More than a Mistress/No Man's Mistress (76 page)

“Men!” Angeline exclaimed. “Always embarrassed at any mention of love and marriage. Are they not ridiculous creatures, Jane?”

“I have frequently said so,” the duchess agreed, looking with some amusement at Tresham, who did not rise to the bait. “But Ferdinand, who
is
Miss Thornhill? Jocelyn did tell me she is beautiful.”

“It was, of course,” Tresham said, “the first question Jane asked when I returned home.”

“Oh, not the
first
, you odious man,” she protested.

“She is the most irritating female I have ever known,” Ferdinand said. “She talked me into making a wager with her, Pinewood as the prize—and she won. She would not take it. Then I gave it to her as a gift. She ran away. I followed her and caught her before she reached London. Today I had Selby make the change of ownership legal, but when I went to tell her so, she had disappeared again. It seems she really does not want it.”

“How extraordinary!” Jane said.

“You must go back tomorrow, then, and get Selby to reverse the procedure,” Heyward said. “You ought to have come to me or Tresham before you did it anyway, Ferdinand. You have a strong tendency to act impulsively. It is the Dudley blood in you.”

“People are always impulsive when they are in love,” Angeline said. “Ferdie, you must find her. You must comb London for her. Hire a Bow Street Runner. How very romantic.”

“I have no wish to find her,” he said.

“Do you have no idea where she is?” Jane asked.

“None,” he said curtly. “And I have no wish to know.
Pinewood is hers. If she does not want it, that is her concern. It may rot, for all I care.”

And then a thought popped into his head as if from nowhere—a thought spoken in her voice …

Probably serving coffee at my uncle’s inn
.

He had asked her what she would have been doing six or seven years ago if he had met her before she became a courtesan. At the time his mind had scarcely registered her answer.

“I believe her uncle owns an inn,” he said.

Angie was all eagerness to know what kind of inn, where in London it might be situated, what the uncle’s name was. She—and Jane, to a lesser degree—seemed determined to find in the whole situation a romance that must be given a happy ending. He could stand it no longer after a few minutes.

“There is no question of finding her,” he said. “I offered her Pinewood and she would not take it. I offered her marriage and she would not accept me. I offered her … protection and she ran away. She would prefer to return to her old way of life.”

“What is that?” Angeline asked.

Ferdinand was aware of his brother’s black stare across the table.

“She was a courtesan,” he said. “A very successful one until she went to Pinewood two years ago. And she is illegitimate into the bargain. So you might as well take a damper, Angie, and go matchmake for someone else. Now let’s change the subject, shall we?”

“Oh, the poor lady,” Jane said softly. “I wonder what is driving her back to her old life.”

“Me,” Ferdinand said.

“No.” She shook her head, frowning. “No, Ferdinand. Not that.”

“A lady with a scarlet past and a murky secret,” Angeline said, clasping her hands to her bosom. “How irresistibly intriguing. You can be sure she loves you as desperately as you love her, Ferdie. Why else would she have run away from you twice?”

Women!
he thought as Heyward launched into a long, dry monologue about a speech he had delivered in the House that very day. The older he grew, Ferdinand thought, the less he understood women. Angie and Jane should be in the middle of a fit of the vapors apiece.

An innkeeper. He dared not even guess how many inns there might be in London. Her uncle—maternal or paternal? How slender was the chance that he bore the same last name as she? He had been an innkeeper six or seven years ago. Was he still?

She had no wish to be found—until she surfaced again as Lilian Talbot, he supposed. And he had no wish to find her. She had deceived and rejected him one time too many.

How many inns
were
there?

He was not really going to waste his time searching, was he?

I wonder what is driving her back to her old life
.

Jane’s words echoed and reechoed in his mind.

A
COACH WAS LEAVING
the White Horse Inn with a great deal of din and bustle. Viola and Hannah stood aside to let it turn out onto the street before stepping into the cobbled yard. The innkeeper was standing outside the door, bellowing something to a distant ostler. But he
turned and saw the two women, and his scowl was replaced by a broad smile.

“Viola!” he exclaimed, spreading his arms wide.

“Uncle Wesley!”

Soon she was enveloped in his strong arms and crushed against his broad chest.

“So you
did
come,” he said, holding her at arm’s length. “But why did you not let us know when? Someone would have met you. Hello, Hannah. Rosamond and the girls are going to be delighted.” He called through the open door of the inn, “Claire! Come and see what we have here.”

Viola’s sister came rushing through the door a moment later. She was looking remarkably pretty, Viola noticed at once. She had blossomed into a slender, shapely beauty with shining blond tresses. Then they were in each other’s arms, hugging and laughing.

“I
knew
you would come!” her sister exclaimed. “And Hannah is with you. Oh, do come upstairs. Mama will be ecstatic. So will Maria.” She took Viola by the hand and turned back toward the inn door. But then she stopped and looked anxiously at her uncle. “May I go up with her, Uncle Wesley? Everything is quiet now that the coach has left.”

“Up with you both,” he said jovially. “Away you go.”

Viola was led up to the private living quarters on the upper floor and into her mother’s sitting room. Her mother was seated by the window sewing, while Maria sat at the table, a book open before her. But a moment later, all was movement and squeals and laughter and hugs and kisses.

“We
knew
you would come,” Maria cried when some
sanity had been restored to the scene. “Oh, I do hope you will be living here now.”

Maria had changed from a child to a young girl with some promise of beauty to come.

“You must be weary,” their mother said, linking an arm through Viola’s and leading her to a love seat, where they seated themselves side by side. “Have you just traveled up from Somersetshire? I wish we had known it was today we were to expect you. We would have come to meet you. Maria, dear, run downstairs and bring up a tea tray and some cakes, there’s a good girl.”

Maria went obediently, even though she looked reluctant to miss even a moment of her eldest sister’s homecoming.

“It is so lovely to be back here and to see you all,” Viola said. For the moment she allowed home and family to wrap themselves about her like a cocoon, where she could be safe from all the menaces of the outside world. And from all the memories. She wondered if Ferdinand had returned to the house yet and discovered her gone.

“All will be well.” Her mother took her hand and patted it.

“But it seems that you were all expecting me,” Viola said, puzzled.

Her mother squeezed her hand. “We have heard,” she said, “about Pinewood’s turning out not to belong to you after all. I am so sorry, Viola. You know I was opposed to your accepting it from—f-from Bamber when you were doing so well at your governess’s post, but I am sorry he deceived you so.”

Despite the bitter quarrel they had had before she left for Pinewood, Viola had had enough experience of life
not to pass too severe a judgment on her mother. She had been got with child—with her, Viola—while she was governess to the Earl of Bamber’s son. The earl had whisked her off to London and kept her there as his mistress for ten years before she fell headlong in love with Clarence Wilding and married him. The change in Viola’s life was total and severe. There was no more contact with her father, whom she had adored. There was the impatience and contempt of her stepfather instead. Sometimes, when he was drunk and her mother was not present, he called her “the bastard.” She had had to ask Hannah the meaning of the word.

It was not until almost thirteen years later, when she recognized her father driving in the park one afternoon while she was walking and had impulsively hailed him, that she had discovered the full truth. Her father had not abandoned her. He had tried to see her. He had written to her and sent her presents. He had sent money for her support. He had wanted to send her to a good boarding school before arranging a respectable marriage for her. Everything had been returned to him.

And so he had discovered the truth about his daughter and the life she was living and the reason for it. He had arranged a meeting with Daniel Kirby and paid off all the remaining debts of the man who had taken his mistress and his daughter from him. And then he had given Viola the precious gift of a new life. He had given her Pinewood.

Her mother had been incensed. At first Viola had been much inclined to blame her. What right had she to keep Viola from her own father? But she had learned enough about life by that time to know that the human heart was a complex organ and frequently led one in the
wrong direction without any really cruel intent. Also she recognized that her mother was reacting without full knowledge of all the facts. Her mother believed that Viola had respectable employment as a governess.

She had forgiven her mother long ago.

“He did not deceive me, Mama,” she said. “But how did you know about Pinewood?”

“Mr. Kirby told us,” her mother said.

Just the sound of his name made Viola’s stomach lurch.

“Do you remember him?” her mother asked. “But of course you must. He comes to the inn to take coffee quite frequently, does he not, Claire? He is still very amiable. I have gone down once or twice to converse with him. He commiserated with us over your loss. Naturally, we were mystified. That was when he told us about the Duke of Tresham’s brother winning the property from the earl and going down to Somersetshire to claim it. What is the brother’s name? I cannot recall.”

“Lord Ferdinand Dudley,” Viola said.

Daniel Kirby had heard, then. But
of course
he would have heard. He made it his business to know everything. This explained why he suddenly discovered a new debt. He knew she would be returning to London. He knew he could exercise power over her again.

“What is Lord Ferdinand like, Viola?” Claire asked.

Handsome. Full of laughter. Gregarious, charming, impossibly attractive. Daring and dashing. Kind. Honorable. Innocent—strangely innocent
.

“I did not know him long enough to form any lasting impression,” she said.

Maria came back then, carrying a tray, which she set down on a table close to the love seat.

“Well,” their mother said as she poured the tea, “you are home now, Viola. That part of your life is in the past and best forgotten. Perhaps Mr. Kirby will help you again. He knows a great many influential people. And of course your former employers may be willing to give you a good recommendation even though you left them rather abruptly.”

Viola shook her head when Maria offered the plate of cakes. She felt quite nauseated. For that, of course, was just what was going to happen. Daniel Kirby would come here soon and the two of them would talk and come to some arrangement for the resumption of her career. They would set about spinning a suitable yarn for her family so they would never know the truth.

Perhaps, Viola thought as she sipped her tea and listened to Maria’s prattle about the latest news from Ben, she should tell them herself—now, before her life became a web of lies and deceit again.

But she simply could not do it. All their lives would be ruined. Uncle Wesley had been enormously kind to them over the years. He had never remarried after his young wife died giving birth to their stillborn child only one year into their marriage. His sister and her family had become his own. He had supported them cheerfully and without complaint. Viola could not see him destroyed. And there were Claire and Maria and Ben, who must be allowed a future of pleasant prospects. Her mother’s health was not strong. She would not be able to support the burden.

No, she could not do it.

T WAS FERDINAND’S SECOND DAY OF RIDING
from inn to inn on a search that he fully expected to be futile. He would waste a week or so in this way until finally he would either see her—in the park or at the theater—or hear of her from his acquaintances. Lilian Talbot was back, the story would go, as beautiful, as alluring, as expensive as ever. Lord So-and-so had been the fortunate one to secure her services first, Lord Such-and-such second …

If he was wise, Ferdinand kept telling himself, he would return to Selby and get him to tear up the papers transferring ownership of Pinewood, and he would go back there himself—and stay there for the rest of his life.

He never had been renowned for his wisdom.

He had arrived at the White Horse Inn at just the wrong time, he thought as he rode into the cobbled yard. A stagecoach was preparing for departure. There were people, horses, and baggage everywhere, and a great deal of noise and commotion. But one stablehand recognized him as a gentleman and hurried toward him to ask if he could take his horse.