Breaking the Rules (6 page)

“You shouldn’t have drunk so much Diabolino last night. You were maudlin then, and you still are now,” Conan replied unsympathetically.

Theo glowered at him. “I needed Dutch courage for today.”

“Which ploy was singularly unsuccessful, because all you have to show for it now are the disagreeable aftereffects and precious little courage.”

“Thank you for being so understanding!”

Conan grinned. “Anyway, to return to the matter of Miss Elcester’s interest in Celtic mythology. What’s so wrong with that? You’ve chosen to call your damned hound after a Celtic hero, a giant actually, which seemed rather appropriate, given that Bran is an extremely large hound.”

“I know I named him, but I have absolutely no idea why. It just came to me.” Theo gripped Bran’s collar hastily as the wolfhound, which was tall enough to look out of the carriage window even when seated on the floor, suddenly saw a pug dog being carried from a house by a liveried footman.

Conan observed something suspiciously tiny and black moving around swiftly on the wolfhound’s coat, and edged away in alarm. “Did you know he has fleas?”

“Oh, yes, but he’ll soon be rid of them because I’ve immersed him in the usual infusion of wormwood, pennyroyal, and fennel.”

“Is
that
what the stink is?” Conan muttered, pressing as far into the opposite corner as he could.

“It’s a fine herbal fragrance, I’ll have you know.”

“Fine herbal fragrance? It’s disgusting.”

Theo persuaded the wolfhound to sit down again, then looked imploringly at Conan. “Can you think of a way I can dissuade my uncle from this damned Elcester match?”

“No, because there isn’t a way, unless she obligingly elopes with someone else. Look, Theo, you can’t have your cake and eat it. If you want to be your uncle’s heir in every sense, you have to take Ursula Elcester, Celtic myths and all.”

“I know, damn it, I know.” Theo gave a long sigh. “This is 1817, not the Middle Ages. A man shouldn’t
have
to marry because a tyrannical old curmudgeon of an uncle says he must!”

“He does when the tyrannical old curmudgeon holds the purse strings.” Conan paused. “Carmartin is the way he is because of that sad business with his ward.”

Theo looked at him in surprise. “Ward? I didn’t know he’d had one.”

“Oh, yes, a little girl called Eleanor Rhodes. She was the apple of his eye, but then she vanished one day, oh, years ago now. Your uncle cut up very rough about it, and quite frankly he hasn’t been very agreeable ever since.”

“How do you know so much about it?”

“Chance really. I heard my parents discussing it when I was a child. It seems that a branch of my family is called Rhodes, and it was wondered if Eleanor was actually a cousin. The possibility must have come to nothing, however, for it wasn’t pursued, and she remained your uncle’s ward.”

The carriage entered St. James’s Square, its team of white horses stepping high. Lord Carmartin’s town residence was in the far corner, a three-story redbrick property with pedimented, shuttered windows on the two lower floors, and an imposing porch that jutted out to the iron railings that guarded the drop between the pavement and the basement. The square was a handsome area, with a railed octagonal pool where a flock of seagulls fluttered excitedly around the central equestrian statue of King William III. At the height of summer there was boating on the one-hundred-and-fifty-feet-wide pool, but there were no boats there at this time of year. The wind rippled the chilly water, and overhead small white clouds raced across the blue sky.

Conan watched the seagulls, and then realized what was attracting them. A squirrel was perched on King William’s head, for all the world like a red fur hat. How on earth had it crossed the water to get there? And why was it in St. James’s Square anyway? There wasn’t a tree in sight! The gulls fluttered and swooped, and when he looked at the statue again there was no sign of the squirrel, although he was sure the gulls hadn’t snatched it. The gulls flew off as the carriage drew closer, and Conan decided he’d imagined the squirrel.

Theo suddenly looked sharply at him. “Mm? What was that you said?”

“What was what? I didn’t say anything.”

“I— I thought ... Oh, it doesn’t matter.”

The carriage continued around the square, then Theo sat forward with a start. “Come on now, Conan, you’ve just said it again!”

“I tell you I haven’t said anything,” Conan repeated a little testily. What was the matter with the fellow?

Theo stared at him. “You didn’t say ‘Eleanor’?”

“No. Well, not since mentioning your uncle’s ward. Why?”

“Oh, I ...” Theo looked away a little awkwardly.

Conan smoothed the moment over. “It was probably a street call—this wind distorts everything.”

“Yes, I suppose so.” Theo let the matter drop, but a puzzled crease remained in his brow.

The coachman maneuvered the horses to a halt at the curb. Conan grinned at Theo. “Well, we’re here, so you might as well get on with it.”

“Will you look after Bran for me?”

“If I must,” Conan replied without enthusiasm, for the likelihood was that his spotless attire would soon look as disreputable as Theo’s.

“I fancy I’ll need a good deal more Diabolino when this is over,” Theo muttered as he flung open the door of the carriage and climbed down. The wind blustered coldly in for a moment before he slammed the door and approached the house.

As he disappeared inside, Bran whined suddenly, and Conan saw that the wolfhound was gazing alertly toward the central pool. A young woman was standing beside it with a white horse, yet he hadn’t heard her ride up. She wore a lilac riding habit and a veiled hat that cast her face and hair into shadow as she tied a length of ribbon to the railing that surrounded the pool. He knew her ... didn’t he? No, he didn’t just know her, he
loved
her!

Bran whined again and pawed at the carriage door, distracting Conan. In that second both the young woman and her mount disappeared, just as the squirrel had a few minutes earlier. All that remained to show he hadn’t imagined her was the lilac ribbon that fluttered on the railing.

Puzzled, and not a little shaken, he opened the door and climbed down. Bran scrambled out too, his claws scraping as he set off across the square, baying at the top of his lungs. He dashed around and around the square, searching for the young woman, but although he halted hopefully at each exit, tail wagging nineteen to the dozen, there was no sign of her. Conan reached the railing and removed the ribbon, which still bore the creases where it had been tied around her hair. The scent of flowers— primroses, he thought—seemed to cling to it, fresh, sweet, and so haunting that he closed his eyes. Bran returned and stretched up to snuffle the ribbon, then whined.

Still shaken by the force of his feelings, Conan slipped the ribbon into his pocket, and then took Bran by the collar to lead him back to the carriage.

At that moment in the second-floor drawing room of Carmartin House, poor Theo was being torn off a considerable strip by his uncle, who was definitely
not
pleased to meet with any resistance to the proposed union.

“Now listen to me, you ungrateful whippersnapper, you are marrying Ursula Elcester, and that is the end of it!” Lord Carmartin slammed his glass down so hard that his pre-luncheon cognac splashed on the highly polished mahogany table beside his comfortable crimson velvet chair. His cold eyes peered over the thick-lensed spectacles wedged upon the end of his large nose.

Theo rose unhappily from his seat and placed a hand on the marble mantelshelf to gaze down into the gently swaying flames. Then he glanced back at his angry uncle. “You must forgive me, sir, but I simply cannot like the prospect of Ursula Elcester.”

“What has
like
to do with the scheme of things? We’re talking about a marriage of convenience.”

“I know, but it would help if I at least
understood
a woman who enjoys translating ancient Welsh myths!”

“Understood her? Damn it all, boy, you’re going to
bed
her, not delve into the mysteries of her mind! Any man who is fool enough to make a study of female intelligence is doomed!” Lord Carmartin moderated his tone. “Look, m’boy, it ain’t as if you’re expected to live in domestic bliss with her. All that’s needed is an heir or two, and then you can both go your separate ways.”

“Yes, but the getting of heirs requires a certain, er, intimacy, sir.”

‘‘By the saints, if you can’t manage
that,
you’re no nephew of mine!” roared Lord Carmartin, losing patience again. His watery hazel eyes were bright, and spots of high color marked his lean cheeks. Jasper Octavius Carmartin was of a generation that had little time for such things as love matches. A man got married, and then, provided he was fortunate, some level of affection followed. That was how it had always been, how it
should
be! He had married twice, so he should know! All this modern namby-pamby romantic nonsense had no place in the serious matter of increasing estates and fortunes. This match was a certain way of joining the Elcester lands to his own, and to that end he cared as little for the bride’s wishes as he did his nephew’s.

Theo returned his attention to the fire, and suddenly it seemed to him that he saw the image of a young woman shimmering among the flames. She had wonderful green eyes and a sweet, heart-shaped face framed with silky red hair. He had seen her before in his dreams, on the night he’d arrived in London from Naples.

Hardly had she appeared in the flames, when the whisper he’d heard in the carriage was repeated.
“Eleanor
... ” Dear God, he must have had even more Diabolino last night than he’d realized! But then the fire shifted, and the image was destroyed in a thousand glittering sparks that fled toward the chill London sky. Startled, he stepped swiftly back from the hearth.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” his uncle demanded.

“Nothing, sir, nothing at all.” Theo glanced at the fire again. Could the image be of his uncle’s lost ward, Eleanor Rhodes? Although why he should think that he really didn’t know, for Eleanor was not an uncommon name. He turned to face the older man. “May I ask you something, sir?”

“Within reason.”

“I’m told you once had a ward—”

“That is definitely
not
within reason!” interrupted the older man, his eyes suddenly alight with bright emotion.

Theo drew prudently back from the brink. “Forgive me, I did not mean to upset you. Er, about this match. I suppose you really are set upon it?”

“Most certainly. Thomas Elcester and I have decided that it will take place soon. Damn it all, as a widower I’d marry Ursula myself if I thought it would achieve anything, but two childless marriages do not bode well for a fruitful third. I’m nothing if not pragmatic about such things.”

“Well, I may not be any more successful than you,” Theo pointed out, for large numbers of offspring did not appear to be a family feature.

“Damn it, boy,
all
marriages are a lottery where such things are concerned. Both you and Ursula are healthy, and therefore the chances are good. That is my last word on the subject. I want you to go down to Gloucestershire tomorrow in order to dance suitable attendance upon the lady. It’s a formality, because she won’t have any choice in the matter either, but we must go through the motions.”

We
don’t have to do anything,
I
do, Theo thought resentfully.

“I’ve already sent word to Carmartin Park,” Lord Carmartin continued, “so you’re expected there late tomorrow evening, that’s the twenty-eighth, in case you don’t realize. I’ve noticed that you can be remiss about dates and appointments when it so pleases you.”

Theo tried not to react to the sarcasm.

“Thomas Elcester and I have already agreed he will invite you to dinner the evening after. That’s the twenty-ninth.” Lord Carmartin finished.

“How pleasant,” Theo murmured under his breath, and then glanced once more at the fire. Oh, how loath he was to go to dine with awful Ursula? Why couldn’t she look like and be like the divinity he had seen among the flames? He cordially wished the Elcesters,
père et fille,
to go to perdition and stay there.

Lord Carmartin’s voice penetrated again. “It will be best bib and tucker time while you’re at Elcester Manor, m’boy, so there isn’t to be any foolish foppery.” His withering glance encompassed his nephew’s Cossack trousers.

“I’m
not a
fop,” Theo replied, taking offense.

“Anyone who wears those damned ridiculous things is a fop as far as I’m concerned, and that’s what Thomas Elcester will think as well, so temper it a little. Dress more like your friend, er, what’s his name? Berrytown?”

“Merrydown. Sir Conan Merrydown.”

“That’s the chap. He always looks manly.”

Theo managed to hold his tongue. Oh, how he hated these one-sided exchanges, his uncleship loading the ammunition, his nephewship in the firing line.

“How is Merrydown?” Lord Carmartin inquired.

“Very well. Actually, I’d like to take him down to Gloucestershire with me. From your own account Carmartin Park isn’t exactly cozy, and I’d be glad of the company.”

Lord Carmartin cleared his throat. “Oh, I suppose it’s all right, although the dinner invitation won’t extend to him as well because Thomas Elcester clearly won’t know of his presence. Just make sure you behave faultlessly where the Elcesters are concerned. The last thing I want at this stage is a resumption of the old feud.”

“I understand, sir.”

“Good.” Lord Carmartin rose from his chair and went to pour some more cognac for them both. Then he came to press a glass into his nephew’s hand. “This will be a wise connection, m’boy, for it means you will one day be master of a hefty slice of the county. You mark my words, this match will see the founding of a new dynasty. Here’s to success between the sheets, eh?” He clinked Theo’s glass.

Theo mumbled something, but drank the toast. Then his glance moved back to the fire, where the shimmering face fingered in his memory. A beautiful, vulnerable green-eyed redhead called Eleanor. Oh, if only ...