The Secret Mistress

Chapter 21

EDWARD WAS LYING on his back on the bed, one hand over his eyes, one leg bent at the knee, his foot flat on the mattress. He was listening to the soothing sounds of birds singing and the curtain flapping at the window. The air was cool on his naked body, though not cool enough that he was tempted to pull up the covers. Angeline’s hand was in his, her arm against him. Both were warm.

He was relaxed. Utterly, totally relaxed in both body and mind. He had expected, when rational thought returned following the sex, that he would feel guilty. What he had done was reprehensible in every sense of the word. But instead he was relaxed. And happy.

Nothing had ever felt so right in his life.

He could have drifted off to sleep. He had chosen instead to float on the edge of consciousness, to savor the delicious feeling of rightness and happiness. Angeline was sleeping—he could tell from the soft evenness of her breathing. She had murmured sleepily when he disengaged from her and moved to her side, but then she had sighed and gone back to sleep.

Her hair was in a fragrant tangle over his shoulder.

Angeline Dudley. Whoever would have thought?

There was some pinkish dried blood on her inner thigh, he had seen, but no dreadful mess. He would clean it off afterward with water from the basin, if it would not embarrass her horribly to have him do such a thing for her. It struck him suddenly that the small intimacies of marriage, not just the sexual ones, were going to bring him enormous pleasure. It struck him that marriage was going to bring him enormous pleasure.

Why had he thought just the opposite even a week ago, even a few days ago? Even when he had looked forward to marriage with Eunice, he had not thought of it in terms of pleasure. But he did not want to think about Eunice. He hoped she really would not be disappointed when he announced his betrothal to Angeline. And he hoped she was not becoming infatuated with Windrow. But, no, surely not. She was far too sensible.

And then Angeline drew a deep, ragged breath through her nose and let it out slowly through her mouth with a sigh—a long, satisfied-sounding sigh. He turned his head to smile at her. He hoped she would not be assaulted with guilt when she came fully awake. She had a great deal more to lose from all this than he did, after all.

Though he had his life to lose if Tresham happened to find out. The thought did nothing to dim his smile.

She did not come awake gradually, however—unless the slow inhale and exhale qualified as gradual. By the time he had finished turning his head, she had abandoned his hand and was scrambling up onto her knees beside him. She leaned over him, one hand on the bed, the other on his chest, and her eyes sparkled into his. Her hair was a tangled cloud all about her.

“Now,” she said, “I am your mistress.”

As though it were the pinnacle of achievement to which all properly brought-up young ladies ought to aspire.

Good Lord! All his relaxed contentment fled out the window.

“You dashed well are not,” he said. Had she misunderstood? She could not possibly have. He had talked of marriage. He had told her he was going to make her another offer. “You are going to be my wife.”

“After you have asked nicely and I have said yes,” she said, “back at Hallings tomorrow or the next day. Today I am your mistress. Your secret mistress.”

“Mistresses get paid for their services,” he said. “We are going to be married, Angeline. Just don’t get any ideas about refusing me. I swear I’ll—”

“When we get up later to dine,” she said, both hands on his chest now close to his shoulders, her face hovering over his, her hair like a curtain on either side of them, “you will pay me—what is an appropriate sum? But no matter. It is merely a token payment. You will pay me one sovereign, and it will be official. I am your secret mistress. It sounds very wicked. It sounds delicious. Admit it.”

Indignation wilted and he laughed.

“Edward,” she said softly.

“Angie.”

“And that will be another secret,” she said. “Your name. I will only ever use it when we are together like this.”

“Man and mistress?” he said. “Employer and mistress? Is it going to cost me a sovereign every time? It could get expensive.”

“You can afford it,” she said. “You can afford me. You have to, do you not, for you cannot live happily without me. You have already admitted it. My price, though, is one sovereign to cover the first eighty years. After that we will negotiate.”

“In that case,” he said, “I will be generous and make it a guinea.”

“I will always call you Heyward when we are not alone together like this,” she said, “and no one will know. I will be your secret mistress all the rest of our lives and no one will suspect a thing. My brothers will always think you are nothing but a dry old stick and will pity me and wonder how I can stand such a dull marriage.”

“That is what they call me?” he asked her. He took her by the elbows and eased her down so that her bosom was against his chest and her face was a mere couple of inches above his own.

“That is it,” she said, smiling. “They have no idea, and they never will.”

Her eyes were bright with warm laughter and love. His own smile faded.

“Angeline,” he said, “that is precisely what I am, you know. I cannot countenance any wildness in myself or extravagance or drunkenness or debauchery or gambling or recklessness—apart from today, that is, when I have broken just about every rule I could possibly break. I will never change. I am just an ordinary man, a very proper man, a dull man. There will be very little excitement in your life if—when you marry me. If is no longer an option for you, I am afraid. But you must not glamorize me. You will only be the more disappointed when the truth becomes apparent to you.”

Her smile had softened. She laid her head on his chest, turning her face so that one cheek was against him.

“You still do not quite understand, do you?” she said softly. “I do not want you to change. I fell head over ears in love with you the first time I saw you just because you are who you are. You were there behind me at that inn before Lord Windrow came inside, were you not? Yet you uttered not one improper word. When he did, you chose to reprimand him rather than ignore him or leave the room. When he would have fought you, you pointed out how illogical violence would be under the circumstances, even though I am sure you could have beaten him and even though you then stood accused of being a coward. When he would have left, you stepped between him and the door and insisted that he apologize to me. And then, rather than speak to me when we had not been formally introduced, you left without a word. I did not know for sure until then that there were gentlemen like you. I had experience only with gentlemen like my father and my brothers and their friends. I did not want to marry anyone like them, for whoever I chose would not remain faithful for long, and how can there be marriage and parenthood and contentment and friendship and happiness and growing old together unless there is fidelity? Maybe my mother would have been different if my father had been. Maybe she would have been happy. Maybe she would have remained at home more. Maybe she would have enjoyed us—me. From the moment I saw you, I wanted you. I desperately, desperately wanted you. And not just someone like you, though that is what I had hoped to find when I left home, even though I doubted and still doubt that there are many such men. I wanted you just as you were, and I want you just as you are. I want you to live your dull, blameless life of duty and responsibility. I want you to be a very proper, perhaps even stern husband. I want you to make me feel you care. I want you to be a father who spends more time than is fashionable with his children. And in private, when we are alone together, I want you to be Edward, my secret and wonderful lover.”

His chest was wet. But he would have known anyway that she was weeping. Her voice had become increasingly unsteady as she spoke. He wrapped his arms about her and pressed his smiling mouth to the top of her head.

“Actually,” she said a few minutes later, and her voice was steady again, “it is silly to say I do not want you to change. For we all must change or remain static in life, and that would be quite undesirable. We would still think and speak and act at the age of thirty and sixty as we did at the age of fourteen. Of course we must change and ought to change. You did not love me at Vauxhall. You only lusted after me, or, if that is too vulgar a notion, then you were simply affected by the seclusion of that clearing among the trees and by the moonlight and the distant music. When you came the next day to offer me marriage, you did not believe in love, not romantic love, anyway. Now you do. I thoroughly approve of that change in you, though I do not suppose it is a real change, is it? You have always been a loving person, after all. It is just that you had not yet opened your heart to that extra dimension of your being. And I have changed too. I knew that I would have no trouble finding a husband once I had made my come-out, for I am Lady Angeline Dudley and all sorts of men would want to marry me even if I looked like a hyena and had the personality of a toad—not that I know anything about the personality of toads, of course. I may be doing them a dreadful injustice. Perhaps they are the most fascinating of creatures. But you know what I mean. I hoped to find a man worthy of my love, though I really did not believe I could ever be worthy of his. I have always thought myself ugly and stupid and unladylike and … Well, a whole host of other depressing things. But now I know that I am beautiful and bright and an original and … Am I being boastful?”

He was laughing softly but with great tenderness too, for there was sudden vulnerability in her voice again. He rolled over with her until their positions were reversed and she was lying flat on the bed with him half over her. He kissed her eyes, her mouth.

“Angie,” he said, “never stop talking, my love. You are an eternal delight to me. Or if I may make an instant amendment to what I have just said, do stop talking occasionally so that I may snatch a few hours of sleep each night and so that I may concentrate upon making love to my secret mistress whenever the spirit moves one or the other of us or both and so that I may read the morning papers and the morning post and … Well, I daresay you know what I am saying. But never cease your chattering. And before you ask, I adore today’s bonnet. I assume there is straw beneath all the flowers? You must have a particularly strong neck to hold up all that weight.”

And then they were both laughing, their noses brushing together.

“You lie through your teeth,” she said. “You think it is hideous.”

“Not so,” he protested. “On this occasion I speak the solemn truth. When I stepped into the parlor downstairs earlier, I thought for a moment that I had opened the wrong door and had gone into the garden by mistake. A beautiful garden.”

She gazed wistfully up at him.

“You punched Lord Windrow on the chin,” she said, “because you thought he was abducting me.”

“So much,” he said ruefully, “for unnecessary violence.”

“You were quite, quite splendid,” she told him. “But poor Lord Windrow, when really he has eyes for no one but Miss Goddard.”

He frowned.

“He had better not hurt or compromise her,” he said, “or he is going to meet with more than just a single punch to the jaw.”

“But she has eyes for no one but him,” she said, wrapping her arms about his neck. “Can you not see, Edward, that they are perfect for each other?”

The logic of women again!

“He really is not a committed rake,” she said. “I have realized that for some time. He has merely been waiting to fall in love with someone who will hold him steady for the rest of his life. Besides, he loves his mother.”

He frowned for a second or two longer, for he really was not convinced. But then he could not help laughing. Perhaps there was room in this life for women’s logic as well as for his own far more sensible reasoning skills.

He kissed her, an action that took care of an indeterminate number of minutes—but who was counting?—before he withdrew somewhat reluctantly.

“We must stop there while I still can,” he said. “We must not go any further yet, perhaps not even tonight. You must be very sore.”

“A little,” she admitted. “It feels good.”

“It would not,” he said, “if I were to try acting the great lover again.”

“No, probably not,” she agreed.

“Are you hungry?” he asked her.

“Starved,” she said.

He rolled away from her and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He got to his feet and crossed the room to the washstand.

“Stay where you are,” he said. “I am going to wash you.”

“Oh,” she said. As he approached the bed again with a wet cloth and the bowl, her eyes moved over his naked body and she smiled. “I love you terribly much, you know, Edward. I just wish there were words.”

Perhaps it was just as well there were not. She might never stop talking.

“If there were,” he said, sitting down on the side of the bed and setting about his task, “I would be the one saying them, Angie.”

EUNICE WAS SITTING very upright in the carriage, her back straight and barely touching the cushions behind her. Her feet were set neatly side by side on the floor. Her hands were cupped one above the other in her lap. Her eyes were on them.

Lord Windrow was slouched comfortably across the corner beside her, his hat tipped slightly over his half-closed eyes. But beneath the indolent eyelids he was watching her keenly.

They had just taken leave of his mother and were on their way back to Hallings. They would stop at the Peacock Inn so that he could reclaim his own horses and see if Heyward and Lady Angeline Dudley were indeed still there.

Eunice’s maid had glanced at the sky before the carriage left Norton, seen with obvious relief that the clouds, though low, did not seem to harbor the intention of raining upon the earth beneath just yet, and hopped up onto the box to renew her acquaintance with the coachman, who made room for her without any apparent resentment.

“Lady Windrow was very kind and very gracious,” Eunice said, “considering what you said to her yesterday, which, by the way, you had no right saying. She must be dreadfully alarmed.”

“What I said,” he reminded her, “was that I intend to ask you to marry me when the time seems appropriate. I have every right to express my intentions to whoever is willing to listen. If I choose to tell you that I intend flying to the moon, you may feel justified in calling me a nincompoop or you may merely yawn and nod off to sleep, but you cannot challenge my right to express such an intention. If memory serves you correctly, you will be forced to admit that I did not say I was going to marry you, only that I was going to ask you. Am I right?”

She would have loved to say no. He could see that. But honesty compelled her to tell the truth—or to avoid it.

“You still had no right to embarrass me and alarm your mother,” she said.

He crossed his arms and braced one foot against the seat opposite.

“You are perfectly correct,” he said. “I did not have any such right.”

Her lips tightened.

“Let me get this right,” he said. “I embarrass you. I know that I also excite you, Eunice, but that is for private lustful moments only, is it? In public you are embarrassed to be seen with me. Dear me. I suppose it is lowering for an intelligent, bookish female to be seen in the company of a mindless rake.”

“That is not what I meant at all,” she said, turning her head to look at him. “Oh, you know very well it is not what I meant.”

His eyes grew sleepier as she glared at him, and he dipped his head a little lower so that his hat brim shaded them more.

“It must be the opposite, then,” he said. “The poor little bluestocking daughter of a university don is consumed by awkward embarrassment at being seen in the company of a rich, titled gentleman of the ton. She feels so far out of her depth that she fears drowning.”

She gazed mutely at him for a moment and then clucked her tongue.

“What utter drivel,” she said.

He sighed.

“I am running out of guesses,” he said. “I give in. You win. Tell me why my words to my mother embarrassed you.”

“Because …” she began. She shook her head. “Well, look at me.”

Plain, sensible shoes. Plain, sensible high-waisted dress and plain white gloves. Plain, sensible bonnet covering neatly combed brown hair caught in an equally neat knot at her neck. Sensible face—not plain. Neat figure, not voluptuous, not its opposite either.

“I know,” he said. “There is a wart or a mole hidden under those clothes, is there not? Either one would definitely do it. Confess and I will order the carriage turned around so that I can return and tell my mother that I am not after all going to offer you marriage.”

She looked at him with tight-lipped exasperation and then burst out laughing.

“Oh, come now,” she said. “Admit it. You did not mean a word. You could not possibly wish to marry me.”

“I would lie to my own mother?” He raised his eyebrows. “What a dastardly thing to suggest. On her birthday too. But let me see. Why would I wish to marry you? Perhaps it is your looks, which utterly charm me. Or your wit, which seduces me. Or your mind, for which I feel a powerful, unbridled lust. Or perhaps it is the simple fact that I like you, that I enjoy talking with you and being with you, that I enjoy kissing you and would love nothing better than to do a great deal more than kiss you. Or perhaps it is that I have a hankering to see what you will look like and to know what you will be like at the age of thirty and forty and fifty and on upward until death do us part. Or perhaps I am curious to discover what sort of babies we may create together. Or perhaps it is that I have never, ever entertained these thoughts before in connection with any woman or even not in connection with any specific woman. I believe I must be in love with you, Eunice. Head over ears. Is that the correct expression? Windrow in love. I am the one who should be feeling all the embarrassment, not you.”

She was staring fixedly at him.

“But your mother must be so upset,” she said. “You are her only son, Lord Windrow, her only child. She must expect so much more of you.”

“She was merely being polite, then,” he asked, “when she hugged you and kissed you just now? And when she sat beside you on the love seat in the drawing room all last evening, taking the place I had coveted, her arm drawn through yours? My mother was the enormously wealthy only daughter of an enormously wealthy merchant when she married my father. She married him for love, and he married her for the same reason, even though his own finances were rather strained at the time of their marriage. He died four years ago after thirty-five years of marriage, leaving her brokenhearted, though she told me just last night after you had gone to bed that she would not trade those thirty-five years and her heartbreak now for a lifetime with any other man. For some time she has been hoping I will marry. She wants a daughter-in-law and she wants grandchildren. But most of all she wants to see me happy. She wants me to find the sort of love she and my father had. She fell in love with you on sight. You were very different, she said, from the sort of woman she feared I might choose—and that was not an insult. It was the highest praise. The only fear my mother has this morning is that perhaps you will say no. She knows I have not always lived the most exemplary of existences during the years since I left home to go to university.”

Her eyes were still steady on his. He took off his tall hat and tossed it onto the seat opposite.

“Will you say no?” he asked.

He saw her swallow.

“Are you asking?” she said.

He looked around at the interior of his carriage and through the window to the hedgerow rushing past and the fields just visible beyond. The Peacock was only a mile or two distant.

“I suppose,” he said, “there is no such thing as a perfectly romantic setting, is there? Or just the perfect time. Only the time and setting that are right and inevitable. Yes, I am asking, my love.”

He reached out both hands and took both of hers. Then, because he was not satisfied, he peeled off her gloves, tossed them, inside out, on top of his hat, and held her hands again.

“Eunice Goddard,” he said, all pretense of sleepiness gone from his eyes, “will you marry me? I have no flowery speech prepared and would feel remarkably idiotic delivering it even if I had. Will you just simply marry me, my love? Because I love you? Will you take the risk? I am fully aware that there is a risk. I can only urge you to take a chance on me while I promise to do my very best to love and cherish you for the rest of my days and even perhaps beyond them. Who knows? It might be fun playing a harp through all eternity if you were there beside me strumming on one too. Does one strum on a harp?”

He grinned at her.

“I would rather swing on clouds,” she said, “and jump from one to another. There would be all the thrill with none of the danger, for we could not fall to our deaths, could we? We would already be immortal. I will marry you, Lord Windrow. I think—I know—I would like it of all things.”

She bit her upper lip, and tears sprang to her eyes.

He raised her hands one at a time to his lips, his eyes never leaving hers.

“Make that Charles,” he said. “ ‘I will marry you, Charles.’ ”

“I will marry you, Charles,” she said softly.

“I suppose,” he said, “I am going to have to make a journey to Cambridge, am I, to apply to the formidable don for permission to marry his daughter?”

“You are,” she said. “He will probably look mildly surprised to discover that I can possibly be old enough to consider marriage yet, and then mildly gratified to discover that someone wishes to marry me without his having to exert himself in any way to find me a husband.”

“Admirable,” he said. “And will he approve of me?”

“Yes,” she said without hesitation. “Vague as he can be, he loves me too, you see.”

He kissed the back of her right hand again and looked past her shoulder.

“Ah,” he said, “the infamous Peacock, scene of sin and passion—or so it is to be hoped. Heyward may be a dullard in many ways, but I was vastly impressed by the way he got into the private parlor yesterday afternoon without either opening or closing the door. At least, I did not see it open or close, did you? Though there was a great deal of banging and slamming for a moment. He veritably pulsated with passion. So did his fist. And so did his person after we left, I would happily wager. And Lady Angeline Dudley likes him, so he cannot be all dullard. I am really rather fond of her.”

“I love them both,” Eunice said. “Very dearly. And I still think it was very, very wrong of us to leave them here yesterday.”

He leaned forward and kissed her briefly on the lips as the carriage made the turn into the small inn yard.