Under the Kissing Bough (4 page)

Eleanor's stare fell to the floor as soon as his gaze caught hers. He watched her, willing her to look up, wondering if she had caught his smile and what she made of it.

And he could have sworn that the faintest answering smile teased her lips. Had the same thought crossed her mind? Or did she hug some other secret amusement close to her?

Before he could move next to her to ask, Miss Glover—Elizabeth—came forward to make small talk with him, and Emma Glover paired up with Patrick, and the ill-assorted group gradually meandered to the front doors and the carriages.

With six in the party, two carriages had to be taken. Geoff sent Patrick to sit with Lady Rushton and young Emma in the Glover's closed carriage. He took up Eleanor and her older sister, Miss Glover, in his town coach.

After handing Miss Glover up the steps, he turned to offer his assistance to Eleanor. She took his hand and hesitated. Looking up into his face, she said, "It is very good of you to give up your pleasure for us."

"Oh, this is my pleasure," he corrected, the polite nothing slipping out in an automatic response. It was the sort of nonsense one spouted to ladies. He had learned that much over the past few months in London.

She eyed him, her expression serious, and shook her head. "I doubt you shall believe that in another hour."

Stepping up into the carriage, she left him frowning at her and irritated. Devil take her! Either she said nothing, or her words came out too blunt. And what did she think him, anyway? An oaf with no polish? He had been shopping with ladies before—some of them respectable, most of them not. He knew how to admire their selections, praise their taste, and weave some pleasant flirtation into the process.

But she acted as if they were all headed for imprisonment in the Tower.

Devil take it, but it could not be all that bad to squire four women about a few shops for a few hours. And he vowed to himself to make it so.

The rain held off as they toured Mr. Wedgwood's showrooms in York Street, St. James's Square. But Lady Rushton had obviously given firm instructions to her daughters on their behavior. All of them, even the saucy-eyed Emma, acted like automatons of virtue. They spoke only when spoken to. They kept their observations to the worries over the worsening weather, which had now added a cold bite to the December wind. And in all matters, they deferred to his taste.

If he admired a vase in Wedgwood blue, Eleanor found it lovely. If he looked at a set of teacups, Lady Rushton said at once that Eleanor must have them, and Eleanor dutifully agreed. Some demon tempted him to admire something vastly hideous, but he held back, for those choices he knew would end up shortly enough at Westerley and he dared not risk it.

With the sky darkening, they went onto Charles Blyde, cabinet-maker and upholster. And Geoff thought with an inner sigh that it really was too bad that it was not flooding, so that he would have an excellent excuse to end this day.

But he was, he vowed to himself, enjoying it.

At Blyde's, Eleanor ordered a writing desk. Or, that is, Geoff watched as her mother ferreted out his tastes and chose something to match his preferences for her daughter.

He began to worry that his bride had no will or thoughts of her own. And he could not help but compare her to Cynthia.

Cynthia would have found a way to tease him out of his dark mood. She would have made fun of his taste, and would have chosen for herself with that impeccable sense of style he had seen in her since her family had first moved to the village at Westerley. What had she been? Eleven? No, twelve. That was right. He had been sixteen and just about to go off to Oxford, and he'd been heart-struck at once by her wheat-golden hair and her bright silver-gray eyes and sprite-like figure. She had grown up during the years, but she had never lost that sense of girlish, fey charm.

"What do you think? Will this rain hold off for one more hour?"

He glanced around to realize that they now stood outside of Mr. Blyde's shop and that Patrick had addressed him.

He blushed at his own poor manners in drifting off to another world—a world both past him, and a future forever lost. It had been his own fault that he had lost it. And now, here he was punishing Lady Rushton and her daughters with his lack of attention.

Forcing a smile, he decided he would make amends to them. He glanced up, measuring the sky. The darkening clouds had not yet deepened to the black that boded a soaking rain. "I think we might at least manage a stop at Schomberg House for refreshments. Some tea or chocolate?"

Patrick stared at him, surprise rising on his face, but Emma's expression at once lit up and even the quiet Elizabeth said, "Oh, yes. Please, Mother, may we?"

Lady Rushton hesitated before she said, "Well, I suppose it would indeed be a nice treat."

Eleanor said nothing, Geoff noticed. But no one else seemed to pay any heed to that.

It was but a few minutes' drive to Schomberg House, a handsome, four-story mansion, built for the Duke of Schomberg in the late sixteen hundreds, but now converted into shops that offered small furniture, drapery hangings, and refreshments to those worn out by their efforts in spending money.

Eleanor looked about her, hanging back a little from the others as they entered and mounted the staircase. She had not visited here before, but she knew from reading her London guidebooks that Thomas Gainsborough had lived and painted here until 1788. That such a famous artist had occupied the house awed Eleanor, and she stared about her, wondering what he had found to inspire him to greatness.

A deep voice pulled her out of her thoughts. "Miss Eleanor?"

She glanced up into Lord Staines's handsome face. Expecting to see a frown, relief eased into her when she saw that a smile softened his mouth instead.

He gestured to the baroque grandeur, the gilt and carved wood. "Are you lost in admiration?"

"Actually, I was wondering if grand rooms inspire grand thoughts. Or do they too often instead inspire grand ambitions, and grand arrogance?"

He cocked his head and his eyes took on a sparkle. "I was about to say we have even more impressive stairs at Westerley, but now I fear I would be inviting comparison to arrogance or ambition."

Her face heated. "I did not mean...that is, I should have known you would have at least one house this grand."

Still smiling, he seemed not at all inclined to take her words amiss. "I have many more, and I can assure you that the ambition they tend to inspire is to keep them all well-roofed and managed. And the arrogance is tempered by the rest of the world's inability to conform with one's wishes."

Stopping at the top of the stairs, she regarded him. He had spoken with a light and teasing tone, but there was that look in his eyes again. That deeply wounded and defensive look. What was it that he had wished for that had not come to him?

He glanced at her, puzzled, that wounded look vanishing from his eyes. He offered his arm to lead her into the room on the second floor where the proprietors served tea, sweetmeats, wine and coffee.

"Come," he said, "Let me find you a seat near the windows. There is a fine view of St. James's Park, and out to the Surrey Hills as well, but I doubt we'll see so far today given the weather."

A little shy of him, she put her hand on his arm. He led her forward, talking about the quality of the refreshments to be had and offering stories about the room, which had once served as the breakfast room of the house. He seemed to be going out of his way to be pleasant, and she began to relax a little.

At the table, Emma was chattering, talking about all they had seen and bought, and she quizzed Elizabeth and Lord Staines's brother on what had been the best bargain of the day. And Lady Rushton soon engaged Lord Staines in a discussion of the upcoming wedding and the invitations to be sent.

Eleanor had nothing to add to any of this. She smiled as Lord Staines ordered her tea. And she sat there, staring out the window, onto the dampening street.

Once, Emma asked about the tea set Eleanor had bought, if she did not indeed prefer the other pattern of strawberry leaves. Unable to even remember what had been picked out, Eleanor merely smiled, said she was content, and went back to staring out the window.

Fat rain drops had started to fall against the panes and onto the street below. The park lay empty, its trees already barren of leaves. And just down the way, Eleanor glimpsed a donkey-cart being loaded.

She could just make out the forlorn figure of the gray donkey, its ears flattened back and its head low. As she watched, the goods piled higher and higher in the cart behind the small donkey.

The poor thing will never pull all that
, she thought, anxiety tightening inside her as if someone had asked her to carry that load herself.

The cart's owner came forward, a ragged, thin man with a black, wide-brimmed hat pull low against the wet. He tugged on the donkey's reins. The donkey strained forward in its harness, and stopped. And the man's arm rose and fell, and Eleanor flinched as if she had heard the whip crack next to her.

She looked away from the window.

Lord Staines had that bored look on his face, but her mother held his full attention with details of guests to be invited for the wedding—which was set for Christmas Eve—and how to keep the list reasonable. Lord Staines's brother—Mr. Westerley—held both Emma and Elizabeth spellbound with stories about the recent political upheavals, which included the facts behind Lord Castlereagh's duel with George Canning, and tales of the late Duke of Portland, the former Prime Minister, falling asleep as he read over state papers with his Cabinet.

Eleanor's stare wandered back to the scene outside the window. She did not care about duels and Prime Ministers—alive or dead. But she did care for those poor creatures who suffered in silence, and who could not defend themselves.

The donkey was still there, struggling with its impossible load.

Forcing her gaze away, she told herself that she could not help. Besides, it would be rude to leave. And it was really none of her business.

She sat staring into her half-empty tea cup, but she could not still the tears of her heart.

Very quietly she said, "Pardon me a moment." No one seemed to notice as she rose and stole out from the room.

What she missed seeing as she fled, however, was Lord Staines glancing up, sighting her empty chair and starting to look for her.

Geoff had known his bride to make herself invisible before, but never before quite so literally.
Where the devil had she gotten to?
Irritated that he had not noticed her departure, he wondered if she had left to find a convenience. Well, she would return. Bored, and wishing he were not, his gaze moved to window.

It had started to rain. They would all be damp by the time they reached home. Ah, well, it could not be helped.

And then he sat up.

There on the street below he glimpsed a small fawn-clad figure striding across the lane, her step purposeful.

The devil take her, what was she doing out there?

Rising, he interrupted Lady Rushton's plans for including second cousins and those more distant connections on the guest list for the breakfast after the wedding. "My dear lady, I shall leave that to you, and to my father's discretion. Westerley is still his house, after all. Now, you must excuse me a moment. Patrick, see if you can find the ladies' wraps, and perhaps they would like a tour of the shops before we go. I'll have the coaches brought 'round, and come find you."

Before anyone could argue with him, or do more than stare at him, he turned and strode for the door, his temper simmering and too aware of Patrick's worried stare on his back. His brother had a right to his misgivings. Geoff wished for nothing so much right now as to sit Miss Eleanor down and blister her ears with a lecture on how future countesses were supposed to behave. And it was not with them waltzing along London streets by themselves.

Outside Schomberg House, the heavy sky now drizzled a hesitant rain. It did nothing to dampen Geoff's irritation, but it did make him realized that he had stepped out without his hat. A fine sight he must look. The pulse throbbed in his tightened jaw. That was her fault, as well, for putting him into such an unreasonable hurry.

He glanced around and saw that the porter beside the door had already unfurled a black umbrella and raised it over them. The man, stiff-faced and dressed in a red livery said nothing as Geoff pulled out a guinea and pressed it into the man's gloved hand.

"For the umbrella," Geoff said. A moment later, he started down the steps, umbrella in hand.

A coach and pair rushed past, making him stop. He strode across the unpaved road, the sodden ground squelching under his step and the wet manure starting to stink. Once he had crossed, Geoff's stare narrowed as he sought his quarry. The rain made it difficult to see, and he had not the advantage now of the view that he'd had from the room upstairs.

He caught a glimpse of movement, and he started forward, brushing past a woman in black who hurried to shelter, her head down and her black bonnet limp with rain.

And that's what my bride-to-be ought to be doing
, Geoff thought, his temper simmering even hotter until it more than covered his fear for her being alone on any London byway. But he realized that Eleanor was no longer headed away from him. She seemed to have stopped beside a donkey cart, and now stood there, stroking the donkey's wet face, talking to the cart driver as if pleasantly passing the time.

His step faltered.

What the devil was she doing?

The cart driver towered over Eleanor, ragged and wretched looking, but also smiling foolishly, his hat off and held in his hands, his thinning, dark hair slicked to his head. A second fellow stood nearby with his arms folded, his hat pulled low and a sullen look on his pinched face. He kept pulling out a gold watch, glancing at it, and tucking it away again.

With a smile, Eleanor left off petting the donkey to fumble in the small reticule that hung on her arm. To the cart driver's grinning delight, she pulled out a slim leather purse and handed over some coins. There was an interchange of words between the driver and the other man, who moved forward to reluctantly drag a chair from the cart.

Geoff stared at the scene, baffled. He tried to summon back his anger for Eleanor having placed herself in danger. But the only peril that seemed to loom over her at the moment was a soaking from the rain—and his own rapidly cooling temper. He felt almost foolish now as he stood there wondering what he should do. He started forward again, at least determined to reclaim his fiancée.

"...most intelligent donkey," Eleanor was saying. "Now be certain you bring him to this address when you have done with Mr. Appleby's furniture."

"Oh, yes, miss. But of course, miss."

"And I trust that with the season of good will upon us, Mr. Appleby, you will not try to short Mr. Ferguson again by making any more of his donkeys carry a double load for the price of one."

Appleby scowled. "He said the beast could…"

"I said he could take a full cart," Ferguson interrupted.

"And that's what it is," Appleby shot back.

Geoff tensed to step between the two men, who now glared at each other, nostrils distended and chest punched forward like fighting roosters. Eleanor was there before him.

"Gentleman, this point is moot. Mr. Ferguson has already accepted my offer, so the donkey is mine and I will dictate his load. And, further, Mr. Appleby, I will remind you that the Good Book tells us that Mary herself rode a donkey to Bethlehem. It is a most noble animal, and ought to be treated with due respect."

His face reddening, Mr. Appleby grumbled, but he ducked his head, finally muttered a reluctant apology and turned back to easing the cart's load.

With her heart light, Eleanor turned to hurry back to the others. Instead, she nearly collided with Lord Staines.

He stood there, hatless, an umbrella slanting over his shoulder, and a soft nimbus of dampness clinging to his golden hair. He was frowning, and he looked as magnificent and daunting as had that staircase in Schomberg House.

Fumbling with the stings to her reticule, she said the only thing that came to mind. "Oh, hullo."

His expression hardened, and those blue eyes flashed like lightning in a clear sky. "Hullo, indeed. So you have found something at last that you truly wished to buy—a donkey."

"It is a rather fine donkey," she stammered, her finger cold and knotting the strings of her reticule and all too aware that her donkey wasn't the least bit a fine anything. She became aware now of her damp shoulders, of the bedraggled feather on her bonnet that clung to her cheek. She must look a fright. But a touch of irritation flared as well.

Why did he have to follow her? Why must he put himself into this when she would much rather that he not do so!

Lord Staines glanced at the poor donkey, whose damp, gray hair now stood in rain-soaked spikes. The animal had begun to give off the ripe, earthy odor of wet donkey.

"And what plans do you have for such a fine beast?" he asked, stressing the fine with a heavy sarcasm.

Taking the high road, she said, "I thought I would send him home."

His frown darkened. "To Westerley?"

She winced and twisted her reticule's strings even tighter. She had been thinking of Rushton Manor as her home—and the donkey's. She had not remembered that she would not return to her father's country estate unless it was as a guest.

Anxiety rose in her. Would he forbid her to keep her donkey? It would be within his rights, for when she married all that she had became his. Chin down, she stared up at him, uncertain what to say or do, wishing he would stop looking so forbidding. It was just too unfair that he did not look as bedraggled in the rain as she felt.

Geoff shifted the umbrella to his other hand and arranged it so that it covered more of Eleanor than it did of him. With a pair of enormous brown eyes tuned up on him, he found himself unable to voice the lecture that he ought to give. She had been foolish and heedless, but he did not have the heart to put any more apprehension into those eyes.

Suppressing the urge to reach out his hand and flick that bedraggled brown ostrich feather from her pale cheek, he glanced at the sorry beast she had bought—for too much money, no doubt.

"Have him sent to Westerley then. We shall just have to find some place in the stables for him."

Her face brightened. "Oh, thank you."

In an instant, she caught him in an impulsive hug, her arms wrapping around him with surprising strength, nearly knocking the umbrella from his grip. Small, firm breasts pressed against his chest. Her warmth mingled with his. Her bonnet scrapped his cheek. The smell of wet donkey and orange blossom wove around him.

And his pulse shot up like a fireworks rocket at Vauxhall pleasure gardens.

She seemed to recall the proprieties at once, for she stepped away, the color charming and rosy on her cheeks, her eyes large and seeming more black than brown. A flash of something else flickered in her eyes, an instant's intriguing glimmer, before she looked down to fuss with her purse and brush at her cheek and present him a view of the top of her sodden bonnet.

His own reaction shamed him. The urge to pull back into his arms stirred inside him, and the image of kissing her here on the misting street with only this umbrella to shelter their faces from the road flashed sweet and hot. He banished those thoughts with an inward curse at his own low instincts. He had learned some control with his practice of sin during the past season.

But still his pulse beat fast, even as he tried to at least act like a gentleman.

"We shall be late," he said, his words short. He took her arm with his hand, even though he knew that he should offer his arm and allow her to lay her hand lightly upon it. Damn the protocols. And damn the niceties. He had learned nine months ago that he was no gentleman. At this moment, this was about as close he could come to being one.

He hurried her forward. Her skirt brushed against his legs, and she had to take two steps for every one of his.

Just before crossing the street, he paused and glanced down at her.

For a giddy instant Eleanor thought that he meant to swing her up in his arms and carry her across. But he merely looked away, a tight set to his beautiful mouth and the lightning back in his eyes, and he hurried her across the mud to Schoenberg House. He must be very angry.

She struggled to keep up with him, wishing that she had the courage to complain. But she didn't trust her voice. Not with his hand tight on her arm, and with her heart pounding so fast. Only it was not his hurrying her that left her feeling light-headed and short of breath. She was such a little idiot to react over something as simple as his hand on her arm.

Besides, she deserved whatever punishment he gave her. Her face burned as she thought of how she had hugged him. Hugged! In the road. With others looking on. No wonder he had stiffened. And no wonder his eyes flashed and looked darker than the skies overhead. She had acted like a child.

He returned her to the others without saying anything. No one else said anything, either, about Eleanor's sodden state. However, she caught the sideways glance from her mother, and she knew there would be questions later. She did not really care, however. Her mind was fully caught up in wondering if Lord Staines would now find her actions horrible enough to cry off from marrying her.

* * *

Four days later Eleanor still had not heard anything to indicate that Lord Staines had changed his mind. Her mother had lectured her, when they got home that wet day, on having ruined her gown. It did not help matters that Schomberg—for that was what Eleanor had decided to call the donkey—had arrived later that afternoon, and she had had to explain his presence, and the circumstances of his acquisition.

At the end of the story, Eleanor's mother had sighed, shook her head and muttered darkly, "When you are married, things will be different."

Eleanor had almost asked how they would be different, but a glance at her mother's exasperated expression made her change her mind and meekly offer to start writing out wedding invitations.

That task soon had bored Eleanor into staring out the window, watching the raindrops fall. And she kept thinking instead how it had felt to press herself against Lord Staines, and how he had taken her arm and had swept her away. She let out a deep sigh. He had swept her away because he had been cross with her, not because he wanted to sweep her anywhere.

Would she spend her entire life with him making him cross?

It had seemed a strong possibility.

A short two days later, Lord Rushton had announced they would be setting off for Westerley on the morrow. Lady Rushton protested that they had not bought everything needed, and he answered with a smile that she would have to be satisfied with buying out the shops in Guildford, the nearest market town to Westerley.

The news had put everyone in a bustle, but there was still time enough for one last event. The engagement ball.

Eleanor had been dreading it. She would have to smile until her face ached. Even worse, she would have to endure everyone watching her and talking about her. And when it came time to dress for dinner, it took the efforts of all of her sisters to get her into her gown and keep her from bolting from the house.

"I think I am going to be ill," Eleanor said, her stomach churning and a leaden weight in her chest.

"Nonsense. You are simply worrying too much," Elizabeth said, as she coaxed Eleanor's hair into ringlets with the curling tongs. She patted a curl into place, and put the iron tongs back to heat again by the fire so that she could curl the next strand.

"But to have all those people staring at me..." Eleanor broke off, unable even to bear the thought of being the center of so much attention.

Emma gave up admiring her own white gown trimmed with cream ribbons and came over to give her sister's shoulders a squeeze. "Well, stop thinking of it if it so upsets you. Mama never allows unpleasant thoughts to upset her, so why should you?"

Eleanor glanced at Emma's cheerful reflection in the mirror on the dressing table. "What should I think of instead?"

"Why not think of Lord Staines?" Emma dimpled, and her eyes sparkled with mischief. "If I were engaged to him, he certainly would occupy my thoughts, as well as all my other senses."

"Emma, really!" Elizabeth scolded, frowning at her sister.