Pleasure For Pleasure (11 page)

L
ord Charles Darlington went to Hyde Park driving the little phaeton that his father had given him for his birthday.

“If you'd gone into the Church as I told you to,” his father had said, his jaw working furiously, “the Church would have taken care of you.”

Charles had snorted. “Just think how much fun I would have had, riding in all those funeral processions for free.”

“You'll be the death of me.” Since that was usually the end of any given conversation with his father, Charles had
turned to leave, but his father had one parting shot. “For God's sake, get yourself a wife and stop infuriating every person who matters.”

Driving up and down the paths in Hyde Park, and around and around the great walk looking for an exquisite little cream-pot of a widow who wouldn't consider marrying him wasn't the way to find a wife. But it did give him time to realize just how many young girls first blushed when he glanced at them and then shot panic-stricken looks at their mothers.

It was becoming bitterly clear to him that he'd turned into a toothy bastard when he wasn't looking. It would have been nice to blame it on bad company. He caught sight of Thurman waving furiously at him from a racing vehicle twice, but both times he cut sharply in the opposite direction. But the truth was that he'd done it himself, out of the bottomless pool of anger and venom he seemed to carry around with him.

And if that wasn't a precise confirmation of his father's many summings up of his character, he didn't know what was. He'd taken all his rage and directed it against young girls whose only fault was to be born to a wool merchant or eat a few more Scottish pasties than the rest.

At least, he thought to himself, self-loathing is a break from making cynical, supposedly witty remarks.

Lady Griselda was nowhere to be found. Obviously, she didn't mean it when she said she would see him in Hyde Park. In fact, now that he thought about it, it was obvious that Lady Griselda—who was, after all, Miss Essex's chaperone—had only flirted with him so he would stop calling Miss Essex such unpleasant names.

Why he didn't see that last night, he didn't know. But somehow it hurt more than it should have after a ten-minute banter. He drove home in a furious mood and dashed off a note to Lady Griselda Willoughby. He used stationery that was as luscious and expensive as she was.

She used him; he'd use her. He'd threaten her.

I feel my newfound ethics slipping away. Encourage me tomorrow evening
.

He paused. If he were truly daring, he would simply fix an appointment at a hotel. But she would never come. Never. Of course she wouldn't. A lady of her reputation and stature likely had never entered a hotel. Well, the hell with that.

Ten o'clock at Grillon's Hotel,
he wrote, and signed it,
Darling
.

Then he looked at his portfolio and pulled a one hundred pound note from the payment he'd just received from his publisher. If he needed to, he could always join the Church and learn to go on his knees for a living. He'd rather go on his knees before Griselda, he thought.

There was something about her that turned him into a raging bundle of lust. She was all cheerful, delicate femininity. She smelled like clean living and faint perfume, like women who spent their mornings relaxing and their nights dancing. Who never screamed at their children, nor their spouses.

Thank God, Willoughby, whoever he had been, was long gone. She would never sleep with him if her husband had been alive; he knew that with a bone-deep knowledge. She wasn't a woman to play false.

But she might…she just might be a woman who would have an
affaire
. Who would be enticed by a mixture of bribery and desire—for she liked him too; he had seen it in her eyes—and might be enticed into something rash.

He sealed the pounds in an envelope and sent over a servant to Grillon's with a request for their very best bedchamber for the following night. To the best of his knowledge, there was nothing happening except a soirée given by the Smalepeeces, which couldn't be anything other than tedious, and Mrs. Bedingfield's musical evening. Griselda would never go to that, if only because she was chaperoning Miss Essex. No
one would go to a musical evening unless they attended in the mad hope that a single gentleman would accidentally find his way there. Lady Griselda was far too experienced in the ways of the
ton
to consider the possibility.

 

Darlington was not the only man riding in Hyde Park that day who wished for acquaintances who didn't appear. Harry Grone had grown old, somehow. These days he liked nothing better than to warm his toes at his fireplace and think about the glory days. But here he was, trundling around the park, gaping at the sparks and dandies.

Because out of the clear blue sky, the glory days were back. They
needed
him.
The Tatler,
them as had pensioned him off and said they weren't doing his sort of journalism any longer. But now, out of the blue, they needed his sort of expertise.

The job came with a nice budget, so Grone had decided to take a carriage into Hyde Park and see what was what. He always called it surveillance in the old days. Now he'd lost his touch, he'd be the first to admit that. He couldn't put a name to many a young man's face he saw.

But it was all in the brains. And his brains told him that it wasn't book-learning that would tell him who Hellgate was. If there were a clue in that book, someone else would have found it. Jessopp, more like. If there was anything known about the
ton
that Jessopp didn't know…

No, it was going to take his special brand of journalism.

In the end, he had to ask someone to point out the man he sought. But once Grone found him, he couldn't stop a grin of pure satisfaction. There was a face as foolish as a turnip. Took after his father, you could see that in a moment, from the puce waistcoat to the high-perch racing carriage that was absolutely improper for the park. An idiot. Just what he hoped for.

Grone rapped on the roof of the hackney and directed the
driver to return him to his lodgings. That was enough of a trip for a man of his age. Once home, he got out of the carriage and tossed the driver a coin, biting back a curse as his right knee twinged. Early to bed tonight…because tomorrow he was taking out a bag of gold sovereigns and going to start what he did best.

Sweetening the pot.

S
ylvie de la Broderie found that races, racehorses, and racetracks were productive of two things only: boredom and dust. She didn't like either. Dust she could tolerate under the right circumstances, although she couldn't bring those circumstances to mind at the moment. A picnic, perhaps. She wasn't very interested in the out-of-doors, but picnics could be quite agreeable. And to tell the truth, she'd had something of a picnic in mind when she agreed to allow Mayne to accompany her to the races.

But Epsom Downs racetrack was a great distance from a charming linen tablecloth spread under a gracious willow tree, perhaps next to the Seine…Sylvie stifled a sigh. It was cruel to think that such a beautiful life as she anticipated in Paris had been interrupted. Frenchmen were so
much more understanding of one's inclinations than were Englishmen. The English had no imagination. If he had had even a scrap of imagination, her fiancé must have known instantly that the racetrack was no place for her.

Instead, Mayne was briskly pointing out all the benefits of their position. They had seats in a box belonging to his friend, the Duke of Holbrook. Sylvie approved of that; she thought that dukes were good friends to have, and Holbrook had easy ways that spoke of an ancient title. Sylvie was a snob when it came to families: the older the better.

She had that from poor
Maman
. Once again Sylvie thought how pleased she was that
Maman
had been carried away by that terrible cold just before Papa made such a drastic decision as to move them all to England. True, Papa had been absolutely right. She and her sister Marguerite might well have suffered the same fate as so many of their dear friends, crowded into the Bastille—but Sylvie wrenched her mind away from that thought. She could not, she literally could not, contemplate what had happened to all the gay, exquisite people her papa had known. Albeit she had not yet debuted when they lived in Paris, but her
maman
had always discussed the goings-on of society with great freedom, so she felt that she did know them.

When Papa wrenched them away from France and settled Marguerite and her in this rainy cold spot, she had been only ten. Poor little Marguerite was merely a year, and far too young to know what she had lost.

The racetrack was extremely noisy. One had to assume that such things existed in Paris as well, but as far as she remembered, her
maman
had never mentioned such a thing. She could ask her father, but he was at their estate in Southwick, occupied with the dogs. Papa seemed to spend most of his day letting dogs in and out of the house. It was no way for a French aristocrat to behave, particularly one with a houseful of servants.

Sylvie sighed. The only enjoyable thing about the racecourse was that English gentlewomen were taking the opportunity to dress themselves with
élégance
. In the box next to hers, Lady Feddrington was wearing a bonnet that looked like nothing so much as an entire meringue, tied up with a ribbon. It wasn't entirely successful, but it had a notable streak of originality about it. And she was waving a fan with a sweet little amber fringe; Sylvie decided that she would quite like to know where it came from. She glanced to her right. Mayne was scowling down at a book they'd given him on entering.

“When does your animal run?” she asked, to be gracious. She had to ask it twice, but he was quite apologetic once she got his attention. That was one thing she liked about her future husband. He was invariably polite.

“I am running two horses,” he said, “an elegant little filly named Sharon and the lazy sorrel gelding who just trotted in last.”

“Oh dear,” Sylvie said, “you should have told me that your horse was running by us, Mayne. I would have paid attention.”

“I told you he ran in the fourth race.”

Apparently he thought that she was counting these tiresome rounds? Sylvie noticed that Lady Feddrington was wearing diamonds as large as daisies in her ears. Rather gauche, or could one put it down to flare? It was so hard, sometimes, to decide between the two. Certainly Lady Feddrington had an adorable
visage,
with her pouting lips and wide set-apart eyes.

“I might go to the stables and see how my jockey is doing,” Mayne said. “It can be quite dispiriting to lose so badly, and I want him to keep his heart up for Sharon's race. Would you like to accompany me?”

“To the barn?”

“If you would be interested.”

There was no question of that. Mayne had a great deal to
learn about ladies, obviously. “I shall pay a small visit to Lady Feddrington,” Sylvie said, giving him a gently corrective smile. In time, he would learn the appropriate places to invite his wife. An enclosure designed for animals was not one of them.

She stood up and waited while he collected her pelisse, her reticule, and her fan. She carried her parasol herself, as she was determined that not even one ray of sunlight would strike her face.

“Lady Feddrington,” she said, as Mayne opened the small door between their boxes, “I trust I do not intrude. We met two nights ago at the Mountjoy fete.”

“Miss Broderie,” Lady Feddrington said with just the right amount of appreciation to soothe Sylvie's slightly disturbed spirits, “I am enchanted to see you. Please do come and relieve the tedium of this afternoon.”

That was precisely the right thing to have said in front of Mayne; it meant that she did not have to point out the same herself. So Mayne took himself off, and Sylvie plumped down next to Lady Feddrington. Within a few minutes they were bosom friends, speaking on the intimate level that Sylvie most enjoyed and which she constantly strove to achieve. In fact, Lady Feddrington—or Lucy, as it turned out—was such good company that Sylvie quite forgot that she was in such an objectionable place as the racetrack.

“I feel just the same,” Lucy confided sometime later. “Of course, I do my best to support Feddrington in moments like these. He has a large stable and works himself into a disagreeable state of anxiety over large races. In fact, I have to insist that he leave me in the box by myself, because I find that I do not enjoy close proximity with a man in a lather of anxiety, if you'll excuse my frankness. But
you
will never suffer as I do, dearest Sylvie. One cannot imagine Mayne in a lather over anything!”

Sylvie agreed. One of her primary reasons for choosing
Mayne had been his impeccable appearance at every moment. He was almost French that way. Well, considering that his mother was French, his elegance must have been inherited from his mother. Although given that his mother had retired to a nunnery, Sylvie found her elegance slightly hard to imagine.

The important thing was that Mayne's attendance at her side had not been all it could be. “He was distraught,” she told Lucy. “I prefer an escort who is more attentive. Mayne actually showed a slight surliness when I did not notice that his horse had lost a race.”

“They're always like that,” Lucy said comfortingly. “I have been married for three years now, and I am, perforce, an expert on the subject. And darling, you will be the same, for I believe that Mayne's stables are even larger than Feddrington's. They grow increasingly agitated in the weeks before a large race, such as the Ascot. Feddrington even wakes up in the middle of the night at times, if you can countenance it.”

“You don't!” Sylvie said with horror, before she caught the words back.

Lucy giggled. “Do you mean share a bedchamber?” And, at Sylvie's little nod, “Of course not!”

“You
must
forgive me,” Sylvie said, flustered. “It's just that I have many things still to learn about English nobility.”

“I feel as if I've known you forever,” Lucy said, bending her head closer, “so I shall tell you something truly indiscreet, hmm?”

Sylvie loved indiscretions.

“When Feddrington is nervous and can't sleep in the night, he visits my chambers,” Lucy confided.

“He has the temerity to wake you up?” Sylvie said, blinking at her. Her father would never, under any circumstances,
have woken her
maman
.
Maman
's chambers were sacred to her sleep, and even her maid knew better than to enter the room until eleven of the clock, and then only if she carried
une tasse de chocolat
.

“I have yet to break him of the habit,” Lucy said, sighing. “I have impressed upon him that my sleep is more important than his horses, but I don't seem to be able to convince him. Men are invariably selfish in these matters, you know. I have found it best for the happiness of the household if I simply acquiesce. Of course, I have made it clear that such things will be tolerated only if the race is truly one of the largest, such as the Ascot.”

Sylvie was appalled. She tended to avoid thinking about the issue of marital intimacies; her
maman
had unfortunately passed away before clarifying these things. But Sylvie knew instinctively that this was not an aspect of marriage that would please her. Under no circumstances would she engage in something so distasteful in the middle of the night. Perhaps…one evening a month. She had decided that would surely be enough to satisfy Mayne. After all, she had chosen a man with a reputation for finding his own pleasures; while she was rather looking forward to the idea of having
enfants,
she did not consider marriage to be a contract ensuring that she provide all the entertainment.

“Mayne is so in love with you,” Lucy said, giggling again. “He must be positively ardent.”

“He behaves precisely as he ought.” Now she thought about it, Mayne would never be so impolite as to try to wake her at night. Never. Her poor friend Lucy's husband was obviously incommodious and, though it pained her to think it, ill-bred.

“Oh!” Lucy cried. “Here is my dear friend Lady Gemima. I asked her to join me this afternoon.”

Coming toward them was a woman wearing an exquisite
promenade gown of periwinkle blue. “She has the most lovely costumes,” Lucy sighed. “She's not married, you know, but she's enormously rich so she just does precisely as she pleases.” She lowered her voice. Lady Gemima was greeting Mrs. Homily, a red-faced matron who had been trotting up and down in front of the boxes like a terrier smelling a rat. “She was engaged four years ago, but then the gentleman died. I do believe he was a marquis. She put on mourning for a year, and then declared that she would never marry. She is the only daughter of a younger brother of the Duke of Smittleton. He was a colonel in the army, stationed in Canada, and as I understand it, he made a positive fortune in shipping. So of course then he was given his own title. One would think that she would be bad
ton,
unmarried as she is, and raised in Canada. But she's not.”

Sylvie could see that for herself. Lady Gemima wasn't precisely beautiful. Her face was a trifle long, and her mouth too coolly intelligent. But her hair was an extraordinary striped, tortoiseshell color, and as she came into the box and curtsied to Sylvie and Lucy, Sylvie saw that her eyes were green and fringed with thick lashes of the same color as her hair. Her clothes were obviously French. Sylvie rose with the sense of having at last met someone who was, as her papa would say of boxers, at her weight.

A few moments later she confirmed that opinion. Lady Gemima was uproariously funny. She no sooner sat down than she had them in stitches, telling them exaggerated tales of the kind of exploits that an unmarried woman obviously shouldn't know about.

“Am I horrifying you?” she asked Sylvie at one point. “I believe you're engaged to the Earl of Mayne, so I thought you were probably unshockable. If not, you soon will be.”

“I am,” Sylvie said, although it was quite untrue. She was rewarded with one of Lady Gemima's warm smiles.

“I didn't think you were one of those tiresome debutante
types,” she said. “Lord, but I'm tired of young women. Men are so much more interesting.”

“I don't agree,” Lucy said.

“Neither do I,” Sylvie said. “I find men of all things tiring and inevitably troublesome. There is nothing more pleasant than spending the afternoon in this way.”

“Well, of course, amongst
ourselves,
” Gemima said. “But I am bored by endless conversations about reticules. You can't even discuss a petticoat without it being a bit too risqué for someone.”

“I heard the funniest thing about petticoats the other day,” Lucy said, giggling again. “Lady Woodliffe told me that she ordered all her petticoats in pale gray silk so that they would suit whatever garment she wore. She intends to stay in half-mourning for her darling Percy the rest of her life.”

“Ridiculous,” Gemima said. “Considering that the man died in the arms of a strumpet, by all accounts. You'd think she'd be wearing pink ruffles.” Her lifted eyebrow was so funny that Sylvie kept laughing. “But you do know, don't you, that the oh-so-righteous Lady Woodliffe was seen coming out of Grillon's Hotel last spring?”

“No!” Lucy gasped.

“Indeed. I heard it from Judith Falkender, who's a very reliable source. Of course, she may have been trying to catch her husband in the act.”

Sylvie wrinkled her nose. “Why would she bother? And what is this place, Grillon's?”

“Oh, it's the only hotel in London worth visiting,” Gemima told her. “All the ambassadors stay there. I stayed there for a fortnight a year ago, just to see if I would like it, but even though I took a whole floor, there really wasn't enough room for all the people it takes to put myself together. You'd like it, Lucy. Are you still interested in all things Egyptian?”