Miss Wonderful (43 page)

"It
is, indeed," said Oldridge. "I have never heard of such a
moss. And you have encountered it again, you are quite, quite sure?"

"Up
on the hill, sir," Caleb said, indicating the lengthy ridge
ahead. "Not five miles away."

To
Mr. Oldridge, who often covered twenty miles in a single day, a
five-mile walk up Longledge Hill was nothing. He would be back hours
before dinner.

It
was a long while before he remembered that dinner wasn't the only
thing he needed to be on time for this day.

And
then it was too late.

THE
meeting dissolved shortly after noon.

It
ended in victory. A majority having voted in favor of the canal, a
committee was formed. The members swiftly drafted the petition to
Parliament, after which the room emptied.

Only
Lord Gordmor and his partner remained.

His
lordship was too shaken by recent events to attempt his usual
nonchalance.

"That
was a near thing, a dreadfully near thing," he said. "For a
time I felt as though I stood upon a storm-tossed ship. I contrived
to hold on until the vicar—that sweet, amiable man—chided
us. Et tu, Brute? I thought. Then overboard I went, and swiftly sank.
Doubtless we must blame the piratical-looking sea captain, in his
gleam-ing uniform and dashing whiskers, for these nautical
metaphors."

Carsington
said nothing. He seemed preoccupied with rolling his canal plan into
the smallest possible circumference.

"What
a fool I was, telling you to hold your tongue and look decorative,"
Lord Gordmor went on, eyeing his friend uneasily. "I should have
remembered how very different a fellow you are when your fighting
spirit is roused. I hope you will forgive me. I had been under the
mistaken impression that Waterloo beat the fight out of you."

Carsington
turned sharply toward him. "You thought I'd turned timid?"

What
the devil was wrong with him? They'd won a great victory this day,
over seemingly impossible odds.

Oh,
Lord, was he brooding about the plaguy female?

"Don't
be absurd," Gordmor said. "And pray don't mope about Miss
Oldridge. Not today. You will bring her round eventually. Meanwhile,
you've won a great triumph. You have plucked us out of the jaws of—of
something. Ah, yes, victory. Snatched from the jaws of defeat. By
gad, I'm so relieved, I'm tongue-tied. That letter. That brilliant,
cruel letter. I collect it was entirely her doing."

"She
warned you, Gordy."

"So
she did. As did my sister. She told me the lady was dangerous. Who'd
have guessed Henrietta could be guilty of understatement?"

"As
it is, I'm amazed we got off so easily," Car said.

"Are
you serious? She all but annihilated us. If you hadn't stepped in…"
Gordmor trailed off. He could scarcely think of it without trembling:
Everything, everything on the brink of being destroyed, utterly. All
his careful scrimping and saving and planning. And all of Car's money
and hopes: The man had taken the last of his allowance to the gaming
tables, then given his winnings to Gordmor to put into their
"company."

If
Car hadn't stood up and done a stunning imitation of Lord Hargate at
his most compelling and eloquent, the redhead in the unspeakable
bonnet would have ruined them.

"Dangerous"
was a laughable understatement. The woman was diabolical. Since Car,
clearly, couldn't manage her, it was up to his friend to solve the
problem.

BY
the time the two men emerged from the hotel, the meeting attendees
had departed. The area, which in the tourist season would have been
thick with walkers and gawkers, was deserted.

As
they stepped into the promenade, though, a neatly dressed fellow,
whom Alistair recognized as one of Gord-mor's agents, hurried up
toward them.

Several
of these men had followed his lordship to Derbyshire and thrown a bit
of his money about to win favor with the locals. It was nothing out
of the ordinary. This sort of thing went on at elections, and most
certainly had occurred wherever canals were under consideration.
Alistair had no doubt that Mirabel's agents had done the same.

Gordmor
had told his men to keep their eyes and ears open as well.
Accordingly, this fellow hastened to alert his lordship: Miss
Oldridge and Mrs. Entwhistle had set out for London.

"London?"
Gordy exclaimed. "Already?"

"They
had a traveling chariot packed and ready, sir," the agent—by
name of Jackson—said. "The ladies were the first out of
the assembly hall, I was told, and scarcely a quarter hour passed
before they were in the carriage and on their way. As soon as I heard
of it, I came to tell you."

Alistair
did not wait to hear more but strode down the promenade until he had
a clear view of the Parade. It was busy today, with vehicles and
pedestrians going to and fro. These he barely heeded. He stared in
the direction Mirabel had gone, and tried to understand.

She
had dealt them a devastating blow. She had very nearly destroyed
them. And yet—and yet…

"She
knew," he murmured. "She knew we'd win." Otherwise,
why have the carriage packed and waiting for her?

A
minute later, he heard Gordy's voice behind him: "It seems the
lady does not mean to give us time to catch our breath."

"She
promised to show us no mercy," Alistair said.

"Indeed,
I have sadly underestimated her, else I should have been packed and
ready to leave as well," Gordy said. "We cannot risk giving
her a minute. She has influential friends in London. Do not forget
that her father's sister is Lord Sherfield's wife, and believed to
wield no small influence over him."

Alistair
turned to his friend. "Sherfield? Aunt Clothilde is Lady
Sherfield?" The Countess Sherfield was one of his mother's
nearest friends.

"Surely
you knew they were related," Gordy said. "Lady Hargate must
have mentioned the connection when you told her where you were
going."

"No."
Alistair continued briskly down toward Wilker-son's, aware of the
puzzled glances Gordy cast his way as they walked.

"That
is very strange," Gordy said.

"Hardly,"
Alistair said. "When I called upon my mother before I left, I
was full of our brilliant plan and the wonders of modern invention
we'd bring to a remote outpost of civilization. She couldn't get a
word in edgeways."

"Waxed
oratorical, did you?" Gordmor smiled. "Well, I doubt it
makes much difference whether or not you knew beforehand. Miss
Oldridge has useful friends, true. So do we. Moreover, we have every
practical point in our favor, as you so eloquently explained a while
ago to the mob."

Theirs
was to be a relatively short canal in a thinly populated part of
Derbyshire, Alistair had reminded his listeners. The route lay along
fairly level ground, requiring no aqueducts, tunnels, or long flights
of locks. The recently enacted Poor Employment Act of 1817 provided
government loans for projects that employed the poor. This reduced
the sum they must raise from investors.

He
knew the plan was sound. The many politicians he and Gordy consulted
had promised that so simple and inexpensive a canal scheme could
proceed from the first committee meeting to the Prince Regent's
signature in two months or less.

If
this hadn't been the case, he and Gordy could not have undertaken it.
They hadn't the money for elaborate schemes and couldn't hope to
raise such funds, given the sour economic conditions following war's
end. Last year's poor harvest had not improved matters.

It
was by no means a villainous plan in the first place. In the second,
Alistair had added nearly five miles to the route to please his lady
love.

Yet
she turned up her nose.

"At
the moment, I'm more concerned about your well-being," Gordy
said. "Do have a care for your heart, Car. I don't wish to
slander your beloved, but you deserve a warning at least. Henrietta
says the lady jilted a fellow some years ago and had to leave London
under a cloud."

"I
know about that," Alistair said. "More than Lady Wallantree
does, I'll Wager. There were difficult circumstances. Not that I care
if Miss Oldridge jilted a dozen fellows. It was in the past, and my
own is nothing to boast of."

He
would never believe that the girl he'd made love to could be cruel
and coldhearted. If anything, her nature was too open, too
compassionate. The cool detachment was only on the surface, shielding
her true feelings. He understood the need to protect tender places.
Still, he did not understand what she was about at present.

And
he was disappointed in himself. In spite of all his efforts, he'd
failed her.

"Car."

Alistair
came back to the moment, the present crisis. "Her past is
irrelevant. The canal is what signifies. I should like to know what
troubles her. I was sure my plan addressed her personal objections.
If there's another difficulty, I'd rather know about it before we're
in front of a parliamentary committee."

He'd
become accustomed to things springing out of the darkness and the
sudden metaphorical blows to the head. He found the surprises
stimulating, actually.

This
didn't mean he could let himself be ambushed in Parliament. The
thought of being rendered tongue-tied, even for an instant, before
his father's colleagues and minions made his blood run cold.

"Very
wise," Gordy said. They had reached the entrance of Wilkerson's,
and he lowered his voice. "Do you go on ahead and learn what you
can from the lady. I'll settle matters here and catch up with you as
soon as I can."

AN
hour later, Jackson was staring in dismay at the motionless figure
stretched out upon a mossy piece of ground in a wooded part of
Longledge Hill.

"What
have you done?" he demanded of Caleb Finch. "Didn't I tell
you what his lordship said?"

"He's
all right," Finch said. "I only give him some medicine."

"What
kind of medicine?"

"Some
of that Godfrey's Cordial. Told him it were my dear old auntie's
elderberry cordial."

Opium
was one of the main ingredients of Godfrey's Cordial.

Jackson
stepped closer. The old gentleman seemed to be slumbering peacefully.
His dreams must be pleasant ones, because he smiled. He had a sweet
smile, did Mr. Oldridge. Quite a harmless fellow. Jackson did not
like seeing him lying on the cold ground. He also didn't like Finch's
failure to wait for orders, and said so.

"And
if I waited, like you say, until tomorrow or the next day,"
Finch said, "what do you think was the chance I could talk him
into coming away again? As it was, he was on fire to run back to the
meeting, even when I told him it was close onto noon, and it'd be
long over by the time he got there. Besides, his lordship wants him
to disappear, don't he? Well, it'll be easier now. We'll just load
him onto a cart and take him away."

"We
don't have a cart," Jackson said.

"Yes,
we do," said Finch. "I borrowed it from the colliery. And a
horse to pull it. They're down that track a ways." He nodded
toward an ancient, overgrown pack-horse trail. "I told you Miss
O had a hundred tricks up her sleeve, didn't I? And wasn't I right?
You let her get going in London, what with her lord and lady
relations, and she'll grind you down to powder. I knew how it would
be, and I come prepared. Well, I don't expect thanks, not a bit, not
for doing my duty."

It
was as well that he didn't expect thanks, because Jackson was
disinclined to offer them. A man was supposed to follow his
superior's orders. A man wasn't supposed to rush ahead and do
whatever he took it into his head to do.

But
Finch had gone ahead and done it, and they couldn't release Mr.
Oldridge now.

"It's
the same plan as his lordship wants," Finch said. "It'll
work perfect. Miss Oldridge'll hurry back from London as soon as she
finds out her pa's missing. While she's here looking for him, master
gets his canal act through Parliament quick and painless. Meanwhile,
we'll have Mr. O in Northumberland, safe and snug. As soon as Lord
Gordmor gets his papers signed, we send the old gentleman home. Only
think how happy they'll all be at the house, like he come back from
the dead. Like Lazarus."