Scandalous (3 page)
Having made up her mind to seize the day while she could, she had suffered sleepless nights and many qualms of conscience ever since. The wrongness of what she was doing unsettled her; but to allow her sisters to suffer for want of a little resolution was, in her estimation, more wrong still. She quieted her conscience by reminding herself that, even if something did not happen to bring the whole scheme tumbling down around her ears, she did not mean to keep up the pretense forever; as soon as Claire was safely married she meant to "receive word" of Marcus's death, and then the sham would come to an end. How wrong could what was actually no more than buying a little time to get themselves creditably established be?
"Is your leg paining you, Gabby?" Claire asked, turning her attention to her older sister as Beth was now engaged in a spirited discussion with Twindle over the sights that it might be proper for a very young lady to visit while in London. Astley's Ampitheatre and the beasts at the Royal Exchange were, in Twindle's judgment, just passably acceptable. Covent Garden— "…and how you came to be knowing of that place, Miss Beth, I can't begin to think…" was definitely not. Having grown accustomed over the years to Gabby's infirmity— indeed, she and Beth never even thought of it as such; Gabby's damaged leg was as much an accepted part of her as her straight-as-a-horse's-tail hair— Claire didn't sound overly concerned.
"Was I frowning, to make you think so?" Gabby asked lightly, summoning a smile. "My leg is fine. I was just running over a list of all I have to do when we reach London."
"Do you think Aunt Salcombe will consent to sponsor Claire, Gabby?" Beth broke off her conversation with Twindle to ask with a worried frown. Although too young herself to partake of the pleasures of balls and routs and evenings spent at such fabled bastions of the
haute ton
as Almack's, she had entered into the preparations for Claire's come-out with gusto.
"I can't say for certain, of course, but I am hopeful that she will. After all, she did invite me to make my come-out under her aegis when I turned eighteen, saying that, as she had no children of her own, she would adore to present her niece to the
ton.
And you are as much her niece as I am, and a far better prospect to make a splash." This last Gabby, with a twinkle, directed to Claire. What she forebore to add was that, when the invitation had arrived all those years ago, she had been over the moon at the prospect of a London season, until her father had laughed and said that obviously his sister Augusta did not realize that her eldest niece was now a cripple and would disgrace her in any ballroom which was unfortunate enough to suffer her presence. Gabby had not been privileged to see what the earl had replied to his sister, but the invitation had been turned down and never repeated. Crushed at first, Gabby had come to realize, in retrospect, that it was probably for the best. She could not have left Claire and Beth, then eleven and eight, with no one but Twindle and Jem to buffer them from their father's excesses even for the few months of a single season, and to have abandoned them forever via marriage, which was, after all, the ultimate goal of all that frivolity, would have been impossible. And her father would never have let her take her sisters to live with her, either to London or her new husband's home. What Matthew Banning possessed, he possessed completely, whether he valued it or not.
"Lady Salcombe is a very high stickler, Miss Gabby." A shade of anxiety darkened Twindle's narrow face as she spoke. From the circumstance of having lived in London for years before coming to Hawthorne Hall, Twindle was at least vaguely familiar with a number of the great lords and ladies who made up the fashionable scene.
"Well, if she is not inclined to help us then we must make shift without her," Gabby said with assumed cheerfulness. Though green to the ways of London, she was not so green that she did not realize that the assistance of her father's sister was of paramount importance in making Claire's introduction to the
ton
the success it should be. Being herself firmly on the shelf, Gabby was, she felt, perfectly qualified to act as her sister's chaperone. As the daughter of an earl, even such an eccentric and reclusive one as Lord Wickham had been, she and her sisters must command a certain place in Society. But she knew no more of London and town ways than she had read of in books, heard about from Twindle, and observed from watching her father's usually less than top-drawer guests over the years. And she had almost no acquaintances there. As she had told Claire, if Lady Salcombe refused to help them they would manage— somehow. But not nearly so well, or so easily, as if that lady agreed to stand their friend.
Always at the back of her mind lurked the knowledge that they must make the most of this time she had snatched from the jaws of fate: there could be no more than this single season for Claire.
"Do we not have any other relations in town who could assist us if Aunt Salcombe refuses?" Beth asked curiously.
"Besides Cousin Thomas and Lady Maud, you mean?" Gabby smiled as Beth made a face. "There are various assorted relations, I believe, but I prefer to start with Lady Salcombe. She is, or used to be, quite a pillar of society, you know."
Gabby sought to turn the conversation then by wondering aloud if the village she could see from the window was West Hurch, or not. Just as she thought it best to keep the knowledge of Marcus's death and the truly desperate nature of this trip from her sisters and everyone else save Jem, so, too, did she think it best not to make Claire and Beth overly conscious of the unconventional nature of their family structure. Although it was true that she at least did have fashionable relatives other than their father's kin, it was doubtful that any of them could, or would, be of much help in facilitating Claire's come-out. They had never visited Hawthorne Hall, or evinced any interest in herself or her sisters that she knew of. The problem was that each of the earl's offspring had had a different mother, and those mothers had varied widely on the social scale. Marcus's mother, Elise de Melancon, had journeyed to London from Ceylon for her season amid hopes that she would make a great match. She had been both an acknowledged beauty of unexceptional birth and a considerable heiress. Her union with the earl of Wickham had satisfied all parties, although after a scant two years with her new husband the beautiful young countess had been so little enamoured of married life that she had taken her baby son and fled back to Ceylon. Upon that lady's death a few years later, the earl had once again visited London to find a bride. This time his unknowing victim had been Gabby's mother, Lady Sophia Hendred, as well born as himself but neither particularly beautiful nor particularly rich; she had died in childbed some three years after Gabby's advent. Claire's mother, Maria Dysart, a beauty of no more than respectable birth and no fortune at all, had caught the earl's eye on a jaunt to Bath and had been considered to have married above her when she wed the recent widower. She had lasted just long enough to produce Claire before succumbing to what was described as a wasting disease. Beth's mother had been an obscure clergyman's daughter. Fortunately for the legions of unmarried ladies still out there, by the time the former Miss Bolton had fallen down the stairs at Hawthorne Hall, breaking her neck, the earl had suffered the riding accident that had confined him to a wheel chair for the rest of his life. No other countess had graced Hawthorne Hall with her presence, and it had been left to Gabby to act as mistress of the house, and surrogate mother to her younger sisters, a role that had suited her very well.
"Just think, Claire, by this time next year you'll probably be a married lady," Beth said with wonder, bouncing a little on the seat. With all the lurching the carriage was doing, such movement seemed redundant, but Beth had been unable to sit still ever since learning that they were going to London.
"I have been thinking of that," Claire confessed, sounding faintly troubled. Her eyes met Gabby's. "To tell the truth, I— I'm not sure I wish to be married, after all. I don't want to leave you two behind— and— and I am much afraid that the gentleman will turn out to be— well, like Papa."
This piece of frankness left the other three occupants of the carriage without anything to say for a moment. Gabby was the first to recover her power of speech.
"You need not marry anyone if you don't wish to," she said stoutly, and meant it, too, despite everything, though the possibility that all her desperate scheming might be for naught sent a sudden chill down her spine. This was an outcome she had not considered; she could only hope that Claire, with her soft heart to make her susceptible and her breathtaking looks to provide her with opportunity, would tumble headlong into love upon being exposed to a world full of eligible, and, it was to be hoped, handsome and charming men. If not— well, they would cross that bridge when they came to it. "And as for worrying about your prospective groom being like Papa— well, I don't think very many gentlemen are— are mean with money, or reclusive, or— or so unloving to their wives and children as he was, so you need not concern yourself overmuch about that."
"No indeed," said Twindle feelingly. "His Lordship was quite unique in that regard, believe me."
"And perhaps Gabby and I and Twindle will come to stay with you, after you're married," Beth added with a grin. "So you need not worry about losing us, either."
Gabby, taking care to keep her expression under control as her youngest sister, in all innocence, hit the nail squarely on the head, again directed the conversation into safer channels.
They passed that night in Newark, continuing on the next day. Their first glimpse of London was had at sundown. The carriage topped a rise, and suddenly there was the city spread out before them like a banquet. Crowding the windows, they marveled over the spires and rooftops, the seemingly never-ending cluster of buildings, the meandering silver ribbon of the Thames, all glittering jewel-like under the rays of the setting sun. However, by the time the carriage entered London proper, clattering across the bridge into streets crowded with vehicles of every description, it was, due to a series of maddening delays, full dark, and Gabby thanked providence for the light of a rising moon. Progress was necessarily slowed, and soon even the novel sights of the metropolis ceased to make them forget their fatigue. Plastered to the windows once again, they at first viewed with wonder the bustling tide of humanity through which they wound their way. Illuminated by newfangled gas street lamps which lent a yellow glow to the smoky haze that lay like a blanket over everything, the sights of London were as fascinating to their country-bred eyes as visions of another world. Then they realized that those citizens on foot seemed, for the most part, to be both ragged and dirty, while those on horseback or that could be glimpsed aboard passing conveyances appeared standoffish and in many cases positively surly. Odiferous smells began to permeate even the walls of the carriage, making them wrinkle their noses and glance at each other in consternation. The cause was soon identified as narrow ditches, thick with floating refuse, that ran alongside the roadways. Shabby half-timbered buildings crowded so closely together on both sides of the road that they seemed after a while to create a single, wall-like facade. This was bisected at irregular intervals by narrow dark alleys into which dangerous-looking characters disappeared like rats down a hole. Observing one particularly evil-looking fellow, Claire echoed the sentiments of all by expressing thanks aloud that the shabby appearance of their carriage and the faded condition of the crest on the door made an assault by robbers unlikely. As they at last entered the posher environment of Mayfair, identified in a thankful tone by Twindle, the traffic thinned and the streets grew markedly less populated. By the time the carriage swayed to a halt on the cobblestone street outside Wickham House, the moon was climbing the sky and there were few people about. The occupants of the carriage were hungry, exhausted, irritable, and, in Claire's case, extremely travel sick. It was with relief that Gabby, who was closest to the door, sucked in a breath of fresh, relatively sweet-smelling air as Jem opened it and let down the steps, then held up a hand to help her alight.
"Thank heavens. Much longer, and we all would have been ill," she said. Bestowing a quick smile on her frowning servant as she gained the dark, windy street, Gabby gathered the billowing folds of her cloak closer about her person in response to the unexpected, although not entirely unwelcome, chill of the April night. At least, she thought in the spirit of trying to find a positive thought to dwell on, the rain had ceased, though puddles stood on the street, gleaming black in the moonlight.
" 'Tis not too late to draw back from this mad scheme o' yours, Miss Gabby," Jem said in a worried undertone. As Gabby glanced at him their gazes held for a pregnant instant. The worst thing about servants who had known one from the cradle, and, indeed, had practically helped to raise one, was that they felt quite free to speak their minds whenever they chose, Gabby reflected with some annoyance, however unwelcome their observations might be.
"Yes, indeed it is too late. I have quite made up my mind, Jem, so you may as well stop pestering me about the matter." Her tart reply was as low voiced as Jem's warning.
"Mark my words, missy, no good will come of it," he muttered direly, then was forced into silence as Beth appeared in the door of the carriage. Beyond casting him a sharp look, Gabby ignored him after that, looking about her instead as she waited for her sisters and Twindle to be handed down. Gaslights burned on each corner of the square. Their flickering glow, coupled with the bright moonlight, made visibility quite good. A wheeled cart rattled along farther down the street, she saw, pushed by a pie man calling out "Meat pasties! Meat pasties for sale!" as though he had not much hope of being attended to. Another carriage, newer and far more fashionable than their own, swept by, its wheels rattling over the street, its flickering lights and open curtains permitting Gabby just a glimpse of an elegant lady and gentleman inside. In the grassy area at the center of the square, a pair of ragged-looking urchins conversed with another, lantern-bearing man whom Gabby guessed— hoped— was the watch.