My Dear Jenny (13 page)

Sunday morning could not come soon enough for Ratherscombe,
in rooms now unheated for lack of the ready to soften the coalman’s heart.
Emily, on the other hand, lay snug in her room at her parents’ house, her head
full of rose-colored fancies. When the light began to show through the
curtains, she was instantly awake despite the late hours she had kept at a
Devonshire House rout the night before—and making a sadly awkward process
of dressing herself. It took her fully five minutes to choose her dress,
tempted as she was to pick a favorite gown that, she was morally certain, would
prove impossible to don unassisted. Finally she settled for less style and more
practicality, and dressed herself in a gray muslin walking dress with a satin
pelisse of vivid cherry red—not perhaps, the most subdued thing to wear
to a secret assignation. In no more than five and thirty minutes she had completed
her toilette and managed to creep from the room and out of the house.

Emily was surprised at how different the streets looked
without the usual crowds of her friends and neighbors upon them. Not that they
were empty, for the early morning belonged to the tradespeople, and there were
men and girls singing down mews, offering new milk, flowers, fresh meats, and
country delicacies.

Among the bustle of working folk Emily felt very strange
indeed, and hastened toward the park. She had thought of going to meet her
admirer on horseback, knowing very well that she appeared to great advantage in
riding habit. But after some consideration she had decided that, on the off
chance that Mr. Teverley—of course it was he—wished to sweep her
into his arms, she ought to keep herself unencumbered by reins and bridles and
other equestrian paraphernalia. The thought of Teverley—and of Teverley’s
embraces—made her blush becomingly, to the delight of several flower boys
standing near her.

She had no notion as to the time, only that it was earlier
than she had been abroad in years—possibly in her whole life. She was
certain that she must be on time, perhaps a little early, even, and hoped that
this fact would weigh favorably with her secret admirer. As she neared the
place appointed by Mr. Reagham, she scanned anxiously for Teverley—or
anyone else, for that matter, since the park was singularly uninhabited at this
hour. It had not occurred to her that she might be very early, and the
realization that this might indeed be the case put the first crimp in her
spirits. “I might have worn the blue gauze after all, and had time,” she
muttered angrily to herself, unsure with whom she was most angry—herself
for being early or Teverley for not being there. For the space of several
minutes she simply stood where she was, waiting. Then, as her impatience grew,
she began to pace. After she had walked the path back and forth some ten times,
she grew tired of the exercise and, sighting a bench nearby, settled herself
there for the remainder of her wait.

Emily had meant to remain as alert as she could, but with
only three hours sleep, and sleep interrupted by excited wakings at that,
fatigue was as inevitable as it was inexorable. Drowsiness began to overwhelm
her. She struggled manfully to keep her eyes open for a full fifteen minutes
and, when she did succumb to exhaustion, slumped back against the bench and
curled one hand beneath her cheek. It was thus, almost an hour later, that
Domenic Teverley discovered her.

Dom had been out, exercising his mount on one of the bridle
paths. At first, not unreasonably, he refused to believe that the girl on the
bench was Emily Pellering, and headed Hellbrand along toward the path again.
But a few minutes later he turned the horse about and returned, piqued by the
resemblance—he even recalled the dress the girl wore as somewhat like a
dress he had seen Emmy in. She was still asleep. And she was still recognizably
Emily Pellering.

Dom was at a loss. He debated a while about what course of
action he’d follow.

He could go up and waken her, then politely inquire as to
what business brought Miss Pellering to sleep in Hyde Park at seven o’clock of
a Sunday morning. But several recent altercations with Emily made him somewhat
loath to follow this course of action. On the other hand, he could not simply
ride by, pretending that she was on a picnic with her family or an outing with
friends. As a matter of fact, Dom realized, not only was she without her family
or even Jenny Prydd, Emily was without the countenance of her maid. There was
obviously something irregular about it all. Full of resolution, Dom reined
Hellbrand in, tethered him to a tree, and began to advance on Emily’s bench.
The recollection of a scold she had read him the week before on “people who
interfere with other people who don’t want to be interfered with” pulled him up
short, and the dilemma pinned him again.

Finally Dom, like any sensible man trained to the hunt from
infancy, settled on the thing to do. Removing Hellbrand to a spot somewhat
distant, he climbed a nearby tree, regardless of the damage to his pantaloons,
and sat there waiting, for what he knew not.

When Emily woke, unaware that she had acquired a chaperone
in the great elm behind her, she was immediately convinced that Teverley had
come to meet her, had been disgusted by the sort of inconstancy which would
permit her to doze at such a time, and had left. A few forlorn minutes of
despair gave way to joy, however, when she heard in the distance the peal of a
church chime announcing the hour: exactly eight o’clock. She began to tidy
herself, shaking wrinkles out of her pelisse (ruined by the dew which it had
collected) and patting her dark hair into place. When a voice behind her
murmured her name, she started so violently that she almost cracked one of
Adrian Ratherscombe’s teeth with her elbow.

“Oh no!” she gasped, less in fear than disappointment.

Ratherscombe, assuming that her reaction must be terror—if
it were not to be overwhelming joy—began at once to assure her that he
had not come to do any harm to her, but that he
must
speak to her ...
she must hear him. After a moment of his pleading Emily consented, thinking
herself very noble, stonehearted, and romantic, all at the same time.

“Well, Mr. Ratherscombe, you may speak your piece. Was it you
that sent Mr. Reagham to meet me and invite me to this place?”

“Yes, Emily my dearest, but only because I was desperate,”
Ratherscombe cried with admirable melodrama; his desperation, at least, was no
fiction. “I had to know that you have forgiven me. That day at the inn—that
whole time—why, did you not see? I was frustrated, fearful that we should
be stopped and our marriage made impossible! I carried the fears of a man who
knows that the world would scorn him and his actions, but who knows he cannot
act otherwise! I was mad for love of you, Emily.”

This sort of raving would once have won Emily’s admiration
instantly. Now, with her heart elsewhere, she heard only the empty phrases and
the actor’s resonance; her nose wrinkled in distaste. “Mr. Ratherscombe, I must
ask that you—”

“Ah, it used to be
Adrian
, Emily darling. Your
Adrian, who longed to take you for his own, to make you his wife. Those people
at that place—you must realize that I curse the day that we stopped
there! I know you think them your friends; indeed, I am sure they think it so
themselves. But how can I, who hoped to have a wife, feel else but pain at the
memory—pain and remorse.” Ratherscombe outdid himself and managed to
produce a tear, a small tear but a tear all the same, in his left eye. Then,
after that effort, he ostentatiously went through the motions of a man
determined that no one shall know the extent of his heartbreak. “Will you not
speak kindly to me, Emily? In memory of the love we shared? The love I still
cherish in my heart for you?” Emily’s head was turned, and Ratherscombe
surveyed the ground nearest her feet to gauge whether he dared to kneel there.
A moment’s reflection decided him: Despite the effect of such a gesture, the
ground was much too wet, and there were several sharp-looking pebbles that
could ruin his trousers completely.

“Mr. Ratherscombe,” Emily began uncomfortably, feeling less
noble and somewhat more like a person who has risen at daybreak to go on a fool’s
errand, “I do not intend to speak of those days to you.”

“Then I am forgiven?” There was genuine joy in Ratherscombe’s
voice; forgiveness, surely, was close to success.

“I will forgive. And forget,” Miss Pellering emphasized
meaningfully.

“Not that! Say, at least, that I may hope. I will spend my
entire life trying to make up to you the injury I did you on our journey.”

Emily had spent her whole life preparing for the moment when
she would receive this sort of speech, but now, rather than answer in kind, as
she had always expected she would do, she found herself thinking that his words
sounded pompous, and she longed for a good straight sentence with no
protestations. She liked to make protestations, but from a man, surely, they
were not quite the thing?

“Please stop, Mr. Ratherscombe.”

“Emily, my dearest.” Her face was turned again, and
Ratherscombe, encouraged by what he thought was a moment’s delicious weakening,
made bold to take one of her hands in his own. The slight resistance he felt
only encouraged him the more. “Emily, sweet, dear, darling Emmy. Say you will
forgive me. Say you will love me! Say it, heart’s darling.”

Emily turned and looked him square in the eye. “I say that
you are talking a great deal of nonsense, sir. Leave my hand alone, you’re
crushing it.” She gave a sound pull, but Ratherscombe was not about to
relinquish a prize that easily, and held on as if he thought that the hand
alone could bring him an easy competence.

“They have poisoned you against me!” he muttered.

“They?” Emily demanded icily, still tugging at her hand.

“The people—that dragon of a lady’s maid, or whatever
she was—”

“Jenny!” The girl squealed in outrage.

“And that heavy-handed blighter with the left hook, and his
cousin or son or whatever that young chub was! Yes, and the landlady too, I’ll
wager. They told you stories, turned you against me, made you think I’d not be
true to the very thought of you.” Privately Ratherscombe wondered if perhaps
Emmy had caught wind of the dancer he had been keeping in Somers Town and
that
had put her nose out of joint.

“No such thing! That heavy-handed blighter, as you style him”—Emily’s
voice dripped with regal venom— “is the finest gentleman I have ever met.”
She liked the sound of her declaration, and continued, a little more levelly, “And
there’s no harm in Jenny, or Dom, either. Now I wish you will let go of my hand
and let me go. You’ve said what you came to say.”

“Damn it, Emily,” he began, then stopped himself. “I mean,
Emily, I’m overcome by my feelings, as I was at the Green Falconer, you
understand. Now listen just a little while longer, do. I only want your
assurance that you return this feeling.”

Emily drew herself up to her full height and stared up at
Adrian Ratherscombe. “Sir,” she began, cutting the word off sharply with a
click of her tongue. “I could not feel about you as you feel about me:
I
am in no need to procure a fortune, and
you
have no fortune for me to
covet.”

Ratherscombe dropped her hand as if it burnt him. “You
little vixen,” he muttered angrily. “I’m no fortune-hunter! I am a Ratherscombe
of Abbotscote and my family goes back farther than you can count, you little
scatterbrain! I know for a fact that you come from trade.
My
blood has
never been tainted, and yet”—he threw himself into the full of his role,
believing it himself by this time— “I would have joined that spotless
name—”

“Spotless, except that you’re known in the
ton
and
out as a family of gamers and wenchers, and have been marrying into fortunes
for years and years and years to pay your tick!” Emily cried hotly, stung at
last into something beyond dignity.

“How dare you, you little bitch! Filthy little shopgirl—”
Ratherscombe began. He got no farther, for Emily slapped him soundly, leaving a
mark as red as her ribbons, and exactly the shape of her palm, along the side
of his face. In retaliation, he took her by the shoulders, intent upon shaking
her into submission, nagged all the while by the knowledge that the game was
well and truly queered by now.

It was at this point that Domenic Teverley chose to make his
entrance.

Dom had seen the entire performance from his perch above,
and while Emily had seemed in control of the situation he had been content to
sit and watch. It was rather like a play, after all, and he thought it might do
Emmy some good to send that rounder Ratherscombe about his business. But when
Ratherscombe actually had the audacity to touch her, he knew it was time to
come to the rescue. He dropped from the tree rather noisily, but as both
players were engaged in a yelling match by this time, he was not noticed until
he grabbed Ratherscombe by the collar, pulled him back, and planted him a
notable left to the chin.

When the dust had cleared somewhat, Ratherscombe was sitting
in the dewy grass, one hand to his jaw, and Domenic had put one careful arm
about Emily’s shoulders, offering her his handkerchief.

“Oh, Domenic,” Emily sighed, in tones calculated to give
that young man dreams of glory for weeks. “Oh Dom, you
saved
me!” This
might have been a trifle too brown, but Dom showed no signs of minding at all:
It was very pleasant to be a hero, to have his name lingered over, and to have
Emily regard him with the same adoration she usually reserved for his cousin
Peter.

“Mind now, Emily, I’m going to set you here for a moment.”
He said carefully, placing her again on the bench. “It looks as if there’s to
be a bit of a mill.” His voice was all eagerness, and Ratherscombe, not content
with picking himself out of the mud, was advancing again with an ugly look.