V #2
“Occasionally, for a day or two, to see my tailor or to have a word with my man of affairs.” He leaned forward, peering out the carriage window. “I hope she doesn’t take it into her head to wander off.”
“My lord, why on earth did you offer for Rory?” The words came before Nell had any notion she meant to speak them. Huntley stiffened slightly, and she dared not speak again, but waited warily for him to respond.
He relaxed again immediately, and when his gaze met hers, she saw amusement rather than irritation. “You haven’t changed very much, have you, Nell? Your tongue still outruns your head.”
“Oh, sir, pray forgive me. I should not have asked such an impertinent question as that.”
“But you did ask,” he pointed out. “Do you wish to know the answer?”
Honesty as well as rampant curiosity made it impossible to respond in the negative. She nodded her head. “And curiosity is so unbecoming in a lady of quality.”
“Nonsense,” he replied bracingly. “Honesty must always be becoming to anyone. And you are, as I recall the matter, always honest, Nell.”
She had scarcely noted his use of her nickname the first time, but she couldn’t fail to note it now. “I have not given you leave, sir, to call me Nell. ’Tis not seemly in view of my position as Rory’s chaperon.”
The hazel eyes glinted with a near metallic hardness. “Don’t play foolish female games with me,” he said, but his voice was surprisingly gentle. “You gave me leave eight years ago.”
“But that was eight years ago, my lord. We were friends then. Now I feel I scarcely know you.”
It was true. Philip Radford had been an open, cheerful young man with easy manners and the patience to set a shy young girl at her ease.
He had been noted for his tolerance, his generosity, and his kindness.
Lord Huntley, on the other hand, seemed harder, more reserved, even cynical, as if the world and time had shown him too much of life.
He was still just as handsome, and she had caught fleeting glimpses of the sense of humor that had once been so easily expressed, but as for the rest, he might as well have been a rather chilly stranger.
“We could be friends again,” he said now.
“Perhaps, and I hope we shall be,” she replied warmly. “It would be most uncomfortable always going about together if we could not be friends.”
He seemed completely taken aback for once. “Always going about! What on earth do you mean by that?”
“Well, surely you mean to escort your intended bride whenever she goes out for an evening’s pleasure, my lord.”
“No, I do not. There can be no reason for that. She will enjoy herself well enough—probably moreso—without my escort.”
Nell stared at him, wondering at her own vivid disappointment. “You cannot mean that, sir,” she said quietly. “How much credit do you suppose the beau monde will give your betrothal if you ignore your intended bride altogether?”
“I daresay the betrothal will survive,” he replied. “It is to be a marriage of convenience, after all. And it would not be convenient to me to begin by being continually dragged to balls, soirees, and musical evenings.”
Nell felt a sudden flash of anger but managed to stifle it before it did any more than add light to her lovely eyes.
“Do you mean to tell me, sir, that you have no reason for marrying my niece other than to acquire her papa’s estates?
I own, I’d not have credited the friend I used to know with, such cupidity. ”
“I offered for her,” Huntley replied in measured, even goaded tones, “because it seemed the most practical thing to do. My brother died without issue, and the title will die with me if I do not produce a son, a fact that has been thrown up to me incessantly over the past two years by both my mother and my elder sister. You should meet them before you condemn my actions. I promise you, they both frighten the wits out of me.”
He seemed perfectly serious, and the atmosphere in the carriage had intensified to the point where Nell felt a distinct need for a touch of levity.
“Termagants both?” she inquired, lifting her brows and smiling at what was so clearly a jest.
But Huntley gave the word serious consideration, his heavy brows knitting into one.
“Louisa is a termagant,” he pronounced at last. “She is married to Sir Gerald Dalrymple, whose family has royal connections. Nevertheless, despite such solid nobility to support him, I cannot recall a single instance when Sir Gerald actually showed the temerity to dispute my sister’s word.
I daresay he goes in terror of her just as I do. ”
“I’ve no doubt you are roasting me, sir,” Nell replied, “and I know for a fact that your mama is no termagant, for I have had the honor of meeting her myself, you will recall. She is a very gentle lady. I remember she always wore pale gowns when everyone else was striving for a rainbow effect.”
“Oh, Mama still wears pale gowns,” he agreed with a wry twist of his lips. “Louisa wins through by her assertive personality, but Mama enjoys even greater success with a mere lace handkerchief and a crystal vinaigrette.”
“Oh dear!” Nell chuckled appreciatively.
“My mama is much the same, sir. Whenever things do not go her way, out comes her vinaigrette. And the hartshorn, as well. She waves the one under her nose and drinks the other and contrives to look very weak and ill-used. But surely you do not allow yourself to be governed by such tactics as that!”
“Alas, you do not know my mama at all, Miss Lindale. She has perfected the use of such common weapons to a pure art form. Feminine tears, I fear, quite unman me, just as they did my brother and father before me. So what with Mama always crying over the shocking fact that, despite her foresight in presenting Papa with not one, but two stout sons, the succession seems now doomed to fade away only because of my dreadful lack of a sense of duty, and my sister saying much the same, of course, and saying it much more loudly … It was she who suggested the Lady Aurora, since the Crossways lands would so admirably increase the size of Huntley Green.”
“But surely there were other, more suitable ladies.”
“If by suitable you mean older, there was only one. Her papa’s lands bound mine on the east. However, even Louisa did not feel we should pursue that connection once she discovered that the lady in question possessed a hook nose, a wart on her left cheek, and forty years in her dish.”
Laughter bubbled up again, and Nell had all she could do to stifle it. As it was, a small gurgle escaped before she could stop it. “How … how kind of your sister.”
He grinned at her. “It was, wasn’t it.”
“Well, it was.” Suddenly feeling as if eight years had simply melted away, she grinned back at him.
“I needn’t ask you how your proposal was greeted at Crossways, either, for my elder sister is as much a trial to me at times as yours is to you.
It is quite lowering to reflect that your wealth and property must have put any other consideration to flight.
Poor Rory.” The last words were spoken without thought, but Huntley seemed to take no offense.
“Why ‘poor Rory’? She seems well enough pleased.”
“But she has such a romantical disposition,” Nell protested. “Surely she must yearn for a love match!”
“You forget that she was raised by your sister, my dear.” The cynical look was back. “Aurora may yearn for romance, but she finds the thought of being a countess with endless pin money quite palatable, I assure you.”
Nell thought over his words and was forced to admit that, from what she had so far seen of her niece, he very likely had the right of it.
She sighed. It seemed so wrong. But really, when one came to mull it over, it was probably not wrong at all.
Rory would have security, a very fine old title, and a no doubt indulgent husband.
Huntley suddenly leaned forward in his seat, and she realized that her niece was approaching the carriage. His lordship pushed open the door and jumped down to assist her, but paused suddenly and stared.
“What is that thing?”
Rory was all smiles. Her eyes sparkled, and her cheeks were flushed from the cool sea air. She wore her russet pelisse, and wrapped up in one of its folds was something she was handling with excessive care.
“Only look at him, sir! Aunt Nell, ’tis the dearest little kitten. He was shivering in a nook of the sea wall and mewing so piteously. I’m persuaded he must have misplaced his family.”
“More than likely, a wise mother abandoned him,” Huntley said. “Which is precisely what you will do, Aurora, if you’ve got any sense at all.”