Practice to Deceive (2 page)

But Geoffrey, tall, bronzed, and full of health and vigour in his twenty-third year, chafing against the constraints his father's will had placed upon his taking full control of his estates, had quarrelled constantly with his rapacious aunt and uncle and had gone off to fight the King's enemies in Scotland. Frightened by a letter notifying her that her brother had been wounded at the Battle of Prestonpans, Penelope was devastated the following day when a correcting communiqué advised that Captain Lord Delavale had been killed and buried by the Scots in an unmarked grave, following that rout. Still mourning her beloved father, Penelope was left to grieve also for the brother she had mothered and adored since childhood. Fat Joseph Montgomery was the lord of Highview now, and he and his beautiful wife no longer had to brood upon a future that must see Geoffrey taking over his full inheritance, and themselves dispossessed.

A mildly complaining whicker from Missy awoke Penelope to the fact that she was standing motionless in the rain. She squared her shoulders, fighting sorrow away as she led the mare through, closed the gate, then used the middle rung as an impromptu step to assist her climb into the saddle. Geoff had been gone for nigh ten months. It was no use grieving so. She must put her wits to better use than vain regrets. For instance, how much longer she could endure the humiliation of existence at—

She ceased to adjust her long wet skirts and glanced about tensely. She was being watched. She knew it as surely as if she could see someone standing in the meadow. There was no sign of life, no movement of anything save for the wind-tossed branches of trees and shrubs. But someone was near, and if it was that horrid Captain Otton…! Her heartbeat quickened. She kicked her boot home with rather more urgency than usual, and Missy snorted and broke into a canter.

The rain had settled into a steady drizzle, but by the time Penelope was halfway across the meadow it became a deluge and, again, she was obliged to change her route. The closest shelter was offered by Nurse's abandoned cottage and a quick dash brought them to the copse and then the broken picket fence and weed-filled garden that the old lady had once kept so meticulously ordered. Penelope dismounted under the now empty woodshed at the side. She looped the reins around one of the support posts, promised the drenched mare that she would come back, and ran to the front door. It was locked, of course, but Nurse had always kept a key above the lintel and, braving dust and crawly things, Penelope groped for and found it.

The door creaked open. Inside, there was a musty smell of disuse. Almost she fancied to catch a whiff of cheese on the air which was, she thought prosaically, mould rather. She went through the small entrance hall and looked about for something to use to rub down Missy. The curtains were closed in the parlour, and a grubby-looking cover of Holland cloth had been thrown over the sofa, this apparently having been judged the only piece of furniture worth protecting. Penelope pulled off the cover. Turning to the door again, she gave a little squeal of fright as something moved in the shadows. Her heart almost stopped. Knees melting with terror, she pressed the dusty cloth to her breast. And then, dimly, she saw the answering flutter and felt weak with relief. The movement that had startled her so had been her own reflection in the old mirror over the oaken sideboard—nothing more.

“Stupid girl…!” she gasped, and tottered nearer.

Her eyes were becoming accustomed to the gloom, and she was depressed by the bedraggled vision in the mirror. Her hat hung limply about her face, water dripping from the brim to trickle in little rivulets down her cheeks, and the feather sagging at a ridiculous angle. Black did not become her. She looked washed-out and colourless. “You are not a pretty girl, niece.…” Uncle Joseph's unkind verdict rang again in her ears. She put down the Holland cover and rested both hands on the sideboard as she leaned forward, scanning her reflection. She sighed. There was no denying it was truth; she was not pretty. Of course, her hair was a straggling disaster at the moment, but even when it was well-brushed and neatly dressed, it was only a rather mousy brown. Unless she wore powder, which she seldom did in the country. She thought defensively that it
did
have honey-gold highlights sometimes, when the sun touched it. But … there were her eyebrows. Too straight, and since she refused to pluck them, lacking the fine, thin line that was The Fashion. Her mouth was full and well-shaped, but the most infatuated of swains could not have termed it a blushing rosebud. And below it, her chin was both too decided and lacking even the suspicion of a dimple. Still, her eyes were really quite good; wide-spaced, well-opened, deeply lashed, and of a rich hazel flecked with blue. Her hopeful look faded. Only yesterday her aunt had scolded that they were ‘witch's eyes.' “And if you persist in looking so directly at the gentlemen, instead of lowering your lashes demurely, as any female should, you'll end a spinster, my girl! The Lord only knows your uncle and I try to be patient, but whoever heard of a chit with your looks receiving three perfectly acceptable offers and spurning every one? Your poor papa must have been all about in his head to have borne with such high flights! On the day you put off your blacks, miss, there'll be an end to such nonsensicality. Your uncle will accept the first respectable offer that comes your way—
if
you ever receive another at your age! So if you're taken some unnatural vow to wear the willow all your days, prepare yourself! I've no mind to keep a spinster here, eating us out of house and home, and so I warn you!”

Penelope had taken no such vow. To be a spinster was, in fact, quite the antithesis of her dreams. Her eyes softened and one finger traced a letter into the dust atop the sideboard. The letter Q. Five years ago she had indulged such glorious hopes. Five years ago next month, she and Geoffrey and Papa had spent that wonderful week at Lac Brillant. Despite all that had transpired since, she had only to close her eyes and she could see Quentin Chandler's aquiline features, the beautifully chiselled lips always ready to quiver into a smile, the mischief that lit the deep green of the wide-set eyes, the grin that flashed white and irresistibly across his face, so that one had perforce to laugh with him. How easily he had slipped into familiarity with them, as though he had been part of the family. And what a golden time it had been, one happy day blending into the next while they rode or walked, or played croquet on Lac Brillant's velvet lawns. A boat party and a ball had been given in honour of the visitors. There had been dances at the homes of neighbours, afternoon musicales and card parties, breakfasts
al fresco.
Laughter and joy, and that thrilling excitement that had made her heart race and brought a sweet new shyness whenever Quentin touched her hand, or smiled her way. Always, he had teased her gently, and she had gloried in his assumption that he had the right to do so.

To leave had been the most painful experience of her life. Quentin also had seemed saddened and vowed he would be at Highview before the month was out, to visit the Montgomerys. Papa had despatched several letters urging that Sir Brian and his sons visit Oxfordshire, but they had not come. The following year Geoffrey had heard through friends that Quentin was in Rome, taking the Grand Tour in the company of his father's chaplain. Then, early in the autumn of 1744, Lord Delavale had walked out at dawn to watch his beloved birds, despite the annoyance of a bad cold. He had come home with a slight fever, and a week later was dead. Penelope had not yet put off her blacks when her brother had ridden off to war, so soon to fall. There could be no thought of marriage whilst she was in mourning—nor did she mean to accept any of the gentlemen who had previously courted her. How could she, when her heart belonged forever to Quentin Chandler? If, on some glorious golden morning he should come riding up the drive-path to claim her … She sighed wistfully. An unlikely prospect. But even though he would probably never come and thus doom her to spinsterhood, there were worse fates. The lot of a spinster must be infinitely preferable to being the wife of a man for whom one could feel neither liking nor respect.

She took up the Holland cover absently, knowing why she had been so frightened when she'd fancied someone stood behind her. She'd thought it might be Roland Otton. The repellent creature admired her, there could be no doubt of it. The gall of the man! She was the daughter of a baron. Her father's family could trace their lineage to the twelfth century, and Mama's people had been numbered among those brave Saxons who had striven against the invading Normans in 1066. All anyone knew of Otton was that he claimed the rank of Captain (which Geoffrey had said was probably self-bestowed) and that he had a splendid physique and a countenance so darkly handsome that it was a distinct shock when one first beheld him. Scarcely sufficient grounds for a gentleman to look at a lady as Otton had taken to looking at her. But then—Penelope's lip curled scornfully—Captain Roland Otton could not be taken for a gentleman. He had come to Highview two years earlier, in Joseph Montgomery's train. The first time she had met the man she'd been in deep mourning for her father, yet Otton's bold eyes, near as dark as the stuff of her gown, had roved her from head to toe, a gleam coming into them as they drifted back to meet her haughty frown. Unabashed, he had grinned and bowed sweepingly, then reached out to shake hands with her brother. The Captain's impertinence had not escaped Geoffrey, however. He had quite “failed to see” the extended hand, and Otton had been relegated to his list of ‘Contemptibles'; a judgement he had not amended to the day of his death.

A growl of distant thunder recalled Penelope to the present and, impatient with her ponderings, she turned to the side door. Her movement was very sudden, and she saw the shadow that whipped across the hall. There
was
someone here! Her blood seemed to congeal, and she felt stifled with dread.
Had
Otton followed her? Was he lying in wait, ready to force his attentions on her the instant she stepped into the hall? A sob of helplessness rose in her throat. She was totally alone. Even if she should scream there was not a soul within hearing distance. ‘God help me!' she thought numbly. ‘What can I do?' Do something, she must! She could not simply cower in fear and trembling until the wretched man came and ravaged her. The prospect of such an outrage made her blaze with anger, and fear was routed. If Otton attempted to assault her, he would pay dearly for his villainy! Thank heaven that when dear Nurse had been denied the pension Papa had promised, and gone to Exeter to live with her sister, she had left the estate cutlery in the cottage. Penelope slid the top right-hand drawer open. The long-bladed carving knife was still there. Her fingers slipped around the handle, and she took up the Holland cover, concealing the knife beneath it.

Her nerves tight but her resolution unwavering, she marched to the door. All was quiet, save for the pattering of the rain, but as she stepped into the hall she heard a faint sound to her right. From the corner of her eye she could see nothing untoward. Her heart was leaping about wildly, but she continued to the front door. At any second she expected to hear hasty footsteps. The skin of her back began to creep and the knife handle slipped in her wet hand. She was almost to the door. She opened it somehow, praying Otton would not be lounging outside, watching her with his lazy, suggestive grin.…

But only a drifting veil of misty air awaited her. Vaguely noting that the rain had stopped, she pulled the door to and made her way to the side of the house. Missy whickered an amiable greeting. Furtively, Penelope slipped her knife into the leather sheath that ran down the stirrup before she went through the motions of rubbing down the mare. Finishing, she draped the sodden cotton over an empty barrel and led Missy around to the front. She was taut with fear, but still there was no sign of the intruder. The front step aided her scramble into the side-saddle, her wet garments hampering her and forbidding any attempt at speed. Not daring to betray fear, even now, she tapped her heels and Missy trotted down the path. Only then did Penelope allow a choked sob to escape her. Her bones felt like jelly, but as soon as they were beyond the garden she urged Missy to a canter.

At first, she was so overwrought that all she could think of was her amazing good fortune. But gradually, as terror faded and the thunder of her heart eased, it came to her that whoever had been in the cottage could very easily have prevented her leaving. Perhaps some poor starving vagrant had taken shelter from the rain, even as she had done, and been just as afraid of her as she had been of him. Or—and more logically—perhaps some wretched Jacobite fugitive, flying desperately for his life and hounded by soldiers and bounty hunters, had used the cottage as a temporary haven of refuge. She drew a deep breath. Either way she had been spared, and she whispered a small prayer of gratitude.

The sky was lightening as she crossed the meadow and, by the time she topped the last gentle rise and looked down upon the misted outline of the great house that was Highview Manor, the sun was slanting a few crimson spears through the clouds. Missy smelled home now and began to canter, and then, as they entered the small stand of birches that ran along beside the stream, a man rode out before them and Penelope had no choice but to rein to a halt.

Roland Otton, clad in a magnificently tailored olive-green riding coat, a small-sword strapped above his lean middle and a tricorne set at a rakish angle upon his thick, elegantly powdered hair, bowed in the saddle. “Thank God you are safe, dear Miss Montgomery! Your uncle is fairly beside himself, and your aunt is nigh prostrated with anxiety. Is aught amiss?”

“The only thing amiss, sir,” she replied tartly, “is that you block my way. Be so good as to move aside.”

He guided his tall chestnut to the edge of the narrow drive, but reached out to seize Penelope's rein. “Sweet lady,” he began.

Through clenched teeth, she gritted, “Captain Otton … let me pass!”