An Untitled Lady: A Novel Read online

  Suddenly, she realized she’d left herself open to ruin, as well. Here she was, alone and unchaperoned, in this towering wreck of a house. If she did not marry, she’d be seen as a lightskirt by anyone who mattered.

  Perhaps a male might escape it, as Nash Quinn had. A grown female who left here alone was ruined, and one who stayed was ruined, as well. And a female who was rejected was ruined. Simply being a female seemed guaranteed to lead to ruin.

  Who else would want a lady who knew everything about Shaftsbury, and nowhere else? Who couldn’t sew a proper sampler? Who read Latin but couldn’t make her hair bundle itself neatly? And who had few relations and precious little money to her name?

  She must make this work. She must convince this flighty new earl to keep his family’s promise. Surely he would do his duty.

  Maddie closed the trunk lid and pushed back the chair. She stood on jellied legs, willing her spine to firm. Grinding her jaw, she headed back into the lion’s den.

  * * * *

  Discovering a small bottle of rum in the bottom-most desk drawer, Nash took a swig. “This is all the earl’s doing.”

  “I’m the earl, boy,” Deacon growled in a fair, if higher-pitched, mimicking of their father. “And hand that bottle over.” Draped against the back of the chair, legs outstretched, he took a longer draft, and then lurched up, sputtering.

  “Is this Navy swill? It’s undrinkable.”

  “Give it back then. I’ve had worse.”

  Instead, Deacon tried a smaller sip, to the same effect, and reluctantly gave up the bottle. “S’wounds! I see it now. The old toad did set this up. He used to say, ‘You’ll marry at twenty-five, boy, and give me a son by twenty-eight.’ Think the lady has the same deadline?”

  “Expect so.”

  “But why hasn’t Wetherby said anything about it? He has plenty to say on most everything else. His own niece.”

  Cecil Lowe, the Viscount Wetherby, had stepped into the breach left by their father’s death, but he was a piss-poor mentor to the new one. Nash wondered why. The old man had never cared for Wetherby. “We’ll know soon enough. The sot must be coming tonight.”

  “He likes you. But he told me yesterday he had a score to settle up north somewhere. Something about the quality of the help. Sometimes, I think he brings it on himself.”

  At least Deacon did not subscribe to all Wetherby’s failings. Wetherby was a beautiful creature and nice in manner, but a menace to his tenants and a danger to the well-being of his estates. That’s what comes when the second son inherits, his father would have said. Nash, also a second son, bristled, just as his father always intended. “You know they never can control their passions,” the old man would say, another twist of the blade.

  Deacon fell back against the chair. Nash would never have dreamed of sitting so slack in his father’s presence. He wondered if he could do it even now. “This started out so well. I thought she was with you. You need a soft hand and tender heart to look after you.”

  That was the last thing Nash needed.

  Deacon draped a hand over his brows. “Let’s just hand her over to Wetherby. He’ll have to take her, family obligation and all.”

  “Wetherby’s no good. What would he do with a young miss?”

  “You, then. She says she knows book-keeping. You might hire her, and give me my Perkins back.”

  “You made him cry.”

  “I’m sure you’ve toughened him up by now. Or living in that sooted-up town has.” At the sound of the door opening, Deacon turned his head. “Just such a good citizen appears. Evening, Heywood.”

  “My daughter has the vapors, your mother is at her most shrill, and Cook is raging that our seating is delayed. Sounds like I missed the party.” William Heywood, the family barrister, took up the chair that Miss Wetherby had earlier graced.

  “Another ghost from the past.” Deacon raised his glass to the man. “Shall others appear? The weather is appropriate enough.”

  “A promise is a promise. Especially to your father, may he rest in peace.”

  “If only he would. Ellspeth is on the mend?” Deacon couldn’t have sounded less interested.

  “I expect so. But she’s taken some sort of fright, and won’t be down for supper.”

  “So we’re odd-numbered at table. No wonder Mama is agog.”

  “Should be even enough. Wetherby rode in just ahead of me.” Heywood shook his head, spreading rainwater from his sideburns across his lap. “The man’s a menace. Filling the generals’ ears with imaginary terrors.” He looked at Nash. “And you are not much better.”

  “I am fomenting riot?” Then Nash remembered. A magistrate’s meeting had been called for this afternoon. But a mislaid shipment of cotton had nearly stalled production at Malbanks mill, and he’d had to scramble to make good. He couldn’t afford to lose a single customer in this economy. He had completely forgotten the meeting.

  “Your voice was sorely missed. Is that brandy?” Heywood looked at the bottle hopefully.

  Nash handed him the bottle and another glass from the drawer. “Piss water. So, they agreed to solicit for special constables?”

  “A new army?” Deacon’s delight did not spread to the others.

  “As if a collection of rabid innkeepers and shop owners can keep the peace,” Heywood said. “On horses, no less.”

  “Stupid enough,” Nash agreed, “and dangerous. But I doubt it was such an even polling that my voice would have made a difference.”

  “You carry more influence than you think. Damn, this is pig swill.” Heywood drained the glass but didn’t pour another.

  “Don’t worry. Mama serves better at table.”

  “Thank you for that, my young lord. No, the bill you would have prevented, Nash my boy, is the ban on singing.”

  Deacon laughed. “Too many flat sopranos at church?”

  “No, the cathedrals are safe, for the moment. But anyone out in the streets who engages in ‘debauched’ singing is fair game.”

  “Pray, how does one debauch a song?” Deacon said.

  “Deliver it with an ironical tone. Or change the words to call for reform.”

  Nash snorted. “Now I’m doubly sorry I failed to remember. They’ve gone far enough. I won’t miss any more meetings.”

  “I made sure of it. I named you to our new select committee. After Oldham, we need a tight group that can act fast and see sense. You’re the new committee secretary, boy, so you’d damned well better be there.”

  “Our Nash, a politico?” Deacon fanned his face. “But won’t they eat him? He’s only been in the town for two years.”

  “Long enough,” Nash growled. “And by the way, how are you managing with the estates?”

  “And how is that fine French silk of yours selling? Mama says we might all be wearing mauve this season, thanks to you.”

  “Boys, boys,” Heywood waved a hand. “Don’t dirty your outfits before the party.”

  A servant announced that supper was served. Nash jumped up to help Heywood rise from the chair. “This new girl. Did she collapse as well, or will I see her at supper?”

  Deacon waved his hand. “It’s nothing. Just some scarecrow my pater fixed on to set me on the marrying path.”

  “Homely, then? Ellspeth shouldn’t mind that.”

  “Rather lovely, in fact, in the Saxon way,” Deacon said.

  “And she’s a complete stranger?”

  “Not exactly.” Nash held the door to let the older man pass. “She’s a Wetherby.”

  Heywood stopped cold. “Not the Wetherby chit. I thought your father had forgotten her years ago. The idiocy of the peerage is only overshadowed by the idiocy of the people.”

  “You know her?”

  “We’ll see soon enough.”

  * * * *

  “Is that the correspondence?”

  Mr. Quinn’s voice, echoing down the receiving room, did not sound ill. His face expressed irritation, perhaps, but not hostility. But Maddie reacted to his ques
tion with a lurch in her chest.

  “May I have them?” He held out his hand.

  She clutched the letters tighter. “Will they be safe?”

  “To be sure.” This time, his odd smile did not relieve her.

  “These letters are everything to me.”

  “I do understand, Miss Wetherby. And we share an aim—we would both see my brother wed and the estate under better management. But if it will put your mind at ease I give you my word: No harm will come to them.”

  She willed herself to meet his reach and loosened her fingertips, one by one, to give them over. She knew it wasn’t true, but it felt as if she were giving away the former earl’s friendship into the hands of others who might not treasure it as she did. But that was nonsense. Hadn’t she nearly memorized their contents? And wasn’t friendship in the heart, not on flimsy pages?

  When he took them from her she felt a whisper of relief. At last, she wasn’t carrying this weight alone. But when he handed them directly to the butler, she thought she might faint.

  “Don’t look so frightened. They’ll be safer in the library. No crumbs.”

  She stared at him, startled. A joke? His smile lifted a bit higher on the right than the left. She tried to match it, but her lips were less biddable than her fingers.

  He’d met her at the door as she re-entered the reception room. This time, she took in more of the furnishings, as well as the people. Fragile Louis XIV settees fought for purchase on the medieval slate floor, while drapery twice as long as her bed tried to tame the windows, if not the stormy dark beyond. Wax candles on nearly every surface succeeded at holding the night at bay, at least in the lower half of the room.

  Two older men in addition to the golden-haired Lord Shaftsbury flanked a petite, ornamented dumpling of good breeding. None wore even the ghost of a smile. This was worse than the interview at the agricultural college.

  Mr. Quinn must have sensed her anxiety, for he took her arm to draw her toward the fireplace. The simple gesture somehow calmed her, and her small smile of greeting was genuine.

  The lady before her matched her affect. Lady Shaftsbury was blond like her eldest son, and blue-eyed, but the children must have come by their length of limb from their father’s family, for she was as tiny as a second-form girl.

  “Miss Wetherby, I am delighted to meet you.” At Maddie’s look of surprise, she continued. “We thought you were dead, didn’t we?”

  Maddie could only stare at her. Lord Shaftsbury trilled a laugh, breaking her stupor. She quickly made her curtsey, but her conversation lagged. “Dead?” she managed to croak out.

  “George had stopped speaking of you, you know, and he didn’t mention it on his deathbed.”

  “But he did speak to you of it.” Did Mr. Quinn’s warm baritone hold a trace of irritation?

  “It was so long ago, dear. Deacon was away at school, so at least five years now.”

  “And what did he say, Mama?” Lord Shaftsbury sounded almost interested.

  “Oh, ‘the young Wetherby’ this, ‘the young Wetherby’ that, that sort of thing.”

  “Nothing about this plan?” Mr. Quinn had voiced Maddie’s question aloud.

  “He would never share his plans with me. He had his dratted will for that.” Her eyes darkened for a moment, and then she seemed to recover herself. “You’re a lovely thing. Introductions? Here is William Heywood, the oldest friend of our bereaved family. Oldest living, that is. And of course you know your uncle. You must be so eager to reacquaint yourselves.”

  If Lord Shaftsbury was a golden child, all blond and blue eyed, Lord Wetherby, was his dark doppelganger, with his Byronic locks and nearly black eyes. And where the earl might be mistaken for a puppy, this man would never stoop to such playfulness. He was not as toweringly tall as she remembered, but the rest was the same. Maddie’s hand went to her throat, touching the gold-bead necklace she always wore. A gift from her father, she had had to have it extended as she grew. Her pulse raced under her skin at the hollow of her neck.

  The man nodded gracefully but slightly, his thin lips pursed in the perfect aristocratic bow. Maddie executed a fully proper curtsey. As she sank down, she imagined how a knight must feel kneeling before his liege lord, exposing his neck for praise or death. Her uncle appeared the ultimate gentleman, but her senses were on fire with fear. Why on earth was she being so fanciful?

  “Little Maddie. How you’ve grown.”

  His mild words shot through her veins like poison.

  Heat flooded Maddie’s face, as if all her blood had fled to the top of her head. Just as fast, it was gone, leaving her eyes out of focus and her head too light. She fought for balance, swaying slightly. “Uncle.”

  She felt the disapproval of his gaze. Panic nearly overwhelmed her, weighting her legs down with lead. He couldn’t hurt her now, here, could he?

  Lady Shaftsbury clapped twice. “Let us go in, now we are all here.” She held her arm to Mr. Heywood.

  Lord Shaftsbury took her uncle’s arm, leaving Mr. Quinn to escort her. “You make quite the impression on your little niece.”

  “She always was a timid little mouse,” drawled the dark man.

  * * * *

  Nash had never seen such a deadly reaction to the fop that was Lord Wetherby. By the time they reached the hall, Miss Wetherby could barely stand.

  Nash bid her sit in one of the seats for the older footman. “You’re choking your air.”

  “What is that?” she choked out.

  “Trouble breathing. Lean as forward as you can.” Louder, he said, “Dashed corsets. I don’t know why you women insist on strapping yourselves like sausages.”

  He told the nearest footman to fetch a glass of water. Crouching down beside the chair, he took her wrist as if to take her pulse. He knew already from the flush on her face and upper chest it was racing. Instead, he used his thumb to brush the pulse point at her wrist. She jerked back, her gaze flashing to his. But soon enough, the tension in the corners of her mouth eased, and she could sit without swaying. She pulled her hand away with a sniff, a sure sign she was returning to form.

  She closed her eyes and took a slow breath. “I apologize, Mr. Quinn. I’m fine, truly. It’s been a long trip, and I’ve thought about—dreamt about—this meeting for so long that when it happened I was overcome. That and the trouble with Lord Shaftsbury. And everything so muddled.”

  It sounded plausible, but it was not true. He felt it.

  “Miss Wetherby, a mouse?”

  She didn’t open her eyes. “I was the one who had to chase the mouse out of the girls’ room at school. But he’s right. I’ve always been frightened of him.”

  “Fear doesn’t need to be rational to be real.” He heard his mother’s voice ordering people about in the dining room and frowned. “Perhaps it was the corset.”

  She rose carefully. “We mustn’t dally.”

  “You don’t need to impress him. Lord Wetherby may be Deacon’s false lieutenant, but he’s not ours.”

  “Let us see,” she said, leaning a bit more on his arm than proper.

  { 4 }

  Instead of the slightly warmer dining salon, Mama had set this meal in the echo chamber of the banqueting hall. Elaborate place settings for the six of them looked a forlorn hope against the long stretch of the scored oak trestle that their medieval forebears had supped on.

  In this setting, the socially preferred even seating looked wrong. Deacon took the head, his back to the open-grated maw of a fireplace. To be proper, Mama should take the opposite end, but as it was six yards away, she wisely chose conversation over propriety. She sat at Deacon’s right, along the length of the trestle, with Wetherby on her right. Heywood had Deacon’s left, with two place settings beside him. Six candelabra illuminated the expanse of empty ebony wood after that.

  Nash escorted Miss Wetherby to the seat next to Heywood, and sat himself on the rump seat. Not surprising that he would have to cede his place to the older man, but in a setting so obviousl
y designed to recall the lineage and greatness of the Shaftsburys, even to using the heavy cutlery, it stung. That he would not need to avoid observing Ellspeth Heywood’s moon-eyes at his brother all meal long was small consolation. He sent a silent plea to the gods of hospitality; let it be a short meal, not one of those four-hour monstrosities.

  He did feel the blow to Miss Wetherby’s aspirations, though. She should have been seated nearest Deacon; even Ellspeth could have claimed that position. What with the unhappy carriage ride, the shock of arrival, and now this, he nearly felt sorry for her. But she played the role of the martyred lady too coldly for his taste.

  Still, her panic in the sitting room felt real enough. He expected that ladies like her did not often face back-to-back set-downs. So often in calm waters, perhaps they did not know how to roll with its swells.

  Heywood cleared his throat, startling the servant setting his soup before him. “Now that you are an earl in truth and the King’s law, Shaftsbury, do you show yourself at Lords this year?”

  “I think not. You do not, do you, Wetherby?”

  “Might be time. With all this hubbub about the country, it might do well to give a speech or two. Get your name in the dailies as a supporter of the crown.”

  Nash had never liked Wetherby, but he had to admit the man defined elegant, every bit the gentleman. He’d ridden from Wetherby in that Corinthian cravat and high-pointed green jacket, and took table better than even Mama. Perhaps he resented the man only because he was a second son, made whole by the death of his brother, Miss Wetherby’s father.

  On the other hand, Wetherby obviously had not been magnanimous in victory. He hadn’t settled a fair dowry on the lady, as he should have done. Will and testament or no, she was family. Small wonder the lady, so round-eyed and attentive, shuttered her gaze when it passed over her uncle. As the Wetherbys sat directly across from each other, she spent most of the meal looking up the table. Nash most often had a view of the graceful curve of her neck, and a tawny curl that had escaped to dance along its length.

  They weren’t through the fish course before talk turned to deeper politics.