Stephanie and the Wicked Deceiver (Wild Marchmonts #2)

6. Miss Galloways Undertaking

Chapter 6

Miss Galloway's Undertaking

G ertrude Galloway was not at all sure she had done aright in coming here. She was forty-five and had only lived with her dear friend Maria, aunt to Maximilian Chance, the Earl of Hedley, for two wonderful years.

She and Maria had met at their come out many years ago and become great friends. That same Season, Maria Chance had become betrothed to the good-natured but rather ordinary looking Lord Dunton and had been treasured by him until his death two years since. They had no children.

Gertrude, on the other hand, did not take . There had been a scholar whom she had met in Bath who had walked her (and her maid) home from the Pump Rooms, but although tempted by the idea of marriage to her, he informed her by letter that he had decided to stay with his college. It was a cruel letter, for Gertrude had not had the slightest hope of marriage until he wrote to her, only to have it taken away at once.

A few years later her father had died and left her in the care of her brother, who had never liked her. He and his wife had treated her like a servant until Maria, now a widow, with whom Gertrude had continued to correspond and sometimes visited, had written to ask her to make her home with her. There she was treated with the greatest of respect by the household, dressed beautifully (for Maria teased that she really could not be seen with such a fright ) and gradually returned to her spirits of yore. She was not in herself amusing, but she could appreciate the jests of others.

She understood that it must be entertaining for such an out-and-outer as the earl to be taught sporting pursuits by a green girl but, why ever she had been brought here, it was clearly her mission to protect the young lady from harm. She was almost sure before she came down to breakfast to join the four silly young bucks that she would not decide in their favour.

Then she met Stephanie.

The girl arrived before breakfast was quite over, followed by two servants: a swarthy little man who did not look at all like a footman (but would not have been allowed into the dining room by the butler if he were a groom), and a middle-aged maid of square face and deeply resigned expression. The maid eyed Hedley and the gentlemen, who had stood to bow at the young lady in the dreadful cape and bonnet, and her face was a disapproving scoff, the prerogative of protector and old family retainer.

The young girl with red curls and wonderful but strange green eyes said in response to the bow, ‘Oh, none of that. I know I am early but it is such a fine morning that I rushed breakfast. Might I have a roll?’ she added, bending forward and taking one.

Hedley gestured to a footman and soon Stephanie was seated at the table removing her bonnet, which she waved in the air to be caught by her maid. ‘Please join us, Miss Marchmont,’ the earl said.

‘Fank you,’ said the girl with her mouth full of roll. Gertrude found herself amused indeed.

A servant set down some coffee for Stephanie, who asked, ‘Can I have chocolate instead?’ which made her old maid cast up her eyes. ‘I might just have some beef,’ she added, her attention on the table. ‘Sir Rupert…?’ She was asking him to pass it.

This was a natural child without guile who had no consciousness of being a young lady amidst a pack of handsome, fashionable gentlemen. She seemed to treat them as equals, as Gertrude believed she would treat all men who were friendly. She was delightful.

Stephanie’s eye eventually caught sight of Gertrude, who smiled.

Hedley said, ‘I have to introduce you to Miss Gertrude Galloway, a family friend who has come on a visit.’

Smiling, Stephanie jumped up and gave a schoolgirl curtsy. ‘Oh, nice to meet you!’

Hedley added, ‘Miss Galloway, this is our new friend and neighbour, Miss Marchmont.’

‘It is very pleasant to have another lady at the table, Miss Marchmont. Pray sit down and eat.’

‘Oh yes,’ said the girl, distracted once more by the food. She accepted a hot chocolate from a footman with a radiant smile. ‘I did not think I was hungry but I find that I am!’

‘Miss Galloway usually resides with my Aunt Maria, but that lady is sick and so she comes to us to escape – er – contagion,’ Hedley continued.

Gertrude frowned at him: as if she would leave Lady Maria if she were ill! She said, ‘All illness has passed, I assure you, Miss Marchmont. It is just that Lady Maria sleeps rather a lot now and has sent me here to be entertained by her nephew in case I be bored.’

Miss Marchmont looked at her vaguely, not much interested. ‘I am never bored. Unless I’m locked up!’

‘Locked up?’ exclaimed Pettigrew, shocked.

‘For her own protection!’ crowed the maid in a Scottish accent.

‘I can imagine that it is sometimes necessary,’ drawled Sir Rupert Armitage smoothly, to appease the maid it seemed.

‘Now that is unkind, Sir Rupert,’ Stephanie protested. ‘I told the earl that I am much more restrained than my sister Phoebe. When she loses her temper – which I never do – she will risk her life, and that of a horse even, and do something reckless.’

With one eyebrow raised, Lord Fortescue asked, ‘And throwing yourself from a moving coach and attacking three footpads armed with foils is not reckless?’

‘No, because I am very good with a blade, as Hedley can testify.’

Gertrude’s mouth was agape as Hedley, in his most banal voice, agreed.

‘Would you rather your friend had been injured ?’ Stephanie pleaded with Armitage.

‘No,’ replied the baronet with a straight face. ‘I quite see that you were not reckless at all.’

‘Oh!’ said Gertrude, against her will. What a unique girl. She was (apart from the curtsy) more mannish than missish, and she was neither standoffish nor flirtatious with these gentlemen.

Stephanie looked to her. ‘What a lovely locket!’ she declared, and Gertrude fingered the pierced-work gold about her neck.

‘I did not think that you cared much for fashionable things,’ said Hedley to the girl, surprised.

‘Did you not?’ Stephanie replied. ‘Well, I like to be practical, you know. It was pleasant having pretty clothes in London, especially the ones with the tricks that my mother prepared for me. But it is not practical in the country to wear such stuff.’

‘Tricks?’ queried Gertrude, interested.

‘Oh, many tricks. Hidden splits in my pelisses—’

‘In case she has to jump in the Thames,’ explained Hedley.

Gertrude could only say, ‘ Pardon…? ’

‘To rescue fallen children,’ Armitage added, also bland.

‘Larger pockets beneath my skirts—’

‘Whatever for?’ asked Pettigrew, bewildered.

‘I collect stones and things for my slingshot – which is also in my pocket.’

‘In London?’ he said, aghast.

‘Well, Mama thought I might get lost and so allowed me a weapon.’

‘Lost?’ Gertrude heard herself enquire.

‘She wanders off, miss,’ explained the maid from the rear in a long-suffering voice. ‘That is why she has Pietro.’

‘And the slingshot,’ Armitage mused. ‘Not useful in close combat.’

‘Yes,’ lamented Stephanie. ‘But Mama wouldn’t permit me a pistol.’

‘Good God!’ declared Pettigrew.

‘I am still worried about close combat,’ Armitage said. ‘What if a thief were to grab at you?’

‘Oh, I also have…’ She rolled her eye in the direction of Pietro and Morag, then said, ‘I should kick him, I suppose. But I met a Chinese person in Edinburgh once and he showed my papa how to put a man to sleep by pressing a thumb into his neck.’

‘Nonsense!’ scoffed Pettigrew.

Miss Marchmont jumped up, her red curls flying and was behind his seat in a trice. ‘Miss!’ protested the Scottish maid, just as Pettigrew yelped ‘Ow!’ when a small thumb was pressed on his neck.

Stephanie was seated again amidst shocked gasps. Gertrude found herself giggling, which ended up as a hearty laugh that the others caught on to. Only the girl herself did not laugh but looked from one to another in mild enquiry. ‘If I’d pressed harder, you would have lost consciousness,’ she informed Pettigrew.

He had a hand to his neck. ‘How—?’

‘It requires precision,’ she told him.

Gertrude saw that this was no ordinary duty of chaperonage that she had taken on. The girl was romantically interested in none of them, and none of the gentlemen were trying to fix their interest, either. Pettigrew seemed afraid of her, while to Fortescue, Armitage and Hedley she appeared to be an object of both amusement and admiration. But what they admired was not her strange beauty, Gertrude felt, but her undaunted, unique spirit and her abilities.

‘Shall you ride with us, Miss Galloway?’ Stephanie asked politely as the meal finished.

‘I am not proficient in the saddle, I’m afraid,’ Gertrude said.

‘I could instruct you, along with the earl.’

It seemed to Gertrude that this was consideration, but not such a consideration that the young girl was enthusiastic about. She had probably concluded that Gertrude would delay them, and she was quite correct. ‘No, no, my dear. I shall stay here, I think. But come back afterwards and we can have a visit, if you please.’

‘I shall. Until later then.’

Stephanie was not stupid, and she had been surprised when the butler had ushered her into the dining room. The other day he had obviously disapproved of her entering his master’s house; something to do with her reputation, she supposed. That Wilson had ushered her in without a blink today she put down at first to Morag’s presence; now, leaving to give the earl his riding lesson, she understood that Miss Galloway’s presence had been the key to Wilson’s lack of annoyance.

Miss Galloway made all the difference. Stephanie decided that she would try to know the lady a little because being able to come here when she wished, even for the fencing lessons that she had to hide from Morag, meant all would go more smoothly. Stephanie heartily approved of Miss Galloway mostly as a tool for her own convenience, and she could tell that Morag was relieved at the presence of the spinster lady. It was absurd, of course, but if it facilitated Stephanie’s aims then so be it.

‘It is market day today,’ Pettigrew informed them. ‘Let us ride to the village.’

Armitage drawled, ‘Why, Horace? Do you find yourself in urgent need of turnips, perchance?’

‘No. It is only that the village is always livelier on market day. There’s more to see.’

Fortescue leaned over and hissed in his ear, but Stephanie answered, ‘I do not think we need display the earl’s horsemanship to the neighbourhood just yet. In a few days his neighbours may all be surprised to see his progress.’

‘They will certainly be surprised to see him ride Sa— Proudfoot.’

‘Yes, the horse is not tall enough for him,’ Stephanie advised. ‘Perhaps there is another in the stables that might do?’

‘I shall send for one,’ croaked Hedley.

He was obviously a little afraid, but Stephanie knew she would cure him of that. ‘You should ride Emperor again.’

‘You rode Emperor?’ Fortescue asked his friend gleefully. ‘Not … side saddle ?’

‘Let us remove my saddle and put on another. I’ll ride Proudfoot today.’ Stephanie could not suppress her reluctance at this sacrifice, but she still added heartily, ‘If you can learn to control Emperor, you know, you can ride anything!’ She slapped Hedley’s back again, ‘I have faith in you, my lord.’

‘Call me Hedley. It sounds better coming from my instructress.’

‘Very well!’ Stephanie liked the earl; he was open and friendly, as well as being a weakling. He was working hard to overcome that and she appreciated it. And she also knew how little the general sort of gentleman wished to be taught anything by a female , though many would benefit from it. At least Hedley was not of the kind who was unable to admit to any sort of feminine superiority; he was happy to receive instruction and she admired him for it.

‘Side saddle!’ scoffed Pettigrew, returning to Hedley’s sore spot.

Since the young man was beside her and she was angered, Stephanie grabbed his ear lobe and twisted. ‘Stop that!’

‘Ow! When will you stop attacking me?’

‘When you stop behaving like a child!’ she retorted. Really, Horace Pettigrew was annoying, like her brother Richard when he was teasing her.

‘I do not think you should ever have children if that’s how you treat them,’ Pettigrew said, holding his ear.

‘Horace!’ exclaimed Hedley, annoyed on Stephanie’s behalf.

But she only knocked the hat from Pettigrew’s head and ran to the stable block. They ran too and caught up with her. ‘I’ll look in the stable and find you a better horse,’ she said.

‘No!’ cried all four, and she turned back to them, amazed.

Hedley was the first to seem calm as she stared at them. ‘Evans will see to it.’ He turned to the stable master. ‘Put Miss Marchmont’s saddle on Proudfoot and bring me a saddle for her horse, Emperor.’

‘Proudfoot, my lord?’ Armitage sidled up and whispered something in his ear. ‘Ah. Yes, your lordship.’

Stephanie said, ‘I shall tell Morag we will drive with Miss Galloway after three today.’

‘And shall we?’ said Hedley, in a conspiratorial voice.

‘Perhaps. But then we will fence !’

‘Very well! Then you must stay to dinner!’

‘Perhaps if Miss Galloway is here, Morag will permit it.’

‘You are ruled by your maid, Miss Marchmont?’

‘She has my mother’s authority, you see, and she has known me all my life.’

‘Ah, she wields formidable power, then.’

Stephanie laughed. ‘Well, she tries to!’

‘I can quite see the poor woman can’t hold back a wildcat like you!’

Stephanie stuck out her tongue at him.

She was such an amusing child, Hedley thought, seeing this. Her attacks on Horace Pettigrew were so much how the rest of their friends treated him that it seemed totally natural. But in truth, she was behaving in a shockingly unladylike way, going so far as to physically attack a gentleman after she had only known him only days. The bold Miss Marchmont was not a young lady at all but a precocious child; and Pettigrew, in his turn, was a badly behaved infant-boy.

She had accepted the whole bunch of them as friends without much thought and, like any child, she would berate her friends as she liked if she found them annoying.

Hedley surprised a look of warm amusement on Armitage’s face. It had escaped the baronet’s sardonic veneer and Hedley found it a touch disturbing. He even forgot to mount awkwardly in his distraction, which was met by a ‘Oh well done !’ by his little teacher, who patted his lower back with her crop in an approving manner.

‘No, Evans,’ she said to the groom. Hedley had alerted the whole stable yard to show nothing of their shock or amusement at Miss Marchmont’s tutelage of their master, the supreme horseman of England, but Evan’s broad face was having a hard time mastering his amusement. ‘Do not let go of his reins yet. Let him get a feel for the horse.’

Now mounted herself, she looked at Hedley and said reassuringly, ‘We’ll just walk a little first, do not fear. I’ll be right beside you. Qianlong Emperor will very likely fidget, but just use your knees a little and he’ll settle. But not too much or he’ll bolt, won’t you, Huangdi?’

‘Huangdi?’

‘A friend of Mama’s, who was at the Chinese court as a painter, said that is what they called the Emperor in Chinese. I suppose it means Your Majesty!’

‘Huangdi!’ said the earl. ‘I must give him his title. He is very handsome.’

‘My brother Richard chose him for me. Well, that is,’ and here she gurgled at the memory, ‘he brought horses back from London for all of us, and I stole the best one. He was originally called Storm but I changed his name for he was just too magnificent. I like him better than even Phoebe’s Genghis Khan, though he is magnificent, too.’ She leaned over and patted the horse’s nose. ‘I suppose this thing can canter?’ she sniffed about poor Sally.

‘You mustn’t sneer at Proudfoot, Miss Marchmont,’ Hedley chided, offended.

‘Quite right.’ She leaned over and patted Sally’s neck in case she, too, was offended.

Hedley’s friends enjoyed the lessons as much as he did, being amused at his feigned clumsiness and his heroine’s determination to aid him do better. He himself would have preferred another private lesson. Though usually it was good to share a joke, he felt guilty that they were rather a gang amusing themselves at her expense. But he knew that Stephanie was enjoying herself too, delighted by his ‘success’ and happy to be out of doors sharing with the others.

Obviously group rides were normal to her and she was used to be being with others. Teasing and intimacy were natural to her, as natural as breathing air; all his friends felt it and relaxed around her, teasing her in return and asking more about her family on the way back. Six sisters and a brother: all handsome, Hedley supposed, looking at her. Her mother was what Stephanie described as ‘wonderful but formidable’, someone who achieved total obedience with just a look.

‘It does not seem to work with you!’ remarked Armitage.

‘It does when I am in her presence. But when she is not there, I just think to do what I feel in the moment. Mama does say that rules might be broken according to extreme circumstance, and that one should always trust oneself and not others. I do trust myself.’

‘Unusual advice from a mama to young ladies!’ remarked Armitage, one slanted eyebrow raised.

‘But this exile to Reddingate is to suggest that your mama does not always think you wise,’ remarked Fortescue.

‘Oh, I do not know that, only that I seem to attract trouble, which there is rather more of in Town than in the country. As a rule, Mama does not get cross. I think she admired my perseverance in acquiring the pickpocket’s method of climbing.’

‘Really?’ asked Fortescue, amazed.

‘Yes, for Mama holds one must always increase one’s skills, you know.’ The girl did not seem to notice the looks the gentlemen exchanged. ‘But she did not like that I had attracted a crowd – apparently that was a step too far. I understand her. One is rather looked upon in London, and I find that the Season is all about female respectability and reputation – although I did not quite see how my drawing a crowd could affect my sisters, which is what Mama said . ’

‘Miss Hilary Preston ran off with a married bishop two years ago, and her younger sister Miss Mary Preston could not get vouchers for Almacks or be presented at court the next year because of it,’ Pettigrew informed her. ‘I thought it unfair myself, for Miss Mary Preston is as quiet as a mouse.’

‘How unjust! I should not be willing to suffer because my sister Phoebe bites gentlemen.’

‘She does? ’

‘Only one,’ Miss Marchmont informed them airily. ‘And he deserved it for some reason or other.’

‘But you have attacked me twice ,’ said Pettigrew, like a schoolboy. ‘So you are just as bad as your sister!’

‘Pooh! Once was a demonstration because you did not believe me, and once was retaliation for your bad manners to your friend.’ She sounded pious when she added, ‘It is not proper that you should tease the earl. He is your host.’

‘I like that! Using what is proper just to come back at me when you yourself have no idea of propriety at all!’ Pettigrew scoffed.

‘Mama is giving me an extra year off from having to practise the excess of propriety,’ Stephanie answered, then sighed. ‘But I expect I shall have to learn it for next Season.’

‘I should like to see that!’

‘But you never will!’ drawled Armitage. ‘Wildcats cannot be tamed.’

The girl seemed to take this as a compliment. ‘Like Phoebe. She is trying to be tamer for Mama’s sake, but I fear she will not succeed.’ She giggled.

‘I cannot believe you have a sister more badly behaved than you are,’ said Pettigrew.

‘Horace, be quiet if you cannot be polite.’ Lord Fortescue sounded bored.

Enjoying the intervention, Stephanie stuck out her tongue at Pettigrew again.

‘ You would not be polite if she had attacked you with her thumb and twisted your ear,’ Pettigrew objected.

‘She has hit Max with her crop on numerous occasions this morning and still the earl’s fabled politeness remains intact,’ Fortescue responded.

Miss Marchmont turned to Hedley and smiled a rather exaggerated smile for Pettigrew’s benefit. ‘I expect all the ladies find you charming, Hedley. You are always kind, even when I abuse you – unlike one of your friends.’

‘Here, I say !’ But this cry was too usual for Pettigrew’s friends to do more than laugh. ‘The butt of the joke as usual,’ he complained.

Fortescue put a comforting hand on his shoulder. ‘Never mind, lad. You would not otherwise be invited to join such an illustrious brotherhood.’

‘I see why they keep you around now.’ Stephanie pulled on Pettigrew’s sleeve then ran off. He followed her, shaking his fist.

‘Should we stop them fighting?’ asked Armitage. ‘He can give her a foot in height.’

‘But I’d place my bet on the wildcat any day,’ said the earl.

‘I admit I am agog to see the wilder sister. I almost wish to depart for town immediately on the quest but for my desire to see what Miss Stephanie will do to you when she finds out your duplicity, Max.’ Fortescue grinned.

‘In a few days I shall tell her that I have been teasing her, never fear. I just enjoy how she pities me and tries to help. I can think of many fellows in search of manhood that could use her help, for it is both practical and coming from a master, but most would never accept it from a chit like her. She is charming, don’t you think?’

‘I do,’ agreed Armitage. ‘And that is why, my old friend, you must be very careful. She should not lose a thing in this game of ours.’

‘I know it, but I believe we are offering her entertainment too. She would be thoroughly bored if left to her own devices.’

‘I don’t know that. She has an independent spirit,’ Fortescue said admiringly.

‘She does.’ Hedley was aware that a smidgen of shame might be prodding him to justify his behaviour. ‘But we gather from her happy tales of her family that she is used to intimacy, to belonging. It is why she fits seamlessly with our group. She would not like the solitude at Reddingate. We are a diversion for her.’

Armitage raised a cynical brow. ‘You may be right, Max, but we await Miss Galloway’s judgement. The game may end today.’

Hedley tried to look unconcerned, but he was not sure he achieved it with panache. He was not yet ready to give up the look in those strange green eyes when she sympathised, or the other look she gave him when she cheered him. This had tickled his most wicked sense of humour and moved him at the same time. He had expected the no-nonsense instructress to be proud of her prowess, but he had not expected the delicate kindness for his apparently frightened spirit. If he were the creature she thought him, she would be cheering him along with no sentimental sympathy but rather a bracing empathy that would have allowed for his male dignity to survive. It was a delicate line and she trod it well. He wished to go on with this game and regretted what he knew of Miss Galloway’s more honest spirit.

He found himself almost afraid.