Regency Sting (2 page)

Harriet looked at him tearfully. “Oh, my dear,” she said in a quavering voice, “what a
catastrophic
blow we've had!”

She handed him the missive which she'd been clutching even during her period of unconsciousness. Peter adjusted his spectacles and read it quickly. Then, completely unmoved, he looked up at his mother. “I don't see why you're in such a taking,” he remarked. “Everyone
expected
Uncle Osborn to stick his spoon into the wall at any time during this past year.”

“
I
didn't expect it,” his mother said weakly. “He wasn't much past sixty, he was the strongest and hardiest man in the family despite his apoplexy, and although he was the eldest, he was always used to say that he would outlive us all. Besides, it is not at all kind in you to use so dreadful an expression. Stick his spoon into the wall, indeed! Have you no respect for the dead?”

“Dash it, Mama,” Peter said defensively, “you surely don't expect
me
to carry on over this, do you? Because I see no cause to put on a long face over the demise of a man I hardly knew. I admit that he was generous with money, if one cares for such things, but I
detest
the sort of sham which prompts one to praise—after he dies—a man one despised while he was alive.”

Lady Harriet shook her head and sighed hopelessly. I must remain calm, she told herself. Peter was not being rude. Although little more than a boy, her son was an independent-minded, scholarly youth who had adopted strong latitudinarian principles. He cared for little but his books and his imminent entrance into Oxford. She was utterly devoted to him and very proud of his scholarly abilities, but she had to admit that she did not always understand him. She knew that his slender physique and his lack of sporting prowess were a disappointment to him. It was too bad that his father had died when he was so young, and that her now-deceased brother had never taken an interest in the boy. He needed the influence of a strong man. But her brother had always been selfish and reclusive, and it was too late now to change things. “I suppose I should not have expected you to grieve for your Uncle Osborn,” she said regretfully, “but you may find that you have other reasons to mourn. You should grieve, if not for your uncle, then for Anne—and for yourself.”

“Why? What do you mean?”

“Did you not read the letter through?” she asked, trying with a perceptible effort to regain her composure, but not quite succeeding. “Osborn left
everything
to … to …” Here, her self-control broke down again. “…
to that rebel
!”

“Rebel?” Peter asked, perplexed. “What rebel? Do you mean your brother Henry's son?”

“Of course I mean Henry's son!”

“Well, really, Mama, you can scarcely call
him
a rebel. He can't be more than twenty-five or six. The American uprising was over before he was
born
!”

“What has
that
to say to anything?” his mother demanded with unaccustomed irritability, unable to recapture her normal complacency. “His father—my rackety second brother, Henry—was a rebel, wasn't he?”

“Not at all,” Peter explained, shifting the book he carried to his other hand and seating himself beside his mother. “As I understand it, my Uncle Henry was a perfectly respectable British officer of the line who discharged his duties quite honorably. Just because he chose not to return to England with his regiment after the war does not make him a rebel.”

“Any man who would choose to remain abroad and give up his homeland is a rebel in my view. Besides, he
married
a rebel, did he not? You'll have to admit that, even if
Henry
couldn't be called a rebel in the strictest sense, his
son
is a rebel—on his mother's side, at least.”

Peter shrugged. “A tendency to rebellion,” he said, repressing a smile, “is not inherited. Anyway, I don't see why you're upsetting yourself over all this
now
, Mama. It isn't at all like you.”

“It's because I cannot understand why Osborn left everything to an
American
, while
my
son is given nothing at all,” she answered, pulling a handkerchief from the bosom of her dress and sniffing into it piteously.

“But you
must
have understood all these years that the inheritance had to pass on down the
male
line—”

“I suppose I
should
have understood,” his mother admitted miserably, “but I kept hoping … all sorts of foolish hopes that Anne would marry well … that Osborn would live for years and years … or that he would make proper provision …” Her voice quivered pathetically. “Oh, dear, I
must
be calm,” she warned herself.

Peter put his book aside and patted her hand comfortingly. “Never mind, Mama. We shall manage. Father did not leave you destitute, after all, and Anne will soon be married to that Claybridge fellow …”

Harriet felt a wave of irritation and frowned at her son in uncharacteristic impatience. “For a brilliant young scholar, as you are reputed to be, you certainly entertain some idiotic notions. Your father left us with barely enough to enable us to live in genteel poverty. This very
house
is Mainwaring property. It was only because your Uncle Osborn detested London and preferred to stay buried away in Derbyshire that we were able to remain here all these years. And now, that American savage is very likely to order our removal as soon as he sets foot in London. We shall have to take rooms in Hans Town or some other such dowdy neighborhood. We shan't be able to afford more than a cook, a butler and one maid for our household staff! And how will you like doing without stables and carriages or even one single horse?”

“Oh? Will things be as bad as that?” Peter asked, startled.

“Worse! And as for Anne, she will
not
marry Lord Claybridge. It is out of the question, especially now.”

“Why?” Peter asked curiously. “You've
always
been against the match. I don't say I especially care for the fellow, myself. Seems a rather dull sort to me. But if Anne is so taken with him, I don't see why you oppose their marriage.” Peter habitually took Anne's part. Although she was five years his senior, and only a half-sister to him, the affection between them was very strong. Anne's mother had died when she was three years old, and her father, Sir Archer Hartley, had married Harriet Mainwaring shortly thereafter. Peter was born two years later. Hartley himself had died the following year, and Peter, as soon as he was old enough to realize that his mother (although lovingly devoted to both her stepdaughter and her son) was not always capable of understanding him, turned to Anne. The two had developed a closeness which had lasted through the years.

“Of course you don't see,” Harriet answered irritably. “You don't see
anything
beyond your Latin epistles and your Greek philosophies. Don't you understand why Mathilda Claybridge was here this morning? Arthur Claybridge has not a feather to fly with! Mathilda told me herself—”

“Told you what?” came an irate voice from across the room. They looked up to find Anne herself poised in the doorway. Above average height to begin with, she had drawn herself up even higher in her anger and was glaring at them from beneath a high-crowned bonnet on which even the ostrich plumes seemed to be waving in irritation. “Well, Mama,” she demanded coldly, “what was Lady Claybridge saying about me?”

Two

“I must remain calm,” Lady Harriet muttered warningly to herself, and she let her eyes dwell for a moment on the enchanting picture her daughter made as she stood framed in the doorway. An artist would have found the girl striking at any time, but now, with her eyes sparkling with anger, her shiny brown curls peeping out from beneath a completely fetching bonnet, and her cheeks pink from either the November wind or her reaction to the bit of overheard conversation, an artist would be bound to find her almost breathtaking. Harriet had heard more than one smitten gentleman describe Anne's eyes as “speaking” and her nose as “perfection itself.” (Of course, Lady Dabney had once remarked that Anne's mouth was rather too full in the underlip, but Lady Dabney's daughter was as plain as a sparrow and broke out in spots at the slightest provocation, so what could one expect from the envious old cat?) As far as Lady Harriet was concerned, Anne's mouth was as enticing as her other features.

The underlip in question was, at this moment, rather too much in evidence. Peter, not blinded by motherly affection, recognized the expression instantly. “Why are you standing there
pouting
?” he asked, peering at her through his spectacles in brotherly disapproval.

Anne surveyed him coldly. “I do
not
pout,” she said imperiously.

“Then what
is
it you're doing that makes your underlip stand out like that?” he asked, undaunted.

“I am merely waiting for an answer to my question. Why, Mama, were you discussing my affairs with Lady Claybridge behind my back?”

“Anne, dear, do come in and sit down. I cannot be easy while you stand there glowering at me. And never mind the Claybridge matter now. I have some other news that I'm afraid may be even more upsetting to you. Here. Read
this
! But first, be sure to tell yourself to remain calm.” And she handed the letter to her stepdaughter.

Anne pulled off her gloves, tossed them on a chair and scanned the letter. “I don't see anything in this to upset me,” she said, looking up at her stepmother candidly. “There's nothing terribly shocking in the fact that an old man who was subject to apoplectic attacks has died. I'm sorry, Mama, if
you're
grieved, but Uncle Osborn never did anything to earn
my
affection.”

“What ungrateful children I have reared, to be sure,” Lady Harriet said with mild disgust. “Who do you think provided you with the niceties of life—even the very elegant bonnet you wear at this moment?”

“Oh,
that
!” Anne dismissed a lifetime of largesse with a scornful wave of her hand. “Who cares for such things? You would not want me to sell my affection for a … a mess of potage? I didn't like him, and I will not wear the willow for him.”

“Hear, hear,” Peter said supportively, grinning at his sister in approval. “I must admit, Anne, that you've quite a bit of pluck, for—”

“—for a girl!” she finished for him, responding to his grin with a quick, affectionate smile.

“You
both
are impossible,” Harriet declared disapprovingly. “Your attitudes are not only improper—they are positively shameful. I'll admit your uncle was something of a curmudgeon—”

“
Something
of a curmudgeon? Really, Mama, even
you
must admit that Uncle Osborn was a brittletempered, puffed-up blackguard!” Anne declared.

“At his
best
!” Peter added teasingly.

“And positively apoplectic at his worst,” Anne went on.

“Under the circumstances, that is a dreadful thing to say!” poor Harriet remonstrated.

“But true,” Anne insisted. “At least, that's how he was whenever
we
saw him—”

“Which was not more often than once in two years,” Peter said.

“And, Mama, I once heard him say that you set up his bristles.
You
, who never said an unkind thing to him!”

“And he never bothered to invite us to dine with him—not
once
in the last decade!”

“And when we
did
see him, he'd kick up a dust if we so much as giggled in his presence—”

“And remember, Mama, how he fell into a pucker when you invited him to dine with us and then had no Madeira for him to drink?”

“And he never condescended to dine with us again—”

“Stop!” Lady Harriet threw up her hands. “Very well, I shall admit he was a curmudgeon. But all this has nothing to say to the nub of the matter, which is that we are left without a groat.”

“Without a groat?” Anne asked in surprise.

“Not one,” her stepmother answered, the tears filling her eyes again.

“Oh, dear. That
is
a problem,” Anne murmured, chastened.

Lady Harriet sniffled into her handkerchief. “
Now
do you understand why I'm so distraught?”

“I daresay I had
better
understand,” Anne admitted, putting her arm comfortingly around her mother's shoulders. “I think I may even shed a tear or two
myself
.”

Peter looked from one to the other in disgust. “Confound it, Mama, and you, too, Anne … it's not as if we were
destitute
.”

“We are
almost
destitute,” his mother said lugubriously. “I don't even know if we'll have the means to send you to Oxford next year.”

Now it was Peter's turn to be taken aback. Entering Oxford had been his dream for years. Most young gentlemen attended the university because society expected it or parents demanded it, but some few, like Peter, actually welcomed the scholarly life. Peter had no talent for sporting pursuits, and no taste for the gambling, the drinking and the carousing that most young men of his age and station seemed to enjoy. He had never even
considered
an alternative to life at Oxford. There was no other world he wanted. As he met Anne's eyes, he lowered his own so that she would not read the sudden fear that he knew was reflected there. “No … money for Oxford?” He could barely say the words.

“Nonsense, Mama,” Anne said with what she hoped would be reassuring firmness. “I'm certain that something can be contrived …”

“Can it? I really can't see what—” Harriet began doubtfully.

“We can use the small legacy from my mother!” Anne said in sudden inspiration.

Peter adjusted his spectacles manfully, picked up his book and rose in offended dignity. “You surely don't imagine,” he declared, “that I would take your money!”