Two Corinthians (17 page)

“The colours are more vivid,” she argued.  “I could almost taste those grapes.”

“How typical of a female. You are all Philistines at heart, I vow.”

“You only admire the Old Masters because you have been taught to venerate anything ancient and Italian. It is not your own genuine opinion. Oh, look out!”

As they turned from Wardour Street into Oxford Street, a bleating flock of sheep on their way to Smithfield Market milled across the road. Before Bertram noticed their presence, his chestnuts were in their midst. The high-strung pair reared and the curricle swung wildly to one side. Struggling to control them, from the corner of his horrified eye he saw Lizzie pitched out into the street.

She landed on top of a surprised sheep.

“Miss Lizzie!” shrieked Molly in his ear.

The horses were calmer now, shifting uneasily and rolling their eyes but no longer panicked. Bertram glanced back at the maid, who was hanging on with grim determination and staring open-mouthed at her mistress.

Undignified but apparently unharmed, Lizzie scrambled to her feet. The sheep followed suit.

“You cow-handed cawker!” she stormed at Bertram.

“Baa!” agreed the sheep and scuttled off.

“Get in,” Bertram said, tight-lipped.

He was all too aware that the pedestrians on the pavement had turned from the shop windows to watch the comedy. The shepherd was approaching, waving his crook and screeching what sounded like Welsh curses, leaving the care of the flock to his black and white dogs. Beneath the horses' hooves a sheep with a broken leg struggled to rise. Two others lay still, one of them with its head in a pool of blood.

Lizzie climbed up beside him and saw the gory corpse.

“I'm going to cast up my accounts,” she choked out.

“No, you are not. You are going to sit looking unconcerned and twirling your parasol.”

“My new parasol!”  To his relief, Lizzie was distracted.

“Lawks, miss, them sheep's a-nibbling at it,” came Molly's shocked voice. “The dirty beasts!  I'll get it.” She jumped down, seized the parasol and whacked one of the animals across the back with it.  ”Scarper, you nasty creetur,” she cried.

Bertram caught Lizzie's eye and she giggled.  Unwillingly he grinned.

“Do you know what that nasty creetur said when I fell on it? I could swear it said 'Oof!'“

“What did you expect the poor animal to say?  'I beg your pardon, madam'?”  Unable to resist the mischief in her face, he burst out laughing.

The shepherd glared up at him in a fury.  Bertram tossed the man a five-sovereign piece. The efficient dogs had moved the flock past by now, its place taken by a swarm of gaping, pointing urchins.  Molly handed Lizzie her parasol; she opened it and twirled it with a sweet, nonchalant smile.

Bertram urged the chestnuts onward, fleeing the scene of the disaster.

“Can I stop looking unconcerned now?” hissed Lizzie as they turned up Wimpole Street. “My face is growing stiff.”

“Yes, no one here saw me making a mull of it.”  He drew up at the side of the road and turned to her. “I don't know what to say, Lizzie. You were right to call me cow-handed.”

“Oh no, for you handled them splendidly after they shied. I daresay they might have slaughtered the whole flock without your firm hand on the reins. Besides, it was my fault for provoking you. My wretched tongue seems to have a mind of its own.”

“The fault was entirely mine. You are not hurt, are you?”

She wriggled experimentally and he found himself suddenly short of breath. Averting his eyes, he fixed his gaze on the nearest house, sadly disconcerting the lady descending the front steps.

“My shoulder aches a little,” said Lizzie.  “That sheep was quite solid, though much softer than the cobbles would have been. It is nothing to signify.  I am sure a hot bath will put it to rights.”

Bertram blinked and lost his breath again as a vision of Lizzie in her bath arose unbidden before his mind's eye. The disconcerted lady dashed back up the steps in alarm and slammed her front door behind her.

“The sooner I get you home the better,” muttered Bertram.

He drove the remaining four blocks in abstracted silence, and when they reached Portman Square Lizzie looked at him anxiously.

“I believe you are in shock,” she said with a motherly air. “You must come in and have a glass of wine.”

“I am quite all right,” he responded, more brusquely than he had intended.

“Pray do come in,” she insisted, “or I shall think you are angry with me for preferring Miss Linwood to Raphael.”

“No, how can I be angry with a sincere opinion, even if I disagree with it?  Perhaps I am in shock,” he added with a wry smile, following her into the house.  “I cannot recall ever having made such a cake of myself in public.”

“Fustian!  I was the one made a cake of, and I assure you I do not regard it in the least. Is the Madeira in the front parlour, Enid?  Now come and sit down, Bertram, and I will pour you a glass. You see, I do not have your vast self-consequence, so an encounter with a sheep cannot dent it.”

She laughed, but her words stung him a little.  Then he saw that as she bustled about, taking off her modish pelisse and bonnet, she winced when she moved her left arm. He wanted to tell her to go and take a hot bath at once, but the words stuck in his throat. Instead he urged her into a chair, and handed her the wine she had poured him.

“I think you are more shaken than you will admit,” he said roughly.

She looked up at him, her blue eyes huge with some unrecognisable emotion. Her rosy lips parted slightly and he leaned towards her. At that moment the door knocker sounded.

“I'll see if miss is at 'ome,” came Enid's voice.

The door of the parlour was open for propriety's sake, and Bertram shuddered as he listened to the caller's reply.

“Saw Miss Elizabeth drive up with my cousin,” came Horace Harrison's confident voice. “Needn't fear that she won't receive us.”

He appeared in the doorway, resplendent in mauve and gold, with Amelia trailing behind him, in pink muslin as usual.

“How do, Miss Elizabeth. Servant, coz.” He glanced about the room. “Miss Sutton not here?”

Bertram saw Lizzie's instinctive protest at his presumption die as she noted Amelia's unhappy face.

“My sister is not at home,” she said with a haughty mien worthy of a duchess. With equal graciousness she turned to Amelia. “I am happy to see you, Miss Harrison. Pray take a seat.”

Horace cast a sly glance from his sister to his cousin. “Yes, do, Amy,” he urged. “I must be on my way, came to see Miss Sutton, but I daresay Cousin Bertram will see you home right and tight.”

Bertram concealed his impotent fury behind a mask of polite acquiescence. He could not bring himself to snub poor Amelia, especially in front of Lizzie.  The day had been an unmitigated disaster.

He thought his cup of adversity was full, but it was about to overflow. New voices were heard in the hall:  Claire and George Winterborne laughing together.

“No, I shan't stay,” said George.

Horace popped out of the parlour. “Miss Sutton!  Well met. Came to call and found you out.”

“Or perhaps I shall,” said George.

So the wretch fancied himself as Claire's protector!  Bertram silently cursed the name of Winterborne.

He sent a glance of appeal to Lizzie and she shook her head slightly, merriment dancing in her eyes. He hoped that meant that she did not mean to reveal his clumsy driving to his rival. It was inevitable that she should tell her sister, if only to explain her sore shoulder.

Claire was pink-cheeked and gay. She greeted him with apparent pleasure, said a word of welcome to Amelia, and turned to Lizzie.

“Such excitement,” she said. “I persuaded Lord Winterborne to spring the horses for a short distance and we flew like the wind, I vow. He is truly a top sawyer.”

“You must try if he will take you out in the high-perch phaeton,” advised Lizzie demurely, avoiding Bertram's eyes.

He breathed a sigh of gratitude, knowing she was bursting to tell the tale of their adventure.

“Allow me to take your shawl, Miss Sutton,” proposed Horace, his tone ingratiating.

“Thank you, but I believe I shall go upstairs.  It has been a long day and I am a little fatigued.”

Since Claire looked anything but tired, Bertram could only applaud this masterly set-down. She was less in need of protection than Winterborne supposed.

He stepped forward, saying in a commanding voice, “We must leave Miss Sutton to her rest, Cousin.”

Amelia jumped up as if he had addressed her.  “Oh yes, so sorry, another time,” she said breathlessly.

With Bertram's large figure towering on one side and George's bearing down on the other, Horace sulkily gave up and made his farewells.

In the bustle of general leave-taking, Bertram managed to whisper to Lizzie, “You will take care of that injury properly, will you not?”

“Of course, but it is nothing.” She patted his arm in an oddly soothing gesture of reassurance.

The four visitors went down the steps together but Bertram and George paused on the pavement and watched Horace and Amelia driven away in Lady Harrison's barouche.

“I don't care for that cousin of yours,” said George with a scowl.

“Nor do I.”

“Beg pardon.” His grin was engaging. “A man ain't responsible for his relatives. It seems to me the best thing we can do is see that Claire and Lizzie get about a bit more, meet more people. I mean to write to my cousin Tilly to come up to Town and introduce them about. Is Lady Caroline expected in London this Season?”

“I believe she means to come later, when the date of the Coronation is fixed. Carfax will have to be here for that, of course. Daresay I could persuade her to come sooner.”

“That's the ticket. How did Lizzie like the exhibitions?”

“She preferred the embroidery to the originals.”

George roared with laughter. “An honest young lady, unswayed by accepted wisdom, or else she was roasting you.”

“I should have laughed. The chit has an unmatched ability to ruffle my feathers.”  Bertram frowned. “What do you say to that curricle race we were talking of the other day?”

“You're on!  Two days hence in the park?  Eight o'clock?”

“That sounds all right. We'll meet tomorrow to settle the course?  And not a word to the ladies.” Bertram saw that Alfie, holding George's horses, was drinking in every word. “Hear that, lad?  Not a word to Miss Claire and Miss Lizzie. We don't want them worrying,” he added to George.

There was an infuriatingly understanding look in the older man's dark eyes as he nodded agreement.

Bertram wrote to Caroline that night. Though grateful to Winterborne for suggesting it, he was annoyed with himself for not having realised that the support of an established matron was needed to launch Lizzie. He was sure his sister would come if she possibly could. After all, Claire was in some sense already her protégée.  He had no idea who George's cousin Tilly was, or whether she would be of any use, but Caroline had all the requisite connections in the Polite World, and she was popular besides.

He only hoped she would succeed in persuading Claire to dress as befitted her future station. Until he saw her fashionably dressed and taking her place in Society, it was impossible to judge whether she was truly worthy of becoming his prospective countess.

On the other hand, he could not dismiss a vague uneasiness at the prospect of escorting Lizzie to the elegant entertainments of the Ton.

On the morning of the race, veils of mist wafted about the trees of Hyde Park and the sun was a pale disc in the hazy sky. When Bertram drove his four chestnuts up to the Grosvenor Gate, where they were to start, scores of spectators were already on hand. More arrived, in carriages or on horseback, at every moment. It seemed that half the male population of the town was eager to watch the match between the two notable Corinthians, and most of them had a stake in the outcome.

Bertram knew that everyone assumed he had a wager on with Winterborne. It was not so; the stakes in this contest were more subtle than mere money.

He was soon surrounded by a crowd of friends, offering advice and wishing him luck.

“I've laid a monkey on you, Pomeroy,” cried one. “Fail me and I starve till next quarter day!”

“Take it easy round those bends,” warned another. “Don't want to come a cropper.”

“Lobcock!” snorted a third, “you don't need to tell Pomeroy that. Tell you what, if you win I'll give you five thousand for your cattle.”

Bertram grinned and shook his head. Leaving the chestnuts in Abel's care, he went over to where Winterborne was talking to Lord Alvanley, who was to act as starter and judge.  Lord Alvanley checked that they agreed on the course, then went off to clear a space for the start. George and Bertram shook hands and returned to their curricles.

As he drove up to the starting line, Bertram noticed Alfie standing under a nearby tree. He smiled to himself, wondering whether the lad understood anything of the sense of rivalry that had led to this meeting.

The course they had chosen was a little over two miles long. There were a couple of curves, but the significant difficulties were a right-angled turn down by the Serpentine and a hairpin bend up near the Tyburn turnpike. Bertram had no expectation of coming to grief at either, barring an unexpected flock of sheep, but he knew his opponent for a superb whip and he planned his strategy with care.

He let Winterborne take the lead as they galloped towards the hairpin. Both curricles rounded it safely and started along the long, winding track down to the Serpentine and along its banks. Bertram let the chestnuts have their heads and they pulled up neck-and-neck with the other team. George looked over at him and grinned, saluting with his whip.  As the right-angled turn approached Bertram urged on his team, but try as they might they could not pull far enough ahead to take the inside. He had to drop back and let his opponent enter the last straightway ahead of him.

The sun broke through the mist. The chestnuts drew alongside the other curricle, then their noses were level with the opposing team's cruppers, their withers, their necks. Scarce a furlong remained before the finish line.