," Anne said. She placed her net bag on the dressing table.

"What is that?" Eleanor asked.

"Kohl black, for your eyes," Anne said. "Hold still or I'll blind you." Eleanor froze.

"You can open your eyes now." She stepped back. "You have lovely eyelashes, Eleanor. Who knew?"

"They're the color of my hair," Eleanor said. "Nondescript."

"Now some rouge, and then a little lip color. And I'm going to put just a touch of black at the outside corner of your eyes. Your eyes are already large, but this will make them mysterious."

"Mysterious?" Eleanor snorted. "No one with my name could possibly be mysterious."

"Every woman is mysterious to men," Anne said, dabbing more color on Eleanor's lips. "Villiers is the kind of man who takes appearances very seriously. You do him dishonor by just throwing yourself together."

"I don't throw myself together," Eleanor said indignantly. "I give the process a reasonable amount of time."

"But you never try to make yourself attractive to a man," Anne said.

Eleanor was silent.

"I was shaken by the bastard children, I don't mind admitting. But now I've decided that Villiers is definitely the one for you. You don't mind a dog in your bed, so I assume a bastard or two in the wings of your household will be equally acceptable."

"Children are not dogs," Eleanor pointed out.

"Of course not. They're a good deal easier to take care of. One never sees children when they're at the stage of peeing on the floor, for instance. Whereas everyone seems to think that dogs can't be hidden in a nursery and trained by servants, the way offspring are.' She started tweaking Eleanor's curls.

What are you doing now?"

Making you look more rumpled."

Rumpled? I don't want to look rumpled!"

Yes, you do. If Lisette's appeal is that of the fragile young maiden, yours is going to be pure sensuality. And the lovely thing about that, Eleanor, is that you actually have an appetite for the bed.

Many women don't, you know."

"All this advice assumes that I want to be a duchess," Eleanor noted.

"I'm assuming that you'd like the choice," Anne retorted. "There! Let's go."

Eleanor started to turn toward the glass but her sister grabbed her shoulder. "No, don't look."

"What have you done to me?" Eleanor asked with a wave of misgiving.

"You are absolutely beautiful," Anne said. "But if you see yourself, you'll want to pin your hair back like a shepherdess in a bad play."

"Are you saying that I normally look as if I'm tending sheep? With straw in my hair? As if I might yodel?"

"You spend a lot of time looking like a virgin," Anne said. "And may I point out that you haven't had claim to that title since you were, what... fifteen?"

"Sixteen. And in fact I stopped dressing like a debutante long ago. You're being unfair. I don't believe I even own a white gown."

"And yet you cling to clean-scrubbed modesty, as if you were going to fall in love with the evil landlord and end up throwing yourself off a cliff."

Eleanor thought about the implications of Anne's description."! have not been wandering around in a melancholy daze," she stated.

"It's as if Gideon stole all the life out of you, those years ago." Anne reached in her net bag and brought out a thin silver box, flicked it open and displayed a row of cigarillos.

"I can't think that tobacco is good for you," Eleanor observed.

"This isn't for me, but for you."

"Me?"

"You. You're going to offset Lisette's pallid brand of perfect Englishwoman by appearing absolutely wicked. Lusciously licentious." "Wicked? Me?"

"The only way to stay young is to try new things," Anne said. "God knows virtue never shaved off anyone's years. On second thought, I'll wait to give you a cigarillo until after supper. But then
you,
Lady Eleanor, are going to have a glass of wine and smoke tobacco. I shall tutor you myself."

"Pah!"

"You don't have to smoke it. I've found that merely holding a cigarillo catapults one from tedious virgin to something far more interesting. Here's my point, Eleanor. Gideon the Godless stole more than your virginity when he turned his back and married Ada instead. Now could we please go downstairs? I need something to drink, and so do you."

"Mother believes drinking spirits before meals causes mental instability," Eleanor said, following her.

"Ratafia promotes mental instability: that's why there are so many silly women in the
ton.
Rum is what you need," Anne said. She breezed into the drawing room, paused for a moment on the threshold so as to draw all eyes, and then moved to the side, pulling Eleanor forward.

Lisette beamed at them, of course. Lisette was always happy to see her friends. Their mother opened her mouth and snapped it shut, for all the world like a beached fish. Villiers said nothing, nor did his face change.

Anne tucked her arm through Eleanor's. "Good evening, everyone." She turned to Popper, who was proffering a silver tray. "Is that ratafia, Popper? And orgeat? Absolutely not. We know exactly what we'd like. Rum punch, if you please."

Lisette came to her feet as if she had just remembered she was their hostess. She was wearing a charming gown of cream silk, embroidered with tiny forget-me-nots. Her bosom was chastely covered, and her panniers equally modest. Eleanor felt like the Whore of Babylon by comparison, dressed in crimson and painted to match.