Lady Leona Vesey was beautiful when she cried. She was
doing so now…copiously. Great tears pooled in her eyes and
rolled down her cheeks as she took the gnarled hand of the
old man lying in the bed. "Oh, Uncle, please don't die,"
she said in a piteous voice, her lips trembling slightly.
Jessica Maitland, who stood on the other side of General
Streathern's bed, next to the General's great-niece
Gabriela, regarded Lady Vesey with cool contempt. Her
performance, she thought, was worthy of the best who trod
the stage. Jessica had to admit that Leona looked lovely
when she cried, a talent that Jessica suspected she had
spent some years perfecting. Tears, she had heard, worked
enormously well with men. Jessica herself hated tears, and
when she could not keep them at bay, she gave in to them
in the quiet and solitude of her own room.
Of course, Jessica, a supremely fair woman, had to admit
that Lady Leona Vesey was beautiful when she was not
crying, as well. She had been one of the reigning beauties
of London for some years now — though she was considered
far too scandalous to be admitted into the best houses —
and if she was reaching the last few years of that reign,
the golden glow of candlelight in the darkened room hid
whatever ravages time and dissipation had worked upon her.
Lady Vesey was all rounded, succulent flesh, soft
shoulders and bosom rising from the scooped neckline of
her dress, more suitable for evening wear than for
visiting the sickroom of an aging relative. Her skin was
smooth and honey toned, complementing the gold of the
ringlets piled atop her head and the tawny color of her
large, rounded eyes. She reminded Jessica of a sleek,
pampered cat — although she was apt to change into
something more resembling a lioness when she was angered,
as yesterday, when Leona had slapped a clumsy maid who had
spilled a bit of tea upon Leona's dress.
Jessica had itched to slap Leona herself at that moment,
but, being only the governess of the General's ward, she
had kept her lips clamped firmly together. Though in
normal times Jessica kept the General's household running
efficiently, Leona was not only above her in rank but,
being the wife of General Streathern's great-nephew, also
had a claim of kinship. From the moment she and Lord Vesey
had swept into the house, Leona had taken over, treating
Jessica as if she were a servant.
"Oh, Uncle," Leona said now, dabbing at her tears with a
lacy handkerchief. "Please speak to me. It lays me low to
see you this way."
Jessica felt Gabriela stiffen beside her, and she knew
what the girl was thinking — that the General was no real
relation to Lady Vesey, being the great-uncle of her
husband, and that Lady Vesey's spirits were anything but
lowered at seeing the General lying in his bed at death's
door.
In the six years that Jessica had been at the General's
house, the Veseys had visited but rarely, and usually
those visits had been accompanied by a request for money.
She had little doubt that it was money that had brought
them flying to the old man's bedside now. Less than a week
earlier, General Streathern had received a letter telling
him of the death of an old and dear friend. He had jumped
to his feet with a loud cry. Then his hand had flown to
his head, and he had crumpled onto the carpet. Servants
had carried him to his bed, where he had lain ever since,
inert and seemingly insensible to everything and everyone
around him. Apoplexy, the doctor had termed it, with a sad
shake of his head, and held out little hope of recovery,
given the General's advanced years. The Veseys, Jessica
was sure, had dashed to his bedside because they hoped to
be named in the General's will.
Jessica had tried her best to put aside her antipathy to
Lord and Lady Vesey. They were, after all, Gabriela's only
living relatives besides the General, and, as such, she
knew with a cold queasiness, in all likelihood Lord Vesey
would become Gabriela's guardian if the General did indeed
die, which seemed more likely with each passing day.
She told herself that some of her dislike of Lady Vesey
stemmed from that woman's voluptuous beauty. Jessica had
grown up stick-thin, with a wild mop of carrot-colored
hair, her eyes and mouth too big in her starkly thin face.
As an adolescent, she had towered over all the other
girls — and most of the boys, as well — gangly and awkward
and feeling hopelessly unfeminine next to the soft, small,
rounded females all about her. And even though her figure
had eventually ripened into womanhood and her face had
filled out and softened, and her hair had deepened into a
rich, vibrant red, so that she had become a statuesque and
striking-looking woman, Jessica still felt twinges of envy
and awkwardness around women like Leona Vesey, who used
their lush femininity as a form of weapon.
Also, she admitted that she had prejudged the woman
because of letters from Viola Lamprey, the lone friend who
had stuck by Jessica through all the scandal concerning
Jessica's father. Viola had married rather late but
startlingly well, becoming Lady Eskew three years ago and
living at the height of London society. She and Viola had
continued to correspond all through the years after the
scandal, and Viola loved to keep Jessica amused with her
witty, entertaining tales of the scandals and excesses of
the Ton.
Lord and Lady Vesey were often the topic of gossip. He, it
was said, was much too fond of very young females, and she
had been carrying on a very well-known "secret" affair
with Devin Aincourt for over a decade. A few months ago
Viola's letters had been full of the stories circulating
through London concerning Aincourt's sudden marriage to an
American heiress and the subsequent termination — by Ain-
court, not Lady Vesey — of the long-standing affair. The
ladies of London were gleeful. Leona Vesey had few friends
among them, having often made it a point to demonstrate
how easily she could take away any of their husbands or
suitors.
Jessica knew she should not have judged Lady Vesey on the
basis of gossip. After all, she had certainly been at the
center of a great deal of unfair gossip herself ten years
earlier. When the Veseys had arrived here, she had made an
effort to look at Lady Vesey afresh, untainted by
preconceptions and prejudices. But it was soon clear to
her that gossip had, if anything, not painted the lady
black enough. Leona Vesey was selfish, vain and mean-
tempered. She was contemptuous of all those of lower
station than she, and she was pleasant only to those whom
she thought could help her, usually men. The Veseys had
been here for only three days, and already Jessica could
barely stand to be in the same room with either of them.
She felt Gabriela tense beside her, and she suspected that
the girl was about to unleash her anger on Leona, so
Jessica quickly linked her arm with Gabriela's, casting
her a warning look. She was worried for Gabriela's future.
If the General should die and she was given to Lord and
Lady Vesey as their ward, her life would be hard enough
without her already having earned the enmity of Lady Vesey.
"Oh, please, Uncle," Leona said, her voice breaking as she
bent over the still form of the old man, waxen in the dim
light. "Please say some parting word to me."
Suddenly the old man's eyes flew open. Leona let out a
small shriek and jumped back. The General stared at her
with piercing hawk eyes.
"What the devil are you doing here?" he asked, his voice
scratchy and fainter than his usual bark, but his
annoyance clear.
"Why, Uncle," Leona said, recovering some composure,
though her voice was still a trifle breathless.
"Vesey and I came because we heard you were ill. We wanted
to be with you."
The old man glared at her for a long moment. "Afraid you
might lose your share of my estate is more like it. Ha!
Well, I have news for you. I ain't dying. And even if I
was, I wouldn't be leaving anything to you and that roué
of a husband of yours."
"Uncle…" Lord Vesey, standing behind and to the side of
his wife, tried an indulgent laugh. "You will give
everyone the wrong idea. Others are not aware of your
little fondness for jokes…."
"I wasn't talking to you," the General pointed out
sharply, sounding stronger with each passing
moment. "Damme! Nobody invited you here. You're a damned
nuisance."
"Oh, Gramps!" Gabriela burst out, unable to restrain
herself any longer. "You're all right! We thought you were
dying."
The General turned his head and saw Gabriela standing on
the other side of the bed, Jessica behind her, and he
smiled.
"Now, would I do a thing like that?" he asked, extending
his hand to the girl.
Tears spilled out of Gabriela's eyes, and she leaned
forward to take her great-uncle's hand. "I am so glad you
are all right. We were horribly scared."
"I'm sure you were, Gaby." The old man squeezed her hand
with only a remnant of his former strength. "But no need.
I'm still breathing."
He looked toward the foot of the bed, where his doctor and
the village vicar stood, staring at him in
astonishment. "No thanks to you, I'm sure," General
Streathern went on, talking to the doctor. "Go away. You
look like a couple of damned crows standing there. I'm not
dying."
"General, you must not excite yourself," the doctor said
in a calming voice. "You have been unconscious for almost
a week now."
"No, I haven't. Woke up last night. Just went back to
sleep."
"It must have been the sound of Lady Vesey's voice that
got through to you," the vicar said, with an admiring
smile in that woman's direction.
"Humph!" the General responded. "Well, you were a fool
when you were young, Babcock, so no use expecting you to
be any better when you're old. Hearing that baggage's
voice is more likely to send me over than bring me back."
"What!" Leona exclaimed, setting her hands on her hips
indignantly. "Well, I like that. We left London and drove
all the way up to this godforsaken place just because we
heard you were ill. And this is the thanks we get?"
"I didn't ask you to come here," the General said
reasonably. "Nobody did. You came because you hoped there
was money in it for you. It's the only reason the two of
you ever set foot in this house, and I told you last time
not to return. You're damned nervy, that's all I can say,
to come strutting back in here. You are a conniving bit o'
muslin, Leona, and I thank God you're not my blood
relative. I wish I could say the same about that piece of
trash you're married to." He broke off his harangue long
enough to shoot Lord Vesey a malevolent glare. "Now get
out, both of you. I don't want to see your faces again."
"Perhaps we had best go back to our rooms," Lord Vesey
suggested to his wife, looking a shade paler than he had a
few moments before.
"Your rooms? You're staying here?" The General's face
reddened alarmingly.
"Why, yes, of course," Leona replied. "Where else would we
stay?"