Lady Dearing's Masquerade (3 page)

“But only think of the gossip that might ensue if one of our Governors were known to consort with her,” said Sir Digby.

“Why
is
she so notorious?” asked Jeremy, stifling an impulse to shake Sir Digby.

“Why, she is known to have had a legion of lovers since her husband’s death. She flaunts herself at the theatre and the opera, wearing the most scandalous of gowns, entertains scores of lovers in her favorite suite at Pulteney’s Hotel, and they say”—here Sir Digby lowered his voice and looked apologetically at the Archbishop—”they say she holds orgies at Rosemead, with wine flowing and—I blush to say it—nude bathing in the fountains.”

“Rubbish!” said Bromhurst, with a disgusted look.

The other Governors joined in a general rumble of disbelief. Jeremy knew they shared his annoyance with the middle-aged fop, who only attended meetings in an attempt to impress his wealthy father-in-law, Tobias Cranshaw the banker, one of the Hospital’s most generous benefactors.

“And then there is the matter of her husband’s death,” continued Sir Digby.

Jeremy stared at him. Was the fool suggesting Lady Dearing had had something to do with it? Bromhurst would never have put children of the Hospital in the care of such a woman.

“What of it?” Jeremy asked.

“It happened over four years ago. Lord Dearing broke his neck taking a stone wall in the Cotswolds. They say he’d been drinking heavily and taking mad risks, all because his wife had been playing him false. They say she must have been using some damned French tricks to keep from conceiving an heir for him.”

“I for one set no store by such gossip,” Bromhurst snapped.

Jeremy looked at Bromhurst. “Have any other charges been laid at this woman’s door?”

Bromhurst shook his head.

“But there is more!” insisted Sir Digby. He drew himself up straighter, and a creaking noise made Jeremy wonder if he wore a corset, like the Prince Regent. “No one can deny she is Lord Arlingdale’s mistress.”

Bromhurst snorted. “They have been seen together at the theatre and opera. It does not necessarily follow that there is anything illicit in their relationship. And there are many good reasons to allow this matter to lie.”

Jeremy met Bromhurst’s gaze and held it. “I do not say you acted improperly, sir, but I still believe an inspection visit may be in order. And I still have every intention of honoring my wife’s final request.”

“I tell you it is best to let the matter lie.”

“Why?”

“For one thing, Lady Dearing has been most generous in her donations. For another, her friends the Debenhams are among our most important and influential benefactors. If we offend her, we offend them as well.”

Bromhurst glared along the length of the table, daring anyone to dispute his words. Jeremy had not met the Debenhams in person, but they had responded to his letter soliciting donations for the branch hospital with a substantial pledge.

“Also,” continued Bromhurst, rapping his hand on the table for emphasis, “the four children who are at Rosemead are no longer a charge on the Hospital, enabling us to take in four new children. Does anyone here need reminding of the usual fate of unwanted infants in London?”

He subjected the group to another fierce look. No one replied. “Moreover, Lady Dearing appears to have quite the way with troublesome cases, even those deemed incorrigible, like Ben Taylor.”

Jeremy lifted an eyebrow. “I’ve not heard that name.”

“Ah, that was several years ago, before you joined the General Committee. Ben started a fire at the Hospital.”

A firebrand . . . Jeremy sat back and stared vacantly into Hogarth’s painting. A notorious widow, entrusted with a possibly dangerous child. And Bromhurst had sanctioned it?

“But Mary Simms . . .” mused the Archbishop. “She is the little girl who sang so sweetly in the choir, is she not? You cannot tell me
she
was incorrigible.”

Bromhurst shook his head. “Of course not. However, several months ago, she insisted she could no longer sing, though the apothecary could find nothing wrong. At the same time, Mrs. Hill reported a sad change in the girl’s manner. It is my hope that Lady Dearing’s care will have a beneficial effect.”

The Archbishop’s kind eyes looked troubled. “You should have discussed this with the Committee. How can we be certain it is right to palm our difficult cases off onto this widow? I do believe Sir Jeremy should investigate.”

Heads nodded around the table.

“Perhaps
I
could perform this delicate task,” suggested Sir Digby. “After all, Sir Jeremy is so busy with the branch hospital project, I should not wish to divert his energies.”

“A bit too eager, aren’t you, Sir Digby?” one of them drawled.

Others stifled disgusted expressions. Sir Digby reddened and shifted downward in his seat, his corset creaking, the gaudy diamond in his cravat winking. Jeremy grimaced, recalling how the fop had boasted of recently founding—what did they call themselves? The Select Company of Exquisites, or some such nonsense; a club of idle dandies with nothing better to do than gossip and invent ever more expensive modes of personal adornment.

From Bromhurst’s deepening scowl, Jeremy deduced the Hospital’s President did not trust Sir Digby to conduct the inspection. But he was not prepared for his next pronouncement.

“I believe everyone here can trust Sir Jeremy to discharge the task with the proper discretion,” said Bromhurst when the room had quieted. “If anyone questions it, he is at Rosemead on Hospital business, nothing more.”

Jeremy shot a grateful look toward his friend.

“I expect you will find everything in order at Rosemead,” continued Bromhurst, “and that Mary Simms is best off where she is.”

“Then the matter is settled,” said Jeremy, deciding not to contradict his friend’s final statement. “I shall speak again to Mrs. Hill and arrange to go to Rosemead tomorrow.”

The meeting adjourned, but as the men filed out of the room, Bromhurst laid a hand on Jeremy’s arm.

“Let’s take a walk around the grounds, shall we?”

Jeremy nodded, unsurprised.

Bromhurst remained silent until they left the building. As the other Governors returned to their carriages, Jeremy and his friend strolled on the fields surrounding the Hospital.

“Does one’s heart good to see, doesn’t it?” said Bromhurst, waving an arm toward a group of boys playing nearby.

Jeremy drank in the sight. Bright eyes, rosy cheeks, sturdy legs: all spoke of health. Of a future.

“Indeed it does.”

“Reminds us of why we do what we do.”

He nodded, knowing Bromhurst was building up to something.

“One hates to think that for each child we take in, five must be turned away.”

Jeremy clenched his jaw. He knew the numbers; he did not need reminding. One in five infants turned away. Nine out of ten infants left at parish workhouses, dead of starvation or neglect. Small corpses left overnight in London’s parks, cleared away before genteel folk could be offended by the sight. Small corpses bobbing in the Thames.

“This place was founded over fifty years ago,” continued Bromhurst, “and still the infants keep coming. People grow cynical; many say first causes must be addressed. Funds that might have come to us now go to societies for the reformation of prostitutes.”

“The majority of women who bring their children here are not prostitutes,” Jeremy protested. More often, they were lowly servant-girls, imposed on by fellow servants or employers, wretched creatures who liked to think of themselves as rakes. Jeremy knew better words for men who abandoned the young women they’d gotten into trouble.

“Of course,” Bromhurst replied. “But until society is in a better state, what can we do but provide for the poor innocents?” He turned an intent gaze on Jeremy. “The branch hospital scheme depends on
you
. You have the reputation, the eloquence, the looks, the voice—”

“That is ridic—” Jeremy interrupted.

“Yes,” Bromhurst went on, “the looks and the voice to coax the ladies into loosening their purse strings on behalf of the foundlings. And gentlemen respect and trust you. With such talents, you should be in Parliament!”

“The Whigs have approached me on several occasions,” he replied in what he knew was a vain attempt to divert Bromhurst.

“What I’m trying to say is that you of all people must know what it takes to persuade people that caring for these children does not encourage immorality. If you wish this project to succeed, you must keep your own reputation spotless.”

Jeremy frowned. “Are you withdrawing your approval to my plan to visit Rosemead?”

Bromhurst’s mouth tightened. “I don’t know why you are so set on it. Cecilia has been dead for over four years. It grieves me to see you still mourning her.”

“I do not suffer.”

His friend raised bristling eyebrows. “If you wish for children, why not just marry again and set up your own nursery?”

“I have an heir.”

“Yes, I know, your cousin Thomas. But he is well provided for, and I’m sure he would be more than happy to be cut out.”

Jeremy could not deny it.

“Lady Bromhurst and I would be delighted to see you with children of your own. You know no one was more saddened during your . . . disappointments.”

Disappointments.
A damned empty, weak word for the ordeals Cecilia had endured, while he suffered alongside, powerless to help her. He thrust back a spurt of unholy anger along with the memories.

“Your sympathies meant a great deal to us,” he replied.

“It is time to move on, lad,” said Bromhurst gruffly. “You are still a young man and—”

“I am five-and-thirty.”

“A mere lad! I’m sure half the young misses at Almack’s would jump at the chance to be the next Lady Fairhill. You need to go about in society more.”

“I have done so, and met no one I wished to marry.”

“For just one paltry Season, it must be two years ago now! Since then many pretty and amiable girls have come upon the Marriage Mart.”

Jeremy remained silent. Useless to admit that he wanted none of the amiable misses thrown his way by Lady Bromhurst or Aunt Louisa. That since Cecilia’s death there was only one lady for whom he’d felt more than a fleeting attraction.

And he’d frightened her off.

“You are too particular,” continued Bromhurst. “You cannot expect to find another such wife as Cecilia. You set too high a standard.”

I do not wish for another like Cecilia.
Jeremy bit the words back. Everyone thought Cecilia a saint. They were right, and it would be disloyal to her memory to reveal that he did not wish to marry another saint.

Nor could he confide to anyone that the lady he’d sought during that one Season was a spirited but foolhardy innocent with a ravishing figure and enchanting dimples. One who bore an oddly shaped birthmark on her left breast and made sweet, whimpering noises when kissed.

Who had run away from him.

“No,” he said at length. “I have no such standards, sir. The fact is that I have no desire to remarry.”

He’d inquired at costume warehouses, searched for her at balls and routs, even investigated the gossip in the aftermath of the masquerade. But all he’d discovered were the usual veiled references to the tawdry intrigues of Lord This and Lady That. Nothing about anyone who sounded like him or the ingénue he’d frightened with his ardor.

He’d never found her, never been able to apologize or make matters right.

“If you married, you could more easily pursue your plan regarding Mary Simms. You heard what Sir Digby said.”

“Sir Digby Pettleworth is an ass.”

“No doubt about it. He would not be on the Committee if he were not Tobias Cranshaw’s son-in-law. But still I do not wish gossip to link your name with Lady Dearing’s.”

“Do you think I would risk it? I’m sure Sir Digby vastly overrates her charms.”

“She
is
quite lovely,” said Bromhurst, rubbing his nose again. “But after a marriage such as yours I cannot imagine you would succumb to temptation.”

“I shall not succumb. Least of all to the overripe charms of a notorious widow.”

“What worries me, lad, is what you are risking by this.”

“Do you think I am being selfish to want to fulfill Cecilia’s dying wish?”

Bromhurst averted his face for a moment. “No, but it’s taken all of four years for you to sort it out. You told me yourself that she had been given a great deal of laudanum at the end. How can you be certain what she meant?”

Jeremy stared back across the lawn toward the sight of playing children. Healthy limbs. Strong lungs. Smiling faces. A wrong made right. Hope.

“I am certain.”

“Well then, I wish you good luck. But I beg you, be discreet. And be careful!”

“Have you ever known me to be otherwise?”

The furrows remained in Bromhurst’s forehead.

Jeremy shrugged. In time Bromhurst would realize what Jeremy already knew: that he was beyond the age of foolish indiscretions, if not—God help him!—beyond feeling desire. But he’d spent most of his life mastering his passions; his disastrous lapse three years ago would be his last.

Chapter 2

“Ten thousand pounds? Adolphus, I am so disappointed. I did not think you would jest with me in this manner!”

Livvy smiled sweetly across her tea at her husband’s nephew and heir. Adolphus, seventh Baron Dearing, had never impressed her with his intelligence. In this, as well as his light brown hair and the regular contours of his face, he resembled her deceased husband, though Adolphus lacked Walter’s athletic physique. And unlike Walter, he was no worse than an annoyance.

“It is not a jest. I am entirely serious, dear aunt.” He leaned forward, the diamond pin in his cravat catching the light. “I realize it must seem quite a vast sum to you. Just imagine the style of living it would afford you, perhaps in Greece or Italy.”

The fool smiled. As if she could be so gullible!

“Ten thousand pounds, to give up my jointure and leave England? Paltry, my dear nephew.”

His jaw dropped. “Paltry?”

“Paltry. You are well aware that my jointure provides me two thousand a year. I trust you are not expecting that I will die within the next five years?”