Beth and the Mistaken Identity Page 11

  ‘You really are in luck then, that’s where my lord, the Marquis of Wrexham lives.’

  Sophy frowned momentarily. She did not know the marquis, but it would be assured that her guardians did. Grosvenor Square was a little too close to home in case she was recognised. She had noted that she did not draw attention that she usually did in London streets, and was a little lowered to think that it might be the cause of her gown. If the admiration one received was only for one’s dress, it was very sad indeed. However, it reduced the chance of being recognised, and for that she was thankful. She would give the tall servant the slip when she saw some place she recognised. They walked for some time, the tall, handsome servant feigning disinterest, but taking a look at her occasionally none the less.

  ‘You’re a pretty piece,’ he said, eventually. Sophy started. Gentlemen said the same things in a rather more delicate way.

  ‘Lawks!’ she said, imitating the chambermaid at Horescombe House.

  ‘Who are you to work for? Don’t be afraid, they don’t usually bite, and you’ll get used to London being so big.’

  Sophy held up her nose. ‘I’ve been here before, my lad,’ she said, aping Betty’s Devon accent, ‘I’m a-joining my mistress.’

  ‘You’re a bit young to be a lady’s maid ain’t you?’ and Sophy realised that Beth had been so. She supposed it was an achievement for a young girl. ‘Well, glad you’re in the square,’ he winked, ‘maybe I’ll see you around. What household do you join?’

  ‘Never you mind.’

  ‘Just trying to be friendly.’ They walked on for some minutes, through Drury Lane and its theatres, which the young girl seemed to be completely fascinated with. Nevertheless, she moved closer to him, as they passed the painted ladies, the street women with their bawling babes - some reeking of gin, the lolling gutter-snipes, and those men she had heard referred to as ‘flash coves’, an obscene and gaudy pantomime of real gentlemen.

  Her tall companion spoke to take her mind off the poor, crying baby which had indeed made her eyes fill. ‘Why are you not with your mistress then?’

  ‘An accident, I had to stay behind when my mistress carried on.’

  ‘What name?’

  Sophy said the first name that came into her mind, knowing that it could mean nothing to him. It was not Horescombe, which he might just know as a neighbour to his lord. And then, Sophy had learnt that the nearer one stuck to the truth, the easier it was to remember the lie. ‘Miss Ludgate,’ she said breezily.

  The tall servant stopped. ‘You don’t mean it? You’re Miss Sophy’s lost maid?’

  Sophy was, for once, totally silenced.

  Beth jumped up as she heard the marquis return, setting aside her book. She ran to the hall, where Frost was divesting him of his driving coat.

  ‘Your lordship, I mean Wrexham, I am so glad you have returned. If it is convenient I should like to speak to you.’

  He looked down on her, smiling that intimate smile that crinkled the lines around his deep sapphire eyes and softened the harshness of his face. She was almost diverted from her purpose and smiled back a little too widely, quite forgetting her task for a second. He broke the moment, saying, ‘It is quite convenient, Miss Frost.’

  The brilliance of his smile as he said this, the joy in his face seemed somehow inappropriate, as though he thought she had some good news for him. She noticed Frost frozen for a moment, watching them in a more interested fashion than butlers usually permitted themselves, and was a trifle confused. At any rate, she must finish her errand and she asked enquiringly, tilting her head, ‘In the library, my lord?’

  He smiled, again with more brilliance than was his wont, and they moved into the room.

  ‘The library will miss you when you are gone, Miss Fox,’ he remarked.

  ‘And I it,’ said Beth, looking around.

  ‘Have you enjoyed your morning with the Greeks?’

  ‘Well yes, when I was able to concentrate. Only I was diverted by a conversation I had with Dobson before he left. That is what I wanted to discuss with you.’ She was looking up at the marquis and saw his eyes dull and his smile fade. ‘Are you annoyed with me sir? Do I intrude?’

  ‘No, I merely thought — hoped — that you might be about to discuss another matter with me.’ He took a seat on the elegant sofa and crossed his legs, looking more forbidding than she had seen him thus far.

  ‘I — do not understand. What matter?’ she said, suddenly nervous.

  ‘Something of rather more importance to me than domestic matters,’ he said in the same, drawling voice.

  His dismissive tone enraged Beth once more, but she kept her tone clipped by saying, ‘There are people behind those domestic matters you find so unimportant.’ She tried to bite it back, and was surprised to see his eyes alight with the old amusement once more. ‘I’m so so—’

  ‘Sorry. I know. You always are after you give me a dressing down. It is most amusing.’

  ‘I can hardly believe the things I say to you. It is just that I have been turning Dobson’s words over in my mind—’ she blushed, and held her hands together in a penitent pose. ‘But it is no excuse. I will discuss whatever you wish.’

  ‘Come, sit,’ he said, perhaps a little penitent himself, indicating the place at the other end of the sofa. Beth did so, still a little stiff, but breathing hard at their nearness, the safe distance eaten up by heat. His eyes seemed to drop to her heaving bosom for a fraction of a second and she was ashamed to give away her reaction to him. He grasped one of her little fists and said, ‘Oh Beth,’ she trembled at his first use of her name, ‘pray do not poker up at me again. We are friends are we not?’ Her eyes had flown to his at the touch, but though it inflamed her, it comforted as well. His eyes were kind again, and she was able to relax a little. ‘I am willing to listen to whatever wonderful plan you have to heal the domestic disasters that I did not even know were fermenting under this roof before you got here, if we can discuss just one thing before we do so.’ He smiled and she squeezed his hand a little before he went on, and then removed hers from his.

  ‘Of course.’ And she smiled at him then, in almost her old way.

  ‘I wish you could confide in me, Beth. You have said we are friends, and I feel it to be so. Would you not tell a friend your troubles, would you conceal so much from him? I need to know your story, Beth.’

  Beth looked at him openly, but sadly. ‘All will be known when the Horescombes return on Friday. Can you not be content with that?’

  ‘So on Friday, the Horescombes will explain all to me? I would much rather you did that before. It would let me know that you trust me.’ His face was serious, and intense.

  Beth looked, and wondered if she could do it. But the look of disgust that she imagined once the truth was told held her silent. She needed the Horescombes to explain what she never could. It was not her place to accuse Miss Sophy, or to blame her for her own stupidity. ‘Please believe me, there are reasons, not all mine, that I cannot tell you all just now.’ His head dropped, losing contact with her eyes, and a muscle in his jaw moved. ‘Perhaps it would be better if I simply left,’ she said desolately.

  He rose and moved to the fire and stood with his back to her. ‘Don’t be absurd. All things will be clear when the general returns.’

  She regarded his back sadly, feeling like the biggest coward that had ever lived. ‘Wrexham —’

  He turned and smiled fleetingly. ‘No, my dear, I will not press you to say more. It is unkind of me. Now! Tell me what domestic disaster you wish to avert.’

  She matched his pretence that nothing had changed, told him, in carefully chosen words, the gist of her conversation with Dobson.

  ‘So you think that I need appoint an under-housekeeper? Why does Mrs Fitch not simply retire? Good God, she has been in my employ long enough to know that no awful fate awaits my old retainers. She will have a snug cottage on one of my estates and a pension. She has nought to fear.’

  ‘You do not understand. Mrs
Fitch is terrified of ceasing to be useful when the truth is, she is still of great value in your home. There is much more to a housekeeper’s responsibilities, you know, such as the household accounts and the running of staff, than walking up the stairs to see that maids have performed their duties. And it seems to me that Meg, long trained by Mrs Fitch, would be ably qualified to do that task.’

  ‘So you have already chosen my under-housekeeper?’ He laughed indulgently, even more like himself.

  ‘I do not even know her, sir. I am going by the advice of Dobson, who does,’ said Beth contritely, but with a little of her teasing tone.

  ‘What I do not understand, is that if this Meg is able to check the other maids, why on earth is she not doing so now?’

  ‘There is a little jealousy on the part of Mrs Fitch. At this time of weakness she fears being usurped. And if one does not have the authority, you know, it is tantamount to starting a battle to instruct other servants. ’

  He sighed. ‘I do not wish to know all this domestic detail. I need a wife to deal with these matters.’

  Beth blushed, and was shaken once more. But it was necessary to continue her task. His eyes seemed to linger on her blush in a questioning way that she feared. ‘Just one more thing. When you discuss the matter with Mrs Fitch —’

  He smiled a lazy and frightening smile, returning to the sofa, to her uneasiness. ‘— and you think I will obey you as usual?’ he teased.

  She could not help responding to his teasing as she always did, saying in the tone she would use to admonish her brother’s starts, ‘Of course you will. It is for your own benefit, after all. You must assure her that you cannot dispense with her services, so well has she run your house. But you have become aware of her illness, and understand that for physical tasks only, she requires some support, so you have determined to appoint Meg to the position of under-housekeeper. Strictly under her supervision.’ Beth looked at him, still lazily smiling. ‘Here is the most delicate part of the interview —’ he adopted a riveted expression, which she sent a quelling look to, ‘You must be a trifle devious I think. Before Mrs Fitch can repudiate the need for help, you will inform her that if she doesn’t accept the support, you will reluctantly have to send her to the country, because you could not have on your conscience the collapse of her health in your service.’

  ‘Inspired! I shall tell Dobson to convey those very words to Mrs Fitch as soon as he returns.’

  ‘Oh, no — it must be you, my lord.’

  His shoulders fell, ‘Why on earth—’

  ‘I assure you, anyone else but you would not carry the case. She would fear that Dobson was against her, and had informed on her. Or Cook or another would bare the blame.’

  ‘Thus causing future ructions,’ he said, defeated. ‘Very well, Miss Fox. It shall be I.’

  Her smiled glowed again, and for a moment he bent toward her. He hovered close and Beth felt she might never breathe again, but after a few seconds, he lifted a curl that had drifted close to her eye. He held it for a second seeming entranced by it, and Beth finally let out her breath. ‘Beth, please—’ he began. Her lips parted and trembled, she was locked in those deep sapphire eyes, a colour she had never seen before in a person. She could look nowhere else. She did not know what he begged of her, but the answer in her heart was yes. His eyes both questioned and enticed, but there was a place in them where she could lose herself forever — had already. They were frozen in the moment, Wrexham still holding her curl, and it was thus that the princess found them.

  Emmeline, pushing the ajar library door fully open, was saying, ‘Beth, you must come and see—’ She paused, taking in the quick parting of her brother, who had seemed to be holding a curl of Beth’s hair, and an embarrassed Beth.

  ‘Tobias!’ she said in the tone of a shocked duenna. ‘What are you about, being alone with Beth?’

  ‘The door was—’ protested her brother.

  ‘Ajar. I know. But that does not excuse this proximity to Beth.’

  Beth was blushing furiously now, saying, ‘Oh but there was nothing—’

  The princess raised her eyebrows, standing over them, now at the very opposite ends of the small sofa, ‘Nothing, you say? And how is it neither of you heard my arrival? Or my chatting to Frost as I took off my bonnet and arranged for the disposal of my parcels? The door is ajar, as you have so recently reminded me, Tobias, and yet I find you as close as any married couple.’

  Wrexham shot his sister a look of warning for her physical being, but she continued. ‘I was never more shocked!’ Beth could hardly look at Wrexham, but he said warningly to his sister, ‘Emmi, if you don’t stop this at once –‘

  Suddenly his sister whirled, and sat between them on the sofa, grasping the hand of each. ‘Oh my dears, I am so very happy. I knew this would happen from the very first!’

  ‘Emmi!’ said the marquis urgently, while Beth uttered, ‘I assure you it is not what you think—’

  But there had been a new arrival in the hallway, not from the front door but from the servants’ quarters, which they did hear this time. Dobson was saying in a low voice outside the door, ‘Wait there, you!’ Then he entered in a stately fashion. ‘Your lordship,’ he said now. ‘I believe I have some good news.’

  The marquis, who had feared a fresh domestic disaster, and had been grateful for the interruption nevertheless, stood and moved forward. ‘Indeed, Dobson? I think I stand in need of good news just now.’

  ‘I believe I have found Miss Lu— Miss Fox’s lost maid.’

  Beth’s mind froze for a moment, standing too. How on earth could—? But it was absurd, a mistake. Her voice shook as she said, ‘Ind-deed?’

  ‘Yes miss!’ He allowed himself a slight smile as he looked at Beth, ‘Shall I bring her in?’

  And Beth, so sure there was some dreadful mistake, could never have expected Sophy Ludgate, wearing some awful stuff gown, bobbing her a curtsy in the doorway. Beth collapsed in the nearest chair.

  The marquis saw a pretty young blond in an exceptionally dull dress, bobbing Beth a curtsy, with a kind of impish look on her face that was quite arresting, if hardly appropriate for her position.

  ‘Oh, Miss Sophy,’ she was saying to Beth, ‘I am ever so pleased to have found you again.’

  Beth’s mouth moved but no sound came out, and Wrexham was intrigued.

  ‘Hah! I told you so Wrexham!’ said his sister. But then she frowned slightly. ‘Did you not then, break your leg?’

  The girl blinked, then said with aplomb, ‘Oh, no, my lady. It turned out to be a bad sprain only.’

  ‘Very fortunate,’ drawled the marquis. ‘As was your discovery of your mistress’s location.’

  ‘I was fortunate to meet your butler, my lord, who offered to show me to Hyde Park, me not knowing that part of Lunnon, sir.’

  There was something pert about this maid. Although the tone in the thick country accent was servile, something in her dancing eyes, which she cast down occasionally, made him suspicious. Beth’s frozen aspect did not detract from this. She seemed fixated on her maid as though to a vision, and could not manage to speak.

  ‘Hyde Park?’

  ‘Well, I fancied Miss Sophy might have gone home to Horescombe House, my lord, and I would know my way from the park.’ She cast those laughing eyes down again, ‘and I didn’t want to give no strange Lunnon men my direction.’

  Dobson became even stiffer at this, looking down his nose at the maid.

  ‘I hope you have Miss F - Miss Ludgate’s baggage.’

  The maid opened those pert eyes wide, trying for innocence that Wrexham did not believe.

  ‘Oh, no my lord, there were too many trunks. So many fine dresses does Miss Sophy take on her journeys. It is to be sent on once I was certain of Miss Sophy’s direction.’

  Again, an inarticulate noise came from Beth, or Sophy, as he must accustom himself to think of her. She was blushing and shaking profusely.

  His sister was set on wrinkling out the details
. ‘I thought you believed her to be at Horescombe House?’

  ‘Well, as to that milady, it wasn’t quite decided,’ she appeared to take a fearful look at her mistress and added in a conciliating tone, ‘Miss Sophy having so many friends in Lunnon.’

  The marquis looked at Beth, concerned.

  ‘Very well. You may go,’ said the marquis with a nod to Dobson, who had to touch the girl’s shoulder to make her obey. She was looking at Beth with a blank look that he thought hid merriment. Obviously, only part of the mystery of Beth — Sophy — had been revealed, but he would not insult her by interrogating her maid in her presence.

  He looked at Beth now.

  She found her voice at last. ‘Wait!’ she said, ‘Send her to my room, if you please, I wish to speak with her.’

  The maid, almost out the door, had the temerity to raise her brows at this, and a hint of a grin passed her face, before she quelled it. She bobbed a curtsy once more. ‘Yes, miss.’ She said with that pert manner.

  ‘What a dreadful dress she was wearing Sophy,’ said the princess.

  Beth appeared to jump and uttered ‘Please call me Beth…’

  His sister was continuing, apparently missing much of what he had seen, ‘—do you not give her your old gowns? Or is she just an abigail, rather than your lady’s maid? She has a very countrified appearance. But rather pretty, I thought.’

  Beth seemed for a second to exhibit relief, but it was not long before the tightness returned. Why could she not tell him now, Wrexham thought. She must know what he felt. He watched her keeping her secrets, holding them in her tightly woven fingers, still not trusting him. It made him frustrated and angry. But the terror in her face, which she sought to mask with a closed expression, inclined him to her again, making him want to protect her from whatever haunted her.

  ‘She is not so long in my employ,’ she said answering the mild enquiry of his sister. ‘Now, if you do not mind, I would like to speak to my maid.’

  ‘I shall order tea at the half hour Sophy — Beth, if you prefer. Don’t be late. And afterwards I shall show you the glorious silks I bought today.’