Carola Dunn (5 page)

“Miss Carmichael...?” he said.

“I am still searching for some way to throw her into high fidgets. Do you know, I even took her to a series of lectures on Natural Philosophy—electricity and fire-damp and such things. I understood not one word in ten but she found them fascinating and even volunteered to be electrified! She simply never takes exception to anything I do.”

“She is actually grateful to you for rescuing her from her previous dull existence. Perhaps you should limit your acquaintance to the most respectable members of the Polite World, your charity to knitting for the poor-basket, and your reading to sermons. Anglican sermons, of course.”

“Good gracious,” cried Aunt Artemis, aghast, “I should very soon expire from sheer boredom!”

“Then you must gird up your loins to be actively unkind.”

“Oh, I could not possibly be deliberately unkind, dear. No, no, I shall think of something. In fact, I have a new scheme in hand at present.” In a conspiratorial tone she added, “Do not be surprised if you see Mr. Sagaranathu calling frequently.”

“Miss Carmichael seemed to enjoy his company,” Peter pointed out.

“Yes, but I am not inviting him for his company. Just wait and see if this does not shake Miranda’s composure!”

“And if it does, who is to be the lucky.... Ye gods, Aunt Artemis, you aren’t expecting me to marry the girl?”

It was Peter’s turn to be aghast, his composure very thoroughly shaken by alarm lest his aunt regard him as a rescuer of forlorn maidens. Not that Miss Carmichael was not a devilish attractive maiden, at least when she smiled instead of frowning. He had enjoyed their brief stolen kiss and had no aversion to repeating the experience. In fact, he liked her very well—but he liked his freedom better.

Besides, he was in no position to support a wife, he recalled thankfully. He was about to draw this indisputable fact to his aunt’s attention when she got there first.

“Heavens no!” she exclaimed in horror. “Miranda’s father was a care-for-nobody just like you. I could not wish to shackle her to another such penniless rapscallion.”

Peter found himself stunned into wordlessness at this home truth from his hitherto amiable, obliging relative. She continued:

“Even if she would have you, which I cannot credit. She is not so lacking in common sense! No, Miranda shall have Godfrey. She is by far the nicest of my companions and she deserves him. How I shall go on without her I cannot imagine, but I daresay she will like to be a baroness.”

“Baroness?” Peter said blankly.

“Did you never meet Godfrey Snell? His mama was Sir Bernard’s eldest sister. Perhaps you did not know his papa was a baron, for he succeeded to the title quite recently, while you were in America.”

“Godfrey, Lord Snell?”

“And Miranda, Lady Snell.” Aunt Artemis beamed.

Though Peter failed to recollect having met a Snell in any shape or form, he conceived an instant and utterly irrational dislike for the man. No cousin of the abominable Fenimore, Redpath, and Jeffries, however blue-blooded, could possibly be worthy to win the hand of Miss Miranda Carmichael.

* * * *

Seated at the bureau, Miranda glanced round as Mr. Daviot entered the study. He appeared oddly uneasy for one who had so blithely obtruded himself into the household with not the least sign of any qualms.

“Has Lady Wiston gone up to rest?” Miranda asked. “She does find her at-homes tiring, much as she enjoys them.”

“Yes, she said she’d lie down for an hour. I don’t mean to disturb you.”

“No matter. It is merely a duty letter to my brother. He frets if he does not hear from me once a month, but I confess I often find it difficult to fill a page.”

Leaning against the desk, he looked at the half-blank sheet and observed, “You must write larger. Aunt Artemis told me he’s a churchman? I daresay he’d be shocked if you described what is involved in your present employment.”

“Yes, indeed! Apropos, have you recovered from your shock at the company Lady Wiston keeps?”

“Quite recovered. I believe I shall enjoy residing here as much as you do.”

“Even more, I imagine,” Miranda said dryly, “since you are not obliged to earn your living. Oh dear!” She bit her lip, perturbed at her own impertinence. “You seem to have a disastrous effect on my ability to hold my tongue! I beg your pardon, sir.”

“Unnecessary.” Mr. Daviot was unwontedly serious. “I am aware of your doubts, your discomfort with my aunt’s offering a home, however temporary, to one who has announced himself an adventurer. I can only be glad she has someone sincerely concerned for her welfare. I’m truly fond of her, you know, and I have every intention of working hard at my book.”

Fine words, Miranda thought. She, for one, would wait and see.

His momentary gravity vanished and he grinned at her. “Fine words—you are saying to yourself—butter no parsnips. You’re quite right, of course, but then I never did care much for parsnips.”

She sighed. “As long as you don’t run off with the silver, no doubt we shall contrive to live in tolerable harmony. Lady Wiston would be sadly distressed if there were dissension in her house.”

“It’s a bargain, ma’am. I shall endeavour not to plague you, and you must endeavour not to scold me for minor misdeeds.”

He offered his hand and she laid hers in it, all too conscious of the warm firmness of his clasp. Quickly she turned her attention to the damage done by Mudge that morning.

“Your scratch is already beginning to heal nicely,” she remarked with satisfaction.

“I was fortunate in having expert medical care.” Mr. Daviot gave her his most engaging smile. “Well, I shan’t keep you from your letter any longer. I just came in to make sure all the stuff from the stationer’s was delivered. I promised Aunt Artemis to set to work bright and early tomorrow morning.”

“Everything is here. I checked.” Miranda waved at the table in the corner. Beside several brown paper packages of various shapes and sizes stood a huge bottle of black fluid.

“Perhaps a gallon of ink was rather overdoing it,” he said with a look half rueful, half laughing. “It didn’t look so vast in the shop.”

“Better too much than to run out in the middle of a fit of inspiration. Shall you use this desk? If so, I must clear away a few odds and ends.”

“No, I believe that table will suit me better. I daresay Aunt Artemis will not mind if I have it placed under the window to take advantage of the daylight?”

“I doubt it.” Miranda doubted her ladyship would deny any reasonable request of her nephew’s. She had to admit that none had been unreasonable. So far.

“Which reminds me,” he said, crossing to the door, “do you really mean to allow her to sleep out on the terrace tonight?”

“Mr. Daviot, I do not allow or disallow Lady Wiston’s actions. She is her own mistress—and mine also.”

“True, but I suspect you are quite capable of effective discouragement, or encouragement, where you consider it appropriate.”

“As a matter of fact,” she said, disconcerted, “I was going to insist on Baxter, her abigail, and a footman standing guard to help her move indoors should it rain. I doubt she will choose to subject them to the discomfort.”

“I knew it!” he exclaimed, laughing.

To Miranda’s annoyance, she felt herself blushing. “I prefer not to interfere,” she defended herself, “but even if the night remains fine there is bound to be a heavy dew. I cannot think it advisable for a lady of your aunt’s years to subject herself to the damp.”

“Oh, I quite agree. As I have said before, she is extremely lucky to have found so determined a protector.”

With that, the infuriating man whisked from the room, leaving Miranda with her cheeks hotter than ever.

Chapter 5

“And then,” said Mr. Daviot, helping himself to a third slice of steak and kidney pie and a spoonful of spinach, “the sea-serpent opened a mouth as wide as a barn door. With a single gulp he swallowed the pirate captain, treasure map and all, leaving our attackers in disarray and permitting our escape. Unfortunately, his tail swept the sheep pens and fowl cages from our deck, so that we were forced to subsist on hard tack the rest of the way home.”

“Have another potato, dear boy,” urged Lady Wiston. “Your ship was some thirty yards distant from the pirate ship, you said? Gracious me, what a very large sea-serpent.”

Miranda laughed. “And what very sharp eyes, to make out the treasure map in the pirate’s hand!”

“You forget, Miss Carmichael,” he said, his tone injured but his eyes agleam with amusement, “our captain had lent me his glass so that I could observe the monster with scientifical thoroughness.”

“Ah yes. How fortunate that irreplaceable instrument was not struck by one of the scores of cannonballs bouncing around you. Tell me, sir, is your proposed book to be fact or fiction?”

“A good point.” He regarded her with an arrested look. “I intended a true tale of my sojourn among the Iroquois, but perhaps a fiction would sell better. Or fact spiced with fiction? What, after all, is truth?”

The question was rhetorical, but Miranda found herself wondering whether Peter Daviot was actually capable of distinguishing fact from fiction. If only she could be certain when he was serious, when he was teasing, and when he was shamming, or simply giving free rein to his undoubtedly lively imagination!

She was never quite sure how to react to him. The uncertainty perplexed her, adding to her reluctance as she approached the study door towards the middle of the next morning.

The origins of her reluctance were twofold. In the first place, the errand driving her thither was to bring up to date the household accounts, her least favourite task. Second, she did not wish to disturb the author at his labours--always supposing he had actually set pen to paper. In the end, her eagerness to find out drove her to march in without a preparatory knock.

His tilted chair wavered wildly. Grabbing the edge of the table, he contrived to save himself from going over backwards. Hastily he removed his feet from the table and swung round to face Miranda.

“You might give a chap a bit of a warning,” he said reproachfully. “Or are you so wild for the practice of medicine you actually wish me to break my head?”

“I assumed you would be so absorbed in writing you would not hear me if I crept in to fetch the account books. I ought to have taken them with me yesterday but....” She hesitated.

“No, no, don’t spare me. But you were by no means convinced I should actually start work today?” Heaving a sigh, he turned and waved at the table-top. “It seems to be rather more difficult than I reckoned on.”

Miranda went over to stand beside him. The top sheet of the small pile of paper, shoved aside to make room for his feet, had the beginnings of three paragraphs, all heavily scratched out. On either side lay a score or so of sharpened quills, their nibs innocent of ink. Another stood in the inkwell.

“I see you have prepared enough pens to last quite some time,” she observed, trying not to sound critical.

“At this rate, they will last the rest of my lifetime. We purchased a gross, you may recall.”

“What is stopping you? You were fluent enough last night.”

“It’s easy enough to talk.” He ran a distracted hand through his hair. “When one writes it down, for a start one has to decide where to begin.”

“Need you decide now?” she queried doubtfully. “That is, can you not go back and add a proper introduction later?”

“It might work,” he said, equally doubtfully.

“After all, you are not carving your adventures in stone, with no chance to make changes.”

“Thank heaven. I’ll try it your way. If I just put down a description of my meeting with the Iroquois braves, I shall get into the way of this writing business, and later it will be easy to do the dull stuff about how I came there.”

Drawing the pile of paper towards him, he took the top sheet, crumpled it, and tossed it through the open window. His pen poised over the blank sheet.

Tactfully, Miranda withdrew to the bureau. She rolled up the top as quietly as she could and took the account books and tradesmen’s bills from their pigeonholes. Her hands full, she turned.

The pen was still poised. Mr. Daviot stared blankly at the blank top sheet.

“Damn...dash it, I still don’t know where to start,” he groaned. “Should I describe the forest? It is like nothing that has been seen in England for centuries. Or shall I dive straight in with that eerie feeling of being watched?”

Miranda set down her papers, turned her chair to face him, and sat down. “Tell me the story,” she invited. “Then at least you will have it straight in your head.”

“You don’t mind?”

“I will do practically anything to postpone the bookkeeping. What was it like in the primeval forest? You were on horseback? Were you afraid of the Americans pursuing you?”

“In reverse order: not really, being far too insignificant for them to take the trouble; yes; and awe-inspiring.”

As he talked about the vast tracts of ancient trees, undisturbed by man, Miranda listened on two levels. She was interested in what he said, and also in how he said it. He had a knack for interspersing description with increasingly dramatic incidents.

First came the spine-tingling feeling of being watched, which turned out to be a pair of chipmunks, “creatures like miniature squirrels with stripes,” he explained. Then there was the morning he awoke in his camp by a stream to see a mother bear teaching her two cubs to fish not five yards from the ashes of his fire. After a nerve-racking half hour, they had wandered on, leaving half a salmon for his breakfast.

And then came the day his horse stepped into an open glade and halted nose to nose with an Indian brave.

“My heart stopped,” said Mr. Daviot, his animated face expressing the terror of the moment. “I had heard all the settlers’ tales of massacres, of course. He stood there motionless, his arms folded, his tomahawk at his belt. Reaching back for my rifle, which I carried slung over my back, I glanced around. I found myself surrounded by a band of braves sprung up out of nowhere, a dozen or a score, I did not take the time to count! All I cared for was that enough arrows and muskets were trained on me to kill me several times over.”