Chapter 4
He’s not terrible.
This was Dani’s first thought. Not in appearance, not in manners, not in bearing. Not in words said or words unsaid.
Not yet.
Granted, Dani knew very little of men. She knew that old men controlled the town council, and their willingness to take risks diminished as they aged. She knew that rich men from the Maidstone quarry bullied and bribed the labor force of Ivy Hill to work in their sand pits.
But this man was not old and she had no notion of his wealth. He seemed to possess a cautious, watchful deference that was
inconsistent with bullying or threatening. The expression that had seemed predatory in the beginning was perhaps (she now
thought) extreme caution. He had not meant to overtake so much as avoid an ambush.
At the moment, he seemed to project discomfort and watchfulness. These were, she admitted, the only appropriate responses
to their current situation. What else could he do? Bluster and preen, she supposed. But he hadn’t. He simply considered her.
No longer on guard although paying very close attention.
Dani herself was certainly on guard. Captain Bannock reminded her of an actor thrust onto a stage and told to perform with no script. Dani felt the same.
But why, she wondered, was she defending this person? What mattered was that she was being forced to marry him. With no warning.
Or input. Or reason.
“Should I address you as Miss Allard?” he asked now, setting his teacup on the table.
“You may,” she said. His next statement, she knew, would stipulate how she might address him.
“Thank you,” he said simply.
Not terrible, she thought again.
“I would restate our apologies for barging in this morning,” he said.
“The surprise of your arrival is inconsequential compared to your purpose here, I think.”
The words were out before she could stop them. The villagers of Ivy Hill gave Dani’s natural boldness a wide berth, but this
man was not a product of Ivy Hill. This man came from Cornwall, by way of London, and apparently the Atlantic Ocean. He’d
scared her parents half to death. She, too, should probably be afraid. Or at least less bold.
He ran a hand through his hair. He slid his boot from his knee and settled it on the rug. Dani took a slow sip of tea and
waited for him to cut or threaten or put her in her place—worse, she waited for him to tell her how very grateful she should
be, that surprise betrothals to strange naval captains are the stuff of dreams.
Instead, he gave her a tight, tired smile.
It was his first smile, she realized, and it was hardly cheerful but it looked genuine.
She didn’t know him well enough to gauge this, of course, but she knew people.
Most situations were made easier with a smile.
Unless, of course, they made them more bizarre.
A flash of white teeth and wild eyes would’ve been cause for alarm, but he hadn’t been flashy or wild.
And Dani could honestly say that she did not feel alarmed—not really. She felt challenged. Coincidentally, Dani rather enjoyed
a proper challenge. At the moment, she found herself wanting to hear what he might say next, to rule it Terrible or Not Terrible,
and to discover why his almost-smile felt like an invitation rather than a threat.
“I find myself in a position to beg your pardon, Miss Allard—truly,” he said. “I am not usually so unprepared for—” He stopped.
“I am rarely unprepared. It’s unlike me, but I traveled to Kent with very little knowledge of . . . what to expect.”
“We’ve both been caught unawares, then,” she said carefully. She studied him over the brim of her cup. She repeated his statement
in her head. Very little knowledge of what to expect . . .
Did he mean he didn’t like her? That he’d expected a certain manner of girl and he’d discovered her instead?
Dani had the odd feeling that she’d swallowed a pocket watch, and now it settled in her belly, ticking off seconds, counting
down to a moment of truth.
“I wonder if it would be possible to go for a walk, Miss Allard?” he asked gently. “Stroll to the high street and back, perhaps?”
Dani frowned. Her life had been turned upside down.
Her notion of marriage had always felt years away, vague and unrelated to her current life—and now she was engaged?
Everything she’d known about herself and her future was in a scrambled heap on the floor.
Given the choice, she would not drag this mental chaos into the street.
This said nothing of what neighbors would say when they saw her walking in the company of a man.
“The situation is complicated, I’ll grant you,” he said. “But I’m loath to discuss it in a dim, cramped parlor. Let us get
outside where we might breathe fresh air and look at the sky and take up sturdy fence posts if we find ourselves on the verge
of collapse.”
Dani considered his descriptions of her parents’ parlor and tried to take offense. Truthfully, it was dim and cramped.
“Alright,” she said, standing up. “This may invite gossip, but no more than a surprise betrothal, I suppose. Let me get my
hat.”
Five minutes later they walked side by side up New Bridge Road. Captain Bannock clasped his hands behind his back. Dani’s
arms were at her sides, fingers opening and closing. The road was, thankfully, vacant save a slow-moving gaggle of geese.
They followed the shapeless clutch of birds waddling toward town. Beside the road, Mr. Thomas’s cow grazed in her paddock,
and the breeze dispersed apple-blossom petals from the orchard. A thick hedge concealed a flock of sparrows, and they flapped
and sang inside its leafy chest. Sunlight poured from a cloudless sky, and Dani found herself breathing easier in the brightness.
She forced her hands to go still. He’d been correct. It was a relief to move her legs, to look at the geese and not at each
other.
“I’d always heard that Kent was like a storybook come to life,” he said.
“I’ve never lived anywhere else.” She looked at the orchard. “That I remember. But I have read countless storybooks, and the
world beyond Kent is what seems enticing to me.”
“You aspire to travel?”
The conversation was innocuous, but it made her eyes sting.
Was Ivy Hill beautiful? Of course it was beautiful.
And Dani had no wish to be forcibly removed from it—not by this man or anyone else.
But it was a lie to say that she wasn’t excited by the notion of traveling beyond it.
For safety reasons, Whittle and Miriam had never allowed the family to travel farther than Maidstone, but they’d provided Dani with London’s best tutors, and these men and women had exposed her to the landscapes and cultures of the larger world.
If she was being honest, she did long to know what lay beyond the storybook of Ivy Hill.
“I would enjoy travel, I think,” she said. “But I love my home, too. I’m a person open to many things, really. But I should
like to be told what to expect. Better yet, to have some say in the matter.”
He said nothing and she wondered if statements like this came across as petulant rather than informative. He’d not yet been
unkind. A half hour with no unkindness was a very low bar, but she knew many people who were terrible within the first five
minutes.
They heard the rumble and snap of a wagon then, the sound increasing as the vehicle approached. Dani had been walking in the
rocky wheel rut, with the captain flanking her along the hedgerow. Now he stepped around to position himself between the passing
wagon and her body. The move was so sudden, and in fact so crowding, Dani stopped walking. But then the wagon was upon them.
“Dani, is that you?” called a woman’s voice from the wagon.
Dani looked up. Her old friend Rose Stripling and her husband, Jonathan, peered down from the driver’s bench.
“Oh, Rose—hello,” Dani called. “How do you do, Mr. Stripling?” She bobbed a curtsy.
“I’m so happy to see you,” Rose said, “because we’ve wanted to tell you that Jonathan’s mother has recovered from—” Rose stopped.
She leaned forward on the bench to get a better look.
Beside her, Jonathan Stripling leaned in the opposite direction.
They gaped at Captain Bannock with a mix of open confusion and astonishment.
Dani sighed. Was it so very unbelievable that she might walk down the road with a tall, fashionably dressed man? Truly?
Yes, she reminded herself. Considering the limited company she kept and the small life she led—yes. It was unbelievable. She
herself had viewed the captain’s chivalry with the same confused astonishment. Gentleman callers were hardly thick on the
ground in Ivy Hill, and even fewer of them found their way to Dani’s door.
“Forgive me, Danielle,” Rose managed, shading her eyes with her hand. “How rude of me not to acknowledge your . . . companion.
I mistook him for Amelia’s brother Robert but I see now that it’s . . . That is—” Rose’s cheeks turned red and she shot a
beseeching look at her husband.
“Forgive us,” said Jonathan Stripling, “I don’t believe we’ve made your acquaintance, sir.”
“Don’t apologize,” said Dani, glancing at Captain Bannock. If she expected him to countermand the introductions, she was wrong.
He seemed perfectly happy for her to manage on her own. “I’ve been remiss. Mr. and Mrs. Stripling, may I introduce Captain
Luke Bannock. Of . . .”
“Cornwall,” provided the captain. “How do you do?” He removed his hat.
Rose and Jonathan Stripling blinked in confusion at the man in the road.
Their smiles were cordial but expectant.
Dani knew she should say more, she should provide some reason or relation, but she barely understood her connection to the man.
She shrugged and dropped her shoulders, willing her friends to recuse her from saying more.
“How do you do?” the Striplings finally said, speaking in unison.
“What were you saying about Mr. Stripling’s mother, Rose? Better, is she?”