Chapter Sixteen

It had to be admitted that Milly was not the easiest of houseguests. Used to going out and about with her mother at all hours of the day and night, she found her confinement in Lady Scattergood’s house difficult.

She didn’t enjoy reading, and even when Clarissa brought her some popular romances, she just glanced through them desultorily. And when Lady Scattergood asked her to read aloud to her to save her old eyes, Milly did it reluctantly and in a bored, flat monotone.

The only thing she did with any enthusiasm was write long letters to Thaddeus, which she did several times a day. Probably full of complaints, Zo? thought.

Clarissa was the most patient with her. Being in the late stages of pregnancy, Clarissa didn’t go out much; mostly she just walked around the gardens a little. She brought over a pile of her clothes for Milly, saying she couldn’t fit into them now, and if she ever did get her figure back, fashions would have changed. She, her maid, Betty, and Zo?’s maid, Marie, had been adjusting them to fit Milly.

“But of course you won’t want to wear one of my dresses for your wedding,” Clarissa said. “We’ve made an appointment for you with Miss Chance of the House of Chance.”

“The House of Chance?” Milly exclaimed. “No! That little woman is frightfully common!” She saw their expressions. “Mama says so.”

There was a cold little silence. Izzy opened her mouth, but Clarissa held up her hand. “That ‘little woman’ is frightfully brilliant,” she said. “Izzy and I have all our clothes made by her.”

“Except for riding habits,” Izzy said, “which are always made by a tailor. But Miss Chance makes everything else, even our nightgowns.” She and Clarissa exchanged secretive smiles.

Milly sniffed. “That nightgown you lent me last night is nothing special.”

“No, that one was a gift from my old nurse,” Clarissa said. “The ones Miss Chance makes are more for married ladies.”

“And for wedding nights,” Izzy added.

Milly pouted. “But she’s so common. A horrid Cockney accent, and the way she talks to people, as if she’s their equal. Mama says—”

Zo? was getting fed up with Milly’s constant sighing and complaining and bleating never-ending nonsense beginning “Mama says.” “You know, Milly, isn’t it time you stopped parroting your mother’s words? Given what she thinks is important, you might want to start thinking and deciding things for yourself.”

Milly blinked. “But—”

“Oh, let her get married in one of your old dresses, Clarissa,” Izzy said. “If she doesn’t want to meet Miss Chance—”

“No, no. I’ll go. I do want a new dress. It’s just, couldn’t we go to—”

“It’s Miss Chance or no one,” Izzy said firmly.

Milly sighed. “Oh, very well.”

So, time being of the essence, they bundled her into the coach, veiled and muffled to the eyebrows, and took her to the House of Chance.

Miss Chance greeted them in her usual friendly fashion and whipped Milly into a private room, where she was measured up. When she finished, she stepped back, scanned Milly thoughtfully and said, “You know, I reckon I’ve got something that’d suit you proper, Miss Harrington.”

She sent an assistant off, and in a few minutes the girl returned with a cream wool dress. “This is almost finished, but the lady who ordered it is now in the family way and it won’t fit her. Try it on. The wool is very fine, so it falls nicely, and it’s lined with silk so it will feel lovely and also keep you nice and warm.” Milly tried it on, and the others were invited in to look.

“It’s perfect,” Clarissa declared.

“It’s very plain,” Milly said doubtfully, having been raised in multitudes of frills, but she was overruled.

“I can get it to you by tomorrow morning,” Miss Chance said. “There’s only a couple of small adjustments to make and the hem to sew up. It mighta been made for you, miss.”

Returning home in the carriage, Zo? said, “Well? What did you think?”

“Well, she is very common—that accent! But she was all right, I suppose. That dress is awfully plain, though. It has not a single frill or flounce.”

“For which you should be grateful,” Izzy said acidly. “The clothes your mother commissioned for you, all frills and fussery, made you look like a pig bursting out of a cushion!”

Zo? stifled a giggle. Clarissa stared fixedly out the coach window, her lips pressed firmly together.

Milly huffed. “You are horrid, Izzy Salcott.”

“But truthful. Wait until Thaddeus sees you in that dress.”

“And the nightgown on your wedding night,” Clarissa said.

Milly’s eyes widened. “You ordered me a nightgown as well?”

“Yes, it’s a wedding present.”

The rest of the journey passed in silence. From the faint, reminiscent smile on Clarissa’s face, Zo? guessed she was recalling her own wedding night. Or maybe not. She was holding her swollen belly, stroking it as if the baby inside could feel it. Her sister Izzy was smiling fondly at her.

Zo? felt suddenly emotional. These were her sisters, her family. Their loving bonds were visible—and she was now part of them. It was such a gift for a girl who, from the age of twelve, had thought herself alone in the world. And their generosity wasn’t only reserved for family. Despite Milly’s constant irritation and ingratitude, they had stepped forward without hesitation and were helping her. She was so proud of them.

They arrived back at Lady Scattergood’s to the news that Milly’s maid, Lizzie, had been dismissed. “But why?” Milly asked.

Betty, the source of the news, explained, “Your ma blamed poor Lizzie for your disappearance, miss. She said Lizzie shoulda kept a better eye on you, and that she oughter’ve known what you was up to and where you were. She sent her packing then and there, miss. Dismissed without a character.”

All eyes turned to Milly.

“Well, what can I do?” she said.

“You owe that girl,” Zo? told her. “She’s been a loyal friend to you, and you cannot let her be punished this way.”

“How can I stop it? You think Mama will listen—not that I’m going to speak to her—but when Mama makes up her mind she won’t listen to anyone. Besides, I have no money—you know that—so what could I do? I…I’ll do something for her once Thaddeus and I are married. Write her a character or something.”

On that note she sat down to write to Thaddeus about the dress she was getting for the wedding.

Julian stood on the front steps of Lord and Lady Randall’s house and pulled out his pocket watch. Not quite ten thirty. He’d been invited to call on Miss Beno?t at eleven. Impolite to arrive early, but he’d been on tenterhooks all morning.

Two days since he’d last spoken to Vita. Zo?. He must remember to call her that. No, it would have to be Miss Beno?t now. Oh, hang it all, he wasn’t going to loiter in the street any longer. He pulled the doorbell, and a moment later, the door opened.

“Lord Foxton to see Lady Randall,” he told the butler. “She is expecting me.” If not quite so early. The invitation to call had come from her, not Zo?, but he knew Zo? would be there, and he knew better than to ask for an unmarried girl.

The butler showed him to an elegant sitting room where a fire was burning brightly. He offered Julian refreshments, which he refused. “Lady Randall will be with you directly,” the butler said, and left.

Julian paced around, ostensibly looking at the paintings on the walls, the ornaments displayed, but really, he took in very little. Eventually he forced himself to stand in front of the fire and wait, giving an illusion, at least, of patience. Where was she?

Ten or fifteen minutes later Lady Randall hurried in, looking a little flustered. “I’m so sorry to keep you waiting, Lord Foxton. I was in the middle of a tricky process with some ointment and couldn’t leave it.” She waved him to a seat, saying, “My cousin will join us directly. In the meantime, did Hobbs offer you any refreshment?”

He assured her he had, but that he’d declined. He apologized for arriving early, for which he was not sorry at all. She gave him a warm smile and assured him he was very welcome. She didn’t have the beauty of her sister Lady Salcott, but she had a sweetness of expression that more than made up for it.

“Ointment?” It sparked a thought.

“Yes, I make herbal lotions and suchlike. It is an interest of mine.”

“I believe Miss Beno?t used one of your ointments on an injury my dog sustained.”

“Very likely.” She glanced again at the door. “She shouldn’t be long.”

“It was most efficacious.”

She beamed at him. “I’m so glad. Ah, here is my cousin now.”

Zo? entered, wearing a bronze dress with a paisley shawl in greens and cream that brought out the color of those glorious eyes. Her hair was loose, as it had been in France. She saw the way he looked at it and put a self-conscious hand to it. “I thought we were meeting at eleven. I didn’t have time for my maid to finish doing my hair,” she said with a look that skewered him and made it clear she did not approve of men who arrived early.

Ah, that was his Vita, outspoken and direct, unlike the smoothly polite Miss Beno?t.

After greetings had been exchanged and Julian had made another insincere apology for arriving early, Lady Randall rose and said to Julian, “I, er, just need to pop out to see to something, Lord Foxton.” To Zo? she said, “I’ll send in some refreshments in fifteen minutes, but if you’d like them earlier, just ring for Hobbs.” She gave her “cousin” a meaningful look and hurried out. Julian repressed a smile.

“Lady Randall is very sweet, but a very poor schemer,” he commented when she had gone.

Zo? stiffened. “What do you mean?”

“It was your sister’s ointment you used on Hamish’s neck, wasn’t it?”

“Y— No. What do you mean ‘my sister’? Clarissa is my cousin.”

“I should have said ‘half sister.’ As is Lady Salcott, I assume. Oh, don’t bother to deny it. Apart from your uncanny resemblance to Lady Salcott, I remember when you first produced that ointment you said, ‘I have some very good ointment that my sist— I mean a girl I know made.’?”

There was a short silence. “You remember that?”

“I remember everything you’ve ever said to me, Vita.”

Faint color stole into her cheeks, but she said firmly, “My name is Zo?.”

“?‘That which we call a rose, by any other name smells as sweet,’?” he quoted softly.

“Stop it. I don’t want that kind of thing from you.”

“What do you want, then?”

She was silent for a minute, then folded her arms and said, “The truth, for a start.”

“I’ve never lied to you, Vita.”

She snorted. “Really? What about telling me you’d had Hamish drowned and sent Rocinante to the knackers?”

He spread his hands. “For that I apologize—again. As I said, I was angry at the time.”

He smiled and sat back in his chair, crossing one long leg over the other. He’d worn buckskin breeches and gleaming high boots—not at all the usual sort of attire for a morning call. Not that this was a morning call, exactly: he’d been invited.

He saw her eyeing his boots. “Do my boots offend you? I went riding this morning and came straight here afterward. There’s a boy holding my horse outside.”

She made an insouciant “don’t care” sort of gesture.

“Do you ride? Perhaps we could go riding together? I gather your sisters are fine horsewomen.”

“My cousins are, yes. I, however, do not ride at all.” Because orphans on the parish are not, of course, routinely given riding lessons.

“Pity. I think you’d enjoy it.”

“Don’t change the subject. I’m not finished discussing the lies you told me.”

He frowned. “But I apologized for that.”

“And what about the lies you told about those three wives?”

“But those wives are real.”

Her jaw dropped. “ What? But you promised me, on your word of honor—”

“That I wasn’t married and never had been. Yes. And that’s the truth.”

“But you just said—”

“That the wives were real, and so they are.”

She shook her head, frustrated. “I don’t understand.”

“Then I shall explain.” He sat back, relaxed, not seeming the slightest bit discomfited. “As I think I told you before, the oldest wife is the bossiest. She thinks she has all of us—the other wives as well—under her thumb.”

“But not you?”

“No, not me.”

She eyed him thoughtfully. This was sounding familiar. “Go on.”

“In her youth she was never what you might call a beauty, but as she aged she has become…you might say handsome. A face full of character, not necessarily appealing, but strong and very definite. She does not tolerate fools lightly, and she considers most people fools.”

“I gather you dislike her.”

“Oh no, I might be very aware of her faults, but I’m very fond of the old tartar.”

She frowned. “But you said that of—”

“My grandmother, yes. Oh that’s right, you know her, don’t you? You painted that brilliant portrait of her after all. So, do you think I’ve described her sufficiently well?” He gave her an innocent look.

Zo? clenched her fists. How dare he play such games with her? His grandmother indeed! “She can hardly be your wife, though, can she?”

He placed a finger on his cheek and pretended to ponder the question.

She itched to smack him.

“I don’t think I ever said I was married to her.”

“You did. You said you had three wives!”

“And I do. Please be patient while I explain.”

Oh, he was infuriating. “Very well, what of the other two?”

“The second wife is my brother’s widow.”

“Widow?”

“Yes, I told you that my brother died. Do try to keep up, Vita.”

She glared at him and he chuckled. “You look very sweet when you’re cross.”

“How can your brother’s widow be classed as a wife?”

“Oh, Celia’s definitely a wife—or was. Or are you suggesting my two nieces are illegitimate? I assure you, there was definitely a wedding at least a year before Sukey, the first one, was born. Or was Ella the firstborn? I get them mixed up. Very dreary girls, just like their mother. Celia’s now the dowager Lady Foxton, a title that doesn’t please her at all. Dowager, such an aging word, don’t you think?”

Zo? gritted her teeth. “And the third?”

“Ah yes, the youngest one—my sister, Dorothea, who just gave birth to a beautiful baby girl, which delighted not only her but also my brother-in-law, who already had two sons to carry on the family name.”

Zo? took several deep, long breaths, then said in as calm a voice as she could manage, “So the truth is, you have no wives at all.”

He gave her a mock-puzzled look. “But no, Vita my dear, as I just explained, I have three.” He gave her a faintly triumphant smile.

“Ooh, you! You’re impossible!” She shook a fist at him.

He laughed and held up his hands in surrender. “No, no, don’t hit me, I’ll explain.”

“You’d better.”

“I think, if you think back, I told you I had three wives. I did not say that I was married. I let you jump to that conclusion. And quite entertaining it was, too, as well as convenient.”

“You thought I was fishing for information?”

His brow rose in amused challenge. “Weren’t you?”

“I was making conversation,” she said with dignity.

“Yes, so was I,” he said affably. “But before you burst into flames, I will explain. Grandmama, Celia and Dorothea are wives, the responsibility for whom I have somehow inherited. You know about Grandmama, but what I didn’t explain, and what she doesn’t realize, is that her fortune has dwindled to a bare competence. She lives in my houses—my town house in Mayfair and my country seat, though I am having the dower house renovated and she will move into it when I marry. I’m sure that will please you. It won’t please her, of course, but we’ll deal with that when it happens.”

“Why should I be interested?” she said airily.

“I hope very much that you will,” he said in a tone of voice that wasn’t anything like his earlier lighthearted banter. His eyes darkened as he spoke. She swallowed and looked away. Her cheeks warmed under his gaze.

He returned to his matter-of-fact explanation. “Wife number two, my widowed sister-in-law, Celia, is a constant drain on my patience and my pocket. She was left a very generous jointure—part of the marriage settlements—which should easily support her and the girls, but the woman is the biggest pinchpenny I have ever met and resents spending a groat, especially if by nagging she can get two out of me. She refused to live in the dower house and won’t share the Mayfair house with Grandmama—to say they don’t get on is an understatement—so I offered her a house in Richmond, which she decided was just acceptable.”

“I see. And your sister? How can she possibly be called a wife?”

“Ah yes, Dorothea.” He smiled, as you would for a fond memory. “Her case is quite different. She fell madly in love with Sir Frederick Strangham. She adores him and he adores her back—but though he comes of good family, he’s as poor as a church mouse. Everybody opposed their marriage—Papa, Grandmama, even my late brother, Ralph—but Dot stood firm, refusing to look at anyone else.”

She was intrigued despite herself. “So what happened?”

He chuckled. “My sister, Dot, bids fair to becoming as indomitable as Grandmama, only a lot nicer. She took matters into her own hands and told Papa and Grandmama that she had lain with Fred and that she was to bear his child. Swore it was true—it wasn’t—but they weren’t going to risk it. They washed their hands of her, and she married Fred by special license. And gave birth to their first child more than a year later. They scraped by for a few years on Fred’s pittance, but when Papa died and I inherited, I handed one of my estates over to Fred and Dot. He’s now learning to become a farmer, the estate is starting to turn a profit and they’re as happy as grigs.”

There was a long silence. He rose, stirred the coals in the fire and shoveled in some more coal. He turned to face Zo?. “So, there you are, Vita my love, my three wives and their three houses explained. To your satisfaction, I hope?”

Vita my love?

She put up her hand as if to hold him off, or to block his words. “Don’t call me that.”

“Why not? It’s the truth.”

She looked up at him, at his tall, spare figure limned by firelight, just as it had been so often in France. But they’d been two different people then. Living a fantasy.

“Your truths are very…twisty,” she said finally.

“Perhaps, but this one isn’t. I love you, Vita.”

“My name is Zo?.”

“I love you, Zo?.”

She shook her head in denial.

He took two steps toward her and took her hands in his. Hers were cold, his were warm. So much for “cold hands warm heart,” she thought irrelevantly.

“It’s marriage I’m offering you, Vita—Zo?, whoever you are.”

She pulled her hands away, rose and moved behind her chair. She gripped it tightly, as if she needed it to support her. “I can’t, you know I can’t.”

“Why not?”

She shook her head again. “I’m illegitimate, you know that.”

“So?”

She sighed at his obtuseness. “You are an earl.”

“Heavens!” He looked down at himself. “So I am.”

“Don’t! Don’t make fun of me.”

“I’m not, love,” he said apologetically. “But you’re being very foolish.”

“I’m not.” She gave him a desperate look. She’d have to tell him everything. “You guessed it earlier, I’m not the French cousin—I’m Clarissa and Izzy’s illegitimate half sister, but it must never get out, or the scandal will affect them, and they’ve been so kind to me. I could never hurt them that way.”

“Very well, we won’t tell anyone.”

“Oh, stop it! It’s not so easy. Or so simple. I’m not French at all—I was born in the back streets of London. In a slum.”

He eyed her solemnly, his blue, blue eyes no longer dancing.

“It’s true that my mother was French—and the legitimate daughter of the Comte and Comtesse de Chantonney. And that she escaped the guillotine when the rest of her family were executed. She was eleven when she came to London, all on her own, and scraped a living as best she could, drawing pictures in chalk on the pavement. My father was an English baronet, Sir Bartleby Studley. He seduced her. She thought she was safe with my father because he was a titled gentleman. She wasn’t. When she fell with child—me—he abandoned her.”

“I see.”

“When she died, some years later, I was taken to an orphanage. I was sixteen when Clarissa and her maid, Betty, came to the orphanage to hire a maidservant. They found me. Only they decided I wasn’t to be a maid but a lady. But I’m not, not really.”

“You’re a lady to your fingertips,” he said softly.

The soft sincerity of his voice brought tears to her eyes. She blinked them away. “Oh, stop it. I’m not. You know I’m not.” She thought of the way she’d dealt with Etienne. No lady would even know to threaten what she had, let alone to be willing to do it. And no lady would ever kick a gentleman in public, on the dance floor, as she had.

“I don’t know anything of the sort,” he said. “And although I’m deeply honored that you’ve shared your story with me, I still don’t see why you can’t marry me.”

She made a frustrated gesture. “Have you not heard a word I said?”

“I told you before, I remember everything you’ve ever said to me.” He smiled. “I was even planning to marry you when I thought you were an illiterate French maidservant, unjustly dismissed from her post.”

Shocked, she stared at him. “You weren’t.”

“I was. Though I was a little worried that you’d find the change to living in England and having a maid of your own difficult. But you won’t, will you?”

“I have a maid,” she said irrelevantly, her mind still spinning from what he’d just told her. “Marie. She was unjustly dismissed in the way I told you. They were her clothes I was wearing when I met you. She’s here with me now, learning English and trying to adjust.”

“Good. I’m glad she has a happy ending. Now, what about mine?”

She gazed at him, trying to think of what to say. He’d turned her world upside down with just a few words.

“What about your grandmother? We battled the whole time I was painting her.”

He shrugged. “Grandmama enjoys a good battle. It keeps her young. But I don’t care what she thinks. I go my own way, remember? In any case, she’s desperate for me to marry and get myself an heir. So what about my answer? Will you marry me?”

“Tea.” The door swung open, and Hobbs, the butler, stood with a footman bearing a tray with a pot of tea, cups, saucers and a plate of cakes.

“Tea?” He rolled his eyes, then gave a rueful chuckle. “It was how we met, after all. But honestly, those sisters of yours have the worst timing.”

It was the best timing, Zo? thought, relieved at the interruption. Clarissa followed the tea tray in. “Have you had a nice chat?” she asked brightly, with a meaningful look at Zo?.

“We were until we were interrupted,” Lord Foxton said bluntly. “I just asked your sister to marry me. She seems to think it impossible.”

“Sister? But I thought…”

“He knows everything,” Zo? told her miserably.

“Really?” Clarissa lowered herself awkwardly onto the sofa. “That’s wonderful. Tea, Lord Foxton?”

Zo? stared at her. Did Clarissa not understand? She’d become a little vague since her pregnancy. And why was she beaming at Lord Foxton like that? He was smiling back at her, as smug as the cat that had swallowed the cream. She couldn’t bear it. “I—I have to go,” Zo? muttered, and ran from the room.

Julian rose to go after her, but Lady Randall waved him back to his seat. “No, no, let her go. She’s a little mixed-up at the moment. Now, tell me what the problem is. And do you take milk or sugar?”

“Just one lump of sugar, thank you,” he said, bemused by her composure.

“Will you have a slice of seed cake?”

“Thank you.”

She cut a slice and passed it to him on a little plate and cut herself a slice. She must have noticed him eyeing her bulk, for she patted it, saying, “Only a few weeks to go. I can’t wait.”

She sipped her tea, broke off a piece of cake and chewed it thoughtfully. “She’s a dear, sweet girl, Zo?, and very protective of those she loves. Meaning me and my sister Izzy, in particular. I gather she told you that we are sisters through our disreputable father.”

He nodded.

“I was his only legitimate child, and when I found Izzy—we were eight, and Papa was about to throw her into an orphanage, horrid man—I made sure I kept her. And when we found Zo?, also in an orphanage, we kept her, too.” She ate another piece of cake. “But darling Zo? was sure she would bring shame and scandal to us if anyone found out.”

She glanced at him. “Our husbands knew, of course, and if they didn’t care, why would we? But Zo? cared. It was her idea, not ours, that she pose as our cousin from France, you know. Her French is exquisite, thanks to her mother. But her English”—she grimaced—“straight out of the London back streets.”

She sipped her tea. “So she hatched a plan with Lucy, the goddaughter of our friend who lives over there.” She gestured across the garden. “She was going to France with her husband, Gerald, who is a diplomat.”

“I know Paton—Lord Thornton as he is now—and Tarrant, too, from the war.”

“Oh good. Then you’ll understand. So Gerald and Lucy took Zo? with them to Paris, where for the last three years Lucy has been teaching Zo? how to be a lady.”

“She needs no teaching. She’s a lady to her fingertips, back-streets accent or no.”

Lady Randall beamed at him. “Exactly, you dear man. But Zo? had to believe it, too, otherwise she did not feel worthy to be our sister. Or even our cousin. Foolish child. We loved her from the start.” She polished off the last of her cake and dusted her fingers. “So now, Lord Foxton, you want to marry our darling girl, but she is being foolishly stubborn, right?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know what she’s thinking. She seems to think she will bring shame on me or something. Which is ridiculous.”

“It certainly is, though it would matter to some people very much. Not you, apparently.” She gave him another brilliant smile. “And not at all to my brother-in-law, Lord Salcott, who, despite his reputation as a high stickler, married my sister Izzy with all the pomp and ceremony any bride could want, in full knowledge of her irregular birth.”

Julian sat back, slightly dazed. This lady, so sweet and apparently shy. He’d even thought her a little simple at first—her sister had done most of the talking before—but she’d stunned him with her warm acceptance and matter-of-fact approach to the problems Zo? thought so overwhelming.

“So, what should I do?”

She gave him that sweet smile again. “If you know her objections—and I assume you do—and you love her enough—and I suspect you do—”

“I do.”

“Good. Then deal with the objections and convince her you love her.”

He laughed. “As easy as that?”

She smiled serenely. “The path to love is rarely easy. More tea?”