Stephanie and the Wicked Deceiver (Wild Marchmonts #2)

18. Facing the Music

Chapter 18

Facing the Music

S tephanie opened the garden doors ahead of him, but Hedley caught her up and tucked her hand in his arm. ‘Hedley, it will be too much of a shock for them,’ she said, shrugging him off.

‘They will have to bear it, my love!’ he recaptured her hand.

They had entered the main hall by now, and Wilson’s face was hard-pressed to remain stone. This little girl, his countess? Reserve intact, he opened the salon door. ‘There are guests, my lord…’ he began.

‘Oh, the duke. I know!’ Hadley paid little attention because he and Stephanie were involved in a fight to see whether her hand was her own or his. The serious child was not given to giggles, but she seemed to succumb now; the pair were obviously in an elevated state.

Seated with his three friends and drinking brandy was Miss Galloway, Sedgewick, the duke – and Stephanie’s mama!

Hedley dropped Stephanie’s hand. ‘Lady Eleanor! What are you doing here?’

The smooth voice of Dorian Marchmont, standing beside her ladyship’s chair, announced, ‘Hardly a polite welcome, Hedley. We have come to collect our girl!’

‘I see you broke your promise, my lord,’ said Lady Eleanor in a severe tone, putting down a ratafia glass.

‘My lady—’ began Hedley abjectly, but Stephanie jumped in front of him.

‘He did not, Mama. Someone told me of his jest, and then I cried, and—’

‘You cried? ’ said Dorian Marchmont, sounding angry. He moved forward but Lady Eleanor’s hand stopped him.

‘Not like that, Dorian! You know I never cry!’ Stephanie protested. ‘It is just that I thought perhaps that Hedley had never really liked me … and perhaps liked someone else. And then I realised that I…’ She turned to face her friends resolutely. ‘Ben, Sir Rupert, Horace – this will come as such a shock to you, and indeed it seems absurd to me , but it seems Hedley likes me and I him.’

‘Och, lassie!’ said Morag from the corner of the room in a tragic voice.

Since Fortescue had already explained it all to Pettigrew, all of her three gentlemen friends and Gertrude Galloway, now looked at her pityingly.

‘You knew? ’ she said, amazed.

They nodded in unison.

‘You rather gave yourself away when I returned from London,’ said Hedley who had been moved by her defence of him and now touched her hair to get her attention.

‘Pooh!’ she said in her old way. ‘I was simply pleased to see a friend… I had no other thought at all then .’

‘But, my dear,’ said Armitage, one eyebrow flying, ‘I also returned from London and I am also your friend, I hope. But your shining eyes were not directed at me !’

‘Oh, I see !’ mused Stephanie, surprised.

‘How often, Stephanie,’ said the firm voice of her mother, ‘have I told you that a young lady does not use “pooh!” as an exclamation!’

‘Sorry, Mama!’

‘And you, Hedley, I see that circumstances may have forced you to break your promise to me, but I am not entirely happy. Just what were you doing with my innocent child when you entered the room?’

The duke hung his head to hide a grin for he recognised the parent’s favourite gambit. In two strides Hedley was at her feet on one bended knee. ‘Lady Eleanor, I ask that you grant me the hand of your wonderful daughter in marriage.’

She looked down on the earl’s bent head and then up at Marchmont. ‘What do you think, Dorian? Can Hedley be trusted?’

Armitage wondered what Marchmont had to do with it, but Dorian’s suave voice said, ‘If Rupert be his best friend, then he is sound, my lady.’ Then he paused. ‘However, I am still not sure.’

He walked to Stephanie and took her face in his hands in an avuncular manner. Armitage was stunned; the last occasion when he had seen Dorian was when he had carried him home from the club, blind drunk. This man resembled him, but Dorian … with a sense of responsibility ? It seemed wrong.

‘Stephanie, what about you?’ Dorian asked. ‘Isn’t he too old for you? You have not even come out yet, little one.’

‘Oh Dorian, help me persuade Mama. I do not even want a come out or balls. I did not think I would ever wish to marry. But with Hedley …!’ she leant in confidentially, ‘Oh Dorian, I fear I have become as silly as Naomi!’

‘Nevertheless, Stephanie,’ said Lady Eleanor quietly, ‘you must attend balls. It is expected of the future Countess of Hedley.’

Hedley, who had jumped up at the sight of handsome Dorian Marchmont taking his beloved’s face in his hands and had been restrained just as quickly by his friend the baronet, knelt down again rapidly. He clutched her ladyship’s hand and kissed it. ‘Oh, ma’am, you permit it?’

‘Dorian!’ called Lady Eleanor. ‘Can you detach him?’

But Marchmont was at her side already and regally claimed the hand that Hedley was bending over.

Armitage was beginning to see the light.

‘Get up, Hedley do,’ Lady Eleanor admonished. ‘It is a plague to have beautiful daughters, for gentlemen are constantly begging for my intercession. But when Stephanie makes up her mind to do something, there is no help for it. I suppose I must relent.’ But she said so with a smile, and Hedley rose and took Stephanie’s hand again.

‘I should really return to London,’ she continued. ‘I did not wish to come for I am extremely busy at present, but after Morag’s last letter I was somewhat concerned. Dorian saw it, as ever, and promised to drive me so swiftly that I should make it back tonight.’

‘You wish me to return to London now , Mama? I do not think I can,’ Stephanie wailed.

‘We could delay until the early morning, my lady,’ said Dorian. ‘It makes very little difference.’

‘Oh, very well. We shall stay for dinner.’

‘Since your horses are at rest, it might be more convenient for everyone to stay here tonight,’ offered Hedley.

Wilson nodded at a footman to start the procedures.

‘Stay here?’ said Stephanie excitedly. ‘I have often wished to do so!’ All eyes were on her, some amused and some shocked. ‘It was such a bore driving back to Reddingate in the dark, you know.’ She turned to Hedley, whose grey eyes were smiling at her. ‘May I?’

‘This will soon be your home, so—’

‘Not too soon, my lord!’ said Lady Eleanor. ‘I have much to consider.’

Hedley looked crestfallen.

‘An actor indeed!’ she went on, taking in this look. ‘You should not be ashamed of falling for his lies, Stephanie!’

‘Oh, he did not lie, Mama, I misunderstood him after the battle with the footpads.’

‘Footpads! What’s this?’ asked the duke.

Dinner was announced. The duke, who had felt he should go home, was moved by his interest in footpads to go to the dining room, too. Cressida would wish to be alone to tend her wounds, he thought, and would reject him so soon after the event.

Stephanie finally discovered that the footpads were the miscreants seated beside her at the table. ‘You are all cruel deceivers,’ she cried. ‘I shall deal with you later.’

‘You were stupid not to guess earlier, Stephanie,’ said Horace Pettigrew, forgetting that he was in the presence of her mother. ‘I nearly gave it away several times.’

‘That would make you stupid, Horace, not me !’ She looked askance at Hedley’s friends. ‘I thought you were too craven for footpads. I suppose you laughed all the way back to the Court.’

‘No – I, for one, was terrified of your foil, Stephanie,’ said Lord Fortescue, supportively.

But Stephanie was not grateful. ‘Oh good, Ben. It serves you right.’

‘That is correct,’ said Armitage suavely. ‘We saved the laughing until we reached the drawing room!’

‘You are all very dreadful,’ said Miss Galloway and Stephanie nodded.

‘Yes, and you quite spoiled my punishment, also,’ said her mother to Hedley and friends. ‘How now am I to prevent her drawing crowds in London streets?’

‘You must have the patience of a saint, Lady Eleanor,’ said Pettigrew, flattering to appease.

‘My daughter is indeed a trial!’

‘Well, I shall keep a close guard on her from now on.’ Hedley was both proud and smug at once.

‘That you will not!’ said Stephanie. ‘I shall move around with Sukey and Pietro as usual.’

‘You think my presence will restrict you?’ asked her love sadly.

Actor , thought Lady Eleanor, not without admiration. But she trusted her daughter.

‘No, not that. But I like to look and notice things … and I have found recently that you are too…’ she pulled back and wiggled her fingers at him ‘… electric for me to concentrate.’

‘Interesting word. The power made when rubbing certain substances together.’ Hedley smiled at her and the table felt uncomfortable. Stephanie held him off with a look. ‘But you will spend time with me?’ he said plaintively.

‘Oh yes!’ said Stephanie airily. ‘We can ride and drive and so on, and if you have a private salon in your London house, we might fence, too. If it is not overlooked, I have always wanted to be free of my skirts when I fence, but it never seemed appropriate before. But if we are alone, I may remove my dress and fight in my pantalons.’

There was an audible gasp from the company, but it was Dorian who cried, ‘You will not! ’

‘No?’ Stephanie looked puzzled. ‘But it would be much more convenient. I have told you before, Hedley, what a trial my skirts are to me.’

Hedley, partly amused and partly on fire at this vision, could not abuse her innocence. ‘I know, my darling,’ he commiserated, patting her hand. ‘But not until after we are wed.’

After the shock, the rest of the company had looked to her mother. Lady Eleanor merely sighed and shook her head as though this was exactly as she’d expected. She put a napkin delicately to her mouth then pronounced, ‘A shorter shift, I’d say, Stephanie, which will allow you movement. And the gown made with eyelets on the hem, so that it might be kilted up while you spar.’

Gertrude Galloway looked at Lady Eleanor with round eyes. ‘A most practical solution, Lady Eleanor,’ she said, with fervent admiration.

Watching as the four gentlemen teased her daughter, Miss Galloway joining in with her dry humour, and the duke and Sedgewick adding a jest or two, Lady Eleanor Marchmont was very, very happy. Her daughter had recreated their family intimacy here at Hedley Court. How Stephanie, who had no interest in finding a partner, would go on in the future had been a minor concern for Mrs Marchmont: minor as yet, because her daughter was young. But Lady Eleanor thought Stephanie’s personality would be hard to match and most husbands would try to curtail her, especially if they loved her and wanted to care for her, and would therefore attempt to trap her to keep her safe. They would hardly have succeeded , of course, but it would not have made for a felicitous union. However, by reputation Hedley was as skilled and brave as her daughter and, as she saw when she regarded him closely during dinner, the earl was wise enough not to chain the child or seek to kill her spirit.

The earl’s footpad friends obviously all adored Stephanie, and Hedley was clearly besotted. That made her say, when Stephanie pleaded to stay a few more days at the Court – ‘until I am used to my new happiness,’ she said – ‘A week then, and no more, Stephanie. That will get the presentations over, and I don’t need any more men haunting the salons before then, which I’m sure those four will do when you come back to Tremaine House.’

‘They are all unmarried,’ said Stephanie, as though that was a novel thought. ‘Perhaps one or other of them might fall in love with one of the girls.’

‘Do not say so!’ replied her mother. ‘If only you knew what romantic complications there are right now in Town. Naomi and I have our work cut out, I can tell you, for there is no help from the countess even for her sisters-in-law!’

‘Oh, but the countess is not very bright. I don’t expect she’d be anything but a hindrance if she did try.’

Assuredly her daughter had grown up since she’d arrived here. ‘I should not permit you to speak so of the countess, but truth will out!’ sighed Lady Eleanor. ‘But hear me well, daughter. You will have Morag or at least another maid with you at all times until you come to London. You will not fence alone with Hedley, even if Pietro is nearby. I have no desire that the Neapolitan be locked up for murder. Hedley is not to be trusted with you alone right now.’

Stephanie, remembering her time under the tree with him, said honestly, ‘I am not sure I am either, Mama!’

‘Oh heavens!’ her mother sighed again. ‘Your word, Stephanie!’

‘You have it, Mama!’

‘I shall involve Miss Galloway in this regard, too. An excellent woman!’

‘Tell me more about everyone, Mama.’

‘I will leave that until London, it will make you return all the sooner to find out. Snuff your candle, dear. Dorian will drive me at dawn. There are some arrangements in the afternoon that I must attend. Goodnight, my dear. I am so glad you have found the one God made for you. Tell me the story to send me to sleep as I used to for you.’

‘Which story, Mama?’

‘The History of Stephanie and the Wicked Deceiver.’

And so, as they snuggled together in the big bed that belonged to the Countesses of Tremaine, past and future, Stephanie told it to her.

Stephanie awoke in the night. How could today have happened? She had always been a free spirit and now she sought to be with someone – and a man at that. But Hedley was her friend and so much more. Hers, as she had realised when she had seen Lady Cressida in his arms. Only for her. As Mama had said, he was the one God had made for her. How else to explain it?

A man she had liked from the first, though her opinion of him as needy was false. Thinking about it now, from the beginning she had liked his eyes; they were amused, like Papa’s always were, and kind, as Papa’s and Richard’s were too. She had wanted to help him.

The shame he had displayed was not false; indeed, she thought now, it was not the shame of an incompetent but of a deceiver. She laughed silently. She saw that it must have been a good joke for all those devils. From what she had learned today, Hedley was a Nonpareil in many sports and Stephanie looked forward to playing with him, learning, but assuredly sometimes winning. He had admitted Sedgewick as his superior with the foil, and certainly the brigand moves of Pietro had taken him by surprise, so she would take them still as her masters in secret and surprise Hedley with new moves.

But Armitage had said something over dinner, too. Hedley was a man of culture and intelligence; she was suddenly glad that Mama, so permissive of her interests for the most part, had still insisted on her education in the arts and in literature. She had no wish to surpass Hedley in such things, but it was her duty not to embarrass him. She had gone to musical entertainments and to the theatre with Mama and her elder sisters in London, and she had liked them. If she did not crave balls, it was for the nonsense that went with them – Roseanna’s hopes and dreams, Ophelia’s tales of ballroom politics and being pursued by gentlemen. If she could attend with Hedley, she did not think she would much mind it.

She was to be a countess, and this meant very little to her, but to uphold Hedley’s family dignity was important. Which did not mean the same as for the Countess of Tremaine, full of pride and upright correctness; for Stephanie, it meant being herself, being honest and loyal to her husband.

She was to have a husband ! Perhaps before Roseanna and Phoebe! It seemed to be strange, but it would be stranger still to be parted from Hedley.

She rose from her bed quietly and went to search the kitchens. She had hardly eaten at dinner because of her excitement, but now a day full of exercise had caught up with her stomach and it was calling for nourishment.

When she reached the hall, she found Hedley emerging from a salon a little drunk, perhaps, wearing only a shirt without a neckcloth or waistcoat, still in his breeches and boots.

‘Stephanie!’ he cried and pulled her into his arms. His chest was hard and she felt entrapped. He kissed her and she trembled at his roughness and kicked him off, hurting her toe in the process. He laughed, holding his shin as she held her toe, and she joined him in laughing. ‘Ow!’ he said, ‘What are you up to down here?’ he asked, his eyes clearer.

‘Looking for food!’ she confessed, ‘I am very hungry, Max.’

She had called his name and he was once more entranced. He sat her on a chair in the hall and bade a servant find her some bread and cheese.

‘Let us to the salon!’ she said, starting up.

He pushed her back down gently. ‘No, Stephanie. Can you not see that it is too dangerous for us? In the last days I have been so jealous of Sedgewick that I am suffering from a desire to make you mine right now.’

‘But I am yours!’ she said. ‘I thought we decided so.’

He was thrilled by her easy reply, and by its innocence, but said seriously, ‘Since my friends went to bed, I have been thinking, You should go to London with your mother.’ He was on his knees, caressing her curls.

‘You want me to go ? When we have just decided?’

‘If you stay here, we will be surrounded with other people all the time. We will be overlooked for all the best reasons, and it may not be so much fun,’ her eyes held his in a sad plea, but he rejected it. ‘Better to go now. I will not be many hours behind you, I promise. I will bring your luggage from Reddingate – and Morag, too – and be in Town by dinner. Then your family, any that are free, can meet me and your mother will be relieved.’

‘But Max!’

‘I love to hear you call my name,’ he said still plying with the long curls, calming her as he might his horse, ‘I love it so much that I do not know what I might do to you without your family about you.’

Stephanie looked confused, then at his lips. ‘I think I understand,’ she said as though she had also imbibed too much wine.

‘We shall do much together in London, and when we drive together, we will at least be alone. Perhaps I can steal a kiss!’ He laughed. ‘But at Hedley Court, Morag, Gertrude and the whole world will try to protect you. Do you know that after you left, all my friends threatened me? Rupert and Ben said I was to have a care or they would deal with me. And Horace said that, as your servant, he was prepared to kill me to protect your honour!’

Stephanie giggled. ‘Don’t they know I can protect my own honour? I forgot to tell you about the knife Pietro gave me to strap to my thigh!’ She looked at him challengingly. ‘So, there is no need for me to go. I can protect myself well.’

He moved forward. ‘From me, perhaps Stephanie, but from yourself …?’

His breath was hot on her skin and the scent of the brandy seemed to make her drunk. She sighed and pushed him away violently. When she looked straight into his eyes, honest and true as always, he saw much there. In a smaller voice than usual, a voice of capitulation and acceptance, she said, ‘I will go back to London with Mama and Dorian.’

She sounded a little sad. He took her arms and said, much more like her friend, ‘We have the rest of our lives, Stephanie. We do not have to rush a thing.’

She nodded, finally giving him her trusting smile again. ‘Then I shall have to wait to have an honest battle with the blades with you. But that suits me! You will be surprised, Hedley.’

Calling him so was to be at a safe distance; he understood, but he too was a little sad. She bent forward suddenly, as though seeing his sadness, and cupped one cheek in her hand. ‘The rest of our lives, Maximillian!’

Her eyes were lit with mischief; she was his darling girl. He wanted to kiss her … but forbore. He stood as the footman appeared with sustenance and took it into the salon, then Hedley kissed her hand and left.

He turned and exchanged a lingering smile with his barefoot love, who was following the food but looking back to him. He would see her tomorrow and every day for the rest of his life.

And so, for now, he would not be a Wicked Deceiver.