Company Of Rogues: An Unwilling Bride Part 28

Beth smiled at him, despite the twinge of pain it cost her. "I will try to learn to ignore some of the troubles of the world, Lucien, but I cannot step over the victim in my path. At the moment, however, our main requirement is a safe haven for Clarissa. You know London. There must be hundreds of places she can hide."

"Not in the London I know," he said.

"I did wonder about the Delaneys," Beth said hesitantly.

"They'd be willing to help," he said, "but there are reasons it would be better not to involve them in anything to do with Deveril at the moment." He grew thoughtful. "You mentioned the White Dove. What do you know?"

Beth could feel her color rising. "She's the actress at Drury Lane. She's beautiful, and she's your mistress."

"Was. How did you know?"

"Was?" Beth echoed, a little glow starting within. She knew he wouldn't lie to her. He nodded. "Lord Deveril told me," she said.

The marquess's eyes flashed. "Did he, by G.o.d? It strikes me the simplest way out of this coil is to kill him."

"You can't do that!" Beth protested. Violence again. Was that his solution to everything?

"He is a bit old for a challenge," agreed the marquess thoughtfully. "I wonder if I can get him to challenge me."

Beth was horrified. "Lucien, it would be murder."

"Call it an execution," he said, and she saw, with dismay, that he was perfectly serious. Before she could marshal all the arguments against the evils of dueling, he spoke again.

"To return to the point," he said, seemingly much refreshed by the prospect of killing someone, "if you know about Blanche, she may provide the help we need."

"How?" asked Beth, finding this turn in the conversation no better. He might have given up the actress, but that was no proof he had given up his feelings for her.

"No one would connect Blanche with Clarissa, and Blanche would give her refuge."

"A Cyprian?" gasped Clarissa.

"An actress," corrected the marquess coldly. "And a remarkable lady. It's the only refuge you're likely to find. If your parents know you've visited Beth, they'll be on the doorstep tomorrow."

Clarissa looked to Beth for guidance.

"I think you should accept this help," said Beth. "It seems safe, and it's a trifle late for us to be fretting about your reputation, Clarissa. I truly don't know what's to become of you, but as you said, anything will be better than marriage to Lord Deveril."

The girl nodded. "Very well. What should I do?"

"Go and dress," said Beth.

When Clarissa had left the room, Beth asked, "Can she go to this place now? Or will Madam Blanche need warning?"

"How very discreet. I don't believe Blanche has a new protector, but I should send a message. She will be at the theater now, anyway. We'll have to wait an hour or two. A messenger.... Ah yes, the little bird."

He turned to go but then looked back. "Can you forgive me?" he asked seriously.

She smiled. "I already have. It all began when I convinced you I had known a dozen lovers. You were right-words have a life of their own once spoken."

He came and held her, a gentle hold of cherishing. "I stole it from Horace," he confessed. "'Semel emissum volat irrevocabile verb.u.m.' Let's cap him with Virgil. 'Omnia vincit amor.' I love you, Beth. Even if you were debauched, G.o.d help me, I would still love you. That was what drove me mad. I thought you a wh.o.r.e, but I still hungered for you."

Beth tightened her arms around him and completed his quotation, "'Nos cedamus amori.'"

Let us surrender to love.

"I know you to be virtuous," he continued. "I know you to be a virgin." With a hint of humor, he added, "Unfortunately."

Beth laughed and looked up at him. "And I love you, though you're a barbarian." Shyly she added, "I, too, think it unfortunate."

But what she thought unfortunate was that the moment of delirious pleasure had been destroyed. She could not imagine how they were to recapture it.

He moved out of her arms. "I am not a barbarian," he said. "A barbarian would throw Clarissa out of the window and carry you to his bed. I'm a baboon in its milieu. I will act according to my code."

"Will you ever let me forget that?" she demanded.

"Never. It is the most wonderfully rude thing anyone has ever said to me."

"What is the code of a baboon?" Beth asked.

"I thought you knew. Must I lose my faith in you?"

"A baboon," said Beth, inventing quickly, "is always indulgent of its mate. It unfailingly helps the weak of its society, especially young females, and never seeks to kill except in the extremes of self-defense. It is also," she added pointedly, "totally monogamous."

"Hmm. In any primitive environment, baboons would be extinct."

"But this is London, the most civilized city in the world," declared Beth.

He raised a brow. "Remind me not to allow you out of the door unescorted, my naive blue stocking. I have to go and make arrangements." She could sense in him, as in herself, a simple disinclination to part, even for a moment.

"You must dress," he said. "I'm not handling Clarissa alone, and I want you to meet Blanche." He smiled. "I can't imagine any other wife in the world I could say that to."

"Is that a compliment?" Beth queried.

"The greatest I can offer," he replied, and his look was a caress.

Chapter 19.

Hours later Beth and Clarissa crept down the servants' staircase to the side door and out onto the street. Lucien had arranged to pick them up nearby.

The waiting time had not been pleasant. Lucien had returned to her room only briefly with instructions, and Beth knew it was not Clarissa's presence which constrained him. He could not bear the sight of her face, already beginning to discolor. When she put on her outer clothes she chose a close-fitting bonnet which shadowed her cheek.

Soon he drew up in a hired coach and handed them in. "I thought it best not to involve the servants except Robin. He carried the message to Blanche, and he's waiting at her house."

"You sent a child out into the streets of London at this time of night?" Beth protested.

"He's doubtless better equipped to survive there than I am," said the marquess, and pa.s.sed the journey telling them how he had first become acquainted with Robin Babson.

"There must be so many children like him," mused Beth.

"No," said the marquess firmly.

Beth flashed him her first deliberately appealing look. "A school, perhaps? To train them for a trade?"

He sighed, but his lips twitched. "Perhaps."

She grinned in triumph, and he shook his head.

The coach drew up in front of a row of houses and the marquess handed the ladies out and paid off the driver. As soon as the vehicle rolled away, a slight figure slipped out of the shadows.

"All's right, milord," said Robin proudly. "The mort's in and waitin'."

"Well done. You go and wait in the kitchen then." Lucien went forward to apply the knocker. In a moment Blanche herself opened the door and let them in.

It was a pleasant house, Beth thought, well-proportioned and furnished with taste. Not, as she had imagined, the home of a lady of easy virtue. Feeling stiff and awkward, she looked at the White Dove. Seen up close she was as beautiful as on the stage. Her milky skin was touched with roses, her large eyes fringed by tawny lashes, and there was no sign of cosmetics that Beth could detect. Her plain white gown was the simplest of muslins trimmed only with a little lace, and yet it seemed to enhance a long slender neck, full high b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and a very graceful carriage. The woman's long silvery hair was gathered on her crown in a simple knot. Beth felt like a mill pony next to a thoroughbred.

Worse, in a sense, was that Blanche looked both kind and intelligent. Mary Wollstonecraft might have railed against women who were trained for nothing but pleasing men, but what was one to say of a woman so gifted by G.o.d who had apparently still retained the powers of her brain?

Having closed the door, Blanche showed her intelligence by standing back to allow Lucien to handle this unusual situation.

He turned. "Beth, may I present Blanche Hardcastle?" Instead of the formal words, it was an honest question.

"Of course," said Beth and extended a hand to the woman. "I am very pleased to meet you, Mrs. Hardcastle, and very grateful."

Blanche shook the hand firmly and smiled warmly, but as her eyes caught the discoloration on Beth's face, they widened and she looked incredulously at the marquess.

"And this is Clarissa Grey stone," he said quickly. "She is the one who needs your help."

Clarissa was clearly at a loss. After a moment, she dropped a little curtsy.

"Let's all sit down," said Blanche, leading the way into her parlor. "Tell me exactly what's to do, and I'll help in any way I can."

Lucien quickly outlined the story. Somewhat to Beth's surprise, Blanche was totally on Clarissa's side. "Lord Deveril is a wart," she said. "If half the stories I hear of him are true, he shouldn't be allowed to touch the toughest binter, never mind a young lady. I'll gladly have you here, Miss Greystone, but it can only be a temporary measure. You'll have to think what you intend to do in the future."

"I know," said Clarissa, looking pale and exhausted. "But I can't seem to think at the moment. This has been the most awful day of my life!" She burst into tears.

Beth immediately went over to her. "If you please, Mrs. Hardcastle, I think we should get her to her bed. Tomorrow will be soon enough to make plans."

Blanche took them upstairs to a small, comfortable room and saw that Clarissa had everything she needed. She left her there with Beth and descended the stairs thoughtfully. She found Lucien sprawled in his favorite chair, knocking back a brandy.

"I like your wife," Blanche said. "Am I allowed to say that?"

"Say what you d.a.m.n well please. Having broken just about every rule of polite society, I'm in no mood to quibble."

"You are in a mess, aren't you, love?"

He sat up a bit and looked ruefully at her. "Do you mind me bringing the chit here?"

"No. I'm a bit surprised you bothered, though. I'd not thought you the philanthropic type."

"My marriage sees me a reformed man."

"Then why does your wife have a bruise growing?" asked Blanche quietly.

He straightened and glared at her, a de Vaux through and through. Blanche faced him unflinchingly. A clock ticked. They could hear, faintly, voices from the upper floor.

"I hit her," he said at last and swallowed the last of the brandy in a gulp.

Blanche picked up the decanter and refilled his gla.s.s. "Because she was helping the girl?"

"No." Lucien could not bring himself to tell her the sordid tale, but he waited for Blanche's judgment. Though he knew he deserved only disgust, he felt Blanche was the one person who might make sense of everything. She'd seen the worst of life.

"You'll feel better in a while," she said at last.

He stared at her. "I? I'm not the one in pain."

"Are you not, my dear?"

He looked thoughtfully away. "Yes, Blanche, I am. But what of Beth? Don't you feel for her?"

"I can see in her eyes you've made amends, though I suspect you have a way to go yet to wipe the record clean. I hope so. It doesn't do for women to be too forgiving. If you lay a hand on her again, I hope she wraps a poker round your head."

"Is that what you'd have done?"

"It's what I have done, and worse," said Blanche straightly. "My father knocked my mother about all the time. I promised then no man would raise a hand to me and get away with it."

They heard the door open above.

"Thank G.o.d," said the marquess dryly, "I never gave in to the temptation to beat you."

"Why didn't you? We had our fights and you've certainly got a temper, but I'll go odds you've never hit a woman before in your life."

He looked down at the amber liquid in his gla.s.s. He hadn't drunk from it since she'd refilled it. "Do you really want to know?"

"Yes, I think I do."

"I've never loved a woman before in my life," he said, adding almost angrily, "It's not all it's cracked up to be."

Coming down the stairs, Beth heard this and stopped. She couldn't help a glow of warmth at the admission of love, but she'd rather not have heard the rider.

"And what's that supposed to mean?" Blanche asked, with laughter in her voice.

"I've never been so miserable in my life as these last few weeks. I don't remember when I last had a good night's sleep."