Much Ado About You

‘What? Oh!’ Lady Clarice laughed. ‘You must have met each other when darling Draven hunts in Scotland, is that it?’ Something guarded entered her tone. Lady Clarice was no fool, and the Essex girls were astonishingly lovely.

Tess caught Lady Clarice’s inflection and felt a wave of panic. If Lady Clarice even caught wind of Imogen’s abject devotion to her son, she might refuse to chaperone them, and then what would they do?

‘I race in Scotland, not hunt,’ Draven told his mother. He was bowing over Imogen’s hand now, and Tess noticed with a sinking heart that he was looking at her sister with some semblance of the passion with which she looked at him.

‘I do believe that my son has a remarkable seat on a saddle,’ Lady Clarice said, not seeming to notice (to Tess’s relief) that Annabel had rudely wandered off without bothering to curtsy and was now standing far too close to the Earl of Mayne and giggling so hard that her curls bobbed around her shoulders like corks caught in a backwash. ‘Not that I can swear to this, because I abhor the out-of-doors.’ And, when Tess looked confused, ‘Fresh air, Miss Essex! It’s ruinous for the complexion to attend those races, I assure you. I only do so under the strongest duress. Of course, my son loves my company so much that it means the earth to him if I do watch one of his horses sail to victory. So I sacrifice … I sacrifice …’

My complexion is clearly ruined, Tess thought to herself. Their father had been dragging them to races since they were able to walk.

‘But I have ever encouraged dear Draven to follow his own delight in these matters,’ Lady Clarice was saying. ‘I do like a man to have an occupation. Far too many gentlemen of my acquaintance sit about all day and never rise from their chairs at the club. They end up with very ill manners, I assure you. And it causes’ — she lowered her voice ‘-a certain spreading in the derrière, if you follow me!’ She trilled with naughty laughter. ‘Although I shouldn’t say such a thing to you, an unmarried girl, for all you are a bit long in the tooth! But not to worry, dear, Holbrook will put you on the market the very first day that you’re out of blacks.’

‘Now, Duke,’ she said, turning from Tess without pausing for breath. ‘What are we to do? I mean, I am more than happy to chaperone your darling wards for a day or so, Holbrook, but London calls. My mantua-maker beckons. Allures me!’ she said with a giggle. ‘So I ask you, Your Grace, what are we to do?’

Their guardian didn’t even blink, so he must be used to Lady Clarice’s style of conversation. Not having had that pleasure herself, Tess could feel a headache coming on. She felt a light touch at her elbow.

‘Would you like to take a turn around the room, Miss Essex?’ The Earl of Mayne stood smiling at her.

‘I would,’ she said, ‘but-’ And she looked helplessly to where Imogen stood talking to Lord Maitland. Surely it wasn’t her imagination that there was something overfamiliar in the way that he smiled at Imogen, something complaisant in the way his fingers sat on her bare arm, just above her elbow.

The earl followed her glance. ‘Rafe,’ he said in a pleasant low tone that cut through the shrilling hum of Lady Clarice’s speech, ‘our guests are likely famished. Shall we adjourn to supper?’

Their guardian promptly towed Lady Clarice out of the room, her stream of gently vindictive conversation fading as they turned the corner into the dining room.

‘Imogen!’ Tess said, trying to sound commanding yet not motherly. Then she turned to the earl and put her hand on his arm.

He looked down at her for a moment, and Tess saw a smile lurking somewhere in his eyes. Then he took her hand and raised it to his lips. ‘If you insist,’ he said softly.

Tess blinked. Could he be starting a flirtation with her?

But the next second Mayne was making smiling remarks about there being no need to attend to protocol amongst close friends and deftly bearing Imogen out of the room.

‘Miss Essex,’ Lord Maitland drawled, turning to her and putting her hand to his lips.

My goodness, Tess thought rather bewilderedly, this hand has been kissed more in the last hour than in my entire life.

‘Josie!’ she called, luring her little sister out from the piano, ‘you may retire to the schoolroom now.’

Maitland may have been wild, but he wasn’t rude. As Josie reluctantly approached, he bowed. ‘Miss Josephine, you look particularly exquisite this evening,’ he said.

‘Cut rope!’ Josie snapped at him.

‘Josie!’ Tess cried, aghast.

‘Oh for goodness’ sake,’ Josie said. ‘It’s only Maitland.’ She rounded on him. ‘You can save your faradiddles for others. You should know that I’m not the person for that sort of foolish talk!’

Tess felt a reprimand coming to her lips, and then bit it back. Josie was obviously on the point of tears. She must have heard Lady Clarice’s comment about a cabbage diet, and Josie was extremely sensitive about her figure.

But before Tess could decide what to say, Maitland tucked Josie’s hand under his arm, and said, ‘Do you know, I’ve a question you may be able to answer. Perfection, my chestnut filly -’

‘I remember Perfection,’ Josie interrupted, a bit curtly. ‘She is a trifle long in the haunches.’

‘I don’t agree about her haunches,’ Maitland said with unimpaired good humour, beginning to walk Josie toward the door. ‘However, she seems to be suffering a bit of tenderness just behind the saddle.’

‘Have you tried Goulard’s lotion?’ Josie asked, her complete interest turning to Maitland. Their father had appointed Josie to make up ointments for the horses’ various ailments, and what had begun as an onerous task had become a true interest.

Tess had to admit that Maitland could be quite beguiling when he put his mind to it. Not that it was of the least consequence.

Still, there were moments in which she could see why Imogen loved him quite so passionately. He was pretty enough, with his cleft chin and rakish eyes. But he was not only horse-mad, he was gambling-mad. Everyone said that he couldn’t turn down a bet, not if it were for his last farthing. Maitland would eat in a ditch, were there the chance of a race afterward.

Just like Papa.

Five (#ulink_343a00e9-aaf2-598e-9832-6fdbfcdde925)

Supper

Tess found herself to the left of the duke, with Lady Clarice seated to his right. The long table glowed with dishes of a deep marroon, with gold bands around the edges. It was set with such an array of silverware that each plate looked as if it had a small shining fence laid on three sides. The silver caught the light of the candles and cast gleaming sparkles on people’s hands.

Suppers during Tess’s life had consisted of two courses at the very most and, in one of their papa’s dry spells, perhaps merely a thin slice of fowl. But on this occasion the courses came and went with bewildering speed. A tall footman with his hair caught back in a bag kept whisking away her plate before she had even tasted it and replacing it with another. And then, just after she would try the new dish, it would vanish. The footman had removed little pastries bulging with chicken and lobster before she finished one, then a turtle soup briefly appeared, and now they were all contemplating sweetbread pie.

The sparkling drink in their glasses was champagne. Tess had read about champagne but had never seen it before. The footman poured her a second glass. It was entirely delectable. It fizzled on her tongue and seemed to increase the pleasure of the moment immeasurably; Tess even found herself forgetting the fact that she and her sisters looked like so many black crows perched around the table.

‘Miss Essex,’ her guardian said, when Lady Clarice finally turned to the Earl of Mayne, ‘it is truly a pleasure to have you in my house.’

Tess smiled at him. The duke’s slight air of exhaustion made him quite appealing, and the way his hair fell over his eyes was a welcome contrast to the faultless elegance of his friend, the Earl of Mayne.

‘We are tremendously lucky to be here, Your Grace,’ she said, adding, ‘rather than in your nursery.’

‘Your claim to luck is generous, given that you father’s death has brought you to me.’

‘Yes,’ Tess said. ‘But Papa was bedridden for some time before he died, you know. I do believe that he is happier where he is. Papa would not have been content had he been unable to ride.’

‘I understand that Lord Brydone simply did not wake up, due to a head injury,’ the duke said.

‘He did wake several times,’ Tess explained. ‘But he was unable to move his limbs. That would not have been a happy circumstance for him.’

‘No, I can see that would have been difficult for one of his temperament. I have vivid memories of my first meeting with your father. He had a horse running at Newmarket, years ago. I was a mere stripling. His jockey was lamed in an earlier race so your father leaped onto the horse and rode it himself.’

‘I would guess that the horse didn’t win,’ Tess said, smiling at the image of it. That was just like Papa – both in the bravado and in the foolishness.

‘No. No, he was far too heavy to win. But he had a wonderful time, nonetheless, and the entire crowd was howling for his victory.’

‘Alas, Papa rarely won,’ Tess said recklessly, feeling as if the champagne had loosened her tongue a bit. ‘I feel — I feel quite ashamed that he asked you to be our guardian, a man who scarcely knew our family. It’s altogether too much to ask of you, Your Grace!’

But he was grinning at her. Really grinning! ‘As I told you earlier, it’s a pleasure. I no longer have family of my own other than my heir, a second cousin who’s more trouble than he’s worth.’ He looked around. ‘And I have no plans to marry. So this house and everything in it … no one is enjoying it except me. I much prefer it like this.’

Tess looked down the table at her sisters, trying to see it through his eyes. Annabel was sparkling, her eyes alight with the pure joy of flirting with the Earl of Mayne. Imogen was glowing with a more subtle happiness; her eyes drifting to Lord Maitland’s face, then jerking away. Tess only hoped that Lady Clarice didn’t notice.

‘This is what the dining room was presumably like when my parents were alive,’ the duke said. ‘I’m afraid that I’ve become something of a solitary man, without realising it. I must say, I am enormously pleased to find that my wards are of an age to converse, rather than simply reciting nursery rhymes.’