Virtue

11

Bernard Melville, third Earl of Gracemere. Judith gazed across the ballroom at the man who had ruined her father, the man who had driven George Devereux and his children out of England, the man who had ultimately driven George Davenport to his death. The slow burn of rage was followed by the same prickle of excitement she felt at the gaming tables, when she knew she had her fellow players on the run.

"Charlie, are you acquainted with the Earl of Grace-mere?"

"Of course I am. Isn't everyone?" Her partner executed a smooth turn. "You dance wonderfully, Judith."

"A woman I fear is only as good as her partner," Judith observed, laughing. "Fortunately for me, you seem to have a natural talent."

Charlie blushed.

"It's a pity it doesn't run in the family," Judith said thoughtfully.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, your cousin isn't much for the dance floor."

"No, he never has been," Charlie said. "In fact, he's such a dull stick, I don't think he cares a fig for anything outside his history books and military politics." His voice was bitter.

"Are you and Marcus at outs?" Judith asked. Charlie's frequent visits to Devlin House had for some reason ceased in the last couple of weeks. She looked at him, noticing his rather drawn look, the constraint in his eye.

"He's so damn strict, Judith. He has such antiquated notions… he doesn't seem to understand that a man has to amuse himself somehow."

"That's not quite true," Judith demurred mildly. "He amuses himself a great deal with sporting pursuits and horses, and he has plenty of friends who don't seem to think him a dull stick."

"I'm sorry," Charlie s,aid uncomfortably. "I spoke out of turn. He's your husband…"

"Yes, but I'm not blind to his faults," Judith said with a wry smile. "He's not overly tolerant of what he considers failings, I grant you. Have you angered him in some way?"

Charlie shook his head and tried to laugh. "Oh, it's nothing. It'll put itself right soon enough… Have you had enough dancing? Shall I fetch you a glass of champagne?"

Judith let the subject drop since Charlie clearly didn't want to pursue it. "No, thank you," she said. "But I would like you to introduce me to Gracemere."

"Certainly, if you like. I'm not in his set, of course, so I don't know him well, but I could effect an introduction.''

Judith cast a rapid eye over the ballroom, looking for Sebastian. She spotted him dancing with Harriet Moreton. He was often dancing with Harriet Moreton, she realized with a start, though shy, soft-eyed, pretty, seventeen-year-olds weren't his usual style. She fixed her eye on her brother until he looked up from his partner. He knew she was going to engineer an introduction to the enemy tonight, one on which he would intrude quite naturally, and he was waiting for her signal.

"I swear, the country is a damnably tedious place at this time of year," the Earl of Gracemere was saying to the knot of people around him as Judith and Charlie approached. "Mud… nothing but mud as far as the eye can see."

"Can't think why you didn't come up to town sooner, Gracemere," one of the group observed.

"Oh, I had my reasons," the earl remarked with a little smile. His eye fell on Charlie and his companion and his smile broadened. "Ah, Fenwick, I trust you're going to introduce me to your charming companion. Lady Carrington, isn't it? I've been hoping for an introduction all evening." He bowed, raising her hand to his lips.

"My lord." Judith looked upon the man who had obsessed her thoughts, both sleeping and waking, for the better part of two years, from the moment she and her brother had read their father's deathbed letter and had finally understood that his disgrace and exile had not been the simple result of his own unbridled passion for gaming.

Bernard Melville had pale blue eyes-fish eyes, Judith thought with a surge of revulsion. They seemed to be looking into her soul.

She withdrew her hand from his, resisting the urge to wipe her palm on her skirt. She felt contaminated even through her satin gloves. He had a cruel mouth and a sharply pointed nose beneath the fish eyes. A dissolute countenance. How on earth was she to hide her loathing and revulsion sufficiently to charm him?

Of course she would. She was an expert at hiding her emotions… thanks to the Earl of Gracemere. She unfurled her fan and smiled at him over the top. "You've just returned from the country, sir. Whereabouts?'

"Oh, I have an estate in Yorkshire,' he said. "A bleak place, but occasionally I feel a duty to inspect it."

Cranshaw. The estate he had won from her father. Sebastian's birthright. A hot, red surge of anger swept through her and she lowered her eyes abruptly. "I'm unfamiliar with Yorkshire, sir. "

"I understand you've spent most of your life abroad, ma'am."

"I'm flattered you should know so much about me, sir." She laughed, the coquette's laugh that she'd perfected.

"My dear Lady Carrington, you must know that the news of your marriage enlivened an otherwise dull summer for us all."

"You pay me too high a compliment, Lord Gracemere. I had no idea my marriage could have competed with Waterloo as the summer's seminal event," she said smoothly. It was a mistake, but she hadn't been able to resist it.

An appreciative chuckle ran round the group and Gracemere's eyes flattened, a dull flush appearing on his cheeks. Then he laughed, too. "You're right, ma'am, to point out my foolishness. It was a facetious compliment. Forgive me, but your beauty has quite overtaken my wits."

"Now that, sir, is an irresistible compliment," she said, tapping his wrist lightly with her fan. "And an admirable recover."

He bowed again. "Is it too much to hope that you will honor me with this dance?"

"I had promised it to my brother, sir, but I don't imagine he'll insist on his prior claim." She turned to where Sebastian stood, having made his seemingly casual approach. "You'll release me, Sebastian?"

"A brother's claims are notoriously low, m'dear," he said cheerfully.

"Are you acquainted with my brother, Lord Gracemere?"

"I don't believe so," Gracemere said. "But the family resemblance is striking."

"Yes, so people say." Sebastian bowed. "Sebastian Davenport, at your service."

"Delighted." The earl returned the bow, his eyes calculating, as they scrutinized the young man, who maintained a rather fatuous smile. Agnes had seen him at Dolby's, so he must be a gamester. How good a one remained to be seen. "You must come to one of my card parties," he said with an air of condescension. "If you care for that sort of thing."

Sebastian assured him that he did and murmured something about being honored. Then Judith laid her hand on the earl's arm and Bernard Melville took her into the dance.

"So you didn't follow the world to Brussels for the great battle, my lord?"

"Alas, no. I have a shameful -or perhaps I mean shameless- lack of interest in military matters."

"Even when such matters involve Napoleon? That's indeed shameful." She laughed, peeping up at him through her eyelashes.

"I'm a lost cause, ma'am." He smiled at her. "Your husband, on the other hand, is known for his expertise on the subject."

An expertise that took him onto the battlefield, Judith reflected, remembering the agony of that day. It seemed so far away now, so far removed from this glittering round of pleasure. No wonder Marcus was often so scornful of Society's priorities. She inclined her head in silent acceptance of the earl's comment.

"Yes," he continued musingly, "your husband makes us all look like mere fribbles. It's well known that he looks down on our simple pleasures."

Judith sensed an underlying point to her partner's comments. It occurred to her that Bernard Melville didn't like Marcus Devlin. "Each to his own," she said neutrally.

The earl's glance sharpened. "But you I take it, ma'am, don't share Carrington's scorn for our idle amusements." He gestured expansively around the ballroom.

If you only knew, my Lord Gracemere, just how purposeful my idle amusements are, Judith thought. But she smiled and agreed, fluttering her eyelashes at him and watching with inward revulsion the shark of interest that swam under the flat surface of his pale eyes.

Marcus strolled up the staircase just as his hostess was about to abandon her post at its head, having decided the hour was now too advanced to expect further guests. Lady Gray greeted him with flattered surprise and the information that the last time she'd seen Lady Car-rington, she'd been in the ballroom.

Marcus made his way to the ballroom. For a few minutes he couldn't see her in the melee. And then he did.

His hands clenched involuntarily as he watched her turn gracefully in the circle of Bernard Melville's arm, her eyes laughing up at him, her hand resting on his arm.

What the devil was she doing with Gracemere? But it was a futile question. She was bound to have met him sometime. It would have been too much to hope that Gracemere would have remained in rustication throughout die Season. Presumably he needed to find another pigeon to repair his fortunes at the card tables.

The dance ended and he watched the earl escort his companion off the floor. Judith was smiling in a fashion that set her husband's teeth on edge. He had watched her accomplished flirtations in Brussels with amusement and not a little admiration, and hadn't been troubled by the lighthearted coquettry that made her so popular in London. But with Gracemere, it was a very different matter. Struggling with the old rage that had barely diminished over the years, he saw the earl lead Judith toward the open French doors.

Marcus threaded his way across the crowded ballroom, acknowledging greetings with the briefest of smiles, and stepped out onto the terrace. There was no reason why Judith and her partner should not have come outside. It was a warm evening and there were plenty of people on the terrace. But the age-old rage in his soul blazed pure and bright, and he had to fight to keep it from his face and voice as he made his way to where they stood against the parapet, apparently looking at the moon.

"Good eveping, my dear."

"Marcus! What brings you here?" Judith turned at his soft greeting and for a moment he could have sworn there was a flash of pleasure in her eyes. But if it was ever there, it was gone in a trice, to be replaced with what looked like vexation, and then that too was gone and her countenance was as calm and untroubled as a doll's. Marcus knew that look. Both brother and sister wore it at the gaming tables. Prickles of unease ran up and down his spine.

"Lord Gracemere and I were just identifying the constellations," Judith said.

"Your wife appears to be an accomplished astronomer, Carrington."

"My wife has many accomplishments."

The tension in the air was as suffocating as a blanket. Judith instinctively moved to lift it. She laughed. "An odd assortment, though, I'm afraid. My formal schooling was lamentably neglected."

"Growing up on the Continent must have been an education in itself," Gracemere observed, offering his snuff box to Carrington, who refused with a flat, polite smile.

"I speak five languages," Judith said. "And my mathematics are quite sound… in some areas, at least." She shot Marcus an impishly conspiratorial look as she said this. "I count quite well, don't I, my lord?"

"Faultlessly," he agreed, unable to resist the invitation to collusion. Such invitations were all too rare, and he felt some of his tension dissipate, the slow burn of memory rage die down. Judith had nothing to do with the past, and at this moment she had eyes only for him, and there was no ambivalence now to cloud their brilliance. "I wonder if I can persuade you to dance with your husband, ma'am?"

Judith put her head on one side, considering. "Well, it's certainly unusual, and I wouldn't want it said that we lived in each other's pockets."

"Heaven forbid. If you think there's the slightest danger of that, I'll make myself scarce immediately."

It occurred to Gracemere, listening to this byplay, that they'd forgotten his presence completely. "You will excuse me," he said, bowing and walking away.

Marcus held out his hand. "A measure, madam wire.

"If you insist." She put her hand in his. "But I can't imagine why you'd wish to torture yourself in such fashion. We both know you find dancing a dead bore."

"That may be so," he said as they took their places in the set. "But I've yet to be bored in your company."

"No, just maddened," she said with an arch smiie,

"And vastly amused and aroused and fulfilled," he responded with a bland smile quite at odds with his words and the sensual glitter in his eyes.

They moved down the set and were separated by the dance movements. When they came together again, he commented, "You, at all events, seem to have been enjoying yourself this evening."

"Is that a crime?" Her eyebrows lifted in a fine and distinctly challenging arch.

Marcus shook his head. "Put up your sword, lynx. I'm not going to quarrel with you this evening."

"No?" The word was weighted with disappointment. "But we quarrel so well together."

The dance took her from him again before he could come up with a response. When she was returned to him, she was suddenly preoccupied, her eyes fixed on something over his shoulder. "My poor efforts at conversation don't appear to be entertaining you, ma'am," he drawled, when she had failed to respond to his second observation in two minutes.

"I beg your pardon." But she continued to gaze over his shoulder, chewing her lip, and whenever he touched her, he could feel the tautness in the lithe, compact frame.

"What is it, Judith?"

She shook her head. "Nothing… only, do you know Lady Barret?"

"Agnes Barret, yes, of course. She's the wife of Sir Thomas Barret. She's been on the scene for many years… a widow of some Italian count, I believe, originally. Then she married Barret this last summer." He shrugged. "Barret's a gout-ridden old fogey, but quite well heeled, so I daresay he offered a port in a storm. Although she's a damnably attractive woman; I'm sure she could have done better for herself."

"Yes, she is," Judith agreed absently. Then she seemed to shake herself out of her reverie. "Did you come here to make sure I was where I was supposed to be, sir?"

"Don't be provoking, Judith."

"I don't mean to be provoking," she protested, all innocence. "But it's only natural, when you do something so out of character, I should look for a reason."

"I came to find you," he said.

"To check up on me," she declared with a triumphant nod.

"Don't put words into my mouth," he said. "I came to find you."

"But surely it comes to the same thing. You wanted to make sure I wasn't doing something I shouldn't be."

"Well, you'll certainly think twice another time if the urge to misbehave does hit you," he remarked. "Since you won't know whether I'm likely to turn up or not."

Judith was for a moment silenced, then suddenly she began to laugh. "I do believe we're quarreling," she observed with satisfaction. "I knew it couldn't be long."

"Hornet!" He led her out of the dance.

"Shall we go home?"

"An admirable idea." He steered her across the room, one flat palm in the small of her back.

"Good evening, Lady Carrington, Marcus… Permit me to offer my felicitations. I would have done so earlier, but Barret was kept in the country with a touch of the gout and we've only just returned to town."

Lady Barret materialized in their path, extending her hand to Judith as she smiled at Marcus. "This wretched war," she murmured. "It played havoc with one's social life. Everyone disappeared to Brussels."

"Hardly everyone," Marcus demurred, letting his hand fall from Judith's back and lifting Lady Barret's to his lips.

"Well, now that the ogre is safely put away on that island, it's to be hoped life can go back to normal." Lady Barret shuddered delicately.

"The war lasted fifteen years," Judith remarked into the air. "Peace is hardly the normal condition."

Agnes's smile froze and her eyes seemed to shrink to mere pinpricks in her suddenly sharpened face. She laughed, a harsh sound like breaking glass. "How true, my dear Lady Carrington. Such a sharp wit you have."

Judith felt that strange aura again and the unmistakable conviction that Agnes Barret was a dangerous woman to cross. She forced a smile to her lips. "I meant no discourtesy, ma'am. But the world has been at war throughout most of my life, so perhaps I see it from a different perspective."

Agnes's eyes narrowed at this reference to their differing ages. "I hope I may call upon you, Lady Carrington," she said coldly as Marcus eased his wife away.

"I should be honored," Judith said distantly.

At the door, Judith halted and looked over her shoulder. Agnes Barret was in close conversation with Bernard Melville. They reminded her of a pair of hooded cobras, touching tongues. A shudder of revulsion ripped through her.

"What's troubling you, Judith?" Marcus asked softly. "You're wound as tight as a coiled spring. And you were unpardonably rude."

"I know. It's something about that woman." She shrugged. "Never mind. I'm just being fanciful." She moved to the staircase.

"Oh, Judith, are you leaving?" Charlie appeared from the shadows of a doorway on the landing, and Judith wondered why she felt he'd been lying in wait for them. He ducked his head at her and addressed his cousin, but without looking at him. "Marcus… could you spare me a few minutes tomorrow… a matter of some urgency?"

"I'm always available for you, Charlie," Marcus said evenly. "Shall we say at around noon, if that will suit you?"

"Yes… yes, that'll be fine." Two bright spots of color burned on his cheekbones. "I'll see you then… uh… Judith, good night." With a jerky bob, he kissed her cheek and then turned and disappeared rapidly into the salon.

"Damn young fool," Marcus observed without heat.

"Why, what's happened?"

"He's in dun territory again. Up to his ears in gaming debts and he's going to want me to advance him the money to settle them. He doesn't know I know it, of course."

"And how do you know it?"

He looked down at her in some surprise. "Charlie's my ward, Judith. Not much happens in his life that I don't know about. He's my responsibility."

"And you take your responsibilities very seriously," she mused. Marcus might be a strict guardian, but he was a very caring one.

"Yes, I do," he said. "And don't you ever forget it, madam wife."

"Autocrat," she threw at him over her shoulder, but she was feeling too much in charity with him to take up the cudgels with any seriousness.

It was near dawn when Marcus went to his own bed, reflecting that if they continued to burn the candle at both ends in this fashion, they would need a repairing lease in the country before the Season was half done.

He awoke when Cheveley drew back the curtains on a brilliant sunny morning. Marcus flung aside the covers and stood up, stretching. "My dressing gown, Cheveley."

The valet held the brocade dressing gown for him. Tying the cord at his waist, Marcus strolled into his wife's apartment. "Good morning, lynx."

Judith was sitting up in bed, her copper hair tumbling against the piled white pillows. A tray of hot chocolate and sweet biscuits was on the bedside table, and her knees were lost beneath a cloud of prettily penned papers.

"Good morning, Marcus." She smiled at him over the rim of her cup of chocolate, thinking how pleasant it was to be at peace with her husband.

"You have a host of admirers, it seems." He bent to kiss the tip of her nose and picked up a handful of the billets-doux, letting them fall back to the bed in a shower. "And a nosegay." The little twist of violets in a chased silver holder lay beside the chocolate pot on the table. He glanced at the card and his face darkened.

"Gracemere. You must have made a significant impression on him last evening."

Judith inclined her head in vague acknowledgment. "He writes very pretty cards, at all events. And the violets are so delicate."

"I don't think it right for you to receive such gifts, Judith."

Judith sat back against her pillows, remembering for the first time that strange tension between the two men. "In general, or Gracemere in particular?"

He shrugged. "Does it matter?"

"I think it does, sir. It's perfectly normal for a woman to receive such little attentions."

Marcus said nothing, turning instead to walk over to the window, looking out at the square. A group of children under the eye of a nursemaid were playing ball in the railed garden in the center.

"You don't like Gracemere, do you?" It seemed to Judith that the matter had better be brought into the open quickly.

"No, Judith, I do not. And you must understand that I will not have the man under my roof under any circumstances."

"May I ask why?" Her fingers restlessly pleated the coverlet as she tried to see a way through this unexpected tangle.

"You may ask, but I can't give you an answer. The issue is perfectly simple: you may not count Gracemere among your friends." His voice was level, almost expressionless, as he remained looking down at the children in the square. But he wasn't seeing them. He was seeing Martha as she had been that morning ten years before. His fist clenched and he could almost feel again the cool silver handle of his horse whip nestling in his palm.

Judith frowned at her husband's back. "Oh, no, my lord, it's not that simple," she said in soft anger. "You cannot issue such a command without a reason."

Marcus turned from the window. "I can, Judith, and I have," he stated flatly. "And I expect you to comply." He gestured to the pile of correspondence on the bed and softened his tone. "You have so many friends… one less can make little difference."

Judith thought rapidly. It was a damnably unexpected complication, but it was vital that Gracemere should not become a bone of contention between herself and Marcus. If she threw down the glove, Marcus would definitely pick it up, and there was no knowing to what length he would go to keep her away from her quarry. No… instead of defiance she must lull him into inattention. Gracemere would have to be cultivated out of eyesight and earshot of her husband.

"I have a suggestion to make," she said in a bland voice, as if the previous conversation had not taken place.

Marcus, on his guard at this sudden change of tone, raised his eyebrows slightly but said nothing.

"Supposing you asked me to do you a favor," Judith continued in a musing, conversational manner, playing idly with a copper ringlet on her shoulder. "Supposing you said To please me, my dear wife, would you mind very much avoiding Gracemere like the plague?" A delicately arched eyebrow rose in quizzical inquiry as she regarded her husband's set face, the taut line of his mouth.

Surprise jumped into his eyes, followed immediately by comprehension, and then his mouth curved in a slow smile. "Point taken, madam wife," he said softly. "But I think I can improve on your suggestion." He left her and went into his own apartment, returning after a minute with a bulky parcel.

He came up to the bed, to where she lay against the pillows, barely able to contain her curiosity. "What is it?"

"A present," he said with a smile, carefully placing the parcel on the bed. "I've been waiting for a suitable moment to give it to you. Now seems like the moment."

"It's a bribe!" Judith said on a peal of laughter, eagerly pulling at the string. "Shameless! You would buy my compliance."

Marcus chuckled, entranced by her gleeful excitement-like a child on Christmas morning, he thought. It occurred to him that an impoverished, helter-skelter childhood wouldn't have included too many presents. The thought produced an unfamiliar tug of tenderness as he took deep pleasure in her delight.

"Oh, Marcus, it's beautiful," she breathed, tearing off the wrapping to reveal a massive slab of checkered marble. The black squares were almost indigo, the white a translucent ivory. Almost reverently she opened the box containing the chess pieces, heavy, beautifully sculptured marble figures. Her eyes shining, she held the board on her knees and set up the pieces.

"It's not a bribe," Marcus said softly, watching her. "It's a gift with no strings attached."

She looked up and smiled at him. "Thank you."

"And now," he said, bending over her, catching her chin with his forefinger. "Will you do me that favor?"

"You had only to ask, "she responded with an air of mock dignity.

She fell back on the pillows under the press of his body, the chess pieces scattering in the folds of the coverlet as he brought his mouth to hers. As she fumbled with the tie of his robe, pushing her hands beneath the material to find his skin, she quieted her conscience with the thought that Marcus would ultimately benefit from her plan to best Gracemere.