Regency Innocents (33 page)

‘Oh, don't be tolerant any more, then,' said Heloise. ‘It made me so unhappy!'

‘Very well, since you ask,' he growled. ‘From now on I shall be the most intolerant—' he kissed her hard on the lips ‘—-jealous—' he pulled her down until she lay flat on her back ‘—possessive husband that ever drew breath! In fact I will never let you out of my sight again. When I think of the torment I suffered when I thought you planned to leave me …'

She looked perplexed. ‘When was that? I never thought of leaving you!'

No … The day he feared she had run back to London with Robert she had in fact been stuck in the tower. And the day he had assumed she was trying to raise money to elope with him she had been trying to sell her pictures to pay off her gambling debts. Even in France, when he had thought she would want to flee an intolerable marriage, she had already been in love with him!

She had never thought of leaving him. Nor had his stepmother, come to that. And at that revelation something inside him seemed to unfurl and blossom. He felt tears prick his eyes. Somewhat appalled, he blinked them away, before burying his face in the silken cocoon of her hair.

‘I love you,' he said, for there was nothing else that summed up so neatly the enormity of what he felt at that moment.

Her answer, ‘I love you too,' was exactly what he needed to hear.

Some time later, she whispered, And you promise you really won't send me away and take a mistress?'

‘I would not dare,' he groaned, rolling onto his back and
pulling her into his side. ‘Besides, you would not let me—would you?'

‘How could I stop you if you really wanted to?'

He chuckled. ‘Are you serious? Don't you know how powerful you are?'

‘Powerful? Me?' she squeaked.

‘Yes, you. You have been able to mould me like putty in your hands from the first moment you set your sights on me. When I had vowed to have nothing whatever to do with your family you persuaded me to marry into it. I had decided nothing would induce me to leave Paris until my lease expired, and scarcely a day later you had me racing for the coast like a lunatic. And worst of all, when I had always believed love was a debilitating emotion from which I would never suffer, you wrung it from my stony heart. Nobody else could have done it.'

‘Are you sorry?' she asked in a small voice.

‘Sorry?' He snorted. ‘I have never been more glad of anything in my life. You are my life, Heloise,' he said softly. ‘The light of my life. If you had never bullied me into marrying you I would have been the coldest, loneliest man in London. Instead of which …' He paused, his eyes suspiciously bright with moisture. Ah, don't talk any more,' he groaned. ‘Just kiss me.'

‘With all my heart,' she sighed. ‘With all my heart.'

* * * * *

‘O
h, no,' Susannah grumbled to her friend, Miss Deborah Gillies, snapping open her fan and raising it to conceal the lower part of her face. ‘Here comes Captain Fawley, hobbling over to ask me to dance again. And I cannot. I simply cannot.'

Deborah compressed her lips to hide her own revulsion—oh, not at Captain Fawley. The poor man could not help the way he looked. He had lost the lower part of one leg, and his left hand in the same explosion which had so badly disfigured his face. His left eyelid would for ever droop into the scarring that covered his whole cheek, twisting his mouth into a permanently cynical expression. No, she could feel nothing but compassion for him.

It was Susannah's behaviour that upset her.

Captain Fawley bowed over her friend's hand, his dark eyes raised to hers with dogged determination.

‘Good evening, Miss Hullworthy, Miss Gillies.' Though he included Deborah in his greeting, he shot her
only the briefest glance. ‘I was hoping I might prevail upon you to dance with me this evening.'

‘Oh, dear,' said Susannah, with just the right amount of regret in her voice to sound convincing. ‘I am afraid my dance card is already full. And here comes my partner for the quadrille.' She looked over Captain Fawley's shoulder, a smile stretching her lips into a pretty pink bow as Baron Dunning came to claim her hand.

Deborah supposed it was not Susannah's fault that the rules of conduct required a lady to repress her true feelings under a cloak of civility. But surely it would be kinder to Captain Fawley if she could just tell him how he made her feel. Then he wouldn't keep on approaching her, and being rebuffed so prettily that he had no idea that the very thought of him touching her made Susannah feel nauseous.

She flicked him a soulful glance as he watched Susannah walk to the dance floor on the arm of her portly young partner. Captain Fawley must have been strikingly handsome once, she sighed wistfully. Dark haired, as well as dark eyed, with features that were still discernibly pleasing, even under that horribly reddened and puckered skin.

Whereas there was nothing handsome about Baron Dunning. He had a weak chin, made more noticeable by a mouth full of prominent teeth, and his skin was a greasy broth of suppurating pustules.

‘Many people suffer from spots,' Susannah had remonstrated when Deborah had pointed out that Baron Dunning's complexion was no better than Captain Fawley's. ‘He cannot help that!'

Besides which, he had a title. All the poor Captain had to offer was his devotion. And Susannah might protest that she would hate to look ridiculous hobbling about the dance floor with a man who had a false leg, but she never worried what it looked like to dance with the doddery Earl of Caxton. The
on-dit
was that the cadaverous widower was on the lookout for wife number three, and Susannah was plainly ready to stifle her squeamishness for the sake of a coronet.

The impecunious Captain Fawley could expect no such consideration.

‘How could I let him touch me, with that false hand?' Susannah had whined only the previous night, when they had been preparing for bed at the end of an arduous day of husband hunting. It had occurred to Deborah, as her friend applied pineapple water to her skin, that it was most apt to refer to the early weeks of spring as ‘the Season'. Débutantes stalked their prey as ruthlessly as sportsmen on a grouse shoot, flushing unsuspecting bachelors from their covers with a swirl of silken skirts, then bagging them with a volley fired from a pair of sparkling eyes. Or lured them into traps baited with honeyed smiles and coaxing words.

‘It is very hard to tell it is a false hand, it has been so well made,' Deborah had pointed out. ‘It looks just like any other gentleman's hand, covered with an evening glove.'

‘I would know it was a dead thing, resting on my arm.' Susannah had shuddered. ‘Eeugh!'

As the orchestra began to play, Captain Fawley came back to himself. Turning to Deborah, he inclined his head and held out his arm. His right arm. She had
noticed on previous occasions that if he offered a lady his arm, it was never what remained of the left one.

‘Shall we take a turn about the room?'

Deborah smiled, and laid her hand upon his sleeve. As she glanced up, it occurred to her that placing her on his right side also had the effect of presenting the unblemished side of his face to her scrutiny. A pang of sympathy smote her. He was sensitive enough to his appearance, without girls like Susannah rubbing his nose in it. He had even grown his hair longer than was fashionable, sweeping part of his fringe over the left side of his forehead, in an effort to conceal the worst of the scarring.

They set out along the edge of the room, in the area behind the pillars that marked the boundaries of the dance floor. Captain Fawley's gait was a little uneven, she had to admit in fairness to Susannah. But by no means did he hobble! And though she had never danced with him, she was certain he would look no worse than many of the men here tonight, lumbering about with straining waistcoats and florid faces.

‘I can see you would much rather be on the dance floor,' said Captain Fawley, noticing the direction of her gaze, ‘than bearing me company. I shall escort you to your mother, and—'

‘Oh, please do not!'

He eyed her curiously.

‘I would m … much rather be promenading, than left to wilt on the sidelines.'

Her dance card, unlike that of her friend, bore very few names. If Captain Fawley abandoned her, it would be humiliatingly obvious that she had no partner.

She felt as though the only time she ever got to dance lately was when one of Susannah's admirers took pity on her, as Captain Fawley was doing now.

And unlike some of those gentlemen, Captain Fawley was invariably attentive and polite, almost managing to make her believe he was enjoying talking to her.

And what was more, she was sure he would never take part in the kind of conversation she had overheard not half an hour since. Not that she could blame Baron Dunning for comparing her unfavourably with Susannah. Although both of them had dark hair, Deborah's curls would have gone limp by the end of the evening. Her eyes, though as brown, were more often lowered bashfully than sparkling with wit. Her complexion, thanks to an inflammation of the lungs she had suffered over the winter months, might, she accepted, by candle-light look somewhat sallow. And when she stood next to the shorter, shapelier Susannah, she supposed she could see why Mr Jay had scathingly likened her to a beanpole.

Not that knowing they had said nothing untrue made their comments any less hurtful, which was why she felt so grateful that Captain Fawley was deigning to spend these few moments with her.

When she thought of the adventures he must have had, in his soldiering days, she was amazed he could talk to her so kindly about the trivial concerns of a plain, provincial miss like her.

He gave her his wry, lopsided smile, which somehow always managed to make her own lips want to rise in imitation.

‘Then let us go and sample the refreshments,' he suggested, turning her towards a door at the far side of the room from where the orchestra was playing.

‘Thank you, I should like that.'

She hoped very much that he would linger while she drank a glass of lemonade. Conversation would be limited, for after her initial burst of pleasure in securing his attention, she would doubtlessly become tongue-tied. He had experienced so much, when she had scarcely set foot outside her father's parish before this trip to London. Not that he had personally related how he had fought his way across the Peninsula before suffering the horrific injuries at Salamanca that had left him hovering between life and death for months. No, that information had been gleaned from her mother's friends, who made it their business to know everything about everyone.

They had shaken their heads, expressing pity as they related what they knew of his history, but she could only admire the determination with which he had clawed his way back to his present state. He did everything an able-bodied man did, though it must take him twice the effort. Why, he had even learned to ride a horse. She had glimpsed him on a couple of occasions, cantering through the park in the early morning, before many other people were about. He seemed to her to be so much more manly than the fashionable fops who lounged their languid way through London's drawing rooms. He had overcome whatever life had thrown at him, which you could see, just by looking at him, had been a great deal.

She felt that first betraying blush sweep up her
cheeks, which always assailed her at about this point in their meetings. For what could she say that might be of interest to a man like him, a man who had really lived? Though she knew that, whatever she said, he would never give her one of those condescending looks, which so many eligible bachelors seemed to have got down to a fine art. He was so kind, so magnanimous, so …

‘Tell me,' he said, as they sauntered towards the table on which a large punch bowl sat, ‘just what a man has to do to secure a dance with your friend?'

Deborah's flight of fancy exploded in mid-air, plummeting to earth like a spent rocket. He had not sought out her company because he wished for it. She was only a means by which he might be able to approach Susannah. Of course a man like him would not willingly spend time with a drab, nondescript, foolish, ignorant, penniless, plain … and let us not forget shy, awkward, dull …

She pulled herself together with effort, and pasted a polite social smile upon her face, as Captain Fawley continued, ‘I purposely arrived early tonight, and still her dance card seems to be full.'

‘It was full before ever we arrived,' Deborah temporised. It was not her place to tell him that, no matter what he did, Susannah would rebuff him. Not only did she find him physically repulsive, but she had her sights set on a title. Forming an attachment with an impecunious commoner was not part of Susannah's plan at all.

‘Before you arrived?' Captain Fawley signalled a waiter to pour Deborah a glass of lemonade.