Under An English Moon (17 page)

They walked around the front of the house, which in daylight, still looked like one of the mansions in the I.C. Moon movies with its walls of golden sandstone. Was it possible they had filmed one of the movies here? She couldn’t remember. A myriad of windows with white-painted sills faced the front and sides, flanked by the ivy she’d noted the night before—emerald green now in daytime. The sun shone gently as she had imagined an English sun would.

Reggie led her back to the garden where she’d waited for him the night before. The wonderful smell she had previously noted emanated from roses, lots and lots of roses in bloom. A small fountain did indeed trickle in the middle of a circular stone pond.

Reggie bypassed the benches and continued to stroll along the garden path. Phoebe lifted her skirts and petticoat to keep them off the ground. She’d always wondered what women did with the hems of their dresses outside. Just let them trail in the dirt?

“Phoebe, do you still wear your sneakers? How is it that you may continue to wear your sneakers and I may not?” Reggie laughed.

She dropped her skirts.

“Oh, man, I’ve got to remember that I’ve got them on,” she said. “That’s why I was standing in the drawing room, couldn’t sit down. Mattie’s slippers are too small, so I had to keep wearing these. Cute with the dress, don’t ya think?”

“As cute as a button,” Reggie said with an admiring glance in her direction.

Phoebe’s heart brimmed with love.

“I sought an excuse to see you in private, Phoebe,” Reggie said.

“Is something wrong?” Phoebe asked. “Did I mess up in there?”

“No, not at all. You comported yourself very well, especially in light of my stepmother’s interrogation. I simply wished to be with you, that is all. As we were—without an audience.”

Phoebe tucked her arm in tighter and pressed closely to his side. “Me, too. Everyone has been so kind, but I feel happiest when I’m with you...alone.”

He covered her hand with his own. “Just so,” he murmured.

“Do you think your father knows? About the time traveling?”

Reggie shook his head. “I do not. My father could not remain silent regarding such knowledge. He is not a particularly discreet man, as you may have noticed.”

Phoebe laughed.

“No, but I’ll bet you’re never left in doubt about his feelings. He’s pretty open.”

“Open,” Reggie muttered. “Yes, that is a good word.”

“I have to say I prefer that to the polished front that Lady Hamilton puts on. She worries me.”

“In what way, Phoebe? For all her high-handed ways, my stepmother would never seek to harm you.”

“No, no, I don’t think she would do that. But...” Phoebe paused. “She doesn’t really seem to accept Mattie, and I think she probably won’t accept me...not that she needs to, of course.”

“But she most assuredly needs to accept you...as the woman whom I most admire in the world. For if it is within my power, if I can will it to be so, I will you to stay with me. I am completely besotted with you, Phoebe. I love you most dearly, and I do not wish to be parted from you...ever.”

Phoebe forgot all about Lady Hamilton as she felt herself swept up into an embrace. Reggie held her firmly but kissed her tenderly, and she returned his kiss with love.

“I love you too, Reggie. I really, really do,” she whispered against his lips. “No, I can’t be apart from you either. I just can’t imagine.”

Reggie lifted his head and smiled at her. “Miss Phoebe Warner, would you do me the honor of—”

The sound of a child’s laughter caught their ears, and they sprang apart. Mia toddled into the garden followed by her father, Mattie, and Lord and Lady Hamilton.

“Ah! You have found our guests, Mia,” William said. “Forgive our boisterous intrusion. Amelia insisted on running out to the garden, to the point of pounding on the front door. It is quite her favorite place on the estate.”

Phoebe caught Reggie’s eye and smiled regretfully before turning her attention to the group near the fountain. Mia reached over the basin of the stone fountain and splashed the water with her tiny hands, giggling and stomping her baby feet as she did so.

“Here you are, Reggie,” Lord Hamilton said. He came to stand beside his son.

Lady Hamilton looked from Reggie to Phoebe with narrowed eyes before seating herself on the bench to watch Mia play with the fountain. William, a knowing smile on his face, turned his attention to Mia, and Mattie joined him.

Thankfully, Mia became the center of attention for the next fifteen minutes as she played, and Phoebe was able to collect her thoughts with an occasional glance at Reggie. Had he been about to propose to her? After only two days? What was she supposed to do? Say?

Everything seemed so surreal in 1827—the palatial mansion in front of her, the clothing, the mannerisms, a proposal of marriage. Did things really move so quickly here? Shouldn’t she and Reggie “date” for a while? Get to know each other better?

She watched Reggie as he spoke to his father. She was crazily in love with him, there was no doubt about it. But she didn’t really know him very well. What if her Georgian hero had a dark side, a violent streak? What if he hid a crazy wife somewhere or a mistress? What if Reggie had a disease, not curable in the nineteenth century—tuberculosis or a venereal disease? Not everything in the nineteenth century was a pleasant Jane Austen novel. The Bronte sisters had already been born, if Phoebe’s memory served her correctly, and were well on their way to depicting gloomy, forbidden romances. Phoebe thought she remembered reading that they themselves had died of tuberculosis.

A shiver ran up her spine. She knew nothing about Reggie at all, and yet she felt so incredibly close to him—as if he were the other half of her. What she knew of him, she loved. But to give up her entire life to a virtual stranger?

She eyed Mattie who seemed very happy with her William. Reggie, similar to William in his aristocratic bearing and dashing looks, seemed wholesome and harmless. But two days?

Maybe she could avoid the subject for a while, stall if and when he brought it up. Besides, for all she knew, he might have been inviting her for a drive in his carriage. Perhaps she was overreacting. The tightness in her throat eased. Reggie—diseased, dishonest, dishonorable? Never!

Lady Hamilton rose and announced they would depart. As the group turned toward the front of the house, Reggie held out his arm and Phoebe took it. He bent his head to speak to her.

“We must continue our conversation at the earliest opportunity, my love. I wished most particularly to ask you a question.”

Phoebe bit her lip. “Umm...sure,” she replied.

She should have known Reggie would be attuned to every inflection in her voice. His brows came together.

“Is aught amiss, Phoebe? I watched you while the child played at the fountain. Your face registered many emotions, some of which I could not decipher. I hope that I have not frightened you with the ardency of my affections.”

Phoebe couldn’t help herself. “I love you, Reggie. What I know of you,” she whispered. “But we don’t know each other very well.”

He didn’t answer at first, and she looked up at him. They approached the front door after the others had entered, and he paused to look down at her.

“You wish to take time to think about your response? Is that correct?”

“Oh, shoot, I don’t know, Reggie!” Phoebe exclaimed. “I’m probably going to start spouting something like ‘this is all so sudden,’ but that’s kind of how I feel. I hope you understand.”

“I do,” Reggie said quietly. “I shall say no more on the subject.”

“Not even about love?” Phoebe knew she was being unreasonable. She wanted his love, but she also wanted to make sure he didn’t have a mad wife in the attic, or a tendency to lie in a pathological way, or even a gambling problem.

“Love and marriage go hand in hand, Miss Warner. I will let you have your time, if you decide to stay.”

“Don’t you ‘Miss Warner’ me, Reggie Hamilton! I love you. Nothing is going to change that. I just don’t know you well enough to marry you, and you don’t know me well enough to ask me!”

Lord and Lady Hamilton emerged from the house, and Reggie stepped away from Phoebe to say goodbye to his father. Having rapidly grown used to tucking her arm in his, she felt her hands dangling uselessly at her sides, empty, and her throat began to ache. She curtsied awkwardly, mumbled goodbye and ran inside the house.

Chapter Twelve

Reggie bid his father and stepmother farewell and turned to see Phoebe disappear inside the house. Rather than follow her in, he turned and walked toward a small grove of trees on the right side of the house.

Phoebe was not incorrect. The brief span of their acquaintanceship dictated that they could not possibly know each other well. Yet, he felt he knew her as he knew himself. Perhaps he was not yet familiar with the vagaries of her temperament or her particularities, but he recognized a kinship with her, an affinity, as if their fates were meant to be intertwined. His attraction to her had been instant and comprehensive—from the delightful upturn of her lovely face to her maternal instincts, though he had resented feeling like a helpless small boy at times. He loved her dearly, and he wondered now that he could ever have thought his youthful attraction for Matilda Crockwell Sinclair to be anything other than an infatuation.

He stared at the ground unseeingly as he strolled in the grove with his hands clasped behind his back. Phoebe had not refused his offer out of hand for which he was manifestly grateful. She simply needed more time to know him—a period of courtship, not at all unusual. But how to court a woman who might or might not disappear at any moment—into the future? How long could he depend upon the generosity of the Sinclairs to house her? And how long could he himself “visit” William when his own house lay not a half mile across the fields—without raising even more undue suspicion or unwelcome speculation from his father and stepmother? Or the neighbors.

It was not possible to avoid contact with the local gentry, nor was it advisable to try to do so. Such social isolation would be cruel to Phoebe. She should experience gaiety in the form of dinners and dances. Was he to lock her away in a stone tower, never to be heard from again? Reggie chuckled at such an image. He could not imagine her going quietly into such an arrangement.

The image, however ludicrous, served to remind Reggie that he needed to set about procuring a house for himself. His father promised to outlive them all, and if Phoebe consented to marry him in the future, he would need to have his own home.

Reggie returned to the house and sought out William. John directed him to the library where he found William at his desk.

“William, I wondered if you knew of any land agents or solicitors who might seek out a house for me.”

“A house?” William said as he leaned back and surveyed Reggie with a lift of one brow. “Did you make Miss Warner an offer?”

Reggie sighed and dropped into a chair. William rose to pour him a brandy.

“Here, I think you must need this.”

“Thank you. Well, I was at the point of uttering the words when you, Mattie and Mia, as well as my father and stepmother arrived, and I was not able to finish. Phoebe preempted any further efforts on my part by informing me that she does not know me well enough to marry me...yet.”

“Yet,” William repeated. “That is certainly encouraging.”

Reggie nodded. “I believe that we share the same affection for each other, but she wishes to proceed more slowly.”

“But that is the point of an engagement, I should think. To become better acquainted before marriage.”

Reggie nodded. “I thought so as well, but I have no experience with this. As you well know, my education regarding women has been sadly lacking in the absence of a mother. I believe my father found my naiveté amusing, along with that of my brother, and the source of much entertainment.”

William chuckled. “Yes, I think he must have. But you have matured now, even more so than when I saw you only last month. I suspect it is due in large part to your encounter with Phoebe and your experiences in the future. Women can either make men or boys of us, and it would seem that Phoebe has made you the former.”

Reggie laughed and sipped his drink. “When she is not playing the mother to me, that is. She has a strong maternal instinct and devoted herself to protecting me while I was in the twenty-first century.”

“Is there much danger there?” William asked.

“Not that I saw, but the pace seems very fast, especially in New York City. Phoebe worried that I might injure myself more than be injured by another. She fretted about cars, traffic—”

“Cars? Describe these to me. Mattie has attempted to tell me of the future, but she is hindered by the fact that she never lived in the nineteenth century. Or I am too obtuse,” William smiled. “Tell me about your journey.”

For the next hour, they discussed Reggie’s experiences.

“Yes, I understand more clearly now. Fascinating! As you know, I once thought I would have to travel to the future to remain with Mattie, but the difficulties inherent in leaving the estate gave me pause.”

“Had she not come back, would you have gone forward, William?”

William nodded. “Yes, had it been within my power, that is, had Mattie and I wished at the same time—though hundreds of years apart—for the same thing, then I would have followed her to the future. I love her,” he said simply.

Reggie nodded. “I understand the sentiment. Though my love for Phoebe is in its infancy, I cannot imagine a future without her.”

“Is she willing to stay here or must you go forward?”

Reggie shook his head. “I do not know. However, I think I must have my own lodgings. You were going to direct me to your man of business? I think I shall seek out an agent in the village as well.”

“Yes, yes. Here is his address.” William dashed off an address on a card, handing it to Reggie as he rose. “Come, let us find the ladies and have some luncheon.”

****

At the end of a delightful repast, Reggie asked Phoebe if she cared to take a walk on the estate grounds to which she agreed, much to his relief.