The Landlord's Black-Eyed Daughter (2 page)

For the upper classes, laws, like women, existed only for men's pleasure. Rand had seen a young fop slit a wigmaker's throat over the price of a wig, while a second ran his sword through a total stranger during a game of cards. Both had received pardons, whereas Rand's fourteen-year-old niece had been hanged for hiding,
on instructions from her employer,
some counterfeit shillings.

Rand had been gone, fighting for England, when the hanging of his niece occurred. Fighting for a country where orphans were sold into servitude to ship captains bound for America or India, and no one raised an objection. Fighting for a country where churchgoers nodded approvingly over sermons advocating that abandoned children should be allowed only enough education to obtain the meanest job. And those same children should learn to read a little so they could decipher the appropriate biblical passages that reinforced their lowly status.

Outside London coffeehouses, ten-year-old whores sold themselves for the price of a loaf of bread. Bucks drank champagne from the slippers of their mistresses while the bastards they spawned off their servant girls were left to die in the streets. Rand never ceased to be amazed, as well as enraged, by the sheer hypocrisy of it all.

With a sigh, he stretched out on the soft feather mattress and tried to sleep. Suddenly, he remembered the novel he had retrieved from Lady Avery. Although Rand was an avid reader, he had never opened a Gothic romance. According to conventional wisdom, such writings required the womanly virtues of imagination and sensibility, but not intellect, so they were a waste of time for serious—meaning male—readers. Not that Rand had ever paid much attention to conventional wisdom. Now, on impulse, he retrieved
Castles of Doom
from his saddlebag.

The novel had been manufactured in three slim volumes. Rand opened the first installment, and a folded piece of paper fell out. It was an invitation to meet the pride of Minerva Press, Miss B.B. Wyndham. Some biological facts followed concerning the lady, as well as the date of the party: April 1, 1787—three days hence.

Licking his thumb, Rand flipped to Chapter One. The first sentence read:
That most malevolent of men, Baron Ralf Darkstarre, paced the length of his watchtower,
which overlooked the churning waters of the North Sea, and impatiently awaited the arrival of his liege lord, Simon de Montfort.

Rand felt as if all the heat from the stuffy room had rushed into his body. Simon de Montfort was a familiar name, a very familiar name. Rand had long believed that his recurring dream was connected with Simon de Montfort and his rebellion against King Henry, which had occurred more than five hundred years ago.

His breath uneven, Rand continued reading:
Despite his evil nature, Lord Darkstarre was a comely man of impressive height, and possessed of an arresting countenance. Lord Darkstarre's brow was wide and noble, and it was only after one gazed into his eyes that one could detect a flicker of the madness that would ultimately consume him.

Swiftly Rand scanned the pages until he found the next mention of Simon de Montfort.

Three hours later, Zak stumbled inside, his waistcoat half-buttoned, his voice mangling the strains of a bawdy tavern song.

Rand was still reading.

“Ye bloody flat!” Zak shouted. “What kinda prancer be ye, spendin' yer nights with books 'stead o' bunters? Damn, lad, what's wrong? Ye look like ye've seen yer own death.”

Reluctantly, Rand left the pages of the past and returned to his cousin. How could he possibly explain what was wrong? The whole thing seemed as mad as B.B. Wyndham's antagonist. “I'm going to attend a party,” he finally managed. “I do believe I should meet the pride of Minerva Press.”

“What the bloody hell are ye talkin' 'bout?” Zak tossed his beaver hat toward a wall peg. “Are ye daft?”

“Yes,” said Rand. “Perhaps I am.”

Elizabeth Wyndham gazed at her reflection in the mirror above her dressing table. Dispassionately, she scrutinized her ink-black hair, which fell in ringlets on either side of her face, not unlike a spaniel's ears. A scowl caused her delicately arched brows to descend toward her dark brown eyes—so dark that from a distance they looked like lampblack. “You're a fraud,” she said to her image. “A cheat.”

“What did ye gabble, Mistress?” asked her servant, Grace.

“I wasn't gabbling,” Elizabeth fibbed, her lashes thick dark crescents against her cheekbones. “I coughed.”

“It didn't sound like a cough t' me.” Grace regarded her mistress with disapproval. While no one could deny that Miss Elizabeth was an attractive woman, Grace wondered how much longer her looks could possibly hold up. After all, she must be close to thirty. And yet she acted as if men would always flock 'round her, like pigeons. Truth be told, Elizabeth Wyndham should have been married for a good decade now, and mother to at least five children.

“What are you staring at? My gown?” Elizabeth allowed a thin smile to tug at the corners of her mouth. “In truth, this gown is so out-of-date, 'tis moss-grown.”

“Ye never fret over fashion when we're at home.” Grace's gaze touched upon Elizabeth's powdered white shoulders, which contrasted dramatically with the red brocade of her gown—her very low-cut gown. “If ye want the
naked
truth, Mistress, yer bosom's practically fallin' on the table. What would yer mother—”

“Stepmother!”

“—say if she saw such a thing?”

With a shrug, Elizabeth turned back to her reflection. She was aware of her shortcomings and strengths, and considered her beauty her most important asset. But only because of
society's
dictates. Her quick intelligence, which would last far longer than her face and figure, would ultimately serve her better. Until that time, however, she would display her physical attributes, turning a blind eye—and a deaf ear—to the servant, chaperone, or even stepmother who expressed dissatisfaction.

“God blessed me with a generous bosom,” she said, “and I see no reason to hide it.”

Grace's lantern-jawed face flushed. “Ye're an authoress, Mistress, not a… one of them… improper ladies.”

“Whores, you mean?”

Grace looked as if she were about to faint. “Yer language,” she reprimanded. “Wait till I tell your mother—”

“Stepmother!”

“Wait till I tell
somebody,
” Grace cried, stomping toward the bed.

“I'm sorry,” Elizabeth said. “It's just that I'm so nervous.”

It's just that you're a fraud,
her reflection silently mocked. How could she face the one hundred and fifty guests gathering even now in the ballroom below? Tonight was supposed to be the crowning moment of a career that, in all modesty, had been enormously successful. And yet Elizabeth felt as if her career replicated the title of her latest book. She felt doomed.

She cradled her face in her hands. Her cheeks were so hot. While she prided herself on her iron constitution, her body was sometimes bothered by a variety of vague aches and pains. She attributed their origin to tension, unhappiness, confusion, and a host of the womanly maladies she had always disdained.

Perhaps I'm coming down with a fever and will die in the next few minutes,
she thought hopefully.
Then I won't have to encounter all those smiling faces, and listen to all those compliments, and pretend I'm still the darling of Minerva Press.

She had already decided that her writing career was over. Pretending otherwise was artifice.

Grace captured two black velvet ribbons and lifted them from the four-poster's gold-threaded counterpane. “What do you want me to do with these, Mistress?”

“Tie them around my neck and wrist, please.”

“I'd rather fetch yer shawl.”

“No.” Elizabeth extended her wrist, but her servant just stood there, holding the ribbons gingerly, as if she'd caught two mice by their tails. “All right, hand over the damnable things. I'll put them on myself.”

Grace gasped at the word “damnable.” Her thick brows shot up toward her mob cap. Without further comment, she thrust the ribbons at her mistress.

Elizabeth's fingers felt like chips of ice as she fumbled with her accessories. She knew she shouldn't snap at Grace. Her servant wasn't responsible for B.B. Wyndham's inability to finish
Castles of Doom,
and Grace certainly wasn't responsible for Elizabeth Wyndham's related problem, or more precisely, her obsession.

“My obsession,” Elizabeth whispered to her reflection.

She squeezed her eyes shut, but it didn't help. Behind her closed eyelids, she conjured up the raven-haired knight whom she hated and feared and loved—the raven-haired knight who existed only in her imagination. His face remained elusive, but the more she wrote, the more frequently she caught flashes of him—the width of his back beneath his surcoat, his thick hair curling over his ears and brushing his nape, the way he held his lithe body so straight and tall. She had fled the Yorkshire Dales in a virtual panic. That way she wouldn't have to confront her knight's forthcoming death. Yet he had followed her here to London, invading her publisher's palatial townhouse. She now knew he would follow her everywhere.

I cannot escape him.

In each of her nine novels she had included the raven-haired knight under various names and guises. In her first work, he had hovered on the fringes as one of the Norman lords who arrived with William the Bastard. Then, with every subsequent book, he had insinuated himself closer to the core. By
Richard of the Lion's Heart,
he had been the King's most trusted advisor, and, in her last work, one of the barons at Runnymede. Now, as Ralf Darkstarre in
Castles of Doom,
he threatened to take over the entire narrative. Darkstarre had never existed, of course, but he was the book's villain, as well as a rebel, and he must die alongside Simon de Montfort.

How could she kill him?

“I don't like pictures of people,” Grace said, as she examined a Gainsborough portrait. “I like huntin' dogs and horses.”

“That painting is very expensive. Everything the Beresfords own is very expensive.”

“I still like animals better.”

Elizabeth rubbed her temples, trying to ease the start of a headache.
Perhaps I could make something up about the rebellion,
she thought. Gothic novels were not required to be factual, yet when it came to historical events she had always striven for accuracy.

I know what I'll do,
she mused, wrapping a curl around her index finger.
I'll return to the Dales and fake my own death. That way I won't have to finish the book and nobody will blame me.

“I hope ye'll act like a lady tonight.” Grace shifted her gaze to the console table where a set of porcelain ladies perched. “No talk 'bout free love, whatever that's supposed to mean, or education, or jobs and laws. Yer papa's right. He says ye'd be a dangerous woman if anyone paid attention to ye.”

“For once I agree,” Elizabeth said, her voice wry.

She could do as she pleased at home, thank goodness. Locals expected her to be eccentric. After all, she was a novelist, an occupation that was considered, if not disreputable, at least unusual for a woman. Elizabeth often imagined regulars at her father's establishment, the Inn of the White Hart, pointing her out to strangers, as if she were some slightly suspect landmark. “There goes Bess, the landlord's black-eyed daughter,” they would say. “She writes Gothic romances.” But perhaps they were simply saying: “I wonder if the poor girl will ever find herself a husband.”

Tempted to run a comb through her curls, Elizabeth stilled her hand. Sometimes, when she brushed the silky strands and counted out loud, she could curtail the whispers from her past, especially the memories of her mother.

Barbara Wyndham had died when Elizabeth was seven years old. A strong-willed woman, Barbara had embraced the notion that social equality should exist between men and women. She often told her little daughter the story of a simple peasant girl named Joan, who had fought valiantly for France.

Yet, even at the tender age of seven, Elizabeth saw that her mother didn't have any power. Everything she owned, including the White Hart, belonged to her husband, Lawrence Wyndham. Mama agonized over Papa's frequent gambling, but she had little say in the matter.

That would never happen to her, Elizabeth swore, as she penned her novels. Success was a viable method with which to assert one's independence, and B.B. Wyndham had proven herself very successful. However, if B.B. Wyndham couldn't finish
Castles of Doom,
all that success would have been for naught.

Shaking her head, Elizabeth crossed to the window overlooking Stratton Street. Coaches were lined up in both directions. The walk was crowded with women in luxurious capes, while men sported beaver hats and wide-brimmed hats and hats that scarcely spanned the crowns of their heads.

Grace was right, thought Elizabeth. Tonight was not the night for a lecture on the ills of the world. People were attending Mr. Beresford's “drum” because they expected to meet an authoress very much like the heroines in her books. Elizabeth knew that her heroines could best be described as vapid. All her leading ladies considered their chastity more important than their lives, and they fainted over a profanity. They spent much of their time in bed, recovering from some mysterious illness, and they could be counted upon to deliver, at the slightest provocation, a sermon on socially correct behavior. Her heroes were merely male versions of her socially correct females.

Elizabeth sighed. If boring characters were the price one must pay in order to remain the bestselling author of Minerva Press, so be it. She thought about her raven-haired knight. He might be many things, but he wasn't a gentleman.

A knock on the door interrupted her reverie.

“Enter.” Turning away from the window, Elizabeth pasted on the public smile she employed at the White Hart.

Her hostess, Penelope Beresford, blew into the room like a ship in full sail. Penelope was followed by her tiny husband.

“Miss Wyndham, you look ravishing,” Charles Beresford said.

While Charles reminded Elizabeth of a rabbit, his voice was deep, wonderfully mellifluous and soothing. She imagined God would sound similar.

“Everyone is talking about you,” Charles continued, extracting a lace handkerchief and dabbing at his forehead. “They cannot wait to meet you. In the fortnight you've been here, I cannot tell you how many inquiries we've had concerning our lovely house guest. Isn't that true, Mrs. Beresford?”

“Absolutely, Mr. Beresford.” Penelope spoke with a lisp, a common affectation, although the effect was marred by her voice, which, if raised one octave higher, could shatter porcelain ladies and rattle windows. “I believe you might even snare yourself a London husband, Miss Wyndham. What grand fortune that would be. Mercy! I would be quite overcome with the romance of it all.”

Elizabeth bit back her first response. Even if she believed in marriage, at her advanced age she was far more likely to be attacked by an army of frogs than receive a serious proposal.

“I hope I won't disappoint you and your guests tonight,” she said, retrieving her fan from the dressing table.

“Never!” Charles and Penelope cried in unison.

While the strains of a quadrille drifted up the stairs and through the open door, Elizabeth accepted Charles Beresford's arm.

If I cannot write about my knight's death,
she thought with despair,
perhaps I can turn my talents to more contemporary novels. Or I can write articles for periodicals. Or poetry. Somehow, I must salvage my career.

They walked along the hall toward the curved staircase that led to the ballroom. Elizabeth looked down upon the sea of people—ladies in their patterned silks, enhanced by the sparkle of jewels; gentlemen in hair both powdered and unpowdered, sporting tall wigs and wide wigs, satin breeches and richly colored coats.

None of the ladies and gentlemen are here for me. They attend primarily because the Beresfords host marvelous parties. B.B. Wyndham is an incidental attraction.

“We have a wonderful mix,” Charles said, as they began their descent. “Everyone from politicians to fellow literary personalities. I spoke with Samuel Johnson only moments before we came upstairs.”

“And so many gallants,” Penelope gushed, the miniature glass garden in her hair fairly quivering with excitement. “They will be beside themselves when they discover that, despite your profession… er, talent… you are both lovely and unattached.”

Charles began rattling off the names of the guests, most of whom were unfamiliar. Rather than appear an unsophisticated rustic, Elizabeth uttered oohs and aahs at what she assumed were the proper places.

I must not embarrass myself,
she thought, her hand trembling on the banister.
For once I must act like a lady.

Careful to avoid stepping on the hem of her gown, she placed one slipper-clad foot in front of the other.

She would not ask any personal questions. She would not look any man directly in the eye, nor challenge anyone who acted as if her brain had been construed from porridge. She would not debate any guest on why it was unacceptable for a woman to earn half as much as a man. For once she would behave like the heroines in her books.

Penelope's cheeks, held up by leather stretchers, reddened under her rice powder. “I just know this party is going to be a triumph for us all,” she exclaimed.

“Indeed,” Elizabeth murmured, trusting her reply was the reply of a heroine.