Jennie Kissed Me (2 page)

“He could have married at twenty, I suppose. Odd his wife is not travelling with him.”

“Perhaps he’s a widower,” I said idly. “What is odder is that he should have been telling his own daughter he could not take her to Brighton. Some relatives he gave as the excuse, did he not?” Mrs. Irvine nodded indifferently. “She didn’t correct me when I called her Miss Savidge. I begin to think he is shamming the waiter with that story.”

Mrs. Irvine is but an indifferent conversationalist when she is eating. No matter that the meal was wretched. The chop was of bullet-proof consistency and the gravy so thick you had to cut it with a knife. She made some vague and incomprehensible sound and put another bite of pie into her mouth, which left me alone with my shame and my questions. Mrs. Irvine felt that if she had two desserts, she would not require more food at Farnborough, and to avoid another meal I went along with her. It was an hour after we entered the parlor that we finally left and went to our carriage. With the smirking eyes of the inn upon us, we carried our noses high, like a pair of camels.

Farnborough, our driver told me, was eight miles farther along, not two as originally thought. With an hour to kill, Mrs. Irvine and I curled up in the carriage, pulled a blanket over us, and prepared to pass the hour in idle conversation, mostly about our recent embarrassment.

We shared one banquette in the dark carriage. We had been travelling for two days and had managed to fill one side of the seating apace with a miscellany of items to pass the time. Magazines, a box of bonbons, a spare shawl, Mrs. Irvine’s netting basket, with a spare blanket thrown over it all. Neither of us gave a second glance at the dark hump in the corner. It was silent and unmoving. How should we suspect a mischievous human body was concealed beneath the blanket?

My first intimation of disaster occurred when Mrs. Irvine dozed off to sleep. From her life on the high sea, she bragged, she could sleep on an active threshing machine. She kept pulling the blanket around her, leaving me uncovered and chilly. Rather than disturb her I reached across and seized the other blanket. And still I did not realize what I had uncovered. She had her face hidden, you see, and her dark pelisse looked like Mrs. Irvine’s spare shawl. It was that sixth sense that finally alerted me. There was an eerie sensation of another presence. I felt a shiver over my scalp. I stared at the dark hump, and as we turned a corner a wan moonbeam picked out the configuration of a human hand.

I let out a shriek to wake the dead, and that is when Lady Victoria sat up straight. “Don’t be frightened. It’s only me,” she laughed. “You said I might go to London with you.”

Mrs. Irvine awoke with a start. “What? What?” Her shrieks were added to mine.

“It’s Lady Victoria,” I told her.

“Good gracious. So it is. I thought we were being boarded by pirates at least.” She leaned forward eagerly. “Tell the truth now, missie. That man at the inn is not your papa, is he?”

“Certainly he is,” she answered.

“Why can he not take you to Brighton? He mentioned some relatives ...”

“My great-aunts think I should still be in school— at
my
age!”

“And what age is that, dear?”

“Nearly seventeen.”

I was the unwitting kidnapper of a noble sixteen-year-old lady, whose papa had the devil’s own temper.

“There’ll be the father and mother of a row when he discovers you’ve slipped overboard. I’d stake my head on it,” Mrs. Irvine said with satisfaction. I knew she found life dull since parting company with pirates and wild Indians and shipwrecks.

“We must get you back to him at once!” I declared weakly. Across the miles I could feel his dark eyes burn into me, and I felt a horrible presentiment of chaos to follow.

“Did you not mean your kind offer to help me?” Lady Victoria pouted.

“It was a misunderstanding. We thought you were his
chère amie,”
Mrs. Irvine confided. Lady Victoria laughed delightedly. I glared futilely in the darkness of the carriage.

“Oh, here we are at Farnborough,” she said a moment later. “Papa won’t miss me till morning. He thinks I am asleep. I put some pillows under the blankets to fool him.

“Aboard the
Prometheus,
we used to use the ship’s dog for that stunt,” Mrs. Irvine informed this innocent young schoolgirl. “Then you have a hairy head on the pillow if the husband comes looking. You want to be sure to feed the dog ale first, for dogs are so jumpy. Old Walsenby had the shock of his life when his ‘wife’ leapt up and started licking him one night.”

Glancing out I saw the myriad lighted windows of the city spread before us. With our inn so close at hand, it seemed a good idea to continue on there and decide what was best to be done. Our team was winded, and to return our unwelcome guest we would have to hire fresh horses. Within five minutes the carriage was lumbering into the coaching yard of a half-timbered inn, and we three ladies alit. Lady Victoria smiled unconcernedly and hung onto my arm as though I were her escort.

“You must be sure to tell your father this was your idea. We had no notion you were with us,” I pointed out firmly.

“But it
was
your idea, Miss Robsjohn. You invited me.”

She smiled blandly, and I, with great effort, suppressed the urge to box her noble ears.

Chapter Two

Mrs. Irvine got her second meal after all. We retired to a private parlor to discuss what we should do, and as we were entertaining a noble lady, I asked for wine. Mrs. Irvine requested sandwiches to accompany it, and Lady Victoria thought she could eat a few macaroons and perhaps a cream bun.

“We must get you back before your father misses you,” I said firmly to Lady Victoria. After insisting on the macaroons, she didn’t touch them but ploughed into the cream bun as if it were manna from heaven.

“He won’t miss me till morning.”

“I shall ask the inn to rent me a fresh team and take her back at once. I suppose we could not send her alone.” I spoke aside to Mrs. Irvine. “I must own, I do not relish the prospect of meeting Lord Marndale again.”

“We cannot send a young lady pelting about the countryside without a chaperone at night. He’d never see a hair of her head. She’d head straight for London. You’ll have to go with her, Jennie.”

“Bother!
We
will have to go with her.”

“Lord, my poor bones cannot take anymore shaking this night. What do you say we send him a note and tell him he may collect her here?”

I had developed a menial attitude from my working past. I was happy Mrs. Irvine alerted me to it. “Perfect! Why should
we
have the bother of the trip, when
he
is the one who let her escape? I’ll ask for paper and write the note at once for John Groom to deliver.”

I rang the bell and wrote the note. There was no cringing or grovelling in it. I said brusquely that Lady Victoria had concealed herself in my carriage without my knowledge or consent, and gave directions for him to pick her up. The instant it was done I sent it off, asking my driver to hire a mount and go on horseback to save time.

“Less than half an hour to get the note to Lord Marndale, and an hour for him to reach us,” I said. “We may as well wait here. We don’t want to be in our nightgowns when he comes.”

That left ninety minutes, more or less, to discover what we could of our runaway. We put the time to good use.

“Your mama is at Wycherly Park, is she?” I asked.

“Mama died when I was born,” Lady Victoria said, looking up from her cream bun with a long face. A daub of cream on her chin quite ruined her pose. She wished to give herself the airs of an abandoned orphan, when she had obviously been raised in the very lap of luxury.

“Lord Marndale scarcely looks old enough to be your father,” Mrs. Irvine mentioned.

“He married my mother when she was seventeen and he, nineteen. They were childhood sweethearts, living right next door. He has never remarried.”

“That’s a long time to be without a woman. I expect he has lady friends?” I need scarcely identify the speaker as Mrs. Irvine.

“Oh, yes. Many ladies throw their hankies at him, but he is interested in politics now. He spends a deal of time in London. Perhaps he has a mistress there. At least he never wants me to go with him, though I shall next year to make my debut. Could I have another cream bun, Miss Robsjohn, please?”

I rang the bell and ordered another cream bun and tea. Eating was better than drinking an excess of wine. I didn’t want her bosky when her father came for her.

“Did you attend a ladies’ seminary, Lady Victoria?” I asked, to pass the time.

“No, I had a governess. Miss Clancy married a neighboring tutor last month, which is why I was visiting Aunt Clara in Salisbury till Papa could come home. To Wycherly Park, I mean. He has been in London. I was supposed to remain with Aunt Clara till August, when we were to go to Brighton.” She added in a pouting way, “I don’t see why we cannot go now if he won’t let me go to London.”

“And why did you leave your Aunt Clara early?” Mrs. Irvine inquired. Her coy look suggested sexual carrying-on.

Lady Victoria hunched her elegant shoulders. “I expect it was because of Mr. Borsini, the Italian singing instructor. As if I would have run off with
him!
We were only sitting in the conservatory while he helped me with my Italian grammar lessons.”

I began to feel a twinge of pity for Lord Marndale. “There is something to be said for sending ladies to a seminary,” I told her, and outlined my own past career.

“Good gracious, you mean you’re a teacher!” she exclaimed, studying my toilette. “I took you for a lady.”

“I
am
a lady!” I replied, high on my dignity.

I glanced in the mirror over the grate to reassure myself on that score. Certainly I looked every inch the lady in my new finery, acquired since coming into my inheritance. How thrilled I had been to discard my ugly round bonnets and severe dark gowns. I now wore what was the highest kick of fashion in Bath society, but Lady Victoria’s toilette put me in the shade. For travelling my outfit consisted of a dark green worsted suit with a fichu of Belgian lace at the neck. My figure was more athletic than feminine, but with, of course, some indication between the neck and knees that I was a woman. I have a noticeable waist is what I mean, with some fullness above it. My travelling bonnet was plain but worn with a dashing tilt over the eye.

I removed the bonnet for greater comfort and because my hair is my crowning glory. It is a true Titian red and gives a clue to my short temper, which made me such a successful purveyor of knowledge to youngsters. They did not trifle with Miss Robsjohn. Since I am no longer required to be a dragon, however, I am endeavoring to sweeten my astringent disposition. I smiled at the reflection in the mirror.

Mr. Vivaldi, Bath’s reigning coiffeur, had achieved a splendid do for me. How happy I was to have that eternal knob lobbed off and let my natural curl have its way. I wear my hair short and saucy, because, quite frankly, it removes a few of my seven and twenty years. Dare I try to pass myself off as twenty-four? There is something so terribly irrevocable about being past the quarter-century mark! Yes, I would be twenty-four when I reached London, which would require a clever memory not to mention I had been teaching for six years. Three years, I would say. My eyes would not give me away in any case. They are green; not so lustrous as Lady Victoria’s, but no crow’s-feet have left their calling card at the corners.

My nose is severely straight, with no entrancing tilt at the end like my guest’s. My jaw is firm, but at least my teeth are in good repair. I would never play the ingénue again, but I would not be a spinster either, nor one notch below a perfect lady. I caught Mrs. Irvine’s eagle eye watching me admiring myself and turned back to the company.

“You are on your way to Wycherly Park with your father now, are you, Lady Victoria?” You must not think I was in the least intimidated by her title! I dealt with any number of noble girls at the seminary, which meant some rubbing of shoulders with their parents as well. One young lady was under the guardianship of her bachelor brother, Lord Anselm. I do not say he made a point of attending every open day for the sole purpose of seeing me, but he did hint on a few occasions that he enjoyed our meetings.

“Only until he can find someone else to look after me. Aunt Clara warned Cousin Eugenia that I would be too much for her, so I expect it will be another governess. No,
companion,”
she said. “I am too old for a governess.”

Why could a position like this not have come along when I had to work for a living? I used to scan the papers daily for some such sinecure. But it was academic now. “Perhaps I could put you on to someone,” I said, mentally fingering Miss Hopkins for the post. She was my greatest friend amongst the teaching staff at the seminary. A genteel-born, penniless lady like myself. I doubted she would have the fortitude to handle Lady Victoria, however. Especially if a continental teaching master formed any part of the household.

I inquired about this and was told that Lady Victoria was finished with all instruction. Borsini was her Aunt Clara’s idea. I would mention Lydia Hopkins to Lord Marndale. It would be pleasant to share my new happiness with an old friend, and I would keep in touch with Lady Victoria’s progress through Lydia. I had a feeling that Lady Victoria’s future would provide interesting reading.

My guest took exactly one bite of the second cream bun, heedless of the cost, which would be put on my bill. “I’m tired. I would like to go to bed now,” she announced.

“Your father should be here inside of an hour,” I pointed out. “It is not worthwhile getting undressed.”

“But it’s nearly eleven o’clock. I go to bed at ten.”

“Lie down on the settee,” I suggested. “I’ll get a bolster for you.”

“I cannot sleep on that!”

Given the choice of sitting on a hard chair or resting on the settee, she soon chose the latter. She occupied the entire couch, making it necessary for Mrs. Irvine and myself to use the hard chairs. Before long the girl was sleeping. I got a blanket to put over her, and Mrs. Irvine and I talked for as long as we could keep our eyes open. At midnight our driver tapped at the door. He had left my note for Lord Marndale but had not spoken to him.