Improper Ladies Read online

  “But you make it ever so much better!” Phoebe said beseechingly. “You make it much better than Mary does.”

  Caroline regarded Phoebe with narrowed eyes. Now she knew something was afoot. The minx could not be planning to elope with Harry Seward, could she? Perhaps she meant to climb down from her window and jump into a carriage with him as soon as Caroline’s back was turned. To make a run for Gretna Green, as she had done herself so long ago.

  Well, they would just see about that.

  “Very well,” she said. “I will go fetch the milk. But you had best be here when I return.”

  “Why, Caro!” Phoebe cried, all innocence. “Where would I go?”

  Caroline gave her one last warning glance, then hurried downstairs, sending Mary back up to keep a sharp eye on the girls while she made the milk. It took longer than expected to heat the milk and find cinnamon and cloves to grate into it while avoiding the cook’s irate questions about why she was in the kitchen, so it was fully fifteen minutes before she returned to Phoebe’s chamber.

  There she found the window overlooking the street wide open, and Phoebe, Mary, and Sarah all leaning over the sill looking down.

  And floating up to them was a sound egregious enough to rival even Miss Stone’s violin playing.

  The strains of some stringed instrument, a lute or a mandolin perhaps, were discernible, and above them rose a voice of unimaginable unmusicality.

  “ ‘When Nature made her chief work, Stella’s eyes, In color black, why wrapp’d she beams so bright?’ ” the voice warbled. “ ‘Would she in beamy black, like painter wise, Frame daintiest lustre, mixed of shades and light?’ ”

  Caroline put the glass down on a table and went over to the window, hardly aware of her own feet moving, carrying her forward.

  Surely this could not be what she thought.

  The three women parted at her approach, hovering at either side of the window with silly, giggling grins on their faces. Caroline leaned over the sill and looked down.

  Justin stood on the pavement outside the house, singing as loudly as he possibly could and gesturing broadly with his arms. Behind him stood Harry, strumming inexpertly but enthusiastically on a lute.

  They had gathered quite a crowd of interested onlookers about them, as well, some of them people Caroline recognized from the musicale. Perhaps they thought this was merely a continuation of the party.

  Against her will, Caroline felt a silly grin spreading slowly across her own face. Then a laugh rose up in her throat, and another and another. She could not help it; he looked so very comical, and so dear.

  And so scandalous. Everyone in Wycombe would know of this scene by morning, and it would be greatly exaggerated as well. Earls simply did not sing beneath respectable women’s windows, causing scenes. It just wasn’t done.

  Perhaps he was foxed, and Harry, too. But Caroline only remembered a weak claret cup being served at the musicale, and they had not been gone long enough to go to some tavern.

  “ ‘Both so and thus, she, minding Love should be Placed ever there, gave him this mourning weed, To honor all their deaths, who for her bleed.’ ”

  His song at an end, Justin fell silent.

  “Whatever are you doing, Lord Lyndon?” Caroline called, trying to sound stem despite her helpless laughter.

  In answer, Justin fell to his knees, one hand clasped over his heart. Harry laid down his lute and reached into a basket at his feet for a handful of flowers, which he tossed up to her window. Some fell back to the ground and some hit her in the face.

  She clutched at the blossoms, her gaze never leaving Justin’s face.

  “Can’t you see, Caroline?” he called back. “I am willing to cause any scene, any scandal, for you. If you refuse my proposal again tonight, I will just come back tomorrow, and the night after that, and the night after that, until you hear me out. I do not care about anything but you, and I never will.”

  The collective gaze of the gathered crowd swung from him up to her window. Phoebe, Mary, and Sarah were all happily crying against each other’s shoulders.

  “It is just so romantic,” Mary sobbed.

  “Like The Romance of the Ruby Chalice,” Phoebe sniffled.

  Caroline saw and heard none of this. The stares, the whispers—it was everything she feared, everything she had hoped she left behind at the Golden Feather. But somehow she didn’t care about any of it.

  She only cared about Justin and what he was doing for her. Earls were meant to be dignified and elegant, and he acted the abject clown right in the middle of the street. All for her, to gain her attention.

  She had been a fool, she saw that so clearly now, to ever hold propriety above love. A silly fool, so blinded by her past that she could not see the truth that was right there before her.

  Justin had faced down scandal in his own past, and he was not afraid of it. He was too strong for that, and she had underestimated him.

  She would never do that again.

  Tears were falling warmly, silently down her cheeks. She buried her face in the fragrance of the flowers she held.

  “Well, Caroline?” she heard Justin say. “Shall I sing again? I only know the one song.”

  Caroline looked up and laughed. “Certainly not! We do not want poor Sir Phillip Sidney to rise from his grave in protest.”

  “I will only not sing again if you will let me come in and talk to you.”

  Caroline looked at his beloved face, bathed in moonlight and hope. Yes, she had been a fool to think she could ever leave him.

  She was a fool no longer. “I will do more than that,” she answered. “I will marry you.”

  All the onlookers burst into applause, while Phoebe and Sarah danced a little happy dance, waltzing each other around the room.

  Justin rose slowly from his knees. “Say that again,” he said in a strangled voice.

  “I will marry you!” she shouted happily.

  Justin ran up the front steps then and through the door that Mary had gone down to obligingly hold open for him.

  Caroline spun about and dashed out of the room. They met halfway up the staircase, and Justin caught her against him in a kiss that no woman could be foolish enough to leave again. He lifted her off her feet, and she wound her arms about his neck, clinging as if she would never let go.

  Justin pulled back and leaned his forehead against hers. “I just want to be certain I heard you correctly. Did you say you would marry me?”

  “I did, and I will.”

  “When?”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “A dash for Gretna Green?”

  Caroline hesitated, but then nodded. “If you like.”

  “Of course I would like it! To have you as my wife within days would be heaven. But I could not do that to you. Your first wedding was an elopement. This time you should have all the gewgaws.”

  “Like cake!” a voice cried. “And champagne.”

  “And rose petals!”

  They looked up to see Phoebe and Sarah hanging over the banister, watching them with avid young eyes.

  “And we want to be bridesmaids,” Phoebe added. “In orange silk.”

  “No, blue,” said Sarah.

  “All right, then. Blue.” Phoebe sighed happily. “It will be just like Lady Arabella’s Royal Wedding.”

  “You see, now, Caroline dear,” Justin said. “We must have a grand wedding. We could never disappoint two such lovely, and helpful, young ladies. Could we?”

  “I suppose not. A grand wedding it is, then.”

  “In the autumn? At Waring Castle?”

  Caroline nodded and actually giggled in her soaring delight. “Autumn. And not a day later!”

  Then she leaned her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes. Safe. She was safe at last. After all the years of searching, of loneliness, she would never be alone or fearful again.

  Epilogue

  October, Waring Castle

  “It is all so lovely,” Phoebe said, her voice rhap
sodic. “Just like ...”

  “The Sins of Madame Evelyn?” suggested Harry.

  “I would wager it is The Enchanted Vale,” said Sarah.

  “You are both wrong,” protested Phoebe. “I was going to say it is just like a ... a fairy tale. Like the ones Caro read to me when I was very little.”

  Indeed it was. The three of them stood at the edge of the grand ballroom at Waring Castle, watching the dancers swirl and twirl in the figures of a waltz. Bright silks and satins and flashing jewels created a kaleidoscope of color and motion. Music soared to the sky blue-painted dome above, and the scent of flowers hung sweetly in the cool autumn air.

  It was like a scene from a fairy tale, a royal ball on the eve of a glorious wedding.

  And at the center of it all were a prince and princess, or rather an earl and a countess-to-be.

  Phoebe watched her sister dancing in the arms of her almost-husband, looking radiant and happy in a gown of emerald green silk, and she gave a smug smile. Without her help, things would not have reached this most satisfactory conclusion, and she was feeling quite smart indeed.

  Surely there were other people who could benefit from her help. She would just have to look about for them, after her wedding duties were concluded.

  “I suppose we will not see each other again until Christmas, Phoebe,” Harry said to her quietly.

  She turned and smiled at him. Dear Harry. How very dashing he looked tonight, in his red-and-gold striped waistcoat and red coat. It went so well with her own coral-colored ensemble. “I suppose we will not,” she answered lightly. “You are off to take charge of Seward Park, and I will be staying with Sarah and her family while my sister is on her wedding trip to Scotland.”

  Harry shifted on his feet, uncharacteristically shy. “But ... well. Dash it, that is, will you write to me, Phoebe? While I am gone?”

  Phoebe laughed and tucked her hand in the crook of his elbow. “Of course I will write to you, Harry! We are family now.”

  “Are you happy tonight, Caroline dearest?” Justin swung his bride-to-be in a wide circle, making her skirts shimmer in an emerald fire.

  She tightened her grip on his shoulder and laughed merrily. For the first time in many, many years she felt free. Free and light and young. In his arms, she knew she could soar. “Happier than I have ever been.”

  “And this is only the beginning.”

  “Oh, yes! Only the beginning.”

  The Rules of Love

  Chapter One

  “Family disagreements should be avoided if at all possible. If not possible, they should always take place in private, away from the eyes of servants and friends.”

  —A Lady’s Rules for Proper Behavior, Chapter Two

  “Oh, Allen. What have you done this time?”

  Though she’d spoken softly, Rosalind wanted to groan the words, scream them out, even throw something at her brother’s head as he lounged so casually in his chair across from her. She could not, of course. That would be highly improper, and it would never do if one of the teachers or, heaven forbid, one of the girls heard her make a fuss. So she folded her hands on the mahogany surface of her desk, clasping her fingers together until the knuckles turned white.

  Besides, even if she did throw something at Allen, it would scarcely make a dent in his thick skull. This was a scene they had played out dozens of times, and it always ended the same way.

  “Oh, now, Rosie, really that is unfair,” Allen protested. He crossed his booted foot over his buckskin-covered knee and jiggled it impatiently. Rosalind frowned as flakes of mud showered from the boot’s sole onto the freshly polished floor. “I have done nothing untoward! A man must pay his gaming debts, after all. It is a point of honor.”

  Honor? Rosalind’s head pounded as if a hundred drummers were tattooing that word inside her brain. She should show him honor, the ignorant young pup!

  Be calm, she thought, pressing her fingertips to her temples. Remember how your parents asked you to look after him.

  Remember the rules. Breaking his skull was assuredly against the rules.

  She reached out for the frighteningly official-looking letter. “So you borrowed money from a bank?”

  “It was only until I receive my allowance. I needed to pay Carteret right away, you see, or I could not have shown my face at the club. They were never supposed to bother you, Rosie. It’s dashed embarrassing to have them go to one’s sister! What if Morley, or one of the others at the club, found out?”

  Morley again. Always the blasted Viscount Morley. Even the very name made Rosalind silently curse, which usually she would never dream of doing. Cursing was also against the rules. Morley was the one who led Allen, and no doubt other impressionable young men, into folly. Morley, and his club, were a terrible influence on Allen.

  But Rosalind did not say that. Any time she tried to talk to Allen about Lord Morley and his questionable activities, to warn him, he cut her off. It was futile—as futile as urging him to concentrate more on his studies and less on the lures of Town.

  “Your allowance would never have covered this amount,” she told him. “Not in a year. And the interest . . . !” Rosalind took a deep breath. “Allen, banks have ways of compelling people to pay. This is a legal debt. Do you have any idea what you have gotten yourself, not to mention this school and me, into?”

  Allen’s face, so bored and careless-looking ever since he had come into her office, flushed a dull red. His foot slid off his knee to land with a loud thud on the floor and he pointed a shaking finger in her direction. “Now, see here, Rosie! I am eighteen now. I can’t stand for having my sister ring a peal over my head. I must live my own life, as a man.”

  Rosalind had had just about all she could take of this scene. Her head was pounding as if it would explode, and she knew that nothing she could say or do would persuade Allen of the truth. These days, only Morley could do that.

  “I must remind you that I am your guardian until you are twenty, along with Uncle Silas, though truly I do everything since he lives in the wilds of Yorkshire. Our parents wished it this way, and in any case they left neither of us much money. It is your sister who pays for your schooling at Cambridge, as well as your allowance, and it is your sister who pulls you out of the soup every time you fall in. Which has been more and more of late!” Her voice rose dangerously on those last words. Rosalind took another deep breath and folded her hands together again. She would not let this get the better of her. “We are not wealthy people. This school allows us to be quite comfortable, but we cannot be extravagant as Mo—as some of your friends are.”

  Allen crossed his arms across his chest, still mulishly stubborn. “I am not extravagant, Rosie! I only need the necessities.”

  “Such as gaming debts? Coats from Weston? New boots every week?”

  “I told you, it was the—”

  Rosalind held up her hand to stop his endless flow of protests and explanations. “I know. It was for your club.”

  “Well—yes. It was. You must agree that a man must maintain his good name at his club.”

  Rosalind sighed, and resisted the almost overpowering urge to sink back wearily in her chair. She wished she could take a tisane and crawl into her bed, to sleep and forget all this. But she could not. It was too early in the day, and she had far too many responsibilities. The parents of her pupils would be arriving soon to take their daughters home for the spring holiday, for the beginning of the Season in London.

  “I cannot think about this right now, Allen,” she said. “Most of the students are leaving today, and I must see them off.”

  Allen nodded, obviously deeply relieved. He never liked quarrels, even when he was the one who started them. “Of course, Rosie. I’ll just come back tomorrow, then, or the day after.”

  Two days. That would give him plenty of time to run up even more debts, Rosalind thought. He would never learn. She just nodded, though, and watched him gather up his hat and greatcoat and hurry to the door.

  The
re he turned back and gave her an uncertain glance, a flicker of a pleading smile. “Er, Rosie, about that letter from the bank ...”

  Rosalind stared down at the letter beneath her clenched hands. The stark black signature stared back, like an accusation. An accusation that she was failing in her duties to her family. Her parents, her flighty, social mother and her distracted vicar father, had always relied on her to look after Allen. Now that they were gone, she owed that to them even more. She was all Allen had. “I will write to them, and see what can be done. I will take care of it.” As always.

  Allen gave her a relieved smile, and came back to kiss her cheek. “You are a brick, Rosie. I knew you would see that it could not be helped.”

  She answered his grin with a stern frown. “I do not see any such thing. All I see is that banks must be dealt with. But I have no time to talk about this now. Just go, Allen.”

  Rosalind closed her eyes, and did not open them again until she heard the click of the door closing.

  Alone at last. Her office, her sanctuary, looked the same as it always did. The lovely, restful lavender and cream draperies and chairs and settees, chosen to be feminine and soothing, were the same. The small mahogany desk she sat behind, the painting of pink and white roses that hung above the fireplace, the porcelain shepherdesses and vases on the tables—all the same. This room was where she could come to be alone, to be quiet, to do what she loved most in the world—write, and run her school.

  Yet after such meetings with her brother, such futile, ridiculous meetings, nothing could soothe her.

  “If only I wasn’t a lady,” she murmured, “I would have a whiskey.”

  Just as her late husband Charles had when things became too contentious. It had always soothed the few rough patches in their marriage.

  But she was a lady. She had standards—high standards—to uphold. And the parents of her pupils would be arriving soon to fetch their precious daughters for their holidays. It would simply never do to greet them with whiskey on her breath!