Scandal's Daughter, Page 2

  "Really?" Beau said, his expression thoughtful. "I wonder if I could arrange it. Now that would be entertaining."

  Chapter 2

  "Wherein we meet our heroine, as yet blissfully unaware of the future."

  Georgiana strode into the house, flinging her bonnet onto a chair into the hallway and calling for her uncle. An excitable black dog of indeterminate parentage followed her, tongue lolling after a morning of great exertion. Making her way down a slightly shabby corridor with a worn carpet and a draft coiling around the window that made her shiver, she gave a peremptory rap on the door and entered the study to find her uncle with his head bent over an enormous medical text.

  With a sigh her relative looked up and gave her a look of reproach as she flung herself down in the chair in front of his desk. She blinked up at him, wondering what she'd done now and raised an enquiring hand to her hair to find it had, as usual, escaped all of her pins and was in a tangled mess of fiery locks about her shoulders.

  She gave him a sheepish grin and shrugged. "I took the medicine to the Farley's, they say the boy's fever broke last night like you said and he's sitting up and complaining fiercely about being an invalid."

  Her uncle, Doctor Joseph Bomford, a small but stocky man blessed with a mild manner and a pleasant face with neatly trimmed white hair and sideburns, nodded and removed his spectacles, placing them carefully on the pages of the massive text book.

  "I thought as much. Well thank you for running the errand. Did you tell them I'd call in tomorrow to see how he goes on?"

  "I did," Georgiana nodded, grimacing as she tried to pin her hair back into something Aunt Jane wouldn't scold her for. She looked up to see Uncle Jo watching her with affection. He gestured to her right shoulder, one eyebrow raised.

  "You missed a bit."

  "Oh, thank you," she grinned, tucking the errant strand back up with the rest. Getting to her feet she went to stand beside the fire, which was lit even in August due to the terrible lack of any real summer, and commenced absently picking horse hair off the fine merino wool of her riding habit. Though more than two seasons old and a little frayed, the olive green sat well with the shocking blaze of her red hair and unlike most of her clothing, she tried her best to keep it in good order.

  "I've been wanting to speak with you," her uncle said, making her look up. "You're not to go riding out alone towards the Gower estate for the next few weeks."

  Georgiana frowned with annoyance. Some of her favourite places were along the land that bordered the neighbouring estate. "Why ever not?" she demanded. "Old Gower said I could go where I liked, you know he did."

  "Old Gower may well have done," he said, a stern look on his usually mild face. "But old Gower is not in residence, young Gower is, and from what I've heard of the goings on up there you'll keep well clear and that is my final word on the matter."

  Georgiana opened her mouth and closed it again. Her uncle and guardian was the sweetest and kindest of men and she had never felt the lack of a father for he filled the role in every way that anyone could hope for. But she well recognised the set of his jaw and doubted she could change his mind. Indeed she considered herself more than fortunate that he and his wife, her Aunt Jane had been kind enough to take on their orphaned niece. They'd had no children of their own and doted on Georgiana as though she was their own daughter. Nonetheless, she was sorely disappointed that some of her favourite riding country was now out of bounds.

  She huffed in annoyance and folded her arms. "So what dark doings are going on up there then? Orgies I've no doubt," she muttered, wondering why on earth that should stop her from going where she pleased.

  "Georgiana!"

  She looked up to see her uncle staring at her in shock and bit her tongue.

  "Sorry, Pops," she said, using the pet name for him that never failed but to soften his eyes. He had refused to let her call him father when she was a child, deeming that it wasn't his right, but he had allowed the affectionate nickname and she knew it pleased him. She grinned and he rolled his eyes at her.

  "I'm going to take every one of those wretched novels away from you if you don't have a care and curb that tongue of yours," he scolded, tutting at her. "Orgies indeed. As if you have the slightest idea ..."

  "Oh of course I do!" she replied, choking with laughter. "It's like a great party where ..."

  "Georgiana!"

  She smacked her hand over her mouth, trying and failing to hold back her laughter while her scandalised uncle looked at her in horror. He picked up his spectacles and waved them at her.

  "You will stay away from the Gower estate and if the word orgy escapes your lips in your Aunt's hearing you'll get everything that's coming to you. I give you a great deal too much freedom, miss. Allowing you to go racketing about the countryside with none but that idiotic dog for company." He tutted and Georgiana looked down at the far from idiotic dog who had raised his head and thumped a happy tail on hearing himself referred to.

  "I know, Conrad," she said as the mongrel scurried to his feet, tail wagging with enthusiasm and gazing up at her with adoration. "You are a very fine guard dog, aren't you. Why just this morning he saved me from an attack by a very vicious hare, didn't you, love, yes I know," she crooned, stroking the ecstatic hound as she pulled his soft ears in just the way he like.

  Her uncle heaved a sigh. "Conrad," he repeated, not for the first time. "If ever there was a more ridiculous name for a dog I've yet to hear it." He shook his head and waved his hands at her. "Now run along, foolish girl, and find your aunt. I've no doubt she can find something more productive for you to do than ride about the countryside like a hoyden or sit here and annoy me," he said, though the warmth in his words dispelled any possible notion of a real scolding. "Off you go, now, and mind what I told you about the Gower estate. You stay away. And no more talk of orgies!"

  "Yes, Pops," she replied, casting an impish grin over her shoulder and calling Conrad to follow her as she closed the door and left her uncle to his studies.

  Her uncle, Doctor Bomford was a very respected man in the area, in fact the Earl of Falmouth himself had sought a second opinion from him before now when a wound had gone bad, having had no great opinion of the doctor who had historically treated him and his family since he was in short trousers.

  The doctor's wife, Jane -Georgiana's aunt - was from an old and very wealthy family and when she disobliged them by marrying beneath her they had cut her off without a penny. Happily it was a love match and while Georgiana might see her aunt sighing with longing over the fashion plates in the latest copy of La Belle Assemblée, and wondering how she was going to remake an old dress to look like a new one, she never believed she had for a moment regretted her decision. Georgiana only hoped that she might one day find a man as agreeable as her uncle, and as happy to turn a blind eye to her habit of racketing about the countryside alone.

  She found Aunt Jane in the scullery, tutting sadly over the state of linens, for it was wash day and the scullery was heaped with dripping fabrics in various states of the process. With a sinking heart Georgiana knew that what was about to come her way was hours of sitting and helping her aunt mend and repair.

  The scullery was thick with the heavy, damp fog of hot water and wet linen as she stepped across the duckboards by the sink to give the young housemaid a grimace of sympathy as she stirred the great copper. Water ran in thick rivulets down the clouded window behind the copper and Mary looked up at her, grinning and wiping the sweat from her face on her plump arm before poking another armful of linens into the bubbling water with the laundry stick.

  "Oh there you are, Georgiana," Aunt Jane said with obvious relief. "Do tell me your uncle has no other errands for you today for I am at my wit's end.

  "No, indeed, Aunt," Georgiana replied, though her reply was so despondent that Aunt Jane couldn't help but chuckle.

  "Oh come now, we'll sit in the back parlour, the fire's been lit, and I shall get a tray of tea brought while we make the best of this hea
p of tatters," she replied, looking at the mountain of linen with just as much dismay as Georgiana had. "We can enjoy a comfortable prose and you can tell me all the gossip you've no doubt gleaned on your jaunt to the Farley's this morning."

  Georgiana nodded and tried her best to look as though it didn't sound like a terrible waste of an afternoon. "I'll go and change and be with you in a trice, Aunt."

  An hour later, changed into a much worn and mended spotted dimity gown, Georgiana looked up from her mending as Mary came in bearing a tea tray.

  "Just pop it on the table, Mary," her aunt said, smiling at the girl. "We'll serve ourselves."

  The maid did as she was bid but Georgiana exclaimed as the girl put the tray down.

  "Why, Mary, look at your hands! They're all red and chapped. Do go and get the pot of cream by my bed and put some on, you poor thing."

  Mary blushed and stammered about it being nothing at all but Georgiana was adamant. "Nonsense, go and use it this instant or I shall go and fetch it for you."

  Bobbing a curtsy, Mary left the room with a devout promise to do just as she was bid.

  Georgiana looked up to see Aunt Jane chuckling at her. "What?"

  "Nothing, my dear. You have the kindest heart and it does you credit but ... well you are very determined in your advice on occasion, love."

  Snorting with amusement, Georgiana looked back down at her row of uneven stitches with a frown. "Bossy is the word you are searching for, Aunt," she replied, wondering whether she should unpick the lot and start over.

  "Oh, no, dear," her aunt replied with a placid tone. "Just a little ..."

  "Overbearing?" she added helpfully, at which her aunt laid down her needlework and glared at her niece.

  "Do stop putting words in my mouth, dear. It's just that a young lady ought not to be so ... well, sure of herself."

  "Oh, fiddle," Georgiana replied, deciding against starting the work over again and picking up another sadly frayed piece of work. "I refuse to act like those empty-headed ninnyhammers who go around blushing and stammering like the feather brains they are. I do have a brain in my head and if I can see something needs doing I don't see why I oughtn't say so."

  "Well because gentlemen don't like a girl to have opinions, that’s why. Particularly not strong ones!" her Aunt replied, sounding flustered now as she put her needlework to one side and turned her attention to the tea tray. "And you don't want to get a reputation for being ... fast," she mouthed, as though the word was too offensive to say out loud.

  Georgiana yelped with laughter. "Fast?" she crowed, stabbing her thumb with the needle in the disarray caused by her amusement. "Ow! Oh dear, Aunt Jane, where pray do you think I could get a reputation for that ... around here?" She stuck her injured thumb in her mouth in an attempt to curb her laughter as her aunt was looking really rather cross.

  Huffing, the older lady put a cup of tea in her hand and admonished her not to bleed on the linens. "And from what I hear you'd need not go far at all. Not safe for decent folk," she muttered, with a sad shake of her head.

  "Whatever do you mean?" Georgiana demanded, and then remembered her Uncle's warning. "Oh do you mean up at the castle. Oh, Aunt! What have you heard?"

  Her aunt sniffed and shook her head. "As if I would tell you!" she said in disgust, stirring sugar into her tea.

  Georgiana pouted and her aunt set down her cup and saucer with a sniff. "Well ..." she said with reluctance. "They do say that the Marquis of Beaumont is there."

  "No!" Georgiana exclaimed. "He's shown his face again at last. I was beginning to think he didn't have the pluck I believed he did."

  "Georgiana!" Her aunt said, clutching at her bosom and returning a pained expression. "I should never have let you start reading those dreadful scandal rags. May I remind you that his lady friend tried to drown herself."

  "Oh stuff," she replied, quite disregarding her aunt's cry of disquiet over her less than genteel observations. "By all accounts the woman had lived in Cambridge all her life so how she couldn't know the Cam is barely deep enough to wet her feet is beyond me. The only thing likely to kill her was catching a chill from going home in wet skirts. Oh and I think you'll find a fellow's mistress is called a Cytherean."

  "Oh good God, Georgiana, you'll be the death of me, I do swear!" cried her appalled aunt.

  Chuckling mischievously Georgiana returned to her botched mending attempt.

  "Well just you stay away from the Gower estate, young lady. For all your reading and knowing talk you've no understanding of how these men carry on and I won't have you putting yourself in danger. If you don't promise me I'll have to make old Lambert your chaperone and you know how well you'd like that."

  "Lambert!" Georgiana cried in horror. The crotchety old man who passed for their groom would suck the joy from any walk or ride through the countryside like blotting paper on wet ink.

  Her aunt gave a sage nod, pleased that she'd been so well understood. "We'll be needing a quantity of dandelion as I'm set on making a good batch of dandelion and burdock. Your uncle looks a touch liverish to me and I think it would do him the world of good. So if I send you out to gather dandelions, be good and sure you don't head over that way."

  "Oh but, Aunt! You know the four acre field has the best dandelions, it will take ..."

  She stopped in her tracks as a forbidding look entered her aunt's usually placid blue eyes. "Yes, Aunt Jane," she said meekly, and returned her attention to the linens.

  Chapter 3

  "In which the beau monde is too rich for his grace's appetite."

  Sebastian looked out of the window as the rain lashed the surrounding countryside and he wondered what in the name of God had induced him to come here. He raised a slightly unsteady hand to his head and winced as he applied it tenderly to his aching temple. Never again. It was a phrase that occurred to him all too often in the aftermath of one of Beau's nights of debauchery and had never seemed more apt.

  He had a vague memory of the room he was standing in filled with revelry and half naked women and suppressed a groan. How the devil was he supposed to extricate himself now. Gower had professed to have given extensive thought to the following week or so's entertainments, no doubt with Beau egging him on, and last night, he'd said with relish, was only the start of it.

  Easing himself with care into a tapestry covered wingback chair with a groan, he massaged his pulsing temples. The vast stone fireplace beside him belched forth a disagreeable plume of grey smoke every time the wind howled past the chimney and Sebastian frowned at it, putting some careful thought into the idea of going home. As soon as possible.

  He was getting old, he decided with a melancholy sigh. Once upon a time he would have been just as happy to spend a debauched week or three in the country while his commitments and obligations could go to the devil. Now he couldn't help but look upon those commitments with a rather fonder eye and wish to go back to them. Marlburgh House was an ancient and sprawling pile full of draughts and leaks, and the land had been growing steadily sicker due to neglect during his own youth and mismanagement by those who should have been keeping the place in order. But after a great deal of investment and a lot of coaxing the surrounding lands were beginning to repay that investment. It was therefore with a wry smile that Sebastian realised he'd rather be walking his fields and talking to his estate manager about the terrible summer and how it would impact on all their future plans than lounging about with a scantily clad female in his arms. He resolved to keep such thoughts to himself. If Beau ever discovered his thoughts he'd never hear the end of it.

  Speaking of the devil, he thought in amusement as the man himself came and sat opposite him. Moving just as carefully as Sebastian had, Beau lowered himself into the chair with a soft groan and sat back with his eyes closed.

  "I take it the brunette was every bit as energetic as you imagined she would be?" Sebastian said, smirking as Beau cracked open one bleary eye.

  Beau shook his head and then winced, clearly deciding the mov
ement was a bad idea. "She was a blonde," he murmured, pinching the bridge of his nose with long, elegant fingers.

  Frowning, Sebastian cast his mind back to the admittedly foggy events of the previous evening. "No, she was definitely a brunette when she left."

  Beau opened his eyes, frowning and then giving a little shrug. "Well I woke up with a blonde."

  Sebastian snorted and shook his head. "I need to get out of here, get some air."

  "In this? Are you mad?"

  Casting an eye back towards the window and the rain that lashed against the window, Sebastian stretched out his legs. "This will be gone by midday. Will you come?"

  "No," Beau replied. "I will not."

  "Suit yourself."

  "I always do."

  Sebastian regarded his friend with a frown. There was something troubling Beau, he was sure of it. But Beau was not one to share his troubles as a rule. Though Sebastian knew Beau would never begrudge him his wealth he was prickly about his own lack of it. His father the Duke of Ware gave him a pittance of an allowance and it was only Beau's own skill and the devil's own luck with cards and dice that kept him afloat. Most of the time Beau was paying off one creditor, just as another began to pound at the door. His extravagant lifestyle was not something he would in any way curtail. It was a situation that Sebastian rarely referred to. He'd tried, once, to speak to Beau and to lend him money to see him through a particularly awkward time, but it had led to the worst and most violent argument they'd ever had and he would never dare broach the subject again.

  To his surprise he didn't have to, as Beau brought the subject up later the same day as they ate lunch together. Lord Gower still hadn't appeared, which surprised neither of them, having seen the state of him last night.

  "I have to marry," Beau said, staring with a gloomy expression into a mug of ale.

  "Ah," Sebastian replied. "I did wonder what was amiss."

  "I can't see any other way, it's that or debtor's prison."