Page 42 of The Chaperone
‘Good morning, Lady Sophy.’ Lord Rothley nodded a greeting in view of the pace. ‘Blowing the cobwebs away?’
‘If only it were cobwebs, my lord.’ She sounded calm, but her mind was suddenly jumbled. Lord Rothley was the very last person she wished to encounter, and yet also the one whose appearance lightened her deep gloom.
He glanced more closely at her, noted the shadows beneath her eyes, the crease between her brows.
‘Did your party not go as you had expected, or perhaps did it go as you had expected in an adverse sense?’ He was conscious of the groom’s presence.
Sophy coloured. Of course he knew about the Chelmarsh party, who did not? Did he wonder why he had been omitted from the list of guests or was it the sort of thing that rakes took in their stride?
‘More the latter, sir.’
‘One hardly need guess the source.’
‘No, one hardly need guess.’ She looked straight ahead and her voice was flat.
The horses, without encouragement, had drifted into a trot and now slowed to a walk. He was caught in the position where he could not reveal why he felt he had not just a right, but an obligation, to take a hand in the matter, but then how he might improve the problem was equally insoluble.
‘You cannot be blamed, you kn—’
‘Oh yes I can. And with justification.’ Sophy cut him off, brusquely. She was near the end of her tether, and bland assurances were of no help to her.
Lord Rothley wondered what had occurred, but plainly could not ask.
‘Is there anything I can do?’ It sounded ridiculous even to his own ears. Without being privy to events, without being trusted, what could he do?
‘What had you in mind, my lord?’ snapped Sophy. ‘Making her fall in love with you instead?’ She kicked the mare back to a canter. ‘Good day to you.’
He pulled up, stung as if she had struck him with her crop. Had they been alone he would have ridden after her, demanded to know more, demanded to have his innocence accepted. She thought him a Lothario upon the evidence that his father’s reputation was … disreputable. That was unfair, and also illogical, so why did she believe it? And when she said ‘instead’, did she mean make Susan Tyneham fall in love with him instead of having other men fall in love with her, or did she, just possibly, mean instead of herself? He rode on upon a loose rein, turning various possibilities over in his mind, lost in a brown study, and only at the last moment noticed Sir Esmond Fawley riding towards him, his face grim.
‘Fawley. You look as bad as I feel.’
‘I am wondering why I am such a damned fool.’
‘So am I. About myself, not you, that is.’
They exchanged looks, and knew they were united in the incomprehension of the male about the female.
‘Rothley, you said a few weeks ago, I might not ask about … about Miss Tyneham and Lady Sophy. Is that still the case, since I have to confess an interest?’
‘There is one thing perhaps above all you should know. It clarifies many things, and in fact whilst I was in ignorance of it, among the matchmaking mamas it is known, even if half forgotten.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Susan Tyneham is my half-sister.’
Sir Esmond’s mouth opened, and then closed. ‘Your …’
‘I suppose there were always less likely things. After all, my father debauched his way about Society for the best part of fifteen years before he took refuge abroad. I probably have a number of half-siblings littering the Ton. It isn’t edifying, but then, my sire’s behaviour never was. I therefore feel a degree of responsibility, not that he would.’
‘Yes, I can see that.’
‘It is not helped by the fact that I am damned sure neither she nor Lady Sophy, and of course Lady Harriet, have a clue that Tyneham was not her father. Brother Tyneham is well aware of it, however. He had the audacity to warn me off, and off Lady Sophy too, whom he regards as his preserve, the fool.’
‘And, just to be clear, you would far rather she were your preserve.’
‘Yes. However, she seems to keep me at arm’s length because of my papa’s reputation, and looks upon my protestations of a desire to help her in the light of nefarious seduction.’ A thought struck him. ‘Our, er, interests do not conflict?’
Sir Esmond shook his head.
‘I should be clapped in Bedlam for it, but the “awful Susan”, if you will forgive me being honest, draws me to her. The oddest thing is that I am one man she does not play the full power of her tricks upon, so I have not the excuse that she has, to use Lady Harriet’s term, “bewitched” me with intent. There is something about her, and it is not her beauty, and certainly not her wilful, selfish and unbelievably wild behaviour, but something I think, I hope, that lies beneath. Just once or twice I think I have glimpsed it and then she misbehaves as she did last night and …’
‘I gathered she had, from Lady Sophy, whom I found out riding earlier. She would not say more, but then her groom was close by, so even had she trusted me …’ Lord Rothley shook his head.
