Joanna Maitland – Rake's Reward (страница 2)

The Earl stopped abruptly. He glanced at his reflection in the ornate, gilt-framed mirror—he was nothing like as large as an elephant. How dare she suggest anything so offensive?

She raised her lorgnette and peered at him. That piercing stare had unnerved him since he was five years old. Now, more than forty years later, it still did.

‘Continue like what, precisely?’ asked Lady Luce acidly.

Her son cleared his throat, ready to do battle on the one subject where he knew he had the whip hand. He was intending to enjoy this. ‘You cannot continue to gamble with money you do not have, Mama,’ he began. ‘You—’

Lady Luce used the arms of her chair to push herself into a standing position. Even then, she was considerably shorter than her son, and looked more than twice as wide in her old-fashioned hooped skirts. ‘And who, pray, is going to stop me?’ she said in an awful voice.

‘I am,’ he said, as stoutly as he could, but avoiding her gimlet eye. ‘I cannot afford to continue to pay your debts, Mama. You seem to forget that I have a family of my own to keep.’

His mother snorted. ‘How could I forget? Never seen so many confounded brats. You’re as bad as Clarence.’

‘Mama! How can you say such a thing? It is highly improper for a lady to mention illegitimate children, even if their father is a royal duke. And you know very well that I have never been unfaithful to Charlotte.’

‘No, because no other woman would look twice at you,’ snapped his mother, ‘even if you did have the money to dangle after them. It’s quite your own fault that you have sired ten children. And I do not see why my style of living should be curtailed to pay for them, just because you cannot keep your—’

‘Mama! Please!’

His mother looked hard at him and smiled nastily. She was clearly enjoying his embarrassment. One day, he would…

He turned his back on her and went to the window. If he did not have to look at her, it would be easier to tell her what she was to do. ‘My children are not in question here,’ he said, trying to keep his temper under control. ‘My father provided you with a very generous jointure. You do not even have to pay for the upkeep of this house. You have the means to live in considerable comfort, but you choose to gamble instead, relying on the assumption that I will always stand behind your debts.’

‘Balderdash,’ said his mother roundly. ‘You left me hanging in the wind when—’

Lord Luce spun round furiously. ‘That was five years ago, Mama, and it only happened once. You knew that I could not raise such a huge sum just then.’ He raised his hand to stop her from speaking. ‘Besides,’ he went on rapidly, ‘you came about soon enough, when you won all that money from Kit Stratton, did you not? You had no need of my backing.’

‘Did I not? I’ll have you know, you miserable apology for a whelp, that—’

‘No, Mama, you will not. You will listen to me. You will learn to live within your means. If you come to me just once more to pay your gambling debts, it will be the last time, I promise you. I shall let it be known that I will not pay in future. And who would accept your vowels then?’

‘You would not dare,’ she spat. ‘Your name would—’

‘Balderdash,’ he said, enjoying the feel of the word on his lips. Let her have a taste of her own medicine. ‘Society will agree that I have been too indulgent for too long. You may be an “original,” Mama, but Society tires of such entertainments in the end. I am the head of the family and I mean what I say.’

His mother stamped over to him and poked him in the chest. ‘Do you, William? Do you, indeed? Then understand this. I shall behave exactly as I please. If I choose to gamble, I shall do so, and nothing you can say shall prevent me. I shall stake my jointure and leave all my other bills unpaid. And I shall make a point of telling all of London that the Luce estate stands behind me, since otherwise I should end up in the Fleet. How would that please your sense of propriety, eh? The Dowager Countess Luce in debtors’ prison because her son would not pay her debts. What would all your fine friends think to that? And your sons, too. I am sure it would make for splendid sport at Eton.’

The Earl’s shoulders slumped. She had won again. She was not a woman, she was a witch.

‘Well?’ she said.

‘Mama, you must understand that I cannot afford it,’ he said, adopting a pleading voice. ‘The income from the estate has been poor ever since the end of the war. If there are any more major calls on me, I shall have to start selling the unentailed properties. Surely you cannot wish me to do that? It is all I have to leave to the younger boys.’

Lady Luce grunted. ‘I might think about it,’ she said grudgingly.

His tactics had worked. That was as near to a concession as he had ever won from her. ‘Perhaps if you had another interest, something to divert your mind—’ he began.

‘There’s nothing wrong with my mind,’ she snapped.

‘No, of course not,’ he said, trying to grapple with the brilliant idea that had just struck him, ‘but…a young companion might be just the thing.’

She fixed him with a steely gaze.

He quailed a little but continued. He could not refuse an opportunity to bridle the Dowager, however temporarily. ‘Let me look about for someone suitable,’ he said. Then he added, as a clincher, ‘I will undertake to pay all the costs of her keep. Your jointure shall remain at your sole disposal, as in the past.’

His mother gave him a very strange look. Then, to his surprise, she nodded briefly. ‘Yes, you are right. I could do with a young thing about the place.’

Victory! The Earl bowed over his mother’s hand. His wife’s bosom friend, Lady Blaine, would be bound to know of a suitable candidate. He would enlist her aid this very day. Now, he must make a speedy exit before his mother changed her mind.

He had just reached the door when she said, airily, ‘Just make sure she plays a good hand of piquet, William. At my age, I do not have time to start teaching gels how to play cards.’

‘Miss Beaumont?’

Marina spun round. She was being addressed by a liveried footman who was taking no pains to conceal his disdain at the sight of her shabby travelling costume and worn bonnet. Marina raised her chin a fraction. She might be poor and ill clad, but she was most certainly a lady. She would not allow herself to be daunted by a mere servant.

She narrowed her eyes as she looked at the young man. She was almost as tall as he was, she noted absently. ‘I am Miss Beaumont,’ she said in a frosty voice.

The footman could not hold her stern gaze. After a moment, he looked away. ‘Will you come this way, miss?’ he said, indicating the carriage that stood waiting to convey her across London to her employer’s house.

It was only a small victory—but it mattered to Marina. If she was to live in Lady Luce’s house, she must ensure that the Dowager’s servants treated her with respect. ‘Please see that my baggage is stowed safely,’ she said, pointing to the two old valises that contained everything she owned. The footman did as he was bid, picking them up as though they weighed nothing at all. ‘Thank you,’ Marina said with a smile.

The footman seemed taken aback for a few seconds, as if he were suddenly seeing a completely different person. Then he remembered his place and helped Marina into the carriage where she sank back against the cushions with a sigh of relief. She had arrived in London, at last. And in a very short time, she would be making her curtsy to the Dowager Countess Luce, the old lady who wanted a gay young companion to brighten her declining years. Marina had decided during the journey from Yorkshire that she could fill the role pretty well. She had often acted as companion to her grandmother in her final years, reading to her, playing or singing for her, even playing cards with her. In those last years, Grandmama had become most exacting, almost as if she were still entitled to be treated as the sister of a viscount. Lady Luce could not be any worse. Reclusive elderly ladies were all much the same, weren’t they?

Marina closed her eyes, trying vainly to shut out the noise and the overpowering smells. She had never imagined that London could be so full of raucous sounds—the cries of hawkers, each trying to outdo his neighbour, the shouts of draymen anxious to make their way through the bustle of traffic, the ring of horses’ hooves and carriage wheels, the underlying hum of a huge, pulsating city. At home, she had been used to the sounds and smells of farmyard animals, the cries of wild birds, and the howl of the wind across the moors. Nothing like this. She resisted the temptation to hold her nose or put her hands to her ears. If she was to live in London as companion to Lady Luce, she would have to become accustomed. She might as well start now.

Armed with this new resolution, Marina sat up and looked out of the window. She had no idea where she was, but the streets seemed to have become a little quieter. They were certainly more genteel than before: fewer hawkers, more gentlemen’s carriages. The houses had large windows and imposing entrances, some flanked by columns like a Greek temple. This was much, much grander than anything she had known in Yorkshire.