The Secret Mistress

Chapter 9

HE FELT THAT he was making a grand public statement, Edward thought uneasily.

Engage a lady for two sets at her come-out ball, including the first, sit with her at supper, and then, two days later, on a perfect spring afternoon when absolutely everyone would be out, drive her in the park—on the high seat of a spanking new curricle.

Add a large, wide-brimmed bonnet in varying shades of green and orange—and not subtle shades at that—laden with artificial fruit and flowers and ribbons and bows and Lord knew what other bells and whistles, and a dazzlingly smiling face below it, and a mobile mouth, and a hand that waved to everyone and his dog—yes, she did indeed wave to a little fluff of a mutt, which was prancing along the pedestrian path with its mistress, its stub of a tail adorned with a blue ribbon bow.

He might as well be done with the whole business and put an engagement notice in tomorrow’s papers. He might as well get the wedding invitations made up and sent out. He might as well book St. George’s on Hanover Square for the ceremony and plan the wedding breakfast. He might as well start fitting out his nursery.

“Is this not all absolutely wonderful?” Lady Angeline Dudley said as he drove through the crowd of carriages and horses that made the fashionable afternoon loop in Hyde Park.

Or drove with the crowd would be a more accurate description. It was impossible to move at a faster pace than the slowest of the vehicles ahead of him, and that was very slow indeed. Speed was not the purpose of an afternoon drive in the park, of course. Neither was getting somewhere—hence the circular nature of the drive. One came to be sociable, to mingle with one’s peers, to hear the newest gossip, to pass along something even newer if one was fortunate enough to have heard anything suitably salacious. One came to see who was with whom and, sometimes, who was not with whom.

One came, sometimes, to make a statement. Sometimes one made a statement even when one did not wish to do anything of the kind, when one wished, in fact, to do the absolute opposite.

Sometimes one could wish one’s female relatives in perdition.

“It is your first drive in the park?” he asked.

She had ridden on Rotten Row, of course, at least once, but that was a different matter entirely.

“Oh, yes,” she said. “Neither Tresham nor Rosalie would allow me to come here before I was out, and yesterday Rosalie insisted that I rest. I went to Hookham’s Library, though. Oh, I met Miss Goddard there, and we went to a tearoom together and talked for a whole hour. And the Marquess of Exwich called at Dudley House in the afternoon. He came to offer me marriage, the silly man. Oh, there is … what is his name? He was my third partner last evening. Sir Timothy Bixby, that is it. The lady with him danced once with Ferdinand. I cannot—How do you do?” She had raised her voice.

They stopped for a few moments to exchange pleasantries with Bixby and Miss Coleman.

Exwich, Edward thought. He must be fifty if he was a day. He had been married how many times? Two? Three? And he had how many children? Six? Eight? Eighteen? All girls, apparently.

“Did you accept?” he asked as they drove on.

She looked blankly at him for a moment and then smiled broadly.

“Lord Exwich?” she said. “Oh, no. He wears corsets.”

Which was, apparently, reason enough to refuse his marriage offer. And perhaps it was too.

She had taken tea with Eunice? He still had not called on her himself.

It took them an hour to make the circuit. Virtually everyone there, of course, had also been at Tresham’s ball, so everyone must be greeted and everyone’s health must be inquired after, and everyone must be reminded of what a beautiful day it was in case they had not noticed for themselves.

And everyone looked with open speculation from Edward to Lady Angeline and back again. Two men of his acquaintance actually winked at him.

“You must be ready to return home,” he said at last. “I will—”

“Oh, no.” She turned a dismayed face his way. “It cannot be time to leave already. We have seen scarcely anything of the park.”

Did she not know that one was not meant to? Hyde Park was vast. The fashionable oval was not.

“You would like to drive for a little longer?” he asked.

“Oh, yes, please,” she said. “But can we find a less crowded area?”

“But certainly,” he said, drawing his curricle free of the crowds and turning down a quiet avenue away from the park gates rather than toward them.

In full view of half the ton.

This was becoming a statement with full fanfare.

He might as well send out invitations to the first christening party.

She raised a parasol above her head—it was an apricot color to match her muslin dress—though what function it could possibly serve given the size of her bonnet he did not know.

“Lord Heyward,” she asked him, “are you being coerced into courting me?”

He turned his head to frown down at her.

“Coerced?” he said.

“I suppose it is the wrong word,” she said. “No one could coerce you into doing anything you did not wish to do. But are you being … persuaded, pressured into courting me?”

He had asked her a similar question two evenings ago and she had denied it. Now he understood why. Good Lord, it was not a question he wished to answer.

“You refer to my grandmother and my mother and sisters?” he said. “They are like female relatives everywhere, I suppose. They wish to see me happily settled. They wish to see the succession happily settled. They are eager to pick out all the most eligible young ladies for me, on the assumption that I am quite incapable of doing it for myself.”

“And I am an eligible young lady?” she asked.

“Of course,” he said. “Probably the most eligible.”

Two children were chasing after a ball on the wide lawn to one side of the path. A lady sat on the grass some distance away from them. Apart from them there was no one in sight.

“And if you had the choosing,” she said, “without any necessity of pleasing your relatives, would you choose someone ineligible? Or less eligible?”

Oh, Lord.

“Lady Angeline,” he said, “I consider this a quite inappropriate topic of conversation.”

She twirled her parasol and laughed.

“You would never choose anyone ineligible,” she said. “You are a very proper gentleman. You are devoted to doing your duty. You would never follow your heart rather than your head. You would never do anything impulsive. No one would ever find you up a tree while an angry bull prowled about the trunk below.”

“I am, yes, a dull dog,” he said, hearing with dismay the irritation in his voice. “It is time I took you home.”

“But it is not dull,” she said, “to be proper and dutiful and to act with considered judgment. It is not dull to be a gentleman. And must we go home? When everything about us is so lovely and I am having my first ever ride in a curricle and loving it? How do you like my bonnet?”

She lowered her parasol as he turned to look at it.

“It is one of the thirteen?” he asked.

“Number eight,” she said. “And actually it is fourteen. I counted them yesterday and there was one more than I remembered.”

“I thought,” he said, “that you bought each new bonnet because it was prettier than the one before. Why, then, are you wearing number eight instead of number fourteen?”

She grinned at him.

“I said it for something to say,” she said. “I often do that. I love all my bonnets—except perhaps the pink one. I bought it because I loved the shade of pink and still do. But it is virtually unadorned. It is boring. I shall have to do something about it if I am ever to wear it. And it would be a horrid waste of money if I never did wear it after all, would it not? You have not answered my question. I suppose you are too polite to tell me the bonnet is atrocious. My brothers are not so tactful.”

“Is my good opinion so important to you, then?” he asked her.

She considered.

“No,” she said. “I have always had dreadful taste in clothes. I concentrate most of it upon my bonnets. Sometimes I take advice with dresses and other garments. And sometimes not. But I always choose my own hats.”

“Who told you you have dreadful taste?” he asked her.

“Apart from my brothers? Oh, everyone. My governesses—every one of them.” She looked for one moment as if she would raise her parasol again, but she changed her mind and rested it across her lap. “My mother.”

And he understood something about her in a flash—something he did not really want to know. Somewhere beneath the bright, noisy dazzle that was Lady Angeline Dudley there was a vulnerability. Perhaps even a massive one.

When she had said my mother, she had almost whispered the words.

Her mother had told her she had bad taste? Her mother, who had been so exquisitely beautiful herself and who had had exquisite taste in dress? Edward remembered her. But how could anyone not remember her once he had set eyes upon her?

“Your hats are distinctive, Lady Angeline,” he said. “This one is. The one you wore when you rode on Rotten Row the other morning was. Was that one of the fourteen?”

“That one?” she said. “Oh, no. That was just an old thing I wore because I needed to keep my hair dry for my presentation to the queen. It is an old favorite.”

“It drew comments,” he said. “This one will be talked about after today. I daresay the other thirteen will be too as you wear them, even the pink one, if the shade is anything similar to that of the dress you wore on the way to London.”

“It is almost an exact match,” she said. She laughed. “Everyone will talk about what ghastly taste I have in hats. But I do not care. I like them.”

He turned the curricle along a path that ran parallel to the waters of the Serpentine.

“And that, ultimately,” he said, “is all that matters. You like them. And a strange thing will happen in time. Gradually your hats will come to be associated with you, and people will look eagerly for new ones. And some people will begin to admire them. Some will even envy them and emulate them because they will assume that it is the bonnets that give you the bright sparkle that characterizes you. They will be quite wrong, of course. The bonnet will lend nothing to their character. You must not retreat into what others deem fashionable and tasteful if you prefer something else. It is sometimes better to be a leader of fashion rather than an habitual follower.”

Good Lord, did he really believe that? Or was he giving her appalling advice?

“Even if no one follows my lead?” she asked, looking across at him with brightly smiling eyes.

“Even then,” he said. “When the parade goes by, there will be no one to look at but you. But everyone will look. Everyone loves a parade.”

Her smile had softened and she turned her face rather sharply to face front again. He had to keep his eyes on his horses and the path ahead—there was more traffic here. Even so, he had the distinct impression that the brightness of her eyes as she looked away did not have everything to do with laughter. And indeed, there was no laughter in her voice when she spoke again.

“I shall remember what you have said all the rest of my life,” she said. “I shall lead fashion, even if no one follows behind me.”

“Someone always will,” he said, and he knew he was right. It was the nature of leadership.

They turned their heads at the same moment, and their eyes met. It was definitely tears that were in hers. They were not swimming there and they were not spilling over onto her cheeks, but they were there.

And then, just before he looked back to the path ahead, there was a spark of mischief there too to brighten the tears.

“You still have not answered my question,” she said. “Do you or do you not like my bonnet, Lord Heyward?”

“I think it quite the most ghastly thing I have ever seen,” he said, “with the possible exception of the riding hat you wore the other morning.”

She went off into peals of bright laughter, turning heads their way and causing him to smile.

Good God, was he in danger of liking her?

She was a walking, talking disaster. She was the very last woman that old sobersides, the Earl of Heyward, needed to become entangled with.

His thoughts flashed to Eunice.

Well, he did like her sense of humor—Lady Angeline’s, that was. He had to admit it yet again. There was really very little humor in his life. There had never seemed much room for it.

He turned the curricle in the direction of Grosvenor Square and Dudley House. He had the uneasy feeling that he was getting into something he was going to find it very difficult to get himself out of.

Even impossible?

And did he mean was getting? Or did he mean had got?———

I JUST HOPE,” Cousin Rosalie said, “that she has learned her lesson this time. I am convinced her marriage was not a happy one.”

“I believe,” Angeline said, “she is genuinely fond of him. She sat apart with him at Lady Beckingham’s this afternoon, and she appeared very happy when she drove with him in the park afterward.”

They were talking about the Countess of Heyward, who had apparently broken Cousin Leonard’s heart five years ago by marrying the earl and was now being offered a second chance to get it right, according to Rosalie.

“I dread to imagine,” she said, “what will become of him if she breaks his heart again.”

Cousin Leonard was almost completely bald. He also had a nose that went on forever. Even so, he was a kindly, pleasant-looking gentleman, and Angeline thought that even the beautiful Countess of Heyward would be fortunate to have him. There was such a thing as family bias, of course.

“I daresay she will not,” Angeline said.

They were in the carriage returning from an evening at the theater, where Cousin Leonard had invited them to join him in his box. It had been a thoroughly pleasant evening, even apart from the novelty of seeing a play acted out live upon a stage instead of just being read from the pages of a book, which Angeline had always found remarkably tedious and Miss Pratt had always insisted was the only way to appreciate good drama.

The theater was packed with people, and Angeline was able to gaze her fill—and be gazed upon. Several people had come to the box during the interval to pay their compliments to one or another of them. Lord Windrow had cocked one mobile eyebrow at her from across the theater and inclined his head in an exaggeratedly deferential bow. The Earl of Heyward was not present. Martha Hamelin was, and they were able to flutter their fans at each other from a distance and smile brightly.

What had made the evening particularly special, though, was the fact that Cousin Leonard had issued yet another invitation before they left. He was organizing a party to spend an evening at Vauxhall Gardens, and he hoped they would be his guests there. The idea had occurred to him while he was driving in Hyde Park earlier in the afternoon and Lady Heyward had informed him that it must be three years at the very least since she was last there but she longed to go again.

Vauxhall Gardens!

The thought of going there was sufficient to send Angeline into transports of delight. It was the most famous pleasure grounds in the world. Well, in Britain anyway. She was not sure about the world. There was a pavilion and there were private boxes and sumptuous food. There were music and dancing and fireworks and broad avenues and shadier paths. There were lanterns in the trees and a boat to take one across the river.

But the fact that she was going there was not all.

The evening was being arranged for Lady Heyward’s benefit. But Lady Heyward had apparently shown some unease over any impression of carelessness or heartlessness she was giving her late husband’s family, so Leonard was going to make it a family party—or a two-family party, to be more accurate. Perhaps, he said, Tresham and Ferdinand would come.

The Earl of Heyward was sure to be there too, then, Angeline thought while she stared dreamily into the darkness beyond the carriage windows as they drove home. The earl and Vauxhall all in one evening.

“I daresay,” Rosalie said from the seat beside her, just as if she had read Angeline’s thoughts, “the Earl of Heyward will accept Leonard’s invitation to Vauxhall. Do you like him, Angeline? Did you enjoy your drive in the park with him this afternoon?”

He had given her permission to continue wearing the bonnets she liked. Not that she needed his permission or anyone else’s. But he had made her feel that it was the right thing to continue wearing them, that it would be the wrong thing to bow to popular opinion.

He had said something else too. Angeline thought a moment, bringing the exact words to mind again in his own voice.

Some will even envy them and emulate them because they will assume that it is the bonnets that give you the bright sparkle that characterizes you.

… the bright sparkle that characterizes you.

No one else had ever said anything even half as lovely to her.

And he had advised her to set fashion rather than follow it—even if no one followed her.

But the loveliest memory of all from this afternoon—oh, by far the loveliest—had come when he had joked with her. And it had been a joke, not an insult as it was when Tresham or Ferdinand said similar things.

I think it quite the most ghastly thing I have ever seen, he had said when she had pressed him for an opinion on her gorgeous green and orange bonnet, with the possible exception of the riding hat you wore the other morning.

And then, while she had laughed with genuine amusement because the words were so unexpected, he had smiled. He really had. A full-on smile that had set his blue eyes dancing and had shown his teeth and creased his cheek on the right side.

“Oh, I did,” she said in answer to Rosalie’s question. “It is the loveliest place in the world to be on a sunny afternoon. Though I daresay Vauxhall at night will be even lovelier.”

She gazed out at a streetlamp that broke up the darkness for a moment.

“And yes,” she said. “I like the Earl of Heyward well enough.”

“I am delighted to hear it,” Rosalie said briskly. “Though there are plenty of other gentlemen worthy of your consideration if it turns out on further acquaintance that you do not like him quite well enough. I am not the sort of chaperon, I hope, who expects her charge to marry the first gentleman presented for her inspection.”

“I know,” Angeline said. “I am very fortunate to have you, Cousin Rosalie. More than fortunate. I am happy.”

Happier than she would be if it were her own mother presenting her to society and the marriage mart? But she made no attempt to answer the question, which was pointless anyway. Mama was dead.

Cousin Rosalie reached out and patted her hand.

I think it quite the most ghastly thing I have ever seen, with the possible exception of the riding hat you wore the other morning.

Angeline smiled secretly into the darkness.

DAMNATION, EDWARD THOUGHT the following morning when he opened the invitation Lorraine had warned him would be coming.

Vauxhall!

It was famous for its glitter, its vulgarity, its artificiality. He had never been there. He had never wanted to go. He still did not. He could not think of many places he would less like to go.

But go he must.

Lorraine had been close to tears in the drawing room before dinner last evening when she had spoken of the planned visit to Vauxhall. Both he and his mother had been present as well as Alma and Augustine.

“It has been only a little over a year since Maurice’s passing,” she had said. “I would not offend any of you or appear uncaring or … or fast by engaging in too many social pleasures too soon or giving the appearance that perhaps I have a … a beau. Will you all please come too to Vauxhall, and persuade Juliana and Christopher to come, so that it will be in the nature of a family outing?”

“I doubt if Christopher will risk the dangers of night air and the smoke of fireworks clogging his lungs,” Augustine had said, looking at Edward with a twinkle in his eye. “Unless Juliana persuades him that it is safe, of course, or that going to Vauxhall is essential for her good health. That would do it. He is soft in the head where she is concerned.”

Edward’s mother had got to her feet and hugged Lorraine tightly.

“Lorraine,” she had said, “no one could have been a better wife to my son, and no one could be a better mother to my granddaughter. But Maurice is dead and you are alive. You must not be ruled by guilt or the fear that we will think you somehow unfaithful to his memory. I assure you we will not. But Vauxhall? My dear! It is for young people. I will certainly not go there with you. But Alma and Augustine surely will, and I daresay Juliana and Christopher will too. And Edward, of course.”

Of course. Of course he would and of course he must. Not just because his mother had given him little choice, but because he was fond of his sister-in-law and could see that she already had a genuine regard for Fenner—and he for her. And Fenner was a steady character. He was not just another Maurice.

Duty called, then. Oh, and affection too. Duty did not preclude love. Indeed, it could hardly exist without love to impel it onward.

So he would go. To Vauxhall of all the undesirable places. With the near certainty that Lady Angeline Dudley would be a fellow guest. If Fenner was inviting all of Lorraine’s family, it stood to reason that he would invite all of his too. And devil take it, that included the Duke of Tresham as well as his sister.

“Send an acceptance of this one,” he told his secretary, waving the invitation in one hand before setting it down on the desk.

She would love Vauxhall. She would bubble over with exuberance. He could picture it already in his mind. Lady Angeline Dudley, that was, not Lorraine. Lorraine’s enjoyment would be altogether quieter, more dignified, more decorous.