LITMIR.BIZ

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and she shrank away, feeling all the force of that rejection she had known when persons she only vaguely recollected—strangers to her—had removed her from the place she had called home and dumped her at the Paddington Seminary, leaving her horribly alone.

      As if through a cloud, she heard voices, saw Kate’s features close to hers, speaking words that had no meaning. She sensed beside her the presence of Claud, and moved as he directed her, going where he led with neither interest nor attention. Only when she was outside the mansion in the fresh air, and being urged into the curricle, did Kitty come back to herself. And to the full realisation of what had happened.

      Having packed the girl into his curricle and taken up the reins, Claud did not immediately instruct Docking to stand away from the horses’ heads. His mind was sorely exercised by the revelation of the existence of a family skeleton, and he sat irresolute, wondering what were best to do. If his aunt Silvia supposed he would meekly bury the finding under the carpet, she had much to learn of him. Particularly in light of the fear she had exhibited on the notion of Lady Blakemere getting wind of the matter.

      A surge of tingling exhilaration rose up inside him at the thought of what this could do to the woman who had long been his Nemesis. She might be his mother, but he had long ago given up addressing her as such. Lydia, Countess of Blakemere, had harried him from his earliest years, and he could not regard her with anything but revulsion. Along with his sisters, he had been terrorised by her frowns and castigated for every fault of character—of which, according to the Countess, he had more than his fair share. He had thanked his stars, and his father’s insistence—likely the only time poor Papa had succeeded in standing out against her!—for his schooling at Eton, which had toughened him to withstand the creature just as soon as he was old enough to do so without fear of retribution. Two of his sisters had escaped into matrimony—not that they’d had choice of who they married!—and it was upon the head of poor Babs at seventeen that the wrath of the Countess now fell. There was little young Babs could do against her. But for Claud, always on the lookout for vengeance, an opportunity such as this was manna from heaven. The family skeleton come home to roost!

      At this point in his ruminations, it was borne in upon Claud that the skeleton was emitting suspiciously doleful sounds. Turning his head, he found Kitty valiantly attempting to stifle her sobs. Tears nevertheless gathered at her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. Stricken with renewed guilt, Claud cursed.

      ‘Don’t cry! Told you I won’t let it harm you, didn’t I?’

      Kitty gulped and sniffed, shaking her head in the hope that he would realise that she could not speak. It evidently did not occur to him that she was less hurt by the possible consequences than her reception in the Haymarket house.

      ‘Where’s that handkerchief I gave you? You’d best find it, for I haven’t another on me.’

      The reminder served to send Kitty’s fingers digging into her pockets. One hand came out clutching the handkerchief. In the other was a package tied up in brown paper. Kitty stared at it uncomprehendingly.

      ‘Here, give me that!’

      The handkerchief was snatched from her hand, and next instant, her chin was being grasped in a set of gloved fingers and Claud was wiping away her tears. As if she had been a little girl, he held the square of white linen over her nose and requested her to blow. Too startled to protest, Kitty did as she was bid, and then stared into the blue eyes as they inspected her face.

      ‘There, that’ll do. You’d best keep this.’ Claud released her chin and stuffed the handkerchief back into her fingers. Then he noticed the package she was holding. ‘What’s that?’

      Kitty looked down at it. ‘I cannot remember.’ And then she did. ‘Oh, it is the hose I purchased for the new girl.’ Recalling the toothbrush and the tin of toothpowder, she dived a hand into her other pocket and found the other package. ‘Thank goodness! The Duck would scold me dreadfully had I lost it!’ It then occurred to her that Mrs Duxford was going to have far too much to scold her over without concerning herself about toothpowder and white hose. A wail escaped her. ‘Oh, what am I to tell her? How long have I been absent? The Duck will kill me!’

      ‘What is all this about a dashed duck?’ demanded Claud, at last signing to his groom and instructing his horses to start.

      Too agitated to be other than forthright, Kitty explained. ‘She is the lady who is in charge of the Seminary. Mrs Duxford, only we call her the Duck. Not to her face, for she would be excessively displeased. Not that it matters, for I don’t know how I am to explain this. I dare say she will turn me from the door if she hears that I ran off to London with you!’

      ‘Must she hear of it?’ asked Claud, turning the horses out of the Haymarket and heading west. ‘Can’t you make up some tale that will satisfy her?’

      ‘When I have been absent for hours and hours? What should I say? And what if someone had seen you drag me off like that? They would be bound to tell her.’

      ‘Then you will have to tell her the truth.’

      ‘She would never believe it. What is more, I could not blame her. Whoever heard such a rigmarole as you have landed me in?’

      Relieved that Kitty no longer showed any disposition to weep, Claud yet had no solution to offer. ‘Well, I admit it’s a thought fantastic, but I’m sure you will come up with a likely explanation.’

      ‘It’s well for you to say so,’ declared Kitty, incensed. ‘Do you suggest I tell her that you forcibly abducted me?’

      ‘You know very well it wasn’t an abduction,’ argued Claud, aggrieved.

      ‘Well, whatever it was, you promised you would compensate me.’

      ‘I intend to.’

      ‘How? The least you can do is help me think up an excuse. You ought to be glad that I am nothing more than a governess, or you would be obliged to make reparation by marrying me.’

      ‘What?’

      The horses suddenly shot forward, and Kitty was almost thrown from the curricle. She clutched the seat as the groom behind issued a warning.

      ‘Take care, guv’nor, or you’ll have us over!’

      But Claud was already bringing his cattle under control. Cursing, he turned wrathful eyes upon Kitty. ‘What the deuce made you say a thing like that? Made me jump nearly out of my skin!’

      A giggle escaped Kitty. ‘I didn’t mean that you should marry me. But I cannot say I am sorry you got a horrid shock, for it serves you right for what you have put me through today.’

      Claud was in no mood for this sort of thing. ‘If you think I did what I did for the pleasure of it, you’re mistaken. Last thing on my mind was to spend the day ferrying my cousin back and forth to no purpose.’

      ‘But I am not your cousin,’ objected Kitty.

      ‘As things stand, it looks deuced likely that you might be!’

      This untimely reminder served to throw Kitty back into gloom. ‘I wish you will not talk about it. It serves no purpose to recall it to my mind, for it is clear that the scandal is too dreadful to be talked of, and there is nothing to be done about it.’

      ‘Oh, isn’t there?’ Claud swept round Hyde Park corner and turned north. ‘I’m hanged if I let it lie, if it’s going to annoy my mother.’

      Kitty gazed at him in the liveliest apprehension. ‘What do you mean to do?’

      ‘I don’t know yet.’

      ‘Why should you wish to annoy your mother?’

      ‘Ha! You don’t know her, or you wouldn’t ask!’

      ‘Is she horrid?’

      ‘Loathsome!’ declared Claud, not mincing his words. ‘If you’d to choose between my Lady Blakemere and this Duck you speak of, you’d run to your Duck and hide behind her skirts.’

      Kitty

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