Maggie MacKeever (18 page)

Marmaduke frowned, as much in response to this thrust as because of the bright sunlight which prevented him a clear view of the barb’s source. “It is no more than I deserve, I suppose, that you should hold me in such low esteem. I mean your father no harm. You have my word on that, Miss Clough.” She made no answer. Defeated, he walked toward the door. Once there, he turned back, unwilling to leave her on such a final note. “I wish you might trust me.”

Clytie wished so also; alas, she could not. Though her expression was obscured by shadows, her tone was unmistakably hostile as she bid her caller a flat goodbye.

While Miss Clough relieved her pent-up emotions via a good cry into her pillow, and Mr. Thorne repaired to White’s, there to imbibe rather more liberally of the grape than was his habit, Lord Sweetbriar underwent a dramatic encounter of his own in Oxford Street. How his lordship came to be strolling along that wide flag-stoned thoroughfare is of no especial importance, nor is the fact that his lordship was so intrigued by the sight of the clown from Astley’s Royal Amphitheatre—who periodically drove through the streets in all manner of quaint costumes in an effort to drum up enthusiasm for Astley’s equestrian displays—that he walked smack into a lamp post. Once Lord Sweetbriar had unentangled himself from this obstacle, he espied a spectacle even more fascinating than had been Astley’s clown. It was no less than his beloved, attended by a gaggle of her sisters, in search of items with which to refurbish their shabby wardrobes.

“I say!” said Lord Sweetbriar, as the Foliot damsels swept by him and trooped into the shop of W. H. Botibol, plumassier by trade. Rolf had no desire to traipse after his beloved through fancy feathers and ostrich plumes. “I say!” he uttered again, when the young ladies emerged. Again no response was vouchsafed him, other than snickers and giggles and noses elevated high into the air. Lord Sweetbriar was not put off by this odd behavior. Clearly, the Foliots had failed to see him. Perhaps the family was shortsighted? It never occurred to his lordship that he had received a deliberate snub. He followed Lady Regina into the Pantheon Bazaar.

Though less spectacular than in its original incarnation—the timber-framed cathedral-like hall had burned down many years before—the Bazaar still had in it much to intrigue. Lord Sweetbriar spent several bemused moments contemplating silken stockings before recalling his beloved. Lest he lose sight of her among the different rooms, he set out in hasty pursuit.

Lord Sweetbriar need not have worried; Lady Regina had no intention of evading him, though she did not wish to seem as though she were anxious to engage in speech. Sweetbriar had treated her very shabbily, Regina thought; she was not reconciled by Mr. Thorne’s continued assurances that his nephew had no romantic interest in Miss Clough. But here Rolf was, sauntering toward her as nonchalantly as if he passed part of every day browsing among trifles of satin and lace, ribbons and bows. “Ho!” he said amiably, upon achieving her side.

Lady Regina dispelled her giggling sisters with a single quelling glance. “Sweetbriar,” she responded coolly. “I am surprised to see you here.”

And so she might be surprised, mused Rolf; the Pantheon Bazaar was hardly among his usual haunts. He would not tell Regina that he had followed her, however. Darling that she was, Lady Regina had a slight tendency to puff up with conceit. “Surprised? he said merely. “So am I surprised. Dashed if I expected to encounter you in this place. But I’m glad I have! Don’t want to stand on bad terms.”

Nor did Lady Regina deem it politic to continue estranged from the wealthiest of her beaux. Even so, she did not mean to forgive him too easily. “We would not
be
on bad terms, had you not discovered a partiality for Miss Clough.”

“A—” Lord Sweetbriar flinched. “I don’t have a partiality for Clytie. You should know that! Ain’t I said I have a preference for
you
any number of times? Clytie’s a good sort of girl, but she can’t take the shine out of you.” Having, as he thought, reassured his beloved, Rolf smiled. “There! I’m glad
that’s
cleared up! I don’t mind admitting I’ve nigh fretted myself to flinders over this business. Tell me, didn’t you miss me just a little bit?”

The object of Lord Sweetbriar’s affections narrowed her fine green eyes. Rolf was very sure of her, she thought. Well, Lady Regina was no longer so certain that she must settle for Rolf. “I have been very busy,” she replied. “Mr. Thorne—”

“Hah!” interjected Lord Sweetbriar, in such violent tones as made Lady Regina stare.
“Hah!”
he repeated, for good measure. “Certainly Uncle Duke has been busy—leading you up the garden path!”

“The garden—” Lady Regina gasped with outrage. “Not another word, Sweetbriar! I am very displeased with you.”

“You’re
displeased?” Rolf would not be denied his say.
“You!
You’d be in the very devil of a pucker if you was me! Don’t bother to tell me I should not swear in front of a lady. You’d swear too if you was me. For that matter, I ain’t sure you
are
a lady, because it’s sure as check you ain’t been acting like one! Which reminds me, why did you say Uncle Duke was dangling after my fortune when he ain’t?”

Only Lord Sweetbriar’s last remark saved him from verbal annihilation. “How do you know that he is not?” inquired Lady Regina, with clenched jaw.

“Who ain’t what?” This reconciliation was not proceeding as Lord Sweetbriar had anticipated it would when he followed Lady Regina through the portals of the Pantheon Bazaar. “Oh! Uncle Duke told me himself that he don’t need a fortune, and I don’t have any reason to think he was telling me a tarradiddle.” His uncle, Rolf reflected, seemed to have a harrowing predilection for the truth.

Lady Regina was also engaged in reflection of which Marmaduke Thorne was the focus. In her view of the world, the only man who didn’t need a fortune already possessed ample resources of his own. If Mr. Thorne did not yearn after his nephew’s wealth, then he must be already wealthy in his own right. Marmaduke gave the appearance of a gentleman who dwelt in easy circumstances, certainly—but appearances could be very deceptive, as Lady Regina well knew. A perfect example was her own walking dress of white muslin, unadorned by so much as a narrow tuck or colored ribbon, not to mention cambric frills and tambour work. The casual observer might think so uncluttered a creation was the epitome of elegance. Regina knew better. She verged on being a dowd.

Lady Sweetbriar’s matched Wedgewood cameos would have made all the difference, Regina realized suddenly. Yes, and such a triumph would also put her siblings’ disrespectful noses firmly out of joint. Lady Regina was growing sick to death of her younger sisters, who were prone to go on at great and maudlin length about the selfishness of the family beauty, who had let slip off her hook the plumpest fish in the matrimonial seas.

Regina cast her whispering, snickering sisters a loathing glance, then looked with heightened appreciation upon Lord Sweetbriar. Her own lack of modality was more than compensated by his lordship’s violet coat, which was made up with French riding sleeves and huge plated buttons and skirt-tails which reached below his knees. “So Mr. Thorne is a man of substance,” she mused.

Though Lord Sweetbriar’s powers of perception were not especially keen, he had begun to glean a tolerable comprehension of the way in which his beloved’s mind worked. “I doubt that Uncle Duke’s substance is equal to my own!” he therefore said bluntly. “Duke was a younger son. Moreover, you wouldn’t care for his conversation of a morning. Just this day he was talking to me about the St. Petersburg prison over the breakfast cups. People thrown into cells below water level and left there with only a few wisps of straw to sleep on and reptiles for company.” He shuddered. “It was enough to make a fellow wish he’d stayed in bed! How would
you
like to have freezing water poured on your head until your whole body froze into a statue of solid ice?”

For herself, Lady Regina could not like the notion, but she thought it might suit Lord Sweetbriar very well. “It is little wonder that natural deaths are notoriously rare among members of the Russian imperial family,” she remarked. “I fail to see what any of this has to do with whether or not Mr. Thorne harbors intentions toward your inheritance.”

It was not toward Rolf’s inheritance that his uncle harbored intentions, that unhappy young man thought. How best to warn his beloved that she was encouraging the attentions of a gazetted rakehell?

Lord Sweetbriar’s long suit was not subtlety. “You are encouraging the attentions of a rakehell,” he remarked.

“A—I am not!” Lady Regina wondered if Mr. Thorne’s tales of Slavic excess had unhinged his nephew’s brain. “Goodness! Can you be referring to your uncle? I never heard of such a thing!”

Lord Sweetbriar could not fault his beloved’s skepticism; he, too, would have doubted his uncle’s aptitude for villainy, had he not had it from Duke’s own lips. “My uncle is a very rascally character,” he said, with praiseworthy restraint. “You took up with him to make me jealous. I don’t mind owning I
was,
a teeny bit! Even though I knew all along it was a hum. But least said, soonest mended! We’ll forget it ever occurred.”

By this indication that her transgression had been magnanimously forgiven, Lady Regina was filled with a sense of burning resentment.
Her
attention had not been first to stray. Were anyone to mete out forgiveness, it should not be Sweetbriar. “That settles it! You
are
a jingle-brain!” she unkindly remarked.

Lord Sweetbriar strove for patience. “I may or may not be a jingle-brain, but I’m awake on more suits than you! You’re wondering if maybe you can attach Uncle Duke for real, now that you know he’s plump in the pocket himself.” Rolf’s quest for patience proved to be in vain. “I was used to think Nikki the most hardened flirt in London. Clearly I was wrong. I ain’t sure I care to be leg-shackled to a female who’s running mad for my own uncle—
not
that he’ll be throwing the handkerchief in your direction, my girl!”

“You think not?” Lady Regina did an excellent impersonation of a person who had had the freezing waters of the Neva poured over her head. “I’ll thank you, Sweetbriar, to be a little less busy about my affairs!”

“Your—” Upon being gifted with this frank admission, his lordship’s feelings so overcame him that even his eyes bulged. “You admit to it?” A further disillusioning realization struck him.
“Affaires?
You’ve, er, gone up the garden path with more than Uncle Duke? Good God!”

Lady Regina, who had endured these perplexing statements in openmouthed bewilderment, now firmly pressed her lips shut. Only after achieving a count of several hundred did she allow them to part again. “Not affaires, Sweetbriar! Affairs
!
A-f-f-a-i-r-s! Business! I requested you to be less busy about my business! As to the other, I have
never—
oh! No gentleman who truly cared for a lady could suggest such a thing.”

Lord Sweetbriar was stricken with not the slightest pang of remorse. “If he knew what Uncle Duke said to
me,
he could! I ain’t wishful of cutting up your hopes, Regina, but someone must. Why, it was all I could do to talk him out of trying to set you up as his fancy-piece.”

“His—” Words failed Lady Regina. She pressed her fingers to her brow.

Anxiously, Lord Sweetbriar glanced around them, but no one seemed to have remarked his companion’s distress save her sisters, who were huddled in a giggling cluster a small distance away, and those little cats seemed less anxious than pleased. “Don’t poker up,” he begged. “Uncle Duke meant it for the best. He decided I must be hankering after Clytie—don’t fly into the boughs! It wasn’t
my
idea.”

But Mr. Thorne had told her that his nephew
didn’t
hanker after Miss Clough. Something very queer was afoot, decided Lady Regina. As regarded Lord Sweetbriar, she may have been a trifle hasty. One did not thoughtlessly toss aside a wealthy suitor in these days of cambric muslins at 1/8 a yard, and damask figured sarcenet at 6, even when it appeared that there might be juicier fish in the sea. “I think you had better tell me all about it, Rolf,” she suggested.

By this indication that his beloved meant to be at least sufficiently reasonable as to refrain from enacting high melodrama in the Pantheon Bazaar, Lord Sweetbriar’s own worst apprehensions were laid to rest. Briefly he repeated his conversation with his uncle, concluding: “I told him Nikki was still smitten, so that should turn the trick. If he’s dangling after Nikki, Uncle Duke can’t very well be dangling after you, too.”

Lady Regina could hardly be expected to appreciate this suggestion that any gentleman, given a choice of women after whom to dangle, must automatically choose Lady Sweetbriar. Nor was she gratified to be mentioned in conjunction with the coarse sentiments Lord Sweetbriar had expressed. In point of fact, decided Lady Regina, this entire conversation was a most improper one.

She changed the subject. “You expect me to believe that it is I whom you hold in esteem above all other females, Sweetbriar?”

Rolf interpreted the question in the most favorable of lights. “You know it’s midsummer moon with me; I told you so myself. Don’t know what else I
can
tell you! Except that I’ll do my best to make you happy.”

“And in proof of your professions,” Lady Regina hinted, “you have brought me your stepmama’s jewels.”

“I have?” Looking confused, Lord Sweetbriar patted at himself. “Dash it, I did not! Don’t know what put such a notion in your head. Not that I won’t, eventually. I ain’t had
time
to try and persuade Nikki to hand over the baubles. I’ve been too busy trying to prevent her marrying me off to Clytie.”

“Nikki!” All the pent-up venom which Mr. Thorne had forbidden Lady Regina to utter in his hearing was released in that one word. “I should have guessed she was behind all this. You claim you do not honor her above me. Yet clearly you do. Do not deny it. In all truth you cannot.”