Fair Fatality Read online

  Matters could not be left in this highly unsatisfactory manner; somehow Lady Easterling must be persuaded to abandon her missish guise. Infinitely more appealing had been her own harum-scarum ways. They would not do for Carlin, naturally, but the hoydenish Jaisy would suit some other gentleman very well — probably any number of other gentlemen. And it was further indication of his innate knavishness that this conclusion made Lord Carlin feel as sulky as a bear.

  Nineteen

  * * *

  Fate, having tipped Lady Easterling a doubler, was in the process of similarly serving home-brewed up to her brother Jevon, who was strolling along Oxford Street on this particular day. The weather had turned from eternal fog and mist to impending torrential downpour, and few pedestrians were about. Rain would turn the dust and refuse accumulated in the gutters into mud that in some places would, be ankle-deep. Had Mr. Rutherford realized the nature of the day, he might well have remained snugly within his chambers at the Albany.

  Despite the imminent danger of a dunking, Mr. Rutherford was not displeased with his decision to take the air, for even this mild degree of exercise proved beneficial to the functioning of his intellect. Jevon had lain too long abed, he now realized. Important things were happening in the world. A gentleman of action should be out among his peers, gleaning the latest news and acting upon it, instead of shuffling like an invalid between his own lodgings and his aunt’s residence in Queen Anne Street.

  Yes, and those forays had gained him precious little benefit, Jevon reflected. A frown creased his handsome brow. He had not set eyes on his beloved since their last encounter in this very neighborhood, when she had with such tender solicitude bade him go in out of the cold. Tender solicitude? Jevon inquired of himself. The misbegotten Confucious received more solicitude from Miss Valentine than he. And moreover was much more often privileged to enjoy her company.

  Sara was avoiding Jevon, obviously, retiring to her garret the moment he set foot within the entry hall of Blackwood House, behaving very like a lady who had taken an aversion. That she had done no such thing, Jevon of all people should have known, due to his vast experience with feminine crotchets and megrims. Was he not the best-beloved gentleman in all of London, Jevon Rutherford of the disarming smile and great good humor and golden hair? Certainly he was, though Jevon’s handsome head was not so swelled that he dwelled upon the fact. His looking glass showed him the same reflection as always. He concluded that a man embarked upon the winning of his chosen lady derived no benefit whatsoever from myriad past amours. That Miss Valentine might fancy herself in the latter category instead of the former never occurred to Jevon, because he did not think of his Sara in that way — or not for more than moments, transgression for which he may surely be forgiven, gentlemen stricken by Cupid’s dart being prone to somewhat heated fantasies, especially gentlemen with backgrounds so enviable as Jevon’s. But that background availed him nothing now, was perhaps a distinct hindrance. Jevon could not rid himself of the appalling suspicion that his beloved preferred a country bumpkin. Determined as she was to avoid Jevon, Sara apparently enjoyed rattling around the metropolis with Arthur Kingscote in tow.

  Love is a malady with frequent adverse effects. Jevon’s customary good humor had abandoned him, as had — in the case of Arthur Kingscote — his tolerance. He thought he would like to see Mr. Kingscote drawn and quartered, tarred and feathered, at the very least ridden out of the city on a rail, and at the best, trundled off to the infernal regions in a handcart.

  Mr. Rutherford, as he indulged in these unhappy and uncharitable thoughts, proceeded in a leisurely manner along Oxford Street. This was a wide thoroughfare, its pavement inlaid with flagstones, its street lamps enclosed in crystal globes, its shops offering every manner of merchandise from stuffed birds to the finest English porcelain. Jevon passed by linen-drapers, silk mercers, dressmakers and milliners. His desultory glance moved over windows displaying jewels and silver, china and glassware, silks and muslins and calico. Mr. Rutherford’s manner was that of a man who has sampled a ruddy, luscious-looking apple, and has found it sour.

  For this disillusionment, a lesser man might have held the apple to blame. Mr. Rutherford was more generous. It was he who had gazed upon the fruit and experienced hunger, who had plucked the apple from its bough and bitten into its red flesh. Therefore, any indigestion he suffered was his own fault. And furthermore, a mouthful of sour apple was infinitely preferable to having bitten into a worm. As may be deduced from the preceding example of his logic, Mr. Rutherford was an optimist. He was also a man on whom severe head colds had a disastrous effect, as if congested nasal passages also blocked the clear flow of thoughts to and from his brain.

  Mr. Rutherford was not accustomed to coming in second-best in the game of hearts. Very well; this time he had been dealt a less-than-perfect hand, and he must determine his best strategy. Should he nobly step aside and allow his Sara the suitor of her choice? Arthur Kingscote would doubtless dote on her, shower her with affection and never cause her a moment’s unease. Actually, Arthur Kingscote would probably make Sara a more comfortable husband than Jevon himself, because a gentleman with Jevon’s background could never be certain just who or what might appear unheralded on his doorstep, no matter how thoroughly he’d reformed. This realization did not noticeably alleviate the tension in Mr. Rutherford’s jaw. He had not hitherto realized just how very unmixed a blessing would be marriage to himself. Had it occurred to him that Miss Valentine might have a not unreasonable objection to the intrusion of diverse females into their connubial bliss, he might have long ago embarked upon the reform of his way of life.

  Yes, and then again he might not have, because that way of life had suited very well until recently. Jevon had not thought about marriage with his Sara until she had hoaxed him with her declared intention of going upon the boards, and Kit had introduced the subject of wedlock. What an amazing thing was coincidence! mused Jevon, and shook his handsome head. If not for those two chance remarks, he might still not have realized that his customary pursuits no longer appealed. Or, Jevon amended, for he was honest with himself, that the notion of pursuits engaged upon with Sara appealed a great deal more. Quantity had too long diverted him. Quality was all.

  His chosen lady of quality would not have him, Jevon reminded himself, not that so disheartening a fact was one he was likely to forget. What was to be done? Jevon was not certain. He did not think he possessed sufficient nobility of character to allow his Sara to bestow her hand upon a country bumpkin, even if Arthur Kingscote was the better man. Some resolution of this muddle would present itself to him, Jevon decided. Meanwhile, Sara could bestow her hand upon no one whilst in the employ of Lady Blackwood. And hadn’t the dowager duchess intended Arthur Kingscote for Jaisy? What a pretty bumblebath! Jevon realized he had been standing for several moments staring blankly into the window of a corsetier’s shop. Quickly he continued his perambulations, lest some passing acquaintance deduce his excellent physique was due less to a bountiful Nature than to the Apollo, a constricting influence composed largely of whalebone.

  First Jaisy must be settled, and then Jevon could devote his energies to Miss Valentine once more. Tempting as was the idea of Arthur Kingscote rendered unsuitable for further pursuit of Miss Valentine by marriage to Lady Easterling, Jevon could not condemn his sister to so ruinous a mésalliance. Carlin it would have to be, in defiance of the dowager duchess, a notion first conceived by Mr. Rutherford after overindulgence in egg hot and bishop and dogs’ noses, Battley’s Sedative and Morris’s Drops; and now remembered after prolonged inhalation of cool damp air. From every angle, Mr. Rutherford re-examined his brainstorm. Prolonged cogitation, the situation had called for. Mr. Rutherford seriously questioned whether he had cogitated long enough.

  Too late now to stay his hand; the die had been cast. There was more in him of his damnably manipulative aunt than Jevon had hitherto realized. This was his day for lowering reflections, it seemed.

  After brief contemp
lation of his own ignoble character, Mr. Rutherford progressed to more constructive thoughts. That Carlin had begun to pay very marked attentions to Jaisy, Jevon was aware — not from Kit, who had grown very reticent on the subject, as if he mistrusted the quality of his friend’s advice, but from mutual acquaintances with wagers on the matter listed in various of London’s betting books. These acquaintances had greatly enlivened Jevon’s sick room. It would have taken more than the risk of contracting a head cold to deter them from avidly following the progress of their bets. A pang of guilt smote Jevon, and was as abruptly dismissed. Once Jaisy was tied-up, he would be free to reintroduce the subject of trysts to Miss Valentine. Consequently, he must be gratified by the woolly-headed conduct of his chosen sacrificial lamb.

  Because he had embarked upon this expedition with a vague notion that he might again encounter his beloved similarly venturing abroad, Jevon paused to take stock of his surroundings. On a street corner stood a woman selling apples hot from her charcoal stove, a child peddling lavender grown at Mitcham and used in linen-presses to counter the abominable smell of the laundry soap; crossing the street was a chimney sweep carrying brush and scraper and shovel, and wearing in his cap a brass plate containing his master’s name and address. Then Jevon’s eye was caught by a huge mosque, its cupola white and blue, surmounted by a crescent and driven by a dapper young man. When this astounding spectacle revealed itself as an advertisement for a patent medicine, Jevon actually smiled. As he did so, the first drops of rain began to fall. Cursing, he ducked inside the nearest establishment, which turned out to be the Pantheon Bazaar. Jevon shook raindrops from his person, then ran a knowledgeable eye over the diverse array of merchandise.

  Tippets of fur and feathers, French gloves and Indian muslins, satins and brocades, ribbons and plumes and lace; hinged silken parasols with folding wooden handles and whalebone frames; shawls of wool and silk — none of these miscellaneous feminine folderols and fripperies were alien to Mr. Rutherford, although he did gaze with slight astonishment upon some of the more fanciful merchandise, in particular a wash of Magnetic Dew Water, guaranteed to restore a youthful appearance even to ladies of antiquity. It was as he was contemplating bestowing some of this miraculous concoction upon his aunt that Mr. Rutherford realized he too was being observed.

  No dire presentiment struck him, as in justice it might have done; a man of Mr. Rutherford’s legendary exploits grows accustomed to the disadvantages of fame. Furthermore, Jevon was too kindly to slight any of the females by whom he had been favored, or even those who had merely wished to favor him, the numbers of which were legion and might be encountered anywhere. He turned to discover who owned the eyes which were boring holes into his back, with an expression of faint interest on his handsome face. Not even then did premonition strike him, with the discovery that the eyes were dark and lively, and set within the face of the pretty little opera dancer from Drury Lane. Quite the opposite. Jevon was as pleased to encounter that damsel as any other but one, because he suspected he’d treated her rather shabbily, encouraging her to get up her hopes when he meant to use her only as a decoy. Therefore he generously indicated his satisfaction with this chance encounter, and engaged the little opera dancer in the sort of sparkling conversation for which he was justly famed. That conversation’s charm consisted more in the manner of delivery than in its content.

  Jevon sought a tactful means by which to indicate to his companion that their mutually profitable interlude was at an end. His thoughtful eye fell upon a very fetching cottage bonnet of yellow twilled sarcenet, trimmed with lavish bunches of cornflowers and tied with a large yellow ribbon bow. Giggling, the opera dancer snatched the bonnet from his hands and crushed it down onto her head. His Sara would have looked fine as fivepence in that bonnet, Jevon thought wistfully. He wished that he might shower her with bonnets and every other extravagance. Unfortunately, Jevon’s competence would not stand such nonsense, and he had no doubt that Georgiana would fly straight into the boughs at the merest indication of an alliance between her hired companion and her heir. Again, so be it. Jevon would bypass any number of fortunes in favor of his Sara; and Sara, having not a penny to her name, was not likely to quibble over living on a competence. All the same, Jevon wished the worldly goods which he intended to bestow upon Miss Valentine amounted to much more.

  By now, perhaps, the reader may have noted certain resemblances between Mr. Rutherford and Lady Easterling. Though they differed greatly in temperament. Lady Easterling being extremely volatile and Mr. Rutherford largely blasé, they shared a common point of view, to wit, that a Rutherford must eventually be granted his or her request. Lady Easterling wanted Lord Carlin, and never for an instant doubted that having her would be Carlin’s fate; Mr. Rutherford felt similarly toward Miss Valentine. Both recognized that their progress would be stormy; nonetheless, both had determined to take the field.

  And, as Fate had planted Lady Easterling a facer, so did it hover in the wings to present a wisty cantor to Mr. Rutherford, who had no inkling that his comeuppance was about to be served. Outside the Pantheon Bazaar, the rain fell even harder. Oblivious to the elements, Mr. Rutherford contemplated his pretty little opera dancer. His attention centered not on the damsel but on her frivolous headgear. Of his beloved Sara’s lust for bonnets, Mr. Rutherford was aware. In point of fact, there was very little about Sara that Jevon didn’t know, always excepting the secrets of her heart, and even about those he could make a very shrewd guess. But deuced if he could understand why she encouraged Arthur Kingscote to dangle after her and cut off Jevon’s own compliments in mid-speech. If any other woman had thus blown first hot (the incident in the garden of Blackwood House) and then cold (every incident thereafter), Jevon would have thought she wished to rouse his jealousy. Sara, however, was no designing female. All the same, Jevon was so very envious that he quite understood his sister’s impulse to box her beloved’s ears.

  Too long, the little opera dancer had waited to be told that the cottage bonnet rendered her complete to a shade. She had already noted Mr. Rutherford’s tendency toward wool-gathering of late. Therefore, she grasped the quickest means of recapturing his wandering attention: she raised on tiptoe, placed her arms around his neck and kissed him enthusiastically.

  Though Mr. Rutherford was somewhat startled to be abruptly embraced, and in the midst of the Pantheon Bazaar, he took no particular offense. Little opera dancers were prone to express their gratitude in this straightforward fashion, and though he no longer was as appreciative of such a lack of artifice as once he had been, he was not so churlish as to refuse to cooperate. Such a nonchalant attitude may seem a trifle startling — but Jevon Rutherford had already embraced a thousand women, at the most conservative estimate. He had no reason to think that one more kiss would signify.

  Therein lay Mr. Rutherford’s error, and misfortune’s cue. As Jevon attempted to dissuade his opera dancer from further embracing him, yet without wounding her feelings in the process, he heard behind him a muffled oath, uttered in a voice that was disastrously well known. All need for tact forgotten, Jevon wrenched the clinging arms from around his neck and thrust the little opera dancer away. He turned around in time to glimpse Miss Valentine’s sodden and bedraggled person, to note the high color burning in her stricken face, before she slammed the shop door and ran back out into the rain-drenched street.

  Twenty

  * * *

  “By Jupiter?” exclaimed Lady Easterling, when apprised of these events. “What an unfortunate family we are! Why didn’t you go after her?”

  Mr. Rutherford gazed upon his sister — clad for an evening at Drury Lane Theater in a gown of pale blue muslin trimmed with knots of white ribbon — through eyes that were reproachful and reddened. “I did follow her, as soon as the accursed door came unstuck! Made an utter cake of myself, running down the street and calling out her name!”

  “And yet she ignored you?” Jaisy’s blue eyes were opened wide. “That was very bad of her — in fact,
it don’t sound at all like Sara! And why should she cut up so stiff just because you went in out of the rain?”

  Mr. Rutherford considered enlightening Lady Easterling as to the precise nature of his encounter with Miss Valentine, and then refrained. There were some things one did not discuss with one’s sister, among them a pretty little opera dancer who was at that very moment posturing upon the stage. “She did not exactly ignore me,” he said, and sneezed. “I caught up with her just as she was climbing into Sir Phineas’s carriage — oh yes, she was with Sir Phineas! I cannot decide if I dislike him more, or that mincing court-card! I was asked to state my business, if you please. When it evolved I had none — I’ve no intention of making Sir Phineas privy to my confidences; he’d merely repeat them to our aunt — I was sent about it! They did not even offer to take me up in the carriage, despite the rain; but drove right past me — and didn’t my man just give me a rare trimming for coming home covered with mud!”

  Cautiously, Lady Easterling regarded her aunt, but Georgiana was deep in conversation with Arthur Kingscote at the far side of the box. Arthur did not look to be deriving any great enjoyment from the dowager’s discourse. Lud, but wasn’t he a figure in his brown-spotted silk coat and breeches, his waistcoat embroidered with metallic threads, his pale pink stockings, seals and fobs and knots of ribbon at his knees! But what had Jevon said about Arthur? Could it be that Sara fancied him? Jaisy recalled that Arthur had offered to remain at Blackwood House this evening and keep Sara company, a generous suggestion which had made Georgiana quiver with outrage and announce that she wouldn’t have her servants mollycoddled, no matter how ill they were with head colds.