The Proper Wife Page 17

  “Lord Sandiford.” Though they exchanged cordial bows, the look Mr. Wickham directed at Sinjin was most unfriendly.

  “We’re charmed to see you, of course,” Mrs. Cartwright said, “but busy as the office is, we mustn’t detain you.”

  The young man’s face reddened. “I’ve got Randall checking accounts and Phillips processing the new orders, so there’s naught demanding my attention just now. Thought I could use a breath of fresh air.”

  “Did Mr. Motrum approve this sudden desire for exercise?” Mrs. Cartwright asked pointedly.

  Mr. Wickham’s flush deepened. “He’s…he’s down at the shipyards today.”

  “Surely Papa wouldn’t mind Mr. Wickham taking a walk, Mrs. Cartwright. It’s such a lovely day.” Miss Motrum smiled at the young man in a charming display of dimples.

  “It is now.” The warmth in Mr. Wickham’s eyes as he gazed at his employer’s daughter left little doubt as to the tenor of his feelings. “Besides, if you require escort,” he directed a belligerent look at Sinjin, “you know you can always count on me.”

  Sinjin had to hide a grin, amused for the first time since this uncomfortable encounter had begun. Mr. Wickham must be the “young tradesman” Hal had mentioned, and Mrs. Cartwright was clearly eager to do whatever was necessary to sweep Sinjin’s social inferior from the courtship field.

  Miss Motrum laughed, a clear bell-like sound. “Haven’t I always counted on you, Jeremy?”

  “Since you were a scrubby brat in short skirts,” he said gruffly.

  “Jeremy is Papa’s right-hand man,” Miss Motrum explained. “Indeed, he’s at the house so often he’s practically like one of the family.”

  “I ain’t family yet.” Mr. Wickham sidled another hostile glance at Sinjin. “But someday I hope to be.”

  “Surely you must be needed back at the office,” Mrs. Cartwright interposed. “After all, working men haven’t the leisure to stroll about the park.”

  Having had little experience gauging the emotions of females, Sinjin couldn’t determine from Miss Motrum’s friendly responses whether or not she returned Mr. Wickham’s regard. He ought, therefore, to speedily eliminate this potential check to his suit.

  A few words in his most imperious aristocratic manner would have done it. Perversely, in part to spite the managing Mrs. Cartwright, he said instead, “I daresay Mr. Wickham could be spared long enough to stroll back to the carriage with us. Miss Motrum, if you are ready?” He offered his arm.

  With a murmur of assent from Miss Motrum, a warily puzzled glance from Mr. Wickham, and an angry glare that Mrs. Cartwright quickly refashioned into a smile when she caught Sinjin’s gaze upon her, the ill-assorted foursome set off down the path.

  He really shouldn’t be maneuvering the Motrum party like actors in a Kabuki play. But—and he found the notion curiously depressing—should he choose to offer for Miss Motrum, he knew beyond doubt the weight of his title and lineage alone would be enough to crush any aspirations the smitten Mr. Wickham might harbor.

  Since this outing had brought him no closer to deciding whether he would in fact offer for her, the walk back was rather strained. Miss Motrum and Mr. Wickham said nothing, the lady blushing as the young man gazed at her adoringly, while he and Mrs. Cartwright exchanged stilted conversation.

  As they were taking their leave of Mr. Wickham, Sinjin spotted a rider mounted sidesaddle on a big black stallion, sunlight striking sparks off the fire of her hair as she cantered toward them. His stomach contracted and a dizzy excitement tingled down his limbs.

  “What a striking lady!” Miss Motrum exclaimed. “And that horse—I should be terrified to ride so large a beast.”

  Before Sinjin could gather his disordered senses, Miss Beaumont drew near. Though he wasn’t at all sure he wished to speak with her, particularly in Miss Motrum’s presence, simple courtesy required it.

  “Miss Beaumont, good day,” he said.

  “Colonel Sandiford.” Smiling, she reined in.

  If she’d ridden past, he might have been able to leave it at that, but now that she’d halted, courtesy demanded he make his party known to her. Grudgingly he performed the introductions, receiving for his pains the dubious satisfaction of watching Mr. Wickham reduced to stammering incoherency after his first good look at Miss Beaumont.

  Jaw clenched, Sinjin waited. Any minute now her clever brain was going to figure out the status of his companions. He braced himself for the worst.

  Disturbed and angry by all she’d learned from Maddie and the Bow Street runner she’d just consulted, Clarissa guided her mount into Hyde Park. She wanted Sarah’s opinion on what she intended to do next, but first, in the relatively deserted midmorning park, she’d have a quick gallop to help settle her nerves.

  Murmuring encouragement, she bent low over Diablo’s head and spurred him to a gallop. As always, the sheer speed of his run and the whistle of the wind rushing past soothed her.

  This morning it also managed to work her hat loose from its pins and send it sailing. She couldn’t bring herself to check Diablo, who reveled in the gallop as much as she, to go in search. Shaking her head with delight at the glorious and unaccustomed warmth of the sun in her hair, she let him run on.

  Not until the black’s sides were heaving and foam-flecked did she finally command him to slow. Crooning her approval of his prowess, she guided him on a gentle circuit of the park while they both caught their breath.

  She was just about to go in search of her hat when she spotted a party on the path ahead of her. Even at a distance, one unmistakable figure held her eye.

  Now there’s a man who could help Maddie.

  Her next reaction, though, was dismay. Breath catching in her throat, for a panicked moment she didn’t know whether to proceed or wheel Diablo and flee. Once again she’d encountered the exacting Colonel Sandiford while looking like a hoyden, her habit mud-spattered, her bare head haloed by wisps of windblown hair, both her hat and her groom left somewhere far behind.

  She saw his body alert and knew he’d recognized her. Realizing she’d look a complete fool if she turned tail now, she swallowed a ridiculous nervousness and made herself proceed.

  What difference would his current disapproval make? she asked herself mutinously as she pasted a bright smile on her face. He already thoroughly disapproved of her. Unless she returned to the streets from which he’d once ignominiously rescued her, she doubted she could drop any lower in his opinion.

  Nonetheless, she was so flustered upon joining him that it wasn’t until he was halfway through the introductions that she realized who made up the rest of his party. This lovely pale blond creature must be his virtuous middle-class virgin, the older woman her chaperone, and the young man some sort of acquaintance.

  Her hands and voice automatically performed the rituals of civility, shaking the young woman’s hand, calming the awestruck young man and replying to the rather intrusive and vulgar questioning of the chaperone. But her attention remained riveted on the blond beauty who hung on the Colonel’s arm as if she belonged there.

  Lovely but not strikingly beautiful, the Virgin smiled demurely, said little, and deferred to those around her. No doubt she could total sums in a twink, sew and knit handily, prepare a meal herself as skillfully as she could direct her staff to do so, and took alms to the poor every Saturday. She was, in short, everything the colonel professed to seek in a wife.

  A nearly irresistible urge boiled up from some ugly place deep within her to leap down from the saddle, slap the Virgin’s hand off the colonel’s sleeve and rip every perfectly arranged hair from that artfully coifed head.

  But of course, even a hoyden couldn’t attack another lady in the Park. Her facial muscles aching with the effort of keeping a smile in place, her fingers clenched on the reins as she envisioned raking her nails down the Virgin’s placid, smiling face.

  Had the colonel been any other man, she would have known just what flutter of lash and purr of tone would draw him to her si
de. Having pried him away from the Virgin, she would have him help her down from the saddle, allowing his hands to linger a few moments longer than necessary at her waist. Standing together chest to chest a mere hand’s breadth apart, she’d let him breathe in her subtle rose scent, watch the play of her lips raised tantalizingly close to his while she teased and flattered him.

  With a deep sense of despair she knew without even attempting it that all the tricks and stratagems she’d used so successfully before would never work on this man. Though desire her he did, Colonel Sandiford had told her himself he thought beauty a paltry allure. Without a doubt he’d see through her every move, resisting the pull between them even as he rebuffed her attempts.

  No, what he prized was that silent, placid cow of perfection hanging on his arm. Doubtless the Virgin had never spoken a word in anger, never wrinkled her gown nor succumbed to a spontaneous impulse in her expensively sheltered life.

  How Clarissa managed to end their short conversation without her face cracking she couldn’t imagine, but mercifully soon she was able to say her goodbyes. The only positive note about the whole dreadful episode was she’d brushed through it without having to utter more than two sentences to the colonel.

  What could she have said? Certainly not what she felt. That seeing him courting another lady had been like a blow to the stomach, a shock that robbed her of breath.

  Back straight, head high, she rode away, resisting the impulse to look back until she knew the party must be safely ensconced in their carriage. Not until she heard the crack of the coachman’s whip did she turn in the saddle and watch the vehicle drive away, her chest tightening with an absurd sense of…abandonment.

  ’Twas ridiculous to react so, she chided herself as she spurred Diablo to pick up the pace. What matter to her if the colonel married his middle-class heiress, as he’d told her from the very outset he intended. She could have any other man in London she wanted, couldn’t she? Alastair was going to propose again any day, forestall him though she try, and she couldn’t think of any other eligible bachelor she couldn’t bring up to scratch if she truly desired him.

  Though she was not nearly as capricious as she’d once been—the need to run the household during her mama’s illness had been a most sobering experience—still, she had to admit, she was used to getting what she desired. This feeling of—no, despair was too strong a word—resulted simply from encountering, for the first time, a man she wanted but could not control.

  Such a thing was bound to happen eventually. She should shake it off and go on. Perhaps after consulting with Sarah about the problem with Maddie, she would take her friend shopping.

  Even as she conceived of it, the idea fell sadly flat, and with irritation she dismissed it. She was already riding, but that didn’t seem to be helping much either. A rapid inventory of the other activities that normally cheered her revealed not one that sounded appealing.

  Not that she begrudged the colonel his wealthy bride. He might be judgmental and prejudiced, but he was also honest, honorable, courageous and in most ways wholly admirable. He ought to have the capable wife he wanted.

  If the possessiveness of the Virgin’s clinging hand were any indication, it appeared he had found one.

  Clarissa was happy for him, truly she was. Even though now the colonel could never be her friend. The two of them were ill-suited for friendship anyway, always striking sparks off one another. Despite the strong desire that flared between them like heat lightning on a June night, any relationship lasting longer than a conversation—or a kiss—would turn to disaster. Indeed, she’d give herself a thorough scold for even entertaining the ridiculous hope that they might have built a friendship—if it weren’t for this awful desire to burst into tears.

  Impatiently she brushed moisture from the corners of her watering eyes, an aftereffect of her gallop, no doubt. Get hold, she admonished. Surely she wasn’t so vain that she must turn into a watering pot simply because she couldn’t make every man in London fall at her feet.

  But he’s the only one I want, a mournful little voice answered. At the thought, something suspiciously like a tear dripped down her cheek.

  Angrily she smeared it away, putting her other hand to her stomach to quell the sick churning there. As for this absurd sense that her world had just tilted and nothing would ever be the same again, doubtless she was merely a trifle faint from rushing off without breakfast.

  She was guiding Diablo around a turn, ostensibly searching for her missing hat, when the conclusion she’d been trying to suppress ever since the colonel’s departure finally elbowed its way into consciousness.

  No, she couldn’t be in love with the colonel!

  Chapter Fifteen

  Her head immediately set about denying the uncertain welter of emotions confusing her heart. Surely she couldn’t have the colossal, totty-headed, wisp-witted idiocy to fall for Sinjin Sandiford. The one man in London who despised her.

  Pulling right against the command that would have urged him left into a tree, Diablo snorted and shook his head at her. Even her horse was disgusted. Hands trembling, Clarissa let the reins fall slack.

  Oh, she was in lust with the man, that she readily admitted. But love?

  Just because he seemed to have winkled his way into her thoughts in nearly every waking moment didn’t mean she loved him. She was merely…entangled by the novel predicament of wanting a man who desired but did not like her. And what matter that in spite of his faults—surely if she were in love with him she’d think him flawless—she still found him the most accomplished and compelling man she’d yet encountered?

  And as for the absolute bleakness that invaded her heart at the idea of him happily married to the Virgin, that was doubtless pique that he found another—especially that insipid chit who’d probably bore him senseless in a month—superior to herself. She’d recover.

  Wouldn’t she? Desolation settled on her like morning fog, its chill penetrating to the bone.

  She tried to feed a fortifying anger. Clarissa Beaumont, reigning belle of the ton, did not go about sighing over a man like some weepy-eyed heroine in a Maria Edgeworth novel.

  Drawing the reins taut, she urged Diablo onward, forcing her mind to focus on the memory of Maddie’s bloodstained hands wrapped in the harness. Clarissa Beaumont had matters more important than heartache to attend.

  Sarah received her in her upstairs sitting room, to which she’d returned after seeing Aubrey settled for a nap. Squelching her disappointment over not being able to cheer herself with a romp with her favorite, Clarissa consoled herself with the offer of tea.

  “Why so solemn a face?” her friend asked.

  The impulse to confess her dreadful suspicion in Sarah’s discerning and sympathetic ear tempted, but she refrained. First, she’d come here on Maddie’s behalf, and second, she was a bit uncertain how her friend would react to the idea that Clarissa might be in love with Sarah’s old sweetheart. Would it distress her? Particularly now, Clarissa couldn’t face the thought of alienating her one true friend.

  So she related to Sarah the unexpected events of the last evening. Her friend listened without comment—until Clarissa told her what she’d done with Maddie.

  Sarah’s eyes widened. “You brought her home with you?” she repeated blankly, and then burst out laughing. “Really, Clare, you are the most complete hand! Whatever will you do with the girl now?”

  “I’ve decided to have her trained as a maid. ’Tis what she came to London for, she told me, to go into service with the family that employs her cousin.”

  “A noble intent, but a devilish tricky business. How did Timms and Mrs. Woburn react?”

  Clarissa smiled ruefully. “Initially as you might expect, especially as the poor girl came clad only in the scandalous gown the procuress had forced on her. But after I related the circumstances, she reluctantly came around. She’ll train Maddie and ensure she’s treated by the staff as well as can be expected.”

  Admiration warmed Sarah�
��s clear gray eyes. “How kind you are—and clever. Bravo, Clare!”

  The aching sadness she’d bottled up deep within warmed slightly at her friend’s rare praise. “More must be done, though,” she replied. “Maddie told me at least two other girls at the brothel had been tricked and abducted as she was. ’Tis an outrage, and someone must put a stop to it!”

  “I’ve heard tales of such deplorable acts, but never known if they were true. You’re right, it is outrageous and illegal besides.” Sarah’s face turned pensive, and she tapped one finger against her chin. “The charge would be kidnapping at the least, but to prove it you’d have to have credible witnesses. Given the girls’ unfortunate situation, I doubt their stories alone would be enough, even if they could be induced to testify.”

  “So Maddie believed.” For an instant, Clarissa remembered the sly rumors and innuendo about her own behavior. Yes, men would ever think the worst of a woman. “Furious as it makes me, I’m afraid I must agree. To stop the bauds, I think I shall have to catch them in the attempt.”

  “Catch them?” Sarah stared at her in dismay. “Clare, what mad scheme have you hatched this time? Don’t misunderstand, I think your aim admirable, but the people who would commit so despicable an act must be totally without scruples! I can’t believe one procuress alone could run such an operation. Doubtless she has a whole network of accomplices, all of them as unprincipled as she. Trying to stop them would be both difficult and dangerous.”

  Clarissa waved an impatient hand. “Really, Sarah, I’m not a complete looby. I know all that, and I don’t propose to try to catch the woman out myself. I’ve hired a Bow Street runner to loiter about the coaching inn when the Mail arrives and watch out for the baud. If she approaches any unaccompanied young females, he can warn them off.”

  “That sounds feasible,” Sarah admitted. “Still, I cannot help feeling uneasy. You have no experience dealing with people as ruthless and immoral as these.”