Page 3 of Indecently Daring

Life at Heart’s Folly is rather wonderful. Sometimes I wake up in the morning, in a great big bed surrounded by lace edged pillows and with a fire blazing in the hearth and think I must be dreaming. The day I met Papa was the luckiest day of my life and I am so grateful to him. I wish I were better behaved, for he deserves the perfect daughter who never says things she ought not or acts imprudently. Sadly, he’s stuck with me. I do try, Fred, truly, but then I open my mouth and… well, you know.

Sometimes I think you will lose patience with me and decide I am not worth the bother. There are so many other young ladies eager for your time who would not try you so sorely. Yet, I do miss your company and wish you were still here. I hope you are doing well at school and getting top marks, but of course I know you are.

Papa has hired a tutor for me, for as his daughter, it is no longer appropriate that I attend Eliza’s school. I rather miss it, for the girls were a lot of fun, but I must become a young lady now and make him and dear Evie proud. Happily, I still get to learn all the lessons I attended at school, including maths and science, though I think it rather scandalises the tutor to be teaching such subjects to a mere girl. However, I intend to confound him by showing him I’m just as good as any boy.

When shall I see you again?

―Excerpt of a letter to the Right Hon’ble Frederick Adolphus (Younger son of Their Graces, Robert and Prunella Adolphus, The Duke and Duchess of Bedwin) from Miss Agatha de Montluc (adopted daughter of Louis and Evie de Montluc, Comte et Comtesse de Villen).

3rdJanuary 1845, Holbrook House, Sussex.

Harry approached the vast building that was Holbrook House with a prickling sensation skittering down his spine. He told himself not to be so ungrateful, nor so unkind as to wish his aunt elsewhere. She was a kind-hearted soul and generous to a fault. As a boy, he’d adored her and believed her the only person in the world who understood him or cared for his well-being, but things had changed. Cora Dankworth’s particular brand of chaos was not something he could welcome into his well-ordered world with equanimity any longer. His living here as parish vicar still felt precarious but, until his housekeeper had left so precipitously, things had been going well. For the first time he could remember, he’d had taken control of his life. He had found meaning and purpose in a life that had been too random and tumultuous for too long. But of late he’d been feeling somewhat restless and on edge, as if the safe, peaceful little world he had built for himself rested on sand, rather than the solid foundation he had wanted so much to believe in. And now here was his madcap relative, plunging headlong into his nicely ordered life without so much as a by your leave and those uncertain footings were shuddering with apprehension.

Forcing down his misgivings, Harry affixed a smile to his face and greeted the countess, who had just preceded the butler out of the front doors. Harry turned at the sound of hooves and wheels upon gravel, to see a splendid carriage and six matched bays trotting smartly down the long approach to the house.

“Perfect timing, Reverend,” Lady St Clair said approvingly as he bowed to her. “Oh, and do you remember my niece, Miss Cadogan? I suppose it’s been rather a while, and I must introduce you to her friend, Lady Catherine.”

Harry turned and almost took a step backwards in shock, which would have pitched him back down the stairs. Instead, he forced himself not to react, which made his greeting rather mechanical, and froze the already stiff smile upon his face. Really, though, one did not expect to be thrust into the presence of Aphrodite and Artemis at the same time. A fellow needed a bit of warning for that kind of thing, but Lady St Clair only hurried through the introductions, keen to greet her approaching guests.

“Lady Catherine, allow me to present the Reverend Harry Martin. Reverend, Lady Catherine Barrington, and my niece, Miss Alana Cadogan.”

“A pleasure, ladies,” Harry managed, though uncomfortably aware that it did not sound as if much pleasure was involved. Lady Catherine, or Aphrodite, as he had mentally labelled her, returned a warm smile, apparently unperturbed by his reaction. Looking as she did, no doubt she was used to men acting oddly around her. Artemis, however, had a challenging glint in her eyes that suggested she thought him rude and rather pompous. He only had a vague memory of Alana Cadogan, though he remembered well enough that she always conspired to be elsewhere when she ought to be in church. Sighing inwardly, Harry turned towards the carriage, which had rolled to a stop before the house, and now he saw the impressive golden crest emblazoned on the door.

Oh, no. And there he’d been thinking it couldn’t get any worse.

The door was flung open a moment before the footman reached it and a large and all too familiar man leapt down, turning to glare back into the carriage, shaking his fist at someone inside.

“Never again, you devil! I’m never travelling with you ever again. Not if my life depends upon it, you malodorous creature. You’ve the heart of a villain, you blackguard, but you’re nothing but a pigeon with pretensions!”

Emerging from the carriage—now a rather anxious looking footman had set down the steps—Lady Beauchamp rolled her eyes at her nephew. “Bainbridge, really, must you make such a scene? It’s only a parrot, dear.”

“It’s the devil’s spawn is what it is!” Bainbridge raged with feeling, before remembering himself and turning to see the assembled company watching him with consternation. Tugging down his waistcoat, he let out a slow breath before bowing to the ladies. “Forgive me, Countess, ladies, but Lady St Clair, whatever possessed you to allow them to bring that wretched bird? I swear it would try the patience of a saint, and I ain’t no saint.”

“I was under the impression the creature would pine if left behind,” the lady said, lips twitching with amusement.

“Pine,” Bainbridge scoffed, looking disgusted. “It would just use the time to make plans for how best to upset my peace of mind, that’s all.”

Harry looked on, amused despite himself, as his aunt stepped out of the carriage and a footman gingerly followed her, carrying an enormous cage with a large, brightly coloured parrot inside.

“Sodom and Gomorrah,” the parrot announced cheerfully, whistling and bobbing up and down on its perch whilst looking about with interest. “Wicked, wicked Bainbridge! Murder, murder!”

“Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you. I wish you joy of it,” Bainbridge said to Lady St Clair balefully, before his gaze fell upon Harry, his expression brightening. “As I live and breathe. That you under all that black cloth, Harry?”

“For my sins,” Harry replied with a wry smile, finding himself pleased to see Bainbridge after so long, despite the fellow always having caused chaos whenever he was around.

Bainbridge took the stairs two at a time and grasped Harry’s hand, shaking it enthusiastically. “Well, well. Look at you, all holy and err, vicary. I heard you’d taken holy whatchacallems, but I hardly believed it, yet here you are. The Reverend Harry Martin.” Bainbridge shook his head, staring at Harry with obvious fascination, as if he’d revealed himself to have a green skin and a tail. “Why, Harry?” he asked then, his tone so bewildered Harry could only laugh.

“It’s good to see you too, Bainbridge,” he said, before turning to greet his relation. “Aunt Cora, you are looking well.”

“What tosh! I look like the Gorgon’s grandmother, especially after that dreadful journey, and I don’t doubt I’m just as welcome, eh, boy?”

His aunt shot him a knowing look, though her lips quirked with amusement.

“Nonsense. I’m delighted to see you, you dreadful creature,” Harry said, finding he meant it, for now at least. Cora brought memories of a happy childhood, of mischief and sweets and stolen cake, and a great deal of laughter. Until now, he’d not realised he’d forbidden himself to remember such things. A bittersweet sense of regret accompanied the memories.

“Dreadful, dreadful, wicked boy!” squawked the parrot.

“Get that blasted bird indoors and out of my sight!” Bainbridge barked at the nearest footman, who practically ran up the stairs, cage in hand. “Thank God I’m not staying here, no offence, Countess—oh, or you, Martin. Blasphemy, and all that. Forgive me, I forgot myself, but you know I’m a philistine by now, I reckon.”