Runaway Miss (20 page)

‘I came to see how Alex did. He has been away from the Smoke so long, and now I find him in the middle of fighting a war and am of a mind to stay and take part. And I have been invited to a ball at the Assembly rooms and am determined not to miss that.’ He looked round at the rest of the company and immediately dismissed Mrs Yates and her children as of no importance, but his eye lighted on Emma. Alex realised at once that she had recognised him, even if he had shown no sign of remembering her.

Amelia had seen it too and put a reassuring hand on Emma’s arm. ‘This is my companion, Miss Fanny Draper, Mr Maddox.’

‘Your obedient, Miss Draper.’ He bowed and she curtsied, looking downwards, not meeting his gaze.

‘Fanny has been my helpmate for ages,’ Amelia lied gallantly. ‘I do not know what I would do without her.’

He smiled. ‘Then you must pray no one carries her off and marries her, madam. Someone as comely as Miss Draper is unlikely to remain single for long.’

‘Maddox, you are putting Miss Draper to the blush,’ Alex snapped. ‘They are not used to your London ways up here.’

‘I beg your pardon. A pretty compliment is a compliment wherever it is uttered and Miss Pettifer did not seem to mind me.’

‘Do you know Miss Pettifer, sir?’ Emma asked, speaking for the first time.

‘Why, Alex, here, introduced me to her only this morning. We had a pleasant little coze in the…What was the place called?’ He appealed to Alex.

‘The Unicorn.’ It was said flatly. He had seen the look of surprise and hurt pass over Emma’s face and knew she had misunderstood the nature of his trip into Ambleside. He wished Jeremy Maddox anywhere but where he was, adding to his torment and Emma’s too. ‘We met by accident.’

‘If you will excuse us, gentlemen, we must be going home,’ Amelia said.

‘Oh, not yet,’ Sam wailed. ‘I haven’t looked at the ships.’

‘Neither have I,’ Jeremy said. ‘Are you going to show me round, Malvers?’

‘A pleasure,’ he said, though he could not make it sound like a pleasure. ‘You can come too, Sam. I’ll take you home with me.’

The ladies went off in the carriage. Emma was silent all the way, though Amelia managed to keep up a light conversation with Mrs Yates. When they arrived, Mrs Yates and Lizzie went to the kitchen to help Mrs Granger with the dinner preparations and Emma and Mrs Summers went up to their rooms to take off their outdoor clothes and dress for dinner.

Emma shut her bedroom door and flung herself on her bed.
She had never felt less like eating. She remembered Mr Maddox. She had seen him talking to her stepfather at Almack’s and she had asked Harriet who he was, thinking he might be Lord Bentwater. He knew Sir George and probably Lord Bentwater, too, and if he knew who she was, if he knew she had disappeared and there was a reward for her return…he would tell Alex. Oh, she was in the most terrible fix.

She sat on the edge of her bed, hugging her arms round herself, and rocked to and fro in despair. She must run away again. But where? And this time there would be no Rose Turner, no Alex Malvers to help her and no Mrs Summers at the end of the journey to give her sanctuary. What had that odious James Griggs said about scrubbing floors? It was beginning to look like reality. And to make her distress even worse, Alex had met Charlotte Pettifer in Ambleside and she was infernally jealous.

A light knock at the door preceded Mrs Summers’s entry into the room. ‘Not changed, Emma?’ she queried, sitting down beside her. ‘Did you not hear the bell?’

‘No.’ A monotone.

‘I can guess what you are thinking, you are thinking you must run away again. I must tell you here and now it is not to be thought of.’

‘That man, that friend of his lordship. I have seen him before.’

‘I surmised as much. But he gave no sign of recognising you, did he?’

‘That’s not to say he might not in the future if he stays in the area.’

‘Where did you meet?’

‘We did not exactly meet. I saw him talking to Sir George at a ball at Almack’s the night before I left London. If he is a crony of my stepfather’s…You do not think Sir George could have sent him, do you?’

‘Emma, child, be sensible. If he noticed you at the ball, he saw a young aristocratic lady dressed in all her finery,
someone as far removed from Miss Fanny Draper, lady’s companion living quietly in the country, as it is possible to be, especially as he thinks you have lived up here for years.’

‘Yes, I thank you for that. But others will soon disillusion him. You heard him say he has already met Miss Pettifer.’

‘We will cross that bridge when we come to it. But you cannot disappear again, truly you cannot. Nothing would arouse his suspicion more. You must brazen it out and if you see him again—’

‘Which I am sure I shall, considering he is determined to stay for the regatta.’

‘If you see him again,’ Amelia repeated, ‘and he suggests you remind him of someone he has met, you must laugh it off. You can do it, I know.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘But you must talk to Alex. Make a clean breast of everything. We must have him on our side.’

‘We
, Mrs Summers?’ There was a ghost of a smile on her face.

‘Yes, my dear. I am in this right up to my neck and so is Alex and it is not kind in you to keep him in ignorance, not now, not any more.’

‘Yes, you are right, but will he believe me when I tell him why I had to disappear? Will he think I am a silly spoiled young woman who doesn’t appreciate what her loving parents are trying to do for her?’

‘Surely you know him better than that? He loves you.’

‘He what?’ She was not sure she had heard aright.

‘He loves you. I am sure he does.’

‘How do you know?’

‘The same way you should know, by the way he looked after you all the way from London, the way he is still looking after you. He was deeply concerned, almost afraid, when you were lost on the fells in the rain.’

She was not sure whether to take heart from that or not.
‘I am not sure that means anything. He is the sort of man to be kind to a mongrel dog. And even if he does, it is Fanny Draper he loves and he knows nothing can come of that because she is way, way beneath him. It can only be a passing fancy.’

‘You will never find out if you do not tell him the truth, will you?’

‘I am not sure I want to find out. He will be angry. And if his love is dependent on rank, then I would as soon do without it.’

‘Emma Lindsay, I am fast losing all patience with you. Now change your dress and come down for dinner and be your usual cheerful self and I will contrive to leave you alone and afterwards I shall want to hear that you and he have come to an understanding.’ She stood up, shook out the skirt of her black taffeta gown, and left Emma to do as she asked.

But their plans were thwarted because, when Emma went down to the drawing room to wait for the second dinner bell, she found that Alex had invited Mr Maddox to dine with them and they were both there, apparently in easy conversation. How could he? How could he do this to her? The answer came immediately: because he did not know who she really was. He did not know the danger Mr Maddox posed.

As she entered the room, they both rose to greet her. ‘Good evening, gentlemen,’ she said, glad she had not had time to do anything more with her hair than brush it back and tie it up and that she had thrown a shawl over the lilac silk to cover her bare shoulders.

They responded and Jeremy spoke glowingly of his tour of the little ships and how happy he was to accept his lordship’s invitation to take pot luck. She was glad she did not have to do anything more than contribute an occasional ‘to be sure’ or ‘indeed’, nothing more than a shy companion might
be expected to say. But she was wound up like a coiled spring and had to keep a tight hold of herself because the smallest thing, a word or a look, would send her composure flying. She was relieved when Mrs Summers appeared and, a minute or so later, the footman to announce that dinner was served.

Amelia, who had been even more surprised than Emma to see their guest, kept the conversation flowing, which was not difficult because Mr Maddox had plenty to say for himself and was enthusiastic about the regatta and Alex was unusually jovial. No one paid much attention to Emma. On Alex and Amelia’s part it was deliberately done to spare her; on Jeremy’s part it was simply that his conceit did not allow anyone but him to hold centre stage.

Alex was annoyed that the man had virtually invited himself to dinner and, if he were not careful, would inveigle a bed as well. He waited until the ladies had retired to the drawing room to explain that he would gladly have him to stay, but unfortunately all the bedrooms were in use and the servants he employed, while doing their best, were not up to serving a gentleman of his standing.

‘Yes, I wondered about them,’ Jeremy said, helping himself to the port. ‘Bit rough round the edges, what? Are they some of your down and outs?’

Alex smiled. ‘You could say that.’

‘Not Miss Draper, though?’

‘No, nor the cook, nor the footman. They were here when I arrived.’

‘She’s a sad little thing, isn’t she?’

‘Who?’

‘Miss Draper. Well, not exactly little, I did not mean that. But withdrawn, not much to say for herself.’

‘She is my aunt’s companion. She is not expected to say anything unless spoken to. And I don’t think she is sad.’

‘Oh, well, you know her better than I do. What do you
make of that Miss Pettifer? Now there’s a one who has plenty to say.’

Alex smiled, glad his guest was so dismissive. It meant he had not recognised Emma. He began talking about the other young ladies he had met and what society was like in the district, which was rapidly becoming the holiday destination of so many of Society’s elite.

‘Taken a fancy to any of them, have you?’ Jeremy asked. ‘Changed you mind about looking for a wife?’

‘No. Besides, I’m too busy with the regatta to think of anything like that.’

‘Tell me more about that. That young shaver—Sam, he’s called, isn’t he? He said there was going to be a sort of play with a girl being kidnapped and held at a castle on an island and the ships were going to rescue her.’

‘Something like that. The battle to rescue her is intended to be the climax of the day. Before that there will be swimming and boating events as well as stalls and amusements. I’m hoping for a good turn out. The men have put so much work into it.’

‘You have advertised it?’

‘Oh, yes. Posters everywhere.’ He drained his glass. The regatta was rapidly becoming a huge undertaking, far greater than he had first envisaged; sometimes he wondered if he had undertaken more than he could easily accomplish. It was a lodestone, a fulcrum perhaps, on which his whole life and Emma’s, too, was balanced. He liked to think that after it was over, he would be able to see his way clearly ahead. ‘Shall we join the ladies?’

‘Emma, you have been worrying about nothing. He did not recognise you at all.’ Amelia gave a little chuckle. ‘He is so full of himself, he cannot see beyond the end of his aristocratic nose.’

‘Yes, but I am on tenterhooks all the time he is anywhere near. I cannot understand why his lordship invited him.’

‘Perhaps because his lordship did not know you knew him,’ Amelia said sharply.

‘I have been trying to summon up my courage to talk to him this evening and now I will not be able to. Would it look very bad if I retired?’

‘I think you should stay for a few minutes after they join us, don’t let him think you are avoiding him.’

‘Lord Malvers?’

‘No, you goose, Mr Maddox.’ She looked up as the door opened and the two gentlemen entered. ‘Why, here they are. Would you like some tea, Mr Maddox?’

He sat down opposite the two ladies and accepted a cup of tea. So did Alex. He stood with his back to the hearth, watching Maddox, watching Emma. He could tell she was rattled, but there was nothing he could do about it until he could see her alone. He caught her eye and smiled at her, seeking to reassure her, but there was no answering smile. Her face was pale, hardly any colour in her cheeks, and her eyes, normally sparkling with fun, even in the midst of one of her adventures, were lifeless. It was as if a candle had gone out inside her.

L
ong before Emma rose next morning Alex was up and about, overseeing the work going on, making sure the men had enough to do so that he could have a little free time to spend with her. He had expected Maddox to return and was relieved when he did not. He supposed that his enthusiasm for the regatta was not genuine, but expressed out of politeness, and another day had brought new diversions. So be it. But he still had to talk to Emma.

He returned to the house and went in search of her. His aunt was in the breakfast room alone. He sat at the table and accepted her invitation to have a cup of coffee with her. ‘Where is Emma?’ he asked.

‘I haven’t seen her this morning. She was not feeling quite the thing last evening, so perhaps she has decided to stay in bed.’

‘Is she avoiding me?’

‘No, of course not. Why would she do that?’

‘You know why, Aunt. I want to have a long talk with her. This nonsense has been going on long enough.’

‘So it has, but you are as much to blame as she is. Bringing that man here just when she had decided to tell you everything.’

‘She had?’ he queried, brightening.

‘Yes. I told her I would leave you alone after dinner and then you came back with that overdressed tulip. Why did you have to do that? It was like twisting the knife in the wound. And she is wounded, you know, deep inside.’

‘I know. But Maddox more or less invited himself. I could not say no without giving offence.’

‘She recognised him as a friend of her stepfather. She saw them talking together at Almack’s and she is half-convinced Sir George sent him to hunt her down.’

‘That’s nonsense. Maddox gambles with Sir George, but I would not call them friends. And he did not recognise her. And even if he did, I doubt he would pass the knowledge on.’

‘I have tried telling her that, but she is unconvinced. She is not even sure of you…’

‘What does she take me for?’

‘Why don’t you ask her?’ She smiled and rang the bell at her side and when Lizzie, pristine in her new uniform, answered it, she said, ‘Would you ask Miss Draper if she would come down, Lizzie, I should like to speak to her. In the back parlour, if you please.’ As soon as the girl had gone, she turned back to Alex. ‘Go in there and wait for her. I am going into Kendal to visit some old friends, if you will allow me the use of the carriage.’

‘Of course. You do not have to ask.’

‘Thank you.’ She hurried away to order the carriage, leaving him to make his way to the back parlour.

Emma, dressed in the tawny light wool gown Mrs Summers had bought for her, because the weather was far from summery, made her way downstairs in answer to the summons. She had spent half the night awake, sitting at the window of her room, looking out at the hills in the distance, dark and awesome against the night sky, wondering if she would ever feel safe. It was all very well for Mrs Summers
to say Mr Maddox had not recognised her, but who was to say he would not do so at some future date? And what a furore it would cause. Soon everyone would know: Sir Mortimer and Lady Pettifer, the doctor and his daughters, everyone at the vicarage, including the odious James Griggs, not to mention the men who worked for Alex. As for Alex…She dare not think of what he might say to her, leading him a dance all the way from London, and falling into one scrape after another and laying him open to arrest. Once her real identity was out in the open it would not be long before her stepfather and Lord Bentwater heard where she was. She would have to tell Mrs Summers she was leaving and this time she would not allow her to dissuade her.

She entered the room and then stopped. Alex was standing with his back to the room, looking out of the window. ‘Oh, I thought Mrs Summers was here.’

He turned towards her and smiled. ‘As you can see, there is no one here but me.’

‘I must go and find her. She said she wanted to see me.’ She turned to go.

‘Don’t go.’ She appeared not to hear him and took another step towards the door. He raised his voice. ‘Emma, wait.’

She froze, unable to go on, unable to turn towards him. ‘What did you call me? ’It was whispered with her back to him.

‘Emma.’ He strode over to her and, taking her shoulders in his hands, turned her towards him. ‘You are Lady Emma Lindsay, aren’t you?’

She could not meet his eyes and looked at the pin in the middle of his neatly tied cravat as if mesmerised by its brilliance. ‘He told you. Mr Maddox told you.’

‘No, he did not. I knew before he arrived. And in case you were thinking of accusing my aunt, she did not tell me either. What I want to know is why you did not tell me yourself.’

‘I had my reasons.’

‘And what might they have been?’

‘It is too complicated to explain and it makes no difference. I cannot be Lady Emma Lindsay ever again and must always remain Miss Fanny Draper. I beg you to accept that.’

‘I will if you tell me why I must.’ He put his finger under her chin and forced her to look up at him. ‘I thought you trusted me.’

‘I do. I trust you to find me when I am lost, to feed me when I am hungry, to rescue me from lustful men…’

‘But not with your secret?’

‘I wanted to, but I was afraid.’

‘What! Miss Fanny Draper, who told me she was afraid of nothing, has admitted to feeling fearful.’

‘I was right to be, wasn’t I? You know Mr Maddox and Mr Maddox knows my stepfather and if my stepfather finds me he will make me marry Lord Bentwater.’ She was maintaining her composure with a huge effort. ‘Do you also know Lord Bentwater, my lord?’

‘I have met him,’ he said grimly. ‘Not a pleasant character.’

‘His lordship seems to think I am affianced to him.’

‘And are you? Have you agreed to marry him?’

‘Certainly not! Why do you think I left London?’

‘To escape?’

‘Yes, to escape all overbearing lustful men who think that they have only to smile at me and I will fall into their arms with gratitude.’

‘And am I included in that number?’

She did not answer and he shook her gently. ‘Emma, answer me.’

‘I am Fanny, not Emma. It will only take someone to call me by the wrong name in company for everyone to start talking. Gossip soon spreads, my lord.’

‘Very well, Fanny. I do not care a fig what you choose to
call yourself, but I want to know if you think I am overbearing and lustful.’

‘No, I did not mean you.’

‘Thank goodness for that.’ He drew her to the sofa and pulled her down to sit beside him. ‘Now, tell me everything from the beginning and then I will tell you what we are going to do.’

After a minute’s hesitation, it poured out of her: her stepfather’s threats, her mother’s fear of him; that dreadful Lord Bentwater assuming she would comply with her stepfather’s decree simply because she had always been an obedient daughter and had no other means of support; wanting to run away, but not daring to leave her mother. ‘But she insisted,’ she told him. ‘She said it was the only way. And Rose agreed to come with me. And then we met you. I was so grateful for your help. I did not know you were coming here. I would not have come myself if I had known.’

‘Why not?’

‘I did not want anyone to know who I was. I still do not, especially now Mr Maddox has turned up.’ She paused. ‘Who did tell you?’

‘No one. I guessed. I was with Sir George and Lord Bentwater when they struck the bargain. The return of Sir George’s vouchers for your hand in marriage.’

‘You were there?’ She seemed to recoil from him, almost as if he had struck her. ‘You were present at the gaming table?’

‘Yes.’

‘So it could just have easily been you making that bargain.’

‘Certainly not,’ he snapped. ‘What sort of man do you think I am?’

‘A gamester. A gambler. Someone who can stand by and condone—’

‘I condoned nothing.’ Why did she have to pick him up on that when it was something he had asked himself over and over again ever since he had discovered who she was?

‘You did not do anything to help, though, did you?’

‘What should I have done? Stayed at the table and tried to win you for myself? I did not know you or anything about you. For all I knew, you were no different from all the other Society chits, empty-headed and concerned only with status and wealth.’ He was aware as he spoke that he was trying to justify himself and digging himself further into the mire. ‘In any case, my skill would not have been enough to ensure I won and what would I have done with you, if I had?’

‘You would have been as bad as they were.’

‘Precisely. And I assumed you would refuse him if you did not like the idea.’

‘Like it! I loathe the man, but I had to flee my home to escape from him.’

‘I know that now.’ He gave a lopsided smile. ‘But it did give us an opportunity to become acquainted.’

‘It is not a joke, but isn’t it just like a man to think it is?’

‘I am sorry, I was only trying to make you see it is not as bad as it seems.’

‘Not bad! I cannot see how it could be any worse. You have been playing with me all along. Pretending I was Miss Draper when you knew I was not, making a fool of me.’

‘I did not know, not at the beginning. But you gave yourself away in so many little things and the further we went, the more convinced I became that you were not who you said you were. I sent Joe Bland to find out for sure.’

‘And there was me, thinking you wanted to help Rose.’

‘I did. I thought it would please you.’

‘So he came back and confirmed your suspicions. But you still said nothing.’

‘I wanted you to tell me yourself.’

‘But you couldn’t wait for that, could you?’ She was furious. All the soul searching about whether she should confide in him or not had been for nothing. She could have
saved herself the heartache. And to discover he was at that gaming table was twisting the knife in her wounded pride. She felt demeaned, humiliated. ‘So now you know, what are you going to do about it?’

‘What would you have me do?’

‘Nothing. Pretend you never found out. My stepfather’s temper was always fiery and I fear he will be out of all control if he ever hears you helped me. He is telling everyone I have been kidnapped and I would not put it past him to say you took me away against my will. What does the law do to kidnappers, my lord?’

Even in her misery she was thinking of him, he realised, and he did not deserve it. ‘It is not going to happen, sweetheart, because I cannot be accused of abducting my own wife.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I said he cannot accuse me of abducting my own wife.’

‘I thought my ears were deceiving me. You mean if he comes here you are going to tell him we are married? I never heard anything so foolish. He would soon find out we are not.’

‘No, but we could be. It would be a way out of your dilemma.’

‘No, it would not.’ She jumped to her feet, distancing herself from him. This was not what she wanted, not a marriage of convenience. Not with him. And she was angry that he had suggested it. ‘If you think I would marry you after…’

He stood up and grabbed her hand. ‘Why not?’

‘Because you are a gambler, prepared to sit at a gaming table all night and throw away a lady’s life and happiness on the turn of a card.’

‘I never did and never would. I only played to make up the four. If I had known—’

‘It makes no odds. Marriage should be based on trust, on knowledge, on love. You don’t love me, you think I am only interested in rank and wealth—’

‘I did not say that. I said you might have been. I know differently now, of course.’ He had been a fool to confess to being there; he had known she disapproved of gambling and who could blame her for that?

‘Yes, because you have wormed the whole humiliating story out of me and now I am to be pitied.’

‘Oh, yes,’ he said grimly. ‘I will show you how much I pity you, shall I?’ He pulled her towards him so sharply she fell against his chest. He put one arm about her to steady her and with his other hand lifted her face to his. And then his lips were on hers, hard and demanding. He was annoyed with himself, not her. He had been given the opportunity to make all right and instead had botched it completely. Instead of talking about their feelings for each other, they had become bogged down talking about Sir George and Bentwater and what she thought about gambling.

All he had wanted to do was ask her to marry him. He had not asked her, had not proposed, he had simply stated it as a fact, to all intents giving her no choice, which was exactly what Bentwater had tried to do. Damn his stupid pride! She did not deserve such rough treatment, especially at the hands of someone who professed to love her. His mouth softened, as his anger softened, until he was putting all his love, all his longing into the gentle pressure of his lips on hers.

He lifted his head to look into her face, so breathless he could hardly speak, did not know what to say in any case. Sorry seemed entirely inadequate. ‘Emma…’

‘I am
not
Emma,’ she said furiously, trying to put his kisses from her mind because they weakened her and she could not afford to be weak. ‘I am Fanny, penniless, simple Fanny who is foolish enough to be grateful for a handful of crumbs.’ She wrenched herself away, her face fiery, her eyes flashing. ‘I
am
grateful, but my gratitude does not stretch to submitting to being mauled. You are no better than the others.’

‘What others?’

‘Lord Bentwater, James Griggs, anyone else who thinks that just because I am no longer what society chooses to call a lady, they think they do not have to mind their manners. I am sick of it.’

‘Emma…’ He reached for her again, but she evaded him.

‘You can find someone else to rescue from your fortress. I am quite sure you are tired of having to rescue me.’ She ran for the door, ignoring him when he called after her. ‘Try Charlotte Pettifer, I am sure she will be delighted,’ she flung over her shoulder. Once up in her room, she threw herself on her bed and sobbed.

He had known all along that she was not who she said she was and he had said nothing. He had been humouring her, calling her Miss Draper when he knew she was not. That gleam of amusement in his eyes, which had so attracted her, was mockery. It was insupportable. And then to suggest marrying her simply to thwart her stepfather was the outside of enough. And he had known about that too, had sat at the gaming table and heard her stepfather barter her for his vouchers.