The Scandals Of An Innocent

CHAPTER EIGHT

SHE HAD GOT TOO CLOSE with her artless questions and her damnable persistence. Miles stood by the conservatory window and stared out into the darkened gardens, ignoring the cold that was starting to eat into his bones. Alice Lister was too perceptive, and worse, she was too stubborn to back down. There had been a moment when she had challenged him about his feelings for his little brother when he had felt the same uncontrollable bite of anger that had driven him from his family all those years ago. Anger was as unproductive an emotion as guilt or resentment or love, as far as Miles was concerned. It led to poor judgment and rash decisions. It led to a loss of control. It could hurt too much. And he, renowned for his cool head and lack of sentiment, was the last person on earth who wanted to feel that intensity of emotion for anything or anyone.

He knew that Alice had been shocked by his heartlessness. He had heard it in her voice. She had tried to make him admit that he cared. He felt cynically amused that she was trying to persuade herself that he had some softer feelings when he did not. She had sought the truth from him and then she had not liked what she had found.

Too bad.

Little Miss Lister had to learn that honesty could sometimes be diabolically uncomfortable to confront.

Total honesty. To his surprise he had not lied once that evening, neither to Alice nor to anyone else. He had thought that he might bend the truth sufficiently to allow him to feel comfortable but not enough that Alice would guess he was compromising. Instead he had been blisteringly candid. At times it had been a painful experience but he thought that he might actually be getting a taste for it.

Strange.

It was a disconcerting discovery. Unwelcome, too.

The winter wind skittered across the dark gardens, bringing on its edge a stinging sleet that it threw against the glass, and Miles shivered, seeking out the warmth of the lighted ballroom. He deliberately did not look for Alice even though he felt an almost irresistible urge to rejoin her. The impulse troubled him and he found it inordinately difficult to dismiss it.

He propped himself against a conveniently placed statue of Apollo, which he assumed was intended to add an air of classical culture to the Granby’s provincial ballroom. He was amused to see that from the waist down Apollo was swathed in a robe, presumably to preserve his modesty and the sensibilities of the Fortune’s Folly matrons.

Across the polished expanse of the ballroom floor Miles could see his sister dancing for a fourth, scandalous time with Frank Gaines whilst the Dowager Lady Vickery watched from the chaperones’ corner, her face expressing disapproval tinged with resignation. Miles smothered a grin. He wondered which his mother would consider the lesser of two evils: having a spinster daughter so firmly on the shelf she had taken root, or accepting a lawyer as a potential son-in-law. She had already demonstrated her social prejudices once that evening when she had been introduced to Alice. Not, Miles suspected, that her mother’s opinion-or indeed anyone else’s-would count for a fig with Celia if she decided she wanted Frank Gaines. And the dowager herself was not without admirers further down the social order. Mr. Pullen, the magistrate, had come over to ask her to join him in an old-fashioned country dance, and after a rather startled response the dowager had agreed.

Lizzie Scarlet caught Miles’s eye as she twirled ostentatiously down the set on Lowell Lister’s arm. She was flaunting herself under Nat Waterhouse’s nose, laughing and chattering animatedly, and Miles knew that Nat was noticing, even as he bent in ever more assiduous attendance on Miss Minchin and her parents. The Waterhouse and Minchin match had been formally announced that morning in both the Morning Post and locally in the Leeds Intelligencer. This, Miles thought, was Lizzie’s response. She was completely eclipsing poor little Flora, who looked like a country mouse in her fussy debutante gown compared to Lizzie, dazzling in turquoise, her flaming red hair held in a diamond clasp.

Miles finally allowed his gaze to move on to Alice. She was not dancing. She was sitting on a rout chair next to Mrs. Lister and, Miles noticed, with a sudden, odd contraction of the heart, she was being quite blatantly ignored. Clearly it took more than Lady Vickery’s brief patronage to bring Alice and her mother into style. Miles could see a group of young sprigs of fashion nearby who fancied themselves London dandies. They had their backs turned to Alice, pointedly excluding her, taking their cue from the haughty matrons who had moved their own chairs a little aside as though to emphasize the gap between the Listers and the rest of polite society. Even as Miles watched he saw one of the ladies pass Mrs. Lister on her way to the refreshment room and draw her skirts aside, as though even to be near her would taint her. It was pointed and discourteous, and Mrs. Lister blushed with mortification until she was almost as dark as her puce gown.

Alice had her chin up and was watching the dance and there was no indication on her face that she found people’s attitudes embarrassing, but Miles thought that she must care. Most people would, to be so obviously and so rudely ignored, and Alice had already shown how sensitive she was to the feelings of others. She could scarcely be insensitive to snubs to herself.

Miles frowned, remembering that Alice had been inundated with dancing partners when he had first met her the previous autumn in Fortune’s Folly. But of course that had been before she had rejected nineteen offers of marriage. Now that most of the fortune hunters had left for the winter, no one else had any interest in her, and she was left high and dry. Nothing could have made it more obvious that Alice had only been tolerated in Yorkshire society because of her money.

He saw Faye, Duchess of Cole, smiling contentedly as she observed the social isolation that Mrs. Lister and her daughter were enduring. She was gossiping to her cronies and whispering behind her fan. And then Miles saw Sir James Wheeler’s son George laugh immoderately at some joke his friend was making and in the process spill the remainder of his wine all over Alice’s silk skirts. The liquid splashed in bright red pools on the pale pink gown. Mrs. Lister gave a little cry of distress and George Wheeler glanced around and said loudly, “Send for a servant to mop it up, ma’am. Oh, no need-there is one here already.” Then he and his friends burst into more gales of amusement. It was true that one of the Granby waiters was already kneeling at Alice’s feet and wiping the spillage up with his white napkin, but Miles thought that that was not really what George Wheeler had been meaning. He suspected that Alice had taken the point, too, for she shifted a little on her chair, and then turned her face away as though seeking some protection from the malicious words and the spiteful stares. And then, as though that were not bad enough, the Duke of Cole’s affected drawl rose disastrously over the ballroom chatter.

“Fetching little piece, ain’t she? I’ll find a place for her if she’s ever looking to go back into service. In fact she could service me whenever she liked, what!”

Someone tittered sycophantically, and emotion kicked Miles hard and unexpectedly in the gut, a mixture of anger and something feral, deeper and more disturbing. He felt a violent urge to go up to Henry Cole and strangle him with his own neck cloth, or to challenge him to a duel or invite him to meet his maker in any imaginative way he chose. The impulse was so strong that Miles found he had already started across the floor before he had himself back under control and reminded himself that Alice’s injured feelings were nothing to him. He might want her in his bed, which was no more than lust, and want her money in his bank, which was desperation, but that was all there was between them. And since Alice had refused a public announcement of their betrothal, he did not even have to defend her good name out of family pride.

Even so, it seemed extraordinarily difficult to leave her unprotected, her reputation bandied about by any ill-bred scoundrel who chose to insult her.

He dismissed his scruples and strolled over to the door where he stood aside with a cynical smile as Nat Waterhouse ushered Miss Minchin and her parents from the ballroom with the immaculate courtesy of the attentive suitor. It was only when the Minchins had vanished through the door that he saw Nat give a shrug as though he was sloughing off an unwanted responsibility. As his friend moved toward the refreshment room Miles stepped forward.

“Perfect son-in-law material,” he drawled. “Attentive, deferential, courteous-and titled, of course.”

“Well,” Nat said, “she is rich and amiable-”

“And witless.”

Nat frowned. “Would you want to marry an intelligent woman, Miles?”

Miles glanced toward the ballroom again. Alice was talking to Lowell and Lizzie Scarlet now. He felt a sense of relief that she and her brother were back on speaking terms and a stronger one that Lowell had missed Henry Cole’s remarks. Had he heard, there would probably have been a brawl in the ballroom by now.

Alice was smiling at something her brother had said, and the curve of her lips sent another kick of something hot and strong through Miles’s gut. Devil take it, he wanted her very much. Three months was an impossibly long time to wait.

He cleared his throat. “Yes, I would want an intelligent wife,” he said. “I would not spend a great deal of time in her company, but on those occasions when we were thrown together I would rather not be bored senseless.”

Nat laughed. “This was precisely why I did not tell you sooner about my betrothal. I knew what you would say.”

“And what was that-congratulations?”

“Hardly. Something more along the lines of once the wedding is over and the fortune secured, I will have to live with her for the rest of my life.”

Miles shook his head. “You will be living with her money for the rest of your life. That is the material point. You must have me confused with Dexter, old chap. He is the one who is always extolling the virtues of love.”

“And yet,” Nat said, “Dexter told me once that you were the one who counseled him against marrying Laura unless he loved her with all his heart. Your words, not mine.”

Miles pulled a face. “I must have been suffering from a fever.” He sighed. “Laura wanted true love and I thought that she deserved the best after tolerating Charles for so many years. That is all there was to it.” He clapped Nat on the shoulder. “Come and have a drink with me in the taproom. You look as though you could do with it and all this talk of love is making me feel the need for brandy.”

“Your own suit does not prosper, then?” Nat asked as they turned in through the door and headed down the stone-flagged corridor away from the gentrified elegance of the ballroom.

“In part it does,” Miles said. “Miss Lister has agreed to marry me. That is the good part.”

Nat stared at him. “How did you pull that off?”

“I blackmailed her into it,” Miles said calmly. He saw the look on his friend’s face and nodded. “Yes, I really did.”

“Hell and the devil.” Nat looked torn between amusement and severe reproof. “First you make a wager to seduce Miss Lister into marriage, then you jilt her for a richer prize and then you blackmail her. You are riding for a huge fall, my friend.”

They went into the smoky taproom and took two chairs by the fire. The landlord, working from long experience, came over at once with a bottle of brandy and two glasses.

“I won’t inquire as to the terms of your bargain with Miss Lister,” Nat said as they sat down. “I’d rather not know. But-” he shook his head “-I hope you know what you are doing, Miles.”

“Got it all worked out perfectly, old chap,” Miles said cheerfully.

“So if that is the good part,” Nat prompted, “what could possibly be the bad?”

“The bad part,” Miles said, raising his glass in a toast, “is that the terms of Miss Lister’s inheritance are not without condition, and she will not allow me to announce the betrothal formally until I have fulfilled them.” He swallowed a mouthful of brandy, relishing the fiery taste. “That mad old trout Lady Membury decreed that Miss Lister’s future husband had to prove his worth by behaving honorably for a period of three months and telling nothing but the truth-” He stopped as Nat smothered a snort of laughter in his brandy glass.

“Sorry, old fellow,” Nat drawled, failing utterly to wipe the smile from his face, “but I thought you said you were obliged always to tell the truth!”

“I did say that.” Miles gave his friend a baleful look.

“But surely you fell at the first hurdle?” Nat inquired.

“Your faith in my ability to be honest is so touching,” Miles said. “I have not failed…yet.”

Nat rubbed a hand over his hair. “My God, I hope Miss Lister doesn’t ask you about your mistresses and expect an honest answer! Did you tell her that there are very good reasons-”

“Why a man does not tell the truth all the time? Of course I did.” Miles took another drink. “What can I do? If I break the terms of Lady Membury’s will I forfeit the right to marry Miss Lister, blackmail or no blackmail.”

Nat raised his glass in ironic toast. “Then there is no more to be said, old fellow, other than to wish you luck and to hope profoundly that you can, against all the odds, behave with honor for the next few months.” He shook his head. “All the same,” he added, “something is going to go awry. I feel it in my bones.”

“You’re turning as superstitious as my mother,” Miles said. He shifted in his chair. Suddenly he was conscious of a feeling of discomfort prickling between his shoulder blades. He dismissed it, draining his glass and reaching for the brandy bottle again. “What could possibly go wrong?” he said.

LYDIA COLE HAD RECEIVED a letter. It had been delivered by hand late the previous night and it had only been by the remotest chance that she had seen it poking from beneath the mat when she had crept downstairs to heat some milk in an attempt to soothe herself into sleep. She had taken it up to her room and opened it, her hands shaking as she unfolded the paper. When she saw the name at the bottom of the page she trembled so much that the letter fell to the floor.

After a sleepless night and hours of reflection the following day, Lydia had decided to respond to the plea in the letter. She knew she was a fool to do so. She was not even sure what prompted her to go-curiosity, anger or even love. She waited until Alice and Lizzie and Mrs. Lister had gone out to the ball, and the servants were enjoying a quiet evening tucked up in the warm, and then she slipped like a wraith from the garden door of the house and crept out to the stables. There was a light in the window of the little mews house where the coachman lived with his family, but the groom’s lodging was in darkness. Lydia suspected that he was probably spending his evening off-and his wages-at the Morris Clown Inn.

It was a cold, damp night, no evening for a young, pregnant girl to be loitering in the dark. Yet Lydia, who had spent so much of the previous few months indoors, turned her face up to the cold, sleety caress of the breeze and felt a spark of life rekindle inside her.

She had her hand on the latch of an empty storeroom at the end of the cobbled row when someone stepped from the darkness in front of her and put a gentle hand on her arm. Although she was expecting him, her nerves were stretched so tense she almost screamed. His hand tightened warningly on her elbow and then he had drawn her through the door of the storeroom and bolted it behind them, and in the dim lantern light within, Lydia turned to look at the man who had been her lover.

He looked different. Gone was the dark, devil-may-care Tom Fortune, the adventurer with a twinkle in his eyes and charm enough to burn. She barely recognized the man who stood before her now. His face was thinner. There were deep lines about his eyes. He looked older and harder. It made Lydia realize, with a sudden pang, just how little she knew him. She had been a naive girl who had tumbled into love with a man she had never known at all. Cocooned in the marvelous sensation of being in love, swept away by the discovery of physical passion, she had never questioned Tom’s love for her or his commitment to her, and she had paid the price of that misplaced trust in the child she bore now.

He made no move toward her, but stood still just within the door, looking at her with a kind of desperation in his eyes. “I was not sure if you would come,” he said. He sounded young and anxious. “I was afraid to contact you, but there was no one else who could help me.”

“I am not sure that I can do that,” Lydia said. Her voice was cold and hard.

There was no one else who could help me… That, she thought, the taste of bitterness in her mouth, was exactly like Tom Fortune. He thought only of himself.

“I only came here because I found that I wanted to see you again,” she added. “To see the sort of man you really are rather than the man I once imagined you to be.”

Tom flinched. “You’ve changed.” His voice fell. “Of course you have. How could you not, with what has happened to you? I am sorry-”

“For what?” Lydia said, still in the same cold voice. “For seducing me for nothing other than sport, like the rake you were, or for running off and leaving me alone and pregnant?” She turned away from him. “Or did you mean that you are sorry you are a murderer twice over and a wanted criminal-” Despite herself, her voice cracked with emotion and she stopped to draw a steadying breath. The pain felt as though it was locked into a tight little box inside her chest. She tried to breathe deeply and to make it melt away, but it was too powerful to be dismissed. The sharp edges of her grief stabbed her, stealing her breath. Suddenly she knew she had to get away from him. This was more difficult and heartbreaking than she had imagined.

“I won’t tell anyone that I have seen you,” she said, “but I cannot help you, Tom.” She shook her head. “That was all you wanted from me, wasn’t it?” she said. The tears clogged her throat. “I came here, pregnant with your child, to see if you had ever cared a rush for me, and I find that all you want is my help. You never think of anyone but yourself.”

She had turned to leave when he put a hand on her arm, and such was her need to believe that he cared, even a little, that she stopped.

“I do care,” he said. His voice was harsh. “Lyddy, I swear I care for you. I want you to marry me.”

Lydia almost laughed aloud. “It’s too late,” she began, but he hushed her, drawing her down to sit beside him on the rough stone floor of the storeroom. He had spread his ragged coat on the stone, but it could not ward off the chill, and even with her thick cloak wrapped about her, Lydia was frozen. Five months ago, she thought, had we met like this, there would have been no words and Tom would have been making love to me by now. There had never been many words between them.

“Listen,” Tom said roughly. “Please.” When she remained silent he seemed surprised, almost as though he could not find the words, now that she had granted him the time he had begged for.

“It is true that I seduced you for sport last year,” Tom said, and Lydia could not quite prevent the tiny shudder that went through her at his words. Even now she had hoped in a corner of her mind that it had not been true. “I was bored and spoiled and a scoundrel,” Tom said, “and you were pretty and gentle and you loved me. It flattered me to realize that you cared for me. It made me feel good. I am sorry if it hurts you to hear me say this, but I have to tell you the truth now-all of it.” He paused and took her cold hands in his. “I am more sorry than I can say, now, that I was so careless and thoughtless and hurtful that I took your trust and I twisted and ruined it.”

Lydia said nothing. She felt cold through and through. She could not tell him that it did not matter because it did. It mattered dreadfully.

“It was the same boredom and immaturity that led me to work for Warren Sampson,” Tom continued. “I wanted excitement in my life, fool that I was. He paid for my gambling and in return I fed him information. Sometimes I rode out with his men when they were about his illegal business. But I never hurt anyone. I certainly never killed anyone! That magistrate whom I was supposed to have murdered on Sampson’s behalf…”

“Sir William Crosby,” Lydia said. “You had his ring. You gave it to me as a love token. A secondhand ring taken from a dead man!”

“That was shabby of me,” Tom said, “but I swear I did not know it was Crosby’s. Sampson gave it to me. He threw it to me carelessly one day and I thought it was pretty and that you might like it.”

“I did,” Lydia said, “because you had given it to me, and I thought it meant that you loved me.”

There was a silence. The wind was rising, catching the edges of the roof and whistling through the gaps in the bricks. Lydia shivered. “Are you staying here?” she asked.

“No,” Tom said. “I stay nowhere very long. It’s too dangerous.”

“You should go to the authorities,” Lydia said. “Tell the Guardians. I know they must be looking for you.”

“They are,” Tom said. “Anstruther and Waterhouse have been tracking down all Sampson’s associates, and Miles Vickery has been interviewing the servants at Fortune Hall to see if I have been back there. It will not be long before they pick up my trail. I’m certain of it.”

“Then go to them first!” Lydia argued. “Tell Dexter or Miles Vickery what you have told me-” She stopped. Tom was shaking his head.

“I can’t, Lyddy,” he said. “They would never believe me. I’m a wanted man and I have no proof of any of it. All the evidence is against me.” His hands tightened on hers. “But you believe me, don’t you, Lyddy? Please say you do.”

Lydia was silent for a very long time. She realized with a shock that she had strength now, strength enough to see Tom Fortune without illusion and to judge him objectively.

“I am not sure,” she said slowly at last, and heard him sigh.

“You see?” Tom said. “If you do not believe in me, then who will? Certainly my own brother does not. Monty has washed his hands of me.”

“Sir Montague was never a very reliable character,” Lydia said. “He bends with the wind. But, Tom, the question we should be asking is if you did not kill Crosby and Sampson, who did?”

“I did wonder,” Tom said, staring at the flickering flame of the lantern, “if it was one of the Guardians themselves. Oh, I know they are sworn to protect and uphold the law, but men have gone to the bad before now, and Sampson could well have been blackmailing them, or Crosby been about to expose them. Any one of them would have the knowledge and the skill to murder.”

“No!” Lydia said, recoiling instinctively from the thought. “It cannot be. Not Dexter Anstruther-”

“Probably not Dexter,” Tom conceded. “He is too principled, though one never knows. But Miles Vickery now…” Tom laughed. “You cannot tell me that he has not done many a thing that would lay him open to blackmail, and he would be ruthless enough to kill, I am sure of it.”

“Lord Vickery has renewed his attentions to Alice,” Lydia said, frowning a little. “If he is mixed up in something illegal, he has not profited from it financially, I am sure. He is so poor he is selling everything off.”

“Surely Miss Lister has not welcomed his suit,” Tom said.

“There is something between them,” Lydia said. “I know it.” She fidgeted with the seam of her cloak. “I recognize it. For all that she was once in service, Alice is as innocent as I was, and Miles Vickery fascinates her in the way that you used to fascinate me, Tom.” She smiled a little sadly. “It is because you are both so very bad, you see. Bad and dangerous and such a temptation to an innocent girl…” She sighed. “But there is one difference between Alice and me. I do not think she will be as foolish as I was. She is very strong and I do not think she will allow herself to be seduced as I was.”

“And now you see me as I really am, Lyddy,” Tom said, his voice cracking with self-disgust. “Not so attractive now, is it?”

“No,” Lydia said, “it is not. But if we are to clear your name and I am to have a father for this baby of ours-”

“Lydia!” Tom crushed her to him so that the rest of her words were lost. “You are too good for me,” he said, his breath hot against her hair, “but if we come through this I swear I shall be a better man and you will be proud of me.”

“Well,” Lydia said breathlessly, feeling his arms about her and thinking it heavenly despite the fact that he was dirty and unkempt, “in that case we had better devise a plan. Now, what are we going to do?”