The Irresistible Buck E-Book

Barbara Cartland

• Herausgeber: Barbara Cartland Ebooks Ltd
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Serie: The Eternal Collection
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 341

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

Handsome, dashing and a close friend of the Prince of Wales, Lord 'Buck' Melburne has London's Society ladies permanently swooning at his feet and so his nickname stuck with him. So, when Lord Melburne goes to his magnificent country seat at the urgent request of a young lady called 'Clarinda Vernon', a nearby neighbour of his, it turns out that she despises and hates him and so he is shocked and perplexed as this has never happened to him before. What could he possibly have done to offend her? He is even more shocked at Clarinda's request – that he agrees to marry her, purely to indulge the last wish of her dying uncle. Once Sir Roderick Vernon has passed away Clarinda will, she assures him, release him from his promise. Despite himself Lord Melburne is really fascinated by this innocent yet feisty red-headed beauty and he is deeply concerned for her safety when he hears of sinister Satanic goings-on in the nearby caves orchestrated by someone who means Clarinda harm and even worse. When she finds herself prone on the sacrificial Altar amid a terrifyingly depraved Black Mass, it is for his Lordship to save her that she prays to God. And when at last her prayers are answered, she realises that her hatred has turned to love and that for her too, Buck Melburne really is irresistible!

Leseprobe

CHAPTER ONE ~ 1802

Lord Melburne yawned.

As he did so, he realised that he was not tired but bored, bored with the picture of fat cupids discreetly veiled that faced him over the mantelshelf, bored as well with the pink satin curtains festooned with silk bows and tassels and bored too with the over-scented overheated room itself.

His eyes lit on his coat of superfine blue cloth thrown over the chair and his white muslin cravat lying negligently amongst the bottles, lotions, salves and perfumes on the overcrowded dressing table.

And the boredom of realising that he must rise and put them on made him yawn again.

“Tu es fatigué, mon cher?” came a soft voice from beside him.

He looked sideways to see two dark eyes raised to his, two red lips pouting provocatively and knew that they also bored him.

It was indeed an unfortunate moment for his Lordship to discover that he was bored with his mistress. Lying beside him against the lace-frilled pillows, she was wearing only a ruby necklace, on which he had expended quite an exorbitant sum of money, and red satin slippers to match the stones.

He recalled almost incredulously that he had pursued her ardently only a month ago. It had undoubtedly added some piquancy to his wooing that the lady in question, Mademoiselle Liane Defroy, was hesitating over whether to accept the protection of the Marquis of Crawley or that of Sir Henry Stainer.

The Marquis might have a higher social position, but Sir Henry Stainer was undoubtedly the wealthier. Both were generous to an extreme, both were members of the much-vaunted set of Corinthians that circled round the Prince of Wales and were habitués of Carlton House, the Prince’s majestic home in London.

That Lord Melburne had filched Liane from under their aristocratic noses had not only given him a quiet satisfaction but had also made the Prince laugh uproariously and declare that he was irresistible when it came to the fair sex.

It was this irresistibility, Lord Melburne thought now with a frown between his eyes that made life so incredibly boring. The chase was all too short and then the conquest was all too monotonous.

He found himself wishing that he was back with his Regiment and that there were battles still to be fought and won with an endless stream of Frenchmen to be chased and killed. The damned Armistice, he complained, had restored him to civilian life and all he could say was that it now seemed cursed dull.

He made a movement to rise and Liane’s little hands fluttered towards him.

“Non, non!” she exclaimed. “Do not move. It is still very early, and we have so much to say, tu comprends!”

Her lips were very near to his. He was overwhelmingly aware of the heavy scent that she used, which he thought was far too sweet, too sickly and now only added to his feelings of distaste.

He seemed almost to shake himself free from her clinging arms as he rose to his feet.

“I must get to bed early,” he said, reaching for his cravat. “I am leaving for the country tomorrow.”

“For ze country?” Liane repeated, her voice rising a little. “But then why? Why are you leaving me alone? C’est la folie! London is very gay, there is so much, how you say, pour t’amuser. Why should you wish to go where there is only ze mud?”

His Lordship next fixed his cravat with the experienced hand of a man who can dress competently without the help of a valet.

“I have to see an old friend of my father’s,” he replied. “I should have gone last week, but you persuaded me, Liane, against my better judgement to stay on in London. Now I must do my duty.

“C’est impossible!” Liane protested, sitting up on the bed with the rubies round her neck flashing in the light of the candles. “Have you forgotten ze party tomorrow night, ze party to which we are all invited, tout le Corps de Ballet? It will be very gay and I think also very naughty. You will enjoy it.”

“I have my doubts about that,” Lord Melburne responded, shrugging himself into his coat.

He stood for a moment looking down at her with her long hair dark as a raven’s wing that fell below her waist, at the small piquant face with its tip-tilted nose and wide mouth, which had seemed so entrancing only a few weeks ago. She was actually a clever dancer and she exploited her few talents very skilfully.

But he wondered now as he looked at her how he had ever endured the banality of her conversation, the artificial flutterings of her hands, the shrugging of her thin shoulders and the coquettish way that she would veil her eyes with her long mascaraed lashes and contrive to appear mysterious.

There was in fact no mystery, Lord Melburne had discovered.

She looked up at him now, noting almost automatically how handsome he was and how outstanding even in a room full of other good-looking and well bred men.

It was not only his looks, she thought, as so many women had thought before her, that were so attractive, it was not only the squareness of his jaw or those strange grey eyes, which seemed so uncannily penetrating that a woman felt, when he looked at her, that he searched for something deeper than mere surface attraction.

No, Liane perceived with a sudden understanding, it was the cynical lines running from nose to mouth, the twist of his lips that somehow seemed to sneer at life even in moments of enjoyment and the sudden twinkle in his eyes, which belied that very sneer when one least expected it.

Yes, he was irresistible and with a smile she held out her arms towards him.

“Don’t linger in ze country,” she said softly, “I wait for you, mon brave. C’est ce que tu desires, n’est-ce pas?”

“I am not – certain,” Lord Melburne replied slowly and, even as he spoke the words, he realised that he had made a mistake –

The scene that followed was noisy, unpleasant and yet inevitable. He left Liane sobbing hysterically on the pillows and wondered as he went down the narrow staircase why he could never end an affair as neatly as other men of his acquaintance did. When they parted from their mistresses it was easy, a mere question of money and perhaps a diamond or two, and there was no ill will.

With him it always meant tears and recriminations, protestations and then the inevitable plaintive,

“What have I done?

“Why do I not attract you anymore?”

“Is there someone else?”

He knew the questions only too well and they were all too familiar.

As he let himself out by the elegant yellow-painted front door and slammed it behind him so that the polished brass knocker went rat-rat, he told himself that this was the last time he would be such a fool as to set his mistress up in a house of her own.

It was fashionable to have an opera dancer under one’s protection, to take her driving in the Park, to provide her with her own carriage and pair, to expect her to remain ostensibly faithful until the liaison came to an end.

But where this termination proved amicable and uncomplicated where other men were concerned, Lord Melburne was invariably different.

He found himself pursued by clouds of tears and broken-hearted letters, with pleas for an explanation and an almost obstinate refusal to believe that he was no longer interested in her.

His carriage was waiting, the discreet closed carriage he used at night for such visits. The coachman had looked surprised at seeing his Lordship so early and lifted the reins with a jerk.

The smart footman, having closed the carriage door after his Lordship, sprang back onto the box and said out of the corner of his mouth,

“Bet you that’s ended!”

“Can’t be,” the coachman answered. “’E ain’t been with ’er more than a month.”

“It be ended though,” the footman said confidently. “I knows the look on his Nibs’s face when ’e says finish and finish it be.”

“Never did care for those Frenchies,” the coachman remarked. “The one ’e ’ad before last, ’er be an English mort. Now she’s a real high-stepper.”

“’E were tired of her within three months,” the footman said with relish. “I wonder what makes ’im tire so easy.”

Inside the coach his Lordship was asking just the same thing. Why did he suddenly and usually unexpectedly find a woman no longer attractive?

He had enjoyed parading Liane in front of his friends. He had taken her to the gaming halls, to the Albany Rooms, to Mott’s and Vauxhall Gardens. It had seemed to him that she outshone every other woman in such places. She was gay, she was amusing, she had a joie de vivre and a vitality that galvanised everyone who spoke with her.

“You are a damned lucky fellow,” Sir Henry Stainer had said to Lord Melburne and the envy in his friend’s voice had been most gratifying.

He wondered now if Sir Henry would stoop to pick up his leavings. But if it were not Stainer, there would be more than a dozen others only too willing to vie for the favours of the Frenchwoman who had captivated the fancy of quite a number of the most fastidious and spoilt young bloods of the Beau Ton.

‘And yet I no longer want her,’ Lord Melburne thought.

He stretched out his legs so that they rested across to the seat opposite.

“To hell with it!” he said aloud. “To hell with all women!”

He knew it was absurd that he should be feeling slightly guilty over the scene that had just taken place. He knew too that it was Liane and not he who was breaking the rules.

The arrangement between a gentleman and his mistress was supposed to be entirely a commercial agreement. They enjoyed each other’s company, it was a woman’s job to be as fascinating as possible and to extort by every means she could think of the maximum amount of payment for her favours.

But there was never supposed to be any question of love, heartthrobs or hurt feelings.

And yet where Buck Melburne was concerned the rules always went by the board. He had been called ‘Buck’ since he was only a little boy. Even his relations had difficulty in remembering what were his real names.

It was a nickname he acquired after he appeared for the first time in a suit of satin knee breeches and he managed even at the age of six to wear them with an air that brought the exclamation from one of his father’s friends,

“Gad, he looks like a Buck already!”

The name had stuck and there was no doubt that it was most appropriate. The Prince of Wales followed the fashions he set with his plain well-cut coats and exquisitely tied cravats, his dislike of ostentatious jewellery or anything that pertained to the Dandy Set.

And the name was appropriate for other reasons as there was no one in the whole country who could tool a coach or a phaeton so skilfully and he had a far better seat than any of his contemporaries when he rode to hounds. He could shoot more accurately and box with an almost professional skill.

Buck Melburne was the most sought after, the most envied and the most irresistible man in London.

It was, however, with the lines of cynicism engraved deep on his face and his mouth set in a hard line that his Lordship stepped out of his carriage in Berkeley Square and entered the hall of his London house.

He handed his hat and cane to the butler.

“I shall leave for Melburne at half after nine o’clock tomorrow morning, Smithson,” he said. “Order my high perch phaeton and tell Hawkins to go ahead of me in the luggage cart. The fast one, not that Noah’s Ark he tried to use the last time I went to the country.”

“Very good, my Lord,” the butler replied, “There is a note here for your Lordship.”

“A note?” Lord Melburne queried, taking the envelope from the silver salver that was held out to him.

Even before he touched it, he knew who it was from. He was scowling as he walked down the hall towards the library where he habitually sat when he was alone.

A footman hurried to open the door for him and he passed into the long book-lined salon which, with its lapis-lazuli pillars and carved gilt cornices, was one of the most beautiful rooms in London.

“Wine, my Lord?” the footman asked.

“I will help myself,” Lord Melburne replied.

As the door closed behind the footman, he stood for a moment staring at the note in his hand before he opened it.

He knew only too well who it was from, and he wondered whether this was, in fact, the answer and the solution to the problems that had beset him in the carriage.

Should he get married? Would that state prove more pleasant and at least quieter than the continual lamentations of droxies?

Slowly, it seemed, almost reluctantly, he opened the letter.

Lady Romayne Ramsey’s elegant, somewhat affected handwriting was characteristic and yet anyone who had a knowledge of such things would have sensed at once that there was also determination in the fine strokes of her pen.

The note was short.

“My dear Unpredictable Cousin,

I had anticipated that you would call on me this evening, but I was disappointed. I have many things concerning which I desire to speak with you. Come tomorrow at 5 o’clock when we can be alone.

Yours Romayne.”

There was nothing particular in the note to annoy his Lordship, yet suddenly he crumpled it in his hands into a tight ball and threw it into the flames of the fire.

He knew in that moment exactly what Romayne Ramsey was after as he had known for a long time that she intended to marry him.

A distant cousin of his, she had presumed on their slight relationship to include him in her intimate circle of friends long before he had made up his mind whether he wished it or not.

And yet it would have been churlish not to be pleased. Lady Romayne was the toast of St. James’s, the most beautiful and the most acclaimed ‘Incomparable’ that the Carlton House Set had known for years.

She had been married when she was but a child, married hastily because her parents had been afraid of her beauty. It was not their fault that Alexander Ramsey, a worthy country Squire, who was excessively wealthy, had broken his neck out hunting just before Romayne’s twenty-third birthday.

Long before her mourning had conventionally ended, she had come to London, taken a house, found herself a complaisant chaperone and set St. James’s by the ears.

She was lovely, she was vivacious, she was witty and she was rich. What more could any man want of a wife?

And she had chosen Buck Melburne to be her husband.

He was aware of this if no one else was. He was too experienced and too sophisticated in the ways of women not to realise how well planned were her little subterfuges of needing his advice, of asking his opinion, of relying on him as a relative to escort her to Royal functions and to sponsor her as she had no husband to do it for her.

She wove her web about him like a diligent and crafty little spider, but, he told himself, he was not caught yet. It might indeed be the solution and it might be what he wanted, but he was not sure.

Romayne would look magnificent in the Melburne jewels. She would grace his table and his house in the country with an elegance that was undeniable.

He also realised that there was something dark and passionate in the depth of her eyes when they were alone, that when he kissed her hand goodnight, her breath came more quickly between her parted lips and the laces at her breasts were tumultuous.

He had been so very near to surrendering to her enticement, to the unspoken invitation he saw in her eyes and the way that she would invariably ask him to see her into the darkness of her house when they had been at a party.

There were candles lit in the open door of her bedroom and yet Buck Melburne, for all his reputation as an inveterate lady killer and for never refusing a beautiful woman’s favour, had not succumbed to Lady Romayne.

The trap had been too obviously baited. He felt a repugnance against doing exactly what was expected of him, of participating in a campaign that had been planned down to the tiniest detail and of which he knew the inevitable end.

‘Damn it, I like to do my own hunting!’ he said to himself once as he had come from Lady Romayne’s house, well aware of the invitation offered and unexpectedly feeling a cad because he rejected it.

Nothing was ever overtly said and yet they both knew that they faced each other just like duellists. She was taking the offensive, trying to gain an advantage to force him into a corner and he was fighting not for his life but for his freedom.

The flames burned Lady Romayne’s letter to ashes and, as it crumpled into nothing, Lord Melburne said again aloud,

“Be damned to all women! A man would be well rid of the lot of them!”

*

When he set off the next morning, tooling his high perch phaeton, the sunshine glittering on the silver bridles of his perfectly matched horseflesh, he was in a surprisingly good mood.

It was a relief, he thought, to be getting out of London. Inevitably one stayed up too late, drank too much and talked a lot of nonsense. Even the duel of wits across the card tables at White’s Club or the glittering elegance of the Receptions at Carlton House, lost their interest if one had too much of them.

It was pleasant to know that he was driving the most expensive and the best-bred horses that could be found in anyone’s stable, that his new high perch phaeton was lighter and better sprung than the one built for the Prince of Wales.

And he was going to see Melburne again.

There was something about his home that had always delighted him and, while he did not visit it as often as he might wish, it was always a satisfaction to him to know that it was there.

The great house, which had been rebuilt almost entirely by his father to the design of the Adam brothers, stood on the site of older and less spectacular mansions, which had housed generations of Melburnes since the time of the Norman conquest.

As a child, he had loved the gardens, the shrubberies, the lakes, the forest and the great broad acres stretching away over the countryside towards the blue of the Chiltern Hills.

Melburne! Yes, this was the time of year to see Melburne, when the miracle of spring would transform the gardens into a Fairyland of blossom and fragrance.

It was almost irritating to remember that the real object of his coming to the country now was to visit Sir Roderick Vernon. His nearest neighbour and an old friend of his father, Sir Roderick had been very much a part of his childhood.

Hardly a day passed when Sir Roderick with his son Nicholas did not ride or drive over to Melburne or Buck had not accompanied his father to The Priory. The two old gentlemen had argued over their estates, quarrelled over the boundaries and yet remained firm friends until Lord Melburne’s father had died at the age of sixty-four.

Sir Roderick had lived on and Lord Melburne, calculating the years as he drove, realised that he must now be nearly seventy-two. He remembered hearing that he had not been well of late and wondered if he was dying.

It was then his conscience smote him for not having gone to The Priory earlier, as he had been asked to do. The letter was clearly urgent and yet it had seemed unimportant beside the attractions of Liane and the many social engagements that he had committed himself to.

He tried to remember the letter now. It had been written by a woman, someone of whom he had never heard. Clarinda Vernon.

Who was she?

Sir Roderick had no daughter and, when he had last visited The Priory there had been no one there except for the old man himself, bewailing the fact that his son Nicholas seldom left London to visit the estates that he would one day inherit.

Nicholas had been a considerable disappointment to his father. He had got into the wrong set in London and indeed Lord Melburne seldom saw him and, if he did, did his best to avoid him.

There were unpleasant stories about Nicholas’s behaviour, but Lord Melburne could not remember them now. He only knew that he no longer cared for his childhood friend, in fact, they had hardly spoken to each other since they had left Oxford University.

What had the woman said in her letter?

“My uncle, Sir Roderick Vernon, is ill and greatly desires to see your Lordship. May I beg you to visit him at your earliest convenience.

I remain, my Lord,

Yours Respectfully,

Clarinda Vernon.”

This had not told him much except that the old main was ill.

‘I should have gone last week,’ Lord Melburne said to himself and pushed his horses a little faster, almost as if it was not too late to make up for lost time.

He did not stop at Melburne on the way, as he longed to do, but drove straight to The Priory. It was less than a two hour journey from London and he turned in at the ancient iron gates, noting with satisfaction that despite the speed they had travelled at his horses had stood the journey well and were neither overheated nor in the least fatigued.

The drive was an avenue of ancient oak trees, their branches meeting overhead to make a tunnel of green. As he journeyed on down the drive, Lord Melburne was suddenly aware of someone coming towards him.

It was a woman on a horse and he noted almost automatically that she rode well yet was keeping to the centre of the drive and making no effort to draw aside to let him pass.

Then to his surprise she drew her horse to a stop and waited for his approach, knowing that he must also check his horseflesh and bring them to a standstill.

She sat waiting for him with an imperiousness that definitely irritated him. She did not raise her hand, she just waited and he had an absurd impulse to challenge her by driving over the grass and passing her.

Then, as if in obedience to her unspoken command, he drew in his reins.

Without haste, moving her horse forward, she came to him and stopped by the driving seat. Even so they were not level and she still had to look up at him.

At the first glance he was astonished at her loveliness. He noticed, because he was well versed in women’s fashions, that she wore an old habit that was outdated and yet the worn green of its velvet threw into prominence the whiteness of her skin.

Lord Melburne thought he had never seen a woman with such a white skin and then as he looked at her hair he understood. It was red, and yet it was not, it was gold – he was not sure.

It was a colour that he had never seen before or even imagined, the gold of ripened corn flecked with the vivid red of flames leaping from a wood fire. It just seemed to shine in the sunlight and was caught unfashionably into a bun at the nape of her neck. She wore no hat.

She was very small Lord Melburne thought and he realised that while her face was tiny, heart-shaped and with a little pointed chin, her eyes were enormous. Strange eyes for a red-head for they were the very deep blue of a stormy sea rather than hazel flecked with green that might be expected with such colouring.

‘She is lovely, unbelievably lovely,’ Lord Melburne told himself and then, as he raised his hat, the girl on the horse in a cold voice without smiling, almost demanded,

“You are Lord Melburne?”

“I am.”

“I am Clarinda Vernon, I wrote to you.”

“I received your letter.”

“I expected you last week.”

It was an accusation and Lord Melburne felt himself stiffen.

“I regret it was not convenient for me to leave London so speedily,” he answered.

“You are still in time.”

He raised his eyebrows.

“I must speak with you alone.” she asserted.

He glanced at her in surprise feeling they were already alone. Then he remembered the groom behind him on the phaeton.

“Jason,” he ordered, “go to the horses’ heads.”

“Very good, my Lord.”

The groom jumped to the ground and went forward to hold the leader of the tandem.

“Shall we speak here,” Lord Melburne asked, “or would you rather I come down?”

“This will do,” she said, “if your man cannot hear.”

“He cannot hear,” Lord Melburne replied, “and if he did he is trustworthy.”

“What I have to say is not for servants’ ears,” Clarinda Vernon remarked.

“Perhaps I had best get down,” Lord Melburne suggested.

Without waiting for an answer, he sprang lithely to the ground. It was a relief after sitting so long, he thought, to stretch his legs.

“What about your horse?” he asked. “Would you like Jason to hold him too?”

“Kingfisher will not wander away,” she answered and then before he could assist her she dismounted with a lightness that seemed as if she almost floated from the saddle.

She slipped the reins over the pommel and turning walked up the drive into the shadows of one of the great oak trees. And Lord Melburne followed her.

She was indeed tiny, even smaller than she had seemed when mounted on her horse. Her waist, even in her worn habit, could easily, he felt, be spanned by a man’s two hands and her hair as she moved away from him was like a light will-o’-the-wisp beckoning a man across a treacherous marsh.

He found himself smiling at his own imagination.

‘Damn it all, I am getting romantic,’ he thought.

He had certainly not expected to find anyone quite so exquisite, so unusual or indeed so beautiful at The Priory.

Clarinda Vernon came to a stop under one of the oaks.

“I had to speak to you before you see my uncle,” she said and now Lord Melburne was aware that she was nervous.

“He is ill?” Lord Melburne enquired.

“He is dying,” she answered. “I think he has only held on to life so that he should see you.”

“I am sorry. If you had been more explicit in your letter, I would have come sooner.”

“Indeed I should not have asked your Lordship to forgo your amusements unless it was absolutely necessary.”

There was a note of sarcasm in her voice that made him glance at her in surprise.

There was a little pause and then she went on,

“What I have to say will perhaps be difficult for you to – understand. For my uncle’s sake it is imperative that you accede to his wishes.”

“What does he want?” Lord Melburne asked.

“My uncle.” Clarinda replied, “is disinheriting his son Nicholas. He is leaving The Priory and the estate to – me. And because it means so much to him and because he is dying, he has one idea and one idea only in his mind that ‒ no one can change.”

“Which is?” Lord Melburne asked as she paused.

“That you should – marry – me!”

Now there was no mistaking the nervous tremor in her voice and the colour rose in her pale cheeks. For a moment Lord Melburne was too surprised to say anything.

Then before even an exclamation could come to his lips Clarinda added quickly,

“All I am asking of you is that you will agree. Uncle Roderick is dying – he may be dead in the morning. Don’t argue with him – don’t cause him unnecessary distress – just agree to what he asks. It will make him happy and it will mean nothing – nothing to you.”

“I really don’t think this is something that I can decide on the spur of the moment,” Lord Melburne began, for once in his life almost bereft of words.

Then Clarinda Vernon looked up at him with what he could only describe to himself as a violent hatred in her eyes.

“Indeed, my Lord, you need not be afraid that I should hold you to your promise once my uncle is dead for I assure you that I would not marry you – not if you were the last man in the whole world.”

There was so much passion in her low voice that it just seemed to vibrate between them.

Then before Lord Melburne could collect his senses and before he could find anything to say and before he even realised what was happening, Clarinda gave a little whistle.

Her horse came obediently to her call and she vaulted unaided into the saddle and was galloping away down the drive towards The Priory as if all the devils of Hell were at her heels.

CHAPTER TWO

Sir Roderick’s tired old voice faltered into silence and he fell asleep. His physician bent forward, felt his pulse and said in a low voice to Lord Melburne,

“He will sleep now for some hours.”

“I will return later,” Lord Melburne replied.

He walked quietly across the bedroom and opened the door. Outside to his astonishment he found a footman bending down, his ear to the keyhole.

When he saw Lord Melburne, he straightened himself up, stared at him for a moment in what seemed an insolent manner and then turned and ran down the corridor as fast as his legs could carry him.

Lord Melburne raised his eyebrows and walked down the staircase. When he reached the hall, he hesitated for a moment and the butler came forward to inform him,

“Miss Clarinda is in the salon, my Lord.”

“Thank you,” Lord Melburne nodded.

He walked towards the salon, noting as he did so that the house was shabby and badly in need of refurbishing. Some of the high curtains were threadbare and, while the pictures and furniture were extremely valuable, the carpets were worn and many of the chairs in need of upholstery.

Clarinda was sitting at a writing desk in the window.

The sun coming through the open casement shone on her hair and made it appear as if she wore a halo of fire.

At Lord Melburne’s entrance she started to her feet and her large dark blue eyes seemed to him to hold not only a hostile but a very wary look. At the same time there was an obvious question in the expression on her face.

“Your uncle has fallen asleep,” Lord Melburne told her.

“You have promised what he – asked?”

It seemed as though she could not prevent the question bursting from between her lips.

“We have discussed the matter” Lord Melburne answered.

He felt that she relaxed as if she had been half-afraid that he would refuse outright to do what was requested of him.

Then walking towards the fireplace, he said,

“I understand you are not, in point of fact, Sir Roderick’s niece.”

“No, my mother was married first to Captain Patrick Wardell of the Grenadier Guards. He was killed fighting before I was born.”

She paused for a moment and then, as Lord Melburne said nothing, she continued,

“When my mother married Sir Roderick’s brother, he adopted me as his own and had my name changed to Vernon. I thought of him as my father and, as he had no other children, I think he often forgot that I was not in reality his own daughter.”

Her voice softened and Lord Melburne noticed that it had a soft musical quality about it.

She had changed from the shabby green habit in which he had first seen her and was now wearing a simple muslin dress, threadbare with washing and unfashionable in shape. And yet he thought, as he had thought before, that she was almost breathtakingly lovely.

There was no need for her strangely alluring hair to be fashionably dressed. It framed the piquancy of her tiny face and he noted that unexpectedly her eyelashes were dark. He thought that perhaps there was some Irish blood in her.

Then sharply, as if she was annoyed at Lord Melburne persuading her into speaking so warmly of her adoptive uncle, Clarinda said in the hard cold voice that she had used to him previously,

“I have something here for your Lordship’s approval.”

As she spoke, she picked up from the desk a large sheet of paper and held it towards him.

“What is it?” Lord Melburne asked before he had even accepted it from her hand.

“A safeguard against your obvious fear of being trapped into matrimony.”

“So you suspicion that I am afraid of that most enviable estate?” he asked her a sudden twinkle in his eye.

“I am not interested in your Lordship’s feelings,” Clarinda answered coldly. “I can only assure you once again that all that concerns me is that my uncle, who has shown me every possible kindness since I have lived with him, should die happy.”

“So Sir Roderick is greatly worried about his estate,” Lord Melburne remarked.

“It is all he has thought about, all he cares about and all he loves,” Clarinda said almost passionately, “His son has failed him. Can you not understand it will be agony for him to die feeling that his life work will be destroyed or neglected? And he has, I understand, been fond of your Lordship since you were a boy.”

She said the words as if it was impossible to credit such affection.

There was a slight twist to Lord Melburne’s lips as he glanced down at the paper she had handed him.

On it she had written,

“I, Clarinda Vernon, swear that under no circumstances whatsoever will I hold my Lord Melburne to any promises he might make of Betrothal or Marriage to me once my uncle, Sir Roderick Vernon, is dead. To this I set my hand duly witnessed on Thursday, May 2nd, 1802.”

Below was Clarinda’s signature and below that again, in illiterate writing, the names of two servants. She saw Lord Melburne glance at them and she said quickly,

“They did not see anything but my signature.”

“This is very business-like,” Lord Melburne approved, “And now, if in further talks with your uncle I agree to your wishes, I think I should ask the reason why you have such a dislike of me.”

Clarinda drew herself up and the colour rose in her cheeks.

“That is something I am not prepared to discuss, my Lord.”

“Then I will say,” Lord Melburne retorted, “that, as you have made your feelings so very clear, I consider that I am entitled to an explanation.”

“I think that is unnecessary – ” Clarinda began, but as she spoke, the door opened and a gentleman entered the room.

He was obviously very young but dressed in the height of fashion, the points of his collar high above his chin, his cravat elegantly tied and his hair so beautifully arranged that it must have taken him many laborious hours.

He crossed the room, a jewelled fob dangling from his brocade waistcoat and then raised Clarinda’s hand to his lips.

“I have brought you some flowers,” he said, offering her the bouquet he held in his hand.

“Orchids!” Clarinda exclaimed. “How very opulent!”

The young man smiled.

“I had to steal them when my father was not looking,” he then admitted. “You know how jealously he guards his orchid house.”

“Oh, Julien, you should not have taken them,” Clarinda cried.

Then, as if she remembered her manners, she turned towards Lord Melburne.

“May I present to you, Mr. Julien Wilsdon, my Lord. Julien, this is Lord Melburne, our next door neighbour, as you well know.”

The young man had obviously not seen Lord Melburne as he entered the room, having eyes only for Clarinda. He stared almost incredulously at his Lordship before he exclaimed,

“What is that man doing here? You have always said you would not have him in the house. Has he upset you?”

“No, indeed,” Clarinda said rapidly. “I have not had time, Julien, to explain to you Uncle Roderick’s wishes where they concern Lord Melburne. He is here for a special purpose and I beg of you to forget what I have said in the past.”

“Surely it is impossible for me to do that?” Julien Wilsdon replied.

“Perhaps you would be kind enough to enlighten me as to what this exchange of civilities is about?” Lord Melburne said and there was then a faint twinkle of amusement in his eyes. “Apparently it concerns myself and yet I am very much in the dark as to how I am involved?”

“I only know, my Lord,” Julien Wilsdon said abruptly, “that Miss Vernon has very good reasons for not wishing to make the acquaintance of your Lordship.”

“Please, Julien, please,” Clarinda interrupted. “I can assure you that Lord Melburne is here by invitation. Sir Roderick needed to see him urgently. I will explain everything later. Do, pray, come back this afternoon.”

“Perhaps I should inform you, Mr. Wilsdon,” Lord Melburne then drawled, “that there is a question as to whether Miss Vernon and I should become betrothed.”

He meant what he said to be provocative and he certainly succeeded.

“Betrothed!” Julien Wilsdon almost shouted the word. “It is not true, it really cannot be! How dare you say anything that involves the good name of Miss Vernon? I swear, my Lord, if you are making a mockery of her, I will call you out.”

The amusement in Lord Melburne’s eyes deepened. Julien Wilsdon was only a thin slip of a youth. His Lordship could not help being aware of the contrast between the young man’s immaturity and his own strength, his broad shoulders and above all his height.

As if she too was conscious of the difference between the two men, Clarinda hastily put her arm through Julien Wilsdon’s and drew him towards the door.

“I beg you, Julien, not to make a cake of yourself,” she pleaded. “I assure you that what his Lordship is saying has a foundation of fact and I will explain everything. But not now. Wait for me, if you wish, and I will tell you what this is about when his Lordship has left.”

Unwillingly and with one backward glance of extreme enmity at Lord Melburne, Julien Wilsdon allowed himself to be led from the salon. He could hear their voices arguing in the hall until finally, after some minutes, Clarinda returned alone.

“I must – apologise,” she said in a low voice.

“A very ardent admirer, I see,” Lord Melburne commented, “and a dangerous rival.”

“Don’t try to humiliate me,” Clarinda said sharply. “It would not have been correct for me to confide in Julien before you had spoken with my uncle. Now he is enraged and it will be difficult to soothe his hurt feelings.”

“I imagine that the whole world cannot be informed that what you contemplate is to be but a pretence,” Lord Melburne said. “There would surely be someone to relate to your uncle that he is being hoodwinked.”

Clarinda clasped her small hands together anxiously.

“No indeed, you are right about that, my Lord. Until my uncle dies we must make quite sure that no one suspects that our betrothal is just a temporary measure. Once he is dead you need never see me again.”

“Surely a somewhat drastic condition,” Lord Melburne said. “I am, may I just say, Miss Vernon, finding our acquaintance most enjoyable.”

“This may seem a joke to you, my Lord,” Clarinda replied crossly, “but I assure you that only the deep affection I have for my uncle and his almost despairing efforts to secure the preservation of his estates would force me to agree to his suggestion.”