Maggie MacKeever (23 page)

Sandor, who had been thinking that Miss Prunes and Prisms was looking unusually lovely, even though her gown of embroidered silk gauze had since his last viewing acquired some damp stains, and even though her intricate coiffure showed evidence of coming loose from its pins, begged that she make an effort to engage in rational conversation. “Who the devil,” he added, “is Toby?”

“This
is Toby!” cried Binnie, and shook her bundle in an agitated manner that would have caused a less serene child to shriek. Toby merely blinked sleepily. “You may think what you will, Sandor, but I will not permit Toby to be mistreated! He is mute! And even if he weren’t, I would not stand for him being abused!”

The duke’s reaction to these remarks defies analysis. He sat down abruptly on the cot. Caliban leaped up and laid his large head on the duke’s knee. The duke glanced blankly at the hound, and then at his cousin. “A
baby?”

“Of course a baby!” Binnie retorted scathingly.” “Gracious God, Sandor, what else would it be?”

For this rather illogical question, the duke had no response. Babies were not on the duke’s list of favorite objects, and less so now than ever. He stared at it somberly. Having decided that he was not about to be dropped on his head, Toby resumed his slumbers. Binnie rocked him in her arms, crooning tunelessly.

As he stared, Sandor pondered the situation. Being unacquainted with the reasons underlying Miss Mannering’s introduction of Toby into his household, or even of the clankers Miss Mannering had told the gullible Baskervilles; indeed, being unaware even that it was Miss Mannering whom he was to thank for this bewildering development, the conclusions reached by the duke were extremely unflattering to Miss Prunes and Prisms. But how to broach the matter tactfully? Obviously, broached it must be. Discreetly, the duke ventured a query as to Toby’s paternity.

“Heavens, how should
I
know?” What a fascinating little fellow Toby was, even when asleep. Binnie gazed fondly upon his chubby little face. “I could venture a guess, but what purpose would it serve? The question of primary importance now is, since you have found me out, what you intend to do.”

For perhaps the first time in a long and misspent life, the Duke of Knowles was rendered speechless with shock. He stared at his cousin, dumbfounded. Stunned by Sibyl’s tacit admission that she had fallen into licentious ways, he had tried to tell himself that even the most virtuous of ladies could occasionally make a slip. But then to be informed that Binnie neither knew nor cared to know the identity of the baby’s sire—it confounded the imagination. Not a brief madness, but positive paroxysms of debauchery. “Sibyl!” he uttered, with what he considered laudable restraint. “Your behavior leaves very much to be desired!”

Binnie, who had no notion that her cousin the duke thought her no better than one of the wicked, set on the downward path to perdition, preoccupied with sin, deemed his remark very typical. “What would you have had me do? Leave the poor little fellow to starve in the streets? How like you, to spout such fustian. No matter how foolhardy you think me, Sandor, I cannot bring myself to regret a moment of it!”

Sandor was trying very hard to be fair, an endeavor in which he had no prior experience, and one he found increasingly difficult. That Binnie should have conceded the ultimate favor was bad enough, but Sandor reminded himself of the infinite number of ladies who had bestowed similar boons on him, and not all of whom had numbered among the frail and fair. Furthermore Binnie, though no longer a green girl, was obviously not up to snuff. That some heartless blackguard might have taken advantage of her unworldliness, Sandor might have forgiven—but with each word, Binnie revealed herself as further sunk in turpitude. Still, he tried to impose a check on his rapidly growing rage. “Is Mark aware of this?”

Strenuous as were Sandor’s efforts at concealment, Binnie was aware of his anger. Perhaps he regarded her championship of Toby as the latest move in their eternal game of one-upmanship. “Why should I tell Mark?” she inquired, puzzled. “It’s nothing to do with him!”

Nothing? When the lady the poor deluded Mark planned to marry was given to philandering, to foibles and indiscretions of a staggering magnitude?

Binnie had become aware of the duke’s expression, which was nothing short of thunderous. “Why,” she inquired, not unreasonably, “are you staring
so
at me?”

Was she grown so iniquitous that she did not realize her conduct was shameful? Extricating himself with some difficulty from Caliban, Sandor rose. “I make you my compliments,” he said in a grim tone. “You have duped me very thoroughly.”

So she had, though not for long; Binnie had not expected Sandor to accept the situation so readily. Perhaps his impatience lessened with the passage of time. “Didn’t I just?” she inquired cheerfully, as she placed the sleeping Toby on the cot. “It is very good of you, Sandor, to take it so well. I thought you would go into high fidgets once you found out.”

The duke regarded Miss Prunes and Prisms, bent over the cot, making very mawkish noises as she tucked the baby in next to Caliban. Sibyl, he decided, was deranged. How else explain what appeared to be countless sordid intrigues? That he himself was as likely a candidate for Bedlam Asylum as was his shameless cousin did not occur to the duke, who due to the discovery that he had nursed an adder in his bosom—an adder, moreover, that had displayed a deflating absence of consideration for himself—was feeling increasingly resentful.

Puzzled by Sandor’s continued silence, Binnie turned to look at him. There was a glint in his cold eyes that she intensely disliked. “You
are
angry! I am sorry for it—but, Sandor, what else could I do?”

“You could have trusted me.” Still attempting to restrain his temper, the reins of which were rapidly sliding out of control, Sandor strode toward her. “Deuce take it, Binnie! How could you think I would turn your brat out into the streets?”

Binnie was uncomprehending. “But, Sandor—”

Surely she did not think to further deceive him? Sandor grasped her shoulders and shook her. “Take a damper!” he said roughly. “I expect I should be grateful that you did not decide to put a period to your life. A pretty mess
that
would have been! As if this is not bad enough. Binnie, I find it difficult to believe you could do such a thing!”

Binnie was no simpleton, when all is said; and Sandor had said quite enough to make Binnie realize he thought her guilty of engaging in an
affairs de coeur.
“Have you taken leave of your wits, Sandor?”

Perhaps he had. Certainly it did not occur to Sandor, engaged in revising his opinion of Miss Prunes and Prisms, that not a breath of scandal had ever attached itself to her name, a laudable accomplishment for a lady of myriad indiscretions, not one of which had inspired the malicious gossip of the ton, who were in the habit of thinking the worst of everyone. He had always known Sibyl was lovely; how could he not, seeing her each day? But now he realized that in addition to mere loveliness, she was a very desirable woman. Doubtless she had encountered little difficulty in treading the primrose path.

Which brought him to the source of his discontent. Miss Prunes and Prisms had with some justification cast aspersions upon His Grace’s state of mind: Sandor was mulling over not his cousin’s breach of every precept of propriety, but her failure to cast the eye of love upon himself. The duke was not accustomed to being ignored by ladies in the process of falling from grace. No one, he fancied, was more familiar with the primrose pathway than himself. Not vanity prompted this reflection, although His Grace possessed his share of that—and every other—failing. His Grace had set feminine hearts aflutter from a very early age.

Ah. Now he understood. Binnie had sought to bring herself to his attention. Perhaps she thought him indifferent—a chuckleheaded notion, but females were prone to such—and had sought balm for her wounded pride. Silly girl! He must make clear his appreciation of her efforts, which if a bit more ardent than necessary, had not been in vain. Whatever emotion Sandor felt toward his cousin, and the nature of that emotion remained elusive even to His Grace, it was not indifference. Generously, he made known these sentiments.

Not one
affaire de coeur,
realized Binnie, as the duke laid bare his soul, but several. She was left breathless and bewildered by the calumnies that rolled so easily off her cousin’s tongue. She was also, and understandably, left furious.

“You utter fool!” she cried, and smartly slapped his face. “You think that I
—
the injustice of it all! How dare you make these odious accusations, when it is
you
who are a Monster of Depravity?”

Sandor gazed in an annoyed fashion upon his cousin. Naturally she would cut up stiff on being confronted with the reasons underlying her naughty actions; his understanding would be a blow to her pride. However, to slap him was to carry sensibility too far. “Doing it a little too brown, Binnie!” he snapped. “Come down out of the boughs.”

Had the duke not grasped her wrists, Binnie would have slapped him again. Since he did hold her virtually immobile, she contented herself with glowering malevolently at him. “Depravity!” she continued, as if no interruption had occurred. “And deceit! You offered me a truce, and yet you have not made the least effort to break up Neal’s engagement to Cressida!”

This abrupt change of subject left Sandor a bit confused. He begged to know what Neal had to do with the present situation.

“Everything!” cried Binnie. “Why do you think I agreed to marry Mark? To try and prevent you from further putting my brother’s money to your own use! Don’t bother to deny it. Or that you are dangling after a rich heiress for the same vile motive! Well, I shan’t allow you to ruin Delilah’s life as you have ruined mine.”

To this rather incoherent outburst, the duke could have made any number of retorts. He could also have done any of several things, among them strangling his aggravating cousin. Of the retorts; he chose to inquire how he had ruined Binnie’s life; and of the actions, to take her face between the palms of his hands.

“That’s a damned silly question.” Binnie’s voice was thick, due to the proximity of tears. “You said I had an unbecoming levity!”

This incomprehensible accusation made perfect sense to Sandor. “That was many years ago,” he said reasonably. “Beside, it’s true. One does not make mock of men who are making you declarations of their sentiments, my girl! Is
that
what’s inspired you to make a storm in a teacup?”

In the conducting of unintelligible conversations, Miss Baskerville had no peer. “You married Linnet,” she said belligerently.

And in the unraveling of irrational remarks, Sandor excelled. “Yes, but you didn’t want to marry me, and I thought I should marry
someone.
If you minded, you should have said so at the time!”

Binnie twisted her head in a futile effort at escape. “Mind? Why should I mind? You suffer an overweening vanity!” This setdown was not so devastating as intended, its delivery being lachrymose. “I suppose because you didn’t want me, you thought no one else would.”

The majority of Binnie’s statements the duke was helpless to counter; this particular accusation, he could easily disprove. Hence, the Monster of Depravity kissed Miss Prunes and Prisms, very thoroughly. When this most pleasant of activities was at length concluded, Binnie stared up at him. “Oh, Sandor!” she breathed.

But then Toby stirred, making the strange little noises with which he indicated a wish to be fed. Caliban, very protective of his charge, leapt down from the cot, butted Binnie’s knees with his large head, and for good measure snapped at Sandor’s heels.

As diversion, it was very effective. Binnie pulled away from the duke and rushed to Toby. The duke, thusly reminded of Miss Baskerville’s descent into amorality, and reminded also of the various unflattering observations made by Miss Baskerville upon his character, the impact of which had just begun to sting, deemed it politic to hint to his cousin that no matter what degree of ardor he might harbor for her, he was not to be trifled with. Not a man to mince words, Sandor put forth a warning that he was not to be made a fool by any lightskirt.

Binnie’s breast swelled with outrage. Naturally Sandor dared embrace her; considering her already sullied by countless diverse embraces, why should he refrain? Having embraced her, an embrace to which she had not offered any appreciable protest, an omission for which Binnie could think of no reason save that she had been stunned by his insolence, Sandor must assume that she would next succumb altogether to his legendary and highly overrated charm.
That
misapprehension he would cherish no longer! Binnie bid her cousin go and be damned.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

The polite world might accord Miss Delilah Mannering a tolerable success, and the reception held in her honor a very gay affair; but Miss Mannering had grave doubts on both scores. Undeniably she had received a great deal of attention, if not from the only person whose attention she sought, but Delilah was wise enough in the ways of the world to realize that the attentive gentlemen who had paid her such gallant court were in uniform need of financial assistance. Delilah had not been impressed by the Upper Ten Thousand, or the members thereof included among Edwina’s guests. She had not found the reception to her taste, and thought it dull to be forever minding one’s manners, and tedious to be on public view. The
haut ton,
decided Delilah, had a strange notion of gaiety. Fortunately, the
ton
were unaware that the duke had stormed out of his house in the midst of the festivities. Currently, Delilah was trying to determine just why the duke had done so. Her endeavors were meeting with no little difficulty.

She was in the nursery, watching with Miss Baskerville as Toby and Caliban engaged in a game of tug with Toby’s blanket. “And then what?” Delilah inquired patiently. “After the duke forced poor Jem to bring him up here, and demanded to be let in.”

Binnie knew she should not sully Delilah’s delicate ears with so shameful a tale, but if she did not share that tale with someone she would burst with indignation. “Sandor,” she said bluntly, “has undoubtedly run mad! He asked who Toby’s father was, and I said I didn’t know; then he asked if Mark was aware of Toby’s presence here, and I said I saw no reason why he should be told. And then—oh, the brute!” In great agitation, she walked up and down the room. “Delilah, he as much as accused me of—of perseverance in loose morality!”