Bar Sinister (35 page)

When it sank in at last that he had been using himself as bait to entrap Newsham's agents,
Emily's temper flew out the window. Her denunciation was vivid and comprehensive. Richard bore
it meekly. In the end Aunt Fan interrupted the tirade and sent him off to bed.

As the door closed behind him, Emily came down out of the boughs with a thud. "What
have I done?"

Aunt Fan regarded her enigmatically.

Emily held out her hands. "Look at me, Aunt. I'm shaking like a blancmange. I can't stand
this much longer."

Aunt Fan shook her head. "When I was a gel I fancied myself in love with one of your
father's Oxford friends. Showed all the symptoms--fits of crying, poor appetite, daydreams, short
temper. Threw a brush at my abigail. Gave me pause."

"Oh, Aunt."

"Fortunately I recovered. Take a dose of salts, Emma, and go to bed."

Emily bored herself very much by bursting into tears.

Resigned, Aunt Fan mopped the excess and administered halfhearted pats.

"Why is it," Emily gasped between sobs, "that I'm only eloquent"--gasp--"when I'm
furious with Richard?"

Aunt Fan considered the problem. "Love," she pronounced after a moment. "Form of
madness."

"He's sent for Tom's carriage."

"Yes."

"And writ Papa we're coming home."

"So he said."

"Oh, Aunt, there's no time! We'll go back to Hampshire, and everything will be just as it
was." Emily gulped. "I don't want that any more. It's not enough."

Aunt Fan made a soothing noise but Emily was not comforted.

The gale blew itself out before morning. Emily woke very early after a restless night.
From the slant of light she decided it could not be eight o'clock. Scarcely dawn. Thanks to the
wind, no morning mist hovered. The leaded casement of her bedchamber window framed the
theatrical green-and-rust-streaked cliffs that bounded the manor. Beyond, the sea glimmered. The
air was so clear she thought she could make out the French coast, but that was unlikely. It did not
feel like the last week of October. The wind-whipped air fizzed like champagne.

Pulling her thick winter robe about her shoulders and scuffing into her slippers, Emily
took up her hairbrush and returned to the window. She stood there, brushing and gazing dreamily
across the park and avoiding conscious thought, for perhaps five minutes. Then it dawned on her
that Richard was walking along the meandering path that led to the cliffs. Alone. She froze, brush
half raised. Her heart did its lurching and thumping trick.
Now or never.

She flung the brush at the dressing table and threw off her robe and night rail. A button
popped. In a twinkling she was dressed in a serge walking dress and stout shoes. Clattering down
the stairs, she startled one of the chambermaids.

Emily slowed her pace, gritting her teeth with impatience. "Beautiful morning. Going for
a walk." The girl gaped at her.

Emily contrived to leave by the garden doors with the semblance of dignity. Then she
ran. Richard was no longer in sight. Puffing, she gained the path--and came to her senses. She
stopped dead. What business had she, Emily Foster--thirty, widow, mother, so to speak, of
three--to be chasing a man in blatant, hoyden style across half a mile of Cornish cliff? He had given no sign
of wishing to be chased.

Gloom settled like a fog about Emily's shoulders, and she drifted aimlessly along the path,
still gasping a bit from her run. As her breathing steadied, she began to think less erratically. She
would find Richard, and they could talk about the children and the weather, and she could
apologise for ripping up at him the night before.
What harm in that? Alas, what good in
that?

The steady wind, warm for October, blew against her right cheek as she walked,
whipping the strings of her bonnet. She stopped and retied the ribbons and started off again. There
was a viewpoint beyond a small clump of wind-sculpted gorse.

As she gained the bush she crashed into Richard. He had been walking in the opposite
direction. They both jumped, startled.

Richard made a swifter recover. "You're up early." He took her arm briefly to steady
her.

"It's a beautiful morning." A dim thing to say. Emily felt his hand on her elbow even after
he dropped it.

"Perfect for tripping along the edges of cliffs. That's quite a drop."

"I know." She paced to the rim of the turf and looked down at the sea, boiling around the
rocks so far below that the sound of crashing surf came to them as no more than a murmur. "When
we first arrived I was terrified that one of the children would tumble over."
Possibly
I
should tumble over and end it all,
she reflected. The extravagance of her thought jolted her
back to sanity and she laughed at herself.

"What is it?" Richard smiled at her.

Emily's pulse thumped. "Nothing. Richard?"

"Yes?"

"I didn't bump into you by accident. I saw you from my window and came to find
you."

"That's flattering," he said amiably. "If you're spoiling for another fight, however, I warn
you I'm feeling peaceful."

Emily blushed to the roots of her hair. "I ought to apologise for last evening."

"Good God, what is this? I thought you were in earnest." He mimed astonishment, hazel
eyes sparkling.

"I was. Am. Oh, do stop teasing." Confusion tangled Emily's tongue. "When does Tom's
carriage come?"

"You may count on arriving in Hampshire in time for Guy Fawkes day."

"It
is
a major family festival." They were drifting back the way he had come.
The sea stretched before them, green and glittering in the morning sun. Two gulls hung almost
motionless at the cliff edge.

Emily stiffened her resolve. "May I ask you a question?"

He cocked his head. "To be sure." His eyes were friendly but puzzled, and perfectly clear
from a blissful night's sleep. He wore no hat and the wind had stung colour into his cheeks. The
scar on his brow was fading. In another year or so it would scarcely be noticeable. Emily thought he
looked splendid.

Her courage deserted her. "What do you mean to do? That is, now this business of
your--the duke--is settled."

He shrugged. "I thought of London. I like London. It would be convenient to publishers,
but of course the distance to Hampshire is too great. My lease of the cottage runs through
November, doesn't it? I might take rooms in Winchester. That's close enough so I could come to
see the children every week, and it would be a good place to write. I've friends in the barracks." He
bent to pick up a handful of loose pebbles and began tossing them sidearm over the edge of the cliff.
Practicing left-handed pitching.

Winchester sounded dreadful to Emily. "Why?" she wailed, despairing. "What's wrong
with the cottage? Papa would give you a longer lease. I thought you liked it."

"I do." He threw the last pebble in a long flat arc and admired the trajectory. "I daresay
there would be talk."

"So?"

He turned, sober. "I've no wish to compromise you, Emily. I'm too much in your
debt."

Emily could have screamed. "You are the
most
exasperating man."

He frowned.

"I wish you
may
compromise me," she exploded.

Richard stared.

In for a lamb, in for a sheep.
"I w-want to m-marry you." There. It was said.
Emily gulped and turned away from him, her cowardice rushing back. "That is, not if you dislike
it..." Her voice trailed off. She knew her cheeks were scarlet.

"Why?" He sounded as if he had been whacked on the head.

A great lump constricted Emily's throat. She shook her head, helpless to speak. She could
not look at him. She had never done anything half so brass-faced in her life.

"Why, Emily?" His obtuseness broke the spell.

"Oh, good God, because I love you!" she cried, turning and facing him at last.

He looked rather white.

"I have loved you any time these two years." Really, this was remarkably difficult. Emily
began to feel sick. She raised her chin, which was quivering. "However, if you do not return my
regard--"

"Hush. You must know I do, for all that I've never told you." His eyes were dark, his
voice rough. "You cannot have thought it through, however--"

"In two years," Emily interrupted, "I have thought every thought, and doubted every
doubt, and none of them matters a whit. I mean to marry you."

He still said nothing, frowning. She held his gaze. "Last year I spent a sixmonth terrified
for you, dreading every post and listening for every post. This summer, when you were wounded, I
wanted to fly to you at once. I was green with envy of Sir Robert Wilson. I am tired of caution and
tired of propriety. For God's sake, Richard, you cannot go off to Winchester!" That was something
of an anticlimax. Emily blushed.

Richard's eyes were bright with laughter and something warmer. His mouth quirked.
"Well, perhaps another month in Watkins's cottage."

"Fiend!" Emily was lost to shame. She threw her arms about him. He returned her
embrace with sufficient enthusiasm to quiet any lingering doubts she might have felt as to his
sentiments. In fact their first kiss left both of them speechless.

Emily recovered first. "I shall write Papa to procure a special licence." She licked her
lips, tasting the kiss.

Richard groaned.

"What is it, dear heart?"

"Sir Henry."

Emily laughed. She felt giddy, light as air, as if she could fly out over the cliffs like a gull.
"How do you fancy I persuaded him to allow me to come to Treglyn in the first place?"

Richard stared. "Good God. But your aunt--"

"Oh, Aunt Fan is awake upon all suits. She has always been your partisan." Emily gave
him a mischievous glance. "I took a great deal for granted, didn't I?"

"By God, you did, madam. I've half a mind to catch the first coach back to London." He
kissed her on the mouth and neither of them spoke for some time thereafter. There was no
need.

I was born in Montana and raised in eastern Oregon, graduated from the University of
Washington, and have advanced degrees (English and history) from the UW and Portland State. I
taught at Clark College in Vancouver, WA for more than thirty years before I retired to write full
time. I've had nine novels published--four regencies and five mysteries--and am now collaborating
with my friend, Sarah Webb, on a YA fantasy set in Ireland before the Christian era. I also continue
to write mysteries and might even write another regency if the spirit moved me. I've been happily
married for many years to a man who is not only terrific but a great photographer and a computer
genius. I have a son whose company I enjoy and whose Rhodesian ridgeback, Mugabe, is the model
for Towser in Buffalo Bill's Defunct, my current mystery. I also have a cat, Ethel White, who is less
jolly, but I'm used to her. I enjoy cooking, traveling, and reading (all kinds of fiction, archaeology,
and history). I've taught fiction writing, science fiction, and Irish history, among other things, and I
miss teaching mainly for the students, who were wonderful. It may be that growing up with four
brothers and a sister has had greater impact on my fiction than my other life experiences, but who
knows? I enjoy their company, too.

* * * *

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