Midnight Masquerade (18 page)

“Eager to be rid of us, are you?” Dick asked unconcernedly.

“Not you, dear. Oh, and certainly not you, Miss Gower. That was not my meaning.”

“She refers to all these other invisible guests, you see,” Dick explained to Deirdre. “You and I are perfectly welcome.” He turned to his mother and said, “Why don’t you call Miss Gower Deirdre? It makes conversation easier.”

“She didn’t ask me to.”

“Please do,” Deirdre said at once. “Perhaps I ought to go, Dick.”

“Stay,” he told her, squeezing her fingers. “Bertie will soon get over her nervousness. Won’t you, luv?”

“I’m sure I’m not nervous in the least,” Bertie objected. “How silly. As though I should be nervous about a young chit. Oh, dear!” Her fingers flew to her lips.

“That’s your other foot you should be sticking into your craw, Mama,” Dick advised, smiling.

“I really didn’t mean . . .” She looked helplessly at Deirdre.

“Of course you didn’t mean me,” Deirdre said, trying to control her lips.

“Of course I did. There’s no other young chit here,” the hostess admitted frankly.

“Bertie would refuse a lifeline if she were drowning,” Dick explained.

“Oh, you were trying to help me cover up my blunder. How kind of you,” Bertie said, smiling at the girl. “I would not have expected it from you. I—”

“I confess my first reaction was to leave in a huff,” Deirdre said blandly.

“How nice. I had no notion you could take a joke either, Deirdre. However did you learn to do it, living all these years with that vinegar—with the duchess?”

“Born with a silver foot in her mouth,” Dick said with a rueful shake of his head.

“I shan’t say another word this visit,” Bertie said, and promptly ran on with another bushel of nonsense. “It is only that Dick rang such a terrific peal over my asking you, Miss Gower. I mean Deirdre. And naturally I have been a little nervous ever since, wondering how we were to get out of the engagement. But as the two of you have very obviously worked it out between you without becoming mortal foes, I can just relax and enjoy myself, as soon as you leave. Have you told Charney?” she asked Dick, giving up all pretense of politeness.

“There’s nothing to tell,” Dick said. “We haven’t worked anything out. We’re working on it, but nothing is definite yet.”

“But are you engaged or not?” she demanded, more confused than ever. “Why are you holding hands if you’re not engaged? And why are you smiling if they’ve truly nabbed you?”

“She has grown three feet,” Deirdre said, shaking her head ruefully.

“What we have here is a sixty-year-old centipede,” Dick replied.

“Fifty-four!” Bertie snapped. “It’s bad enough, without your making it worse. And don’t you dare tell a soul I am fifty-four, either. I haven’t publicly reached fifty yet. I was so very ancient when you were born, Dick, that I can easily let on I am still in my forties. I wish that demmed cocoa would come.”

“I’ll run down to the kitchen and hurry the servants along,” he offered.

“No, don’t leave me alone with her. I’m sorry, Deirdre, but I don’t know how to talk to clever girls. I never had the knack of it. I can get along very well with clever gentlemen, but you clever gals always want to talk about books and things that are too boring for words.”

“Here’s the cocoa now,” Deirdre said. “Isn’t that lucky? Now you won’t have to be alone with me, ma’am. A pity, really. I was all set to bore you with my notions on Gibbons’ great, thumping, dull books of history. It will have to wait for another time.”

“The worst thing about history is that it just goes on and on,” Bertie said, nodding her head. “You think you’ve learned all you have to know, and someone goes and writes up another volume. Now they’re doing them on Wellington’s campaigns; I wish history would stop.”

“They should have a moratorium on it at least,” Deirdre agreed. “Besides, I’m sure history is half lies.”

Bertie narrowed her eyes at her guest, wondering if she had heard her correctly. “You speak very much like Dick,” she said, staring. “Satirical. That’s what you are being. How clever. I wish I could learn to do it.”

“It’s really very simple,” Dick told her. “You just say the opposite from what you mean, as if you meant it.”

“It wouldn’t be very clever of me to say ‘no cocoa for me’ when I really want another cup. People—stupid people, I mean—might misunderstand, and I should be cheated of my cocoa. Fill me up, Dick. I’m not being satirical. I need another cup of cocoa.”

Dick poured three cups and they sat around the table, sipping nervously. “There has to be more to it than that,” Bertie decided, after deep thought. “More than saying the opposite from what you mean. You should write up an extract on the subject. It would be a great hit with all the stupid ladies like me who want to be smart.”

“You don’t have to be clever, Bertie. May I call you Bertie?” Deirdre asked daringly.

“You may as well, even if it does sound fast coming from a chit. Why don’t I have to be clever?”

“Because you are charming, and that’s much better than clever.”

“Is she being satirical?” Bertie asked her son, who shook his head. “I don’t know how you can say so. I’m a perfect widgeon. The duchess herself told me so, not that I didn’t know it already.”

They talked on, discussing the walk on snowshoes, the condition of the roads, and their intention of skating on the pond that afternoon. Bertie accidentally insulted both her guests a dozen times, and her guests were good-natured enough to take it for satire. When she finished her cocoa, Deirdre arose and said she would go to see if her aunt was up yet.

“Oh, you’re leaving now. Good,” Lady Belami said with great feeling. “If your aunt is sleeping, pray don’t awaken her. Let her sleep as long as she likes. Longer.”

Dick covered his mouth with his hand and looked out the window. “I’ll see you downstairs shortly,” he said to Deirdre.

“What a strange girl,” Bertie said when they were alone. “What on earth is going on with you and her? Why did you bring her to visit me? I’ve never done you any harm, except to drop you once when you were a very infant. I didn’t think you even remembered it. You were only three months old at the time. You should learn to let bygones be bygones, dear. It’s not nice to hold a grudge.”

“Then why don’t you drop your grudge against Deirdre? She can’t help it if her aunt is a Tartar.”

“Very true. No one can do anything with Charney. Deirdre is more conversable than I had hoped. And she don’t poker up as I feared she would at any little thing that slips out.”

“I’d like us both to know her better.”

“It’s not necessary now. You have found the diamond. You can wiggle out of the engagement if you are very sly about it.”

“I was never sly, Mama.”

“Pooh. The slyest man in the parish, always up to anything.”

“The girl has qualities,” he said, in a ruminative mood.

“Being satirical would not wear well in marriage. It’s good enough for a brief conversation, but as a steady diet, it would be extremely tiresome.”

“That was not the quality I referred to, though I like it too. She’s . . . different. You don’t get to know her in a day, like most of ‘em. Get used to her, Bertie. All it takes is a little familiarity.”

“She has countenance, intelligence—all those things I lack. But a trifle cold, don’t you think?”

“A bit, but there are ways of warming up a lady, if a man has any ingenuity at all. I shall keep you informed of my progress.”

“Walking in the ice and snow is a poor way to warm the poor girl up. Freeze her to death is more like it.”

“Cold hands, warm heart,” he said unscientifically, and poured himself another cup of cocoa.

Chapter 13

Lord Belami was behaving as a fiancé ought to behave, the old duchess decided with a grimace which she supposed to be a smile. She doubted he would do so if he had indeed found her diamond, which he had not yet brought for her examination. Just what freakish start that false announcement was about she had no clear idea, nor did she care much. One way or the other, she would get her thirty thousand pounds, but she suspected Deirdre would only get Belami if the diamond remained lost. She must mingle with the guests of the house and hear what was being said about all this.

To this end, she had herself outfitted in her best day gown, a hideous puce outfit, chosen for its ability to conceal the ravages of gravy and wine. Such a nice, practical color, puce. Her thin hair was stuffed up under a matching turban, adorned with a single feather. The absence of any jewels would be her oblique reminder to the hostess of what happened to a lady’s jewels at Beaulac. She might praise the courage of any dame who appeared more finely bedecked. That would set Bertie down a peg.

Deirdre was at considerable pains to appear pretty. After skating all afternoon with Dick and enjoying a greater degree of intimacy than hitherto, even in the duchess’s conservatory, she needed no cosmetic aids to enliven her face. Her cheeks were pink from the outing, her eyes gleamed, and her hair was arranged as he liked it, in loose curls. An elegant toilette could not be constructed from nothing, but she had borrowed a set of ribbons from Lenore to enliven her plain white gown and, by shivering judiciously in front of Bertie, had achieved the loan of a lovely paisley shawl.

Dick was appreciative of her efforts. He greeted her warmly when she and the duchess entered the saloon before dinner. His praise was equally directed at them both, but she was coming to know him well enough to see the compliment was intended for her. It was Pronto who noticed her livelier style first.

“By jingo, Deirdre, you’re looking all the crack tonight,” he told her, his eyes roaming from coiffure to ribbons to sparkling eyes. “You’ve brightened right up, hasn’t she, Dick?”

“Ravishing, as usual,” Dick agreed.

“Eh? What are you talking about?” Pronto asked angrily. “She ain’t ravishing now, and she was even plainer before. ‘All the crack’ was what I said. She’s got a spot of color is all I meant.”

“You
should have spent the day outdoors as well,” the duchess told him. “You look like a garden slug, Mr. Pilgrim. It is the Pilgrim constitution. Your papa too had always that faded complexion. His walk too just like your own, at the pace of a constipated turtle. An excess of wine was thought to be the cause, but I believe it is constitutional.”

Pronto glared and stalked off, muttering into his collar, “Ain’t constipated, by jingo. Ain’t going to take the blue pill.”

Bertie came hopping over to greet her troublesome guest. “How lovely, Duchess. Turbans are so becoming to old—elderly—they, my, I
do
like your turban. And a little old feather in it too. How stylish. I shall try one myself.”

“Don’t be a ninny, Lady Belami,” the duchess said scornfully. “A turban would not suit you in the least. You haven’t the countenance for one, though it’s high time you were in caps. Wearing your rubies, I see. You are brave, I must say. I made sure your son would have them safely tucked away in the family safe. Old Cottrell has his emerald stud in place as well. Brave souls! I have been meaning to ask you to put my jewelry box away in your vault, Belami, just in case.”

“Remiss of me not to have offered,” Belami returned, unfazed.

They got to the table without further sparring. The duchess was more easily seduced into humor by a good dinner that by any other means. Bertie, to do her justice, did set a fine table. Her son was also amusing company. Beaulac was convenient to London too, whereas her own ancestral heap was in the wilderness. Tallying up these advantages, she determined she must not let Belami slip through their fingers. She had turned quite mellow by the time the ladies left the gentlemen to their port.

She disliked that Deirdre was again sitting with Lady Lenore. She’d hint her out of that increasing intimacy before the night was done. Her mottled teeth were revealed in a broad smile of approval when Belami pranced smartly to Deirdre as soon as the gentlemen joined the female party. He very properly exchanged a few social nothings with Lady Lenore, before taking up his seat beside her niece. Lenore, the hussy, hadn’t the common decency to leave the young lovers alone, but stuck like a burr, trying her fading charms on Belami. Herr Bessler ran to her own side, and for the next ten minutes she failed to notice what was afoot across the room.

Deirdre Gower could not fail to notice that Belami was blatantly ignoring her in favor of Lenore.

“My poor head feels as if it is splitting wide open,” she overheard Lenore say in pitiful accents.

“I am sorry to hear it. Can I get something for you?” Dick offered at once.

“Nothing helps,” Lenore replied in a strange, choking voice. Peering around Belami’s shoulder at the woman, Deirdre saw a coy smile stretching her lips wide. “Nothing except going to bed. Laudanum only makes it worse.”

“Then you must go to bed,” Belami dictated, also in a strange, strangled voice. It was some game they were playing, some act they had worked out in advance. She was immediately suspicious of their motives.

When the voices fell low enough to make overhearing impossible, Deirdre arose and strode majestically to another sofa, where she sat alone, in high dudgeon, and higher hopes that she would be joined by Dick. For several minutes she watched them flirting outrageously, with never so much as a glance at her. At the end of that time, Dick arose and went to speak to Bessler. Her aunt joined in the conversation with enough relish to make Deirdre wonder. Auntie had no use for Lady Lenore.

A disruption of the seating arrangements occurred when Cottrell insisted on leading two tables off to the card room. The duchess was among them, but Lenore and Belami remained behind with Bessler. Before long, Belami arose and went to Deirdre.

“You decided to study Lenore’s tricks from afar tonight, did you?” he asked, having no idea he was out of favor.

She bristled at the very mention of the lady’s name. “I shan’t bother studing her further. How should that impress anyone, when the original is here to outdo me?”

“Lenore has a headache,” he said.

“I wonder why she doesn’t go to bed, then. It’s strange she should sit around complaining when she has a bed she could retire to. She
does
know beds are also for sleeping, I suppose?”