Once and Always Read online

  Jason picked up the report he had been reading earlier, his expression glacial. “Make out another list during the next week and bring it to me.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  THE TASK OF SELECTING THE best prospects from amongst the increasing number of Victoria’s suitors, in order to prepare that list, became far more difficult for Charles than the last time. By the end of the following week, the house on Upper Brook Street was overflowing with bouquets of flowers brought there by a parade of eager gentlemen all hopeful of gaining the distinction of winning her favor.

  Even the elegant Frenchman the Marquis de Salle fell under her spell, not despite the language barrier, but because of it. He appeared at the house one day in the company of his friend, Baron Arnoff, and another friend who had stopped to pay a morning call on Victoria.

  “Your French is excellent,” the marquis lied with suave, meaningless gallantry as he wisely switched to English and sat down in the appointed chair.

  Victoria looked at him in laughing disbelief. “It is dismal,” she declared ruefully. “I find the nasal tones one uses in French almost as difficult to imitate as the guttural ones used in Apache.”

  “Apache?” he inquired politely. “What is that?”

  “It is the language spoken by a tribe of American Indians.”

  “American savages?” echoed the Russian baron, a legendary horseman in the Russian army. His expression of boredom changed to one of rapt interest. “I have heard that these savages are superb horsemen. Are they?”

  “I’ve only known one Indian, Baron Arnoff, and he was quite old and very polite, rather than savage. My father came upon him in the woods and brought him home to nurse him back to health. His name was Rushing River, and he stayed on as a sort of helper to my father. However, to answer your question, although he was only half Apache, he was indeed a superb horseman. I was twelve when I first saw him do tricks, and I was speechless with wonder. He used no saddle and—”

  “No saddle!” the baron exclaimed.

  Victoria shook her head. “Apaches don’t use them.”

  “What sort of tricks could he do?” asked the marquis, far more interested in her intoxicating face than her words.

  “Once Rushing River had me place a handkerchief in the middle of a field; then he rode toward it, his horse running full-out. When he was nearly there, he let go of the rope bridle completely, leaned way down and to the side, and scooped up the handkerchief while his horse was still running. He taught me how to do it, too,” she admitted, laughing.

  Impressed despite himself, the baron said, “I would have to see this before I believed it. I don’t suppose you could show me how it is done?”

  “No, I’m sorry. The horse must be trained in the Apache style first.”

  “Perhaps you could teach me a word or two of Apache,” the marquis teased with a coaxing smile, “and I could tutor you on your French?”

  “Your offer is very kind,” Victoria replied, “but it would not be at all fair, for I have much to learn and little to teach. I remember very few of the words Rushing River taught me.”

  “Surely you could teach me one phrase?” he prodded, smiling into her sparkling eyes.

  “No, really—”

  “I insist.”

  “Very well,” Victoria capitulated with a sigh, “if you insist.” She spoke a phrase in guttural accents and looked at the marquis. “Now, try to repeat it.”

  The marquis got it perfect on the second try and smiled with pleasure. “What does it mean?” he asked. “What did I say?”

  “You said,” Victoria replied with an apologetic look, “ ‘That man is treading upon my eagle.’ ”

  “Treading upon my—” The marquis, the baron, and everyone else gathered in the gold salon dissolved into laughter.

  The following day, the Russian baron and the French marquis returned to join the ranks of Victoria’s beaux, adding immensely to her prestige and increasing her popularity.

  Wherever Victoria was in the house, there was laughter and the sound of animated gaiety. Throughout the rest of the house, however, there was a vibrating, ominous tension that sprang from Lord Fielding and stretched its tentacles around everyone else. As week drifted into week and the number of Victoria’s suitors doubled and redoubled, Jason’s mood went from menacing to murderous. Wherever he went, he saw something that displeased him. He berated the cook for preparing his favorite meal too often; he chastised a housemaid for a speck of dust he found under the banister; he threatened to dismiss a footman who had a loose button on his jacket.

  In the past, Lord Fielding had been a demanding, exacting employer, but he had also been reasonable. Now, nothing seemed to satisfy him, and any servant who crossed his path was likely to feel the lash of his caustic tongue. Unfortunately, the more impossible he became, the faster and more furiously they worked, and the more nervous and clumsy it made them.

  Once his households had run as efficiently as well-oiled machines. Now servants scurried about, colliding with one another in their desperate haste to complete their tasks and avoid their employer’s smoldering wrath. As a result of their nervous frenzy, a priceless Chinese vase was dropped, a bucket of wash water was spilled onto the Aubusson carpet in the dining room, and general chaos reigned throughout the house.

  Victoria was aware of the tension among the staff, but when she cautiously tried to broach the subject with Jason he accused her of “trying to incite insurrection,” then launched into a scathing tirade about the noise her visitors were making while he was trying to work and the nauseating smell of the flowers they brought her.

  Twice Charles tried to discuss the second list of suitors with him, only to be rudely told to get out of his study and stay out.

  When Northrup himself received a stinging reprimand from Jason, the entire household began to crackle with terrified tension. It ended abruptly late one afternoon, five weeks after Victoria had made her come-out. Jason was working in his study and called for Northrup, who was about to place a newly arrived bouquet of Victoria’s flowers in a vase.

  Rather than keep his ill-tempered master waiting, Northrup rushed into the study, the bouquet in his hand. “Yes, my lord?” he inquired apprehensively.

  “How nice,” Jason sneered sarcastically. “More flowers? For me?” Before Northrup could answer, Jason said bitingly, “The whole damned house stinks of flowers! Get rid of that bouquet, then tell Victoria I want to see her, and bring me that damned invitation to the Frigleys’ affair tonight. I can’t remember what time it begins. Then tell my valet to lay out formal clothes for it, whenever it is. Well?” he snapped. “What are you waiting for? Get moving!”

  “Yes, my lord. At once.” Northrup rushed into the hall and slammed into O’Malley, whom Jason had just chastised for not having a proper shine on his boots.

  “I’ve never seen him like this,” O’Malley gasped to Northrup, who was plunging the bouquet into a vase before going to summon Lady Victoria. “His lordship sent me for tea, and then he shouted at me because I should have brought him coffee.”

  “His lordship,” Northrup remarked haughtily, “does not drink tea.”

  “I told him that when he asked for it,” O’Malley replied bitterly, “and he said I was insolent.”

  “You are,” Northrup replied, furthering the animosity that had been thriving between himself and the Irish footman for twenty years. With a smirk at O’Malley, Northrup strode off.

  In the small salon, Victoria stared blindly at the letter she had just received from Mrs. Bainbridge, the words blurring before her burning eyes.

  . . . I cannot find any gentle way to tell you that Andrew married his cousin in Switzerland. I tried to warn you of this likely event before you left for England, but you chose not to believe it. Now that you must accept it, I suggest you look about for a more suitable husband for a girl of your station.

  “No! Please!” Victoria whispered as her hopes and dreams crumbled and fell at her feet, along with her faith in