Midnight Pleasures (34 page)

Sophie looked at him sharply. Papa
couldn’t
try to set Madeleine up as a flirt! But George was smiling at Madeleine with paternal approval. Sophie sent up a silent prayer of thanks. Amorous interest on her father’s part would be a disaster for Sophie’s plans. Then her mother would be bound to dislike poor Madeleine.

“Never heard of the Marquis de Flammarion, have you?” The Honorable Sylvester Bredbeck had finished imparting a delicate rumor about a mutual acquaintance and was scanning the room. He was a small, bustling man with a creaky corset and a fervent love of gossip.

“Certainly I have,” Eloise replied firmly. She prided herself on a vast knowledge of French aristocracy. “The marquis lived a very retired life. I never met him myself.” She frowned. “I can’t quite place where his estates were. The Limousin, perhaps.”

“Can’t be too careful, these days,” Sylvester commented.

Eloise bridled. Sylvester was close to suggesting that Eloise’s own daughter had invited a pretender to her home. Sylvester caught her glance and quailed.

“I certainly didn’t mean to suggest anything of the sort about the daughter of the marquis,” he said hastily. “Seeing as she is a special friend of your family.”

“Not only because of that,” Eloise snapped. “Lady Madeleine is French aristocracy to the tip of her fingertips, sir. It is visible with just a glance. I, if anyone, would be able to ascertain immediately if she were an impostor, and she is
not
.”

Sylvester nodded energetically. He had no wish to cross swords with Eloise (to be frank, he was terrified of her), and besides, the girl did seem to be charming.

“You misunderstand me, dear lady,” he said, pouring oil on the waters. “I never meant to cast aspersions on Lady Madeleine’s background. I simply made a general statement. Someone with your keen eye must have noticed that there seem to be more French aristocrats in London than there ever were in Paris, even when Louis XVI was on the throne!”

Eloise settled her ruffled plumage. “In that respect, Mr. Bredbeck, you are absolutely correct.” She lowered her voice. “Did you hear that the so-called Comte de Vissale turned out to be a French nobody? In fact, Madame de Meneval told me that she suspects he was nothing more than the music instructor for the real comte’s children.”

Sylvester’s eyes brightened. “Goodness me,” he said. “Why, I had the pleasure of talking to the comte—or rather, the
not
-comte—just last week.” He tittered happily.

Sophie walked up to her mother. “
Maman
, now that our party is complete, I thought we might go in to dinner.”

Eloise cast a look toward the door. To be sure, Sophie had already corralled the Earl and Countess of Sheffield and Downes, Patrick’s brother and sister-in-law.

But Sylvester had one more thing to ask. “And where is the former comte now? Applying for work in a music academy, perhaps?”

“Madame de Meneval told me that he has fled the country,” Eloise replied. “Most likely he has gone to America. I understand that all manner of thieves and frauds live in that country.”

“My goodness,” Sophie said lightly. “What on earth are you two talking about?”

Sylvester turned to her. “Your mother is the best of friends with Madame de Meneval and is telling me amusing tales of false Frenchmen. Have you met Madame?”

Sophie shook her head. “Who is she?”

Eloise broke in impatiently. “Goodness me, Sophie. I told you about dear Madame last week. You must not have been listening. She was a valued member of the court of Louis XVI, and she personally knew every single member of the French aristocracy. Now she is in London, and one of her more unpleasant tasks has been unmasking the large number of pretenders who are thronging our streets, pretending to be French nobility!”

Sophie’s eyes widened. Madame de Meneval was clearly someone whom Madeleine must avoid at all costs. But Eloise was already turning away, going to join her husband at the door.

Sophie had placed Madeleine between Quill and Lord Reginald Petersham. Quill would never do anything to overset a lady’s composure, and while Reginald was practically guaranteed to bore Madeleine’s ear off with some lengthy bits of gallantry, he too was harmless.

Braddon was
not
invited. Sophie judged him too likely to forget himself and smile intimately at Madeleine. Although she had to admit that Braddon was taking this particular scheme with deadly seriousness. It was he who had insisted that Madeleine have a chaperone who herself came from the highest ranks of English society. Mrs. Trevelyan was a highly respected widow, formerly married to a bishop who had been, as it happened, the younger son of a duke.

Living now in reduced circumstances, she had happily agreed to chaperone a motherless young Frenchwoman, the dear friend of Lady Sophie Foakes’s. Sophie could see that Mrs. Trevelyan lent Madeleine a great air of respectability. Braddon had been right to choose a well-bred Englishwoman rather than one of the many Frenchwomen scattered around London.

When everyone was finally seated, Sophie found that she was too nervous to touch the lobster. She looked past the four candelabra that separated her from Patrick, at the far end of the table. He was leaning slightly to his left, talking to Lady Skiffing.

Sophie had invited as many dedicated gossips as she could without making her intent obvious. The idea was that if they met Madeleine in Sophie’s house, under the eagle eye of the Marchioness of Brandenburg, at least these particular gossips would not question Madeleine’s ancestry.

And it seemed to be working. Lady Skiffing was smiling happily at whatever Patrick was telling her. Lady Prestlefield was holding forth in a shrill undertone, detailing the latest disgraceful expenditure of the Prince of Wales, who was rumored to be over seventy thousand pounds in debt. None of the three appeared to have had a qualm when they met Madeleine.

Madeleine herself was playing the part of a maiden born to the highest ranks of French society, without turning a hair. In fact, she wasn’t terribly afraid. She was too busy remembering all the rules Sophie had drilled into her head. At the moment she was counting silently. Nine minutes, ten minutes … It was time to smile politely at Lord Petersham, turn her head to the left, and talk to Erskine Dewland.

Wonder of wonders, Mr. Dewland had just ended his conversation with Chloe Holland, who was sitting to
his
left. We must look like a dance troupe, Madeleine thought with a giggle. All of us are turning our heads to and fro at exactly the same moment.

“If I may enquire,” Quill asked, “what on earth are you thinking about, Lady Madeleine? I should tell you that English dinners are very serious affairs, and one rarely, if ever, laughs.”

Madeleine smiled at him. “I was thinking that we must all resemble a choreographed ballet. I saw one once, as a young girl in France. All the dancers balanced on their toes and turned their heads just so, and then back, just so. Here we all are, sitting about a table, and turning our heads at precisely the same moment.”

Quill’s dark green eyes filled with laughter. “It sounds more like a bankside interlude, as you describe it.”

Madeleine looked curious.

“A puppet show,” Quill explained.

Madeleine gave him a tiny smile. “I, sir, would never be so impolite as to describe the crème of English society as puppets.”

At that Quill laughed out loud, instantly drawing the attention of Lady Skiffing, Lady Prestlefield, and the Honorable Sylvester Bredbeck.

Lady Skiffing frowned slightly. “Lady Madeleine could do much better than Erskine Dewland,” she remarked to Patrick. “True, he will be a viscount someday, but one must ask: Is he capable? Although he
appears
to have almost recovered from the accident, I hear that his father has arranged for the younger boy to marry an Indian heiress, so the family must know something we don’t.”

Patrick resisted the impulse to give his dinner partner a sharp set-down. Sophie had been so worried about the success of her dinner that he didn’t want to cause further anxiety by snapping at her guests, although Lady Skiffing was a petulant old witch.

So he looked down at her benignly, his face smooth and friendly. “Quill is a particular friend of mine; I can assure you that Lady Madeleine could not do better than to accept his hand in marriage, were he to offer it.”

Lady Skiffing sniffed disapprovingly. As someone who spent her days spicing gossip with an intonation, giving faint blame and even fainter praise, she thoroughly understood the language of the undertone.

Smiling graciously, she inclined her head. “You put me to shame, dear sir,” she crooned. “One should remember, of course, that when your brother was abroad for such a long period of time, many people believed that you would inherit his title, and yet here you both are.” She smiled happily at Patrick and turned to the Marquis of Brandenburg, seated on her left.

Touché! Patrick thought appreciatively. She managed to remind me that I am a younger son and untitled.

And he wondered for the fortieth time why Sophie had assembled such an odd group for their first dinner as a married couple. True, Quill seemed happy talking to Sophie’s friend Madeleine, and that was splendid, given that Quill rarely left his house. It was a pleasure to see Will Holland and his lovely wife, Chloe. And at least Braddon hadn’t been invited.

But why on earth had Sophie invited that dried-up old prune, Lady Skiffing? And why, in God’s name, had she invited Lady Sarah Prestlefield, the woman who had walked into the salon at the Cumberland ball and caught them kissing?

With a sigh he turned to Sophie’s mother. Eloise was picking at her stuffed capon in an unsatisfied sort of way.

Patrick bent toward her. “May I summon a footman to dispatch with your capon?”

Eloise jumped, just slightly. A true lady, of course, is never startled because she is never lost in thought. All her attention is directed to her dinner partners.

“I was thinking about Sophie’s babe,” Eloise said forthrightly.

It was Patrick’s turn to be startled. He and Sophie had achieved a sort of calm equilibrium. They did not discuss the subject, and there were days when he forgot that his wife was with child. Certainly he hadn’t thought about it tonight. Sophie sat at the bottom of the table glowing like the fairy on top of a Christmas tree. She didn’t look pregnant. She looked as delectable as spun sugar.

Eloise continued. “I am not convinced that Sophie is adhering to a correct diet.”

“She seems to be eating regularly,” Patrick said lamely.

“I believe that bathing in milk would strengthen her constitution.” Eloise looked at Patrick, her eyes shadowed with worry. “She refuses to do so. And when I recommended that she add oranges to her diet—oranges soothe the stomach, you understand—she refused to do that either.”

“But her stomach has not been indisposed, has it?” Patrick asked cautiously. It was a bit shameful to find that he did not know if his own wife had been ill.

“I believe not,” Eloise replied. “But I still could wish that she would eat an orange a day, and perhaps a glass of bitters once a week.”

“Bitters!”

Eloise nodded. “Drinking bitters is extremely salutary for the health. It strengthens the blood, you know.”

“I didn’t know that,” Patrick replied gravely.

There was a moment’s pause broken by the clamor of sixteen well-bred voices chattering of this and that. The marchioness launched into an explanation of her recommendation that Sophie should eat partridges on a regular basis. Patrick looked down the table at his wife.

Tonight Sophie looked very much the grande dame, a far cry from the sensual little sprite who had frequented his bed on the
Lark
. She was wearing diamonds at her ears and around her throat; their chilly brilliance perfectly suited the creamy luster of her gown.

Suspended from the dining room’s arched ceiling was a chandelier that Patrick had shipped from Italy, long before that country had been swept into Napoleon’s net. Its crystal shards hung, sparkling, far above their heads. A draft caused by footmen moving silently in and out of the dining room caused the crystals to turn and gleam. They caught the reflection of Sophie’s diamonds as they twinkled in the candlelight.

But the diamonds didn’t turn her into an icy reflection of themselves. If anything, they made the rosy, creamy tint of her bosom look even warmer, softer, more delectable.

Patrick swallowed. If there is one thing a gentleman must
never
do, at his own dinner party in particular, it is to stare at his wife until his breeches are uncomfortably tight.

Patrick tried to look at his wife objectively. Why had he never enquired whether Sophie’s stomach was upset by her condition? Apparently it was a common occurrence. Why had they never talked about the child she carried?

For an instant he listened again to Eloise’s monologue. She seemed to have returned to the beneficial qualities of milk baths.

“I shall recommend it to Sophie,” Patrick said with perfect gravity, then stopped listening again.

He was very conscious of the distance growing between himself and his wife. He was caught in a web of his own making. Strangled by fear, he didn’t want to think about the baby because that meant thinking about its birth. Strangled by jealousy, he didn’t want to think about what Sophie did with Braddon on their long afternoon excursions, and yet he couldn’t help thinking about Braddon some twenty, thirty times a day. So he ended up walking the streets for hours at night, fighting against dual foes: his fear and his jealousy.

He knew, rationally knew, that Sophie and Braddon were not indulging in an affair, although sometimes he persuaded himself otherwise. It was just that his wife greeted Braddon with an affectionate smile whenever they met him, and they seemed to meet that blighter everywhere. If they went to the theater, there he was. If they attended the opera, the Earl of Slaslow was certain to attend. The only explanation Patrick could find was that Sophie informed him of their plans.

Why? So that she could greet her ex-betrothed with an insufferably intimate smile? So that Braddon could linger next to them, his hand on Sophie’s arm, until Patrick was ready to burst with rage? Red heat rose in his ears, and he forced himself to calm down. If gentlemen don’t stare lustfully at their wives at dinner parties, they also don’t work themselves into fevers over unanswerable questions.