Maggie MacKeever (8 page)

Tabby flushed as she realized what sort of reward a rakehell would demand. She tried to ignore the warmth of his hand, which was disturbing even through the fabric of her glove. “So I am forfeit?” she said lightly. “It does not seem entirely chivalrous of you to demand a reward.”

“Chivalrous?” Vivien quirked a brow. “You forget my reputation. It was not by being chivalrous that I earned my name.”

“Nor is it by being chivalrous that you live up to it, I gather!” Tabby retorted wryly. “I begin to think myself doubly fortunate that you interfered with that odious officer on my behalf.”

Vivien stroked the palm of her hand with his thumb. “Chivalry played no part here, either, my dear. I could not stand by and watch another man take what I wanted myself.”

Here was plain speaking! Tabby stared at the marble floor. Then she realized that, of course, he was not serious. “You are in a very teasing mood, I think!” she murmured.

In a teasing mood, was he? Vivien glanced down the passageway. The other guests having withdrawn to the banqueting rooms to discover what culinary delights awaited, he and Tabby had the Oriental hallway to themselves. It made a very romantic setting. “No, I do not jest,” he said, and moved his hands to cup her face.

He was going to kiss her. Tabby knew that she should flee. Common sense was outflanked by the combined effects of champagne and Ermyntrude’s reckless gown. Vivien’s hand moved over her bare shoulders, her arms. She shivered.

Her bemused expression was absurdly touching. “Come away with me,” Vivien said huskily. “Now.”

Where did he want her to go? Tabby wished she might find out. Honor demanded that she carry out her duty to Sir Geoffrey. “I cannot,” she said.

Vivien’s hands tightened. “Why not? You’ll want for nothing. If there’s some, er, impediment, I’ll buy him off.”

Tabby blinked. “Good heavens! You’re offering me carte blanche!”

Vivien was not accustomed to having his offers of patronage greeted with astonishment. “I’ve made a mistake, it appears,” he said, and released her. “Pray accept my apologies.”

How cross he looked. Tabby thought Vivien seldom blundered in matters such as this. “Don’t regard it!” she said kindly. “It is no wonder that you thought I was a bit o’—that you thought what you did. This dreadful gown would lead anyone to that conclusion, and my own behavior was not, well, er!”

Vivien was charmed by her confusion. “Shall we cry pax?” he said. “I have both rescued and abused you, so perhaps we may now be friends.”

“I should like that.” Tabby glanced shyly up at him. “You did not abuse me so very much, you know.”

Vivien knew that he would like to abuse her further, so winsome did she look. He was spared putting his willpower to the test by the sound of a distant voice calling his name. Tabby recognized that voice also. She looked wildly about her, as if she might seek refuge behind an illusory Chinese tree.

“Wait!” Vivien caught her wrist. “We are friends now, so you must trust me a little bit. Won’t you tell me who you are?”

Quite naturally, Tabby did no such thing—although, truth be told, her reticence sprang less from a desire to protect her employer and his family than from a desire to spare herself the mortification that such a confession must bring. If Vivien were to think of her again, unlikely as the prospect seemed, let him remember her as a woman of mystery rather than a lowly governess embarked on a charade.

Sara’s voice came closer. “Vivien!” She sounded as though she would momentarily appear around the bend of the hallway.

“Oh, please!” gasped Tabby. “You must let me go!”

Vivien knew he must release her, for both their sakes. Did Sara discover them together, nothing would prevent her from raising an almighty fuss. But he would not give up his advantage. “Your name!” he said again.

He demanded a name? Then Tabby must give him one. But what, if not her own? And not Elphinstone?

“Vivien!” Sara’s voice came closer still; her footsteps echoed down the hall. “Quarles!” gasped Tabby. Vivien released her, and she fled.

Chapter Nine

Lady Grey was taking the waters, for reasons of her health. Sea bathing in Brighton was a serious affair, to be undertaken with medical supervision, and was prescribed for all manner of chronic complaints, asthma and deafness and consumption, rheumatism and ruptures and madness—and, in lady Grey’s case, afflicted nerves. One hired a machine, in which one could disrobe privately and don a flannel smock. Then one was pulled out into the water by a horse, and descended from the machine into the water in the strictest seclusion. It was a popular procedure, engaged in occasionally even by royalty. The story was still told of how, when Prinny had gone in too far, his dipper had to drag him in to shore by the ear.

Lady Grey intensely disliked the whole business. The bathing machines had no awnings, and she was convinced that the gentlemen with their telescopes trained on the shoreline were much less interested in the antics of the fishing fleet than in the beflannelled ladies splashing in the muddy margins of the sea. She was equally convinced that taking the waters had not benefited her nerves. If anything, the sojourn had made them worse. She made a final adjustment to her bonnet, her gray walking dress. Her obligation to her physician fulfilled, she exited the bathing establishment and stepped into the sunlight.

Wood’s Bath was situated within a few yards of William’s New Bath, near the fish market on the Steyne. Lady Grey averted her gaze from the gentlemen clad for their early morning baths in buff trousers and slight jackets, who shockingly lounged about in this state of undress for all the world to see, and glanced toward the market stalls. A certain gentleman engaged in a transaction at the fish stall attracted her interest. He beckoned to her. Lady Grey ignored him and quickly set out at a good pace.

Along the Steyne, she traveled; past shops displaying toys and rare china, lace and ribbons and millinery, muslins and chintzes and cambrics, and tea. Neither the parish church nor the Chapel Royal aroused her interest; she did not pause even for Mr. Donaldson’s library, where customers sat under the colonnades reading the London newspapers and watching fashionable Brighton pass by. But then a plaintive voice caught her attention. “I say, Gus! I wish you would slow down, because I can’t stand the pace. That sea bathing seems to be the ticket! Maybe I should take the waters myself.’’

Lady Grey loathed her nickname and had once boxed her younger brother’s ears for daring to address her in that way. From this source, however, she accepted the detested familiarity. There was satisfaction, also, in the fact that he had trailed after her all this way. She turned.

Sir Geoffrey smiled. He bore his ladylove no malice, for all she’d led him a merry chase. Gad, but his Gus was a lovely creature, with her bright green eyes and pale fair skin and hair. “Have I put your back up again?” he inquired ruefully. “Because, if not, I have not the least distant guess why you should run away from me!”

Lady Grey flushed with embarrassment. “I do not mean to be contrariwise! Pray forgive me. It is just that—”

“My dear, it is I who must apologize.” Sir Geoffrey was charmed by his ladylove’s confusion. He shifted the package that he held, thus bringing it to her attention. It was a very sloppily wrapped package, tied with string, and the aroma that clung to it left little doubt as to what was within.

Augusta wrinkled her delicate nose. “Gracious, Geoffrey! Are you doing the household shopping now? It is what I might expect from your daughters, but I wonder that your Miss—what
was
her name?—would allow such a thing.”

Sir Geoffrey drew Lady Grey’s hand through his arm, guided her toward the seawall that did double duty as an esplanade. “Miss Minchin is a clever little miss. A taking little thing. I make no doubt she’ll take us in hand!” He chuckled at his joke.

Lady Grey did not join in his laugher, permitted herself only a wan little smile. Her silence was comment in itself, and Sir Geoffrey studied her pale face. “It is very good of you to concern yourself about my girls. They are a thought high-spirited, I know.”

A thought high-spirited? Lady Grey could not let this gross understatement pass. “Ermyntrude,” she said bluntly, “is making an exhibition of herself in the neighborhood. You’ve raised your daughter from the cradle. Can’t you stop her throwing herself at St. Erth?”

Sir Geoffrey disliked conversations of this nature. He was an amiable man and made unhappy by upsets. It occurred to him, not for the first time, that his Gus was frequently in a deuced touchy frame of mind. He murmured vaguely about letting nature take its course. “Anyway, I don’t think I
did
raise her! Seems to me like Ermy and Dru raised themselves.” He smiled. “You worry too much. My girls will be right as a trivet. As for Ermy’s tendre for St. Erth—why, look about you! Love is in the air.”

Among her countless virtues, Lady Grey did not include a sense of humor. Taking Sir Geoffrey’s injunction seriously, she gazed about the esplanade.

Brighton was popular at this time of year. The esplanade was thronged with people strolling on foot, riding on horseback and in coach, traveling in bath carriages. Beyond the esplanade lay the beach itself, where children queued up for a donkey ride while their elders made use of the bathing machines. Nothing in Gus’s surroundings reminded her of Cupid, except Sir Geoffrey himself. He appeared deep in thought.

Lady Grey took advantage of her fiancé’s abstraction to subject him to a covert inspection. He was tall and handsome, with those classic features and blue eyes and red-gold hair and the physique of a man much younger than his forty years. Augusta sighed. Each day she hoped to find Sir Geoffrey less attractive and herself less susceptible to his good looks. To date, that hope had been in vain. He was rendered no less handsome even by the smelly fish he held, as was evident from the number of ladies who gazed appreciatively upon him as they strolled past. Lady Grey had never felt this way before, certainly not about her deceased husband, who’d been chosen for her by her parents and had been a great deal older than she. It seemed to her inappropriate that she should fall in love for the first time at her age, and with someone about those whose character she had grave reservations. She thought of Ermyntrude. At least at five-and-thirty one might hope to have more worldly wisdom than at seventeen.

Sir Geoffrey caught her gaze. Gus looked unhappy, and so he thrust his own worries away. “There’s no need to be troubling your pretty head about Ermy!” he repeated. “She’ll do just fine. I make no doubt Miss Minchin will have both my girls up to snuff in no time! Already, she’s settled in and become quite one of the family.”

Lady Grey valiantly withheld the opinion that it would take the intervention of the Almighty to convert Sir Geoffrey’s hoyden daughters into pattern cards of respectability, after their papa had left them to run wild for so long. As for this Miss Minchin whom he considered such a paragon— “I hope you may not have to repent of your choice,” Augusta said repressively.

Sir Geoffrey wished his Gus wasn’t quite so high a stickler. “Come down off your high ropes, puss! Next you’ll accuse Miss Minchin of being a serpent clasped to my bosom. Let me assure you that the only thing I’ve clasped to my bosom of late is you, and that not half so often as I’d like!”

Augusta flushed. Shocking as it was in her, she wished the opportunity for clasping arose more often than it did. “Oh, dear, was I being—”

“Starched-up?” supplied Sir Geoffrey. “It don’t signify.” His long acquaintance with the family weakness had gained him a certain insight where feminine feelings were concerned. Lady Grey’s sense of decorum would not allow her to admit that her pride had been wounded by his failure to consult with her. Seldom did Gus slip and show him her true feelings. He was gratified.

But he did not wish her to be made unhappy, and the matter of Miss Minchin had obviously caused her distress. “Should I not have hired Miss Minchin? Do you wish me to turn her off?”

“Gracious, no!” Augusta protested nobly, although she wasn’t certain she didn’t wish just that. “You must do what you think best, of course.”

What a paragon his Gus was—or tried to be. Sir Geoffrey smiled. “Let me introduce you to Miss Minchin,” he suggested. “You may see for yourself that she’s a well-brought-up young woman, fallen on hard times.”

Fallen into clover, rather. Lady Grey could not imagine that the duties required of Miss Minchin would prove arduous. “Ah, yes, I must meet Miss Minchin,” she said vaguely. Could Augusta have met Miss Minchin in that moment, she might well have succumbed to an unbecoming violence of feeling and boxed the scheming hussy’s ears.

Perhaps the sound of the waves pounding on the soft white cliffs was giving his beloved one of her frequent headaches? How charmingly absurd it was of Gus to take a pet. “A mere slip of a girl!” Sir Geoffrey said reassuringly. “She can’t hold a candle to you, puss!”

Lady Grey roused from her abstraction. “I don’t care a fig for Miss Minchin!” she snapped. “Look! Why on earth is that female making such an exhibition of herself? Can she be trying to attract our attention, do you think?”

It was with no particular foreboding that Sir Geoffrey turned to discover what had aroused Gus’s interest. Assuming that Tabby had successfully carried out the duty he’d assigned her, he had been feeling free from much alarm.

“She
is
waving at us!” marveled Lady Grey. “How very queer. I’m sure I’ve never seen the woman before in my life!” She narrowed her eyes. “Or I think I have not, although it is very difficult to tell in that absurd hat!”

It was indeed a large hat, decorated in a very fanciful style, and obscured not only its wearer’s face but hid her hair. Still, Sir Geoffrey had no difficulty recognizing the hat’s owner. He wasn’t certain he didn’t also recognize the hat. Perhaps it was among a number of similar concoctions for which he had stood the bill.

Lady Grey’s suspicious were aroused by Sir Geoffrey’s silence. She hoped she might not be called vulgarly inquisitive, but surely any woman must be a teeny bit curious to see her fiancé’s eyes starting out of his head. “Geoffrey! That woman is trying to get
your
attention!” she said.