Baroness in Buckskin (11 page)

“I am pleased to know that your father was so conscientious,” Peter said, choosing his words with care, “but surely the absence of cruelty, even the presence of kindness, is a poor substitute for the free-dom to determine one’s own fate.”

In all her eighteen years, it had never occurred to Susannah that kind old Uncle Nate or Aunt Hepzibah might want something more from life than to serve as occasional playmate and surrogate parent to a motherless little girl. The realization put her on the defensive, and she spoke more harshly to Peter than she otherwise might have done. “It seems to me that you have no room to talk! As I understand it, slaves in the American South have a much lighter burden than those on the sugar plantations of the British West Indies.”

He threw up his hands in mock surrender. “If you are looking for a quarrel, Cousin, you will not get it from me. I deplore the practice of slavery in my own country every bit as much as I do in yours.”

“And—and Richard?”

“He shares my sentiments. In fact, he has spoken on the subject in the Lords. Parliament,” he explained, seeing her puzzled expression. “Much like your own Congress, I believe, although probably a great deal stuffier.”

She smiled at that, and they were once more on the friendliest of terms. They had reached the stream by this time, and agreed to walk along its banks while the horses refreshed themselves. Peter dismounted, and then turned to assist his cousin.

“Such courtly manners!” exclaimed Susannah, who on her Kentucky homestead had been obliged to fend for herself. “I feel like a princess from a fairy tale.”

She lifted her knee over the pommel, kicked her foot free of the stirrup, and slid out of the saddle and into his arms. Peter was not tall, but neither was Susannah, and she was obliged to look up at him to thank him for this courtesy. Their eyes met and held, and although she opened her mouth, the words she had intended to say somehow stuck in her throat.

Peter, suddenly conscious of the feel of her trim waist beneath his hands, abruptly dropped his arms and took a stumbling step backwards.

“I’d best see to the horses,” he said, and suited the word to the deed. He took the reins of both horses and led them to the stream, looping the reins over the low branches of a willow overhanging the water. While the horses drank greedily, Peter turned back to Susannah and offered his arm. “Shall we?”

They strolled along the bank for some time, while Peter plied Susannah with questions about her home in America. This, he soon learned, had very little in common with stately Ramsay Hall, consisting of only two rooms with a dogtrot running between them.

“A dogtrot?” echoed Peter, unfamiliar with the term.

“Sort of a wide corridor, open on both ends,” she explained. “Since it is under the same roof as the rooms on either side, it makes a nice, shady place to sit in the summertime—much better than a porch, really, for it catches every breeze.”

“I see. And the two rooms?”

“One is the bedroom, and the other is the kitchen. It also serves as what I suppose you might call a drawing room, but Papa and I never had much time for sitting and drinking tea.”

“My dear cousin!” Peter hardly knew whether to be intrigued or appalled at the thought of so primitive an existence. “Life at Ramsay Hall must seem like the stuff of fairy tales.”

Susannah’s brow puckered as she considered this observation. “In some ways, yes, I suppose it does. Although it never before occurred to me how very uncomfortable it must have been for Cinderella. How did she ever learn to dance at that ball anyway, when her stepmother made her work all the time?”

“Very true! I confess, I never thought of that. Perhaps the glass slippers did the dancing for her.”

She shook her head. “No, for surely the fairy godmother must have mentioned it, if that had been the case.”

“Well then, I suppose her father must have engaged a dancing master for her at some time before his death—a very wise investment, obviously.”

She snatched her hand from his arm and stepped back. “You are saying it was very
un
wise of Papa not to do so for me!”

“I said no such thing!” Peter protested hastily, although privately his thoughts had been running along very similar lines. It was obvious to the meanest intelligence that Mr. Gerald Ramsay had been shockingly neglectful of his daughter’s upbringing—except where her skill on horseback was concerned and this, by her own admission, was more out of necessity than any desire to render her a suitable bride for a gentleman of property. Peter found himself wondering what might have become of her had not Richard decided to offer for her.

“Papa was not always so—so hermitlike,” Susannah said, apparently feeling some defense of her father was called for. “He and Mama used to spend part of every year in Richmond—Mama was quite the Virginia belle, if her portrait does not lie—but after she died, he closed up the town house and took me to Kentucky. We have lived there ever since. The town house was pointed out to me when I went to Richmond to visit Papa’s solicitor, but I haven’t been inside it since I was two years old, so I don’t remember anything about it. It is tall and narrow, with a red brick façade and white columns on the portico, and black shutters on all the windows.”

“It sounds very handsome,” Peter said, and was surprised to discover that he meant it.

“Oh, it is, at least from the outside. But it has been closed up for more than fifteen years, so I daresay the inside needs a good airing, and very possibly more.”

“If it has been standing vacant all this time, I should think it very likely. It appears Richard may need to engage an agent to oversee the American property.”

The mention of her fiancé was sufficient to erase the animation from her face. “There is to be a ball to announce the betrothal, you know,” she said, her voice expressionless.

“Ah,” Peter said cryptically, understanding the reason for her sudden concern as to how Cinderella acquired her dancing skills.

“Cousin Jane says she will teach me to dance—she and Aunt Amelia and Cousin Richard.”

“If she says she will teach you, then you may count on her to do so,” he assured her. “Depend upon it, she will not throw you to the wolves all unprepared. And as she is a very graceful dancer herself, you may be sure you are in good hands as far as your instructress is concerned.”

She raised wide, troubled eyes to his. “Yes, but—but what if I’m not—what if I can’t—”

He took both of her hands in his and gave them a comforting little squeeze. “If I can learn to dance, anyone can. Like you, I had not the advantage of a dancing master either. It was not until after I came here to work for Richard that the Aunts informed me I might be expected to fill in socially on occasions when an extra male was needed, and that it was my duty as a Ramsay not to disgrace myself or my name—and to tell you the truth, I suspect it was the latter that weighed most heavily with them. Between the pair of them, they took me in hand—along with assistance from Cousin Jane and Richard—and today I can at least contrive to get through a quadrille or a cotillion without treading on a lady’s toes.”

“I suppose it’s different for men,” protested Susannah, unconvinced.

“Yes, for we are expected to lead,” he pointed out. “Uncomfortable though it may be, your position is more to be envied than mine was.” Of course, there was the small matter that she, as Lord Ramsay’s affianced bride, would be the cynosure of all eyes, while he would be merely an extra male whose duty it was to see that the less desirable of the young ladies were not allowed to languish against the wall. He hoped this circumstance would not occur to her, at least not until she had achieved some degree of proficiency in the dance.

“Then you truly don’t think I will have any difficulty in learning?” she asked, her expressive blue eyes pleading for confirmation.

“Truly, Cousin Susannah, I don’t. Anyone who can handle a four-legged creature as well as you handled Daffodil should have no trouble at all with only your own two to manage.”

She gave him an uncertain little smile, and he was gratified to know that, even if he had not been able to convince her entirely, at least he had relieved the worst of her fears.

“Will you help with the dancing lessons, Peter?” Receiving no answer, she was obliged to prompt him. “Peter?”

They had followed the stream as it traced a wide arc around the foot of the hill. Upon rounding the curve, Peter’s steps had slowed and finally ceased altogether, and he stood staring off into the distance at a mossy, slate-tiled roof rising over the treetops.

“Peter?” she said again. “What is it?”

“Fairacres,” he said, pointing toward the distant roof. “The estate borders Richard’s, and the house dates to the sixteenth century. You should see it from the front: mullioned windows with diamond-shaped panes, exposed timbers on the upper floors, and a great front door so wide that four men could pass through it walking abreast. They say that Queen Elizabeth once visited, and that the first Lord Ramsay was ennobled for allowing the queen and her retinue to hunt in his woods, after the royal party had denuded the Fairacres park of deer. And it is true that the barony dates back to that time, so there may be some truth to the story.”

Susannah stood on tiptoe for a better look, but could see nothing but the roof cresting the tops of the trees. “Who lives there?”

Peter sighed. “No one, now. I’d like to buy the place someday and restore the house before it falls down. It would be an expensive undertaking, but the land is fertile enough that I think it could bear the cost—so long as the estate was not obliged to entertain any more royal guests,” he added with a grin.

“You aren’t happy working for Cousin Richard?”

“I have no complaints about Richard as an employer—far from it, in fact, for he is more than generous. But I would like to have a place of my own someday. I have ideas I should like to try, ideas about farming and animal husbandry.”

“And you don’t think Richard would allow it?”

He shook his head. “On the contrary, I am almost certain he would. Therein lies the problem. If I should be wrong, if my plans should fail—” He shrugged. “I should prefer to risk my own money, rather than Richard’s.”

“Then I think you should buy Fairacres,” she pronounced with a decisive nod.

“Oh, so do I. There is only one little problem.”

“What is that?”

He gave a bitter laugh. “I haven’t the money. Richard pays me well, so far as stewards go, but not
that
well. My needs are small, though, so I set aside what I can out of each quarter’s pay.” He sighed. “At my current rate of savings, I ought to have enough put back in, oh, another thirty years.”

“But that is dreadful!” she exclaimed in ready sympathy. “Is there nothing else you can do?”

“I suppose I might marry an heiress, but even assuming a likely female should wander into rural Hampshire, it is doubtful she would be interested in a potential husband with nothing to recommend him but an old County name and a distant connection to the current baron.”

“Nonsense!” Susannah’s bosom swelled in indignation. “
I
am an heiress, and not only have I wandered into Hampshire but I also think you would make a very nice husband.”

So touched was Peter by her emphatic defense of his prospects that he ignored her garbled syntax. “I am flattered beyond words by your high opinion of me, Cousin Susannah, but since you are already promised to Richard, I can only hope to find an unattached heiress who shares it. And now, if you are ready, I think we should turn back before Sheba and Daffodil give us up for lost.”

* * *

“She
what?
” demanded Richard several hours later, when the story of Susannah’s adventures had been recounted to him by Jane, who had had the story from Peter.

“Really, Richard, she is the most unusual girl!” exclaimed Jane, choking back a laugh. “You must admit, she is nothing if not resourceful.”

“I must admit nothing of the sort!” he growled, pacing the Aubusson carpet adorning the drawing room floor. “When I consider that your kindness to her is rewarded so shabbily—”

“Nonsense! I daresay it is my own fault, for neglecting to explain to her that a lady’s riding garments are not made by a dressmaker, but by a tailor. In hindsight, I quite see that she could not have been expected to know such a thing.”

“Why not?” challenged Richard. “
You
did.”

“Only because your mother took it upon herself to provide for me, and was kind enough not to make a great to-do about my deficiencies, which I can assure you were many.” Seeing by the slowing of his steps that he was beginning to weaken, she added, “It is not as if the dress is ruined, you know. The fabric is not torn at all, only the stitching ripped out. It can be repaired, and no one will ever be the wiser.”

“
I
will,” he grumbled. “Besides, that dress looked better on you,”

“Yes, well, you must remember that it was made for me,” she pointed out, willing herself not to set too much store by this very flattering remark which was in fact no compliment at all, but a simple statement of opinion. “Come, Richard, it is
my
dress, after all, and if
I
can see the humour in the situation, surely there is no need for
you
to take offense.”

He sighed. “I suppose you are right, and I will not mention the matter to her, if that is what you wish. It is only that she has so much, and you have so little.”

“
Little?
” she echoed incredulously. “Little, I? My dear Richard, surely you jest! Why, I have an entire wardrobe of lovely gowns; surely I cannot begrudge her one, whatever she may choose to do to it. Besides that, I have a very comfortable home, and a family who cares for me, and—oh, a hundred other things beside. I would not trade places with Susannah for anything!”

“Yes, I know,” Richard acknowledged with a rueful smile. “Your opinion on the subject, as I recall, was quite emphatically stated.”

They had not spoken of his rejected offer of marriage from that day to this, and Jane, to her chagrin, felt her cheeks burning as if that most awkward of events had taken place only the day before, instead of almost a decade earlier. Her fingers worked in agitation, pleating the folds of her muslin skirts, but she forced herself to meet his gaze, and to smile.