The Perfect Princess (27 page)

“Yes,” said the duke, “it says a lot for Maitland that he has friends of that caliber. Harper is quite a character, isn’t he, though, of course, my view is tempered by the fact that he was on his way home with Rosamund when he ran into you, Caspar. There’s something appealing
about his loyalty to Maitland, too, wouldn’t you say? And he knows about coaches. I was quite impressed.”

His last remark had Lords Caspar and Justin exchanging veiled glances.

The duke chuckled. “I would advise you not to make any sudden moves around Maitland when Harper is around.”

“And the same goes for Templar,” said Lord Justin.

“Yes,” replied the duke. “As I said, Maitland is fortunate in his choice of friends.”

They fell silent when a footman entered with a coal scuttle and banked up the fire. When they were alone again, Lord Caspar took up the conversation where it had left off.

“Are you satisfied now, Father, that Maitland is innocent?”

“Oh, I don’t think there’s any doubt of that. When he refused my offer to clear his name, he passed the test. But tell me about Rosamund. What happened between her and Maitland? How did he win her over?”

Lord Caspar’s eyes were unclouded. “Has he won her over?”

“All she can talk about is our duty to prove his innocence.”

Lord Caspar shrugged carelessly. “You’ll have to ask Rosamund. But you must remember that Harper was only acting on Maitland’s instructions when he tried to bring Rosamund home. I suppose Rosamund feels grateful to him.”

“Mmm,” said the duke.

Lord Justin was incredulous. “Father, you can’t be thinking what I think you’re thinking. You’ve met the man. ‘Short on charm’ doesn’t do him justice. If you were to put him in the stillroom, one look from him would curdle all the milk and cream. And when you compare him to Prince Michael, well, there’s no comparison, and Rosamund turned off the prince.”

The duke’s gaze rested on his younger son for a long moment. “Justin,” he said finally, “you have a lot to learn about women. He’s different. Rosamund has never met a man like him.”

“You’re worrying for nothing,” said Lord Caspar. “I have it from the horse’s mouth that he wouldn’t have our Rosamund at any price. And I believe Maitland is a man of his word.”

The duke said nothing, but now he
was
beginning to worry.

Prudence Dryden was a year or so younger than Rosamund and had seemed like an ideal choice for a companion-chaperon when Rosamund first offered her the position. She came of good family—both her father and brother were vicars—and she wasn’t awed by a duke’s household. Rosamund had thought her a well-bred, sociable girl. She’d hoped they would become friends, but was now coming to believe that she’d misjudged Miss Dryden’s character. The girl was either moody, or she, Rosamund, had done something to offend her.

They were in the little parlor, just off Rosamund’s bedchamber, and Miss Dryden’s dark head was bent over her embroidery. She was wearing one of Rosamund’s gowns, a green gown that Rosamund had never worn because the color made her look sickly. For some odd reason, though she and Miss Dryden had the same coloring, the gown suited the younger girl and intensified the green in her eyes. There were other gowns Rosamund would have liked to offer her companion, gowns that would need very little altering since she and Prudence were about the same size, but she was afraid of giving offense.

Miss Dryden looked up with a question in her eyes. “And that was the last you saw of him, when he locked you in your room at Dunsmoor?”

They were talking about Richard, and her “rescue” by Caspar and Hugh Templar. “Yes,” said Rosamund. She had to be careful of what she said, for Richard’s sake. “Caspar said they must have missed him by minutes.”

Miss Dryden cocked her head to one side. “You’re glad he escaped, aren’t you?”

Rosamund would have liked to pour her heart out, but she couldn’t, of course, not to anyone. She was walking a very fine line. If she said too much, she might put Richard in danger. On the other hand, she couldn’t bring herself to make him appear as the dangerous felon everyone thought he was.

She said, “He treated me with respect. I could not believe that he would kill anyone.” And because she was afraid of saying too much, she quickly changed the subject. “Now tell me what has been happening here in my absence.”

There was little to tell, except that Prince Michael had been out to the house every day to inquire if there was any news of Rosamund.

Rosamund made a face. “I hope this doesn’t mean he’s still pursuing me.” She looked at Miss Dryden. “I hope my father isn’t encouraging him!”

Miss Dryden was looking at the door, and her cheeks were turning pink. Rosamund turned her head. Caspar had entered the room.

Caspar said, “Father will see you now, Rosamund.”

Oh, no, thought Rosamund. She hoped Prudence hadn’t fallen in love with Caspar. Poor Prudence. No wonder she was moody.

There was no sign of Prudence when Rosamund returned to the parlor, and she couldn’t say she was sorry. She felt that her face was cracking from smiling so much. She didn’t think she was fooling anyone. Her father, her brothers—they were so solicitous, so uncharacteristically
solicitous, that she was sure they knew her heart was breaking.

Her father rarely talked of her mother. It was too painful. He was a man who liked to keep his softer emotions tightly locked inside him. But he’d talked of her mother just now.

His voice had been thick, and there were tears in his eyes. “She would be proud of you if she could see you now,” he said. “Damn proud! And I’m proud of you, too.”

She had many happy memories of her mother, and the most vivid of all was that her father and mother had had the kind of love most people can only dream about. It was true that Richard could bring tears to her eyes, too, but those were tears of vexation. He really was an impossible man.

At least her father was going to do right by Richard. He could stay here for as long as he liked. But she couldn’t speak to him, couldn’t do anything that would draw attention to him. Then, in a week or two, when he was on his feet, he would leave here and she would never see him again.

And she would bear it because she was a Devere. That’s why her father had told her he was proud of her.

With a little sigh, she began to wander around her room. Her father had reminded her that it was her birthday next week and he thought that they should let her ball go forward. For one thing, the invitations had already been sent out; for another, it would do her good, he said, take her out of herself, and she had smilingly agreed. What else could she do? She couldn’t go into a decline just because her heart was broken.

She had to get ahold of herself.

She sighed again. She’d hoped that when she was back with her family and in her own setting, her world would right itself, and she’d see the past week in its proper perspective. But it hadn’t turned out that way. Her world seemed much smaller than she remembered.

She picked up her embroidery frame and examined the work in progress. It would eventually become a shawl with a border embroidered in white satin-stitched vines and acorns. She was an accomplished needlewoman, as every room in her father’s house could attest—needlepoint cushions, embroidered tablecloths and sheets, monogrammed handkerchiefs for her brothers, wall hangings. And if she wasn’t at her needlework, she was reading, or cutting and arranging flowers.

How had she managed to stay sane all these years?

She knew two other accomplished needlewomen, Prudence and Aunt Fran, and no wonder—they had nothing else to occupy their time. But what was there for an unmarried woman to do? Maiden aunts invariably ended up as nursemaids in a brother’s household. That’s why Prudence had struck out on her own and accepted a position as her companion. She, Rosamund, must be a terrible disappointment to her. At this rate, they would both end up like Aunt Fran, tolerated but with no real life of their own.

Then what could they do?

She already knew the answer. It wasn’t only her adventure with Richard that had made her restless. Long before that she’d begun to chafe at the role that had been assigned to her. She was tired of being seen only as a duke’s daughter. She’d wanted to be a flesh-and-blood woman; she’d wanted to see things and do things she’d never seen or done before. She wanted to have a real life.

She breathed deeply. The next step, as she knew very well, was to set up her own household, where she could come and go as she pleased.

R
ichard looked up from his ledger and glanced out the window of his office. The stable block was on the east side of the house and his upstairs office had an excellent view of the drive and courtyard. As he watched, Lord Caspar, Rosamund, and her companion, Miss Dryden, descended the front stairs of the house, entered the curricle that was waiting for them, and were soon bowling along the drive for their morning outing.

It was a ritual he’d watched for a week now, Rosamund taking the air in her brother’s curricle. There was another ritual in the afternoon. That’s when a procession of carriages arrived at the house as all of fashionable London came to pay its respects to the duke’s daughter, and none more fashionable than Prince Michael of Kolnbourg.

There would be no Prince Michael and no procession of carriages this afternoon. That would wait until tonight, when guests arrived for the ball the duke was
hosting to mark the occasion of his daughter’s birthday. Meantime, there was a flurry of activity as servants readied the house for the great occasion. From his vantage point, he could see gardeners and their helpers stringing lanterns from trees, and footmen carrying plants from the conservatory to the folly, which overlooked the man-made lake.

He’d been mistaken to think that Twickenham House was like Dunsmoor only bigger. This place was like a miniature palace. As for the people who lived here, however . . . he shook his head. Sometimes he wondered if they’d been born on a different planet.

He was supposed to be the second coachman, but so far his services had not been required, because whenever the duke wanted to take one of his coaches for a spin, he invariably sat on the box beside Harper while he, Richard, traveled inside. And the drive defied description. The duke and Harper were like a couple of maniacs when they got going.

And when the duke and Harper were not taking one of the coaches for a spin, they could be found, more often than not, in the old coach house, commonly referred to as “the infirmary,” where broken-down carriages were brought to the duke by their owners—-just as though he ran a shop in his back garden—to be lovingly restored to health.

And Harper was in his element.

After dipping his pen in its ink pot, he made a notation in his ledger. This was all he was good for! He’d been assigned to keeping the coach house and stable accounts, but only because he couldn’t do anything else. And when he wasn’t making notations in his ledger, he’d find himself watching for Prince Michael to arrive in sartorial splendor to take Lady Rosamund for a spin in his equally sartorial curricle with its showy chestnuts.

Two curricle rides in one day was one too many, in
Richard’s opinion, but Rosamund didn’t seem to mind. In fact, she seemed to enjoy it.

A blob of ink rolled off his pen nib and smeared a column of figures. Richard glared at it long and hard, then let out a furious oath. He blotted it, put down his pen, and got up.

There were no aches and pains when he moved now. A week had made a remarkable difference to him. He felt as good as new. The excellent doctor who tended his wound hadn’t raised an eyebrow when he’d first examined him. He’d shaken his head and said something to the effect that it was time that the duke’s retainers learned that the war was over and to stay out of drunken brawls.

He debated with himself about going to the tack room to help Harper polish the harness, but last time he’d been bawled out for using the wrong polish, and he’d been told to keep away. He wasn’t looking for something to do so much as someone to talk to. He was tired of his own company.

His thoughts drifted to Digby and Whorsley. They’d made the trip from town with hopes of getting a lead on him, or at the very least of arresting Harper and dragging him off in chains. According to Harper, however, they couldn’t get Rosamund to say one word against him, and Harper had stuck to his story—that he’d been duped by his chief into believing they were working on a case, and he never would have helped him escape from Newgate if he’d known the truth.