Maggie MacKeever (21 page)

It occurred to Madame le Best that Puddiphat was very likely responsible for Lady Bligh’s current mission. “That puppy!” she muttered.

“Is he?” The Baroness looked interested. “I have not met Puddiphat. Are you aware, Helen, that your niece has been conniving with Puddiphat to send Calveley to jail? She requires a share of the reward money to purchase her independence. Puddiphat is on the trail of a cracksman who departed England in a very great hurry several years past. He was a very clever fellow known only to the authorities as Blood-and-Thunder, after his preference for that drink.”

Upon Madame le Best these confidences had a startling effect. She turned ashen, loosened her grip on the
Repository,
and moaned.

“Precisely,” said the Baroness, once more retrieving the
Repository,
which was not benefiting from its abrupt descents to the floor. “Wouldn’t it be ironic if your niece connived to send Calveley to jail in her own father’s place?”

“You don’t know that!” Madame’s sharp features were frantic. “This is only guesswork.”

This time the Baroness deposited the
Repository
on the table, instead of Madame’s lap. “I have told you not to try and humbug me,” she said severely. “The law is not to be trifled with—or if the law may be, because I have done it,
I
am not! Since when have you become so devoted to that rascal William, by the by?”

Deprived of Mr. Ackerman’s
Repository,
Madame grasped a current edition of
The Ladies’ Monthly Magazine
and vigorously fanned herself. “Devoted? I wouldn’t shed a tear if I was to see him hang! But what would my ladies say to
that,
do you think?”

In a ruminative manner, the Baroness again tapped her long, elegant fingers, this time against her delicately tinted cheek.
“1
should think it vastly diverting if my milliner’s brother was hanged as a cracksman, but I admit that not everyone might feel similarly,” she allowed. “It was precisely for that reason that I did not tell John that your brother had done worse than abandon his wife and child—no sooner did he mention milliners with relatives who’d run afoul of Bow Street than I thought of you. And when he mentioned to me Blood-and-Thunder—” She shrugged her elegant shoulders.
“Voilà!
I recalled your brother’s fondness for that drink.”

Madame gripped the
Ladies’ Magazine
so tightly that the pages tore. “What are you going to do?”

“Do?” Lady Bligh continued to look contemplative. “I have not quite decided. There is no real reason to think that William has returned to England, save Dame Gossip—yet, for some odd reason, I feel that in this instance rumor does not lie. How refreshing! I must know everything you can tell me about your brother, Helen—yes, I know you would prefer not to speak of him, but wishing will not dissolve the connection. There are several members of my own family I would dispose of, if only I could.”

Faced with this ultimatum, Madame le Best fell back on her usual excuse. “I am vowed never to mention That Man’s name under this roof.”

“Twaddle! You have already done so,” the Baroness pointed out. Madame continued to look obdurate. Immediately, Dulcie’s patrician features took on a melancholy cast. “What resolution you exhibit, Helen. I am inspired by your example. I, too, shall nurture self-discipline. Where do I begin, I wonder? I have it! Long have I deplored my extravagance.”

Warily, Madame le Best eyed her most influential customer, from whose extravagance Madame had reaped considerable benefit. “What a pity,” mused the Baroness, “that you who inspired my reformation will suffer for it most.”

Not surprisingly, in light of this remark, Madame le Best lost no time in attempting to cajole Lady Bligh into a resumption of her extravagant ways. “I’ve changed my mind. I’ll tell you all you want to know,” she hastily amended, and did so. At all events, there was little enough she
could
tell, having always turned blind eyes and deaf ears toward her feckless brother, of whom she had never been fond.

“Humph!” remarked the Baroness, when Madame had done. “I had hoped for more. You have had no hint, then, that William might have returned.”

Becoming belatedly aware that she was shredding it, Madame returned the
Ladies’ Magazine
to the table-top. “None. But William isn’t likely to get in touch with me, knowing there’s no love lost.” Her sharp features contorted. “He might attempt to contact Melly, though I never saw in him any spark of paternal feeling.” And then she flung herself onto the floor at Dulcie’s feet. “I beg you, Lady Bligh, don’t betray us to Bow Street!”

The Baroness surveyed her milliner, who was clutching her calves, and weeping upon her knees. “Pray do not enact me a Cheltenham tragedy, Helen. Were I going to blow the gaff, I would have already done so—not that John is such an ogre as all that.”

Mortified by her lack of self-control, Madame le Best untangled herself from Lady Bligh’s knees. “John?” she echoed.

“The Chief Magistrate of Bow Street.” Dulcie’s roguish smile flashed. “And an old friend. You must trust me, Helen! Now I would like to speak with your niece.”

Madame le Best had scant choice but to trust the Baroness, she reflected, as she climbed to her feet and crossed slowly to the atelier. One glance within revealed that Melly was not there. With this fact, she acquainted Lady Bligh.

Prior to departure, the Baroness adjusted her bonnet one last time. “Has it occurred to you that your niece has inherited her father’s tendency toward stealth and guile, as well as his enterprising nature?” There was neither warmth nor humor, now, in Lady Bligh’s dark glance. “We must trust that the chit benefited from her glimpse of Newgate.”

Chapter Nineteen

“This is
better
than the Tower and London Bridge!” sighed Miss Bagshot, who was this day spreading sunshine in St. James’s Park. “Yes, and Newgate, too. You are a first-rate hand, sir. Dashed if I
don’t
have a knack for being in the right place at the right time. But you was telling me about your cousins before I interrupted you, and I wish you would go on!”

Lord Davenham did not do so immediately, but drew up his carriage and set down his groom with vague instructions to enjoy some gentle exercise. That worthy—whose corpulent person exercise could not fail to benefit—looked offended, but voiced no outright protest. The Duke gathered up his reins. He drove a vehicle as whimsical as himself, a sprung whiskey perched upon two great wheels, painted in shades of violet and blue and old rose, and sporting the family crest. “Now we may be private.” he remarked to his companion as they drove away.

“Bless my soul! Who’d’ve ever thought I’d be private with a Duke?” giggled Miss Bagshot. “I am very glad I gave my aunt the slip, though I expect she’ll be mad as toads over it. But there ain’t the least use borrowing trouble, because it comes soon enough, anyway. And here I go again, jawing on like a regular rasher-of-wind!”

Upon hearing Miss Bagshot’s inelegant description of her style of conversation, Lord Davenham roused sufficiently from his habitual preoccupation to cast his companion a quizzical glance. She looked very charming in a simple sprigged muslin gown with blue trimmings and a blue spencer, worn with a bonnet composed of thousands of pieces of fine Ionian cork pieced together in a mosaic pattern.

Melly responded to his lordship’s attention with fluttering lashes and a dimpled smile. “You saw a grand melodramatic spectacle at Drury Lane!” she prompted.

“So we did.” Lord Davenham was at his most vague. “Did I tell you that James I introduced mulberry trees into the park?”

“Yes, and you explained to me how St. James’s Palace was built on the site of a leper hospital, and how it’s haunted by the Duchess of Mazarin.” Miss Bagshot’s voice was stern. “I hope I ain’t ungrateful, but I don’t care a fig for palaces and mulberry trees. Tell me how you liked the play!”

“The play? At Drury Lane?” Lord Davenham’s hands were deft upon the reins. “It was very well if you like that sort of thing.”

Melly had no notion whether or not she would find such entertainment to her taste. Personally, she suspected that greater melodrama had been enacted in the Davenant family box. “Does
Lady
Davenham enjoy the theater?” she slyly inquired.

“I suppose she must. She said it was a charming evening.” Lord Davenham gestured. “You will notice the canal, Miss Bagshot. Charles the Second added it to the park. It runs from the mulberry garden to Whitehall.”

Melly’s interest in canals was little keener than her interest in palaces and mulberry trees; but she was not to be gifted with a description of the adventurous Davenant
ménage à trois
at play. She fidgeted with her bonnet, which she had appropriated from her aunt’s atelier, and tried a different approach. “Sir Malcolm wants me to give you up. He told me so himself. He said we was playing a May-game, and talked a great deal of nonsense about a person named Croesus who isn’t even alive.” Her tone was wistful. “What an out-and-outer Sir Malcolm is! A regular hand.”

Lord Davenham bestowed upon his companion a whimsical smile. “You seem to be quite taken with my cousin, Miss Bagshot.”

“Taken with him?” echoed Melly. “What female ain’t? Sir Malcolm needs only walk into a room to set hearts fluttering, you know—or perhaps you didn’t!
It don’t signify. I’m not going to be played fast and loose with.”

“Fast and loose?” The Duke looked intrigued.

“Fast and loose!” Miss Bagshot was firm. “I’ll make book on it. Of course you must take up the cudgels on Sir Malcolm’s behalf, because you’re a gentleman and he’s your relative, even if you
don’t
like him above half.”

Lord Davenham arched a brow. “I don’t?” he said.

“How
could
you?” In a sympathetic manner, Miss Bagshot patted the Duke’s arm. “You of all people must realize Sir Malcolm is depraved—after all, it’s your wife he’s being depraved
with!
As I told Sir Malcolm, he’s dashed lucky you ain’t horn-mad.”

“Ah.” Lord Davenham’s second eyebrow joined its fellow. “And what was his reply?”

Melly frowned. “I don’t recall, exactly. That may’ve been when he followed me into the alleyway and kissed me—you look startled, sir. It’s the truth, I swear it. Sir Malcolm
did
kiss me, and I slapped his face for it, even if I did like it
prodigious
well. A girl must look out for her future.” Her frown gave way to dimples. “Now, if
you
was to try and kiss me, sir—”

Lord Davenham’s brows lowered, simultaneously. “I hope you will not take offense, Miss Bagshot, but I am not in the habit of such things.”

“No?” Melly looked arch. “Then it ain’t no wonder Lady Davenham has allowed herself to be trifled with! Kissing is all very well in its place.”

“You misunderstand,” responded the Duke, as the sprung whiskey approached the trees that lined Birdcage Walk. “I have nothing against, er, kissing. I merely think that to do so in the middle of St. James’s Park is not the thing.”

“Bless my soul!” This hint that Lord Davenham might yet be persuaded to set aside his scruples inspired Melly to snuggle closer on the carriage seat. “Wondrous great together, are we not?”

Lord Davenham gazed serenely down the length of Birdcage Walk. “Have I told you about Jethro Tull’s seed drill?” he inquired.

Seed drills! Though Melly might be bird-witted, she could take a hint. “I can take a hint,” she said, as she undraped herself from Lord Davenham’s arm. “You think that to get up a flirtation with me would be the most improper thing. It seems to me that you have an excessively high regard for propriety, sir! Which is very hard on a girl. That is to say, you
look so
adventurous. Oh, I know you can’t help it, any more than I can help falling into pickles and cutting larks.” She was very thoughtful. “Mayhap that is why Lady Davenham has tossed her handkerchief in Sir Malcolm’s direction. One shouldn’t pretend to be something one ain’t.”

“I shouldn’t think so,” Lord Davenham responded vaguely. “We were betrothed in the cradle. If you will direct your attention over
there,
you will see Duck Island, Miss Bagshot.”

Poor Lady Davenham! thought Melly, even as she expressed her admiration for some distant pelicans. Married to someone she’d known all her life—naturally the Duchess was flirting with her cousin; the Duke would have few surprises left. In such a situation, Melly would be flirting, also. To own the truth, Melly would have flirted in
any
situation, but that is quite beside the point.

From waterfowl and pelicans, Lord Davenham had progressed to wheat. Reluctantly, Melly abandoned her intention of diddling the Duke in lieu of Sir Malcolm and Bow Street. “Sir Malcolm warned me you wasn’t a pigeon for my plucking,” she sighed. “But a girl has to try! I have decided that I don’t
wish
to see Sir Malcolm taken into custody by Bow Street, no matter how much reward money is involved. And so I warned him that Bow Street is on his trail.”

“Did you. Miss Bagshot?” Lord Davenham was quickly enough diverted from seed plows and turnip drills once one had discovered how to set about it. “And what was my cousin’s reply?”

“Oh, I didn’t tell him about
you!”
Miss Bagshot was rendered indignant by the inference that she was untrustworthy. “I just meant to put him on his guard against Puddiphat. It ain’t pleasant to be imprisoned, sir, as I should know, due to my aunt. What a hobble! I have had to positively cudgel my brain.”

This graphic description of Miss Bagshot’s thought processes caused Lord Davenham to smile. “Surely the situation is not so serious as all that.”

“In a pig’s whisker, it ain’t!” Melly responded bluntly. “That shows all you know. But then you ain’t dwelling under the hen’s thumb! Or do I mean foot? I
am
going to get clear of this pickle, no matter how much of a kick-up Aunt Hel may make. Yes, and I even know how to do it.”

Miss Bagshot’s pregnant pause clearly invited comment. Lord Davenham halted his sprung whiskey in a leafy copse. “And how is that, my dear?”

Delighted to have at last received his lordship’s full attention, Melly nonetheless was severe. “You shouldn’t call people ‘my dear’ unless you mean to flirt with them,” she scolded, “and you’ve already said you
don’t
want to flirt with me—although I’m sure as check you would have liked it excessively! But I ain’t one to flog a dead horse,” Her escort gave vent to a strangled noise, and she frowned. “It ain’t a laughing matter! Since I’ll have no reward money from either you or Bow Street, I’ve had to think of some other way to get out from under my Aunt Hel’s thumb, and after puzzling my head very hard over it, I’ve hit on the very thing: you must buy me off, before I make a nuisance of myself!”