The Undoing Of A Lady

why should I cease to be a person in my own right when I wed?”

“Then I will have your black crepe gown laid out if you insist, madam,” Mrs. Alibone said, her nose twitching with disapproval.

“No, thank you,” Lizzie said. “I require my silver silk evening dress-and the Scarlet Diamonds. I intend to make an impression.”

“I DIDN’T EXPECT YOU TO be free on your wedding night, old chap,” Dexter commented as Nat joined him in a quiet corner of the Granby’s taproom. “How is Lady Waterhouse?” he added. “I am surprised that you were able to tear yourself away from her.”

“Lizzie is fine,” Nat said. He took a long, appreciative mouthful of ale and settled back on the bench. “She is very tired,” he added. “It has been a long day for her. I left her reading quietly at home.” By the time that he had left the house, Lizzie had been dressed and sitting in the drawing room at Chevrons, flicking through the Lady’s Magazine. It had been a sight that had pleased Nat and had made him feel very content-his demure wife rising from the bed where she had just pleasured him most satisfactorily and then taking up her books or her sewing to sit quietly at home. It seemed that he had tamed his vixen and she would be the perfect wanton in the bedroom but a paragon of wifely virtues out of it. Indeed, Nat had begun to think that perhaps Lizzie had it in her to be the calm, decorous wife that he had desired all along. Perhaps she would surprise him. Maybe their marriage would not be the disaster he had predicted.

Perhaps all Lizzie had needed was a settled home and a secure background. Nat was proud that he had been able to give that to her. She had certainly been a great deal quieter and more malleable in the weeks preceding their wedding. She had accepted his proposal without further argument, she had agreed to all the arrangements he had made and she had been remarkably reserved and quiet.

Dexter was looking at him a little quizzically. “If you say so, old chap,” he said. “It doesn’t sound much like the Lady Elizabeth Scarlet we all knew before, but you must know her best. She is your wife, after all.”

Nat nodded. He reflected that the past couple of weeks had gone exceptionally well. From the moment he had rescued Lizzie from Fortune Hall on the night of Tom’s orgy he had been completely focused on doing what he had to do to protect her, to secure her fortune and to pay off Tom’s blackmail. Today had been the culmination of all his work. He had married Lizzie, thereby saving her reputation, gaining her dowry and in some indefinable but deeply satisfying way, putting matters right. He had paid off her brother with a draft advanced by his bankers. He had been able to keep safe the secret of his sister Celeste’s sexual indiscretions. He had shielded his family from harm, which had been his prime concern from the very first. He was entitled to feel satisfied with his efforts. Everything was safe, everything was ordered again. He had done his duty.

Nat took another mouthful of ale as he silently congratulated himself. Once Sir Montague’s murder case had been successfully resolved, he thought that he would take Lizzie to Water House to meet his family again. She had known his parents when she was younger and had even been a friend to Celeste during his sister’s first London season, for Celeste and Lizzie were of an age. Perhaps Lizzie would be pregnant by the time they went to Water House. Perhaps she already was. She had not mentioned that she had had her courses in the six weeks since they had first made love. A beautiful, dutiful wife and an heir…Nat felt remarkably expansive. He gestured to one of the inn servants to refill his glass and the conversation turned to the murder case.

Nat’s good humor lasted for precisely two hours.

“Excuse me, my lord.” By the time one hundred and twenty minutes had passed Nat had consumed several pints of the excellent local ale and was feeling very mellow. Then one of The Granby servants approached discreetly and slipped a note into his hand. It was short and to the point, clearly written in haste.

“Please come to the card room as quickly as possible. Lizzie is here and there is a problem. Alice Vickery.”

Nat frowned. He had been aware that The Granby was hosting one of its fortnightly assembly balls that night. When Sir Montague had died it had been suggested that the program of entertainment in the village should be canceled for the summer as a mark of respect, but Tom had promptly vetoed the idea because he wanted the income that the balls and other social events brought. Nat knew he was traditional in such matters but he realized that he was shocked to think that Lizzie would attend a ball only three weeks after her brother’s death. Disquiet stirred inside him. He knew that Lizzie frequently behaved unconventionally and chose to do precisely as she pleased, but surely that should all have changed now that she was his wife? He had thought that she had understood that and had settled down in her new role. Perhaps his earlier optimism had been premature. The mellowness that had possessed him was draining away now and he felt exasperated with himself for his complacence. Evidently he had imagined matters to be how he wanted them rather than seeing them as they really were. How foolish he had been to picture Lizzie sitting quietly at home when she had never done such a thing in her life.

“Is something wrong?” Dexter asked, brows raised.

Nat crumpled the note fiercely in his hand. He looked at his friend’s face and then sighed. “Lizzie is apparently here at the assembly, in the card room, and Alice has asked me to join them. There appears to be some sort of problem, so I can only imagine that she is gambling.” He got to his feet.

“If Miles and Alice are present they will be keeping an eye on Lizzie,” Dexter said reassuringly, getting up, too.

Nat knew that Dexter was right but he admitted to himself that the last thing he wanted was for their friends to witness any discord between him and Lizzie. They were all so happy in their own marriages that he felt hopelessly lacking. Dexter and Laura had practically fallen in love at first sight, years before, and although the road to marriage had proved decidedly bumpy for them they were now incandescent with bliss. Miles was even more irritating because he had been the sternest opponent of marriage imaginable, had cynically denounced love as nothing more than a fig leaf to make lust appear more acceptable, and had even tried to blackmail Alice into marrying him so he could have her fortune to save him from debtors’ prison. Yet here he was now, the most sickeningly uxorious of husbands and desperately in love with his wife. It made Nat feel ill with envy because he had a depressing feeling that he and Lizzie would never achieve the sort of deep understanding that was blossoming between Miles and Alice. True, he had married Lizzie under different circumstances, primarily those of finance-his- and reputation-hers-and as such they could not really expect to experience the dizzy heights of love. He had run through that sort of emotion in his salad days anyway, with Priscilla Willoughby, and had no inclination to suffer it again. No, he had wed Lizzie out of duty and desire. Yet despite telling himself that his reasons for the match was perfectly adequate, somehow he felt perfectly inadequate in the face of his friends’ wedded happiness.

And now it seemed that his wilful wife was already behaving very badly indeed, just as he had feared she would…

Nat quickened his pace from the taproom down the stone corridor, round a corner, through a doorway and into the Granby ballroom, his temper rising at each step as he wondered what on earth he would find when he caught up with Lizzie. A country-dance was taking place in the main assembly room. It was very calm and decorous. Nat looked around but he could see neither Lizzie nor Alice nor Miles. Alice’s note had mentioned the card room. Nat skirted the dancers and strode through the doorway, past the long table that groaned under the weight of refreshments. He could already see a crowd in the card room. They were pressing close around one of the tables and a feverish atmosphere was in the air. As Nat and Dexter entered, Miles Vickery pushed through the throng toward them. Nat grabbed his arm.

“What’s happening?”

“Lizzie is playing Three Card Monte with Tom,” Miles said tersely. “He challenged her for the Scarlet Diamonds.”

“What?” Nat froze.

“Tom challenged her,” Miles repeated. “He said the diamonds should have been his because he was the elder. Lizzie said their mother had expressly left them to her but she would play him for them, the best of three games. So far they have won one each.”

Stifling a curse, Nat cut his way through the crowd about the table. Lizzie looked up as he pushed his way to the front. She was wearing a concoction of silver net, scandalously low cut, and her auburn hair was piled up in a diamond clasp on the top of her head. She looked ethereal and fey. Her green eyes were smoky and slanted and when she saw Nat her mouth curled in the smile that always did strange things to Nat’s insides, turning them molten with lust. There was a champagne glass by her elbow and she looked more than a little cast away for her