Sitting up, he shrugged his shoulders. 'Alas, you're right. Yet you must marry someone. You owe it to little Charles.'
'Oh, I'll wed again; although not yet awhile. Charles is barely ten months old; so for some years to come he'll reap no ill from the lack of a father. But your case, Roger, is very different. Your little Susan is welcome to a home here for as long as you may wish, but however loving my care of her it will not be her own home; and that she should have. Poor Amanda used her last breath to place her infant in Clarissa's charge and express the hope that you two would marry. I pray you…'
'So Clarissa told you of that?'
'Yes. She did so soon after her arrival here with the child last week, and I pray you, Roger, give Amanda's wish your serious consideration. Clarissa is a most lovely young creature and passionately enamoured of you.'
'I know it. Has she not pursued me from the West Indies on the excuse of bringing my daughter to me, although the child was over young to travel?'
'That is unfair. There was less risk in her doing so with a wet-nurse in attendance than to wait until the child was weaned and had to be fed for many weeks on such dubious foods as a ship can carry. You could find no better step-mother than Clarissa to rear your child, and…'
Yes, yes! I grant you that. She is, too, sweet natured and intelligent. I will admit that did I contemplate marriage I'd be tempted to make her my wife. But I do not; so spare me, I beg, further solicitation on her behalf.'
Georgina began to put on the nightdress with which she had been toying. 'I'll not promise that. But now is no time to pursue the topic, and at such an hour as this it was foolish in me ever to have raised it. At any moment Jenny will be bringing my chocolate. Be off with you now, this instant.'
Jumping out of bed he snatched up his chamber robe, and exclaimed in mock distress, 'You drive me from Paradise! How I'll live through the day I cannot think!'
She laughed. 'What a liar you are. You know full well that your mind will be filled with schemes to win over the Venetian. You'll not give me another thought till its night again and time for us once more to essay a flight to Heaven. But the woman is not yet born who would not love your pretty speeches.'
Grinning, he blew her a kiss over his shoulder before disappearing into her boudoir. Beyond it, through another door, lay the room he always occupied when at Stillwaters. Having rumpled the sheets of the unslept-in bed, he got into it and lay down. As Georgina had predicted, his mind had already switched from her to the members of the house-party that had assembled there the previous afternoon. She had made no difficulty about asking Richard Brinsley Sheridan to bring down the Venetian envoy for the weekend, and both had come accompanied by their wives.
Roger had known Sheridan for some years and, much as he detested his politics, could not help liking him personally. The son of talented parents, the gifted Irishman had early achieved fame. At twenty-three, his play The Rivals had scored a great success, a few months later his opera The Duenna had taken the town by storm, and at twenty-five his School for Scandal had placed him among the immortals of the British stage. During the years that followed, as poet, playwright, producer, manager, and principal shareholder in Drury Lane, he had become the arbiter of London's theatrical world.
A little before he was thirty, realising what an asset his quick brain and silver tongue could prove to their party, the Whig politicians had persuaded him to contest Stafford in their interests at the elections of 1780, and he had won the seat.
From his entry into Parliament he had given his unquestioning allegiance to Charles James Fox. Now, leading only a rump of Whigs who refused to join the Coalition formed for the better prosecution of the war, Fox was old, embittered and discredited; yet Sheridan continued to support him in his venomous attacks on the Prime Minister and near treasonable advocacy of the policies of the French revolutionaries. Even so, on other matters Sheridan was high-principled and full of good sense; while his fertile mind, charming manner and amusing conversation made him a delightful companion.
His first wife, Elizabeth Linley, had been a concert singer. Her great beauty and golden voice had brought her a score of rich suitors while still in her teens, but Sheridan, himself then only a few years out of Harrow, had won her heart, fought a duel on her behalf and carried her off to France. Their romantic elopement had proved the prelude to a marriage lasting eighteen years and, although towards its end he had caused her much pain by his unfaithfulness, her death from consumption had proved a terrible blow to him.
He was now forty-five, and a year earlier he had married another beauty this time a daughter of the Dean of Winchester. They had bought the estate of Sir William Grey at Polesden, near Leatherhead, and, as it was only seven miles from Stillwaters, Georgina had ridden over several times to see them. She had told Roger that 'dear Sherry's new young wife was having the effect of an Elixir of Life on him' and, apart from the fact that his face had become very red from heavy drinking, Roger, now having met him again, fully endorsed’ her opinion.
The couple the Sheridan’s brought with them were so different from themselves that at first Roger was puzzled by their close association; but during the Friday evening he had learned that Signor Rinaldo Malderini was a rich backer of Venetian theatrical ventures, and that the two men had many mutual acquaintances in the international world of opera singers and ballet dancers.
They were, too, about of an age, but whereas Sheridan had a fine presence, lustrous laughing eyes, a sensitive mouth and well-cut features, the Venetian's appearance was so nondescript that one might have met him half a dozen times yet later failed to notice him in a crowd. He was a bulky man, although somewhat under middle height, deep chested and broad hipped. His complexion was pasty, his cheeks flabby and his face pudding like, its only noticeable feature being the eyes. These were a pale grey under thick dark brows, and had a curious opaque quality which gave the impression that with them he could, while completely masking his own thoughts, read other people's.
His English was poor, but he spoke excellent French; so during the evening the company had used that language. As yet, Roger had had no chance to talk to him in private, but he had soon taken a strong dislike to him. Before the evening was out he had formed the impression that the Venetian was cruel, cunning and treacherous. He had never felt any enthusiasm for the task that Mr. Pitt had thrust upon him and now he was unhappily aware that having to deal with such a man would make it doubly difficult of accomplishment.
The two wives had proved as great a contrast as their husbands. Esther Sheridan was a typical product of a Cathedral Close; moderately intelligent and well-read, transparently honest and good tempered, good-looking above the average in an unmistakably English way, and still aglow with her own happiness as the young wife of a successful man whom she obviously adored.
The Signora Malderini or as her husband always referred to her, the Princess Sirisha was the still young daughter of an Indian Rajah. Her tall slim figure was accentuated by the beautiful silk sari she wore swathed tightly round it. The loose end of the garment practically covered her raven hair and in the centre of her broad forehead she had a caste mark. Her face was oval and the colour of pale coffee. In it her dark almond-shaped eyes looked enormous and seemed to hold all the mystery of the Orient. But their expression was sad, and that was hardly to be wondered at, as she spoke not a word of any language other than her own, so was cut off from communication with everyone except her husband, and he rarely bothered to address her.
It was largely this which, despite Georgina's gifts as a hostess and Sheridan's inexhaustible fund of amusing anecdotes, had caused the Friday evening at Stillwaters to be a little less gay and carefree than was usual on such occasions. During dinner they had all been rendered vaguely uncomfortable by the presence of the silent Princess. She had eaten practically nothing and, apart from acknowledging with a pale smile the courtesies shown her by her neighbours, had played the part of a beautiful ghost at the feast.