Regency Buck (Alastair-Audley Tetralogy 3)

He got up at once, and laid the paper aside. ‘I am so late. Forgive me, cousin! I was detained longer than I had thought possible – hardly liked to call upon you at this hour, and indeed should have done no more than leave the book with your butler, only that he assured me that you had not retired.’

‘Oh, I am glad you came in!’ Judith said, holding out her hand to him. ‘It was kind in you to remember the book. Is this it? Thank you, cousin.’

She picked it up from the table, and began to turn the leaves. Her cousin’s hand laid compellingly over hers made her look up. He was regarding her intently. ‘What is it, Judith?’ he asked in his quiet way.

She gave a little, angry laugh. ‘Oh, it is nothing – it should be nothing. I am stupid, that is all.’

‘No, you are not stupid. Something has occurred to put you out.’

She tried to draw her hand away, but he did not slacken his hold. ‘Tell me,’ he said.

She looked significantly down at his hand.‘If you please, cousin.’

‘I beg your pardon.’ He stepped back with a slight bow.

She put the book aside, and moved towards a three-backed settee of lacquered wood and cane, and sat down. ‘You need not. I know you only wish to be kind.’ She smiled up at him. ‘I am not offended with you, for all I may look to be in one of my sad passions.’

He followed her to the settee, and at a sign from her seated himself beside her. ‘It is Worth?’ he asked directly.

‘Oh, yes, it is, as usual, my noble guardian,’ she replied, with a shrug of her shoulders.

‘Mrs Scattergood informed me that he was with you. What has he been doing or must I not ask?’

‘I brought it upon myself,’ said Judith, incurably honest. ‘But he behaves in such a way – oh, cousin, if my father had but known! We are in Lord Worth’s hands. Nothing could be worse! I thought at first that he was amusing himself at my expense. Now I am afraid – I suspect him of a set purpose, and though it cannot succeed it can make this year uncomfortable for me.’

‘A set purpose,’ he repeated. ‘I may guess it, I suppose.’

‘I think so. It was you who put me a little on my guard.’

He nodded; he was slightly frowning. ‘You are very wealthy,’ he said. ‘And he is expensive. I do not know what his fortune is; I imagined it had been considerable, but he is a gamester, and a friend of the Regent. He is in the front of fashion; his clothes are made by the first tailors; his stables are second to none; he belongs to I dare not say how many clubs – White’s, Watier’s, the Alfred (or, as I have heard it called, the Half-Read), the Je ne sais quoi, the Jockey Club, the Four Horse, the Bensington – perhaps more.’

‘In a word, cousin, he is a dandy,’ Judith said.

‘More than that. He is of the Bow-window set, I grant, but not of the Unique Four. That is composed, as you know, of only your complete Dandies – Brummell, Alvanley, Mildmay, and Pierrepoint. Worth has other interests, even more expensive.’

‘So has Lord Alvanley,’ she interposed.

‘Very true. Lord Alvanley hunts, for instance, but he does not, I believe, aspire to be first in so many fields as Worth. You may hardly go to a race-meeting but you are sure to find Worth has a horse running, while his curricle-races, the teams he drives, are notorious.’

‘It is the only thing I know of to his advantage,’ Judith said. ‘I will admit him to be an excellent whip. But for the rest I find him a mere fop, a creature of affectations, tricked out in modish clothes, thinking snuff to be of more moment than events of real importance. He is proud, he can be insolent. There is a reserve, a lack of openness – I must not say any more: I shall put myself in a rage, and that will not do.’

He smiled. ‘You’ve no love for the dandies, Judith?’

‘Oh, as to that – Mr Brummell is of all people the most charming companion. Lord Alvanley too must always please. But in general, no, I do not like them. I like a man to be a man, and not a mask of fashion.’

He agreed to it, but said seriously: ‘I collect there is more than you have said. These faults, though you may despise them, are not enough to anger you as I think you were angered this evening, cousin.’

She was silent for a moment, her eyes smouldering again at the recollection of her interview with the Earl. Mr Taverner laid his hand over hers, and clasped it. ‘Do not tell me unless you choose,’ he said gently, ‘but believe that I only wish to serve you, to be, if I may be no more, merely your friend.’

‘You are all consideration,’ she said. ‘All kindness.’ She smiled, but with a quivering lip. ‘Indeed, I count you very much my friend. There is no one I can open my mind to, saving Perry, and he is young, taken up with his new acquaintances, and amusements. Mrs Scattergood is very amiable, but she is related to Worth – a circumstance I cannot forget. I have been thinking how very much alone I am. There is only Perry – but I am falling into a mood of pitying myself, which is nonsensical. While I have Perry I cannot want for protection.’ She gave her head a little shake. ‘You see how stupid Lord Worth makes me! We cannot meet but I find myself picking a quarrel with him, and then I become as odious as he is himself. To-night in particular – he informs me, if you please, that he shall not consent to my marriage with anyone but himself while he is my guardian! It has put me in such a rage that I declare I could almost elope to Gretna Green just to spite him.’

He started. ‘My dear cousin!’

‘Oh, I shall not, of course! Do not look so shocked!’

‘Not that – certainly not that, but – I have no right to ask you – you have met someone? There is some man with whom you could contemplate –’

‘No one, upon my honour!’ she said, laughing. Her eyes met his for an instant, and then fell. She coloured, became aware of her hand under his and gently drew it away. ‘Where can Mrs Scattergood be gone to, I wonder?’