A Baron for Becky

Chapter sixteen

They were married on Friday, and spent Saturday quietly at home in the apartment with Sarah, except for a walk in the park in the afternoon, where several of Hugh's friends were delighted to be presented to the new Lady Overton.

Sarah was cautious at first, but by late afternoon, sat on the parlour rug with him, laughing as they played at spillikins. Becky, who had begun to fall in love with him during their week of courtship, tumbled a little deeper as she watched him with her daughter. Particularly after last night.

Aldridge had been kind, courteous, and skilled. Hugh was those things, but also grateful. He treated her with respect, and not just in bed. He took her out in public and proudly introduced her to the wives of his friends. He needed her—not just the baby, but her, Becky, as chatelaine and mother to his children, to reassure him when he felt ugly or off-balance, to give him an heir to save the title.

The vows they'd exchanged thrilled her. To love and to cherish, forsaking all other as long as they both shall live. She repeated them silently to herself over and over through the day. And 'Rebecca, Lady Overton.'

She reminded herself again and again, love was not part of their bargain. He would give her and Sarah a home and respectability. She would give his daughters a mother and him the child in her womb. If she were foolish enough to fall in love with him, she would not burden him with that knowledge.

Aldridge had given Becky the deed to her daughter's apartment to her as a wedding present. "I promised you the town-house," he apologised, "but questions would be asked if you owned the town-house where The Rose of Frampton lived." The solicitor that Aldridge hired secured the apartment and a substantial sum of money to her name, persuading Hugh, at Aldridge's direction, that her marriage settlement should give her the atypical right to continue to own property.

On Saturday evening, Lord and Lady Overton went to a dinner party at the home of the Earl and Countess of Chirbury, where Anne (as she insisted they called her) introduced Becky as 'a friend of mine from the Southwest counties. Her daughter and mine are of an age.'

On Sunday, they attended church at St George's, in company with the Chirburys. The Duchess of Haverford herself greeted them outside, showing her public approval of the new wife of her son's best friend, even presenting Lady Overton to His Grace, who was making one of his rare appearances at Sunday services.

Aldridge was not at church, but in the park, riding with his chère amie, as a husband scornfully pointed out to a wife who thought she saw a resemblance between the new Baroness Overton and the Merry Marquis's Rose.

Later that day, Aldridge and his mistress strolled in the pleasure gardens at Vauxhall, in plain view of half the ton, and Lord and Lady Overton attended a musical afternoon at the home of Mrs Wakefield, a protegée of the Duchess of Haverford.

On Monday, the Overtons, after a quiet day at home, joined the Chirburys in their box at the opera. Aldridge, in his own private box with the infamous Rose of Frampton, caused something of a stir when he and his mistress passionately embraced halfway through the second act, then left the theatre abruptly.

By now, a number of people had noticed the resemblance between Lady Overton and Rose Darling, but that they were two separate women was beyond doubt.

On Tuesday, the Duchess of Haverford held a ball, and Society held its collective breath to see the Merry Marquis meet a lady who looked so like his mistress. They were disappointed. Beyond a certain possessiveness in the way the baron put his hand over the one his wife nestled in the crook of his arm, and the laughing bow with which Aldridge acknowledged what nearby onlookers whispered was a refusal to dance, the three were clearly well acquainted and on good terms. And the baroness did not dance that evening, so nothing could be made of her not dancing with Aldridge.

On Wednesday, they met again, this time in Hyde Park. It was, of course, scandalous of Aldridge to bring his mistress there at all, especially at the most fashionable time of the afternoon. But what else could one expect of Aldridge, and didn't Mrs Darling ride well? She moved as if she and the horse were one.

She wore a riding dress in her signature powder blue, cut close to her curves, with a deep scooping neckline. A jaunty top hat with a veil perched on her pile of dark curls, and the dress was draped to show neat boots that hugged shapely ankles.

Lady Overton, by contrast, wore an afternoon dress and redingote in shades of rich deep red. She had been wearing jewel colours all week: red, deep blue, a rich emerald green. There was, beyond a doubt, a surface resemblance between her and Aldridge's doxy, but Lady Overton was every inch a lady.

Aldridge tipped his hat to his friend and his friend's wife as he rode past, and onlookers noticed that the lady did not seem to be offended when the mistress grinned cheerfully and waved a hand. Not at all high in the instep, Lady Overton. A good sort. Society was inclined to approve of anyone so clearly sponsored by its grandes dames, and Baron Overton was well regarded (except his occasional excesses, which most blamed on Aldridge) but Lady Overton was fast winning supporters on her own modest and charming merits.

What happened next, nobody quite knew. Something spooked Mrs Darling's horse; that much was obvious. It bolted. Bolted so suddenly and so fast that Aldridge, whose attention had been on the Overtons, was seconds late in responding.

In moments, horse and rider disappeared into the trees, with Aldridge in hot pursuit. The park erupted in a collective gasp when a low branch swept Mrs Darling from the horse.

The Overtons were among the first on the scene, and Lord Overton persuaded the distraught Marquis to allow the still, broken body to be lifted into the Overton carriage. Aldridge insisted on taking his mistress to Haverford House, and servants were sent running for any doctor who could be found.

Three of them arrived in quick succession, and together they examined the body and pronounced it dead. If they thought the injuries inconsistent with a fall from a horse, none of them mentioned it, even to one another.

Naturally, no one at a nearby workhouse hospital linked the disappearance of a body with the death of the Marquis of Aldridge's mistress. Why would they? What had a low street prostitute, beaten to death by a client, to do with goings on in the upper echelons of Society?

The following day, the Overtons left for their estates in Lancashire. Aldridge, reportedly deeply affected by the death of his mistress, did not come to see them leave.

Two days later, Aldridge walked behind the coffin at a small private funeral. His half-brother, David Wakefield, was the only other mourner. Afterwards, Aldridge thanked him for coming. "It's the least I could do," David said. "After all, I found her for you. Poor girl. That coffin is the most luxury she has ever known."

Elsewhere, at the same time, Christiana O'Blair, formerly an equestrienne in the employ of Astley's Amphitheatre, stood at the rail of a ship with the horse trainer who was her husband. The docks of London disappeared into the fog.

"Don't you go missing that high life, Chrissie," said the husband.

Chrissie tossed her head. "It were fun for a few days, Charlie, but it ain't me. All that gossiping and such, and the screechy music, and that there Marquis? Spoilt, he is. Thinks he's God's gift to women, and so he does."

"If he tried it on, Chrissie, I'm going straight back to London to knock his head off."

Chrissie made a face, poking her lips out in distaste. "Nah. That's not to say he wouldn't have, if you know what I mean. But I'm a married woman, Charlie, and so I told him. And if any of that was in the plan, then it was no deal, I told him."

"It's a rum deal, and that's a fact."

Chrissie looked alarmed. "You won't say nothing, though, Charlie? You promised."

Charlie laughed. "And lose the money his nibs is goingto pay us right and tight every year? Not likely. With what he gave you, andwhat we've saved, we're going to have us a stud farm and horse training school,Chrissie, my love. And in a land with no Marquises and such sniffing 'roundanother man's woman. No. He's got what he wanted, and you and me, we're goingto get what we want, and no mistake."