To Win the Lady Page 7

  Tibbet, an old campaigner who had been engaged as a footman by Colonel Bertram when he became too old for soldiering, admitted them to the cool hall. A bowl of sweet peas stood on a table and filled the air with perfume. ‘Mrs Bertram is in the blue salon with Lord Barbour, Miss Paget,’ he said.

  Georgie ignored Richard’s sharp intake of breath as she took off her shawl and hat and handed them to the servant. ‘He came to see my aunt?’

  ‘No, miss, I formed the opinion it was you he wished to see.’

  ‘Oh, you have made a hit!’ Felicity cried. ‘And you did not say a word of it to me.’

  ‘Didn’t I? It must have slipped my mind.’

  Richard gave a loud grunt which made them both turn towards him and he quickly changed it to a cough. Of all the men in London who could have attached themselves to Miss Paget, it had to be Barbour. ‘Your pardon, ladies, but I must take my leave,’ he said. He could not face the man in Mrs Bertram’s drawing-room where the rules of etiquette obliged him to be polite. ‘A pressing engagement.’

  ‘Will you not stay and meet Georgie’s admirer?’ Felicity asked him. ‘I must admit I am excessively curious.’

  ‘Felicity!’ Georgie cried. ‘How can you be so rag-mannered?’ She turned to Richard, her face flaming. ‘I must apologise for my sister, Major. She is sometimes less than tactful.’

  ‘Not at all; I find her candour delightfully refreshing.’

  ‘Then you will stay?’ Felicity asked.

  ‘I am already acquainted with the gentleman,’ he said, endeavouring to keep the frigidity from his voice but aware that the elder Miss Paget was not easy to deceive. `I will call tomorrow as planned, unless...’ He looked directly at Georgie, making her squirm uncomfortably ‘unless Miss Paget would like to change her mind?’

  ‘Of course I haven’t changed my mind,’ she said quickly. ‘Felicity wishes to ride with you and I shall chaperon her. There is no more to be said.’

  She watched him as he bowed himself out and then, with a sigh, went to join her aunt, followed by her sister. Lord Barbour, who had been ensconced in an armchair by the hearth, rose ponderously to his feet and hurried forward to bow over Georgie’s hand.

  ‘So sorry to miss you, my dear Miss Paget,’ he said. ‘Said I would call, if you remember...’

  ‘So you did,’ she said lightly. ‘I forgot. May I present my sister Felicity?’ She turned and quelled her sibling’s inclination to giggle with a furious look. ‘Felicity, this is Lord Barbour.’

  He inclined his head towards her. ‘Your obedient, Miss Felicity.’

  ‘His lordship has been here this past half-hour,’ their aunt said, trying not to sound as if she was complaining, though it had been excessively tiring trying to follow the gist of his lordship’s staccato conversation, laced as it was with horsey allusions; he was worse than her brother-in-law and Henry had been bad enough. ‘We have had a most interesting prose, have we not, my lord?’

  ‘Indeed?’ said Georgie, with a sinking feeling; that she had been a subject of their discourse she did not doubt. ‘I am sorry I missed it.’

  ‘Oh, you will be apprised of it, do not fear,’ his lordship said. ‘Your aunt has given me permission to invite you to ride with me. Got a new mount, you know. Black stallion. Not tried his paces yet. Told you’re a bruising rider y’self.’

  ‘I cannot think who told you that,’ Georgie said, giving her aunt a meaningful look. ‘I do not care for the term; it smacks of cruelty.’

  ‘No, wrong thing to say,’ he corrected himself. ‘Meant capable. Capable, that’s the word. What do you say? Will you ride with me tomorrow? Bring your sister if you want.’

  ‘Oh, but we are going riding tomorrow in Green Park,’ Felicity said before her sister could stop her. ‘With--’

  ‘I am sure Lord Barbour does not want the details, dearest,’ Georgie interrupted her. She turned to their visitor and gave him the benefit of a sugar-sweet smile. ‘I am sorry, my lord, but I am already engaged for tomorrow.’

  ‘Later, perhaps a carriage drive?’

  ‘We are taking tea with Mrs Melford. I am sorry, my lord, you seem to be out of luck.’

  ‘The next day, then? You do not go back to Rowan Park before the week is out, do you?’

  ‘No, but...’

  ‘Georgiana will be pleased to ride with you the day after tomorrow,’ Mrs Bertram said, frowning at her niece. ‘Tom Dawson will accompany her.’

  ‘I have no mount.’ Her excuses were wearing thin, she knew it, and she knew she was exasperating her aunt, but she really did not see why she should be thrown at this unattractive man. If she had to marry, then why could it not be someone a shade younger and with a little more countenance?

  Her aunt told her the answer to that in less than flattering terms when his lordship had taken his leave, after promising to provide her with a suitable mount and to call for her two days hence. ‘It is no good you playing hard to get, my girl,’ she said as soon as Felicity had left them to go to her room to change. ‘He does not strike me as a patient man and you may lose him.’

  ‘I wish that I might.’

  ‘How can you say that? You are fortunate that he is interested. You are not in the first flush of youth, you know, and you have no call to turn your nose up at him. He is wealthy and generous to a fault. Why, he told me that he has a mare he thinks you will like. He hinted he would make you a present of it, if you pleased him.’

  ‘I am to be bribed, is that it?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Mrs Bertram said, realising she had made a grave error. ‘You will not be coerced into marrying someone you take in aversion, I promise you, but do give him a chance. You will not be committing yourself if you agree to ride with him. And even if he were impatient enough to offer for you so soon, which I doubt, for he is a man of breeding and knows how to go on, you do not have to answer him straight away. Give yourself a chance to become better acquainted with him.’

  ‘And if after that I say we shall not suit?’

  ‘Then no more will be said.’ Her aunt sighed melodramatically. ‘Though where else you will find another opportunity like it I declare I do not know. And you really ought to be married before your sister.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because you are the elder, and besides, once she is married it will be the end of any interest in you. You will be put out to pasture. Is that not the term you horse-lovers would use?’

  Georgie laughed, though she was far from amused. ‘Then I shall become fat and contented like an old horse.’

  ‘No, you will not. The stables will become run-down for want of business, the staff will have to be stood off and the house will go to rack and ruin without a family to fill it. You will not grow fat, for you will not have two grigs to rub together and certainly you will not be content because you will be lonely, banging around in that great barn of a place like a pea in a rattle. Is that what you want?’

  The picture she painted was certainly not an enticing one. ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘Then consider it carefully, my dear. You may think me hard and unfeeling, but someone has to point out the pitfalls of what you are doing. For your sister’s sake, I beg you not to turn Lord Barbour down out of hand.’

  ‘Very well, I shall ride with him, but if I do not find him agreeable I beg leave not to encourage him.’

  She really was not in a position to dictate terms, she realised. She did not consider herself beautiful - striking perhaps but not beautiful - and she should have come out eight years before. Eight years! Where had they all gone? She had been so content at her father’s side, looking after the horses, learning the day-to-day routine of a busy stables, breaking, exercising and grooming the horses, watching Papa haggling over prices, putting a horse through its paces for a potential buyer, sitting up all night with a sick animal. Oh, there had been a great deal to do, especially when the army needed so many horses. The seasons had followed one upon the other, each busier than the last, and her small sister had grown in
to a lovely young lady without her even noticing the transformation. She didn’t think Papa had noticed either. And then he had died and everything had fallen on her shoulders.

  Sometimes the burden seemed too much to carry. Sometimes she wished desperately that she did have a cousin or a brother to take charge. Sometimes she longed for a little fun. But never, never would she abrogate her responsibilities. She might argue with her aunt and resist pressure simply because it was pressure, like a young colt testing its will against its trainer, but, like the colt, she would become docile in the end.

  She tried telling herself that living with Lord Barbour would not be so bad. He was interested in horses and kept an extensive stable; combining their interests could be beneficial to them both. He had been married before and had a family already and it was unlikely that he would make unnecessary physical demands on her. None of her arguments carried any weight beside the overwhelming one that she did not even like him.

  If only someone young and handsome would come along and sweep her off her feet, someone who would carry on the stables in Sir Henry’s tradition, someone like Major Baverstock. The thought, coming to her so suddenly, brought her up short. Why had he come to her mind? Unless...

  She must not think along those lines, not for a single moment. Major Richard Baverstock was not for her. He had made it abundantly clear that he did not like mannish women and that was what she had become. Besides, Aunt Harriet had set her heart on marrying him off to Felicity and it seemed to her that both parties were more than agreeable. She followed her sister up the stairs to take off her outdoor clothes and wished, with all her heart, that she had never come to London.

  Richard had ordered Heacham to take the phaeton back to the mews behind his father’s town house in Portland Square and gone on foot to Bond Street where he proceeded to work out his ill temper at Gentleman Jackson’s boxing establishment, though if he had been asked he would have strongly denied that his irritability had anything to do with Lord Barbour being at Holles Street. Mrs Bertram could entertain whom she pleased; so, for that matter, could Miss Paget. But Barbour! What was he up to?

  When sparring failed in its purpose, he took himself off to Watier’s where he polished off a bottle of wine and sat down to play a hand of cards with Lord Hereward and a couple of his cronies. But he could not concentrate on the game and when John appeared soon after midnight he was glad enough to throw in his hand and repair to the smoking-room.

  ‘Are you playing deep?’ John demanded, looking at his friend’s dishevelled appearance.

  ‘No, just dabbling. Nothing better to do.’

  ‘You don’t look quite the thing, old fellow. Been given the right about by Miss Paget, have you?’

  ‘Not at all,’ Richard said morosely, lighting a cigarillo. ‘It seems I have found favour.’

  ‘Then you’re a lucky fellow, that’s all I can say.’

  ‘I only hope my irascible parent may think the same.’

  ‘Why should he not? Miss Paget is lovely, and well-bred, and though I ain’t so sure about the dowry it don’t much signify, does it, you having plump pockets anyhow?’

  ‘I shan’t have if my father leaves everything to my cousin William.’

  ‘He ain’t still on that tack, is he? I thought you went home to set that to rights...’

  ‘Easier said than done, old fellow. William is still toadying round him, bringing those odious brats of his. They seem to take it for granted that they may have the run of the place in expectation of it becoming theirs. Noise and sticky finger marks everywhere and the dogs teased until I wonder they do not turn round and bite. I am persuaded William positively encourages them to misbehave in order to infuriate me.’

  ‘Don’t you like children?’

  ‘How should I know? Never had any.’ He paused and smiled. ‘With the right wife, I suppose I might become the doting papa.’

  John laughed. ‘I cannot see you as a family man.’

  ‘It seems my father can. I am to find a wife as soon as maybe.’

  ‘What’s so hard about that? You ain’t still thinking of Maria, are you?’

  ‘No, that’s all over with, but damn me, John, I just do not like being pushed.’

  John laughed. ‘No and nor don’t I. I’ve just spent the more boring hour of my life in the company of Juliette Hereward and our respective mamas.’

  ‘Matchmaking, are they?’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind so much but the chit is hardly out of the schoolroom.’

  ‘There speaks an old, old man,’ Richard said, with a laugh.

  ‘I’ll be twenty-one in a few months. I may be young but I’ve had plenty of time to grow up in the last three years, wouldn’t you say?’

  ‘I can’t deny it. Battle certainly hardens a man.’

  In his mind’s eye Richard saw again the smoke and flames, the blood of men and horses mingling on the baked earth; heard the guns, the clash of sabres and the cries of the wounded. Every battle was the same, though he wondered if anyone ever became truly hardened to it. But in time it had a numbing effect; you pretended indifference, convinced yourself that you were invulnerable and sometimes it worked. He had come through with only a slight shoulder wound which only troubled him when the weather was damp or if he had to put undue strain on it.

  But Maria, who had no business near the fighting, had died. She had died because some clunch of a trooper had told her that her lover had been wounded and she had hurried to his aid, as so many of the wives and other camp followers had. Making his way back to the hospital wagon on foot, he had seen her coming and shouted to her to go back. She had heard his voice but, unsure of its direction, had stopped to listen and the shell had landed right beside her. It had been his fault; if he had not shouted, she would have kept moving. The day had been won but he could find no joy in the victory. Now the war was over and he had to try and forget.

  ‘Juliette doesn’t seem to have matured by as much as a day.’ John’s voice invaded his memories and brought him back with a jolt.

  ‘Protected as she is, she has no reason to grow up too soon, has she?’ he said. ‘Have patience, my friend.’

  ‘Thank God there’s no hurry and I don’t have to offer for her before I come of age. And by then who knows...?’ He laughed in an embarrassed way and got to his feet. ‘Do not forget we have an engagement to go riding tomorrow at the ungodly hour of ten o’clock, so I am away to my bed.’ He beckoned to a waiter who was passing with a tray of glasses and bade him fetch a hackney, before turning back to Richard. ‘Do you want a lift?’

  Richard, befuddled by the smoky atmosphere and the wine he had consumed, needed fresh air to clear his head and said he preferred to walk. By the time he arrived back in Portland Square dawn was just coming up over the chimney-pots and the milkmaids were leading their charges out of the parks and taking them to the kitchen doors of the big houses to dispense their milk. He was greeted at the door by Heacham, still fully clothed.

  ‘Why are you still up, man?’ he asked in surprise. Unlike many, he did not expect his servant to wait up for him.

  ‘I thought you would like to know the Viscount has arrived,’ the valet said, helping him off with his coat.

  ‘My father?’

  ‘Yes, Major.’

  ‘Damn!’

  Heacham thought it tactful not to hear that remark. ‘Before his lordship went to bed, Major, he bade me tell you he will take breakfast with you. I told him you would be up and out by half-past nine but he did not seem to take exception to that. I heard him order his man to wake him at half after eight.’

  Richard had barely set his head on the pillow - or so he thought - before Heacham was shaking him into wakefulness again. He had pulled back the curtains and the sun was streaming in at the window, hurting his eyes. ‘Time to rise, Major. I left you as long as I dare.’

  Richard grunted and took the cup of coffee his servant held out to him, swallowed it scalding hot and demanded another while he hauled himself out of bed, washe
d and dressed in soft buckskin riding breeches and a linen shirt. He swallowed the second cup of coffee before carefully tying his cravat. His third was consumed after he had pulled on his tasselled riding boots and Heacham had helped him into a jacket of Bath cloth with velvet facings. By the time he went down to the small family dining-room he was feeling more himself. He was not in the least surprised to find his father, in a quilted dressing-gown, already at breakfast.

  ‘Good morning, sir,’ he said, pretending a brightness he did not feel. ‘Heacham told me you had arrived. What brings you here?’

  ‘I can come to my own house, can’t I?’ his lordship said irritably. His gout was more than usually troublesome, probably because he had sat up waiting for his son the night before and drunk too much claret. ‘You bolted without so much as a by your leave. Dashed bad manners, don’t you know?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Father. I thought we had said all there was to say...’

  ‘Well, we did not. At any rate, I had not. Seems to me if I want to have a conversation with you I must uproot myself from a comfortable home and chase after you. You know I don’t like town above half; the fog gets into m’lungs.’

  Richard forbore to point out that it was the middle of summer and there was no fog. ‘I’m sorry to have put you to that inconvenience, sir.’

  ‘The devil you are! Where did you get to last night?’

  ‘Watier’s. If I had known you were coming...’

  ‘Watier’s! You’ll not find a bride there, my boy. I begin to wonder if you are making any push at all. Good thing I did come, if you ask me...’

  Richard’s heart sank. ‘What’s the haste? You are in plump currant, aren’t you?’

  ‘If you mean by that am I about to wind up my accounts, then the answer is not if I can help it. Another reason I had for coming to town was to see my physician.’