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Benedict dug in his tail pocket and produced his purse. ‘And?’ He carefully counted out the twenty-five sovereigns in five neat heaps. ‘You are going to refine upon that, I hope.’
‘Nothing to refine upon.’
‘You are bamming me.’
‘No. What happened and what was said between us is our private business and nothing to do with the wager.’
‘She turned you down!’ It was said almost triumphantly.
‘Not at all.’ Benedict was annoying him and he was damned if he would tell him anything. ‘But, unlike you, I do not rush in where angels fear to tread. I prefer to deal gently with the fair sex. It pays in the end.’
‘Ah, the assault goes on. You want another wager?’ His hand hovered over the coins. ‘Double or quits?’
‘For what?’
‘For a night in her bed.’
Duncan should have refused. He should have scooped up his winnings and told his friend that he had no intention of even trying, when he realised that Benedict would take that as weakness or a lack of self-confidence at the very least and would offer to do the deed himself. The thought of his clumsy friend going anywhere near Madeleine filled him with a kind of desperate fury. He smiled. ‘Done, my friend.’
‘Done to the wager or done to the deed?’ Benedict queried, grinning.
‘The wager, you bufflehead.’
Benedict retrieved the coins and replaced them in his purse with evident relief. ‘Another se’nnight?’
‘No, give me credit for more finesse than that. Make it a fortnight.’
He could have bitten his tongue out. If the object of the wager had been anyone else but the lovely Madeleine Charron, he would not have given it another thought. As it was, he was consumed with shame. She had endured so much in her short life, he had no right to play with her as if she were a toy. She deserved his respect. He flung the contents of the coffee cup down his throat and with a curt, ‘I will see you later,’ stood up and left the premises.
He knew he ought not to see Madeleine again, but he also knew it would be impossible to stay away. He had been ensnared. It was not a condition he was comfortable with and he set off for Bond Street, where he took out his frustration, anger and guilt on his sparring partner at Gentleman Jackson’s boxing saloon, until that gentleman called out to him to stop if he didn’t want to be done for murder. He apologised and decided there was nothing for it but to go home and pretend nothing had happened. He had enjoyed an evening out with a pretty actress; nothing out of the ordinary in that, nothing to lose another night’s sleep over.
He would pay Benedict his fifty pounds and be done with it.
Chapter Two
B eing part of a theatrical troupe, Madeleine was used to strange hours, when night became day and day was a time for sleeping and she did not see Marianne again until the following afternoon when the cast met to rehearse the new play to be put on the following week.
Although he sometimes put on burlesque or contemporary plays lampooning the government, Lancelot Greatorex was chiefly known for his revivals of Shakespeare’s plays to which he gave a freshness and vitality, often bringing them right up to date with modern costumes and manners and allusions to living people or recent history. The following week Madeleine would be playing Helena in All’s Well That Ends Well, which lent itself surprisingly well to such treatment.
In it, Helena, a physician’s daughter, cures the king of a mysterious illness and as a reward is allowed to choose one of his courtiers for a husband. She chooses Bertram, Count of Rousillon, but he maintains Helena is beneath him and though he is obliged to obey the king and wed her, he goes off to the wars rather that consummate the marriage. Later, Helena tricks him into bed by making him think she is another woman for whom he has a fancy and they exchange rings. When he realises what has happened, he accepts Helena for his wife.
Maddy did not like the play; she thought the hero a weak character and the ending even weaker and she questioned whether a marriage based on such a trick could possibly be happy. Now that she was contemplating a hoax herself, the question was even more pertinent. Not that she intended to trick anyone into her bed, far from it, but she did mean to deceive Society as a whole.
‘Madeleine, do pay attention,’ Lancelot said mildly, after she had missed her cue for the second time. ‘You have been in a brown study all afternoon. Whatever is the matter with you?’
Maddy pulled herself out of her reverie and peered down into the gloom of the orchestra pit where he was standing. She knew from past experience that his mild tone hid annoyance, and it behoved her to pull herself together. ‘I am sorry, Mr Greatorex. It won’t happen again.’
‘To be sure it won’t,’ he said. ‘Unless you wish to see your understudy in the role. Now, let us do that scene again.’
Madeleine looked across at Marianne who winked at her. She smiled back and began the scene again and this time it went some way to satisfying the great actor-manager. Nothing would ever satisfy him completely, he was such a perfectionist, but he knew just how far to go with his criticism before he had a weeping and useless performer on his hands. Not that anyone had ever seen Madeleine Charron weeping, not offstage, though she could put on a very convincing act on stage if it were required.
After the rehearsal, Marianne joined Madeleine in the dressing room they shared to prepare for the evening performance of Romeo and Juliet. ‘It is not like you to miss your cue, Maddy,’ her friend said. ‘Is anything wrong?’
‘No, not at all. I am a little tired.’
‘I hope you did not lie awake last night, fantasising about the Marquis of Risley.’
‘Now, why should I do that? He is one of the idle rich and you know what I think about them.’ Her answer was so quick and sharp, Marianne knew she had hit upon the truth.
‘Then why, in heaven’s name, did you find it necessary to deceive him?’
‘It just came out. It always does, when anyone asks me about my family.’
‘But why? You are admired and respected as an actress. Why cannot you be content with that?’
‘I don’t know. I suppose because I have always wanted a family of my own, someone to belong to, and if invention is the only way—’ She stopped speaking suddenly. Her reasons seemed so trite, so unconvincing, and yet Marianne detected the wistfulness in her voice.
‘You do have a family, my dear,’ Marianne said softly. ‘You have me and all the rest of the company; that is your family. Mine too, come to that.’
‘Yes, I know, but I can’t help wishing…’
‘We all have dream wishes, Maddy, the secret is to recognise them for what they are, and to be able to distinguish the attainable from the unattainable. You have it in you to be an outstanding actress, one of the few who will be remembered long after they have left this world behind, a byword for excellence. Surely that is better than being remembered for a short time for pretending to be something you are not.’
‘That is what acting is, pretending to be someone else.’
Marianne laughed. ‘You do like to have the last word, don’t you? I will concede you right on that, but you should not extend that into your everyday life.’
Madeleine was silent for a minute, during which they attended to their make-up, but if Marianne thought that was the end of the conversation, she was mistaken. Maddy worried at it like a dog with a bone. ‘You have met the Stanmores, haven’t you?’ she asked, apparently casually.
‘Yes, the first time was when I took part in an amateur production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream they put on at Stanmore House to raise funds for the Duchess’s charitable works. The whole family was involved, even the children.’
‘And they took you for a lady?’
‘Yes, but only because Sir Percival Ponsonby introduced me and vouched for me. He was the one who invented my history.’
‘He evidently did not mind deceiving them?’
‘It was in a good cause.’
‘And they never guessed?’
‘Oh, it all came out in the end, of course. We never meant to deceive them permanently.’
‘And they forgave you and the Duchess still receives you. I know you are sometimes included in her soirées.’
‘I go to entertain the company. It is in aid of the charity and I am pleased to do it, but the Duchess does not treat me as an equal, though we deal very well together.’
‘Will you take me with you next time?’
‘Maddy, don’t be a ninny. How can I? I go by invitation and they are not easy to come by.’
‘You could fix it. Offer them a performance that needs two players and take me to assist you.’
Marianne looked thoughtfully at her friend, wondering what was behind the request. ‘Perhaps I could, but the Marquis might not like his outside pursuits intruding on his home life; he might be very angry, not only with you, but with me for encouraging you.’
‘He cannot know that you know my story is not true. No one will blame you. At least it will make him notice me.’
Marianne burst into laughter. ‘He has already done that and you repaid him with whiskers.’
‘I know. But if he believed them, where’s the harm?’
‘Maddy, my love, his father will have the story checked, even if the son takes it at face value. You will be in a serious coil, if you persist.’
She had not thought of that, but then brightened. ‘What can he discover? So many Frenchmen came over during the Terror, there’s no keeping track of them.’
‘I think you would do better to own up and apologise.’
‘I will. When the opportunity arises. But the Marquis did not intimate he was going to ask me out again and I can hardly accost him in the street to tell him, can I?’
Marianne laughed. ‘No, but going to his home and confronting him will not serve either. Besides, he might not be there. True, he still lives at Stanmore House but that does not mean he is tied to his stepmama’s apron strings. Most young men of his age, married or not, have flown the coop long before they are his age.’
‘He said his papa was anxious for him to marry.’
‘No doubt he is. But you must face the truth, my love, he will not look at you for that role.’
Madeleine sighed, thinking of the play they had just been rehearsing. ‘If I were really a comte’s granddaughter, he would.’
‘If you were a comte’s granddaughter, my dear, you would not have led the life you have and you would not be nursing a grievance against the whole haut monde. And if you are thinking of exacting your revenge on Stanmore, father or son, then you are like to have your fingers burned, mark my words.’
‘I am not thinking of revenge. It is the haut monde I wish to study. I want to see the family together; I want to see how they deal with each other, if they are loving towards each other and how they treat their servants. You have taught me a great deal and I am sure there is nothing you do not know about acting the lady, but I want to see it for myself. I want to be among them just for a little while. It will be a great help to me when I have to play the great lady.’
Marianne looked at her with her head on one side, as if cogitating whether to believe her or not. ‘And you expect me to collude with you in this?’
‘Yes, dear Marianne, get me an invitation to the next soirée you go to, please, just this once. I won’t ask you ever again.’
She was not sure why she wanted this so much. It was not as if she hoped to promote herself in the eyes of the Marquis, let alone his family, but if she could make the story of the French comte convincing enough, the fact that she was accepted at Stanmore House might gain her entry to a few more social occasions and maybe she could establish herself in Society without having to delude some susceptible nobleman into marrying her. And perhaps, in time, she might meet someone who could know the truth about her and still love her.
Her imagination soared; she could see herself fêted and showered with invitations and being accepted. Yes, that was what she wanted most, to be accepted. She wanted to be seen at Stanmore House in order to set the ball rolling. ‘Please,’ she begged. ‘If you cannot ask her ladyship yourself, ask the help of Sir Percy. I believe he is a frequent visitor to Stanmore House. The Duchess will perhaps listen to a suggestion from him.’
Sir Percy was one of the few men who did not ask sexual favours for his patronage. Marianne said it was because he was in love with the Duchess of Loscoe and had been ever since she first came out, but she had married the Earl of Corringham and, after he died, the Duke of Loscoe. Having been rejected, Sir Percy had taken refuge in pretending to be an outmoded fop. He was far from that, as Madeleine appreciated, and if anyone could help her, he could.
‘She might, but I doubt he will agree to hoax the Duke and Duchess.’
‘It is not exactly a hoax, is it? And he will do it if you ask it of him, he is very fond of you, he told me so when we were out in his carriage last week.’
Marianne chuckled. ‘Did he now?’
‘So, will you ask him?’
‘Perhaps, if the opportunity arises next time I see him, but I make no promises.’ She adjusted her powdered wig, stood up in a flurry of silk-covered hoops and took a last look at herself in the mirror. ‘Come now, put it from your mind and concentrate on the play. I can hear Lancelot calling everyone to their places.’
Madeleine’s performance as Juliet that night excelled anything she had done before and the applause at the end meant she had to take several curtain calls before they would allow her to go. Her dressing room was awash with flowers and she examined each bouquet carefully to see who had sent them, but none that she could see had come from the Marquis of Risley. It was evident he was not going to further their acquaintance; she would not give him the carte blanche he wanted and so he had lost interest. But she would not admit to being disappointed, not even to herself.
Duncan was sipping tea in the withdrawing room of Stanmore House, having dined at home with the Duke and Duchess and their guests, his sister Lavinia and her husband, the Earl of Corringham and the Earl’s sister, Augusta, and her husband Sir Richard Harnham.
‘Duncan, you really must put in an appearance at Almack’s at least once this Season,’ Lavinia said.
‘Why?’ he demanded. He loved his sister dearly, but ever since she had married James six years before and borne two lively children, she seemed to think she could bully him into doing anything. He gave a quirky smile; she had always tried to bully him, even when they were children; it was nothing new. ‘Why should I dress myself up in breeches and stockings and stand about like a liveried footman just for the dubious pleasure of dancing with some plain chit who thinks she can trap me into marriage?’
‘How can you be so cynical, Duncan? There are any number of very acceptable girls coming out this Season. How do you know that one won’t turn out to be exactly what you are looking for?’
‘I doubt it. They will either be missish and just out of the schoolroom, with silly giggles and no conversation, or spinsters at their last prayers who have been residing on the shelf for years and yet each Season they dust themselves off and launch themselves at every eligible man foolish enough to go near them.’
The Duke and the Duchess, their stepmother, had been listening to this exchange between brother and sister with amused tolerance, but now the Duchess smiled. ‘Duncan, don’t you want to marry?’
‘Not particularly, Mama, certainly not enough to jump into it simply because a young lady is considered suitable. Suitable for what? I find myself asking.’
‘Why, to be a marchioness,’ Lavinia said.
‘But it is no certainty that someone who might make a good marchioness will make a good wife. I want to have feelings for the woman I marry, feelings that last a lifetime. I am not prepared to shackle myself to a breeding machine with whom I have nothing in common. There is more to marriage than that.’
‘In other words, you want to love and be loved,’ Frances said softly.
He did not think his stepmother’s comment needed an answer. She understood him and had often in the past interceded for him with the Duke and he loved her for it, but if she was ranging herself alongside Lavinia in this quest to find him a wife, he was going to disappoint her.
‘Somewhere out there, in the ranks of the nobility, there is someone who will answer for both,’ Lavinia persisted. ‘You must give Society a chance.’
He smiled at his sister. ‘You were fortunate that your choice of husband was also suitable from the point of view of the haut monde, Lavinia dear, no compromise was asked of you. It does not happen often.’
‘Thank you very much,’ James put in drily.
‘You know what I mean.’
‘All I am saying is that you should attend those functions where you might meet suitable young ladies,’ Lavinia went on. ‘But if you do not go out and about, how can you possibly make a choice?’
‘I do go out and about, I am not a recluse.’
‘Oh, yes, you go about with your dandified friends and hover about stage doors dangling after actresses, but you won’t find a wife there, now will you?’
‘Vinny!’ her husband admonished her. ‘It is not for you to comment upon how your brother spends his evenings.’ He paused, curious. ‘How do you know so much anyway?’
‘Benedict told his sister and she told me.’
‘What did he tell her?’ Duncan asked, suddenly interested.
‘Oh, nothing of import, except that you were rivalling each other to take a certain actress out to supper. Felicity said there was a wager on it.’
Duncan muttered darkly under his breath. Trust Willoughby to empty the bag. If the object of the wager had been anyone but the delectable Miss Charron he would have answered teasingly, but there was something about their meeting the evening before that did not warrant that; it was the confidences they had shared, the private moments when they had not been flirting with each other, when he had been privileged to see the real Madeleine Charron hidden behind the actress. It was something he wanted to keep to himself; now that Benedict had made light of it, he was angry.
