Duchess Quartet - A Wild Pursuit Part 21

"I expect the n.o.ble public servant holds it against you, though." The marquess's eyes were kind, too. As kind as Stephen's. What was it with these men? They didn't react to her best overtures, and then they made her feel like crying.

"Actually, Mr. Fairfax-Lacy said that he wanted a mistress with less experience," she said, her wry grincrooked. He stared at her. "Fairfax-Lacy said that?"

She nodded.

"You're better off without him. Why on earth would you wish to be a mistress to such an intolerable lout? Or a mistress to any man, for that matter?" He was looking at her so intently that Bea wondered

whether he'd suddenly noticed she was a woman. Was he going to offer her a consolatory kiss? For all she'd drawn him to the library, she didn't want him to touch her. "I suppose I don't wish to be a mistress," she said, dismissing the memory of Stephen's kisses. "Nor a wife either."

"Humph," he said, looking unconvinced. "Well, then, where's that poetry you brought me in here for? I shouldn't like to go back to the salon without having read some of it. Lord knows what they'll think we were doing."

Bea smiled back, feeling an unwilling pulse of friendship. He got up and threw another log into the fireplace and then walked back to the couch. "Here it is," she said, plucking the book off the end table. He started reading and his eyebrows rose. "I suppose this is from Esme's personal library?"

"No." She blushed. "I brought it with me. Truly, some of the poetry is quite... quite unexceptional." Bea liked his chuckle. She drew up her legs and curled into her favorite position-the one she would never a.s.sume before a man because it didn't emphasize how slender her limbs were.

"I like this," he said. ' "0 faire Boy, trust not to thy beauty's wings.'" She nodded. He looked over at her with a wry grin. "I spent a great deal of my life trusting the wrong things. My t.i.tle, for example."

"Your beauty?" she said daringly.

"Not so much... I was convinced that I had to live up to the dignity of my t.i.tle. I suppose I trusted my

reputation too much."

Bea's smile mirrored his. "Whereas I simply threw mine away."

"Then perhaps you are the one who trusts your beauty overmuch." He put the book to the side. "Shall

we return to the salon, Lady Beatrix?"

She put her feet down and rose. He looked down at her, and Bea felt a faint blush rise in her cheeks. "If

I hadn't met Esme first, you likely would have been the making of me, Lady Beatrix."

"I'm not suitable for someone who honors their reputation," she observed, starting toward the door.

A large hand curled around her hand, drawing it under his arm. "Ah, but it wouldn't have taken long for

you to convince me of the worthlessness of reputation. Esme didn't even try, and I was ready to throw it away as soon as I met her."

She looked a question as they walked through the corridor.

"She was married at that point."

"Now she isn't," Bea observed.

"And therein lies my trouble. I am of the fixed opinion that Esme should marry me and no other." He glanced down at Bea. "I am telling you this merely because I wouldn't want you to worry if I have to take out your darling Fairfax-Lacy."

"Take out?" Bea said sharply. "What on earth do you mean by that, sir?"

He shrugged. "I doubt it will come to violence. But no one is going to marry Esme but myself."

Chapter 24.

Waltzing on One's Deathbed.

Trying to not feel guilty because one's wife is dying is a difficult task. d.a.m.n near impossible, Rees finally decided. After all, they'd been married for years-nine or ten, he estimated. He'd married Helene when she was barely out of the schoolroom. They were both too young to know better. Yet it wasn't entirely his fault the marriage failed, no matter what she said about it.

But he never, ever thought of her as not being there. Not there to send him nagging letters, or curl her lip at him as they pa.s.sed. Not there to send him horrid little notes after he debuted a new piece of music, putting her finger directly on the weakest spot, and not saying a word about the best of it.

d.a.m.n it, she couldn't die.

He'd been to Lady Rawlings's house a mere few months ago, and Helene had seemed perfectly healthy then. A little too thin, perhaps. But she was always thin. Not like Lina's overflowing little body, all curves and fleshy parts. Rees frowned. Surely it wasn't correct to think about one's mistress while riding in a carriage to greet one's dying wife. And was greet the right word?

It was with a great sense of relief that Rees realized his carriage was finally pulling up in front of Shantill House. It wasn't that he cared for his wife, of course. He didn't. Hadn't the faintest feelings for her of that nature. It was merely natural anxiety that had his chest feeling as if it were clamped in a vise. His fists kept curling, and he could bellow with rage. At what? Helene, for growing ill? No!

He had to be sweet, calm, tell her loving things. Because she was dying. His bitter-tongued, frigid little wife was dying.

G.o.d knows, that should probably have given him a sense of relief. Instead he couldn't seem to swallow, and he actually had to support himself on the side of the carriage when he descended, because his knees felt weak for a moment.

He could tell by the butler's minatory gaze-Slope, wasn't that his name?-that he probably should have changed his garments before leaping into a carriage. Instead he ran a hand through his hair, doubtless disheveling it more than before. "I've come to see my wife," he said brusquely, heading past Slope and up the stairs. He knew where Helene stayed when she was at Lady Rawlings's house. Not that he visited her bedchamber, naturally, but he'd noted the room.

Dimly he realized that Slope was calling after him. Impatient, he stopped and glared down the stairs. "What is it, man?"

"The countess is not in her chamber. She can be found in the Rose Salon."

Rees blinked. Seemed an odd place to stage a dying scene, but who was he to cavil? Perhaps she wouldn't die until tomorrow. He all but galloped down the stairs, brushed by Slope-and stopped.

A typical scene of English country life greeted him. A stout peer was dozing in a low chair by the fire. A beautiful little tart of a girl was leaning over her embroidery, her lips painted a fantastic red. And there were a few other remnants of English n.o.bility strewn around the room.

But it was the piano that held his attention.

He'd know her playing anywhere, of course. She was seated at the pianoforte, and not by herself, either. They were playing one of Beethoven's sonatas in E-flat major. And she was laughing. As he watched, her companion leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. Kissed Helene! True, it was just a brush of a kiss. But Helene blushed.

Rees's body went from cold to burning hot and back to cold again, in the mere moment he stood in the doorway. Suddenly he was aware of the butler standing just at his shoulder, of the wintery morning sunlight making Helene's pale hair look like strands of silver. Of the very-aliveness of her. They started playing again and she was swaying slightly, her shoulder just b.u.mping her partner's arm. Her face was glowing with joy, as it always did when she played. Always. Helene and he had only lived in the same house for a matter of months, but he'd never forgotten the way she looked when she played the piano.

It was that joy that had made him fall in love with her. The very thought shocked his senses back into movement. Fall in love? Ha!

"I see that the report of your demise was overhasty," he drawled in the nastiest tone he could summon. And Earl G.o.dwin was pretty much an expert at giving offense.

Helene looked up, and he saw her mouth form a little.

Oh. But the next moment she turned to her partner and said saucily, "I'm so sorry; I almost lost my place, Stephen." And her fingers flew over the keys again, just as if he weren't there.

Stephen? Who the h.e.l.l was Stephen?

Rees had a vague sense he'd seen the man before. He was handsome, in a pallid, English sort of way. d.a.m.n it, he'd been rooked. Although it wasn't clear to him why he had been called as audience. Why in the h.e.l.l had his wife wanted him to jump to her bidding? He wasn't going to stand around and give her the satisfaction of gloating over his presence. For tuppence he'd turn around and head straight back for London. But he'd been on the road for two days, and his horses were exhausted.

"Excuse me," an amused voice said, just at his elbow. Lady Withers smiled at him. She was a quite lovely woman of a certain age and Esme Rawlings's aunt, if he weren't mistaken.

"Lord G.o.dwin," she said. "How splendid to have you join us. The countess did mention that you might make a brief visit." For a moment her eyes danced over to his wife, cozily tucked against her piano partner.

"Who the h.e.l.l is that?" he snarled, jerking his head backwards, dismissing the fleeting thought that he might actually greet Lady Withers.

..he blinked as if the room were so filled with gentry that she might have trouble identifying the pallid Englishman. "Mr. Fairfax-Lacy is the Member of Parliament for Oxfordshire, and such an intelligent man. He also holds the honorary t.i.tle of the Earl of Spade, although he chooses not to use it. We are all enjoying his company."

Rees was pulling himself together. He'd be d.a.m.ned if he showed any sort of husbandly emotion before a smirking viscountess. And since he wasn't feeling any of those husbandly feelings, that should be simple. Unless murderous was considered a husbandly emotion.

Then Helene was before him, holding out her hand and sinking into a curtsy. "Rees. I must apologize for my letter," she said, as tranquil as ever. "While the midwife in the village did suggest I had pleurisy, it turned out to be something far more innocent."

"Oh?"

"Well, you see pleurisy starts with a red rash. But I had beard b.u.m, as it turned out," she said, laughing slightly. "Aren't I the naive one, then? I suppose you were so young when we married that I never encountered this problem."

Her laugh was breathy, perhaps a sign of nerves. But Rees wasn't going to give her the satisfaction. Any satisfaction. He just looked at her, and the giggle died on her lips. "You are still my wife-" he began.

She put a hand on his arm. This was not the naive girl he'd married. Not the Helene he woke up with the day after they returned from Gretna Green, a girl who veered madly between shrieking tantrums and sullen tears. She was poised, cool, and utterly unapproachable.

"Only in name, Rees. Another woman shares your bedchamber now."

He looked over her shoulder. Fairfax-Lacy was practicing chords. He played well. Presumably she wasn't sleeping alone in her bedchamber. "A gentleman who planned to be at your side during divorce proceedings wouldn't sit at the piano while you face an irate husband," he said, his tone polished steel.

"You are hardly an irate husband," she said, shrugging.

"I asked Stephen to remain where he is. I hardly think you are interested in making his acquaintance. And who said anything about divorce?"

"So you've taken a lover," Rees sneered, on the verge of crashing his fist into that sleek b.a.s.t.a.r.d's face. "What is it all in aid of, Helene?"

"Pleasure," she said, and the smile on her face burned down his spine. "My pleasure, Rees."

He turned on his heel and then back at the last second. "Who did that arrangement of Beethoven for four hands?"

"I did. I've been rearranging all of them."

He should have known that. The sonata sounded half like Beethoven and half like Helene, an odd mixture.

"Now we have that little discussion out of the way," Lady Withers said brightly, coming up from somewhere, "why don't I show you to your room, Lord G.o.dwin? I do hope you'll make a long stay with us."

Rees turned like a cornered lion and snarled at her, then strode out of the room. As Arabella described it later to Esme, who hadn't been in the Rose Salon at the time, Earl G.o.dwin acted precisely like the Wild Man of Deepest Africa whom Arabella had seen once in a traveling circus.

"All hair, and such a snarl, Esme!" Arabella paused, thinking about it. "Honestly, Helene, your husband is quite-quite impressive." There was reluctant respect in her voice.

"Oh, Rees is very good at snarling," Helene said. She, Arabella and Esme were cozily seated in Esme's chamber, drinking tea and eating gingerbread cakes.

Esme looked up from her plate, her eyes sparkling with laughter. "The important thing is he snarled because you managed to tangle his liver-or whatever that phrase is that you keep using, Helene."

"Curdle his liver," Helene repeated, and there was a growing spark of happiness in her eyes. "He did seem chagrined by our conversation, didn't he, Lady Withers?"

"Chagrined is not the word," Arabella replied, stirring a little sugar into her tea. "He was incensed. Absolutely incensed. Purple with rage."

"I hope he's not feeling too violent," Esme said. "I can hardly have my future husband mangled by your present husband, Helene. It would all be such fodder for gossip if the servants shared what they know."

Helene thought about the difference between what the servants thought they knew about her and Stephen, and what the truth was. "I do think you could have left Stephen to me," she told Esme somewhat peevishly. "What if Rees discovers that you have claimed my lover as a future husband?"

"I doubt very much that your husband will raise the subject with Stephen," Esme replied. "Rees already announced that he will stay one day at most, so Stephen only has to briefly juggle a fiancee and a mistress. He'll not be the first to do so. I can't tell you how many times I found myself at a table that included Miles and Lady Randolph Childe. Miles always acted with the greatest finesse, and if my husband could do it, so can Stephen."

Arabella chortled. "Supper will be an interesting meal. Mr. Fairfax-Lacy will face quite a difficult task. You, Helene, wish him to impress your husband with his devotion, and you, Esme, wish to impress the marquess with Mr. Fairfax-Lacy's devotion. Hmmm, perhaps I could ask Bea to create a diversion by flirting with Earl G.o.dwin?"

"There's no need to go as far as that," Helene said hastily. "And do you know, I have the strangest feeling that Bea might be having some feelings for Mr. Fairfax-Lacy herself? There's something odd about the way she looks at him."

Esme laughed. "That would make three of us chasing the poor man. Arabella, are you certain that you have no use for Mr. Fairfax-Lacy?"

"Quite sure, thank you, darling," Arabella said, carefully choosing a perfectly browned gingerbread. "It seems to me that the poor man must be growing tired. I dislike fatigued men. Still, it seems to be quite enlivening for him," she continued rather absently. "The man was getting hidebound. He looked so cheerful this morning. And that, of course, is your doing," she said, beaming at Helene.

Helene hid a pulse of guilt. She was hardly enlivening poor Stephen's nights, even though the whole house believed she was. Now Esme was smiling at her too. Her sense of guilt grew larger.

"I'm very proud of Helene," Esme said. "Arabella, you can't imagine how impossibly rude Rees has been to poor Helene over the years, and she's never staged even the slightest rebellion until now."

"Now that you've rebelled," Arabella asked Helene with some curiosity, "what will be the outcome? Are you wishing to continue your relationship with Mr. Fairfax-Lacy? That is, if Esme gives up her rather dubious claim to him?"

"I wouldn't call it dubious," Esme put in. "Merely unexpected."

"No," Helene admitted. "I don't wish to remain his friend."

"I knew that," Esme said. "I watched the two of you. Otherwise, I would not have claimed him as my own future husband, I a.s.sure you, Helene."

"Stephen Fairfax-Lacy is good marriage material," Arabella said. "I am never wrong about that sort of thing. All three of my husbands were excellent spouses." She finished her gingerbread and added, meditatively, "Barring their short life spans, of course."

"I have to tell you something," Helene said rather desperately.