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Chapter 1
Lucinda’s angry, discordant note on the piano brought Lissa’s head up sharply. It seemed her disgruntled charge had finally—like Lissa—had enough of the muffled and completely inappropriate giggles of Lord Beecham’s ‘special’ friend. For the last hour, Lissa had sat quietly sewing by the window, as well behaved as any good governess could be suffering such trials.
Meanwhile, seated on an elegant blue and silver silk-striped sofa opposite the piano, Lord Beecham seemed wholly occupied with his increasingly regular guest, Lady Julia, and until now, impervious to his ward’s attempt to regain his attention.
Lissa slanted a glance at Lucinda. When Lucinda was angry, she was not a pretty girl. Her peaches and cream complexion became red and mottled; her rosebud-shaped mouth flattened into a harsh, thin line, and her normally luminous blue eyes seemed almost black beneath beetling brows. This was how she looked now as she hunched on the piano stool, glowering at Lady Julia—or Lady Ledger, wife of Sir Archie Ledger if she were happy to be properly identified, which, judging by the surreptitious fondling the pair were engaged in today, she would not.
Lady Julia, supposedly an earl’s daughter fallen upon hard times, was purportedly Lucinda’s very young godmother. She arrived at Lord Beecham’s London townhouse at regular intervals, heavily veiled, to instruct Miss Lucinda Martindale in the musical arts, though she could not—as far as Lissa could tell—play a note. At least, Lissa had never heard her play a note, though she’d heard a lot of other noises emanating from Lady Julia during her visits to his Lordship’s bedroom between music lessons.
Finally, it seemed, Lucinda had achieved what she’d been after—Lord Beecham’s undivided attention.
“What an infernal noise!” he exclaimed, the dewy adoration as he’d gazed at Lady Julia instantly replaced by a thunderous scowl as he jerked his head around to look at Lucinda. “I spend a fortune on your musical education! Surely I should expect better than that!”
Lucinda’s mobile face went through a gamut of emotions—devastation then outrage, however her mouth remained a thin, tight line. It was quite obvious the girl was desperately in love with her benefactor into whose care she’d been placed the previous year.
It was upon the death of her parents and younger brother during a scarlet fever outbreak in their village that Lucinda became a ward of Lord Beecham. But while Lucinda was obstinate and demanding of her governess, she had never, as far as Lissa knew, openly challenged Lord Beecham.
Nevertheless, there was an underlying challenge now as the girl asked, “Perhaps Lady Julia would care to demonstrate how Pachelbel’s Canon in D should really sound.”
Lady Julia, who had attempted to discreetly put at least several inches between her thigh and that of his Lordship’s on the sofa, smiled sweetly. “My dear, I don’t want to show you up.” She patted her bright golden hair, then purred, “Please, play it again. With just a little more practise you will have mastered it, and Lord Beecham and I are quite happy for you to entertain us while I continue to outline to him my hopes on how your general carriage, demeanor and…might I add without offense…character itself might be improved sufficiently to make your come-out without undue embarrassment to either yourself or his Lordship.”
Lissa was interested to see how Lucinda would take this. With her head still bowed over her embroidery frame, she didn’t miss the flashing eyes above the pretty, pert nose of her young charge, and Lord Beecham’s wolfish, apparent approval of Lady Julia’s saccharine demeanor.
In the two months Lissa had spent in Lord Beecham’s employ, she had not warmed to her charge; for all she knew she ought to pity the girl. It was true that she’d established more control over Lucinda than Lucinda’s previous governess had. Lucinda no longer tried to undermine her at every opportunity or threw tantrums, and it appeared Lissa’s policy of being firm but distant appeared to have worked. But there was little affection between the pair.
Lucinda was the first to drop her eyes from Lady Julia’s scrutiny. Her shoulders slumped, and she turned back to her music which she started to play once again, this time softly and with no discordant notes. Lucinda was rather good at most things, if she put her mind to it.
Meanwhile, Lissa strained to hear what Lady Julia and Lord Beecham were discussing. It was one of the reasons she’d been placed in this position by her ‘real’ employer, Sir William Deane, late of the Foreign Office. The fact that Lissa could apparently appear as nondescript as the wallpaper was to her advantage, for she’d already gleaned several tidbits, which had been well-received as points of interest by Sir William’s successor.
Her ears pricked up at a reference to Lord Silverton, not a name she’d expected to hear in this drawing room, but a name that induced mixed feelings since she’d learned her younger sister, Kitty, now a celebrated actress, had become his mistress.
For months, Lissa had been desperate to make contact with Kitty. She’d resisted because she feared Kitty’s unbridled love of chatter, and her reputation for indiscretions might compromise Lissa’s dangerous work in espionage and bringing to justice a very dangerous gentleman. Lissa was the responsible one, and Kitty was quite likely to inadvertently destroy the hard-won gains Lissa had painstakingly worked toward during these past few months.
Reluctantly, she’d therefore refrained from directly seeking Kitty out, though she kept as much of a sisterly eye upon her as she could from afar, informing their mother of Kitty’s successes on the stage though their mother had, of all the family, been the most distraught at the scandalous life her daughter had embraced. Just as well she had no idea of the murky world of intrigue in which Lissa was involved.
In the midst of these musings, Lissa was brought up short by Lady Julia’s loud whisper. “Did you know Silverton’s betrothed is due to travel down from the north sometime next month? I wonder if word has reached poor Octavia that there’s already a little cuckoo in the nest.”
She wriggled against Lord Beecham and put her mouth to his ear as she ran her hand inside his waistcoat. “Kitty La Bijou! You did hear, didn’t you, that the darling of the London stage arrived at the altar not four weeks ago, all set to marry Lord Nash?” Lady Julia was clearly enjoying the salacious details in inverse proportion to Lissa, whose very soul seemed to be in the process of
being sucked through her feet. To hear the gossip-hungry Lady Julia muckraking Lissa’s own sister as if the girl were society’s grisly spoils was a particularly cruel piece of purgatory.
When Lord Beecham put his head on one side to indicate his interest, Lady Julia eagerly supplied the details Lissa had heard in only the sketchiest form. “Yes, Lord Nash’s irate pater appeared in St Mary’s in high dudgeon to announce his son wasn’t permitted to wed before he was twenty-five. You won’t believe what happened next! Miss La Bijou, in full wedding regalia, burst into tears and ran out into the street with Lord Silverton in hot pursuit. By the time Lord Nash caught up with his erstwhile lover and intended bride, to explain to Miss Bijou that he’d already ensured the legalities were iron-clad, and furthermore, here was his lawyer and now his father to attest to the fact, it was to discover Miss La Bijou in a state of post-coital bliss with… Lord Silverton!”
