Chapter Six
“He is here.”
Beatrice’s voice carried the particular tension of a woman who had spent the morning watching the front door like a hawk watching a field mouse.
Eliza looked up from the book she had been pretending to read, the same page for the past hour, the words swimming meaninglessly before her eyes, and felt her heart lurch into her throat.
“Who is here?”
“Do not play coy with me, Eliza. You know perfectly well who.” Beatrice crossed to the window and twitched the curtain aside, peering down at the street below. “The Duke of Hollowshade’s carriage has just pulled up. He is stepping out now. He is…” She paused. “He is carrying flowers.”
Flowers.
Eliza set down her book with hands that were not entirely steady. She had spent the night after the ball in a state of fevered anticipation, replaying every moment of the waltz until the memories were worn smooth as river stones. I will call on you tomorrow, he had said. If you will receive me.
She had not truly believed he would come.
And yet here he was. With flowers.
“You cannot receive him alone,” Beatrice said, abandoning the window and turning to face Eliza with an expression of maternal concern that sat oddly on her youthful features. “Mama is out making calls. I shall have to serve as chaperone.”
“That is not necessary.”
“It is absolutely necessary.” Beatrice’s voice brooked no argument. “After last night, after the way he looked at you during that waltz, you cannot be alone with him for even a moment. The servants are already talking, Eliza. The ton is already talking. If we are not extremely careful—”
The butler appeared in the doorway. “The Duke of Hollowshade to see Miss Hayfield, miss.”
Eliza stood. Her legs felt strange, weak and trembling, as though she had just run a great distance. She smoothed her skirts, checked her hair, and tried to compose her features into something that did not broadcast the fact that she had spent the entire night dreaming of his hands on her body.
“Show him in,” Beatrice said, when Eliza proved incapable of speech.
And then he was there.
William Bradworth, Duke of Hollowshade, standing in the modest parlour of their rented townhouse, looking as devastating by daylight as he had by candlelight.
He was simply dressed, in a well-cut coat and immaculate cravat, with no ostentatious display of wealth, and in his hand was a bouquet of flowers that made Eliza’s breath catch.
Not roses. Not the expected, conventional offering of a gentleman caller.
Ferns.
He had brought her ferns.
Delicate, verdant fronds arranged with what appeared to be actual care, tied with a simple green ribbon. The sort of bouquet that required thought. That required memory.
“Miss Hayfield.” He bowed, proper and correct, though his grey eyes found hers with an intensity that was anything but proper. “Miss Ashborn. Thank you for receiving me.”
“Your Grace.” Eliza’s voice came out steadier than she felt. “What an… unexpected pleasure.”
“Unexpected?” One eyebrow arched with familiar amusement. “I told you I would call. Did you think I would not?”
Yes, she thought. I thought you would come to your senses. I thought the light of day would reveal whatever madness seized us last night for what it was, a momentary aberration, a dance-floor fantasy, nothing real.
“I thought perhaps you might reconsider,” she said aloud.
“I have done nothing but reconsider since I left you last night.” He crossed the room and offered her the ferns with a gravity that made her heart ache.
“I reconsidered in my carriage. I reconsidered through a sleepless night and an interminable morning.” His voice dropped.
“And yet here I am. Still unable to stay away.”
Beatrice cleared her throat with pointed emphasis. “Tea, Your Grace?”
“Thank you, no.” William did not look away from Eliza’s face. “I was hoping Miss Hayfield might accompany me for a turn in the park. The weather is fine, and I find myself in need of fresh air.”
“A turn in the park.” Beatrice’s tone suggested she found this proposal roughly as innocent as an invitation to a den of iniquity. “I suppose I shall have to accompany you.”
“I would expect nothing less.” William’s smile was all charm, but his eyes remained fixed on Eliza. “Shall we?”
***
Hyde Park in the afternoon was a theatre of carefully orchestrated display.
The fashionable hour had brought out London’s finest, gleaming carriages rolling along Rotten Row, elegantly dressed ladies parading on the arms of attentive gentlemen, clusters of gossips gathered at strategic vantage points to observe and be observed.
It was, Eliza thought, rather like the ballroom translated into daylight: the same performances, the same calculations, the same exhausting pretence.
But walking beside William, she found she minded it less.
He had offered his arm, and she had taken it, and the contact, even through layers of gloves and fabric, sent warmth spreading through her entire body. Beatrice walked three steps behind them, close enough to satisfy propriety but far enough to allow conversation.
“You brought me ferns,” Eliza said, when the silence had stretched long enough to become charged.
“You seemed to prefer them.”
“At the Worthington ball. Nearly two weeks ago.”
“I have an excellent memory.” He glanced down at her, and there was something in his expression that made her stomach flutter. “Particularly for conversations I cannot stop thinking about.”
“You cannot expect me to believe that the Duke of Hollowshade spends his time thinking about conversations with country nobodies.”
“I expect you to believe very little of what you have heard about the Duke of Hollowshade.” His voice was light, but there was an edge beneath it. “Most of it is exaggeration, and the rest is strategic cultivation.”
“Strategic cultivation?”
“A reputation, Miss Hayfield, is a form of armour. It tells people what to expect and thereby controls what they see.” He guided her around a cluster of gossiping matrons, nodding politely as they passed. “If everyone believes me a heartless rake, they do not look for evidence of anything else.”
“And is there anything else?”
He was quiet for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was softer. “That is what I am trying to determine.”
Before Eliza could respond, a commotion near the Serpentine caught her attention. A small crowd had gathered at the water’s edge, and she could hear raised voices, one high and distressed, the others lower, murmuring.
“What is happening?” she asked.
William frowned, his gaze sharpening as he assessed the scene. “I’m not certain. Stay here.”
He released her arm and strode toward the commotion with the authority of a man accustomed to being obeyed. Eliza, who had never been particularly good at obeying, followed.
The crowd parted for William, of course it did; crowds always parted for him, and Eliza slipped through in his wake, Beatrice close behind her.
At the centre of the disturbance, she found a tableau that made her heart clench.
A young woman, barely more than a girl, really, perhaps sixteen, stood at the water’s edge, her face blotchy with tears.
Her gown was expensive but dishevelled, her hair escaping its pins, her entire posture radiating distress.
Behind her, a small dog, a spaniel, Eliza thought, was paddling frantically in the water, having apparently fallen or jumped in and now unable to find purchase on the slippery bank.
“Someone help!” the girl was crying. “Please, someone, she cannot swim properly, she’ll drown.”
The assembled crowd was doing what crowds typically did in such situations: watching, murmuring, offering useless suggestions, and making absolutely no move to assist. Several gentlemen had positioned themselves at what they clearly considered a safe distance, their expressions suggesting that rescuing a small dog from a pond was beneath their dignity.
Eliza felt a surge of disgust. The water was not deep, the dog was in no real danger of drowning, but no one would soil their fine clothes to help a distressed girl and her pet.
She was about to step forward herself when William moved.
Without hesitation, without apparent concern for his immaculate coat or his polished boots, he walked to the water’s edge, crouched down, and extended his arm into the pond.
The spaniel, recognising salvation, paddled toward him with renewed vigour.
William caught the dog by the scruff, lifted it clear of the water, and deposited the sodden, wriggling creature into its owner’s arms.
The girl burst into fresh tears, of relief, this time. “Oh, thank you, thank you, I was so frightened, no one would help…”
“It’s quite all right.” William’s voice was gentle in a way Eliza had never heard from him. “She’s unharmed. Just wet and frightened.”
“Your coat, sir, Your Grace, I am so sorry, she is ruining—”
The spaniel was, indeed, enthusiastically transferring pond water onto William’s previously immaculate person. His sleeve was soaked, his cravat spotted with muddy droplets, and the dog was now attempting to lick his face with the desperate gratitude of the recently rescued.
William laughed.
Not his practised, social laugh. Not the controlled chuckle he deployed for witty remarks at parties. An actual laugh, warm, unguarded, sparked by the absurdity of a small dog’s enthusiasm.
“I believe she is thanking me,” he said, gently disentangling himself from the spaniel’s affections. “Or possibly apologising for the trouble. It is difficult to tell with dogs.”
The girl laughed too, watery but genuine. “Her name is Biscuit. She is always getting into scrapes. I don’t know how she fell in, one moment she was beside me, and the next…”
“Dogs are unpredictable creatures.” William straightened, seemingly unbothered by his ruined coat. “As are ponds. I would suggest keeping her on a lead near the water in future.”
“Yes, Your Grace. Of course. I’m so grateful.”
“There is no need for gratitude.” His voice was kind but firm. “Any gentleman would have done the same.”