Maggie MacKeever (10 page)

So able a politician as Lord Chalmers was not likely to be put off by so feeble a diversion. He pondered his wife’s guilty manner, and the haste with which she’d tucked those papers away. Only one explanation presented itself, and Lord Chalmers didn’t like that explanation above half. “I wished to speak privately with you,” he said, as he wondered how a man so greatly in the public eye as himself might best deal with an errant wife. “I take it that we
are
private, Rosemary?”

Rosemary was very strongly tempted to hurl herself upon her husband’s manly chest, there to weep out her woes. She dared not, lest she sink ever lower in his estimation. If it was possible to sink lower, she amended, recalling the unfavorable and unalterable opinion that he’d already formed. “Of course we’re private!” she retorted, in an unfriendly manner. “Gracious, Chalmers, are you gone horn-mad? Perhaps you would wish to look under the
longue!”

Only with difficulty did Lord Chalmers refrain from doing precisely that, so taken was he with a sudden conviction that his young wife had embarked upon a course that would result in horns being planted on his brow. However, he did not wish Rosemary to learn how deeply this conviction wounded him— which, since Lord Chalmers already considered his wife a heartless baggage, cannot be blamed in him. “I merely wish,” he said repressively, “to ascertain the whereabouts of your sisters.”

Once more, as she plucked at the trimmings of her gown, Rosemary felt that her husband was a great deal more interested in her sisters than herself. “Lily and Fennel are riding in the park. I don’t know where Angelica has gone, she’s probably poking around some stuffy old museum. I can’t think what she finds to interest her in such dreary places, but there’s no denying Angelica has an inquiring nature.”

So Rosemary had rid herself of her chaperones? Chalmers wondered to what end. He expressed an opinion that Rosemary should keep a closer watch on her siblings. London was rife with traps for the unwary, he explained; while dwelling beneath his roof, the Millikins were his responsibility.

“You mean they’re mine,” retorted Rosemary, thinking that it took scant effort on her part to deepen her husband’s displeasure. Even without lifting a finger she sank further in his esteem. “As you say. You have
not
said what brought you home so early today.”

No, and he did not intend to; Kingscote’s infatuation with Lily paled into insignificance in comparison with Lord Chalmers’s suspicion that his wife was ear-deep in intrigue.

Since Lord Chalmers had chosen his wife carefully, on the basis of breeding and birth and conduct, as much for her adherence to the dictates of propriety as for her decorativeness, he considered this development extremely unfair.

Perhaps Rosemary didn’t realize the vile scandal attendant upon her ruinous course. Tactfully, Lord Chalmers explained that ladies who failed to conduct themselves with discretion were apt to find their names bandied about in the most vulgar fashion, a situation that he would find extremely distasteful.

As a result of these gentle hints, Rosemary stared at her husband in blank bewilderment. He was extremely handsome in his plain blue coat with brass buttons and horizontally striped waistcoat, his snug-fitting inexpressibles and superbly fashioned cravat; and if he cared a fig for her he wouldn’t load her with reproaches at every opportunity. What had inspired his current snit, she could not imagine, nor did it especially signify. “I hope that I am always discreet,” she replied.

“As do I!” said Lord Chalmers, then paused. He was not an unfair man, and there was always the possibility that he had leapt to the wrong conclusion, though what other conclusion might exist he could not say. For this lack of comprehension, there is some excuse: Lord Chalmers was by lack of time and inclination not a patron of pretty ladybirds, and consequently unaware of the expensive nature of feminine fripperies. He thought he kept his wife in very easy circumstances, and failed to understand why she was forever short of funds; he was impatient of her failure to keep to a budget, and considered it his duty to curb her spendthrift ways, an effort in which he believed he had met with some success.

Lord Chalmers was not, however, thinking of Rosemary’s wastrel habits just then. “It seems we cannot converse easily these days. I suppose it is my fault for leaving you so much to your own devices, and I am sorry for it. I did warn you that my time is not my own—but you are very young.”

This attempt at reconciliation, though generously offered, was not well received; to Rosemary’s ears it seemed as if her husband had for their marriage sounded a death-knell. “You refine too much on it,” she responded frigidly. “I assure you that I rub along very well without your escort. Nor,” she added resentfully, “am I a child, and for you to act as if I am annoys me excessively.”

Obviously it did. With an oath, Lord Chalmers rose from his chair, crossed the room, grasped his wife’s wrist and pulled her to her feet. She scowled up at him, belligerently. He had meant to sternly scold her for her conduct, since it did not suit his notions of wifely behavior that Rosemary should in his presence exhibit such churlish constraint. Now, glimpsing a hint of tears behind her hostile gaze, he found that he could not. “Rosemary,” he said helplessly. “I wish that you might trust me.”

But Rosemary was too wise to tumble for this gambit; she was not to be lulled into a candid confession that would likely land her in the divorce court. Still, her husband’s sympathetic manner was not without effect, and she had to exert tremendous power of will to keep from weeping all over his horizontally striped waistcoat. “Do not think of it!” she gasped. “I cannot! Anyway, ‘tis the most trivial of affairs!”

Lord Chalmers was, due to his long experience of politics, also well equipped to recognize dissemblement. “You seem to be,” he observed, “sadly out of curl.”

This remark, which Rosemary interpreted as an adverse comment upon her looks, put her further out of humor. “A passing indisposition, merely. I did not sleep well last night.”

Had Lord Chalmers been of a different disposition, he might have expressed a willingness to help his wife achieve an excellent night’s rest, to which his wife might have responded that she would like nothing better in the world; but he did not, and neither did she, and therefore nothing was resolved. “You are,” he said, “overtaxing your strength with all these routs and
soirées.
I must request that you refrain from exhausting yourself.”

Rosemary, contemplating one of the brass buttons that adorned her husband’s coat, concluded that he didn’t want her to have friends. Doubtless he would prefer to see her locked away somewhere where she could spend none of his money and behave in no way that was indiscreet—which would have suited Rosemary very well, if only her spouse was locked away with her. Reflecting that few of her acquaintances would care to claim a bosom-bow who was in residence at a debtor’s prison, Rosemary became aware that her husband awaited a response. What had they been talking about? “Lily must have her chance,” she said.

“Lily already has half the gentlemen in London dangling after her!” Lord Chalmers retorted. “If not more! Leave Angelica to look after the chit; she’ll do it very well.”

Rosemary could hardly explain that Angelica was too busy attempting to extricate her from difficulties to properly attend to Lily. “You approve of Angelica?”

“Why should I not?” inquired Lord Chalmers, with some surprise. “I like Angelica very well.”

Perhaps Lord Chalmers had married the wrong sister. This realization, that an ugly duckling stood higher in her husband’s estimation than she did herself, was an additional blow to Rosemary’s pride. With all her might she strove to control her trembling lips.

It occurred to Lord Chalmers that the last discussion he’d held with his wife had not concluded amicably. In fact, as he recalled, it had ended with himself in a temper and Rosemary in tears. Perhaps she was still sulking about that? He would not have thought her of so unyielding a disposition. There was one way to find out. “Are you still angry that I took you to task for squandering your pin money? Very well, give me an accounting and I’ll settle your debts, but this is the last time, Rosemary! You must learn to practice economy.”

Were Chalmers to settle her accounts, thought Rosemary, it would be permanently. He was a cheeseparer and a nip-farthing; he expected her to live in the very best possible style on a mere pittance; he was cruel to the greatest degree. Yet Rosemary loved her husband, despite his innumerable shortcomings; and she meant to delay as long as possible the inevitable moment when he cast her off without a farthing.

“Pooh!” she said, somewhat unsteadily. “You’ve no need to trouble yourself, I’m not in the basket yet. Now, if you will excuse me, this is not a subject on which I am particularly anxious, and there are matters to which I must attend.”

Lord Chalmers grasped his wife’s shoulders. “No,” said he.

“No?” Rosemary stared at her husband with fascination. “Why not, pray?”

“Because,” replied Chalmers, in husky tones, “I have not yet finished speaking with you.”

“Oh,” said Rosemary.

Alas, at this most promising of moments, the baron recalled that for a gentleman of mature years and serious inclination to be stricken all aheap by the mere proximity of his wife was the height of absurdity; and the baroness, similarly stricken, recalled her conviction that her husband had a high-flyer tucked away; and both resolved that the other should not learn that he or she had nearly succumbed to the fancies of a disordered brain. The baron abruptly released his wife; the baroness returned in good haste to her
chaise longue.
“Where are you engaged this evening?” inquired Chalmers, for want of anything better to say. “Perhaps I shall accompany you.”

Rosemary, deep in contemplation of her husband’s highflyer, greeted this offer with no appreciable delight. “But your time is not your own!” she reminded him, rather pettishly.

Lord Chalmers was also deep in contemplation, concerning the identity of the gentleman who dared send his wife
billets-doux.
“I begin to think that in pursuing affairs of state, I have in other matters been somewhat remiss. Do you wear the sapphires this evening? They suit you admirably. If they are still at the jeweler’s, I will fetch them home for you.”

“Gracious, Chalmers!” Rosemary responded airily, as her heart sank. “I can only conclude you don’t trust me to execute the simplest errand myself! And tonight I wear pink, so you see that the sapphires will not do.” Frantically she wondered how she was to reclaim that accursed necklace.

Lord Chalmers, meanwhile, wondered what he was to do with a wife who so patently prescribed to wrong-headedness. One course of action recommended itself to him, but the baron decided regretfully that it was beneath his dignity to turn his wife over his knee.

Unaware that her husband contemplated taking gross liberties with her person, Rosemary eyed him warily. Were Chalmers to suddenly start living in her pocket, he was bound to quickly discover that those pockets were to let, which thoroughly ruined her pleasure in the rare prospect of having her husband at her side. “You accompany me then? I am engaged for the theater.”

“Oh, yes,” responded Lord Chalmers, in a manner that was distinctly ominous, due to his intention to keep a very sharp eye on the young hopefuls who habitually flocked around his wife. “I have neglected you shockingly, and I mean to do so no more.” Perhaps this noble admission might kindle some slight degree of warmth in its object’s breast.

It did not. “As you wish,” said Rosemary, with a fine indifference attained only through monumental effort.

Lord Chalmers did not trust himself to answer. Wishing even more fervently that he was of a disposition that would allow him to apply a hairbrush to his lady’s
derrière,
he stalked out of her boudoir. Rosemary listened to his footsteps fade down the hallway. Tears trickled down her cheeks.

Chapter Nine

Since Lady Chalmers was not one to suffer in stoic silence, Angelica was presented with an accounting of her sister’s sorrows, complete in every minuscule detail. Rosemary related her most recent interview with Chalmers, including his offer to discharge her debts, and took great umbrage at Angelica’s untactful suggestion that her husband’s offer seemed the most practical solution to the current difficulties. Did Angelica
wish
Rosemary to be cast off? Rosemary inquired. Perhaps Angelica was not the font of impartial wisdom that the family thought her; maybe Angelica wished Rosemary’s marriage to fail so that she could snare Chalmers herself! Rosemary wouldn’t stand for it, even if Chalmers
did
like Angelica best. And she didn’t care a fig for Angelica’s suggestion that there might be a law against such a thing. Rosemary didn’t see why there should be such a law, but even if there was, a man so influential as Chalmers could easily have it set aside. Moreover, were Angelica so devoted to her family as she professed to be, she would somehow contrive to reclaim the Chalmers sapphires. Since Angelica had failed to thus contrive, Rosemary surmised that Angelica wanted her to be miserable. If so, Angelica had her wish; Rosemary considered the sorrows of Cleopatra, as viewed the previous evening in company with her ill-tempered husband, far inferior to her own.

This diatribe was conducted, to the accompaniment of sobs and sniffles, over Lady Chalmers’s breakfast toast. Nor was it the only diversion to accompany that meal. While Rosemary bewailed her lot, complained that she was the most unfortunate of beings, and in general acted the wet-goose, Fennel enlivened the little party with an account of the latest goings-on of his hero—who had departed England in a blaze of notoriety, scarcely avoiding the bailiffs who seized everything in sight; and was Angelica aware that at eight-and-twenty Lord Byron already had gray hairs?—and Lily dropped hints so arch and vague that they entirely missed their target.
Who
was running counter to conventional behavior, as Lily intimated? Wearily Angelica wondered, and cravenly decided that she would rather not know.