Chapter 3
Three
It would be wrong to say, though Thom was tempted to do so, that he’d never met a lady as intelligent as Miss Westbrook. He had met many intelligent women, including his sister, who was twelve years his senior and as clever, in her own way, as any man he knew.
What he had not met was a lady who spoke intelligently about the same things that interested him. She knew about the golden number, for example—the mathematical ratio that, in architecture, was believed to give a building balance, harmony, and interest.
And she recognized that the thick walls of this church had been made by building two parallel walls of stone and filling the gap with smaller stones, rubble and lime mortar.
Thom was able to tell her why—that the kind of walls found in cathedrals and the like required master stone masons, whereas this church would have been built by unskilled peasants, ordered to the work by the local bishop or landowner.
She accepted his information with a delighted smile, which further entranced him.
It was so rare to meet anyone, male or female, so enthusiastic about abstruse historical facts.
It didn’t hurt that she was strikingly attractive.
Not pretty in a china fashion doll sort of a way, but magnificent in the manner of a warrior queen, with auburn hair that seemed to have a mind of its own, a determined nose and chin, creamy skin dusted with a few pale freckles, and curves that he, as a gentleman, was honor-bound to ignore, even while his mouth watered and an ungentlemanly part of him reacted with unseemly enthusiasm.
They must have been talking for half an hour when a maid hurried into the church, looked at him in alarm, and inserted herself between him and Miss Westbrook. “Miss, your mama is awake and looking for you. If she finds out you came here to meet a man—”
“If you tell her that, Brownlee, you will be lying. I came here to look at the paintings, as did this gentleman. We were introduced by a lady who resides hereabouts, and we have been talking.”
The maid glanced around. “I don’t see a lady,” she declared.
“Lady Huddlestone is an elderly lady,” Thom said. “She felt the need of a lie down.”
“Indeed,” agreed Miss Westbrook, her eyes dancing.
The maid gave her a suspicious look, but only repeated. “Your mama is looking for you.”
Miss Westbrook held out a hand to Thom, as if inviting him to shake it. “Thank you for your company, Mr. Medlock, and the information about the Norman peasants, and why they built the church walls in that way.”
The maid, Thom noticed, relaxed her glare at this information about their conversation. Apparently, she considered that talking about church walls absolved him from suspicion.
The glare returned, though, when he took Miss Westbrook’s hand and bowed over it in proper form, not kissing it, but merely cradling it in his gloved hand.
What a small hand it was! It felt soft and fragile in his, but he had been raised by his sister, and suspected this small woman had the same core of steel.
Witness how she managed the nagging of her mother’s maid!
“I have greatly enjoyed our talk, Miss Westbrook. Brewster, the innkeeper, has offered me a tour of his inn. Would you and your mother be interested in joining me?”
There. The glare faded again. A gentleman who invited a lady’s mother on a proposed excursion was obviously not dangerous.
As for Miss Westbrook, perhaps she was the dangerous one.
He could easily become addicted to those dancing eyes.
“Sadly, Mama lacks my interest in architecture, Mr. Medlock. However, I am certain Brownlee would be charmed to accompany me. We are currently domiciled at the house of Mrs. Peabody, next door to the smithy.”
“I shall speak with Brewster and send you a note with a choice of times,” Thom promised.
She bobbed him a farewell curtsey, and so did Brownlee, before they hurried out of the church. Did the maid’s curtsey mean he had gained her approval? Did he want to?
You are here to find the Duke of Haverford’s treasure, Thomas Medlock. Not to fall for a fine mind and a pair of beguiling eyes. On the other hand, he’d never been a man to miss a promising opportunity. After all, when before had he met a lady like Miss Westbrook?
Mama was awake, dressed to the nines, and sitting in the parlor that their landlady, Mrs. Peabody, had set aside for their personal use.
And Mama was not alone. Arianna did not know the gentleman who stood when she entered the room, but she knew the type.
Handsome, with ash-brown hair and light blue eyes.
Fashionably dressed. A charming smile that would probably be convincing if Arianna had not learned to watch eyes rather than mouths. And his were wary and watchful.
“And here is my daughter,” Mama said. “Arianna, darling, this is Mr. Mills. Mr. Mills is related to the Warwickshire Mills family. He was just telling me about his cousin, the viscount, and the family seat, Mill Court.”
Arianna knew perfectly well there was no viscount with the surname Mills, and she was almost certain that no peer had a family seat in Warwickshire, or anywhere else, called Mills Court.
As a girl, she had been forced to memorize at least the title, surname, and family seat of every entry in Burkes’ Peerage.
Her mother had insisted, saying, “You are not particularly pretty, Arianna. But if you hide how clever you are, your dowry should allow you to attach an earl, at least, if not a marquess or a duke.”
Mama’s sights had lowered over the years, until apparently the untitled relative of a fictitious earl was better than nothing.
“Do not just stand there, Arianna. Come and sit down. You are keeping Mr. Mills on his feet. Forgive her, Mr. Mills. I imagine she is struck all a heap by your good looks.” Mama giggled.
Heaven help me. Arianna took the seat next to Mr. Mills, praying for the patience to deal with yet another fortune hunter and her own mother’s foolish infatuation with the man.
Mr. Mills, it transpired, had escorted the sister of a friend to Fenwick to meet her betrothed, and had stayed on to take the sea air after that duty had been discharged.
“It is a peaceful little village,” he declared.
“Not like Brighton. Even when my friend Prinny is not in residence, Brighton is far too fashionable to be restful. Everyone who is anyone spends at least part of the year in Brighton. I must confess that little Fenwick is nothing to Brighton, but it has its own charm, Miss Westbrook. Indeed, it does.”
He arched his eyebrows, leaned a little closer, and said, “Especially now I have met two such pretty ladies.” He smirked at Mama. “It is hard to believe that you are old enough to be Miss Westbrook’s mother, Mrs. Westbrook. You must have been married from the cradle.”
Mama’s presence prevented Ariana from telling him that he was speaking nonsense.
Pretty? Me? With my pasty skin, my freckles, my overlarge nose, my terrible rust-colored hair that will not stay confined by any ribbon or pin ever made?
Not to mention curves that, in the current fashions, made me look plump, and that Mama does her best to conceal with tight lacing and lots of ruffles.
Mama was simpering at Mr. Mills as if he had dropped from heaven with a label around his neck, reading “Divine intervention in the marriage stakes.”
Arianna, on the other hand, was wondering what his game was. Why was such a snake not hunting in London—or, given the time of year, at one of the interminable house parties or even Brighton? Perhaps his pockets are to let, and Fenwick is all he can afford.
He and Mama were comparing notes on entertainments they had been to and people they knew.
Arianna knew that Mama was making most of her stories up.
Arianna had been with her, navigating the fringes of the fashionable world through several London Seasons plus one each in Cheltenham, Bath, and York.
According to what Mama was telling Mr. Mills, they had been in the thick of every fashionable event.
Arianna recognized her mother’s stories. They were lifted from articles in news sheets such as The Teatime Tattler or from the gossip of her cronies whose orbits reached further into Society. And Arianna was observant and had an excellent memory. Mama didn’t report her sources accurately.
Some of Mr. Mills’ stories didn’t add up, either. He was at least as fake as Mama, if not worse. At least Mama was only pretending to be better connected than she really was. What Mr. Mills was pretending remained to be disclosed.