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Mailer frowned. “Yes, I know. I received a note earlier. It seems there has been a delay of some sort, and the remainder of the party won’t arrive for another few days.”
Valentine considered this dollop of news. Perhaps the rest of the party was still out hunting for their missing shipment from France? Searching for their goods, and for one Honorable Ambrose Webber, who had so foolishly put a period to his own existence rather than be captured, and who now was most probably nothing more than a skeleton lying at the bottom of the Straits of Dover, bits of him having filled the bellies of a variety of marine life.
Valentine rather hoped there wouldn’t be a fish course at dinner.
“That’s a pity, then, isn’t it? Do these tardy guests have names, or are they to be a surprise? I rather dislike surprises, Charles. You said I was in for elevated political conversation and some entertainment that indulges what even the most lenient fleshpots in Piccadilly refuse. I suppose I could deal with the loss of the former, but if you’ve been exaggerating the latter, well, then, Charles, shame on you, and I’ll be leaving.”
“No, no, you can’t leave— That is to say, you’ll miss all the fun! As to the other guests? Well, you see now, that’s the thing,” Mailer said, pushing a split, smoked herring around his plate with his fork. “It’s all true, just what I said—beyond your wildest imaginings, I promise you. But...but I explained this, didn’t I? No, I suppose I didn’t.” He looked across the table at Valentine, his expression hopeful. “I didn’t? Are you sure?”
Valentine imagined the herring shoved halfway down Mailer’s throat. Nasty, but the image helped him tamp down his temper. “No, you didn’t, and yes, I’m quite sure. Why don’t you do that now, if you’re done dissecting your kippers. I admit to being highly intrigued.”
Mailer put down his fork. “The thing is...the thing is, I’m not certain who is coming. It...varies. Yes, that’s the word. Varies. Variety being the...the something of life.”
“The very spice of life, the thing that gives it all its flavor. Cowper said it first, I believe.” Valentine sat back in his chair. “I see.” Then he sat front again, glaring at Mailer over the candlesticks. “No, that’s a lie. I don’t see. Are you host of this party or not?”
Mailer dismissed the servants with an abrupt wave of his hand, then leaned forward toward Valentine, not speaking until the door closed behind the footmen. “Look, sometimes it’s...well, the guests are known, and we meet here at Fernwood. But at other times we meet somewhere else, and the entertainment is more...anonymous.”
“Here, perhaps there—and you say you don’t know? Not the time, not the place? My first instincts were right, weren’t they? You’re all talk, Charles, boastful talk and wishful thinking. I should simply hire a coach and head back to town. I’ve already explained my appetites, and you assured me—”
“Oh, but I meant it, I meant every word! Anything and anyone you want, anything and anyone you desire. London’s brothels are but pale imitations of what you and I deserve, just as I told you that night after we left Madame La Rue’s and you complained yours all objected to the restraints.”
“Love knots, and not for long,” Valentine corrected, remembering with extreme distaste the sharing of experiences Charles had insisted upon after they’d departed the brothel. “Compliance. It’s all in the way you present the thing.”
“Yes, if you’re into begging,” Mailer said, his eyes gone flat and hard. “If it’s pleading you want to do, it can be arranged, but why beg when you can demand, hmm? Did I tell you about the time I—”
It was time to take charge of the little fish.
“Again with the boasts, and all as you continue to tell me I must be patient,” Valentine said, tossing his serviette on the table and getting to his feet; if he took one more bite he might just cast up his accounts in Mailer’s face. “Two days, Charles. I can almost enjoy being bucolic for two days, but no more. Understood?”
Mailer rose, as well. “Yes, yes, do that. Anything you wish, anything at all. The grounds are lovely, you know.”
“But your wife isn’t. I do not want to see her at table again while I’m in residence. Do you understand?”
Mailer nodded furiously. “She’s sadly indisposed as of this moment. Is there anything else you require? One of the maids? I can personally recommend—”
Valentine cut him off. “A man of my name and reputation doesn’t so lower himself as to diddle the servants.” He took a line from his grandmother’s verbal arsenal and asked, “Were you raised by wolves?”
“I—I—I say, Valentine, that wasn’t called for.”
Valentine bowed, figuratively feeding out more line. “You’re correct. Forgive me, Charles. I’m embarrassed to say my hot Spanish blood doesn’t deal well with delays. If you’ll excuse me now, I believe I should take myself off outside, perhaps to walk away my foul mood, partake of a liquid lunch at some nearby pub. We’ll speak again at the dinner table. Perhaps by then you’ll have more news on your other guests. Should we call them guests? Fellow participants, perhaps?”
“Ha-ha,” Mailer laughed nervously, and waved him on his way.
At the doorway, Valentine turned to see the man once again attacking his kippers, seemingly confident the conversation had gone well, that he’d ridden over some rough ground and traversed it all to his satisfaction.
What a total ass.
Valentine returned to his assigned bedchamber, running down Piffkin in the dressing room. The valet retrieved his master’s newly brushed hat and smoothed gloves before handing him a carved ivory-topped sword cane.
“Really, Piffkin? It’s not as if I’m to be strutting up Bond Street, now is it?” Valentine asked, refusing the hat and gloves. He did accept the cane, but only to prop it against the wall. “As for the cane, I’m taking a leisurely country stroll over my new bosom chum’s estate, not facing a Piccadilly alley alone at midnight.”
The dour-faced man of uncertain years merely shrugged and turned back to the pressing iron he was employing to smooth one of a pile of pristine neckcloths currently residing on a tabletop. Piffkin wore white cotton gloves at all times, even when pressing neckcloths or laying out towels for the master’s bath. This, more than anything, described Piffkin. The gloves, and his fatherly concern for young Master Valentine.
“There may be bears in the woods, sir,” he said in way of explanation.
“Piffkin, there haven’t been bears on this damp island in a thousand years. All right, except those brought here from Europe for bear-baiting, a despicable excuse for sport.”
“Indeed. One or two may have escaped a cruel master, and even now lurk close by, eager to revenge themselves on any passerby so foolish as to stumble about in unfamiliar woods, unarmed.”
Piffkin turned to smile broadly at Valentine, showing a remarkable gold tooth Valentine had always admired but never dared to inquire about since he was seven, and the valet, then nursemaid, had told him he’d been given it as a reward for saving a princess in a tower. If the man didn’t want his charge to know the true story, then so be it. Valentine had secrets he wouldn’t care to share with Piffkin, either.
“Observe me as I dutifully tuck the cane beneath my arm, thankful to have such a caring friend concerned for my welfare.”
“Concerned? I simply don’t wish to have to clean up the mess in an effort to make you presentable for the dowager countess. Sewing your ears back on and such before laying you out,” Piffkin said, the gold tooth in evidence once more.
“How much does Trixie pay you over and above what I do, Piffkin? How often do you report to her? I’ve always wondered.”
“Her ladyship worries over all her chicks. Be on the lookout for those bears, Master Valentine. I do believe they are plentiful here,” the valet said, and returned to his pressing, the conversation obviously over, his charge dismissed to go bear hunting.
Valentine was fairly well pleased with himself as he made his way downstairs and was bowed out-of-doors by a small boy in preposterously gilded livery.
For one thing, he knew for certain now that coincidence had nothing to do with his new friendship with Mailer. As he had been cultivating the man, the man had been cultivating him, most probably on orders sent to him at his country estate, which had brought Mailer hieing back to Mayfair. Purposely seeking him out, being amenable, testing him as to his politics and his pleasures, hanging the bait of unlimited debauchery while Valentine pretended an avid interest in both.
That was why he could run hot and cold with Mailer, threaten to leave and be indulged, insult and be smiled at in return. Mailer was acting on orders: get the fellow here and we’ll see what we’ve got. It hadn’t hurt that, while feigning drunkenness, Valentine had babbled about collapsed tunnels at Redgrave Manor and dirty little books full of wild tales that would put the ancient Kama Sutra to the blush.
Valentine knew he wasn’t Gideon, but he was a Redgrave, probably appearing as the easiest target for the Society. How did they plan to use him? So far, he’d convinced Mailer he was a kindred spirit, both in sexual tastes and politics. He’d waxed poetic about the glorious Bonaparte over a half-dozen bottles of wine, extolling the freedom of men and the injustice of this English folly concerning titles and younger sons. Being the first to push free of the womb took no special talent, it was sheer good luck, and deserved no special rewards, Bonaparte would reward endeavor, not birth order, et cetera.
He’d been brilliant, he thought, but he wasn’t foolish enough to believe he’d got here on his own; he was here at Fernwood because the Society wanted him here.
And if they wanted him dead?
It was going to take more than a swordstick to protect him if he made a misstep. More than the stiletto tucked in his boot or the small pistol stuck into an inside pocket of his hacking jacket.
At least he had cleared one possible distraction out of his way. The so timid and sad Lady Caroline would be confined to her rooms. She was safer there, he hoped, and at least she wouldn’t be looking down the dining table at him with pleading eyes, or sadly staring at the wall, her mind gone somewhere else, making him want to forget he still needed Charles Mailer breathing. He contented himself by thinking the woman would make a much happier widow.
Now to get rid of Perceval’s so-obvious agent. He worked most effectively alone, without having to worry about anyone else getting in the way and muddying the waters. Especially a woman, damn it.
Leisurely swinging his cane, Valentine set off across the scythed lawns in search of the patently false governess and her charges, telling himself he was merely interested in rousting the woman from the estate.
But perhaps he wouldn’t shoo her back to Downing Street quite yet...not before he had satisfied his curiosity to see Miss Daisy Marchant with her hair down....
* * *
“I WANTTO go inside, Daisy,” seven-year-old Lydia complained. “My boots are pinching. Why did we have to wear boots? I don’t like it here. It’s muddy, and it smells.”
Daisy gritted her teeth, inwardly cursing Valentine Redgrave for a slugabed. Did he really think children slept past the first crowing rooster of the morning? They’d been up, and fed, and dragged into the fresh air before the dew had left the grass, and she would soon be at her wits’ end to keep them amused...and out of doors.
“I told you, sweetheart, I’ve decided upon a lesson in botany, and that’s why we’re in the greenhouse, to learn the names of all the pretty flowers.” And to stay out of sight of the windows of the house, and Lord Charles Mailer, not that Mr. Redgrave seems to be a man of his word.
Lydia grinned rather evilly. “Willie doesn’t care about botany. He’s eating dirt out of that pot over there.”
“Oh, laws—now I remember why I take care my usual charges are all above the age of ten. William, stop that!” Daisy hastened across the hard dirt floor to where the child was happily smearing dark, rich soil over his chubby cheeks. “What on earth do you think you’re doing, young man?”
Willie looked up at her, his small baby teeth and round blue eyes shining in his otherwise muddy brown face, and shrugged.
Clearly, Daisy thought, the boy was a prodigy. He didn’t answer her because it should be obvious to her what he was doing. Either that, or the child would eat anything that even vaguely resembled food, which was more likely.
She picked him up at the waist and held him at arms’ length in order to carry him to a nearby trough and pump, where she made short work out of cleaning his hands and face, which didn’t mean her plain morning gown came away from the exercise in pristine condition. Her cuffs were soggy and there were a few splashes of mud on her bodice. William’s little face, however, shone.
“You didn’t find any pretty pink squiggly things in the pot, did you, William?” she asked, more than slightly concerned as she bent to go eye to eye with him. “You didn’t eat any?”
“You mean worms, don’t you? Willie eats worms, Willie eats worms!” Lydia trilled, dancing about in her glee, her pinching boots forgotten.
“He does not!” Daisy protested, lifting the boy down from the wooden table and standing him on the dirt. “Stay,” she warned tightly.
Willie began to cry.
“Willie eats worms, Willie eats—”
“For the love of heaven, Lydia, stifle yourself.” Daisy winced. She was being a bad governess. A bad, bad governess. Clearly the children had no place in the greenhouse, and should be taken inside for a midmorning snack. William was always up for a snack, and Lydia could be easily bribed with the promise of a special story before bedtime. One having to do with dragons, or perhaps man-eating fish. Any sort of monster or ogre would do, as long as they died horribly in the end and the princess was saved by the handsome knight.
And speaking of handsome knights, she thought even as she pointed out a particularly fine rose to the children, I’m more now than ever convinced there aren’t any in my immediate future. I picked the one perfect spot for us to meet and talk without being observed, and all I’ve gotten for my genius so far are two filthy children and my hair misbehaving badly in all this humid heat. Where is the man?
“Now, children, this is a rose,” she said, holding on to the tail of William’s small jacket so he couldn’t wander. “I’m convinced it has some intricate Latin name, but for now we’ll simply call it a rose. A...a pink rose. Why don’t you sniff it, Lydia? It should smell delicious.”
“Ow! Ow, ow, ow!” Lydia cried out a moment later, holding on to one hand with the other and hopping about in circles. “I’m bleeding, I’m bleeding!”
William began to cry. Again.
“You must have grabbed a thorn,” Daisy said, reaching for Lydia. “Stop hopping and let me see. Ah, yes, there it is. Let me just pluck it out.”
“No! Don’t touch it! This is all your fault, Daisy. You made me hurt myself.”
“Yes, of course,” Daisy bit out as she attempted to hold the child still. “I thought making you cry would be the perfect topping for my morning.”
“My, my, my, what do we have here? I was drawn inside by what I thought was a voice raised in song, a song of worms, no less, only to find a pretty princess, crying. No, no, this cannot be countenanced.”
Daisy’s spine went stiff at the highly dramatic, definitely mocking tone in Valentine Redgrave’s voice. Now he bothers to present himself? Just when I’m at my worst? How wonderful.
There was one thing to say, however: Lydia was definitely all female. The child took one look at Valentine and her cries were cut off as if by magic. The magic of a smile. “Are you a prince?”
“Indeed I am, fair lady, late from the kingdom of Redgravia,” Valentine said, bowing as if to a queen.
“Oh, good grief.” Daisy longed to murder him, and she’d always believed herself to be a calm, carefully controlled person. Perhaps a tad sarcastic when pushed too far, a failing her father had never been reluctant to point out to her, but she was by and large, she thought, a reasonable person. “Miss Lydia’s got a rose thorn stuck in her thumb and refuses to let me dislodge it,” she said, which was the only greeting he would get from her. A prince? Indeed!
“And I can see why she refused you, Miss Marchant,” Valentine said, going down on one knee in the dirt. “Clearly this is a magical thorn, and only a prince of the blood can remove it.”
“Then perhaps you’d be so good as to toddle off and fetch us one,” Daisy said sweetly, her blood boiling now. Did he have to look so much like a fairy-tale prince?
His smile made her feel petty. After all, he was only trying to help. The thorn had to be removed, and she didn’t relish chasing a screeching Lydia all over the greenhouse to get the job done.
“Your hand, fair princess, if you please,” he said, holding out his own.
Lydia curtsied and offered her hand (both done rather saucily, which made Daisy wonder if some females were simply born to beguile the opposite sex—a gift from the gods she herself had not been granted).
Valentine looked deeply into the girl’s eyes, complimenting them on their sky-blue brilliance, and at the same time managed to remove the thorn—which wasn’t all that deep in any case. He then dabbed at her thumb with a pristine handkerchief he’d produced from somewhere, neatly blotting away the single drop of blood.
“And now to banish the pain with a kiss,” he said. “By your leave, my princess?”
As Daisy opened her mouth to protest, Lydia nodded furiously...and Valentine bent, pressed a kiss on the child’s thumb.
“You’ve mud on your royal knee, prince,” she said as he stood up once more.
“Better than on my nose,” he countered, and then laughed as Daisy instinctively raised her fingers to her face.
“There’s no mud on my nose.”
“True. But your reaction tells me if I’d told you not to turn about because someone is standing behind you, the first thing you’d do is turn around. That’s the trouble with women. You’re too curious. I can’t have that.”
He couldn’t have that? The nerve of the man! She’d thought he’d be serious today. But here they were again, as they were last night, with him hinting at something she didn’t understand. It was a game she had no interest in playing at the moment. “Children, it’s time to go inside,” she said quietly. As far away from this genial madman as we can get!
But Lydia, who minutes earlier would have leaped at this suggestion, was too busy staring at her thumb in some bemusement. “I don’t want to go inside. I want to look at the pretty man...the pretty flowers. Don’t we, Willie?”
Since William was sucking on one of a handful of pastilles he’d inexplicably come in possession of, he neither agreed nor disagreed. He was too busy smiling up at Valentine.
“You’re incorrigible, and all your children will grow up to be entirely unmanageable,” she accused him quietly.
“You can’t ruin a child by encouraging their imaginations, my dearest grandmother always said, you can only achieve that by breaking his natural spirit to suit your will.” Valentine grinned. “She raised the entire current crop of Redgraves, you understand.”
“That explains so much. Your sisters were allowed to revel in fantasies and you and your brothers were given anything and everything you wished.”
“Two brothers, and we learned life has its responsibilities, as well, and one younger sister, who variously dubbed me her shining prince or the ogre at the gate, depending on her mood. Luckily for the young lady here, I suppose, I mostly was cast in the role of rescuing hero. With Kate, you rather had to be.”
Daisy shifted her feet in slight embarrassment. “Well, you certainly took to the role.”
“Thank you.” He gifted both them with an elegant bow. “Your humble servant, ladies.” Then he straightened, and called out to a young servant who’d just entered the greenhouse. “Here, young man,” he said, already reaching into his pocket, to extract a coin quickly slipped into an entirely new pocket. “The young miss wishes to have you assist her in gathering a large bouquet for the nursery, if you please. As for young Master William, he would very much desire a small trowel, a pot of water, an apron of sorts and a low table he can use to make pies. Mud pies. All young gentlemen enjoy patting out mud pies. Isn’t that right, Master William? Why, I can nearly feel the pleasurable experience of Redgrave mud squeezing out from between my fingers. Pure heaven, I promise you.”
For a child who seemed to never understand much of anything Daisy said to him, young Master William showed a quick intelligence in grasping what Valentine had offered. He grabbed the servant’s hand and began tugging him back to the trough.
“And a second bouquet, my prince, in thanks for your rescue,” Lydia gushed, dropping into her best curtsy before following after her brother.
Daisy opened her mouth to protest, but just as quickly shut it again. He was making the children disappear, and she was about to learn why, whether she wished to or not. She probably really wished to, much as she tried to tell herself she did not. She’d just have to stand here with her hair twisting itself up into ridiculous corkscrew curls and attempt to prove she was reasonably intelligent in spite of the mud and her damp cuffs.
“They’ll be safe enough, and near enough, for the few minutes we need, Miss Marchant,” Valentine assured her. He reached out and touched one of the errant ringlets hugging her nape, and a shiver ran down her neck, skipped across her shoulder, as if anticipating his further touch. “Almost alive, isn’t it, winding itself around my finger. I should like to see it all down.”
A lesser man would have burst into flame as she glared at him in her most stern governess manner. “Then it can only be hoped your grandmother also taught you how to deal well with disappointment.”
“Sadly, her one failing. Yes, well, down to business, I suppose,” he said, crossing his arms and leaning one hip against a potting table. “Now, who are you?”
