Maggie MacKeever (27 page)

Jynx had endured a very trying day, and her efforts to think of a resolution to her hostess’s mountainous debts had left her with a raging headache. “You are a curst humbug!” she said rudely. “Do go away.”

“A humbug, am I?” Innis was additionally more than a little foxed, having imbibed a vast quantity of various sorts of alcohol, including a potent concoction known as a dog’s nose—warm porter, moist sugar, gin and nutmeg—before starting in on the brandy. “Damned if I know why you must be so devilish disagreeable!”

Miss Lennox sank down on the sofa and dropped her head into her hands. “God in heaven!” she moaned.

Innis still nurtured hope for the success of his grand plan. He dropped to his knees on the floor in front of her, carefully set down the brandy decanter, and grasped her hands. Jynx tried unsuccessfully to free herself. Innis then launched into a dissertation upon her wit and beauty, and offered protestations of loyalty unto death. “My darling,” he concluded, “fly away with me! Once the knot is tied, no one can ever part us again.”

“Nothing,” remarked Jynx, “can be more revolting than this persistence of yours! How many times must I tell you that I am perfectly aware of your deceit and duplicity?”

Innis was not deterred by her unappreciative tone, or the jaundiced expression with which she regarded him. “Even a man of notoriously bad character,” he offered, and kissed her hand, “can by affection be reformed.”

Miss Lennox snorted and yanked her hand away. “You are the most impudent rascal that ever existed! First you steal my betrothal ring, and then the other night——”

“I am more sorry for that than I can say!” interrupted Innis. “You must understand, my darling, how a man may be driven to—”

“I understand nothing!” Jynx said impatiently. “Except that your behavior is strongly to be deprecated! I do not love you; I do not even think that I
like
you, and that you should take it upon yourself to bully and badger me is too much to be borne! I will not fly away with you, I would not even walk to the street corner with you. Now be done with this nonsense!”

Even then, Innis did not despair of rousing a tender emotion in Miss Lennox’s chaste and fluttering breast. She might refuse him in the most emphatic manner, she might state unequivocally that she wished to hear no more on this subject, but she had forgotten the aces that he had up his sleeve. He proceeded to remind her of them. “What of Cristin?” he inquired slyly. “And Lord Peverell, and my sister? Recall that you may condemn them all to woe, or grant them happiness.” Miss Lennox stared at him, stunned. “Come, my darling, admit that alliance with myself is not all that hideous a fate. I am not, I hope, a
cruel
man.”

“What you are is a candidate for Bedlam!” A muscle twitched in Jynx’s cheek. “So I am expected to sacrifice myself on the altar of the Ashley intemperance? To give myself—and my fortune!—over into your hands so that Cristin and your sister may be spared the consequences of their own follies? That is the most idiotic notion I have ever heard, and I’ve heard a great many idiotic notions since I came to this house.” Innis, who was trying to regain possession of her hands, did not look convinced. “It is utterly out of the question!”

For the first time, Innis realized that he might fail. Lest this opportunity totally escape him, as it appeared she might, he determined on a more direct approach. Miss Lennox would sing a different tune were she truly compromised. He swore at her and lunged.

Jynx was prepared for exactly such an attack. She boxed his ears vigorously, shoved him over backward, ran across the room and grasped the fireplace poker. Innis was no little bit startled to see the phlegmatic Miss Lennox transformed into a snarling virago.

Not so Lord Roxbury, who several times had been tempted to interrupt this shocking scene. Lord Roxbury, during several of the preceding moments, had experienced the novel sensation of feeling his blood boil in his veins. In the interest of enlightenment, however, and an enlightenment of which he stood sorely in need, he had refrained from interference. Shannon congratulated himself for it. Had he rushed to defend Miss Lennox, he would not have been privileged to witness her shatter forever the myth of the weaker sex.

Shannon stood erect, for he had leaned against the wall for support. His sides ached with suppressed mirth. With an air of leisured unconcern, and only the slightest of smiles, he strolled into the room. Innis turned, gasped, and fled.

Miss Lennox’s reaction was a great deal more complex. She did not blanch, or start, or gasp; she did not even appear especially surprised. Instead, she carefully replaced the poker. “I gather,” she said without expression, “that Adorée let the cat out of the bag.”

Lord Roxbury had no objection to a slight inelegance of speech. He moved further into the room. “She did.”

“I thought she would eventually. To request silence of Lady Bliss is as futile as to ask a babbling brook to be still.” Still Jynx remained impassive. “What did she tell you?”

“Me? Nothing.” The viscount thought, erratically, that he would prefer to see Miss Lennox animated by a very bad spirit instead of so lifeless and spent. “It was to Sir Malcolm that she made her confession, and Sir Malcolm did not confide to me the details of it.”

Miss Lennox was seen to wince. “I suppose he is very angry.”

“Extremely. He blames you for his present onset of gout— though it’s my opinion that a turkey stuffed with chestnuts is the true culprit.” Shannon was stirred to compassion by that still figure and shuttered face. “You need not fear Sir Malcolm’s wrath, poppet. He has promised he will neither scold or punish you, if only you will come home.” Jynx’s expression indicated doubt of this paternal magnanimity. “All of us have been very worried about you.”

This politely phrased reminder of the extent of her transgressions caused Miss Lennox to raise her eyes at last to the viscount. Perhaps because she had not seen him for what seemed a very long time, she was stricken anew by his figure and appearance. He was looking at her not with anger, as she had expected; his face wore only the smallest of frowns. Jynx did not consider this an indication of concern, but of indifference. “You are looking,” she said hollowly, “very fine.”

Lord Roxbury regarded her face, pale against the hideous black gown, and her untidy chestnut hair. “Well, you’re not!”
he retorted. “Good God, what the devil possessed you, Jynx? Our difficulties might have been settled easily enough had you not seen fit to publish them to the world.”

If Shannon had expected to continue their argument, and Shannon apparently did, he was doomed to disappointment. Miss Lennox cast him a very odd glance, then turned her back on him and stared into the fireplace. Shannon glared at her stiff spine. “And then,” he said grimly, “to come of all places here, and allow all of us to think you had been kidnapped—or worse! And apropos of worse, just what
did
Innis Ashley do to you the other night?”

Jynx had no intention of offering detail. “It was nothing so very bad,” she murmured. “He only kissed me.”

“Only!” uttered the viscount angrily, and in three strides was across the room. He grasped Miss Lennox by the shoulder, spun her around, and kissed her himself. “Since you are on the way to becoming expert in such matters, how does
that
compare?”

Jynx stared at him, then touched her fingers to her swollen lips. “It doesn’t,” she said faintly. Lord Roxbury cursed and turned away, fast in a paroxysm of rage. “Perhaps I should leave you here, after all!” he growled, at which point Miss Lennox displayed the good sense for which she was celebrated, and which had been demonstrably absent these past many days. She sniffled, choked, then gave vent to heart-rending sobs.

“Jynx!” Lord Roxbury was appalled. “My God, Jynx!” These soothing remarks failed to have any appreciable effect, so he took her once more into his arms. “But, Jynx, you never cry!”

“I’ve learned it from Adorée!” wailed Miss Lennox, who had thrown her arms around the viscount’s lean waist and was hugging him so tightly that he could barely draw breath. “And what I meant was that I didn’t like
Innis’s
embraces, not yours!”

It took Shannon a few moments to make sense of this utterance, and when he finally did his face was thunderstruck. “What about that accursed ring?”

“It’s not accursed!” sobbed Jynx, to the grave detriment of his satin waistcoat. “It’s a lovely ring, and I’m sure anyone would be happy to wear it! Innis asked to see it, so I had taken it off—I had just beat him at checkers, you see—and then that dreadful man came in, and Tomkin came to my rescue, and I forgot
.
And by the time I’d realized, it was too late, and you accused me of
gambling!”

“The devil!” Shannon was quite oblivious to the discomfort of Miss Lennox’s grip on him, and his own lack of breath.

“And I’m very sorry,” continued Jynx, who was determined that her confession should overlook no detail, “if I accused you unjustly, and I doubt I’d have believed just Eulalia, or just Innis, but they both told me the same thing.” She hiccoughed. “And I
like
Adorée, so I thought it perfectly reasonable that
you
should!”

Lord Roxbury, perhaps owing to his lack of oxygen, was feeling dizzy. “Goose!” he said. Miss Lennox seemed to consider this encouraging; she loosened her death grip, stepped back, and looked at him. The viscount responded as any right-thinking gentleman must: he kissed her again.

Some time later, they were established companionably on the couch. “I still don’t understand,” Miss Lennox remarked, “why you should think I’d taken to gambling—and
tête-à-têtes
with Innis.”

“I’m not sure myself.” No longer bedeviled by frustration, Shannon was in a most amiable mood. “I think it had something to do with Percy, but I don’t distinctly recall. What does it matter, poppet? It’s all behind us, and there’s no use in crying over spilt milk. So let’s forget the Ashleys.”

Thus recalled to her responsibilities. Miss Lennox removed her head from Shannon’s shoulder, where it had been resting comfortably, and looked at him. “I’d be very pleased to,” she said, with a certain trepidation, “if I could, but I cannot! The Ashleys are conspicuously crazy—I would be the last to deny it—but I cannot abandon them. Oh, not Innis!” she added quickly, lest the viscount fly once more into the boughs. “He can go to the devil in a handcart, and I will wave him goodbye. But you would not wish to see Percy in the basket!”

Lord Roxbury was at a loss to understand what Percy had to do with the feckless Ashleys. Jynx folded her arms beneath her bosom—an act that did not escape the viscount’s appreciative attention—and proceeded to explain. Shannon was gifted with an exact account of Miss Lennox’s sojourn at Blissington House, the discoveries she had made, and the remarkable occurrences she had witnessed. As a result he roared with laughter. His merriment was infectious. Lady Bliss found them clutching one another in a mutual fit of giggles when she cautiously stepped into the room.

“You’re not angry with me, then!” Beaming upon their flushed faces, Adorée advanced. She bore a bottle of champagne and three glasses on a silver tray.

“Oh, no!” gasped Jynx, and wiped her damp eyes against the sleeve of her ugly gown.

‘Tell me, Adorée,” said Lord Roxbury, in strangled tones,
“did
you give Erland back his opera cloak?”

“Well,” Lady Bliss looked extremely guilty, “no.” She might have explained that she had quite forgotten the cloak, as apparently had the earl, had not her reply sent both Lord Roxbury and Miss Lennox into fresh outbursts of mirth. She regarded them tolerantly.

“Ah, Adorée!” gasped Shannon, when he had recovered partially. “Give me an accounting;
I’ll
pay your bills!”

“You’ll do no such thing!” Lady Bliss looked faintly scandalized. “You’re not my—ah! You have no reason to be held responsible for my debts, and to allow you to be so would be very bad of me.” She eyed Miss Lennox warily, but that very insensitive young lady was still giggling. “Anyway, there seems little point in it, since no sooner are the wretched things paid off than I am plagued with more! They are the most insidious things, I swear! If they do not multiply like rabbits—or is it guppies?—of their own record, I do not know how they are to be accounted for!” Lord Roxbury and Miss Lennox seemed to be stricken mutually hysterical by these observations, and Adorée thought it time the subject was changed. “We shall not talk about such disagreeable things, if you please! I wish to drink a toast to your reconciliation—you
are
reconciled? Good!—and to your continued felicity and good health!”

“And in turn to yours, Adorée!” Jynx raised her glass. “I owe you a great debt.”

“We will not,” reproved Lady Bliss, grimacing, “speak of debts. Or my health, which is always very good, though with the way things are going I’m sure I should be prostrate.” She regarded Miss Lennox, who had choked on her champagne. Lord Roxbury, with great effort, had kept a straight face. Obviously, they were in perfect charity with one another, and lovers in perfect charity were famed for queer behavior, so Adorée wasted no concern on their combined eccentricities.

“People may say what they wish about me,” she remarked, “and that they talk about me I’m aware, not that I regard it! I may be so improvident that I am dragged off to debtors’ prison, and I may be so foolish as to suffer an unrequited passion, but,” her tone was triumphant, “no one knows more about romance.”

“Shannon!” gasped Jynx, who was laughing so hard she could not draw breath.

“Oh no, child!” cried Lady Bliss, horrified.
“Not
Shannon!” It was the final straw; Lord Roxbury clutched Miss Lennox to his chest and went off in whoops.

Reassured that her efforts toward the reunion of this pair were not to be set to naught by a chance remark, Lady Bliss helped herself to more champagne. A pretty picture they made, Lord Roxbury sprawled on the sofa, his immaculate jacket rumpled and his pristine cravat askew; and Miss Lennox, in an equally crumpled condition, sprawled across his chest. A very nice chest it was, reflected Lady Bliss, though she prudently refrained from voicing that opinion. Miss Lennox hiccoughed weakly and the viscount, shoulders shaking, buried his face in her disheveled hair. “Ah, love!” sighed Adorée.