Maidie, meanwhile, ensconced in the Hope family coach with her abigail in attendance, was congratulating herself on the outcome of her mission. To be sure, there had been a dreadful moment when she had doubted her ability to bring it off, but the entrance of Lady Hester Otterburn had changed all that. She was heartily glad of it, for she was now certain that, left to himself, Lord Delagarde would have repudiated her. It was fortunate that Lady Hester had been visiting just at this moment, for failure did not bear thinking of! What in the world would she have done?
Not having made any contingency plan—for how could she have guessed that Delagarde would dislike it?—she might have found herself at a loss. She supposed she would either have had to retreat to the Sussex house which was no longer her home, or to have continued on to the Shurland town house and revealed herself to Adela and Firmin, neither of whom had the least idea that she was in London. No, she would not have done that. Nothing would have induced her to gratify Adela with a show of willingness.
But she was not, she remembered with a resurgence of emotion, obliged to do either of those things, thanks to Lady Hester Otterburn deciding, for whatever reason, that she wished Delagarde to meet his obligation—and it was an obligation! Maidie had seen quite enough of Lady Hester to guess that she possessed sufficient influence over her great-nephew to ensure that she had her way.
Arrived at the Coach and Horses where she had passed the previous night, Maidie lost no time in relaying the story of her success to her duenna.
It had not been with Miss Ida Wormley’s unqualified approval that she had set forth that morning. Indeed, having kept up an incessant discourse against the scheme throughout the two-day coach journey from the Shurland estates at East Dean—to which Maidie had paid not the slightest heed—the Worm, greatly daring, had made a final attempt to prevent her from going at all.
‘I do wish you would not, Maidie,’ she had begged, almost tearfully. ‘It would be the most shocking imposition, and I do not know what his lordship will think of you.’
‘It does not matter what he thinks of me, Worm,’ Maidie had declared impatiently. ‘Do stop fussing! Unless you would have me wed Eustace Silsoe, after all?’
‘No, no, I am persuaded he could not make you happy,’ had said Miss Wormley, distressed. ‘And after the manner in which Lady Shurland has behaved towards you, I cannot blame you for wishing to seek another way.’
‘Well, then?’
‘But not this way, Maidie! To beard Lord Delagarde in his own home! He must think you dead to all sense of decorum. And what he will think of me for allowing you to behave in this unprincipled way, I dare not for my life imagine!’
‘Have no fear, Worm,’ Maidie had soothed. ‘I will make it abundantly clear to his lordship that the scheme is mine, and mine alone. Do not be teasing yourself with thoughts of what he may think of you, but set your mind rather to the programme of how we are to go on once we are installed in his house. You will be obliged to take me about, you know, for we cannot expect Lord Delagarde to chaperon me. It would be most improper.’
But Miss Wormley had been in such a fever of anxiety that she had been unable to set her mind to the resolution of anything. Besides, as she had several times informed her charge, she had no idea how to set about such a programme since she had never moved in fashionable circles. Maidie knew it, and did not hesitate to set her mind at rest as she related her doings at the Delagarde mansion in Charles Street.
‘I must thank heaven for Lady Hester,’ sighed Miss Wormley, setting a hand to her palpitating bosom, and sinking down upon the bed.
For want of something to distract her mind, she had been engaged, when Maidie returned with her abigail in tow, in collecting together those of Maidie’s belongings that were scattered about the bedchamber they had shared at her insistence, for she could not reconcile it with her duty to allow her charge to sleep alone in the chamber of a public inn in the heart of the capital.
‘But was not his lordship very much shocked?’ she asked presently.
‘Oh, yes,’ said Maidie carelessly, removing her hat and smoothing the unruly bands that had held her hair tightly concealed under it. ‘But I took no account of that.’
‘No, I should have known you would not,’ agreed her duenna mournfully. ‘The large portmanteau, Trixie.’ Rising again, she directed the abigail how to pack her mistress’s clothing. Her own accoutrements were already neatly stowed in the smaller receptacle. Then she turned again to Maidie, adding, ‘You never take account of me, after all.’
She spoke without rancour. A colourless female of uncertain age, Miss Ida Wormley had become inured, after near eleven years, to the knowledge that her influence over Lady Mary Hope was but sketchy. She suffered a little in her conscience, which led her to overcome a natural timidity and speak out, whenever she felt her principles to be at odds with Maidie’s conduct. But, despite the fondness with which she knew her charge regarded her, she could not flatter herself that her advice and protestations were attended to.
‘But I thought perhaps you might attend to Lord Delagarde.’
‘Humdudgeon!’ snorted Maidie indelicately. ‘You know very well, dear Worm, that Great-uncle counselled me never to allow myself to be impressed by rank.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Miss Wormley, repressing a desire to disabuse her charge of her unshakable faith in the wisdom of the deceased fifth Earl’s counsel.
‘In any event,’ Maidie pursued doggedly, ‘Delagarde is only a viscount.’
‘Only!’ sighed Miss Wormley.
‘But he’s ever so fashionable, m’lady,’ put in Trixie suddenly. ‘Ain’t that right, Miss Wormley?’
‘Oh, yes. Lord Delagarde is always finding a mention in the Court sections of the London journals, and I recognised his name often in your great-uncle’s copies of the Gentlemen’s Magazine.’
‘Yes, and in them scandal pages often and often! Breaking hearts left and right. Abed here, abed there—’
‘Trixie!’
‘Is that true?’ asked Maidie, interested. ‘Has he had many such associations?’
‘You must not ask me, Maidie!’ uttered the Worm, blushing. ‘Trixie should not have spoken. It is all nasty gossip.’
‘But is it true?’ persisted Maidie, unheeding. ‘I can readily believe it, for he is certainly personable.’
‘Is he, m’lady?’ asked the maid, awed. ‘What is he like?’
‘He is tall and dark, and very cross!’
‘Now, Maidie—you should not! I am sure Lord Delagarde must be all that is amiable—even if it is true that his name has been linked with a number of fashionable…oh, dear, I did not mean to say that!’
‘It does not signify. You are bound to think well of him, Worm,’ said Maidie, ‘for you are more closely related to him than I. For my part, I find him excessively temperamental. I only hope he may not take it into his head to interfere in my concerns. My dependence must be all upon Lady Hester.’
It seemed, when the party arrived back at the Charles Street house, that her dependence was not misplaced. She was touched by the enthusiasm of Lady Hester’s greeting, and noted, with a rush of gratitude, that her champion encompassed Worm in the warmest of welcomes.
‘You and I, my dear Miss Wormley, must sit and enjoy a comfortable cose in the not-too-distant future. We call ourselves cousins, that much I know, but I am hopeful of pinpointing the exact relationship if we exchange but a few of our respective forebears.’
‘Oh, Lady Hester, you are too good,’ uttered Miss Wormley, quite overcome. ‘And your kindness to dear Maidie—’
‘Nonsense,’