Regency Rumours: A Scandalous Mistress / Dishonour and Desire

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‘Certainly you may. Thank you.’ She eyed the large box that one of the footmen had carried in. ‘If that’s from you two,’ she said to her brothers, ‘it will be the first ever to have arrived on the right day.’ There was laughter and warmth in her cultured voice, and a sisterly tenderness in her blue-grey eyes that made her sparkling smile even more remarkable. Unlike her siblings, she was fair-haired and fair-skinned, still girlishly slender and so modish that she could wear with self-confidence an unlined white-spotted muslin of such fineness that no detail of her dainty breasts inside the minuscule bodice was left to the imagination. Tied beneath with a wide pale-blue satin ribbon, the long ends were left to trail over her train, which the black puppies were convinced was one of the latest games and which concerned the wearer not at all.

For her part, Amelie saw an appealing insouciance in her hostess’s manner that would be able to take an ugly tea urn in its stride, even to flaunt it before her friends as good for a laugh. All the same, Amelie wished now that she had not taken her anger out on Dorna, of all people, for she was sure she was going to like her.

There was nothing not to like about the Elwick family or their spacious lived-in house by the river, or easy-going Sir Chad and his gentle parents, or Dorna’s aged godparents and her various brothers and sisters-in-law.

However, Colonel Tate, an old family friend and neighbour, fell into rather a different category. He had an annoying habit of saying whatever came into his head, often causing laughter, but sometimes irritation. Nudging his old-fashioned powdered wig into position, he lifted his quizzing-glass to examine the single row of pearls around Amelie’s neck and, convinced of their value, dropped it with a squeak of surprise. ‘Well, m’boy,’ he said, swivelling round to fix Lord Rayne with his bloodshot eyes, ‘you’ve found yourself a flush mort here and no mistake. What’s she worth, eh? This one’ll put you back in funds, if you can keep her, eh, m’lad? What?’

‘You’ve got it wrong, Colonel,’ said Lord Rayne, wincing visibly. ‘Unfortunately, Lady Chester is engaged to my brother, not to me.’

‘To Elyot? Eh?’ The quizzing-glass was picked up again to find the elder brother. ‘What does Elyot want with that kind of money? He’s not in queer streets too, is he? Looking for a golden dolly, m’boy? When I was your age—’

‘Thank you, Colonel,’ said Lord Elyot, taking Amelie’s hand and threading it through his arm, ‘for your advice on our financial affairs, but I can assure you it isn’t in the least necessary. Lady Chester’s financial affairs are of no one’s concern but her own. Shall we go through? Lord, Dorna,’ he whispered to his embarrassed sister, ‘why the devil did you invite that garrulous old turnip? You know what he’s like.’

‘I had no choice,’ she replied. ‘He invited himself. Please.’ she leaned towards Amelie ‘.take no notice of him, will you? He means no offence.’

Amelie smiled. She had met the Colonel’s type before. ‘I am not in the least offended,’ she said. ‘One could be called worse names than a golden dolly.’ She felt the quick squeeze of the arm over her wrist, but what had concerned her more than the old man’s indiscretion was Lord Rayne’s use of the word ‘unfortunately'. Could it mean that he did not approve?’

She looked to see if Caterina had heard, but her attention was being held by a tall good-looking dandy with shirt-points up to his ears and a curly mop of light brown hair worn in fashionable disarray.

‘That’s Tam,’ said Lord Elyot. ‘Short for Tamworth. Sir Chad’s younger brother. He and his sister live with their parents next door. That’s Hannah over there.’ Looking across the room, he indicated a petite lady of about Amelie’s own age, quietly attractive but not conventionally pretty. ‘She’s the sedate one,’ he said. ‘Not a bit like her brother.’

‘I’d like to meet her.’

But there were other more pressing introductions, first to Lord and Lady Appleton, another of Sir Chad’s sisters and her supercilious husband for whom the whole event was a tedium to be endured with a minimum of effort. Kitty, his chattery wife, was happy to hear that her brother-in-law had begun to think more seriously about his relationships, but her intrusive queries were too much for Amelie, who was glad to leave all explanations to the man himself. Listening to him, she realised that there was no incident or remark that he could not deal with politely while giving away very little real information. She need not have been concerned about anything, not then or during dinner.

The giving of gifts, to which Amelie had not been looking forward, passed off with the same noisy good humour as the greetings. The controversial tea urn was exclaimed over and, after various impertinent suggestions as to its role in laundry or cellar, a place was found for it in a mirrored alcove where its ugliness, to Dorna’s delight, was doubled. ‘Pride of place,’ she exclaimed, ‘to show that my brothers do remember!’

Lord Elyot’s shapely brows lifted a notch as he caught Amelie’s sheepish expression across the table, and she was reminded that he had understood. But her eyes had wandered towards the lady who sat on his left, to Hannah, his sister-in-law, who was looking at him with such poorly concealed adoration that Amelie could see how her heart was aching with the pain of love.

Like Amelie, Hannah was no longer a young girl. She was fair haired and possessed of a serene expression that bluff Colonel Tate mistook for an un-natural lack of animation, and the remarks he made from the opposite side of the table brought flames to her pale cheeks. Amelie’s heart went out to her, but she held back the invitation that was on the tip of her tongue until she’d had a chance to talk with her. If she was as in love with Lord Elyot as Amelie believed, an invitation to stay at Richmond might make matters more complicated than they were already.

To Amelie’s relief, Caterina had accepted the new situation with remarkably little surprise, as if she had foreseen the event and was pleased to have her own future placed on a surer footing. Her only disappointment was that, as yet, there was no ring to show for it, and no celebrations planned.

More gifts were unwrapped between courses and passed round the table to be admired, amongst them Amelie’s painting of purple irises, which even she believed to be one of her most successful.

‘Good gracious me,’ said Kitty’s patronising husband, ‘you can paint! I believe this is quite beyond the usual for an amateur, my dear.’

‘I didn’t know you were an authority on watercolours, Appleton,’ said Lord Elyot drily from across the table. ‘You’re viewing it upside-down, by the way.’

Hurriedly, Lord Appleton turned the painting round, frowning at it as if it should have known better. ‘Er…well, no old man. I suppose fishing’s more my line.’

‘That’s what I thought. I should stick to it, if I were you. That piece was exhibited at the Royal Academy last year.’

‘Eh? Oh…really! Good lord!’ said Lord Appleton, sinking a little into his cravat. He passed the painting on, taking another longer look at Amelie.

Every other remark was complimentary, but the one whose look held all the approval Amelie needed had again shielded her from the merest hint of disdain, even that provoked by ignorance. As at the ball, she felt the warmth of his protection and, while talking to her table-partners, watched how his dark handsome head bent towards Hannah, giving her all his attention while caressing the neck of a dessert-spoon with long fingers and nodding at some serious point she was making. No wonder, Amelie thought, that Hannah was in love with him and how changed he was from the hard-bitten cynic she had first met in the London goldsmith’s shop. How could the two counterparts ever be reconciled?

By coincidence, the answer to that vexed question came after the sumptuous dinner when she seized the chance to speak to Lord Rayne, who had left Caterina to the dedicated attentions of Tam, Hannah’s brother. As if their meeting had been booked in advance, he offered her his arm and together they strolled out on to the rustic verandah that overlooked the river and the meadows beyond. They were not alone, but no one approached them as they perched on a low windowsill with the evening sun in their eyes.

‘We’ve had little chance to talk, my lord,’ said Amelie, adjusting the Chantilly lace shawl over her shoulder. ‘Could we be friends now, or did my earlier resistance quite put you off? It was meant to, of course, at the time.’ She could see why Caterina had lost her heart to this young man, and why she would fall some way short of his more cosmopolitan tastes.

His smile, though, was boyish as he looked out across the river at the gliding of late wherries and their passengers. ‘Our family has a reputation for not being easily put off,’ he said, turning to her. ‘I’ve been waiting for the right moment to talk with you.’

‘About your brother’s offer? You disapprove of it, I fear.’

‘Why should I disapprove, my lady? It’s extremely sudden, I have to admit, but I approve of Nick’s choice. No, I envy him and congratulate you.’

‘But…but you used the word “unfortunately” to Colonel Tate. I thought that—’

‘Heavens above, no, my lady. It’s only unfortunate that you’re not engaged to me instead of Nick. But I’m not in a position to offer for anyone yet, you see. Otherwise.’ He sighed, and looked away again.

For Caterina’s sake, Amelie thought it best to let the subject rest. ‘Well, then, I’m glad we have your blessing. It would have made me very unhappy otherwise. I would like us to be friends, my lord, and your sister too, though I’m afraid I cannot say the same.’ she looked over to the group where a loud voice shouted down the rest ‘.for everyone.’ Seeing the amusement on her companion’s face, she relented. ‘Oh dear, I hope he’s not a particular friend of yours, is he?’

But his smile told her otherwise. ‘Old Colonel Dandyprat? No, he still thinks he’s in the army. We’ve known him since we were children so we can take his silly prattle with a pinch o’ snuff. We used to mimic him a lot. Still do, sometimes. You should hear him on do-gooders…philanthropists, you know. His favourite aversion.’ His comely features adopted Colonel Tate’s florid puffiness and petulantly wobbling mouth as if he had practised for years. ‘"Them young bits o’skirt ought to be locked up!'” he yelped, for her ears only. ‘"Vagabonds! Nob-thatchers! And anybody who thinks ‘em worth helping must be addle-brained! A load o’ loose screws, that’s what they are! The workhouse is too good for tarts like that."’ His features relaxed as laughter overtook him again, and he did not notice how Amelie’s expression of astonishment changed to sheer relief as the uncompromising sentiments were spoken once more, this time in their original context. ‘We’d never take him up to the workhouse,’ he said, still chuckling. ‘He and my mother have fearsome arguments about it, but nobody ever gets the better of her. “If only you knew what trouble you people cause!"’ he mimicked again. ‘She tells him to go to the devil.’

‘She’s very fierce, your mother?’

‘Oh, she’s a character,’ he told her.

Amelie hoped he might have gone on to elaborate, but his place was taken by his sister. ‘Seton,’ said Dorna, ‘be a darling and rescue Hannah from Mr and Mrs Horner. The poor girl looks desperate.’ She took his hands and pulled him up. ‘Besides, it’s my turn to talk to Amelie.’

But by now, Amelie’s curiosity had been aroused by several anomalies, one of which concerned the fearsome Marchioness, another was to do with the names handed down from the ancestors.

‘Our names?’ said Dorna, in answer to her query. ‘Elyot and Rayne are both family names dating back to Tudor times. The first Lord Elyot had a son named Sir Nicholas Rayne who was assistant Master of Horse to Queen Elizabeth. He married the first Adorna whose father, Sir Matthew Pickering, was Master of Revels when the palace at Richmond was still used by the royals. Apparently, there were as many fireworks over that match as there were over the Queen’s affaire with the Earl of Leicester. A huge scandal, there was. Since then, the position of Assistant Master of Horse and Keeper of the Royal Stud has been passed down through Sir Nicholas’s family, which is how my father comes to hold the office. That’s why he can’t be with us.’

‘But he’s now the Marquess of Sheen.’

‘Yes, he was created earl by King George III, then he became a marquess and, as you know, one usually has to be the earl or marquess of somewhere, so he took the name of Sheen, since that’s where we’ve always lived.’

‘The old name for Richmond.’

‘That’s right. So Nick took the handed-down title of Lord Elyot, and Seton became Lord Rayne. It must be so confusing to strangers, with all these names from the past.’

‘But then, you are a lady by birth as well as by marriage.’

‘Which is why I’m Lady Adorna Elwick, rather than just Lady Elwick. As if it matters,’ she laughed, nudging Amelie, who knew that it did. ‘The first Adorna had a brother named Seton who wrote stageplays for the Earl of Leicester’s company, and their brother Adrian acted with William Shakespeare.’

‘Really? So Adorna’s scandalous affair with the first Sir Nicholas…is that something the present Marchioness prefers to keep secret?’

‘Mother?’ Dorna’s laugh rang out as she threw back her fair head, curving her long throat. ‘Heavens, not a bit of it. Mama is no stranger to scandal. I sometimes think she thrives on it. Ah…Nick! There you are. Have you come to interrupt our cosy chat?’

‘Yes. Have you told Lady Chester that her house is on the same Paradise Road where our ancestors once lived?’