“If he were here,” she said, “trying to poison my food, or creeping into my room with a knife, I would know what to do.”
“You would?” he said.
She nodded.
He thought for a time. Then he climbed out of bed and pulled on his dressing gown.
“Where are you going?” she said.
“To ring for a servant,” he said. “All this talk of poisoning reminds me that we haven’t dined. I’m famished.” He crossed the room and pulled the rope. “And you’ve given me an idea.”
Eighteen
Monday, 11 May
Everything goes into the newspapers. In other countries, matters of a public nature may be seen in them; here, in addition, you see perpetually even the concerns of individuals. Does a private gentleman come to town? you hear it in the newspapers; does he build a house, or buy an estate? they give the information; does he entertain his friends? you have all their names next day in type; is the drapery of a lady’s drawing-room changed from red damask and gold to white satin and silver? the fact is publicly announced.
The observations the American ambassador, Mr. Rush, recorded in his diary about the amazing English press were much the same as those he’d made at dinner on the night he and his wife and a few privileged others had met Lord Lexham’s youngest daughter.
And so it was hardly surprising that the amazing English press would report the doings of the Duke and Duchess of Marchmont. Anyone who could read would read in the newspapers that the new duchess had made substantial changes in the household staff and was shortly to embark upon an extensive refurbishment of Marchmont House in St. James’s Square.
Anyone who could read would read in the papers that the Duke of Marchmont meant to set out on the following day for Lancashire, on urgent legal business related to one of his properties there.
His Grace’s former house steward, Harrison, could read, and did so, while he drank his coffee in the room he’d taken at the Black Horse Inn in Haymarket, immediately after Mary Dunstan’s abrupt departure.
“‘Normally, His Grace’s agent would act in his place,’” he read aloud as he’d always used to do when he and Mrs. Dunstan breakfasted together. “‘But the matter of these fishing rights has apparently reached a pitch such that his personal attendance is wanted to avert a lawsuit.’ Oh, certainly. That’s what sends my lord duke out of London at the height of the Season to travel some three hundred miles, to the wilds of Lancashire. Fishing rights, my foot. It’sshe. She’s driven him out of his house.”
Had Harrison given his temper time to cool, he could have spared his master the ignominy of running away from his wife. But Harrison had acted rashly and botched the business. Not only had the Harem Girl failed to die in the carriage smash-up, but she’d escaped with scarcely a scratch.
She’d gone out dancing that same night—at Almack’s! She—the Harem Girl—at Almack’s!
A proper lady would have taken to her bed for a fortnight. She wasn’t a lady. Why were only a handful of servants able to see her for what she was?
“We could have told him she was common,” he said, as though Mary Dunstan were still with him, listening as she always did. “She’s made turmoil in his house. His Grace can’t abide that. He likes his peace.”
He sighed deeply. “I knew him better than he knew himself, did I not? It was my responsibility to do so. What’s he to do without me? Where’s he to go for peace and quiet? White’s? That’s well enough for some, who haven’t anything better to do. It won’t do for him. To spend all his days and nights there? Out of the question. He’d be bored witless. Where else, then?”
Harrison considered. “Unwise to go back to the dashing widow. The Harem Girl would hunt him down. Vulgar scene bound to ensue. I know her sort. Knew the instant I clapped eyes on her, she was never Lord Lexham’s daughter. It was the Princess Caraboo all over again, and she took them all in. Even the Queen. Not that it’s so hard to fool a sick old woman.”
He returned to the newspaper. The article went on to share with readers one of the duke’s humorous remarks. According to an unnamed source at White’s Club, when asked about his impending journey, his grace had said, “If your wife was redecorating the house, would you hang about?”
Harrison repeated the riposte aloud, and laughed. “Have I not always said the master was the cleverest wit in London? ‘Would you hang about?’ Ha, ha. That is good.”
His amusement faded when he remembered that he would not, ever again, be present to hear one of the duke’s witticisms. He would not be able to enter the hostelry where the crème de la crème of London’s servants gathered, and tell his envious friends what his clever master had said and done lately.
“Where shall I find another like him?” he said. “Where should I find another place like that one? Ireland? France?” He shook his head. “Oh, Mary, Mary. How could we hold our heads up if we sank to that: presiding over one of those hovels they call inns in those savage countries.”
But Mary wasn’t there to answer. She’d run away, and the Runners had caught her, as he’d warned her would happen.
Naturally the Runners were looking for him. He knew they’d be doing their sharpest looking along the roads leading out of London. He’d explained to her: He had friends in London, so many friends who owed him and who would make sure he wasn’t caught. They wouldn’t want to risk his telling all he knew about them. For him, there was no safer place to be than London.
“Oh, Mary, Mary.” He glanced sadly about the empty room. “I was in liquor that day. It frightened you, I know.”
He wasn’t the kind to drink to excess. He’d done it because of the horses.
He’d acted too hastily, and he’d paid for it. He’d heard the horse’s screams in his head long after he fled King Street. He’d seen the blood even when he closed his eyes. He’d begun drinking and had kept on drinking until he was senseless and couldn’t hear or see any of it anymore.
He’d always been so proud of His Grace’s cattle: the finest beasts in London. When he’d burst out of Cleveland Yard that day, he’d attacked in a frenzy. When the hot anger dissipated, he’d grieved for them.
