Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Blythe Blatchfield, widowed Countess of Chilcombe, ought to be grateful. Days earlier, just as dawn broke over London, she’d sent the last guest home from the mad crush of a ball she’d held here. Her drawing room had been filled with callers ever since.
The ball had been her official come out after her year of mourning, an event she’d paid for herself out of the pin money she’d squirreled away for years.
She’d planned a smallish affair for guests like her friend Lady Loughton, whose daughter was having her first season.
The other invitees had included members of the ton who hadn’t cut her entirely, as well those who hadn’t yet had the opportunity to do so.
The gathering had mushroomed beyond her wildest imaginings.
To her surprise, notes of acceptance had poured in, as well as requests for invitations. The ton was eager to see the scandalous countess who’d disappeared into the countryside with her husband and his disreputable friends.
Despite her murky past, despite the watered down ratafia and skimpy supper on offer, her carefully planned reappearance in society was a raging success. Those with a nose for more scandal were rewarded by the scene of a duke insulting Lady Loughton’s daughter.
Many of the best of London attended. She was gratified, even as she hoped they wouldn’t lay the blame for the young duke’s misbehavior on the hostess.
She needed to curry the favor of the beau monde if she was to confront a scheming marquess.
She needed to find her place in society, and the higher the place, the better.
If only her morning callers represented the best of the ton. Unfortunately, the most dedicated ones were inveterate gossips like Mrs. Netley and her daughter, as well as a scattering of brash young bucks.
It wasn’t merely tittle-tattle about the misbehaving duke they wanted. Her late husband’s sordid life and death, and the old rumors about the Chilcombes’ marital arrangements, still had gossips probing. The lusty gentlemen enjoyed gossip too but were mainly here to test the new widow’s virtue.
The news of Diddenton’s claims of a new will disinheriting her added to the titillation, despite the marquess’s struggle to produce a credible document. A document she prayed he would never find.
The impasse would end, somehow, when Graeme Blatchfield arrived in England.
The court would either tell the marquess to find another widow to impoverish, or Blythe would be cast out of her home.
If that happened, her fight would be with the new Earl of Chilcombe to honor the terms of his late cousin’s settlement agreement. And fight, she would.
A buckskin clad leg brushed her skirts, making her skin crawl.
The loathsome man who’d seated himself next to her, Lord Vernon Falfield, was her late husband’s bosom friend and the fourth son of the scheming marquess.
He’d been a participant in the goings-on at Risley Manor.
He was also very likely the source of the gossip about her at White’s, Boodle’s, and Brooks’s.
After Archie’s death, she’d banned him from Risley Manor and Bluebelle Lodge, and even escaped for a time to Lady Wyndham’s Matron Manor, a haven for widowed ladies like herself. Upon her return to town, her servants had held him at bay, except on her at-home days.
Today, he’d wedged himself and his Pomona green waistcoat onto the settee next to her.
“The latest on dit,” Lord Vernon said, “is that the Swilling Duke has fled town.”
Laughter ensued, along with speculation about the duke’s destination.
The silly young duke, who’d expelled his dinner on Lady Loughton’s daughter’s ball gown and passed out—dubbed the Swilling Duke by the wits—was only displaying publicly the least offensive behavior she’d seen in Archie and his friends privately.
She turned her gaze to the mantel clock, wondering how soon she could send all of them away and pay a promised call on Lady Loughton.
“Speaking of traveling peers,” Mrs. Netley trilled over the hubbub in the room, “when will the new Earl of Chilcombe arrive?”
Blythe steadied herself. She fielded this question at least once at every social event she attended, and yet every time, her insides quaked from the uncertainty. She aimed to be gone from Chilcombe House before the new earl swanned into London looking down his nose at her.
“Has he been found?” one pink of the town asked.
“Lord Chilcombe’s date of arrival is uncertain,” she said, “but I’m informed that we might expect it to be in a few months.” July, if the winds are favorable, the Foreign Office said.
“At which point you will be cast out?” Lord Vernon asked with a sly, sympathetic pout.
Mrs. Netley visibly perked.
Blythe uncurled her hands and drew in a breath, refusing to be baited. Chilcombe House had to be maintained anyway, and she would stay until she needed to move into lodgings an easy drive to Doctor’s Commons.
If only her own dear little son had lived, her one worry might be an unfriendly daughter-in-law years from now precipitously tossing her out of Chilcombe House.
“Dear Lord Vernon,” Blythe said blandly, “I am not living in the plot of one of Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels.”
The others laughed, as she meant them to do.
“I’ve heard that there’s to be a hot air balloon ascension next month in Sussex,” she said, “and if any one of you is au courant on all matters scientific, you must tell us everything you know about it.”
Delighted, one rattlepate clapped his hands and launched into a report, while Mrs. Netley settled back in disappointment, and Blythe eased in another breath to slow her racing heart.
Smiling and nodding at what must be all the right parts in the monologue about Mr. Graham’s balloon and the aeronaut accompanying him, she heard barely a word.
She was not anymore living the plot of one of Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels. Archie’s death had given her a reprieve from the gothic, sordid existence that he’d thought to impose, and that she’d refused to embrace. She hadn’t so much won the battle as simply outfoxed and outlasted him.
It had been an exhausting trial, one she wouldn’t willingly renew with any man. She might have to fight for Bluebelle Lodge and its lands, but Graeme Blatchfield wouldn’t cast her out of Chilcombe House because she wouldn’t give him the chance.
Though the despicable brat surely would attempt it.
She’d been a good steward, even before Archie died.
She’d seen to the much-needed repairs on Chilcombe House, begun before Archie’s death.
She’d stretched the budget allowed by the court to sweep out the stench and sordidness of the late Earl of Chilcombe and his friends, both here and at Risley Manor, the Chilcombes’ main seat.
She hoped that by the time Graeme set foot in England, the old will would be proved, and she’d be residing permanently at Bluebelle Lodge.
Mrs. Netley was voicing her disgust at female aeronauts when the drawing room door opened and the Chilcombe butler, Adwick, white-faced under all his dignified aplomb, caught her eye. Before he could speak, another man stepped around him and surveyed the room.
A stranger to her, he was a man of perhaps thirty, starkly handsome with light brown hair.
Not as handsome as Archie had been, not as tall nor golden-haired like her Adonis of a husband.
Still, wide-shouldered and square-jawed under the start of an afternoon beard, he stirred a warmth in her that she hadn’t felt in years.
Along with the awareness rippling through her came a touch of apprehension. Despite the need for a shave and coats dusty from travel, he carried himself like a man in command, entitled and privileged, and signaling… disdain, perhaps.
His unsmiling gaze made a circuit of the room, noting Mrs. Netley and her daughter, moving over the dandies, fops, and pinks of the town, then flitting over her to Lord Vernon.
And then quickly returning to her. His study of her sent his lips into a thin line and then his eyes widened.
Her heart raced and stuttered, while around her the air shimmered and the floor threatened to open and take both herself and the lovely Queen Anne settee down into… into…
No. No, no, no. She would not faint. Would not. Would not.
Adwick cleared his throat and announced the arrival of the Earl of Chilcombe.