Chapter Eleven

Julian Fox, the seventh Earl of Foxton, sent his curricle and groom around to the mews, then ran lightly up the steps of Foxton House in Mayfair and rang the bell. The door opened immediately.

The butler, Purvis, ushered him in with restrained butlerish delight. “Welcome home, my lord. We weren’t expecting you so early. Home for Christmas, is it?” The smile slid from his face as he saw what was standing beside Julian, panting slightly and waving a ragged tail. His gaze tracked from the large and scruffy animal to the lead in Julian’s hand, then he said with faint disbelief, “Is that your animal, my lord?”

“It is. His name is Hamish,” Julian said, offering him the lead. “Give him a drink of water in the kitchen, will you, Purvis?”

“In the kitchen , m’lord? I don’t think Cook will—”

“Or the scullery or even outside. Hamish isn’t fussy and it’s only for a short while. We’re not staying.”

Relieved, Purvis accepted the lead gingerly, saying, “Very well, m’lord. I will consign the animal to the care of the second footman, who has an affinity with such creatures. You will find your grandmother in the green drawing room.”

Julian frowned. “I don’t recall a green drawing room.”

Purvis tsked and shook his head. “I’m sorry, m’lord, I forgot. M’lady had it redecorated several months ago. It used to be the pink drawing room. Shall I announce you?”

“No need. I know the way. You take care of Hamish.” Julian headed to the erstwhile pink drawing room, gave a perfunctory knock on the door and entered.

His grandmother looked up from the magazine she was perusing. “Foxton, finally, you have deigned to return.”

“As you see, Grandmama.” He bowed over her hand.

“And what have you been up to in the last few months? Gadding about with who knows whom, I suppose, and getting up to who knows what!”

He inclined his head. “That’s it, my life in a nutshell.”

She glared at him. “Frittering your life away when you have responsibilities here! Leaving the estate to go to rack and ruin!”

“Is Cartwright dead, then?” he said mildly. Cartwright was his very efficient and capable estate manager.

“No, of course not!”

“Has he left my employ?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“Become a drunkard?”

“Don’t be ridiculous! You know very well the man is a teetotaler.”

“Then I fail to see the problem. Cartwright is doing the job he is employed to do, and doing it well, as I discovered when I called in on my man of business yesterday. He delivered an excellent report on the state of my various properties and businesses.”

She drew herself up in outrage. “You called on your man of business before coming to see me ?”

“Yes, Grandmama,” he said mildly. “As you have told me for time out of mind, the business of the estate should be my first priority. I knew you’d want to know how everything is faring.”

She compressed her lips and glared at him. “Family should always come first.”

“You being its sole representative in London?”

“Exactly,” she said, slightly mollified. “I don’t know what would happen to this family if it weren’t for my vigilance and care. But,” she said, rallying, “I wouldn’t be the sole representative if you would only do your duty and take a wife!”

Julian smiled. “I thought we’d come to that, and there it is, only”—he glanced at the ormolu clock on the mantelpiece—“four minutes since I arrived. That might well be a record.”

“Don’t be frivolous, Foxton. Taking a wife is a serious business.”

Julian picked an invisible bit of fluff off the immaculate sleeve of his coat.

“Well?” she prompted after a minute. “Have you done anything about it in the months since I last saw you?”

He toyed with the idea of telling her he’d found the only woman he’d ever wanted to marry—a beautiful French maidservant he’d known for just over a week who painted like a dream and was full of life. And who had stolen from him.

But as entertaining as the notion was, if he did, she’d probably explode, and he’d never hear the end of it. Besides, Vita’s betrayal and disappearance were still rather…painful.

In his saner moments, he told himself he’d had a lucky escape. The rest of the time, he missed her. Ached for her.

“No, Grandmama, no prospective brides on the horizon. But I’m in no hurry. I’m not yet thirty.”

“Your father married your mother when he was just four-and-twenty.”

“I know.” The estate being in a mess, and with crushing debts, his father had been forced to marry Mama, who was an heiress. And thus Grandmama had come into their lives, since she was the one who held and controlled the majority of the wealth Mama was heiress to. Ambitious and autocratic, she held it still and didn’t hesitate to wield her power. Or try to. She hadn’t yet found the way to rule Julian. Money didn’t motivate him.

“And your brother married at five-and-twenty.”

“Yes, he fell madly in love with Celia.” His sister-in-law had soon revealed herself as nothing more than a pretty face with a rapacious nature beneath. She was the bane of Julian’s existence—well, one of them.

“Love! Pah! What nonsense! Your brother was a fool. He fell out of love with her fast enough, and then he was off frittering money on opera dancers and the like!”

“Grandmama, I’m shocked to hear you speak of such things,” he said, amused.

She snorted. “I didn’t come down in the last shower. I know what’s what! But my point is, your brother did the right thing in marrying young. He did his best to secure the succession. It was that feckless wife of his who failed in her duty and only gave him girls. So now that duty is yours—you must marry soon and get yourself a son.”

Julian smoothed a wrinkle from his breeches. He’d heard this refrain a hundred times, but he had no intention of dancing to his grandmother’s tune.

It was funny—she’d come from a mercantile background herself. Both her father and her late husband had been wealthy millowners, and she’d poured all her efforts into first securing a knighthood for her husband and then moving heaven and earth to get her only daughter married into the nobility.

Now, with husband and daughter dead, she considered the Foxton earldom and all it entailed to be her business, and she was relentless in her effort to rule Julian as well, attempting to mold him into what she considered to be a proper lord.

But he was fond of the old despot, so he didn’t quarrel with her. He simply let her ring a peal over his head from time to time and then quietly went his own way, doing his duty as he considered it to be and pleasing himself as well.

No one had expected Julian to become the earl—least of all himself. His brother, the heir, had died of an infection from what he’d considered to be a trifling cut. Shortly afterward his father had died of a rage-induced apoplexy at the realization that his despised second son, having survived numerous battles and taken a number of wounds that failed to fester, was now the heir.

His grandmother eyed him beadily, the unsatisfactory second son who, through some huge cosmic error—he had no doubt she’d had words with the Almighty about that—had become the seventh Earl of Foxton. She was determined to lick him into shape. “I’ve put you in the Chinese room. Purvis will have taken your bags up.”

“No, he won’t. I left my bags in my lodgings in St. James’s.”

She swelled up. “ Lodgings? The Earl of Foxton in lodgings !”

“Your hearing is excellent.”

“But your place is here! This is Foxton House, the town house of the Earls of Foxton.”

“I know. Nevertheless, I have taken bachelor lodgings in St. James’s.”

“Apart from what you owe your name and position, it’s a waste of money!”

“It’s my money, Grandmama,” he reminded her gently. “In any case, you’re here to wave the family flag, aren’t you? Now, I must be off. I have an appointment with my barber.”

“Barber, indeed! Dandy!” She snorted, and as he bowed over her hand, she muttered something about the younger generation and young men who had no respect. But Julian didn’t wait to hear the end of the tirade: he was inured to them.

Live under the same roof as his grandmother? Be on hand for her to watch and constantly criticize? She could rule the roost to her heart’s content, but she wasn’t going to rule him.

He sent for his curricle to be brought around from the mews and called for his dog who, going by his smug expression and the gravy-stained fringe of fur around his muzzle, had enjoyed the fruits of the kitchen. Cook was clearly more of a dog lover than Purvis.

Then, with Hamish sitting up in lordly fashion on the passenger seat, Julian drove away, heading to his barber.

Julian was driving his curricle through the streets of London when he spotted an elegant dark-haired lady approaching Hatchard’s Bookshop with another female. He caught a glimpse of her profile and blinked. It was Vita!

But it couldn’t be. She was in France.

The footpath was quite crowded, but he saw the woman turn to her companion, and say something that made them both laugh.

Dammit, it was Vita, he was sure of it! Calling to his groom to hold the horses, he jumped down and plunged into the crowd after her.

He reached them just as they were about to enter the bookshop. “Vita!” He grabbed her by the arm and swung her around to face him.

And stared, dumbfounded.

“I beg your pardon,” the woman said in freezing accents.

He just stared, stunned.

Her gaze dropped pointedly to where he gripped her arm. He hurriedly released her and stepped back. “I’m so sorry, madam. I thought—I was sure you were—the resemblance is uncanny.” Dammit, he was practically stammering.

She arched a skeptical dark brow in exactly the same way Vita used to. Her green eyes—the same color as Vita’s—gleamed with humor. Or was it malice? He wasn’t sure. She wasn’t Vita, he could see that now. This woman was a few years older, more polished and sophisticated. And far better dressed.

Still, her resemblance to Vita was striking.

She gave him an amused look, smoothed her gloves and said to her companion, “I’ve had men try to scrape an acquaintance with me before, but never in a public street. It lacks finesse, don’t you agree, Clarissa?”

Her companion murmured something he didn’t catch and tried to draw her away.

“I do most sincerely apologize,” he said firmly. “The fact is I mistook you for someone else.”

“Indeed? I would never have guessed.”

He felt so stupid. “Yes. Someone who looks remarkably like you.”

“Really?” she said in amused disbelief. “And here I’ve always considered myself an original.”

Dammit, he was digging himself in deeper. He took a deep breath. “Again, I must apologize, madam, for approaching you so intemperately, and for, er, touching your arm. I was clearly mistaken.”

“I should think so.” She said it severely, but her eyes were dancing. She linked her arm through her companion’s. “Come, Clarissa, we shall leave this gentleman to his delusions.” And the two women disappeared into the shop.

Julian returned to his curricle, which was now surrounded by carters and traders and other drivers, not to mention interested onlookers, all loudly objecting to the way his curricle was blocking the street and holding up the traffic.

Issuing curt apologies in all directions, he climbed back into his curricle, gathered the reins and drove off, cursing his foolish mistake. He knew Vita was in Paris, so why on earth had he imagined she was about to enter a London bookshop? She probably couldn’t even read. Certainly not in English.

He was obviously doing the same as he’d done in Paris—imagining things, seeing Vita everywhere.

The sooner he left London and headed down to his country home, the better for his sanity.

“Well, you’re a dark horse, aren’t you?” Izzy said to Zo? later that day. The three sisters were gathered in the summerhouse with a pot of tea and a plate of delicious almond and orange biscuits that Izzy’s cook, Alfonso, had baked.

“Me?” Zo? said. “What do you mean?” Her two sisters were smiling at her in a very knowing way.

“I was accosted in the street this morning,” Izzy said.

“Accosted? Who b— I mean, by whom?”

“By a very handsome gentleman.”

“Yes,” Clarissa added. “Very smartly dressed he was, too.”

Bewildered, Zo? looked from one to the other. “What has that to do with me?” She didn’t know any gentlemen in London, apart from her two brothers-in-law and Gerald and Lord Tarrant, Alice’s husband. And she couldn’t imagine her sisters being mysterious about any of them.

“He mistook me for someone else,” Izzy said and bit into a biscuit.

“Oh?” Zo? felt a small pang of misgiving.

“Oh, indeed. Very certain he was that I was someone else, until he got a proper look at me.”

“Really?” Zo? tried to look uninterested.

“He called Izzy Vita,” Clarissa said.

“Which we know, from our generally inadequate schooling, is Latin for ‘life,’?” Izzy said. “Interesting, isn’t it, that your name also means ‘life,’ only it’s from the Greek?”

Oh lord, it had to be Reynard. “Quite a coincidence,” she said weakly.

Izzy chuckled. “Come clean, little sister, you’ve met a man, haven’t you?”

“A man?” she attempted. “In London, no, not at all.”

“In France, then. Look, Clarissa, she’s blushing. Isn’t that adorable?”

“Don’t tease her, Izzy.” Clarissa leaned across and put a comforting hand on Zo?’s arm. “Don’t worry, you don’t have to tell us anything if you don’t want to.”

“Yes, she does,” Izzy said. “Sisters tell each other everything.” Clarissa gave her a look and Izzy said, “Oh very well, you don’t have to tell us if it’s a secret. Is it a secret?”

Zo? thought for a moment and then gave in. “It’s not really a secret, but I don’t want anyone else to know.”

“We won’t tell a soul,” Clarissa assured her. “Not even our husbands.”

Zo? looked at Izzy. “Promise?”

“I promise.”

Zo? took a long sip of her tea. “I did meet a man in France—an Englishman.”

“Hah, I knew it!”

“Hush, Izzy. Let Zo? tell her story,” Clarissa said.

Zo? continued. “You said the man who accosted you was a gentleman, but the man I knew wasn’t a gentleman at all. He was unshaven, shabbily dressed and lived in a Romany caravan, though he said he wasn’t Romany. He was—or at least he told me he was—a vagabond artist, who traveled from place to place, painting pictures.”

Izzy and Clarissa exchanged glances. “How curious,” Izzy said. “The man I met was definitely a gentleman, very fashionably and elegantly dressed.”

“Yes, and afterward I saw him climb into a very smart curricle and drive away,” Clarissa said.

“What did he look like?” Zo? asked.

Izzy thought for a moment. “Tall, well built, with lovely broad shoulders. Stylish boots and doeskin breeches that fitted very nicely over—”

“He had dark hair, slightly overlong, and very blue eyes,” Clarissa added hastily.

Oh lord, it did sound like Reynard. But she had to be sure. “Wait a minute. I might have a drawing of the man I met. I’ll run upstairs and fetch my sketchbook.”

A few minutes later she was back. Flipping the pages until she came to one of the sketches she’d done of Reynard, she showed it to her sisters. “Was this the man?”

Clarissa took it from her, and she and Izzy looked closely at it. “Our man was clean-shaven and tidier, but this is definitely him.”

Izzy took the sketchbook and started turning pages. “Oh, here he is again. And here.” She kept turning pages. “You really are very talented, aren’t you, little sister? These are brilliant.” She turned a few more pages and gave a small chuckle. “You might have a drawing of him, eh? I’ve spotted several here.”

“I counted at least six,” Clarissa said and gave Zo? a complicit smile.

Zo? felt her cheeks heat.

Izzy closed the sketchbook and set it aside. “So, what happened?”

They sent for a fresh pot of tea and more biscuits and Zo? told them the story, from the time she left the Chateau Treffier—and why—to how she’d traded places with Marie because she wanted to visit the place where her mother spent her childhood. And about her decision to travel with Reynard.

“He was a painter, you see, and it was such fun working with him, painting together. But I slept in the wagon—which locked from the inside—and he slept outside.” Except for the one night he hadn’t, but she wasn’t going to tell them about that. It was still too tender, too painful to recall how she’d given herself to him wholly, believing him to be the honorable man she’d imagined he was. Believing it to be an act of love. And that he felt the same.

Instead he was just a cheating opportunist. And she’d been a fool.

“Pity,” Izzy said, and winked at Zo?.

“Izzy!” Clarissa said, shocked and at the same time amused.

“But you liked him, this Reynard, didn’t you?” Izzy said to Zo?.

Zo? nodded. “Too much,” she said in a low voice. “But it was impossible, so I had to leave.” She had no intention of telling her sisters or anyone that she’d discovered he was cheating the villagers. Or that she’d stolen a valuable painting from him, but that it wasn’t really stealing because it had originally been stolen from her family.

She’d already shown them the painting of her family, now in a handsome gold frame, saying simply that she’d come across it in France and had acquired it.

“Impossible, why?” Clarissa asked. “Because he was a vagabond and an artist?”

“Partly. I know you all want me to make a grand marriage and so—”

“No! We want you to make a happy marriage,” Clarissa corrected her firmly.

Izzy nodded. “In any case, it’s clear that he’s not a shiftless vagabond at all but an English gentleman playing at being a vagabond artist.”

“And if he looked after you and slept outside on the ground, giving up his bed to you, he sounds truly gentlemanlike,” Clarissa said, her eyes shining.

“So he’s not impossible at all,” Izzy concluded.

Zo? nibbled on a biscuit. She had to find some way to discourage them. He was still impossible. She would never marry a man who cheated poor people for a living.

And if he was in pursuit of her, it was probably only to retrieve the painting she stole.

She brushed crumbs off her fingers. “Well, whether he’s impossible or not, it’s of no consequence because we have no idea who he is. So let’s forget about him. I already have.”

Izzy picked up the sketchbook and passed it back to Zo?. “Don’t worry, we’ll find him.”

“No, I don’t want you to.”

Izzy just smiled. “The English aristocracy is rather like a village. Everybody knows everybody else, and eventually we’ll find someone who knows him.”

“Yes,” Clarissa agreed. “Even if we don’t go looking for him, he’s bound to turn up somewhere.”

Zo? hoped they were wrong. If he did turn up, lord, what a scandal there would be.

“So now that’s settled,” Izzy said. “What do you know about this ‘special Christmas surprise’ Gerald and Lucy are putting on at Alice’s house on Christmas Eve? I confess I’m very curious.”

Zo? shook her head. She knew what it was, but if Lucy wanted it to be a surprise, she wasn’t going to spoil it. “All I know is that we’re all invited to dinner on Christmas Eve at Lord and Lady Tarrant’s home.”

“Yes, but it’s a very early dinner—six o’clock, isn’t it?”

“Yes, because they want the little girls to be there.”

“How intriguing,” Clarissa said. “I’m looking forward to it.”

“And only a few days after that is our reception to introduce Zo? to the world—well, our small corner of it,” Izzy said. “And that will be fun.”

Zo? smiled, but she wasn’t looking forward to that party at all. She was still in the dark about her sisters’ plans for it. She’d had her dress fitted—green silk with dark red piping, very elegant and stylish, and it suited her beautifully, so why all the mystery about it? But both her sisters were being very closemouthed and secretive, and so there was nothing to be done except wait for it to happen.

As Julian drove between the stone pillars that guarded the long driveway to his childhood home, he felt the tension between his shoulder blades ease. Foxton Place, home of the Earls of Foxton. He’d spent his first seven years living here in blissful innocence.

Then at the age of seven he’d been shipped off to school. His brother had been sent two years earlier and claimed he loved it. Julian had hated it. His brother had called it tough; Julian thought it brutal.

Then some master had called him “dreamy” on his school report and pointed out that he spent more time drawing than studying, so his father had sent him to an even more brutal school.

Being enlisted in the army—even if he was pitched into a war at the age of sixteen—had been a relief.

Now, every time he drove down the long, curving driveway lined with ancient lime trees, he felt a sense of release. And homecoming.

He spent the first few days going over the estate books with Cartwright, his manager, and visiting tenants and following up on the various matters that had arisen in his absence.

Hamish went everywhere with him and soon became a welcome sight, loping along beside Julian’s horse or sitting up on the bench of his curricle, observing his surrounds with a dignified air. The children of his tenants ran out to greet him—not Julian, the dog—who endured all kinds of attentions with remarkable patience until he wearied of them and took himself off to somewhere inaccessible.

“That dog’s your ambassador,” Cartwright commented one afternoon. “I reckon he’s made you a lot of friends here.” Julian agreed.

On the fourth day home, his butler, Crowther, approached him with a small problem. “One of the maids has reported a leak in her quarters, m’lord. A small matter, but I thought you should know.”

Normally Julian would have simply sent one of the estate workmen to fix it, but it occurred to him that it had been some time—years, in fact—since anyone had inspected the roofs, so he decided to look for himself.

Foxton Place was ancient. It had begun as a sixteenth-century Tudor manor house constructed on the remains of a medieval hall. Various additions had been made over the centuries, depending on the state of the family coffers and the artistic leanings of the current earl, and it was now a mishmash of architectural styles. Constructed initially in a U shape, a final wing, called the Long Gallery, had been added some few hundred years later, creating a central courtyard.

Many called it an architectural monstrosity, and several of Julian’s friends had urged him to demolish it and build something new and elegant—and convenient. But Julian loved it as it was, every twisty, crooked, ridiculous inch of it. All he’d done to the old place was have several bathrooms and a new kitchen range installed, which earned him the undying gratitude of Cook, and a handful of other innovations made mostly for comfort and convenience.

“Take me to this leak,” Julian said. “And then I’ll want to inspect the roof.”

Crowther led the way, taking a shortcut through the Long Gallery, which had been turned into a portrait gallery by the fourth earl. Julian knew every painting by heart. All his ancestors were there, lined up in grim solemnity. His ancestral gallery of rogues, he’d always thought of it. But as he passed, something caught his eye. He stopped. “What the devil is that?”

“It’s a portrait of her ladyship, m’lord.”

“I can see that! But what the devil is it doing here?” The portrait gallery was for portraits of his family, the Fox family. His grandmother was not, never had been and never would be a member of the Fox family. She was only his father’s mother-in-law.

“Her ladyship had it sent down here several weeks ago, m’lord, with instructions that it be hung in the portrait gallery.”

“I bet she did,” Julian muttered. She’d been trying to take control of his family ever since he could remember.

“I thought it a very good likeness, m’lord,” Crowther ventured tentatively.

“Yes, I’m not arguing the quality, just the placement. Why the devil didn’t she hang it in the town house?”

The butler simply looked at him. Of course he would have no idea.

“Take it down.”

“Yes, m’lord. Er, what shall I do with it?”

“Hold on,” Julian said as the butler moved to take it down. Something about the painting nagged at him, something he couldn’t quite put his finger on. Who was the artist? He moved up close and peered at the signature in the bottom right-hand corner. Z-B. Who the devil was Z-B?

He scrutinized the painting carefully, and things fell into place. Whoever this Z-B fellow was, he’d clearly studied art in the same place as Vita. There were several distinct similarities in technique and style. Dammit, the portrait could even have been painted by Vita herself.

He stepped back and eyed the painting broodingly. Was he imagining things again? It simply wasn’t possible that Vita had painted his grandmother’s portrait. She was in Paris somewhere.

Crowther coughed discreetly. “Shall I have it removed, m’lord?”

“No. You might as well leave it there.” His grandmother’s attempts to control him and act as the matriarch of the family were irritating, but although she wasn’t a blood relation, he supposed she’d earned her place in the gallery of ancestral rogues. She, or rather her money, had pulled his father out of debt, and her interfering ways had ensured he stayed out of debt. Had she not married her daughter into the Fox family and started throwing her weight around, keeping his father and brother under her thumb, he supposed the estate would still be in a dire financial state. Or worse.

He kept staring at the portrait. Who the devil was Z-B? Did he know Vita? And if he did, how well did he know her?

The butler cleared his throat. “The leak, your lordship?”

“The leak. Right. Lead me to it.”

That night Julian dreamed of Vita for the third night in a row. He woke up thrashing around in the bed, hot and bothered. And aroused. Cursing himself silently, he got up and fetched himself a glass of water. It was a cold night, but he hadn’t bothered having the fire in his room lit.

He padded to the window and drank his water, gazing out over the scene below, etched in shades of gray and silver and darkness. The sky was clear and the moon was almost full. No doubt that was the cause of these wretched dreams. Moon madness.

Vita. What did he want with her? He didn’t know. He just needed to see her, that was all. See her properly—in the flesh. To touch her. And to stop imagining her everywhere.

A cold damp nose nudged his hand. He looked down. “I know, boy, it’s ridiculous. But I can’t forget her.”

Hamish gave him a soulful look and sighed.

“You, too? We’re a sorry pair, aren’t we? Come on, back to bed.” Julian climbed into bed and Hamish flopped down at the foot of it, on the special bed of blankets one of the maidservants had made for him. He had a way with women, did Hamish.

Julian lay in bed, trying to go back to sleep. He could hear Hamish snoring gently. How did dogs do it, drop to sleep instantly? No worries, he supposed.

His head was full of things, plans, possibilities—and Vita. He refused to think of her anymore. Christmas was coming.

No doubt his grandmother expected him to drive back up to London and attend the service at St. George’s Hanover Square with her on his arm. So everyone would see.

But no. He would stay here for Christmas, he decided. He’d dodged his Christmas obligations last year and for several years before that by being abroad. This year, having come home earlier than planned, he would be here to do his duty. The warm welcome home he’d received from the tenants, servants and villagers had shamed him much more successfully than his grandmother’s lectures did.

So he would swallow his distaste for all the fuss and read the lesson in church, invite the vicar and others back for Christmas dinner and give out the Christmas boxes on Boxing Day. Cartwright had done it last year, but Julian and Hamish would do the honors this year.

And after Christmas he’d drive back to London and ask Grandmama about that blasted portrait. And find out who the devil this Z-B was.