Abandoned to the Prodigal, page 23
“I thought I was saving you!” she cried.
Dan was enchanted. He closed his free arm around her. “You did, you are.”
“No, I almost got you killed instead! And now I’ve struck you for my own idiocy, and you’ll hate me, and I’ll never—”
He stopped all that by simply capturing her mouth once more. Which at least seemed to convince her that he was not angry.
Ames uttered a snort of disgust. “You’ll spread colds and diseases of all kinds.”
Dan drew back to stare at him. “You’re worried I’ll get a cold when you just tried to shoot me?”
“That’s the third time.” Ames sighed. “The first time, I didn’t really try very hard, wasn’t sure I wanted to do it. But even so, you have the luck of the devil.”
“Why?” Juliet demanded helplessly. “Why do you want him dead?”
“Hugh,” he said simply. “I don’t have very much, let Hugh run through what little there was… Thought old Miserly would leave him at least something, but I soon saw the way the wind was blowing. The old man loves you.” He gave Dan a smile that was incongruously sweet from a man who had tried several times to kill him. “As I love Hugh. I don’t have long for this world. It’s time for me to face the clouds and stay away… And then who will look after Hugh? I had to do it first.”
“Hugh is six-and-twenty years old,” Dan pointed out, “Don’t you think he can shift for himself?”
“Didn’t work so well for you, did it?” Ames said, quite without anger. “Until the old man decided to favor you. I think it’s time to go. Tell Hugh…”
“You can tell Hugh,” Dan said, taking his arm and beginning to walk.
Ames frowned at him. “Aren’t you taking me to the magistrate?”
“To charge you with what? Being a rotten shot? Aiming at an empty and already destroyed hat?”
“Or putting rat poison in the mushrooms?” Juliet said severely.
Ames sighed. “A moment of madness. I picked up the tin someone had left in the back hall, put some in my snuff box. No one noticed at the table when I tipped it into the mushrooms. Dan didn’t even eat them.”
“Susan the maid did,” Dan said shortly.
“Oh,” He looked quite alarmed. “Is she…is she dead?”
“No, but it was close,” Dan said.
“Madness,” Ames murmured. “It’s the clouds. Can’t think straight. But I’m glad she didn’t die.”
Which left him ambiguous at best about Dan’s survival. They walked on in silence as Dan tried to come to terms with the danger lurking beneath his uncle’s vagueness.
“You will look after Hugh and Hetty, won’t you?” Ames said suddenly.
Dan stared at him. “Why the devil didn’t you ask me that before all this…palaver?”
Ames shrugged. “Didn’t know you and didn’t like you much. Didn’t think you would share. Perhaps I was wrong.”
“You were wrong,” Juliet said fiercely. “Very wrong.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Juliet’s bolt to the house of her father’s enemy gave Lord Barden the clue that she would not be so easily managed as he had assumed. Therefore, he rose early in order to accompany Cosland in retrieving her and was glad to find the earl alone in the breakfast room.
“I want the matter dealt with as speedily as possible,” he told the earl briskly. “I have already spent more time than I had intended on this matter. Therefore, I shall accompany you to Myerly, and I have taken the liberty of sending my man to your vicar with instructions to meet us there.”
Cosland blinked. “I’m not sure instruction is the correct way to deal with a respected clergyman like Mr. Coates. I do know that even more piling into his home will arouse the ire of Lord Myerly. He will be angry enough to see me.”
“His sister told me he was bedridden,” Barden said carelessly. “He need not see any of us.”
Cosland paused. “Sir, I do not think it advisable that you accompany us. It was largely because of you that my daughter fled in the first place. Your presence will merely make the matter more difficult.”
“We are agreed it was your handling of her that caused her to bolt,” Barden retorted. “Thus, forcing my hand. Most men would withdraw an offer of marriage after such a vulgar start, particularly considering she is already ruined. I, however, am still prepared to take the girl on the conditions we agreed, providing it is done today.”
Cosland’s face spasmed.
Which warmed Barden’s heart. He had waited a long time to insult the proud aristocrat who had cost him everything. He rubbed salt in the wound. “I brought a special license from London. If you can control her, she may stay with you until my return from Cheshire, by which time I shall expect our business arrangements to be complete.”
“You are running ahead of yourself,” Cosland said abruptly. “My daughter has not yet chosen, and Catesby also wishes to press his suit.”
Barden laughed. “I trust he knows there will no saving the reputation of his would-be wife. Without me, she will not be received in society. People will snigger behind their hands as he walks past, the husband of a—but there,” he finished hastily, catching the murderous glint in Cosland’s eye, “you understand me perfectly.”
“I do,” Cosland said grimly. “And it’s my belief that if she chooses Catesby, the power of the Alfords and the Coslands will easily counter your vulgar innuendo. Particularly once we prove you placed that disgusting piece in the newspaper.”
“But I didn’t,” Barden said amiably. “I learned a lot, made a lot of useful…acquaintances in my years of servitude to His Highness. You will find me above suspicion.”
“The Regent’s snake is above no suspicion,” Cosland snapped, though before Barden could do more than flush with anger at the insulting nickname, he rose to his feet, holding up one hand as though to prevent a tirade. “However, I have said I will allow her to choose between you, and I will. But Barden? If she chooses you, you will treat her with the respect due to her birth and rank, or I will tear you down at any cost. If you insist on coming, we leave in ten minutes.”
“We” turned out to be not only the earl but the countess. And Jeremy Catesby.
“There is no point in your going,” Barden said irritably as he came face to face with his rival in the carriage. “I have a special license and mean to marry her immediately.”
“What you mean may not matter to Juliet,” Catesby said with an oddly deprecating laugh. “At least I know I have behaved badly.”
“We have all behaved badly,” Lady Cosland uttered. “The test now is if we can manage better.” She did not look at her husband as she spoke, but it was he who bit his lip.
Oh, yes, the matter needed to be finished today before the earl got cold feet and Barden lost any control. It struck him he had allowed triumph to get in the way of the cold good sense that had first formulated his plan. He had made mistakes in dealing with both the earl and his daughter. But he held the special license, and he undoubtedly held the upper hand still. The girl would choose him. There was no other viable choice.
Besides, he would make it easy for her. He could be conciliatory when he chose.
It was not a long journey to Myerly. The house unnerved him slightly because of its general air of neglect and several windows appeared to be shuttered.
“Good God,” he murmured. “Why did she come here?”
“To annoy me,” Cosland said without heat. He alighted first and handed down his wife.
The place hardly looked as if it was used to receiving visitors, and yet the door was opened almost immediately after Cosland’s sharp rap.
An elderly butler gazed at them. He did not seem surprised but bowed without immediately standing back to admit them. “My lord.”
“Good morning, Griffin. I imagine his lordship is at home if he is able or chooses to receive us. But it is my daughter I’ve come to see.”
That didn’t seem to surprise the butler either. He sighed and stood back, opening the door wide. Lady Cosland sailed in, and the others followed.
The ancient butler closed the door and tottered toward a door on the right of the entrance hall. “Please follow me, and I shall inform the ladies.”
“Lady Juliet, if you please,” Cosland reminded him.
The old man bowed and opened the door to a musty-smelling room. The shutters were still closed, letting in a few beams of sunlight through the cracks. While the butler retreated, a middle-aged footman entered and opened the shutters.
“Why would she come here?” Catesby asked uneasily. “How could she live like this?”
“Oh, it isn’t all this bad,” a vaguely familiar lady said, bustling into the room. “I’m so sorry they put you in here. It is the reception room, but as you see, there hasn’t been much call for it. Come up to the drawing room.”
“Jenny—Mrs. Stewart,” the earl said, striding up to her. “Where is my daughter?”
“I have sent for her,” Mrs. Stewart assured him.
“Why did you not tell us she was here?” the earl burst out.
Mrs. Stewart glanced ruefully from him to his wife. “I’m sorry. I can only imagine your anxiety, but she assured us she had left you a note to say she was safe. She asked us particularly not to inform you, and to be frank, I was afraid she would bolt again if we insisted. She was…upset when she arrived, and I for one thought you would rather she stayed here than went anywhere else less…safe.”
“You were right,” Lady Cosland said, following her from the room while Barden and the others trailed after her. “Thank you for looking after our daughter.”
“Actually, it has been a pleasure, although she has been looking after us. We had something of a household emergency last night, and Juliet was most helpful.”
“Myerly?” Cosland asked quickly.
“No, no, one of the maids. My father appears to be indestructible.”
“He won’t like you receiving me,” Cosland warned.
Jenny laughed. “Then he has changed his tune since the last time we discussed it.”
Barden neither understood this sally, nor cared to, but it caused the earl to emit a bark of laughter, and the countess to cast a sour glance at Mrs. Stewart.
In the drawing room, which was at least clean if faded, they discovered Mrs. Stewart’s sisters and the stiffly upright Colin Cornwell, all of whom Barden knew slightly from London as well as the dinner at Hornby. They all looked anxious and embarrassed, and Cornwell, who bowed very low, said in a rush, “I hope you know, my lord, that keeping Lady Juliet’s presence here from you was at no point my idea. Nor did it have my app—”
“Content yourself,” Cosland interrupted wryly. “I know full well whose idea it was.”
An elderly maid stood in the doorway, panting slightly. “Lady Juliet’s not in her chamber, ma’am. Nor with Susan.”
“Oh.” Mrs. Stewart seemed genuinely surprised. “Perhaps she has gone for a walk with Dan and the dog. She will be back directly. Are they making tea, Betty?”
“If they’ve gone for a walk,” Cornwell said grimly from the window, “they haven’t taken the dog. It’s digging up a tree in the garden.”
How would you tell? Barden wondered with amusement as he glanced at the window and the wilderness beyond.
“Oh, no, they haven’t gone together,” Mrs. Ames pronounced in her irritatingly nervous way, clutching at the shawls, which fell continuously from her arms and shoulders. “Dan went early, if you recall, to meet with Patrick—the Myerly steward, you know—and I did see Lady Juliet in the garden after breakfast. Playing with the dog.”
Why did people keep harping on about the dog?
Cornwell frowned. “Why didn’t Dan take the dog? He always takes him when he’s tramping the estate.”
“Oh, no,” Mrs. Cornwell blurted, exchanging glances with her sisters and then gazing at Lady Cosland. “He wouldn’t have.”
“Wouldn’t have what?” Mrs. Stewart asked with a hint of irritation.
“If Juliet isn’t in the garden, where is she? Why did neither of them take the dog? What if they have…?”
“Eloped?” Mrs. Ames said in horror.
“Oh, don’t be ridiculous!” Mrs. Stewart uttered. “Dan would not elope with her!”
“Well, he was clearly making up to her,” Cornwell retorted with more than a hit of bitterness.
“You are thinking of yourself there, I think!” Mrs. Stewart shot back.
“I find it offensive,” Lady Cosland interrupted, “that you assume my daughter would elope with anyone. I understand from my younger daughter that Juliet considers this young man a friend.”
“They are friends,” Mrs. Stewart agreed cordially. “And neither has the reason nor the character for elopement.”
“Ha!” uttered a cadaverous old gentleman shuffling into the room with an ancient valet at his side, bearing two cushions and a bottle of smelling salts. “What on earth makes you imagine that? Dan’s your son, isn’t he? Handsome young devil, too. Wouldn’t be surprised if the ladies didn’t take a shine to him.” He looked directly at Lord Cosland and smiled. “Your girl certainly did.”
Cosland took one step toward him, then seemed to remember himself and bowed jerkily. Barden didn’t blame him for the stiffness. All this talk of elopement was making him uneasy, too.
“I hope you forgive the intrusion,” Cosland said frostily. “I have to thank you for caring for my daughter, but we have come to take her home.”
“If they can find her,” Barden couldn’t help murmuring.
One would have assumed such an old gentleman to be deaf, but apparently, he was not, for he turned at once on Barden. “Who the devil are you?”
“Papa,” Mrs. Cornwell protested in clear embarrassment. “This is Lord Barden.”
“Lady Juliet’s betrothed,” Barden said, bowing gracefully.
The old man’s eyes widened gratifyingly.
“Allow me to preset Lady Cosland,” the earl added, “and Mr. Catesby.”
“Catesby?” Myerly pounced. “Alford’s boy? Weren’t you engaged to the girl, too?”
“Yes,” Catesby admitted, tilting up his chin. “And I have hopes she will still marry me.”
“Bah,” Barden said derisively.
Lord Myerly admitted a crack of laughter. “Well, looks like you’re both too late if she’s off to the border with Dan.”
“She is not off to the border with Dan!” Mrs. Stewart exclaimed. “How can you even think such a thing?”
“Because you did it, of course,” the old man snapped.
“I had no choice,” Mrs. Stewart claimed. “Dan has every choice.”
“And perhaps, it’s not marriage he has in mind,” Barden said nastily, for he already disliked this so-called friend.
“Best run off after them, then,” Myerly snarled unexpectedly. “No one wants you here, and I’d quite like Dan to punch you in the nose, even if I’m not there to see it.”
Mrs. Stewart made a strangled sound in her throat, which she turned into a cough, just as the elderly maid and footman carried in tea trays.
“Tea,” she said shakily. “Thank goodness. Please, sit down…”
Just as things were easing back into tense civility with the pouring and receiving of tea, someone else wandered into the room. Hugh Ames, who fancied himself a dandy and had excruciating taste. This morning, his coat was pink, and it quite clearly caused a spasm to cross his grandfather’s face.
However, he looked preoccupied, and his eyebrows shot up to see so many people in the room. He bowed with his usual flourish. “Enchanted, enchanted,” he exclaimed. “But no, I don’t believe I will have tea, Aunt Jenny. I just thought my father was in here?”
“Oh, no,” Mrs. Ames said, looking guilty for some reason. “I have not seen him since breakfast. I thought he was with you.”
“For God’s sake, who cares?” Lord Myerly interrupted, and Barden tended to agree with the sentiment. “He’s a grown man, isn’t he? Let him off the leash!”
After a faintly nervous glance at his grandfather, Hugh returned his gaze to his mother. “I fell asleep,” he admitted. “Bit of a disturbed night, with one thing and another. I’ll just head off and look for him.”
“No need,” Cornwell said abruptly from the window. A look of profound relief covered his face. “He’s just come back with Daniel and Lady Juliet.”
Barden did his best to hide his own relief. They had almost had him believing in this ridiculous elopement. But the girl was not a fool. She would not elope with a nobody.
“They’re in the garden,” Hugh Ames said, having walked over to join his cousin. “Playing with that monster Dan insists is a mere dog. Perhaps I shall have a cup of tea, Aunt.”
“They’re not bringing the animal into the house, are they?” Colin said in obvious alarm.
“Why shouldn’t they?” Lord Myerly demanded, presumably from sheer devilment. “I already told Dan he could, if he keeps it under control.”
They must have come into the house with a key, for Barden heard no knocking, no creaking of ancient footsteps before bright laughing voices and the quick clip-clip of a dog’s claws on the wooden floor.
“Griffin, is my cousin Hugh about?” called a young man.
“In the drawing room, sir. But, sir, my lady, you should know—” The butler clearly meant to warn them about the visitors, but with the impetuosity of youth or sheer foolishness, Lady Juliet walked into the room. And stopped dead.
Close on her heels came the elder Ames, who, in fact, walked into her. Behind him came the hugest, hairiest, worst-bred dog Barden had ever had the misfortune to lay eyes on. And holding onto its threadbare leash, the equally shabby figure of the young man who had stolen Juliet for the waltz while Barden was still tormenting her. So that was Daniel Stewart.
Barden had neither the time nor the inclination to put up with tantrums, though judging by Juliet’s face, he suspected he was going to have to grit his teeth with boredom and put up with one.
