Only when he’d opened the wardrobe door did he note the flaw in his plans, such as they were. The small space contained several items of clothing, all of them female attire. So far, so good. However, while one might distinguish by touch silk or satin from muslin, one’s touch was not so refined as to distinguish a peach-coloured frock from one of any other hue. He cursed softly to himself.
At that moment a candle flickered into light and a soft voice murmured, “If it is a dream, I do hope I don’t wake up.”
Lord Rand turned towards the bed and found himself staring down the barrel of a pistol.
Chapter Fourteen
At the other end of the weapon was a comely brunette. The candlelight was gentler upon her countenance than the grey daylight of Hyde Park, and she was not so heavily painted now. Max judged that she was pretty, though in a rather blatant way.
He smiled, the pistol notwithstanding.
“I suppose,” he said calmly, “you wonder why I’m here.” He had not attended Eton and Oxford for nothing. Max knew how to preserve a mask of indifference even when in the throes of the greatest inner misery. At the moment he was not miserable, only a tad concerned that the weapon might have been constructed with a hair trigger, and thus might accidentally go off... in his face.
“Only if I am awake,” Lynnette answered, quite as calmly as if she too had known the privileges of public school education. “If I am, I expect I’d better shoot you and have it over with, because whatever the reason, it must be a wicked one. Either you’re here to murder me, or...” Her voice trailed off invitingly.
“Then shoot me,” said his lordship. “It makes no matter. When a man has lost his heart and has no hope, it makes no matter whether he lives or dies. My heart,” he went on, gazing soulfully into her eyes, “is yours. Has been since I saw you yesterday. And I have no hope because”—he hesitated meaningfully, but upon perceiving the pistol shaking, quickly continued—“because you belong to another.”
Lynnette was no more proof against those devastating blue eyes than any other young woman. Besides, a handsome, virile lord had entered her bedroom, like manna from the heavens. She was not so ungrateful as to question the motives of Providence.
She relented, whereupon a tender scene ensued which is better left to the memoirs she will feel compelled to write when middle age begins to fasten its clammy hands upon her person and bank account.
The scene might have proceeded with dispatch to its inevitable conclusion—thereby providing Lord Rand another black spot on his conscience—had not the young woman’s protector returned earlier than expected.
Since that gentleman returned drunk—as was his wont on all occasions—and therefore noisily, young love was not taken unawares. A mere twenty minutes after Max had arrived, he was once again clambering over the balcony, and Lynnette, her own conscience considerably clearer than she would have liked, appeared to be sleeping the sleep of innocent angels when Lord Browdie stumbled into her bedroom.
Lord Rand was not accustomed to failing in his enterprises. This time he had failed miserably, and now he thought on it, the enterprise itself had been hasty and ill-considered. Hasty he could understand. What baffled him was how he’d expected to steal a peach-coloured muslin frock from an ink-black wardrobe in an equally dark bedchamber. Still, he told himself, had he not been interrupted, he could have taken everything that felt like muslin— though he’d have had the devil’s own time climbing down from an upper storey carrying a stack of gowns.
The whole business now struck him as patently ridiculous. Had this been an isolated incident, he might have put it down as one of his occasional aberrations. The trouble was, aberration seemed to be growing a habit with him lately—and it had all started, he now realised, the moment he’d met Catherine Pelliston.
An assortment of unrelated rash behaviours was normal. A string of freakish activities all connected to one female was not. The girl was dangerous.
Lord Rand began to wish, precisely as her papa often wished, that Catherine Pelliston would go away. Thence the viscount proceeded—again, like the parent—to wishing she’d never been born. To wish the latter was futile. He concentrated instead upon how to make her go away. How difficult could that be? Even her father had done it, though it had taken the old fool twenty-one years.
Lord Rand doubted that Lady Diana would wait patiently twenty-one years for him to disentangle himself. Strong measures were called for. He must frighten Miss Pestilence away, terrify her back to Wilberstone. That would be hard on Jack, but really, if Jack was so taken with her there was no reason he couldn’t go to Wilberstone after her.
In pursuance of dark plans, Lord Rand betook himself to his sister’s establishment the very next morning. Twinges of conscience he had none. In fact, as he met Molly upon the steps of Andover House the next morning, Max bestowed upon her such a dazzling smile that the abigail had to clutch at the railing to keep from stumbling headfirst onto the pavement.
He marched into the breakfast room in his usual unceremonious way and announced to his sister and brother-in-law that he’d come to take Miss Pelliston driving.
“Max, I don’t care what Catherine says. You are a sad wreck. You took her driving yesterday, don’t you remember?”
“Yes, and I’ve come to take her again. Where is she?” the viscount demanded.
“Max, it’s scarcely nine o’clock in the morning.”
“Confound it, I can tell time as well as the next chap.”
“Catherine is still abed, you great blockhead,” said his loving sister. “Now, you may either sit quietly and breakfast with us or you may go away.”
Miss Pelliston chose that moment to enter the breakfast room.
“There you are,” said Max. “Wide awake too, I see, to give the lie to my rag-mannered sister. But she’s always out of sorts these days. Will you take a turn in the park with me this morning?”
“Good heavens, but you do take hold of something and worry it to death,” Lady Andover complained before Catherine could recover sufficiently to make a reply. “Will you sit down and be quiet? Catherine has not breakfasted yet.”
Though Max was impatient to get his nefarious enterprise over with, he did realise that he was behaving like an idiot. He subdued himself, sat down, and dined relatively quietly, waiting until Miss Pelliston’s plate was empty before he renewed his invitation.
Catherine realised quickly enough that her caller would not be so insistent about her driving with him and would not have come at such an early hour if he hadn’t important news for her. She was mightily curious why he’d left the party and what he’d done. Besides, she was eager to relay her own interesting news. Now that they could be sure she was in no danger, perhaps he’d leave her alone. Certainly he would not subject her to any more disquieting physical displays and mad proposals.
Catherine, in short, grew as impatient to be gone as the viscount was. She scurried to get her bonnet, and the two were out of the house before the earl and countess had time to realise they were going.
Considering the unhappy memories of aberrant behaviour the place held for him, it was curious that Lord Rand took Miss Pelliston to Green Park. Perhaps he thought in this wise to exorcise the demon that had possessed him there. Whatever his motives, he directed the horses along a path of shifting shade and dappled sunlight. No colourful flowerbeds distracted the eye from the park’s green serenity, for this was the place in which Charles II’s Queen had commanded no flowers ever be planted. Here at least the straying husband could not pluck bouquets for his army of mistresses.
Max brought the carriage to a halt beside a large plane tree and turned a troubled gaze upon his companion. At least he meant the gaze to be troubled, because he meant to make her anxious. Unfortunately, he found a pair of hazel eyes gazing back. Those eyes were so unfairly large and their depths disclosed such a tumultuously thrilling universe that his own features relaxed, and the only trouble he knew was a mad desire to kiss her.
He forced
the kissing part from his mind and focused on the desperation: he had to get rid of her.
He began by apologising for his abrupt departure the night before. When Miss Pelliston answered graciously that Mr. Langdon had been an altogether satisfactory replacement, Lord Rand experienced a novel, and thoroughly disagreeable, sensation—one that could not be, though it was suspiciously like, jealousy.
He forgot the slightly exaggerated warnings he’d meant to frighten her with and proceeded to relate his adventures instead, describing in unnecessary detail his meeting with Lord Browdie’s mistress.
“Good heavens!” Catherine cried. “Steal back my dress? Whatever were you thinking of?”
“Destroying the evidence. You must see that the dress is the only concrete proof you were ever at Granny Grendle’s. Without it, everything else is just hearsay—only the word of a tart against yours.”
“Well, I do wish you’d waited a bit before rushing into such a dangerous act. Wasn’t it you told me to find out how much Lord Browdie knew? And then you didn’t wait to hear what I learned. Which you ought to have done, you know— and perhaps would have, if you had been sober,” she added, half to herself.
Lord Rand had, all his life, considered it beneath his dignity to justify his behaviour to anyone. He knew the world called him Viscount Vagabond and he was rather proud of the title than otherwise. All the same, he was heartily sick of hearing this sanctimonious female constantly ascribe his every word, practically, to the effects of spirits.
“I wasn’t drunk, dash it. Why are you always accusing me of being so?”
Being a just woman, Catherine considered the question impartially. After a moment she answered, “I suppose it is because I can think of no other explanation for your behaviour. You are very inconsistent. Sometimes you appear perfectly normal.”
Max knew a dangerous wish to be enlightened. At which times, he wondered, did she consider him normal? Was it at all possible that at such times she found him pleasant company? But he didn’t want to be pleasant company to her!