At Last Comes Love

5

MARGARET felt very embarrassed as she danced with the Marquess of Allingham. She would have felt self-conscious anyway under the circumstances – though fortunately he had no way of knowing what her expectations had been when she set out for the ball this evening.

But he had heard the Earl of Sheringford calling her /my love/, and though she had told herself that it was none of his business what anyone else called her, nevertheless the words seemed to hover in the air about them as they danced. It did not help that they danced in silence for the first ten minutes or so.

She smiled until her lips felt stiff.

Did he know who the Earl of Sheringford /was/?

But /of course/ he must know.

He was the one who spoke first. "Miss Huxtable," he said gravely, "forgive me if I am speaking out of turn now and forgive me if I did not speak when perhaps I ought. I /ought/ to have taken that fellow to task for the familiarity with which he addressed you, when I daresay you have never met him before this evening." /That fellow/? Yes, indeed he knew. "Lord Sheringford?" she said lightly. "Oh, I did not take offense, my lord. He was joking. I am relieved you did not take any more notice of his words than they merited." "But as your friend," he said after hesitating a few moments, "I feel that I ought to warn you to keep your distance from the Earl of Sheringford, Miss Huxtable. It would pain me to see your reputation tarnished by any connection with his. I daresay you do not know who he is or why he is justifiably shunned by all respectable people. I would wager he did not receive an invitation to the ball tonight but came quite brazenly without one. And I do not know who thought it appropriate to introduce you to him." "You are wrong about one thing," she said. "I /do/ know about him. I even remember the scandal, which was still quite fresh when I made my first appearance at a London Season five years ago, just after Stephen inherited his title. You must not concern yourself, my lord. I am quite capable of looking after myself and choosing my own acquaintances." Like the gentleman he was, he said no more on the subject, and Margaret thought that was surely the end of the matter – beyond having to deny admittance to Lord Sheringford if he did indeed put in an appearance at Merton House tomorrow, of course, and beyond having to tell Crispin the truth when she saw him next.

Oh, dear, she /had/ behaved foolishly this evening.

She was not proud of herself. She had always been the soul of propriety and discretion. She would remember this evening for a long time and with considerable discomfort. She turned hot and cold again when she remembered all that she had poured out to the Earl of Sheringford – all her most embarrassing and humiliating secrets. That was surely the worst thing she had done all evening.

Whatever had possessed her!

Vanessa and Katherine were both waiting for her when the marquess returned her to their sides. Elliott and Jasper were conversing with a group of gentlemen nearby. "Meg." Vanessa linked an arm firmly and possessively through hers. "I was never more happy in my life than to see you dancing with the Marquess of Allingham. Whoever presented you to the Earl of Sheringford?

If it was Lady Tindell, she really ought to have known better and I will not scruple to tell her so. The earl is absolutely beyond the pale." "He even /looks/ disreputable," Katherine added. "And downright dangerous. Meg, do you know that – " "Yes," Margaret said, interrupting. "I /do/ know that he eloped with his bride's sister-in-law five years ago. I cannot see that that makes him an utter pariah today. Perhaps people ought to be entitled to a second chance." "That is true," Vanessa said, patting her hand. "It is very true, indeed. I daresay he is a very sad and contrite gentleman. She died recently, I have heard – the lady with whom he eloped, I mean, though he never married her. Her husband would not divorce her. It is just like you to refuse to give him the cut direct, Meg, though it was a little alarming to watch him lead you off the dance floor in the middle of a set in order to sit with you in that alcove." "Which is in full public view," Margaret pointed out. "I was in no danger whatsoever of being kidnapped or otherwise assaulted." "True." Vanessa laughed. "But I had visions of him whispering all sorts of improper suggestions in your ear. I might have stridden over there to rescue you myself, but Kate was dancing at the time and could not accompany me, and Elliott thought it unnecessary to risk making a public scene, since he trusts your good sense. Crispin went to see if you needed rescuing, though. I was glad of that even though I know you are not entirely delighted that he is in London." And a mistaken sense of pride had goaded her into introducing the Earl of Sheringford to him as her betrothed. The enormity of what she had done swept over Margaret again. Thank /heaven/ she had at least sworn Crispin to secrecy – or as good as sworn him, anyway. She had told him the betrothal had not yet been publicly announced. She must find him without further delay and tell him the truth. But he had asked to dance with her later, had he not? She would tell him then, humiliating as it would be.

And there – finally – would be an end of the matter.

It was already too late, though.

Stephen was striding toward them across the ballroom, looking uncharacteristically grim, his eyes fixed upon Margaret. "Stephen," Katherine said as he came up to them. "Whatever is the matter?" He spoke directly to Margaret. "Meg," he said, "I do not know who on earth introduced you to that fellow. Whoever it was deserves to be shot. But that is the least of our worries. The most ridiculous rumor is spreading and we are going to have to move quickly to quash it. It is being said that you and Sheringford are /betrothed/." "Oh, Stephen, no!" Vanessa exclaimed. "But how very ridiculous!" Katherine said, laughing. "No one will take it seriously, Stephen." Margaret stared at him, speechless.

Elliott and Jasper must have heard what Stephen had said. They both turned away from their group. "I'll draw his cork for this," Elliott said. "What does he think he is up to?" "It would be more to the point," Jasper said, "to draw the cork of the joker who began the story. It was hardly Sherry himself, as he left the ball half an hour ago. Do you know who /did/, Stephen?" It was Margaret who answered him. "I fear it must have been Crispin Dew," she said, and not for the first time that evening she felt on the verge of fainting.

There was that quite unmistakable buzz in the ballroom that always accompanied the spreading of the newest salacious rumor. And a quick glance about the room confirmed Margaret in her fear that it was indeed she who was the subject of that rumor. Far too many eyes were turned in the direction of her group to be normal. /"Dew/?" Stephen's voice was like thunder. "Why the devil would he start any such rumor?" He did not even apologize for his language – and no one in the group thought to demand an apology. "I fear it was something I said," Margaret said. But that was clearly not explanation enough. She drew a deep, somewhat ragged breath. "I introduced the Earl of Sheringford to him as my betrothed." "You /what/?" Elliott asked very quietly.

The others stared at her as if she had suddenly sprouted a second head. "I also told him no one else knew yet," she said. "It was a /joke/. It was … Well, it was something I said impulsively and would have corrected later when I dance with him." To say she felt foolish – as well as a number of other uncomfortable things – would be a massive understatement.

The buzz of excited conversation about them had not abated. "But what," Katherine asked, "did Lord /Sheringford/ have to say about such an extraordinary announcement, Meg?" Margaret licked lips that were suddenly dry. "It was he who suggested it," she said. "And he wants to make it real. He wants to marry me. But it is really all nonsense and best forgotten." This whole evening seemed like a ghastly nightmare. She would be fortunate if they did not haul her off to Bedlam before the night was out. "Which may be easier said than done," Jasper said, bowing to her and extending a hand for hers. "You are attracting a great deal of attention, Meg, especially as Sherry has absconded and cannot take his half share. Come and dance with me again. And smile. Katherine and I will escort you home afterward, and the others may remain to dispel the rumors as best they can." Margaret set her hand in his. "This is so very ridiculous," she said. "Most gossip is," he said. "It can also be very tenacious." "Where is Dew?" Stephen asked grimly, looking around the room. "I'll break his damned neck for him." "Tomorrow will be time enough for that," Elliott said. "We do not need you confronting him here to add to the general delight, Stephen. Dance with Vanessa, if you will. And do watch your language in the presence of my wife and sisters-in-law. Katherine, may I have the pleasure?" And Margaret danced with Jasper for a second time and smiled at the light, amusing banter he kept up throughout. It was truly awful to be the main focus of attention in the room, especially when she knew she had brought it on herself.

But how /could/ Crispin have done this to her? She had never known him to be openly spiteful.

She was going to have to wait out the gossip with all the patience she could muster, she decided later as she rode home beside Katherine in Jasper's carriage. It ought not to take too long once the /ton/ realized there was no basis to the rumor. And then she was going to settle back to her old respectable life even if it meant being a spinster and Stephen's dependent for as long as she lived.

Margaret went to bed that night before Stephen returned home. She even managed to sleep fitfully between spells of agonized wakefulness in which she remembered every secret she had poured out to that black-eyed, grim-faced stranger who had once abandoned his bride and eloped with a married lady and lived in sin with her until her death. And there were the wakeful spells in which she remembered introducing him to Crispin as her betrothed.

And Crispin had gone and told the whole world!

She even slept later than usual in the morning. Stephen was up before her. He had already breakfasted and left the house, the butler informed her when she asked.

He had left his place at the breakfast table untidy. The dishes had been cleared away, but the morning paper had been left open and bunched in a heap beside where his plate had been. Margaret went to fold it up neatly but first let her eyes rove over the topmost page. It was the one always devoted to society gossip.

And there was her own name, leaping off the page at her as if it had legs and wings.

She bent closer to read, her eyes widening in horror.

Miss Margaret Huxtable, the journalist had written, eldest sister of the Earl of Merton, had been seen sitting in scandalous seclusion in a remote alcove of Lady Tindell's ballroom the previous evening tГЄte-Г -tГЄte with that very notorious jilt and wife-stealer, the Earl of Sheringford, whom the writer had reported seeing skulking about town a few days ago. And when confronted by a friend, who had approached in order to rescue her from scandal or even worse harm, Miss Huxtable had boldly presented the earl as her /betrothed/. The beau monde might well be asking itself if the lady was quite as respectable as she had always appeared to be. The reporter might humbly remind his readers of what had befallen her younger sister two years ago… Margaret did not read any further. She closed the paper with trembling hands, as if she could thereby obliterate what it said. A bad dream had just turned into the worst of nightmares.

She sat down shivering and remembering how the spreading of vicious and almost entirely untrue gossip had forced Kate into marrying Jasper two years ago.

History was not about to repeat itself with her, was it?

Oh, surely not! Such catastrophes did not happen twice within the same family.

Whatever was she going to /do/?

Duncan very much doubted that Miss Margaret Huxtable was a gossip – especially at her own expense and on the topic of her meeting with him. It must have been the military officer with the peculiar wet-sounding name and the red hair, then.

For gossip there was.

It was his mother who alerted him. She actually appeared at breakfast the morning after the Tindell ball, albeit well after Sir Graham had left for his club and just as Duncan himself was about to rise from the table. He knew she had been at the ball, though he had not been there long enough himself to see her. "Duncan," she said as she swept into the breakfast parlor, still clad in a dressing gown of a pale blue diaphanous material that billowed and wafted about her, though her hair had been immaculately styled and he suspected that her cheeks were rouged, "you are up already. I scarcely slept a wink all night. I feel quite haggard. But you were not in your room when we arrived home last night, you provoking man, and so there was no talking with you then. I did not hear you come home. It must have been at some unearthly hour. /Do/ tell me if it is true. Can it /possibly/ be? /Are/ you betrothed to the Earl of Merton's eldest sister? Without a word to your own mother? It would be a splendid match for you, my love. Your grandfather will be quite reconciled to you if it /is/ true. And that will be a very good thing as Graham has been grumbling and complaining, the silly man, that you will be living under his roof for the rest of our lives. Not that he does not love you in his own way, but … But speak up, do, Duncan, instead of sitting there silently as though there were nothing to tell. /Are/ you betrothed?" "In one word, Mama," he said, hiding his surprise and signaling the butler to fill his coffee cup again, "no. Not yet, anyway, and perhaps never. I danced with the lady once last evening, that is all." "That is /not/ all," his mother protested. "Miss Huxtable presented you to someone – I cannot for the life of me remember who – as her betrothed.

Prue Talbot told me, and she never spreads stories unless they are accurate. Besides, /everyone/ was saying so." "Then, Mama," he said, getting to his feet after taking one sip of the fresh coffee, "you had no need to ask me, did you? You will excuse me? I ought to have been at Jackson's Boxing Salon twenty minutes ago." "It is /not/ true, then?" she asked, looking crestfallen. "Miss Huxtable was provoked into saying what she did," he said, "at my suggestion. I will be calling on her later today to discuss the matter." She looked befuddled but hopeful as she gazed at him and ignored the food on the plate before her. "But when did you /meet/ her, Duncan?" she asked. "That is what has been puzzling me all night, and I daresay it is puzzling Graham too, as he could suggest no answer when I asked him that very question. He would only grunt in that odious way of his. You have been in town only a few days. Now that I think of it, I do not believe Miss Huxtable has been here much longer. I do not remember seeing her before last evening, though I have seen her sisters everywhere and that very handsome brother of hers. Oh, /now/ I see! You met elsewhere and arranged to meet again here. You – " He took her hand in his and raised it to his lips. "Keep all this to yourself for a while, will you, Mama?" he asked.

Though it was surely a pointless thing to ask, if the ballroom had been buzzing with the rumor last evening after he left. "But of course," she said. "You know that I am the soul of discretion, Duncan. I shall tell Graham what you have told me, of course, but we hold no secrets from each other." He went off to Jackson's. The first man he encountered there was Constantine Huxtable, and his initial suspicion that Con had been waiting there for him was soon confirmed. "Come and spar with me, Sherry," he said, but it was more an ultimatum than an affable invitation. "It will be my pleasure," Duncan said. "You look as if you are ready to punch my head in, though. Which, I must confess, is preferable to sparring with one of those fellows who like to prance about striking poses that they think make them look manly." Con did not laugh or even grin. He went on looking grim and a little white about the mouth.

Con was Merton's cousin, Duncan remembered suddenly. He was Constantine /Huxtable/. One would not expect there to be much love lost between the two branches of the family, though, since Con had been the eldest son of the late earl and ought by rights to have inherited the title himself.

But there was that asinine law to the effect that a man – or woman – was forever illegitimate if born out of wedlock, even if his mother and father later married. A couple of days or so later in Con's case. And so when the old earl had died, it was Con's sickly young brother who had inherited and then – after /his/ death – a second or third cousin. The present Merton.

Miss Margaret Huxtable's brother, in fact.

Now, why should Con care about Margaret Huxtable?

He apparently did, though.

He spoke again after they had stripped down to the waist and were in the ring, circling each other warily and taking preliminary jabs, testing the land, watching for weaknesses, looking for openings. "I cannot believe, Sherry," he said, "that you can be serious in your intention to marry Margaret. Why did you allow that story to spread last evening?" Duncan saw a clear path to his opponent's chin and headed through it with a right jab. But Con neatly deflected the blow and buried one of his own in Duncan's unprotected stomach.

It hurt like the devil, and for a moment Duncan was winded. He would not show it, though. He was a little ashamed at finding himself so out of practice, if the truth were told. He hooked his left arm wide and dealt Con a blow to the side of his head.

Con winced. "One does not either permit a story to spread or stop it from doing so once it has started," Duncan said. "Stories quickly develop a life of their own when there are people to begin them and people to believe them. This particular story did not even start up until after I had left the ball." They concentrated upon throwing punches at each other for several minutes. It became quickly obvious to Duncan that it was no friendly bout. "You are saying, then, that the story is untrue?" Con asked somewhat later, when the ferocity of their attack had abated and they were catching their breath before going back at it. "That I am betrothed to Miss Huxtable?" Duncan said. "Yes, it is. That she introduced me to a popinjay in a scarlet coat as her betrothed? No, it is not. That I offered her marriage? No, it is not. I was not there to hear the details of the story myself and so am not sure what it is exactly I am being called upon to confirm or deny." He spotted that same path to Con's chin again – there was a definite weakness in his defenses there – and this time he successfully planted a right upper cut, snapping Con's head back. But, as before, he had left his own defenses weak, and Con buried a fist in his midriff again.

Duncan received it with a woof of expelled air and stepped in closer with both fists flying. Two fists flew back at him with equal ferocity.

They pummeled each other for several more minutes without talking, until they were both sore and breathless and sweating and the strength was going from their arms. Eventually they backed off by unspoken assent, neither of them having succeeded in putting the other down. "I like you, Sherry," Con said, reaching for his towel. "I always did.

It did not bother me that you ran off with Mrs. Turner instead of marrying /Miss/ Turner. A fellow's business is his own, and I assumed that you had your reasons for doing what you did. But this time your business is mine too." Duncan flexed his knuckles, though not with any intention of renewing their fight. They were looking red and even raw. "Miss Huxtable is your business?" he asked. "She is when someone is about to hurt her," Con said, "even if only her reputation. She has had a raw deal of a life, Sherry, as women all too often do. She was not quite eighteen when she promised her father on his deathbed that she would make a home for her brother and sisters until they were all grown up and settled in life. That was long before my own father and then Jon died and her brother inherited the title. They were poor. But she kept her promise anyway. Merton reached his majority and the youngest sister married just two years ago. She is free of the obligation, but she is no longer young. She has probably realized that if she does not marry soon she will have the unenviable life of a spinster for the rest of her days, and be rewarded for all she has done for her family by being eternally dependent upon them. I can see that she would be an easy prey to such as you." He spoke heatedly despite the fact that he was still half out of breath. "Such as me?" Duncan raised his eyebrows. "Mrs. Turner is dead," Con said. "So is your father, Sherry, and your grandfather is an old man. You have come to town, I presume, in order to choose a bride." "And if I have chosen Miss Huxtable," Duncan said, wrapping his towel about his shoulders and wiping his face with it, "it must be because I intend to /hurt/ her?" "Your notoriety itself will hurt her," Con said. "Leave her alone, Sherry. Choose someone less vulnerable." "But if the story of how she presented me to Frost – or was it Fog or Dew? /Dew/! That was it. If the story has spread, Con, and obviously it has," Duncan said, "will I not hurt her quite irreparably by withdrawing my offer now?" Con gazed stormily at him. "Damn you, Sherry." He scrubbed at his face and arms and chest with his towel and stalked off to retrieve his clothes. "Why did you have to choose Margaret of all people? If you marry her and hurt so much as a hair on her head, you will have me to answer to. /This/ was nothing." He jerked his head back in the direction of the ring. "This was mere sparring." "Are you going to White's by any chance?" Duncan asked. "If you are, I will walk with you." But going to White's brought him face-to-face with the Duke of Moreland, who had still been just Viscount Lyngate when Duncan had last frequented town. "Moreland." Duncan nodded affably to him and the blond young man who was with him, and would have proceeded on his way to the reading room to look at the morning papers if the duke had not stood quite deliberately in his way. "Sheringford," he said, frowning ferociously "I will have a word with you. My wife, if you did not know it, was the former Mrs. Hedley Dew and before that Miss Vanessa Huxtable. This is the Earl of Merton." Ah. So Moreland had a connection with both the Dews and the Huxtables, did he? Duncan sighed inwardly. He had not realized that.

Merton inclined his head and looked grim. He was a handsome lad and a slender one, but Duncan's practiced eye registered the fact that it would be a mistake to assume that he was therefore a weakling. That youthful physique looked very well honed indeed, and the face had character. "Ah, Merton, well met," Duncan said. "You are just the man I would have been seeking out later today." He had not thought of doing so until this very moment actually. It was a while since he had made any formal marriage offer. But though Margaret Huxtable must be several years older than this brother she had brought up almost single-handed, it was surely the decent thing to do to meet formally with him to discuss marriage settlements and all the other business surrounding an impending marriage offer. "Later today is a little /too/ late, is it not," Merton asked him curtly, "when the question has already been asked and answered and word spread among half the /ton/? And announced in the morning paper?" "Announced in the paper?" Duncan asked in astonishment. "More or less," Merton said. "On the gossip page, anyway." Extraordinary. And it /must/ have been the military officer with the weak chin. No one else could have seen him and Miss Huxtable talking with each other and thought of spreading the rumor that they were /betrothed/. Duncan would not mind having a word or two with Major Dew.

How was Miss Huxtable holding up this morning? he wondered. Were circumstances playing into his hands and almost forcing her into accepting him? If the /ton/ believed that she was betrothed to him – and clearly it did, or /would/ once it had read the papers this morning – she would cause herself some embarrassment if she cried off. On the other hand, marrying him was going to bring her scandal. He was not the /ton/'s favorite son.

Miss Margaret Huxtable, it seemed, had trapped herself somewhere between the devil and the deep blue sea. "I would have said no a thousand times over," Merton said while Moreland loomed, silent and menacing, "if you had done all this properly and spoken with me privately first. I would /still/ say no if the answer were mine to give. Unfortunately, Meg is not subject to my will. She is her own person and can answer for herself. I do not like you, Sheringford." Duncan raised his eyebrows. "As far as I remember," he said, "we met for the first time a few moments ago, Merton. You form impressions with great haste." "I do not like men," Merton said, "who abandon their brides to private heartache and public scorn and run off with lawfully married ladies instead. I do not like such men at all especially when they are contemplating marriage to one of my sisters. And I do not need any prolonged acquaintance to form such an opinion." Duncan inclined his head. "We are beginning to attract attention," Moreland said.

The hall was large enough and wide enough that they were in no danger of blocking the progress of other gentlemen as they arrived or left. But heads were indeed turning their way – and no wonder if the Tindell ballroom had been as abuzz with gossip as Duncan imagined it must have been – and if the gossip writer had made as juicy a morsel of the story as gossip writers usually did. And now here was he, the notorious Lord Sheringford, in company with Miss Huxtable's brother and brother-in-law, all of them looking as solemn as if they were attending a funeral. Yes, of course they were attracting attention. "I promised Miss Huxtable last evening," Duncan said, "that I would call upon her at Merton House this afternoon. If I may, Merton, I will speak with you there first." Merton nodded stiffly, and Duncan bowed to the two gentlemen and went on his way.

He would have left White's without having gone farther than the reception hall, but sheer pride prevented him from crawling away now.

Besides, he wanted to read what had been written about him in the papers. He proceeded upstairs, where he was greeted by a number of gentlemen. Indeed some of the greetings were jovial and even raucous and accompanied by much back-slapping. Among a certain crowd, it seemed, he had established himself as one devil of a fine fellow.

And then he read the description of himself as a jilt and a wife-stealer.

Both perfectly true.

And he read that he had been presented to the friend who had come to the rescue of Miss Huxtable as her betrothed.

It was indeed Dew who had betrayed her, then. /Again/.

Duncan would definitely want a word with that particular military officer.

There was, he learned before leaving the club after an early luncheon, a wager written into the betting book on whether or not he would abandon /this/ bride at the altar. The odds were heavily in favor of his doing so.

And this afternoon he would be making Miss Margaret Huxtable a formal marriage offer, which she might well feel compelled to accept now. He would be left with thirteen days in which to present her to his grandfather and arrange a wedding by special license.

His freedom was going to be bought – /if/ she accepted him, that was – at a high price.

Though freedom was not the issue, was it?

Toby was.