Read Online The Constant Companion by M. C. Beaton - Free Book Online

temper broke completely. As Constance was beginning to mount the stairs, Amelia seized a carriage whip from the hall stand and lashed Constance across the back with it so viciously that the wicked thong slashed through the fine velvet of the dress and cut into the girl’s flesh.
    Constance swung round, her face parchment-white and her eyes glittering with rage. She slowly walked towards her mistress.
    “Bergen!” called Amelia, summoning the butler before Constance could reach her. The butler scuttled forward as if he had been waiting in the shadows. “Make sure Miss Lamberton finds her room,” said Amelia, breathing hard. “The house is still strange to her and I fear she may become lost.”
    “Very good, my lady,” said Bergen with a slow smile. Constance stared at the ill-assorted pair, the butler with his sinister smile and Lady Amelia with her beautiful face contorted with rage and malice and spite.
    The full shock of the attack on her struck her, and Constance turned and fled. She ran as hard as she could to her rooms and only when she had barricaded the door, did she allow herself the luxury of bursting into tears, sitting on the bed with her arms wrapped tightly round her middle, rocking herself back and forth in an agony of pain and humiliation, crying over and over again to the uncaring silk-covered walls, “What is to become of me? How can I escape? What can I do?”

Chapter Six
    Lord Philip Cautry was angry with Miss Constance Lamberton. Looking back on his evening at Amelia’s in the damp, sober light of a misty London afternoon, he finally came to the conclusion it was all Constance’s fault. What right had she to play Miss Propriety? No one could live for longer than a day with Amelia and not realize she had the morals of a cat, thought his lordship sourly, forgetting that he had only too recently considered Amelia innocent of the scandal that surrounded her name.
    He had been celibate for over a year and had been happily on the point of putting an end to that uncomfortable state. He felt somewhere in the back of his mind that Amelia hoped for marriage. But didn’t they all? Even the little opera dancer that he had kept in such style for several months some time ago had begun to show alarming signs that she wished to legalize the romance. The effrontery of some women was past all believing, thought Lord Philip. He came from an ancient family and had no intention of tainting his family tree with doubtful branches of the Fashionable Impure.
    Miss Constance Lamberton would just have to learn the ways of the world and not sit around like some sort of chaste angel giving gentlemen of the
ton
, hell-bent on seduction, a guilty conscience.
    He voiced as much to his friend, Peter, when that young man called round to see him. Peter was wearing an impeccably tailored blue swallowtail coat of Bath superfine. His waistcoat was a subdued rose color, his pantaloons were without a crease and his cravat was a miracle of starched perfection. But he had spoiled the whole effect by forgetting to put on his boots, and his long narrow feet were encased in a pair of red Morocco slippers.
    “Don’t think that’s the case.” said Peter after much hard thought. “Amelia is said to keep Constance with her the whole time—even when she’s playing hot-in-the-hand in her drawing room with the Comte Duval.”
    “I think the prim Miss Lamberton may be a malicious gossip,” said Lord Philip. “Must you pick your teeth with the end of your quizzing glass, Peter? Sometimes your mannerisms are just as irritating as Miss Lamberton’s stately virginity. And you have forgot your boots, man. You’re wearing your slippers.”
    “No. Not Miss Lamberton. Amelia’s lady’s maid is related to my cook, and
she
told my second footman who told my butler who told my valet. So there! I’m not picking my teeth. I’m polishing ’em. And damn my slippers. What’s that man of mine about? But I suppose he’ll be along directly,”