A Regency Match (28 page)

As he expected, a figure climbed out onto the sill and lowered itself awkwardly onto the rope. It was surely Sophy; he could make out a head of dark curls. She had pinned up her skirts, revealing a pair of stockinged legs which curled around the twisted sheets with endearing lack of skill. Trembling, and clutching at the sheet with taut fingers, she lowered herself little by little until, to her obvious horror, she found herself at the end of her rope, from which she dangled more than one story above the ground. He could hear her gasp as she looked down at the ground which was too frighteningly far below her to permit a safe jump.

He gave a choked laugh. It was just exactly like the girl to use a rope which was too short. It seemed just exactly right that his first glimpse of her should be this one. But the sight of the girl dangling there in midair, unable either to pull herself up or to jump down, was too much for his equilibrium. He sat down on the grass, lowered his head in his arms and gave way to uncontrollable hilarity.

Chapter Twenty

“W
HO
IS
IT?
” she whispered into the darkness. “Who's
there
?”

But the choking laughter continued unabated.

“Will you stop laughing, whoever you are, and come over here to
help
me? Who is it?”

“A white knight, of course, to rescue you,” he whispered back when he'd regained his breath. “And not a moment too soon, from the look of things.”

“
M-Marcus
?” she asked in a choked voice, in which the only emotion he could recognize was astonishment.

“At your service,” he said with a slight, ironic bow as he came to stand beneath where she dangled.

“But … what are you
d-doing
here?” She tried to look down at him from her precarious perch. “Why did you … c-come?”

“Don't you think you'd better come down before we make the necessary explanations? Unless you'd rather stay where you are. I, of course, have not the slightest objection to conversing with you like this—the view of your legs is unspeakably delightful, and—”

She uttered a horrified gasp. “And you, sir, are unspeakably rude to refer to them,” she managed to exclaim. “You must know that I didn't expect to be
observed
during my climb.”

“I beg your pardon. Well, shall you jump? Or shall I ask your father for a ladder.”

“Oh,
no
, don't ask
anybody
for
anything
, or I shall be discovered! Do you think you can catch me?” she asked dubiously. “I'm not a lightweight, you know.”

“Have no fear. I shall manage.”

With a brief intake of breath, Sophy let go her grasp on the rope and fell into his hold. The impact made him stagger backward, but he kept his balance and managed to hold her against his chest for a moment or two longer than was absolutely necessary. When he set her on her feet, they both were breathless. “Are you all right?” he whispered.

“Yes. Are you?”

“Never better. Now what?”

“Now I think we'd better run for our lives. Have you a carriage?”

“Right around the bend.”

Without another word, he took her hand and pulled her behind him to the waiting carriage. With a flick of the reins, he started the horses bowling down the drive. “Oh, good heavens, I've left my bandbox!” she cried, clapping her hands to her mouth.

He pulled the horses to. “I'll run back for it,” he said, putting a leg over the side.

“No, no!” she said in terror. “We'll be caught! Let's just go on.” But he had already gone. The moments seemed interminable before he returned. He tossed the bandbox into the curricle behind their seats and jumped up beside her again. He started the horses and soon they had left Edgerton far behind. Her tension eased as the distance between them and her stepmother increased. “I don't know how to thank you,” she said after a while, “although I cannot
imagine
how you came to be waiting under my window at just the right time.”

“It's the talent of white knights to arrive in the nick,” he said cheekily. “Otherwise, how would you ladies-in-distress manage your lives?”

Sophy did not like the arrogance of his tone. It seemed to her that he always managed to see her at her worst. “I was not
really
in distress,” she said defensively. “I was just momentarily nonplussed.”

He chuckled. “Indeed? I'm sorry then that I came out of hiding. I should have remained where I was and watched you get yourself out of that fix.”

“You are straying from the point, sir,” she said primly. “I had asked how you came to be at Edgerton.”

“I came to be there, ma'am,” he said, mimicking her tone, “to pay a call on you. But I was told you were not receiving visitors.”

Sophy made a face. “The old dragon had locked me up, just because I'd sent the vicar sprawling.”

He bit his lip. “Oh, is
that
all? How
can
she have been so narrow-minded? Although I dare say if it had been the
curate
she might have been persuaded to forgive you.”

“You needn't be sarcastic. I know you think I dote on these disasters, but—”

“Why, Sophy, how
can
you believe I think any such thing! Dote on disaster?
You
? Nonsense. Just because you inspired a daft young man to break into my home for love of you, just because you ran away from my home in the dead of night without a word to me, just because I find you locked away like the princess in a fairy tale and then discover you hanging from a rope more than a story above the ground, you think I believe you dote on
disaster
? My dear girl, you misjudge me!”

Sophy felt the sting of tears behind her eyelids. There it was, that tone of disparagement. Why was it that every time he came into her life she was involved in some mishap or calamity? Why had he come along at just the wrong moment and found her dangling in the air? Just a moment ago she'd been grateful beyond words for his rescue, but now it seemed a most unfortunate coincidence. How could she ever win his respect if he kept discovering her in the act of blundering into some chaotic misadventure? Her throat tightened painfully, but she swore she would not let herself cry. “You needn't say anything more, sir. I suppose it would be useless for me to expect you to believe that none of those things you've just enumerated was my fault. They might have happened to
anyone
.”

“Is that so?” Marcus asked drily. “I wonder why they don't happen to me.”

“Oh,
you
! You are too perfectly precise and orderly to fall into scrapes,” she said promptly.

He threw a quick glance at her. “Is that a set-down, Miss Edgerton? By that you mean, I suppose, that I'm a pompous prig.”

Sophy didn't answer. She had once described him in just those words, but it was a long time since she'd felt that way about him. To her he
had
become the white knight, but there was no point in revealing her feelings—she would only be more humiliated.

But to Marcus, her silence meant agreement. Something in his chest seemed to grow numb. He fixed his eyes on the road, and the lines around his mouth hardened. “Where am I taking you, ma'am?” he asked coldly.

“To London, if you please. I've no place to go except to my grandmother's. My return will be a shock to her, I'm afraid. She's bound to give me a dreadful scold, but it will be like music when compared with my stepmother's sermons.”

Marcus nodded, and they drove on in silence. It was only when the twinkling lights of London began to appear that he spoke again. “At the risk of sounding more like a prig than ever, I'd like to suggest that this might be the proper time to unpin your skirts. We shall be coming into populated areas soon, and, unbelievable as it may seem, we might encounter some types who are even more priggish than I.”

Sophy choked and reddened to the ears. “You might have said something
before
!” she accused, looking down in hideous embarrassment at her exposed legs.

“I suppose I should have,” Marcus said with a trace of the amusement that had marked his tone earlier that evening, “but that was expecting too much pomposity, even from me. The view was too attractive.”

Sophy hastily undid her skirts and arranged them decorously over her limbs. She eyed him covertly as they plodded along through the increasing traffic. Truth to tell, it was comforting to have him at her side. Now that the pain of her humiliation was subsiding, she had to admit that she'd had no real plan to take her back to London when she'd climbed out of that window. She had taken a foolhardy risk. The act may have ruined forever his respect for her, but from a practical point of view she'd been fortunate that he'd been waiting there. “You never told me, sir, why you came all the way to Wiltshire to see me,” she reminded him softly.

Even in the darkness she could see him stiffen. “It was nothing. Only an impulse …”

“An impulse? You?”

He gave a rather bitter laugh. “Yes, I. It's not like me to behave impulsively, is it? I've always held that impulsive behavior is foolish behavior. I shall try not to behave so foolishly again.”

Sophy didn't understand why he sounded so angry, or what he was talking about. But he didn't respond to her questions, and eventually she stopped asking. The rest of the ride was passed in strained silence, during which Sophy remembered with a pang the joyful gleam in Marcus's eyes when he'd helped her down from the rope … a gleam which, somehow in their subsequent conversation, she had caused him to lose.

Lady Alicia didn't learn until the following morning that her granddaughter had been restored to her, for Sophy had refused to permit the overjoyed Miss Leale to waken her during the night. As soon as Alicia was told the news, she hopped out of bed and scurried to Sophy's bedside. Sophy awoke with a start, took one look at the old lady's brimming eyes, and the two fell into each other's arms. They laughed and wept and kissed each other until Lady Alicia regained her self-control. She sat down on the side of the bed and demanded to be told all. Sophy faithfully recounted the story of the vicar's ludicrous courtship, her stepmother's punishment and the fateful rescue at the hands of Lord Wynwood.

Lady Alicia looked at her granddaughter quizzically. “How strange. Did Lord Wynwood tell you why he'd come?”

“He merely said it was an impulse. I must admit, Grandmama, that it's been puzzling me. What can he have wanted?”

Lady Alicia had a theory, but she thought it best to keep it to herself. “If it was something of importance, we'll discover the answer before long. In the meantime, my love, I hope this marks an end to the excitement you've been generating.”

“Oh, yes,” Sophy sighed pathetically, “I hope so too. I've had quite enough tremors and palpitations to last a lifetime.”

For the next few days, Sophy remained quietly at home. Her grandmother often noticed that she seemed to watch out of the window as if waiting for a visitor, but none came. Soon, however, the news of the girl's return began to spread, and callers began to knock at the door. One of the first was Sir Tristram Caitlin, whose pursuit of Sophy had been quite marked before she'd gone to Wynwood and who showed every sign of intending to continue. Dennis Stanford called, indicating his continuing interest in fixing her affection. And shortly thereafter, Bertie sauntered in.

He was greeted with such an affectionate hug that he blushed. “You'd think you hadn't seen me for years,” he laughed, wriggling out of her embrace.

“It
feels
like years! Where's Dilly? Afraid to show his face here, I expect,” Sophy remarked.

“No, I don't think that's it,” Bertie told her with a grin. “You'll never credit it, but the gudgeon's gone and tumbled for
another
female!”

“Really?
Already
? I must say, Bertie, that's quite the most lowering news I've heard since my return. One would think the fellow would wear the willow for at least a month.”

“He didn't wear it for a
day
!” Bertie said in disgust. “He fixed on the new girl the day after he broke in to the Wynwood drawing room.”

“The next
day
? You don't mean it! Are you saying it was someone at Wynwood? But who—?”

“Fanny Carrington, who else? If
you
think his abrupt turn-about is lowering, how do you imagine
I
feel? Losing out to that scarecrow is hardly likely to lift
my
self-esteem.”

Sophy laughed. “Poor Bertie. It must have been a shock to learn that Dilly managed to lure her away from Dennis Stanford.”

Bertie grinned sheepishly. “Right! That bobbing block must have depths we haven't discovered.” He took an awkward turn about the room, pausing and glancing at his cousin in some concern. Then he said, with calculatedly casual nonchalance, “Speaking of affairs of the heart, has anyone told you about the item about Marcus in the newspapers?”

She looked up quickly. “About Marcus? No. What item?”

“It seems that Miss Bethune jilted him. My father showed me the item in the
Times
.”

“
Jilted
him?
No
!” Sophy paled, reddened, and paled again. “She
couldn't
have! Bertie, are you sure?”

He shrugged. “Ain't likely to find mistakes in the
Times
.”

Sophy, speechless, dropped down on the sofa and stared ahead of her with unseeing eyes. Marcus,
free
! For the first time since she'd met him, he was unentangled. Could this mean something to
her
? Her heart began to pound alarmingly. Had this news anything to do with his visit to Edgerton? “When
was
this, Bertie?” she asked, trying to make sense of the events. “Yesterday?”

“No. A couple of weeks ago, I'd say. Why?”