The Irish Earl Read online

  The Irish Earl

  Patricia Bray

  Copyright

  Diversion Books

  A Division of Diversion Publishing Corp.

  443 Park Avenue South, Suite 1008

  New York, NY 10016

  www.DiversionBooks.com

  Copyright © 2000 by Patricia Bray

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For more information, email [email protected]

  First Diversion Books edition February 2015

  ISBN: 978-1-62681-616-9

  Also by Patricia Bray

  A Most Suitable Duchess

  An Unlikely Alliance

  Lord Freddie’s First Love

  The Wrong Mr. Wright

  For my family

  Author’s Note

  Although I drew my inspiration for this story from my travels in Cork and Kerry, the town of Glenmore is fictional, as are the family of FitzDesmond and the Earl of Kilgarvan.

  One

  Lady Felicity Winterbourne stood on the steps of the New Theater, pausing to adjust her cloak, wrapping it tightly around herself to ward off the chill night air. The crowd swirled around her and her escort, but she took no notice of them.

  “Was not the performance marvelous? I daresay this Farnsworth will soon rival Kean in his fame. I can’t think of when I have seen a finer play,” Sir Percy Lambeth exclaimed.

  Lady Felicity glanced at her escort. “I will grant you that John Farnsworth was adequate as Hamlet,” she said. “But the actress who played Ophelia was far too old to be convincing, and forgot half her lines. And the ghost was drunk and missed one of his entrances.”

  Her tone was sharper than she had intended, and her escort winced. “Of course, of course,” Sir Percy said, nodding his head vigorously to indicate his agreement. “It is as you say.”

  Lady Felicity bit back a sigh. She had chosen Sir Percy Lambeth as her escort this evening because of his affability. Sir Percy’s chief talent was in making himself agreeable to all. He would pronounce even the most deadly dull of events to be delightful. The least mark of favor or condescension was cause for lengthy exclamations.

  He had declared himself delighted and honored when she had first allowed him to escort her, and since then had shown himself to be her devoted servant, agreeing eagerly with every word that she uttered. It was enough to drive her mad. At first she had suspected hypocrisy. But now she knew better. Sir Percy had no opinions of his own. He lived only to please others, and measured himself by their opinions of his worth.

  Before meeting Sir Percy she had been convinced that a gentleman who strove to make himself agreeable would be the best sort of husband. But as her acquaintance with Sir Percy improved, she found herself questioning her convictions. Perhaps there was such a thing as being too willing to please.

  Sir Percy looked up toward the portico where his mother and sister stood waiting, and then down at the street below, which was thronged with vehicles of every description. But apparently he did not see the one he was looking for. “My coachman is late,” he fretted. “But my carriage should be here presently.”

  Around them the theatergoers swirled, descending the steps toward their own vehicles. The steps of the New Theater and the courtyard in front were filled with society ladies and gentlemen, rubbing shoulders with those from the pits. Orange sellers and women of dubious virtue hovered at the fringes of the crowd, advertising their wares. There were the hubbub of voices, the creak of carriages and the cries of coachmen.

  Above the din she heard a voice calling. “Please, my lady, can you spare a coin for a crippled soldier? My lord? A penny for a hot meal?”

  A one-armed man, dressed in tattered rags, slowly made his way through the crowd at the bottom of the stairs. He repeated his beseeching cry, but not one of those present would meet his eyes.

  Lady Felicity felt something stir inside her. These days beggars were a common sight in London. One could hardly walk a block without hearing the cries of the unfortunate. Soldiers left idle after the victory over Napoleon, laborers who had been displaced by the new factories, even whole families of tenant farmers who had lost their land as a result of the Corn Laws. She could not help them all, and yet…

  The one-armed man repeated his call, shuffling listlessly along the edge of the crowd. But he might as well have been invisible, for all the attention he received.

  She reached in her cloak pocket for her purse, but her hand found only empty space. She bit back angry words. As a lady she was not expected to carry a purse, especially in the evening. That was for servants or gentlemen.

  “Sir Percy, lend me a crown,” she said impatiently.

  He goggled at her. “Whatever for?”

  “I don’t have time to waste with questions.”

  Sir Percy began unbuttoning his cloak.

  She began making her way down the stairs, certain that Sir Percy would follow. But before she had taken more than a few steps, she saw the beggar pause as a gentleman approached and called to him.

  The gentleman spoke to the former soldier. She continued down the stairs, but could not hear what they said. Then the strange gentleman reached inside his cloak and withdrew his purse. She could not see what he gave the beggar, but it was clear that it was more than a single coin that he pressed into the beggar’s remaining hand.

  The former soldier’s face was transformed, apathy replaced with desperate hope, as if he were a man dying of thirst in the desert who was afraid to believe that he had found his long-sought oasis.

  The gentleman gave a parting admonition, then turned to leave. His eyes raked across Felicity’s. She caught her breath. There was something in the way he looked at her, as if he was weighing her, and then found her wanting. Then he strode off.

  “May all the saints bless you,” the soldier called after him.

  “Lady Felicity!”

  She turned and saw that Sir Percy had finally reached her. “Your crown,” he announced, holding his arm outstretched.

  “Keep it,” she said dismissively. “I no longer need it.”

  She could tell that she had puzzled him. But she did not care. Instead she wondered about the encounter she had just witnessed. Who was that gentleman, and why of all those present had he been the only one who heeded the beggar’s cries?

  And why had she felt so strange when he had turned his gaze on her?

  The incident lingered in her mind, and she spent the next week searching for another glimpse of the mysterious gentleman. But he had disappeared, swallowed up by the vast metropolis that was London. He was not to be found in the crowds at Lady Fulton’s ball, or at any of the routs or Venetian breakfasts that filled her engagement book. Nor was he among the select gathering that attended the opening of a new exhibit at the Royal Museum.

  Finally she allowed another of her admirers to escort her to the opera, hoping that the gentleman would be there as well. Her companions raved over the exquisite singing, but she was unable to share their rapture, having spent most of the performance scanning the audience, hoping for a glimpse of the elusive stranger.

  In the end she found him where she had least expected, within the sacred walls of Almack’s.

  “And how are you finding London this Season?” Mrs. Gilbert asked.

  “Dull,” Felicity replied succinctly.

  Mrs. Gilbert gave a conspiratorial laugh. “True enough, although don’t let the patronesses hear you, or they might consider it a slur on th
eir hospitality. Still, it is hardly to be marveled at if one finds this Season lacking, compared to the grand celebrations of last year. After one has met the Tsar of Russia and his court, how could any other Season compare?”

  The two women were sitting on one of the benches that lined the walls of the ballroom. Mrs. Gilbert was an older woman with whom Felicity had struck up a friendship. On the surface the middle-aged wife of a junior minister in the foreign service had little in common with a duke’s daughter, but they both shared a taste for plain speaking, and a wry sense of humor. Felicity, although not yet one and twenty and still unmarried, had not made friends among the other unmarried young women who had come to London for the Season. Though the girls were her age or at most a few years younger, she felt separated from them as if by decades of experience.

  Many of these young misses were experiencing London and the social Season for the first time. What could she find to say to these young girls? Felicity had traveled the globe with her father, an eccentric duke who had indulged his whim to see the world, and had seen no reason not to drag his daughter along.

  At the age of eight she had been presented to Napoleon’s court, during the short-lived Peace of Amiens. By the time she was eighteen, she had seen the great courts of Europe and the raw civilization that was America. She had ridden on camelback in the great desert of Egypt, and listened to her father declaim in Greek from the steps of the Parthenon in Athens. After all she had seen, a mere Season in London held neither wonders nor terrors for her.

  Lady Felicity fanned herself idly, nodding to an acquaintance across the room.

  “I vow, I never thought to see him here. I wonder what the patronesses were thinking,” Mrs. Gilbert said.

  Lady Felicity turned her head to follow her companion’s gaze. She could see nothing remarkable, but then the crowd parted, and suddenly there he was, cool as you please.

  Felicity felt her pulse quicken. “Have I missed something?” she asked.

  Mrs. Gilbert made a discreet motion with her fan. “There, you see that gentleman? The one who just came in with Mr. Bingham?”

  “Yes,” Felicity said, her heart unaccountably racing.

  “Well, that’s Lord Kilgarvan. I must say I never thought to see him here, in Almack’s of all places.”

  Neither had Felicity. The length of the room separated them, yet even at this distance Felicity could see that Lord Kilgarvan was not like the other gentlemen in the room. There was an air of suppressed energy about him, and tension. It was clear that he would rather be anywhere else them here.

  “I have not heard of Lord Kilgarvan. Is he bad ton? Perhaps with a reputation for gambling or seducing young ladies?” Felicity asked, trying for nonchalance.

  “No, nothing so shocking. But everyone knows that Lord Kilgarvan doesn’t have a feather to fly with. His father left him saddled with debts.”

  “That makes him no different from many another nobleman. If solvency were a criterion for admittance, the ranks of Almack’s would be thin indeed.”

  Mrs. Gilbert gave Felicity a sharp glance, as if sensing that her young friend had a more than casual interest in this stranger.

  “Well, if he had an English title, or family connections, that would be a different matter,” Mrs. Gilbert allowed. “But as it is he has naught to recommend him but an Irish earldom and an estate somewhere in the wilderness. He’ll hardly find a bride among those here, no matter how charming the rogue looks when he smiles. No, he’ll be better served by finding a wealthy cit who’s willing to pay a fortune to see his daughter marry into the nobility.”

  Felicity glanced over at Lord Kilgarvan. It struck her then that of all those present the other evening, he had hardly been in a position to be charitable.

  “I believe I would like to be introduced to this Irish earl,” she said. “Can you arrange that?”

  “Of course. But, Lady Felicity, are you certain this is what you want? The gentleman is hardly in your circle.”

  “Perhaps. Still he is the most interesting person we have seen all evening, and surely that is reason enough. There can be no harm in a few moments of conversation.”

  Mrs. Gilbert appeared to have her misgivings, but she rose and led Felicity over to where Lord Kilgarvan and Mr. Bingham stood. She presented Mr. Bingham to Felicity, and Mr. Bingham was pleased in turn to present his friend Lord Kilgarvan to the ladies.

  Felicity took the opportunity to study Lord Kilgarvan, and was not surprised to find herself studied in turn. His black, wavy hair and dark eyes gave him the look of a pirate, and his countenance was carefully guarded. She could not tell what he thought of her.

  Mr. Bingham and Mrs. Gilbert began chatting about common acquaintances, leaving Felicity and Lord Kilgarvan staring at each other somewhat awkwardly. There was much she wanted to say to him, but she did not want to do so in front of the others.

  Just then the set ended, and a new set began, forming the quadrille.

  “Is this your first time at Almack’s?”

  “Yes,” Lord Kilgarvan replied.

  “Then you must be sure to experience it to the full. Will you dance with me?” she asked, greatly daring.

  He gave a small bow. “As you wish.”

  Taking her hand in his, he led her to the dance floor. She felt unaccountably nervous, as if she were a social novice, and not a veteran of a hundred balls.

  The music began. Kilgarvan bowed to her, and she curtsied in return. Kilgarvan took her in his arms, as countless gentlemen across the dance floor did with their own partners, and Felicity realized that she had invited him to waltz with her.

  Now that they were alone, she found that her courage had deserted her. She could not come out and ask him the questions that were burning in her mind.

  She sought refuge in silence. He regarded her quizzically, and after a moment he spoke.

  “Forgive my staring, but I cannot help thinking that I have seen you before,” he said.

  “Indeed,” she said. “A few weeks ago, at the theater.”

  He shook his head. “I am sorry, but I do not recall.”

  “But I am sure you must. It was the most wretched Hamlet ever to disgrace the London stage.

  “Ah. That I do remember.”

  As he smiled in remembrance she felt her innards contract, and she missed a step of the pattern. She could not believe a simple smile could be so devastating. Were he to smile more often he could have half the women of London at his beck and call.

  But the smile was gone as quickly as it appeared, and she took a quick breath to steady her composure.

  “There was a soldier that night. A beggar. No one seemed to see him, but you went up and spoke to him, and then gave him coins.”

  He shook his head in quick denial. “I don’t remember that.”

  “But you did,” she insisted. She could tell that he was lying. “I was there and I saw you.”

  He shrugged his shoulders, seeming to realize that there was no point in further denials.

  “Surely you see beggars every day. What made you help him? Why that soldier?”

  Her eyes caught and held his. The silence stretched between them for so long that she was afraid he wasn’t going to answer, but she refused to give in. She did not know why, but she had to know the answer.

  “He wasn’t a soldier,” Lord Kilgarvan said finally.

  “But—”

  “He was a navigator. He came over to work on the canals, and lost his arm when it was crushed in a rock slide. He found people were more apt to give charity to ex-soldiers, so he stole the soldier’s coat off of some other unfortunate, and has been living in London ever since.”

  Most of the navigators who worked the canals were Irish laborers. It made sense that Lord Kilgarvan would feel sympathy for a fellow countryman. And yet…

  “You knew he was a liar. But you still gave him alms?”

  Lord Kilgarvan looked her straight in the eye. “The poor wretch was just trying to stay alive. Hoping to get home. Th
ere’s no sin in that.”

  “Not many would have done as you did.”

  There was a wry twist to his lips. “I gave him enough coins for passage. No doubt he’ll spend it all on drink, but that is his affair, not mine.”

  Gerald FitzDesmond, ninth Earl of Kilgarvan, looked down at his dancing partner, trying to hide his discomfort. His affairs were his own, and he was not prepared to discuss them with a woman he had known for scarcely a quarter hour. Especially not this woman. For Lady Felicity, with her regal grace and elegant carriage, was clearly one of the cream of English society. He did not know why such a woman would have sought him out, for it had taken no genius to realize that she had deliberately pursued the introduction. Left to his own devices he would not have approached her.

  Not that an Irish nobleman wasn’t worth ten or twenty of his foppish English cousins. He knew his own worth and considered himself the equal of any gentleman here, and indeed better than most. It was not his character that was being judged here, however, but rather his purse and his prospects. And by that measure, he had no more hopes of marrying Lady Felicity than he did of marrying Princess Charlotte.

  He glanced around the room. He had no doubt that within ten minutes of his arrival, his name, lineage and fortune had been known to every mother with eligible daughters, and every dowager who had taken a young relative in hand for the Season. And, as they judged such things, he knew he would not be considered a match for Lady Felicity. A duke’s daughter, particularly one who possessed her full share of beauty and wits, could do far better for herself than a penniless Irish earl.

  He had squirmed when she questioned him about the beggar. In truth he had remembered the man well. He told himself that the coins he had given the man, far more than he could afford, were no doubt wasted on drink. And yet a small part of him hoped that the man had done as he had promised, and had used the funds to purchase passage back to Ireland. At least one soul would be free of this blasted place.