The Dubious Miss Dalrymple

Straightening, Elly pasted on a deliberate smile and turned to greet her guest. “Lose something?” she repeated blankly. “Why, yes, I seem to have misplaced, um, my knitting. Mrs. Biggs, our housekeeper, appears to delight in hiding it from me.”

“You don’t knit, Elly. Never could, without making a botch of the thing.”

Elly swung about, to see Leslie down on all fours behind the settee. “Leslie!” she gritted under her breath. “Get up at once. What are you doing down there?”

Leslie Dalrymple, Earl of Hythe, rose clumsily to his feet, his pale blonde hair falling forward over his high forehead, his knees and hands dusty. “I was sitting quite nicely, just as you instructed, Elly, when a breeze from the doorway sent the loveliest dust bunny scurrying across the floor. See!” he demanded, holding up a greyish round ball of dust. “I think it’s just the thing to complete my arrangement of Everyday Things, don’t you?”

Elly didn’t know whether to hit her brother or hug him. He looked so dear, standing there holding his dust bunny as if it were the greatest treasure on God’s green earth, yet he was making the worst possible impression on John Bates. John Bates! Elly whirled to face her handsome guest, daring him with her eyes to say one word—one single, solitary word against her beloved brother.

Her fears, at least for the moment, proved groundless. John Bates, who had indeed witnessed all that had just transpired, only advanced across the width of the Aubusson carpet, his golden hair and beard glinting in the candlelight, his cane in his left hand as he favored his left leg, his right hand outstretched in greeting.

“My Lord Hythe, it is a distinct pleasure to meet you,” he said, his tone earnest even to Elly’s doubting ears. “I wish to thank you for agreeing to honor the rental arrangement made between the late Earl and myself. And, oh yes, please allow me to offer you condolences on your loss.”

Leslie looked down on the dust bunny. “But I didn’t lose it. See, I have it right here.”

“Mr. Bates is referring to our libertine cousin Alastair’s untimely death,” Elly corrected sweetly even as she glared at John Bates. He already knew how she felt about her late cousin. Why was he persisting in bringing it up again and again? Anyone would think they had killed the stupid man, for pity’s sake!

The dust bunny disappeared into Leslie’s coat pocket as he took John’s hand, wincing at the older man’s firm grip. “A strong one, aren’t you? Oh, you meant m’cousin, of course. Please excuse Elly. M’sister’s taken a pet against him for some reason, ever since his mourners wouldn’t stay to tea after the service, as a matter of fact. Rather poor sporting of her to my way of thinking, as the fellow’s dead, ain’t he—leaving the two of us as rich as Croesus into the bargain.”

“Leslie, please,” Elly begged quietly, steering the two men toward the settee and seating herself in the blue satin chair.

But Leslie was oblivious to his sister’s pleading. Seating himself comfortably, one long, skinny leg crossed over the other, he informed his guest, “I have been considering composing a picture to honor the late Earl and his accomplishments—only, I can’t seem to find that he actually accomplished anything, except a few things best not remembered. I’m an artist, you understand.”

“You wish to do a portrait?” Alastair asked, to Elly’s mind, a bit intensely.

Leslie waved his thin, artistic hands dismissingly. “No, no. Never a portrait. That’s so mundane—so ordinary. No, I wish to execute a chronicle of Alastair’s life, with symbols. For instance,” he expanded, thrilled to have found a new audience for his ideas, “if I were to do Henry the Eighth, I should include a bloody ax, a joint of meat, weeping angels, a view of the Tower—you understand?”

“What a unique concept, my lord,” Alastair complimented, his eyes shifting so that he was looking straight at Elly, who shivered under his penetrating, assessing grey gaze.

What was he looking at? she wondered. And why did she have the uncomfortable feeling that John Bates could prove to be a very dangerous man?

CHAPTER TWO

HE WAS STARING at Elinor Dalrymple; he knew he was, but he couldn’t help himself. Alastair had come to Seashadow to unmask the new Earl as his attacker. It had seemed so simple, so straight-forward—in a backhanded sort of way. But Leslie Dalrymple, bless his paper skull, wouldn’t harm a fly—even if he knew how. Alastair wasn’t so bent on revenge that he couldn’t see that.

Unfortunately, he told himself as Mrs. Biggs called them to the dinner table, that left only the sister, Elinor, to take Leslie’s place as suspect. Offering Elinor his arm to escort her in to dinner, and throwing a stern look at Mrs. Biggs, who so forgot herself as to begin a clumsy curtsey as he moved past (after she had done so well earlier when he had first arrived at the door), Alastair knew he had to rethink his deductions.

A man, after all, did not accuse another man of attempted murder without a wheelbarrow full of irrefutable evidence. Wasn’t the desire to accumulate evidence what had brought him, under an assumed identity, to Seashadow in the first place? But a man—at least any man who considered himself to be a gentleman—never accused a lady of anything.

Once he had helped Elinor to her seat and taken his own chair across from her, Alastair resumed staring at her, knowing he was dangerously close to being indiscreet, but unable to help himself. A woman! It had never occurred to him that his attacker could be a woman. Oh, certainly she had employed someone to actually perform the dirty deed—to conk him on the head and send him to a watery grave—but that didn’t make her any less guilty, did it?

This was going to take some getting used to, Alastair decided, deliberately smiling at Elinor Dalrymple, as if enchanted by her spinsterish charms and idly wondering if her small, shell-like ears really fit so snugly against the sides of her head or if her ruthlessly pulled-back hair had anything to do with it. He watched her spine straighten as it had on the beach and this time recognized the action as the proud, stiff-necked posture of one who has had more than a nodding acquaintance with poverty.

And with a brother like Leslie to support her, he considered thoughtfully, is it any wonder the two of them had been purse-pinched? He doubted he had to look much further for a motive.

“Do I have a smut on my nose?”

Alastair blinked, his attention caught by the question in Elinor’s voice, although he hadn’t quite comprehended what she had said, his attention still concentrated on her blonde hair as he tried to imagine her as she would look with it soft and loose against her high-cheeked face. “I beg your pardon?”

“You’re staring, Mr. Bates,” she pointed out needlessly. “I wondered if there was something wrong with me that has put you off your food. You haven’t even touched your meal, and Big George has really outdone himself with the veal.”

“Yes, indeed, I have—” Alastair had always relished Big George’s way with veal—so much so that he nearly gave himself away, only catching himself in time to amend his conversation by ending, “always enjoyed a veal. Big George, you say? Is there also, perchance, a Little George running about somewhere?”

Leslie Dalrymple, his mouth full of veal, answered. “Little Georgie, actually, even though he’s past eighteen and fully grown. He doesn’t cook, though—big George won’t let him, at least, according to Mrs. Biggs, not since he set the capons on fire. Little Georgie just helps. Biggs is their name. You already met Mrs. Biggs, our housekeeper. Big George is her husband.”

“Making Little Georgie their son,” Elinor completed hastily. “It is as logical as it is boring, Leslie, my dear, and before you launch into a dissertation on all the other little Biggses running tame about Seashadow, I suggest a change of subject. Perhaps our guest would rather discuss something more worldly than our servant situation.” Leaning forward slightly, she went on encouragingly, “You served with Wellington perhaps, Mr. Bates? What battles were you in, exactly—and when?”

Alastair was amazed at the obvious intensity of her interest. He suddenly felt like a prisoner in the dock, undergoing a detailed cross-examination bent on exposing his guilt in some heinous crime. “Well, actually, madam, I didn’t see much action before—”

Leslie stuck out his bottom lip petulantly and interrupted, “Who cares, Elly? I wanted to tell Mr. Bates about Rosie.” He brightened slightly, looking to his sister. “I’m going to paint her, you know.”

“Yes, dearest, I do know,” Elinor said, reaching over to pat her brother’s hand. “Rosie will be a wonderful subject, once she cuts her second teeth. Now, why don’t you try some of those lovely peas?”

Alastair watched, bemused, as Leslie obediently picked up his fork and began to eat. Oh yes, there was no question as to just who was in charge here. Elinor Dalrymple of the flat ears, scraped-back hair, and miserable disposition—sitting at her brother’s right hand—was the real Earl of Hythe in all but name. Wait until he ran this one past Wiggins!

“Mr. Bates?”

Alastair looked across the table at Elinor, his grey eyes deliberately wide, his expression purposely guileless. If he had decided nothing else, he had decided that this woman was intelligent—which also made her dangerous. “Yes, Miss Dalrymple?”

“You were telling us about your time with Wellington,” she prompted, accepting a small serving of candied yams from the hovering Mrs. Biggs. “From the left, Mrs. Biggs. You serve from the left.”

“Do yer wants ’em or not, missy?” Mrs. Biggs challenged, glaring at Alastair as if begging his permission to dump the bowl on Elinor’s head. “Right, left. What does it matter? I’ve got Baby Willie crying in the kitchen, afraid of that horsey-faced brute, Hugo, and that lazy, good-for-nothin’ Lily nowheres ter be found.”

“Baby Willie’s crying?” Leslie exclaimed, hopping from his seat so quickly, the chair nearly toppled behind him. “We can’t have that, Elly, now can we?” He reached up to pull the large linen serviette from his shirt collar, where he had obediently tucked it after dripping soup on his neckcloth. “I know. I’ll make him a crow from this serviette—of course, it will be white rather than black, but then, that just adds to the romance of the thing, doesn’t it? I can use these peas for eyes,” he went on excitedly, filling his hand with the green vegetable before heading for the kitchens. “It will be famous, I vow it will! Here I come, Baby Willie! Caw! Caw!”

“Leslie, come back here—” Elinor began as Alastair hid a grin behind his own serviette. “Oh, what’s the use? It’s like speaking to the wind.”

His sense of the ridiculous overcoming his good manners, Alastair threw back his head and laughed aloud for a moment before sobering and apologizing almost meekly, “I’m sorry, Miss Dalrymple. I am but a lowly soldier sitting at an Earl’s table. I really shall have to cultivate more elegance of mind. But you have to own it, Miss Dalrymple—your brother is most amusing.”

Her brown eyes turned as black and forbidding as an angry sea. “You think he’s an utter addlepate, don’t you, Mr. Bates?” she accused hotly. “Well, perhaps he is, but Leslie is my addlepate, and I’ll thank you to keep your thoughts to yourself!”

Alastair waved his hands in front of his face, as if to ward off her accusations. “No, no, Miss Dalrymple, please don’t fly into the treetops. I meant nothing by it, really I didn’t. Besides, you are wrong. Your brother is not an addlepate. He’s rich, madam, which makes him a delightful eccentric. Only a poor man is an addlepate.”

There was a commotion in the kitchens that reached into the dining room, turning the heads of both its occupants toward the baize door just as Hugo exploded into the room, Leslie on his arm. “Elly, look! A giant. A Titan! Isn’t it above everything famous!”

Leslie turned delighted eyes to Alastair, who felt himself rapidly wilting beneath Elinor’s white-hot glare. He had brought Hugo along with him because he couldn’t feel right leaving him alone in the cottage. He’d had no idea the man’s presence would cause either Baby Willie’s tears or Leslie’s euphoria.

“Is he really yours?” Leslie went on in accents of rapture. “Mrs. Biggs says he is. Do you think I could borrow him? I’ve just had the happy notion of painting him—for comparison, you understand—alongside of Baby Willie, if that poor dear will ever stop crying. Hugo’s the loveliest thing I’ve ever seen!”

“Aaahh,” Hugo crooned softly, accepting the compliment most graciously by picking Leslie up by the coat collar with one hand and placing a smacking wet kiss on his lordship’s thin cheek.

Elinor leapt to her feet. “You brute! You put my brother down this instant!”

“Aaarrrggh!”

Feeling as if he had just stepped unawares into a Covent Garden farce, Alastair rose as well, ordering, “Don’t growl, Hugo. It isn’t polite. And put his lordship down; I think he’s having a spot of trouble getting his breath.”

“Dear me!” Leslie gulped, nervously smoothing his neckcloth as he gazed up at the giant. “He is a strong fellow, isn’t he? But not to worry, Elly, I’m convinced that Hugo and I will become fast friends. Won’t we, Hugo?”