Elizabeth Mayne - Man Of The Mist

Elizabeth couldn’t find words enough to express her disappointment to her father. She stood for quite some time without moving, hating this room, but unable to hate the man who dominated it so thoroughly. She prayed fervently that he would soften and change his mind, because he didn’t know what he was doing in forcing her to remain here in London while Evan MacGregor was in town.

It filled her with terrible dread to consider her alternatives. She couldn’t imagine what fury her father might give vent to if the worst should happen, and Evan MacGregor came forward and told the duke that he and Elizabeth had run away to Gretna Green and got married when they were fifteen and seventeen years old.

But she knew her father would surely kill Evan.

Elizabeth swallowed what felt like her own heart lodged in her throat. She took a deep breath and tasted defeat. Abruptly she quit the study.

Upstairs, she collapsed on a stool before the fire in her room, watching red-and-blue flames lick their way out from underneath several wedges of split oak. The sight consumed her. She felt like the wood, smoking and burning, aching, ready to burst into flames.

“I’m a coward,” she said out loud. “The first and only Murray ever born who was an outright coward, down to the bone. Grandfather George must be spinning in his grave. I’ve shamed every Murray that fought at Culloden.”

It wouldn’t do any good to argue with herself that it wasn’t true. Elizabeth Murray was a coward. All she wanted to do was run away...just as she had from the beginning.

The slightest thought of pain and suffering made her tremble and quake. Thinking back to Tullie’s bravado of the night before only made her stomach turn vilely. How had he done it? But that was a man for you!

Woman weren’t of that ilk, and little girls were even more vulnerable. Why, her father had only to remind her of one telling incident from her childhood—the one time she’d struck out on her own — and she knuckled under, even today.

She was nearly twenty-one, would be in April—a woman grown, by all rights. But she had no backbone. She didn’t have what it took to stand up to anyone. Oh, she could act as if she did. Like that time her father had referred to. But how far had she actually got? Charing Cross, that was how far.

She wasn’t a child now. More importantly, she had a child of her own, whose best interests were not being served by her father’s insistence that everyone in his household keep up appearances.

Elizabeth had to do something.

She couldn’t go to any member of her family for aid in any plan that went against her father’s will. Elizabeth had enough common sense to know which of her friends would help her with no questions asked. Only one had the means to go against a duke, Elizabeth’s long-standing friend, the writer Monk Lewis. Her only other friend with the gumption to assist her was George, Lord Byron.

Both Monk and Byron adhered to styles that played fast and loose with society’s rigid expectations of correct behavior, though neither had gone beyond the unredeemable pale. And of the two, Elizabeth was more inclined to put her faith in Monk Lewis. Monk was twenty years her senior, a confirmed bachelor, and a true gentleman where ladies were concerned. He’d never failed to give her good advice in the past.

However, she was closest to Byron. They were of the same age, and had practically grown up together, so to speak, being thrown into one another’s company at the same social functions since they’d turned sixteen.

Elizabeth made up her mind to write to Monk. She saw no good coming of putting off the inevitable.

Chapter Five

Almack’s

January 20, 1808

“Well, well, well, here we are again, the lost, the lame and the duckling. Whatever shall we do to entertain the haut ton, hmm? See no evil, taste no evil, hear no evil...have no fun?”

“Oh, stop being so nasty, Byron. Just because I can’t risk being seen doesn’t mean you have to hide behind the potted palms, too.” Elizabeth slapped the young baronet’s arm smartly with her fan. “Go take your terrible temper out on someone more deserving than Monk and me.”

“I wouldn’t dream of deserting either of you. Imagine the consequences of MacGregor’s temper, should he discover how assiduously you avoid him. Suppose he decided to wreak his vengeance upon skinny little Monk here? He’d make a bloody mess of the poor half-witted sot.”

Monk peered through his quizzing glass at Elizabeth. His prominent Adam’s apple bobbed between drooping points. “Why would MacGregor want to do that?”

“Never mind, Monk, of course he won’t do any such thing!” Elizabeth countered. She bit down on her jaw, hard, glaring at Byron. “I should have never told you a blessed thing. Damn you, Byron, don’t make me regret befriending you.”

The youth splayed his fingers across the breast of his coat, above his heart, his eyes widening with sincere hurt. He and Elizabeth were the same age, and had known each other forever. True friendship had evolved when each felt the awkwardness inherent in being thrust onto the social scene to sink, swim or flounder. Good or bad, they’d been ardent supporters of one another ever since.

“You misjudge me, Elizabeth. We are both wounded by life’s cruelest blow — ill-fated love. I could no more betray your secrets than you would mine,” he added apologetically.

Not certain she was mollified, Elizabeth arched a questioning brow. “Then I take it your grumbling originates from some other source. Perhaps you’re out of sorts because no one has remarked upon your upcoming birthday? Shall I hire a carousel and hobbyhorses? If you behave yourself tonight, you may just find that you have what you most desire by the end of this evening.”

“My dearest Lady Elizabeth, an angel of your stature could not possibly grant me the intercourse I most desire.” Byron waggled his thick brown brows suggestively. “Not an angel of the first water, such as you.”

Beneath those brows, the most outrageous eyes in all of London simmered with mock heat. Elizabeth pursed her lips and drew back her fan. He blinked, and those clear blue orbs widened in genuine alarm when he perceived her intent to strike him again. “Behave, you pesky little brat,” Elizabeth balked. “Don’t use those eyes on me. I’m immune.”

“Are you? Really?” Byron lifted a brow in a wicked arch, and when Elizabeth’s scowl deepened, he laughed with genuine amusement. “You’re supposed to melt at my feet and simper, damn it.”

“Ladies don’t melt,” Elizabeth said confidently, but she couldn’t keep up the ruse. The corners of her mouth spread in an impish smile. “And gentlemen don’t swear.”

“I vow, Elizabeth, you sound as pedantic as Lady Jersey. You really should write a poem titled ‘Ladies Don’t.’”

“It’s been done — and overdone, and satirized, as well.” Elizabeth sighed. She leaned her chin on her hand, her elbow on the table, to look over Monk Lewis’ bent shoulder, watching his pen fly across his sketchpad.

“What would be of greater interest is what ladies do.” Byron resumed his previous sulk. “I don’t want any fuss on my birthday, and well you know it, Elizabeth. Gads! Imagine how hostile I’d feel if people actually jumped at me from all directions, yelling, ‘Surprise,’ giving me apoplexy and propelling me to an early grave? I’d probably shoot someone, and then have to repent and regret it.”

Abruptly he made a fist and slammed it forcefully on the table. “Confound it, Elizabeth! There’s not a blessed thing to celebrate about being twenty. All twenty marks is another three hundred and sixty-five days of groveling, begging and explaining myself. I fear I’ll never become my own free man...ever. Damn me, do you realize how much I envy MacGregor his age, his luck and his damned bloody daring? He managed to throw off all the traces and escape this bloody coil.”