Miss Francie's Folly Page 16

  “Fifty to one! And you expect to win?”

  “—and with just four hundred pounds, we can have our twenty thousand before the day is out,” Coombs concluded with animation. “I knew it was meant to be when my button came off my waistcoat and—”

  “We are going to God-knows-where on the basis of a button? Take me home, my lord. Now!”

  “I’m telling you, fate sent this to us. My button rolled onto an announcement of this race and landed right on Fancy Dancer’s name. Surely you must see what this means?”

  “I see, Lord Coombs, that it means you are more harebrained than I ever believed possible!” she Francie flashed back, her dreams turning to dust even as the hooves of his lordship’s team kicked that commodity up into her face. “I demand that you turn around now. I’ve no intention of seeing this race or any other.”

  “Dash it all!” he expostulated, turning an angry face to her. “This isn’t some nodcock notion, you know.”

  Even as he spoke, his tiger seated behind him shouted, “Look out, m’lord!”

  Startled, Francie looked up in time to see a four-in-hand coach bearing down upon them. Coombs pulled on the reins, but in his agitation he was too forceful and his horses reared up, rending the air with their whinnying protest. The next instant, as the coach flew past them, an appalling crunch of splintering wood sounded, and they were jolted roughly from their seats and thrown to the ground.

  Several stunned seconds later, Francie opened her eyes to darkness. The instant of panic left her as she pushed the brim of her bonnet back from her face and rose shakily to her feet, fixing a wrathful eye upon his lordship.

  “Now see what you have done!” She pointed an accusing finger at the curricle, which lay on its side, bereft of one bright yellow wheel.

  Chapter 14

  The afternoon had given way to evening by the time Miss Hampton and Lord Coombs ceased blaming one another for the accident. While his lordship maintained that Miss Hampton’s arguing had distracted him, she held that his own lack of sense was responsible. Words of accusation and condemnation had flown thickly, clouding common sense from view Coombs’s tiger pointed out that the horses must be released from their traces. The young groom had been the most severely injured, with a nasty cut upon his forehead, but he declared himself able and willing to ride for help on one of the horses, which he did as soon as the animals were freed.

  He left the pair behind him sunk in gloom, rousing themselves only to cast further slurs upon each other’s head. They nearly came to blows when Lord Coombs declared he could now see why his mother had said Miss Hampton would never get off the shelf, but would remain an old maid. In the end, however, Francie merely sniffed and sat down in the grass at the roadside where the lone horse now grazed.

  Stripping off her gloves, she uprooted handfuls of green grass, spilling them indiscriminately over her lap. Finally she lay back in the cool grass and studied the loitering progress of white clouds across the clear sky while counting to herself in an effort to regain her temper. The fresh scent of the new grass, the lazy caress of the late afternoon sun, and the rhythmic swish of the horse’s tail all lulled Francie into a pleasant sleep.

  When she awoke, it was chill and silent. She was cramped and sore, and it was rapidly nearing nightfall. She sat up with a jerk, then sprang to her feet as she realized with a pounding heart that the bay was gone. Lord Coombs had deserted her!

  Her fear turned to sheer fury. Francie strode to the road and stood uncertainly for a bare moment before beginning to walk back in the direction of Town. She kicked a ball of dust at his lordship’s curricle as she passed it and thought how pleasurable it would be to kick him instead. Men! she thought with keen hostility. They were all the same. And not worth a tuppence the lot. If she could but lay her hands on one of them . . .

  Her vexation gave her the energy to keep walking long after she was too tired to do so. As darkness wrapped itself about her, she was forced to step more cautiously, stumbling several times and tripping once on the hem of her skirt. At last she thought she could move no farther. Too weary to maintain even her anger, she sank to the roadside and considered crying. She was, she decided, fatigued beyond tears.

  A distant drumming caught her attention. As it neared, it crystallized into the hammering of horses’ hooves and the creak of wheels along the road. Her heart matching the beat of the horses’ gait, Francie stood to the side and waited, ready to hail the vehicle and beg for aid. But she had no need to stop the carriage for, as the old country gig drawn by a sway-backed nag drew up, it pulled to a halt. Looking up, she was amazed to discover Lord Coombs handling the ribbons.

  “Miss Hampton! I feared I should not get back before you awoke. I trust you did not suffer undue alarm?” He held a hand down to her, which she accepted silently as he rattled on. “When Toby didn’t return, I could wait no longer. I took off after him, and it’s a deuced good thing I did! That bump to his head was worse than we thought. He fell from his horse and I found him lying by the side of the road. But I plucked him up and went on to procure this rig.”

  Feeling suddenly too tired to care whether she might have been murdered or worse while left alone by the side of the road, Francie made no comment whatsoever during the return journey, contenting herself with merely staring dully at the blue-black sky. When his lordship drew up before her home and tried to make an impassioned apology, she waved him away with one hand, expressed her hope that Toby was quite recovered, and bade him goodnight. She felt as utterly ramshackle as she knew she must appear and desired only to retire to her room.

  Entering the foyer, she left a trail of dust from the torn hem of her long skirt. Fortunately, the grass stains could not be easily seen on the dark green of her gown, but the stains upon her hands stood out vividly, as did the dirt beneath her nails. Her hair, which had not been properly combed to start, tumbled in bedraggled snarls about her shoulders. Her bonnet, with its soiled, crumpled sash, hung limply from her hand, and her shawl dragged from elbow to elbow in twisted disarray. Thus it was not to be wondered at that Miss Dill stopped dead upon sighting this ragamuffin vision.

  “Frances! What on earth has happened?” she cried. “As if there has not already been enough!”

  “It is nothing, Agnes. Do not fuss. Indeed, Lord Coombs’s curricle met with an accident, but nothing is truly the matter that a little soap and water cannot mend. You need not look so distraught.”

  “But you do not know!” Agnes objected. Lowering her voice to a dramatic whisper, she explained, “I’ve been waiting for hours to tell you. You must come with me at once!”

  She did not listen to Francie’s loud protests, but clasped her hand and tugged her into the sitting room. Shutting the door, she leaned against it and said with uncharacteristic emotion, “I have been out of my mind with worry! I fear I do not know what is to be done!”

  In no mood to face such theatrics, Francie sagged where she stood and said with a heavy sigh, “Agnes, I beg you to cease enacting me a tragedy and tell me what is wrong. I’ve had the most distressful day and long only for a bath and my bed.”

  “I scarce know where to begin,” Agnes declared, wringing her hands. “You see, I had the misfortune of being in a most awkward position this afternoon.”

  “Please cease this roundaboutation!” Francie’s voice hovered in the air, then tumbled tiredly as she dropped upon the nearest chair.

  Miss Dill took the opposite chair, folded her hands together, inhaled deeply, and began. “Very well. Your sister Mary received a call from Mr. Harvey this afternoon here in the sitting room. I had come to this room to be by the warmth of the fire and was employing my time by mending several unmentionables when I heard them approach. Upon recognizing the deep tones of a male voice, I naturally repaired behind the screen to avoid the embarrassment that must ensue should he see the articles upon which I worked.”

  Both ladies focused upon the cloth print screen standing in the farthest corner of the room. Knowing why Mary had inv
ited Mr. Harvey to call, Francie said simply, “You overheard them.”

  “I meant to make presence known immediately. But before I could—the very instant the door had shut, in fact—Mary behaved in the most shocking manner!” Miss Dill’s indignation pealed through the room. “She threw herself upon the gentleman mostly wantonly and professed her love for him! And she addressed him by his Christian name!”

  Francie brightened. At last some good news! Eagerly she leaned toward her friend and demanded to know Mr. Harvey’s response to this disgraceful behavior.

  “At first he acted quite properly. He detached your sister from about his neck and begged she would remember she was about to become affianced to another. But I’m afraid Mary was lost to all sense of propriety. She promptly flung herself back into his arms and announced she did not care for anything but him!”

  Better and better. Francie’s fatigue fell away with the thrill of success, and she prompted impatiently, “And then? What happened then?”

  “Oh, my dear, I cannot know how to tell you,” Agnes claimed on a near-wail. “Mary told the gentleman—my dear, you will never credit this, I’m sure –she told him that you had fallen in love with him and desired to be his wife.”

  Striving to keep from betraying herself with a blush, Francie bent her head and murmured, “Where can she have gotten such a caper-witted notion?”

  “I need not tell you that Mr. Harvey was horror-stricken at that idea! And then, oh, Frances, and then your sister descended to such vulgarity I know not how to tell you!”

  “Just tell me, Agnes. You only make it worse by all this rambling.”

  “They discussed what to do that would cause the least suffering for everyone, the least scandal, and all the while Mary insisted that if you wish to marry him, you would, for no one was more determined than you—with which, Frances, I can only agree, for you are very like a dog with a bone once you—”

  “Agnes! What did they decide” Francie broke in with a great deal of heat. This was what she had been working toward—Mary’s decision to end her betrothment to Sir Thomas—and she must hear of it now!

  “My dear, they’ve run off!” cried Miss Dill.

  For a moment Francie did not understand. “Run off?” she repeated stupidly.

  “Eloped!”

  “What!”

  With the satisfaction of one who has delivered a piece of news to great effect, Miss Dill explained, “As bold as brass, Mary declared they should elope. To give him credit, Mr. Harvey strenuously resisted the idea at first, but your sister convinced him it was the only way. She told him you would come to understand and forgive him in time and that it would be far better to break swiftly and cleanly than to prolong your suffering. I do not know how I remained silent behind the screen.”

  The fog of stupefaction was clearing. Francie shook her head, then stood up. “When did all this occur? Have they already left? Have you told anyone else?”

  “No,” Agnes replied in response to the last of these rapid volleys. “Your parents have been from home since early afternoon and neither has returned. Mr. Harvey left, then returned at five o’clock. Mary went with him.”

  “Five o’clock! It is nearing nine now! You did nothing to stop them?”

  “My dear, what could I do. I have no say over your sister’s actions.”

  With another emphatic shake of her head, Francie cleared the last of the shock from her mind. She had never meant for Mary to go to such scandalous lengths. They must be stopped before the story was out. Ignoring Agnes’s questions, Francie ran from the room, heading straight for the morning room. There she threw open the desk and did not pause before gripping paper and quill.

  Though she had determined never to speak to him again following the argument at Almack’s, Francie did not hesitate now. Hastily, she scribbled, Come at once. I need you. Francie. Smudging the words as she folded the paper without allowing the ink to dry, she dashed out, calling for James as she went. The instant he appeared, she instructed him to deliver the note immediately to Sir Thomas.

  “Search the town for him if you must, but get this into his hands as quickly as possible!” she ordered.

  Moving directly to her room, she scrubbed the grime from her hands and face, pulled her hair back into a loose knot, and was reaching for the first button of her gown when Agnes burst in to tell her that Mrs. Hampton had arrived home at last. Leaving the button, she snatched up her heavy cloak and draped it over one arm as she strode into her mother’s boudoir, preparing herself for what could be an exhausting interview with Mama.

  To Francie’s vast surprise, her mother received the news of her younger daughter’s elopement with astonishing calm. She reclined on her chaise longue with closed eyes and wondered on a long sigh, “Whatever can have gotten into the silly child that she must needs run away like this?”

  Perversely, her mother’s placid acceptance sent Francie flying up into the boughs again. “What can have got into her? I can tell you, Mama, precisely what! Who wouldn’t run off to get away from being forced into marriage!”

  “Such fustian, Frances,” her mother said without moving a hair. “No one was forcing Mary into marriage. And it appears, my child, that marriage is precisely what your sister is after.”

  “But not to Sir Thomas! I cannot say that I blame Mary in the least!” Francie paced back and forth as she ranted on. “Oh, I’m not saying that we shall allow her to make such a mistake as a Gretna Green marriage. We shall stop her. But I don’t wonder at her going to such lengths to avoid a life with Sir Thomas Spencer and all his mistresses.”

  Mrs. Hampton opened one eye, watched her daughter take one fervent turn about the carpet, shuddered and closed it again. “Must you move so . . . energetically?” After a brief silence, she lifted her lids again to see Francie leaning wearily against the fireplace mantel, her bent head pressed into her crossed forearms. “You should not say such foolish things, you know, Frances.”

  The head lifted and Francie fixed a tired eye upon her. “What do you mean?”

  “My dear child, everyone knows the baronet hasn’t kept any muslin company in the last three years.”

  “He hasn’t?” Francie stared at her mother in disbelief. “But—but what about Caroline Bond?”

  “Caroline Bond has been the companion of the Marquess of Armourdale these past three years and more,” her mother answered.

  “And more?” Francie repeated, every muscle in her face taut with tension. It could not—it simply could not be the truth. She knew he had seen Caroline on the day of their betrothment—or at least, she thought he had. She had no time to sort out her memories, however, for James entered with a sharp tap to announce that Sir Thomas was waiting for them below.

  Francie did not stop to think how she should greet the man with whom she had so recently and so violently argued. She swept up her cloak and took the stairs at a gallop. He stood in the hall, watching her flying descent with a quizzical expression. She was aware of a tremendous relief and without hesitation came to a halt by casting herself into the folds of his greatcoat and exclaiming, “Thank God you have come!”

  Clamped as she was against his chest, Francie felt the shudder that passed through him. She heard the breath he drew from his innermost depths and quivered in trembling response. His arms came round to enfold her for the barest second, then his hands took firm hold of her shoulders, and he put her from him. Tilting her white face up to the light of the branched candelabra, he searched her eyes intently.

  “What is wrong, Francie? How may I be of help to you?”

  His controlled tones calmed her and, taking a steadying breath, she opened her mouth to reply. But it merely hung wordlessly wide as she took in the bright hint of a snowy cravat at his neck, the tight black trousers flowing into pumps at his feet. Contrition furrowed her brow. “Oh,” she said flatly. “You’re wearing evening dress.”

  “Yes, I was on my way out when your note arrived.” His lips curved gravely upward. “And it looks
rather as if you’ve been out. What has happened? Why are you looking like some street urchin?”

  “I’m sorry,” she murmured with unaccustomed penitence. “I’ve had a rather . . . distressful day. I shouldn’t have disturbed your evening.”

  “Don’t be cloth-headed, Francie,” he returned softly. “If you needed me, I would come from the gates of heaven to help you. Now tell me why you summoned me so frantically.”

  She managed a lopsided smile. “It’s Mary. She’s eloped. With Mr. Harvey.”

  His hands dropped away from her arms and his brow lifted. “Indeed?”

  “Yes! We—we must go after them, stop them before it’s too late!”

  The emotional strain of the day became a burden Francie could no longer bear. Before she could repress them, tears welled up in her eyes to spill over her lashes, clumping them darkly together. They coursed in rivulets down her cheeks, one charting a path over her nose. She made no effort to stop them or to dash them away, but let them stream freely down to splash past the fluted lace about her neck to form dark patches on the bodice of her dress.

  Sir Thomas did not attempt to interrupt her weeping, but began issuing orders like a general about to enter the battlefield. He dispatched his groom with commands to return with the baronet’s curricle and fleetest team of horses, as well as a study pair of boots and leather gloves. He sent James to fill a flask with Mr. Hampton’s best brandy. Even Miss Dill was recruited to request a light meal of the cook.

  When they were alone in the hall, he turned at last to Francie and said in a voice that was oddly rough, “Don’t worry, Francie, I’ll have them back well before dawn. In a hired chase they can’t be too far ahead.”

  Francie sniffed, then hiccupped. She rubbed her dampened face vigorously with both palms, then sniffed again. Through her fingers she saw a fluttering of white, reached gratefully for the proffered handkerchief and blew her nose with a most unladylike thoroughness.

  At last she expelled a deep sigh. “Thank you. You are very . . . kind.”