The Kent Heiress Read online

  The Kent Heiress

  Roberta Gellis

  Author’s Note

  In general it is my practice to take no liberties with history in any way. I must state here that I have done so in one instance in this book. There is no implication anywhere that General Bennigsen was in any way connected with the leakage of the secret articles of the Treaty of Tilsit to the British. If any evidence as to how that information came to England existed, it does so no longer or is still considered a state secret.

  All that is known on this subject is that less than three weeks after the treaty was signed, the content of the secret clauses was known in London. There is no violation of history in making a fictional character carry this information. Someone did so, but that person’s name has not come down to us. In these circumstances, it is a novelist’s right to place the onus of this act on a man who most likely had no connection with it at all. That I have implied General Bennigsen was involved is solely for the purposes of the plot of my novel.

  My excuse for this liberty is my conviction that whoever in the Russian or French hierarchy leaked this information to the British performed a service to humanity—whatever his or her reason for doing so might have been. Napoleon’s concept of a unified Europe may have been a fine one. If we do not destroy ourselves and our civilization, we may someday see the fruition of this idea. However, unification cannot be engendered by force, nor can it be encouraged by the armed domination of one group over another.

  Not only was Napoleon’s concept ahead of its time—as was Alexander of Macedon’s before him—but he was far less likely than Alexander to achieve his purpose. Napoleon ruthlessly drained the nations he conquered to support his imperial ambitions in France. Moreover, he did not respect the individuality of the people he conquered, but forced upon them foreign rulers (most often his own relatives) they hated and despised, as well as foreign laws and customs. It is not to the point whether or not these laws, customs, or rulers were better than their own; they were neither desirable nor acceptable to the people.

  Had the secret clauses of Tilsit been put into effect, it is possible that Napoleon might have overcome the British navy and invaded England. Whether the invasion failed or was successful, it is not likely that Napoleon’s empire could have endured. The constant waves of rebellion against him from 1804 through May 1814, when he finally was confined on Elba, indicate that the end result would have been the same whatever the route. Thus, implementation of the secret clauses of Tilsit could only have prolonged by a few or many years the bloody war that ended at Waterloo.

  I wish to make clear that to the best of my ability the character and personality of General Bennigsen were portrayed as described in contemporary sources. He was said to be proud, touchy, and ambitious. Further, it is historical fact that he led the group that murdered Tsar Paul, and the events of Pultusk, Eylau, and Friedland are also fact. Under the circumstances, I do not feel that I have dishonored General Bennigsen by placing him in the role I did. If any differ from me in this opinion, I apologize to them and also to General Bennigsen’s memory. It is in my fiction alone that he is connected with this intelligence coup of the British.

  Roberta Gellis

  Roslyn Heights, New York

  November 1982

  Chapter One

  Sabrina, Lady Elvan, pulled her rich cashmere shawl a little tighter over her bare white shoulders. Near the window it was cold, despite the roaring fire. She looked out on a sparkling fairyland. The new snow had melted just a little when the sun had come out during the day; now that it was gone again, a layer of ice had formed. It glittered as if the entire boulevard had been seeded with diamonds. The buildings across the way glittered, too. White on white—exquisite.

  Beautiful, beautiful, her eyes told her. Ugly, ugly, her heart whispered. Everything in Russia was like that—an incredible dichotomy that drowned the senses and sickened the soul.

  St. Petersburg looked like a city built by gods—wide streets, beautiful buildings. While other cities huddled in filthy, sloppy misery in winter, St. Petersburg glittered and sparkled in its covering of ice and snow. But Sabrina knew it hadn’t been built by gods; it had been built by slaves who died by the thousands from cold and hunger and beatings. Everything else was like that, too—gorgeous outside and ugly inside. The huge rooms inside the sparkling houses also sparkled and glittered, ravishing the sight with gold leaf and jeweled ornaments. All too often, though, they were unclean, the furniture dusty and greasy. That was the result of using slaves who could have no hope for advancement nor pride in their work.

  No, Sabrina told herself severely. She was being unfair. Many of the serfs were treated well, and there were dirty houses in England, too, where the mistress was too high-and-mighty or too lazy to make sure the housekeeper kept the maids to their work. There were as many wretched people on English lands, also. Bad landlords could ruin the farmers, and neglectful ones permitted stewards and bailiffs to extract bribes so that tenants starved. It was useless to blame Russia because she was unhappy. It was William’s fault.

  Slowly Sabrina turned away from the window and returned to her dressing table. She stared sightlessly into the glass, automatically hanging a complex necklace sapphires and diamonds around her throat and pushing the hooks of the matching earrings into her ears.

  But it was not her own elegant appearance that Sabrina saw. What appeared in the mirror was another scene entirely. She was looking again into the small drawing room, with its cozy grouping of sofa and chairs—right into the mirror behind. A few moments before that Sabrina had returned home from her scheduled round of morning visits, barely half an hour after leaving the house because she had forgotten her visiting cards. Having been told that Countess Maria Fedorovna Latuski was not at home, she had reached into her muff and found the card case missing. Then she remembered she had left it on the table in the small drawing room.

  Sabrina shuddered She had found the countess, instead of the cards, in the drawing room—found her in William’s arms. So shocked had Sabrina been that she stood mute and paralyzed. The high back of the sofa cut off her view of the couple from below the chest. Unable to believe, in that first half second, what the expression on her husband’s face and the movement of his body implied, Sabrina’s eyes had passed to the mirror behind them, which revealed a head-to-foot view.

  Perhaps a low whimper of shame or rage had forced itself from Sabrina. The sound was not enough to disturb the countess, who had her head buried between William’s shoulder and neck and was gasping and trembling in the penultimate stage of her climax, but William’s eyes shot open. Sabrina wanted to shrink away. In the instant before her mind comprehended what she was seeing, she had been racked with all the shame, guilt, and embarrassment William must feel. And then she saw his expression. If her first shock had numbed her, this second turned her to stone.

  William looked…irritated. He was annoyed—but apparently no more annoyed than if she had walked in on a delicate diplomatic negotiation or interrupted him when he was writing a difficult letter. There was no sign of guilt, or shame, or even embarrassment. No tinge of extra color rose in his cheeks. Without interrupting the thrusts of his hips, he freed one hand and gestured at Sabrina to go away.

  She staggered out of the doorway as if the flick of his hand had thrust her backward physically. Blindly, without knowing what he did, she found her way upstairs to her own dressing room, shed her heavy furs, and sank into chair. Slowly the total deadness that had made her respond automatically to William’s gesture of command faded into indignation. How dare he? In her own drawing room! She had never suspected William of such crudity!

  Such bad taste! And then Sabrina was shocked all over again, this time by her own se
ntiments. She should have been torn by pain and humiliation, burning with jealousy, frantic with grief. What she felt was the same kind of irritation—perhaps stronger, but essentially the same—as William had displayed. Again the first shock was followed by a stronger one. She did not love William any longer—if she ever had!

  What was she to do? Now tears filled Sabrina’s eyes.

  She realized she did not want William, had not wanted him for a long time—not even in bed. At first his caresses had been almost unendurably thrilling, the culmination of hours of delicate pursuit—a whispered word or two, sultry glances, fleeting touches, all built expectation so that she was halfway to climax before she got into bed. William was an expert at that technique, but it had failed after Sabrina had seen him use it on other women. That was when she still believed he was faithful and that the languorous looks he cast on other women were only harmless flirtations. Still, after noticing, she had found it difficult to obtain satisfaction in lovemaking. William never bothered to arouse her fully, and frequently was done before she came to climax.

  Sabrina had at first blamed herself. Now she understood. William’s preliminaries to lovemaking were all public. Women like Maria Fedorovna could not spare more than fifteen minutes or so to make love. William expected his women to be ready and to be in a hurry. He wanted to get right down to “business”.

  The ugly image of that “business”, of the countess’s dress crumpled on her abdomen, of William’s breeches drooping around his knees, made Sabrina nauseous with revulsion. Love? Was that love? Sabrina shook with distaste. William was incapable of love. Sabrina covered her face with her hands and wept. She knew she could cut this affair dead where it was, that she could keep her husband relatively faithful by finding various methods to make herself the object of his pursuit—because William did not really care who the object was. Sabrina choked. That was horrible, horrible. The thought of William courting her again, glancing at her sidelong, touching her insinuatingly with the tips of his fingers…it was unbearable.

  The door opened. Without lifting her head, Sabrina said, “Go away!”

  “Now, Sabrina,” William reproved sharply, “I know you are angry, but I cannot have you acting up in a silly way right now. Why the devil did you come home?”

  Sabrina’s hands dropped. Her head snapped up, eyes and mouth open in astonishment. She had thought it was a servant who came in. It had not occurred to her that William would dare confront her.

  “You are upset to no purpose,” William went on. It was an accident. It meant nothing.”

  “In my home? In my drawing room!” Sabrina gasped.

  For the first time, William had the grace to look self-conscious. “I told you it was an accident,” He snapped “I met her on the doorstep. It was impossible not to invite her in. I didn’t know, after all, that you weren’t home.”

  “Liar!”

  “Don’t be a fool,” William snarled. “I have no time for your ‘finer feelings’. I’ve told you a hundred times already, this has nothing to do with you. I wouldn’t have bothered to talk to you about it, except that the political situation is particularly precarious. I cannot afford to have you pouting and sullen.”

  “But you can afford to indulge your—your—”

  “That has its political purpose, too,” William interrupted angrily. “Then, seeing Sabrina redden with rage, he added, “I didn’t mean things to go so far—I swear it. I tell you again, it was an accident.”

  “One accident too many,” Sabrina spat. “I’m finished! I’m through with you!”

  “This is no time for childish tantrums,” William shouted. “Will you allow your petty personal foibles—”

  “Petty foibles!” Sabrina shrieked.

  “Yes!” he screamed. “Petty! Petty! Infantile! There isn’t another woman in the world who wouldn’t have had the common sense and good manners to pretend she hadn’t stupidly walked in on what wasn’t her business. Instead of that, you’re prepared to add a completely irrelevant factor that may cause the collapse of the whole British mission here.”

  “That’s a lie!” Sabrina cried. “You only say it to force me to condone your lecheries.”

  But her voice trembled uncertainly. Sabrina knew that there might be truth in what William said. Czartoryski, the foreign minister of Russia, who had always urged alliance with England, had fallen out of favor. Tsar Alexander had not yet dismissed him from office—in fact, Czartoryski was hosting the ball that she and William were invited to that very evening. If they did not attend—even if she alone did not go—there might be political repercussions.

  It was ridiculous that a personal quarrel between a man and wife should cause echoes in international politics, and in most cases it would not. Now, however, the tsar was behaving so peculiarly and the diplomatic situation was so strained that even the smallest incident might precipitate serious consequences. Quite false rumors might be attached to the “migraine” Sabrina would plead to excuse her absence from the ball; and even if the truth were known, it could be used as an excuse for action taken for quite another reason. Sabrina bit her lip.

  “It is not a lie,” William said emphatically, but in a normal tone of voice. “I have told you that what happened was an accident. I had no intention at this time… It was impossible to avoid. It would have given great offense if I had refused—and I would have needed actually to refuse—and I couldn’t chance that yet, not until I’m sure it’s not Czartoryski alone but the whole Polish party that is out of favor.”

  “Another excuse?” Sabrina asked sardonically, but her voice, too, was merely conversational.

  “It is not an excuse,” William replied. “You know Alexander is sleeping with Maria Naryshkin, and whatever else she is, she is Polish to the core. At present he is completely besotted with her. I’m informed that Novosiltsov and Stroganov will be dismissed also—the whole liberal group, in fact—but there’s no special reason Czartoryski’s fall should affect the other Poles. No one could call most of them liberal. In any case, Countess Latuski is too friendly with Naryshkin for me to offend her with impunity.”

  It was true. Of course, if William hadn’t started the flirtation, he wouldn’t have been placed in a situation where offense was possible. However, that thought was just a cynical flicker through Sabrina’s mind. Expecting William not to flirt was the same as expecting pigs to fly. Sabrina had come, at long last, to a willingness to admit to herself that she didn’t care with whom William went to bed so long as it wasn’t with her. She knew she had been furious only because he had not enough respect for her to be ashamed of being caught. And probably it was true that what happened had been an accident. Usually William was very discreet…although he had been growing more and more careless.

  “So you must attend this ball, and you must behave toward me just as usual. Do you understand me, Sabrina?”

  Obviously she had missed something while her mind had been busy. It didn’t matter Sabrina acknowledged that this was no time to stir up a hornet’s nest in the diplomatic community. She would, indeed, have to attend the ball and behave normally toward William. Her lips twisted as she realized it would not be at all difficult. It had been a very long time since she had displayed any overt sign of wifely affection.

  Suddenly Sabrina was aware of herself, still staring into the mirror. No, it would be no trouble to behave as usual to William. Once her rage at the insult done her was past, she found she did not feel differently about him. Her eyes grew troubled. Was this William’s fault or her own? She focused on her own face, and the lips made a sardonic grimace. The fault was not there. Sabrina knew she was beautiful. Diamonds and sapphires sparkled in her hair, so pale a blond that William had called it “moonlight hair”. Her eyes were pale, too, and in spite of perfect features her face would have been without character, except for the fortunate accident that her brows and lashes were darker than her hair—an ash brown—and there was an odd ring of darker color around the circumferenc
e of her irises.

  Sabrina leaned forward. Silly eyes. They tended to open very wide because the lids were thin, and that gave her an expression of slightly surprised innocence—or the less kind would say stupidity. The sardonic grimace deepened. It would have been much better if she were stupid. Life would have been sweeter, easier, happier. If she only were as stupid or innocent as she looked, she would either never have discovered what William really was or would have accepted it.

  Did William still think she was stupid or innocent? He had when they first married, she now realized, Sabrina acknowledged that she had been innocent then—but she had been only sixteen years old. Besides, how could she be anything but innocent after living with Leonie and Roger since she was nine years old?

  In spite of her general unhappiness, Sabrina chuckled suddenly. Unlike most parents or guardians, Leonie and Roger made no effort to keep her mind pure. Well, no, Roger would have, perhaps but he was no match for Leonie, who believed that ignorance on any subject led to misery rather than bliss. But knowing all the sins in the world by their names hadn’t convinced Sabrina that her husband could commit any—not after he married her. Roger hadn’t. Even Leonie, who was jealous as a cat, admitted her accusations were far more preventative than realistic.

  A frown wrinkled Sabrina’s alabaster brow. Had she just determined that Leonie’s theory was wrong? Would ignorance have kept her happy? Sabrina shuddered and drew her shawl up over her shoulders again. No, Leonie was not wrong. If William’s repeated infidelities had remained unknown to her longer, the blow of discovery would have been much, much worse, and what had happened this morning would have killed her. In the beginning she had refused to believe the hints and winks of her “friends”—and what thanks had she had? William had simply behaved more and more blatantly until it was impossible to ignore the truth. He had not even bothered to lie! Sabrina gritted pearly teeth whose whiteness belied their strength. She remembered her first heartbroken accusation and the way William had responded.