Early in the afternoon, Lord Blackwood called. Fanny, after a glance at their faces, quite improperly left the two in sole possession of the drawing room.
"Your sister is a perceptive woman, Miss Hampton," Lord Blackwood said. "I did wish to speak to you privately."
Jane felt a flash of uneasiness, and then was heartily ashamed of herself. Lord Blackwood was not likely to make unwelcome advances to her in her own drawing room with her father within calling distance. She looked at Lord Blackwood's fine figure in his claret-coloured coat, frilled white shirt, form-fitting pantaloons and shining Hessians, and could not help but feel a moment of regret.
Lord Blackwood smiled his knowing smile at Jane, and again she had the feeling he always knew precisely what passed in her thoughts.
"I only wished to tell you I am leaving for the Continent on the morrow, Miss Hampton, and to ask if you would reconsider your decision not to accompany me."
Jane moved as if to speak, and Lord Blackwood held up his hand.
"Please allow me to finish. I know that I would be your second choice, but I accept that. I love you, regardless. I could not promise to be a perfect husband, but I would cherish you always."
"I wish I could accept your offer, but I cannot," Jane said a little sorrowfully. "You are leaving tomorrow, then? I shall miss you," she said sincerely.
"Yes, my sister has already departed, and I see no point in staying myself, hospitable as Lord Staplefield has been.”
"Lady Juliette has left?" Jane asked in surprise. She would have thought Lady Juliette would stay and try to win Edward back now that Lord Staplefield was beyond reach.
"Yes, she and Lord Crawford are on their way to Gretna, if I am any judge."
"Lord Crawford? Gretna?" Jane repeated, feeling like a parrot repeating Lord Blackwood's every word.
"Yes. In truth, I think my sister will be happy with Lord Crawford. He is a rogue, but so is my sister at heart. I know that sounds unkind, but it is true."
He stood. "If I cannot convince you to go with me, Miss Hampton, there is no point in delaying. I shall be on my way."
Jane stood also and Lord Blackwood came forward and took her hands in his.
"Goodbye, Jane," he said, bending to place a last kiss upon her lips as he spoke her given name.
"Miss Hampton," he said, without letting go of her hands, "I shall most probably regret this impulse later, but I feel at this moment that I love you so much I wish you to be happy, even at my own expense. Please do not condemn Tremaine for thinking he loved my sister. My sister is the kind of woman few men can resist. Credit him with seeing through her as soon as he did. And I also happen to know that he did
not
offer for Juliette. I doubt he would have, even if my sister had not gone for bigger game in the earl. Do not let your pride keep you from him. Go to him. Pride is a cold bedfellow."
At these last words, so like Edward's of the night before, Jane started.
Lord Blackwood squeezed her hands lightly and left. Jane sat back down and stayed alone in the drawing room a long time, thinking over what Lord Blackwood had said. Perhaps he was correct, but she knew she could not go to Edward. He must come to her.
* * * *
From her place by the dining room window, Fanny observed Lord Blackwood when he left. She sensed that Lord Blackwood had offered for her sister and been refused. There was only one reason for Jane to refuse Lord Blackwood—she still loved Edward Tremaine. She thought back to the night before. Even in the excitement of what had been her betrothal ball she had not failed to notice Jane's early departure. She had also observed the black expression on Captain Tremaine's face when he returned to the ballroom after being gone almost an hour.
It was clear Jane and Edward loved each other and equally as clear that they would need help if they were ever to make a match of it. Fanny pulled a chair from the dining table and sat down to think. It was a situation that called for drastic measures. She would not be able to handle it alone, but she knew who would help her. Charles had not failed her yet.
* * * *
Edward sat quietly in the cozy rose drawing room with his sister and mother early in the afternoon several days after the masquerade. Lord Tremaine and his sister Mary's husband had gone to look at some horses Squire Shirley was considering parting with, and Jamie was riding with Chris.
He was thinking about the odd parcel that had arrived from Bramleigh that morning. Not odd, precisely, for it contained the missing letter from Colonel Wentworth, and the direction had been written in a hand very like Lady Juliette's. So the lady had a conscience after all—she must have left the letter with a servant to be delivered after she was gone. Edward wondered why she had taken it to begin with. To keep him in Sussex, perhaps? That must have been it—she had not wanted him to leave so that she could continue to have access to the earl. Her plotting had not done her much good though, he thought, since she had lost the earl to Fanny, anyway. He wished Lady Juliette well with Lord Crawford.
"What is on your mind?" Mary asked with some asperity. "That is the third time I have repeated my question, Edward."
"I beg your pardon, Mary. What did you ask?"
"I asked if you agreed it was a good idea for Jamie to accompany George and me back to Yorkshire until the term begins."
Jamie had been in very bad spirits since the announcement of Fanny's betrothal to Lord Staplefield at the masquerade.
"Yes, either that or purchase him a pair of colours," Edward said. "I am not sure the university is the place for him. He needs to grow up."
"Let him make that decision," said Lady Tremaine. "We shall give him the choice when he goes up to Yorkshire. He can think about it there."
Dawkins entered the room, interrupting their conversation.
"Miss Fanny Hampton has asked to speak to you, Captain Tremaine," he said. "She says it is most urgent, and appears to be quite agitated. I have put her in the green drawing room."
Edward looked up in surprise. "I wonder what it could be?" he said as he excused himself to join her.
When he reached the door of the green drawing room, Fanny was pacing up and down the length of the room. When she heard Edward’s step at the doorway, she turned and ran up to him, her large eyes looking tearfully distressed.
"Oh, Captain Tremaine, you must help me! I think Jane has been abducted!"
"Abducted?" A cold fear went through Edward. "Explain yourself," he commanded rather brusquely.
"Either that or she has run off with Lord Blackwood, and if so she cannot have thought what she is doing," Fanny cried. "I had gone to the village to purchase some embroidery silks, and on the way back I saw a closed carriage with its shades drawn go by. It looked odd, but I didn't give it any more thought until I returned home to find Jane gone." She stopped to take a handkerchief from her pocket and wipe her eyes.
"Gone? Is it possible she just went for a walk or on an errand?"
"No," Fanny said. "I checked her wardrobe, and several items are missing. I did not know where to turn, so I came to you," she cried, hoping that in his agitation Edward would not stop to wonder why she hadn't appealed to Lord Staplefield or her own father.
"How long ago was it you saw the carriage?" he asked.
"Two hours."
Two hours. If he left immediately he might be able to catch them by nightfall. He rang the bell and ordered his father's fastest horse to be saddled and brought round. Thank goodness he had fully recovered his strength.
"What road did the carriage take?" he asked as he waited for the horse.
"The road to Brighton, I think."
"Do not worry, Fanny," Edward reassured her as he watched out the window for his horse, "I shall bring your sister back safely whether she left of her own free will or has been forcibly taken."
He saw the groom bringing round the horse and ran down to meet him.
Fanny's eyes dried miraculously as she watched Edward mount his horse and ride down the drive at a fast pace. Then she went calmly upstairs to join his sister and Lady Tremaine.
* * * *
Jane walked slowly along the road to the Archers', feeling more irritated with her sister by the minute. She didn't know why Fanny could not have gone herself to collect the pattern books from Lady Archer, or why she had to have them today. Fanny’s wedding to Lord Staplefield would not be for several weeks yet. One or two days' difference would make no matter, and it was a long, hot walk.
She heard a carriage coming up behind her and moved to the side of the road. She was surprised when it stopped a little way up the road. Thinking the driver might want to ask directions, she advanced to the coach, but fell back when the door opened and a man dressed in a long black cloak, mask and wide-brimmed black hat jumped out. Before she knew what he intended, he had grabbed her and thrust her into the carriage, slamming the door and shouting at the coachman to drive on.
"What is the meaning of this?" Jane demanded, outraged, as she picked herself up from the green velvet squabs where she had fallen, glaring indignantly at her abductor.
"Odds salts and vinaigrettes, my dear, that is not the proper reaction. You are supposed to scream and have a fit of the vapours."
"Lord Staplefield, let me down immediately!" Jane fumed. "If this is another prank of yours and Fanny's, I want none of it!"
"I fear I cannot oblige you, fair damsel in distress," Lord Staplefield, for it was he, said cheerfully. "Do not fret, the journey will not be long."
"I should hope not. My father will begin to worry if I am not home by nightfall," Jane said, making herself more comfortable on the soft cushions.
"That's right," the earl said with approval. "You might as well relax and enjoy the ride." He lifted a basket from the floor and opened it. "Bread and cheese, my dear? Or perhaps a meat pasty?"
Jane ignored the offer of food. "Where are you taking me?"
"That I cannot tell," he replied, removing his mask and eating a meat pasty with apparent relish.
Jane resigned herself to participating in the escapade and accepted some bread and cheese, but after two hours passed she began to worry.
"You must take me back, Lord Staplefield," she insisted. "I haven’t the clothes or anything else I need for a journey."
Lord Staplefield cocked his head, listening intently to something outside the carriage. "No need, damsel in distress. I believe your rescue is at hand."
Now Jane also heard the sound of more hooves upon the road. Lord Staplefield knocked on the roof of the carriage and shouted for the coachman to stop.
"Forgive me if I leave you, Miss Hampton, but odds bullets and barrels, I've no wish to be shot, and your rescuer may be rather incensed with me."
He threw his hat and cloak on the seat of the carriage and jumped out. Taking the horse the postilion had been riding, he disappeared down the road.
Jane heard a shout, and a horse came round the curve behind them. The horseman stopped as he pulled up to the carriage, and, swiftly dismounting, ran to the carriage door and threw it open.
"So Lord Blackwood got away," Edward said, looking in the carriage. "He'll not get far before I overtake him. Are you injured?" he asked, assisting Jane from the carriage.
"Do not waste your time going after Lord Blackwood,” she said dryly, "it was not he." She stretched her legs and walked down the road a little to alleviate the cramps.
"Then who?" asked Edward, but before Jane could answer, they were distracted by the sight of the carriage starting to pull away,
"Hold!" Edward cried, chasing after the carriage on foot a good distance before the futility of the action struck him and he returned somewhat sheepishly to Jane.
"Fanny and her betrothed are careful planners," Jane said. "I see they thought of everything."
"Fanny and Lord Staplefield? It was she who told me you'd been abducted!" Edward exclaimed, and then smiled ruefully as the light dawned.
"Yes," Jane corroborated, and was suddenly overcome with anger and mortification. "How could they! I told Fanny not to interfere in my life. They have left us stranded with one horse, with night coming on and too far away to find shelter. I could strangle them both."
Suddenly Edward tossed back his head and laughed. "Tell me, was Staplefield dressed like a highwayman?"
Jane nodded. "It is
not
amusing," she said as Edward laughed harder.
"I think," he said, trying to stop laughing as he put an arm about Jane, "that after they have gone to all this trouble, the least we can do is to get married. I would rather like to be connected to Fanny and Staplefield. Why," he said, pointing to a basket by the side of the road, "he even had them leave us provisions of some sort."
When Jane made no reply, he turned her face to his. "You really have no choice, Jane. We shall be alone together tonight, at an inn if not in the forest. We are too far away from Staplefield or any other village I know of to find proper accommodation, and my horse is too tired to press."
Jane looked into Edward’s hazel eyes, and her resistance began to crumble. Her shoulder felt tinglingly aware of his arm and as his finger slowly caressed her cheek, her breath came short and shallow.
Edward noticed as well, and bent to kiss her, a kiss that soon became passionate and demanding.
Jane was losing sense of where she was when a nudge on her shoulder caused her to jump, and then laughed when he saw Edward’s horse, who had come to remind them he was also there.
"It is fortunate we are not walking," Edward said, taking the reins and helping Jane up on his horse's back,
"If it had been Ariel, no doubt we would be," Jane said, laughing, "He is much too independent to wait patiently for his rider."
Edward went to fetch the basket that had been left for them and tied it securely on the horse. He swung up behind Jane and they began going slowly down the road.
Jane, remembering Lord Blackwood's words, banished the last of her reservations and leaned back onto Edward's chest. His arms tightened about her and he kissed her neck softly. The motion of the horse and the warmth of Edward's body against hers began to make Jane sleepy.