Kitabı oxu: «Kitty»

Chapter One

No warning of impending disaster struck the sleepy village of Paddington. A kindly sun obligingly cast its warmth upon the grateful inhabitants, while May bees and butterflies flitted about their business in the hedgerows. The carter’s horse plodded slowly around the confines of the Green, and the baker’s boy, sauntering from the shop to set out upon the next of his deliveries, let out a jaunty whistle.

He gave a cheery wave as he took in the identity of the young lady perched upon the fence that edged the Green, alongside the road leading to Edgware and thence to the metropolis. The baker’s boy was scarce to blame for missing the tell-tale reddened eyes, their brown the more lustrous for having being drowned in tears, for Miss Katherine Merrick undoubtedly added something to the picturesque scene.

A quantity of lush black curls descended halfway down her back, escaping from under a straw hat that framed a countenance undeniably lovely. A straight nose and a pretty mouth, just now turned down in discontent, were worthy of an ensemble more becoming than the dimity gown of faded pink, with its unfashionably low waist and three-quarter sleeves, and the short hem revealing more than a glimpse of the white cotton hose that Miss Merrick thoroughly detested.

Truth to tell, the young lady loathed every item she had on, from the ancient black shoes to the unmentionable undergarments that confined her curvaceous figure in the least flattering way. The gown was only marginally less hateful than the rest. Only how was one to manage upon a paltry income of three shillings a week?

It was through the agency of the upper maid at the Paddington Charitable Seminary for Indigent Young Ladies—which had been Miss Merrick’s home for more years than she cared to count—that she had acquired the pink cast-off gown. Where Parton got it, she could not have said. Indeed, she took care not to enquire too closely.

‘Let’s just say as I’ve a friend of a friend as is friend to a parlour maid in the house of a great lady hereabouts. And this one will be three shillings, if it’s to your liking, Miss Kitty.’

It was not much to Kitty’s liking, but for want of any other means of augmenting her wardrobe with anything fit to wear besides the horrid grey Seminary uniform, she had handed over the entirety of the week’s wages. Now that she was no longer strictly a pupil, Mrs Duxford had decreed that she must receive a little something for her services. And not before time! It was more than a month since she had been dragooned into the trying task of inculcating a modicum of grace into the clodhopping feet of the junior girls. It was like teaching a roomful of elephants!

Kitty dabbed at her eyes again with the sodden pocket-handkerchief. Perhaps she had best swallow her yearnings and take up the latest in a series of beastly posts the Duck wished to thrust upon her. Only what hope had she of emulating the success of her dearest friends as governess in a household where the eldest son was but eleven years of age, and there was not a widower in sight?

A fresh deluge of tears cascaded down her cheeks at the melancholy remembrance of Helen Faraday’s coming nuptials. The letter handed over to Kitty at breakfast this morning by Mr Duxford, who always dealt with the post, had been couched in rhapsodic terms wholly unlike Nell’s usual manner. Kitty held the handkerchief to her eyes as she vainly attempted to stem the flow. She was happy for Nell, she told herself miserably. Had she not predicted this outcome the moment she had heard of the widowed Lord Jarrow and his Gothic castle? She had told Nell to fall in love with him, and her friend had done it within a few short weeks. While as for Prue—! Who would have thought that so unpromising a creature would have captured any man’s romantic fancy? Mrs Rookham she was now, and disgustingly happy. It was too bad!

But no sooner had this unkind thought passed through her mind than Kitty chided herself for a beast. She could not envy darling Prue. Nor would Kitty have settled for a mere mister! But it was hard indeed to be the only one left, and with no prospects. Of the three, she had been the one to repudiate the future to which she had been raised, and if she ended after all as a governess, it would be the greatest injustice imaginable!

There was but one consolation, her present status permitting her to escape now and then upon the flimsiest of pretexts. This morning she had volunteered to nip out to the village shop in order to procure three pairs of the regulation hose for the latest orphaned arrival, along with a toothbrush and a tin of toothpowder—essential items that had been mysteriously forgotten by the persons who brought the child. Having made the purchases, Kitty had thrust them into her inner pockets and dawdled in the shop as long as she dared without buying anything more. Having used every penny of the last of her pupil’s allowance, as well as her new wage, she had no money left to spend.

But the thought of returning to the Seminary, and to the task of listening—her unenviable occupation now of a Friday afternoon—to one of the worst-fingered pupils in the place practising upon the pianoforte, was altogether unbearable. Especially at a time when she was severely moved by Nell’s good fortune—and no privacy in which to indulge it. The two other beds in her shared accommodation were now occupied by girls much younger than herself. Seventeen and eighteen—and Kitty was one and twenty in all but a month or two.

One and twenty! It was all of a piece. By rights she should have made her come-out and been long betrothed, if some ill-disposed person had not cut her off from the heritage she was convinced should have been hers. And condemning her thereby to a life of drudgery. She was the unluckiest female in the world!

A sound unusual in this out-of-the-way village penetrated her self-absorption. A vehicle coming down the lane, and drawn by several horses? It could not be the stage, for Mr King’s coach boasted but one pair, and it was travelling too fast for a carrier. Distracted from her troubles by an idle curiosity, Kitty looked towards the sound, which was coming from the direction of Westbourn Green.

Around the corner swept a team of matched greys, drawing a smart-looking open carriage. It was driven by a man who looked to be a gentleman, with a liveried fellow up beside him, whom she took to be his groom. Tutored by her avid reading, Kitty recognised a fashionable spencer in the short green jacket, worn over a brown frock coat, the whole topped by a stylish hat. She watched the approach of the carriage with a feeling of envy. How she would love to be driven in so dashing a vehicle! Was it a curricle?

The carriage sailed by, and Kitty could not help but preen herself a little upon seeing its occupant glance in her direction. Especially when she thought she caught an expletive bursting from his lips. She was used to being an object of male attention, even if her admirers were for the most part bucolic yokels like the baker’s boy. It did her heart good to know that her features had caught the interest of a personage of this calibre.

And then Kitty realised that the carriage was slowing. In some surprise, she watched it come to a halt, and saw the groom jump down and run to the heads of the leading pair of horses. Had the driver mistaken the way? A riffle disturbed her pulses as an enticing thought struck her. Perhaps he took her for a village maiden, and had leaped to the notion of indulging in a little flirtation.

The horses began to back, guided by the groom, and Kitty experienced a moment of doubt. Hitherto, her flirtations had been confined to the ilk of old Mr Fotherby, who lived in the house at the top of the Green, and knew how to keep the line. Lord, what if this man were to—

There was time for no more, for the carriage was coming level with where she perched, the gentleman’s attention fully directed upon Kitty. She took in a vaguely pleasing countenance, just now marred by a heavy frown, and a glimpse of yellow hair under the wide-brimmed beaver, brown in colour. And then the gentleman addressed her, in strongly indignant tones.

‘I thought it was you! Dash it, Kate, what the deuce are you about? How did you get here? You haven’t run away, have you, silly wench? Didn’t I tell you not to fret?’

As Kitty stared at him, utterly bemused, his glance raked the surrounding area and came back to her face, a pair of blue eyes popping at her.

‘What the devil—? Have you come here alone? Where’s your maid? Gad, Aunt Silvia will be having a blue fit! I’d best take you home without more ado. Come, get off that fence and hop up!’

Bewilderment gave way to wrath, and Kitty found her tongue. ‘I shall do no such thing! Who are you? I do not know you, nor have I heard of your aunt Silvia, and I’ll thank you to take yourself off, sir!’

‘Oh, will you?’ muttered the gentleman grimly. ‘Stop playing games, Kate, for the Lord’s sake!’

‘I am not Kate,’ stated Kitty bluntly. ‘I do not know who you are, and my name is Kitty.’

‘No, it isn’t,’ argued the young man. ‘Kitty indeed! Never heard such flimflam.’

‘It’s the truth!’

‘And I’m a Dutchman.’

Kitty blinked. ‘Are you? You sound English to me.’

The young man groaned. ‘I’ll throttle you in a minute! Now be sensible, there’s a good girl. Leave off joking, for I haven’t got all day.’

Kitty began to feel desperate. ‘Sir, I am not joking. You are quite unknown to me. I am not this Kate, whoever she may be, and—’

‘Next you’ll be telling me I’m not your cousin Claud!’

‘I haven’t got a cousin Claud! Indeed, I have no cousin at all.’

Claud—if that was indeed the gentleman’s name—gazed at her in a look compound of disbelief and frustration. Kitty pursued what she perceived to be an advantage, and assumed as haughty a mien as she could.

‘Be pleased to drive on, sir.’

The gentleman threw his eyes to heaven. ‘Will you stop behaving like a third-rate play-actress? Are you going to get into this curricle, or do I come and get you?’

A rise of apprehension made Kitty grasp tightly to the bar of the fence upon which she was perched. Was the man mad? Her voice quivered a little as she tried again to disabuse him of his strange delusion.

‘Sir, I have n-never set eyes on you in my life! You are m-mistaken in me, I do assure you, and I most certainly will not get into your curricle.’

The gentleman cursed fluently, and called to his groom. ‘Hold them steady, Docking. I’ll have to get down.’

Seeing him move to alight from the curricle, Kitty jumped hastily off the fence and made a dash for safety, running away from the vehicle in the direction of the little bank of shops to one end of the Green. The thunder of feet in pursuit threw her heart into her mouth, and she gasped her fright as a hand seized her from behind.

‘No, you don’t!’

Kitty shrieked, trying to pull away, as the relentless young gentleman tugged her round to face him. Panic took her.

‘Let me go! Let me go!’

But his hold instead strengthened upon her arms, and he berated her with some heat. ‘Will you stop making such a cake of yourself? Enacting me a tragedy in the middle of the street, silly chit! Come on!’

‘I won’t! Let me go!’

‘Kate, I won’t brook your defiance! Get into the carriage!’

Glancing wildly round for succour, Kitty saw only the empty Green. The hideous truth of a quiet country village hit her. There was no one to come to her aid! Those few inhabitants round about would be stuck in their parlours or out in the gardens that looked away from the Green. And there was little to hope for from the proprietors of the few shops for which she had been headed, who were in all likelihood snoring at their posts. She was alone with a madman, whose tight hold she could by no means shake off.

Sheer fright drove her then, and she fought like a tigress, shrieking protests and imprecations as her captor struggled to control her.

‘You won’t make me! Beast! Brute! How dare you?’

‘If you won’t come quietly, I’ll pick you up and carry you!’

But Kitty was beyond reason, yowling as much with rage, as panic, as she tried to break free. The man let go of her, and Kitty staggered back, almost losing her balance.

‘All right, young Kate, you asked for it!’

How it happened, Kitty could not have said, but the next instant, she found herself flung over the gentleman’s shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Half-winded and distressingly uncomfortable, Kitty was borne resistless to the curricle and dumped down without ceremony on to the seat, where she sat mumchance and numb with shock. She gazed in a bemused fashion as her assailant, panting a little, collected up his hat, which had fallen off in the struggle, clapped it back on his head, and leaped nimbly up into his seat, where he settled himself and gathered up the reins.

The horses were given the office to start and the curricle rumbled down the road. The groom jumped up behind as it passed him, and Paddington Green began to recede as it dawned on Kitty that she was being abducted.

Her heart began to hammer. In a shaking voice, she informed her captor of his iniquity. ‘You are the h-horridest man I have ever met in my l-life! Set me down at once! Stop the carriage, I tell you!’

‘Screech as much as you like. It won’t make a ha’p’orth of difference.’

Kitty looked back and saw the familiar Paddington landmarks disappearing rapidly behind them. In a few moments, they would be turning into the Edgware Road. The heavy thump at her chest almost overwhelmed her, and she could barely get the words out.

‘This is—is k-kidnapping! You—you may go to p-prison for it!’

But the heartless creature, who, in a few short moments, had turned her world upside down—literally too!—had no other answer for her than a mocking laugh. For a hazardous instant or two, Kitty contemplated jumping from the curricle. But it was travelling faster than she could ever have imagined, and as her glance raked the swiftly passing road beneath the carriage, her imagination presented her with a hideous picture of broken limbs, or worse. Her eyes swept the road ahead, where the rapid approach of the fork told her that hope of a swift return to the safety of the Seminary was receding all too fast. Fright enveloped her, and she descended to pleading.

‘Oh, pray, sir, take me back! Indeed, I do not know you, and there will assuredly be the most dreadful uproar when you discover your mistake. Pray, pray stop now, before it is too late!’

A brief glance came her way, and the gentleman addressed her in a conversational way. ‘That’s very good, Kate. Never knew you were such an actress. You’d best get up some theatricals and give yourself some scope.’

Despair gripped Kitty. Could she make no impression upon him? His conviction of this false identity appeared unshakeable. What could she say to make him recognise that he was making an error, which could not fail to have serious repercussions? She clenched her hands in her lap as the curricle slowed for the turn into Edgware Road.

‘You will not believe me, but you will be sorry presently, I promise you.’

His head turned. ‘I should dashed well think I will be, if Aunt Silvia chooses to cut up rough! If I don’t get you back as fast as bedamned, as sure as check she will have gone to the Countess in hysterics, and then the fat will be in the fire, and no mistake!’

Kitty caught her breath against a rising sob. ‘I think you are mad! And if you are not put in prison for this day’s work, very likely you will end in Bedlam.’

‘Ha! Hark at the pot calling the kettle black! The only thing that would put me in Bedlam is finding that I’ve got to marry you, after all. Which is what the Countess is bound to say if she gets wind of this escapade.’

So saying, he put the horses into the corner at a speed that raised the hairs on the back of Kitty’s neck. The curricle swerved horribly and she clutched hastily at the side, fearful of being overturned. But within seconds, the vehicle had made the turn and was running straight and true down the Edgware Road.

It was a moment or two before Kitty’s fright abated enough to think over what he had said. Not that it made sense. Had he mentioned marriage? Certainly, his words bore out that he truly had mistaken her for another. Was she so much like this Kate?

He turned his head again and the blue eyes raked her. ‘What in Hades possessed you, Kate? Thought you were a biddable girl. Can’t blame you for rebelling, for I want the match as little as you do. Only why go to these lengths? Told you I had the matter in hand, didn’t I? Should have known I’m not the fellow to let myself be pushed into it when the female ain’t willing. I know my mother’s a tartar, but I ain’t about to knuckle under over this, and so I tell you!’

Kitty began to be curious, despite her lurking apprehension. ‘Is your family then constraining you to marry your cousin?’

She received a disgusted look. ‘Don’t start all that again! As if you were indeed someone other than Kate.’

The curiosity turned to annoyance. ‘But I have told you so! Why you should mistake me for your cousin, I cannot tell, but I am not she.’

‘I’ve had enough of this!’ He glanced over his shoulder to address his groom. ‘Docking, who is this female?’

Kitty turned in her seat and found the liveried fellow grinning. ‘Why, it’s Miss Katherine, me lord.’

‘And what relation is she to me?’

‘Cousin, me lord, being as your ma and her ma be sisters.’

The blue gaze swung back upon Kitty. ‘I rest my case.’

But Kitty’s attention had caught upon the manner of the groom’s address. Almost she held her breath. ‘Are you indeed a lord?’

‘Don’t be a nodcock, Kate. You know I am.’

Kitty experienced a jolting leap in her chest, and turned to stare at the gentlemen’s profile. He looked to be pleasant enough—if only she had not discovered him to be anything but!—for his features were clean cut and even, the nose straight and true, the lip rounded. She had taken in little in the brief glimpse she’d had of his hair, except that it was of pale gold. But there was something about the chin. Kitty examined the chin with a certain intentness. It was not a heavy jaw, by any means, only that chin had a stubborn jut. Which explained why his character did not match his appearance! Only he was a lord.

‘Your name is Claud?’ she ventured.

‘Devil take it, Kate, will you stop this?’

Then she had recalled it aright. ‘And you are unmarried?’

‘They could scarce be constraining me to marry you if I wasn’t.’

A daring thought occurred to Kitty, and her heart jumbled its beat. ‘Is it not the case that if you ruin my reputation by abducting me, you ought in honour to offer me marriage?’

‘Lord above!’ Claud’s horrified gaze swept hers. ‘What the deuce will you be at? You ran off only because you don’t want to marry me, didn’t you?’

The daring notion died at birth. Kitty sighed. ‘I keep telling you I am not your cousin. It is true that my name is Katherine, but—’

‘Listen!’ begged Claud. ‘I don’t know what your game is, but I’m at the end of my rope! Any more, and I’ll tie something round your mouth, so you can’t talk!’

Having no reason to disbelieve him—had not the brute thrown her pell-mell over his shoulder in that horrid way?—Kitty refrained from responding in kind and subsided into brooding silence. The pace of the curricle picked up, causing a wind to fly at her for which she was most unsuitably clad. Realisation hit, and the pit of her stomach vanished. She was being driven to London, with nothing but the clothes upon her back! She would likely die of exposure, if she did not expire from sheer terror.

The shock of her enforced capture had in fact receded, although Kitty could not subdue the leaping apprehension. That she had been mistaken for another could not be in doubt, and what would happen when her captor discovered it, she dared not think. Not that she was in any way to blame! If there was any justice, this Claud must acknowledge it. Surely, he would make her reparation? At least he must find a way to send her back to the Seminary.

That he would opt to send her back was all too likely, Kitty reflected a little despondently. He showed no sign of being attracted to her. He clearly did not wish to marry his cousin. And since Kitty evidently resembled her, she could not suppose he would wish to marry her either. A pity, for she desperately wanted to marry a lord! Still, it might not be comfortable to be wed to a stranger, and it was apparent that it would be difficult to bring this Claud up to scratch.

Besides, he was a brute! She recalled the rough treatment she had received at his hands—and the recent threat—with a resurgence of outrage. Oh, but she would serve him out for it! Only wait until he discovered his mistake. For discover it he must, sooner or later. However much she resembled his cousin—

The thought died. Kitty’s pulse did a rapid tattoo and shot into a wild thumping that echoed in her ears. Why had she not thought of it at once? If she was this alike to an unknown female, there could be only one explanation. She had stumbled inadvertently upon a member of her lost family.

Buried in his own thoughts, Claud, Viscount Devenick, paid scant heed to his cousin beside him, although she came within the scope of his ruminations. His temper had cooled, but he was at a loss to account for Kate’s freakish conduct. Not that he would question her again. If she meant to persist with this ridiculous masquerade, it would only drive him up into the boughs. Thank the Lord she had ceased her nonsensical arguing. Did she think he truly would have gagged her? Should have known him better. Clearly she did not, as this escapade proved. Silly chit hadn’t trusted him!

He reminded himself that she was only eighteen and just out this season. From the vantage point of five and twenty, it was clear how readily this escapade could put the cat among the pigeons. Faced with a niece who ran away rather than marry her cousin, ten to one his mother would force him to the altar on the pretext that Kate had blasted her reputation.

Not that he was such a nodcock as not to realise why Lady Blakemere had taken this notion into her head. If it hadn’t been for Grandmama’s promised legacy to the girl to give her a decent dowry, the scheme would not have occurred to the Countess. As if he hadn’t enough money of his own! And all his mother would keep saying was that the Dowager Duchess’s money ought to be kept in the family. A pity he had no brother instead of three sisters. It would have made sense for a younger son to dangle after the loot. But not for Claud to tie himself up in matrimony to Kate, of all girls under the sun!

She was comely enough, but what man wanted to wed his cousin? Besides, she was a thought too much of a milk-and-water miss for his taste. Which made her conduct today all the more incomprehensible. He’d never known the chit to be so flighty, nor to face him down as she had. A faint stirring of interest rose up. Perhaps there was more to young Kate than he had thought. He turned to glance at her, and found her studying him, her dark brows lowering. Claud shot instantly to the attack.

‘What are you scowling for? You should be grateful to me.’

She continued to stare at him, a pout forming on her lips.

‘Lost your tongue?’ demanded Claud crossly. ‘Answer me, can’t you?’

It was too much. Kitty lost her temper.

‘Answer me, can’t you!’ she echoed, in almost exact imitation of his tone. ‘Why should I answer you, when you can think of nothing better to do than to threaten me? Is it not enough that you have dragged me by force into your carriage?’

‘That was your own fault, Kate. Why couldn’t you come quietly? Fought like a wildcat!’

‘And I would do so again!’

But to his utter bewilderment, the chit abruptly burst into tears. Claud was thrown into instant disorder. He hadn’t meant to make her cry.

‘Hey, no need to turn into a watering pot!’

‘Yes, there is,’ sobbed Kitty, hunting frantically for her pocket-handkerchief. ‘You don’t know what you’ve done, and I can’t tell you. Except that it is terrible!’

Unable to find the handkerchief, Kitty recalled that she’d had it in her hand when this infamous Claud had come upon her. It must have been lost in the struggle. She sniffed, turning on her abductor.

‘And you made me lose my handkerchief!’

He transferred the reins to his left hand and dug the right into a pocket of his frock coat. ‘Here.’

Kitty snatched the snowy white pocket-handkerchief he presented to her and defiantly blew her nose, wiping away her tears. The desire to weep was receding, but she did not return the handkerchief, instead jerking it between her fingers in a nervous fashion. The wind had begun to make her feel chilled, reminding her of the woeful lack in her costume. She looked round at the author of her plight.

‘Do you realise that you have brought me away without a stitch to wear besides this gown?’

The blue gaze travelled briefly down her person and returned to the road. ‘Beats me why you’d want the thing! Where did you get it? You look like the farmer’s daughter in her Sunday best.’

‘How hateful of you to say so! I know it is not fashionable, but—’

‘If you take my advice, you’ll burn it.’

‘Burn it!’ shrieked Kitty, outraged. ‘It cost me three whole shillings!’

He looked round again, a critical frown between his fair brows. ‘You were robbed. Mind you, I can’t think why you didn’t provide yourself at least with a cloak. Featherbrained, that’s what you are, young Kate.’

Kitty glared at him. ‘Why should I take a cloak merely for a trip to the shops on the Green on a day like this?’

But Claud was not attending. It had been borne in upon him that his idiotic cousin was shivering. Why she must need escape without proper preparation, he was at a loss to understand. Silly chit hadn’t a brain in her head. Thank the Lord he had held steadfast against marrying the wench!

He slowed the carriage, and called over his shoulder to the groom. ‘Docking, is there a blanket in this thing?’

‘Under the seat, me lord.’

Kitty, who had been lost in the realisation that everything she owned was at the Seminary, came to herself as the carriage was pulled up. Her abductor was rummaging under the seat, and Kitty briefly thought of taking a chance and jumping down. Only he would be bound to come after her, and would have no difficulty in catching her. Besides, how in the world would she manage, left in the middle of the highway, with no notion where she was and no means of getting herself back to Paddington?