Elizabeth Mansfield (6 page)

She smiled. “Well, then, you needn’t. Not for a while, anyway.” This was the sort of greeting she’d hoped for. The evening was getting off to a very promising start. “You are free to gaze at me all evening long,” she murmured, her voice a purr.

The young man’s eyes dropped. “No, my dear, I’m afraid I can’t.”

“What?”
She felt herself stiffen, as if something inside her—a basic female instinct—were warning her, before she actually knew why, that things were not going to proceed as she’d expected. “What on earth do you mean?”

“I’ve just had a message from home. An urgent message. I must leave.”

She stared at him in disbelief. “Leave? Surely you don’t mean...
now?”

“I’m afraid so. My carriage is waiting. I just stopped in to explain...”

“Explain?” Her arm slipped from the mantel, and as a wave of fury swept over her, her fingers clenched into fists. “Yes,
do
explain. What is so dreadfully urgent that you must go dashing off tonight?”

“I don’t know the details. She didn’t say. But it’s urgent, right enough. It must be. Julie has never sent for me this way before.”

“Julie?”

“Yes. Julie Branscombe. My ... my closest neighbor. Her mother and mine are bosom bows, you see, and Julie and I were brought up together. Like brother and sister.”

“Indeed.” Cleo’s voice was like ice. “Like brother and sister. How interesting.”

“I wouldn’t call it interesting,” Tris said with boyish innocence, having no inkling of the storm to come. “Troublesome would be a better word. But something dreadful must be brewing or she wouldn’t have written the way she did. Please forgive me, Cleo, for this abrupt departure, but I must go.” With a quick bow and a rueful grin, he started toward the door.

“Just one moment, my good sir!” Cleo strode angrily across the room and blocked the door. “Let me be certain that I understand all this. You are breaking off an appointment with
me
—an appointment which you yourself requested and to which I
generously
agreed, despite having to cancel
several
others—to dash off to Derbyshire on the
whim
of a young woman named
Julie?”

Tris blinked, suddenly recognizing the anger in her tone. “Yes,” he said, puzzled and defensive, “but I don’t think it’s a whim—”

“A young woman who is
no
relation—not even a
sister?
”

“Yes, that’s right, but—”

“And for an emergency the details of which you do not even
know?
”

Tris felt not only helpless but decidedly foolish. “Yes,” he admitted. “That’s more or less the gist of it.”

“You don’t know the details, but you deem the matter
more important
than an evening with
me?
”

“Well, I wouldn’t put it that way, exactly...”

“No? Then how would you put it?”

“It isn’t a matter of relative importance. Damnation, Cleo, don’t look at it that way. You must know how important you are to me.” He took a step toward her and grinned at her sheepishly, hoping she’d find it charmingly reassuring. “I’ll return as soon as I possibly can, I promise. And then we can pick up right where we left off tonight.”

“Is
that
what you think?” She stared at him for a moment in furious disbelief. Then, brushing by him, she swept across to the fireplace, her back to him. “No, my dear sir, you will
not
return,” she said with ominous distinctness, “not to this house. Once you cross that threshold, you will never cross it again, not as long as I can take a breath.”

“Cleo!” He stared at her, aghast. “You can’t mean—!”

“I
do
mean it!” She turned her head to him, her eyes glittering with rage. “Take a
good
look, Tris Enders, for once you leave this house, this is the last you’ll see of me.”

“B-But—” he stammered, completely nonplussed.

“If you are going, then go!”

“You don’t understand,” he said desperately. “It isn’t that I
want
to go. It’s just something I must do.”

“Then go and
do
it! No one’s holding you.”

He hesitated for a moment, wondering if he should forget Julie’s note and stay where he was. Cleo was heart-breakingly beautiful at this moment, and she evidently wanted him to remain, while on the other hand, Julie’s summons was vague. Couldn’t he at least wait for tomorrow? He was torn, like a classic hero, between love and duty. But, like a hero, he chose the harder road. He turned away from temptation and threw open the door. “I
shall
go,” he declared as firmly as his choked throat permitted, “but I’ll be back. I’ll be back, will you or nill you!” With that, he stalked out to the corridor, ran past the astonished butler and flung himself out of the house.

When Lord Smallwood returned home an hour later, he found his daughter lying prone on the sofa in complete disregard of the condition of her new gown, sobbing as if her heart would break. “Cleo!” he cried in alarm, kneeling down beside her. “What on earth has happened here?”

“Oh, Papa!” She raised herself up and flung herself into his arms. “He doesn’t l-love me! He doesn’t care for m-me one whit!”

“Who? The bumpkin?”

Cleo could only nod.

“There, there,” her astonished father murmured, patting her back helplessly. “You mustn’t let yourself become upset over him. The fellow is a fool. A country bumpkin. What can he know of quality?”

But even as he said those words, Lord Smallwood’s respect for Tristram Enders grew by leaps and bounds. Not one other suitor for his daughter’s hand, not even the most sophisticated of city dwellers, had ever shown himself remotely capable of reducing his remarkable daughter to such bitter tears. He shook his head in grudging admiration. That deuced bumpkin must have depths of character... depths that he, Smallwood, had never suspected.

8

All through the long night’s ride home, Tris relived the scene in the Smallwood drawing room. Over and over he questioned his own sanity. Had he made a foolish choice? Had he ruined his chances with the magnificent Cleo Smallwood? Had he sacrificed the one great love of his life (for he would surely never again find a woman as lovely, as charming, as perfect as Cleo) for what she’d called a whim? What on
earth had made him feel so obligated to answer Julie’s summons? Why had he taken her note so seriously? And why had she written to him in the first place? If it turned out that it
was
a whim, he would wring Julie’s neck!

It was almost dawn when he arrived at Larchwood. He stopped his carriage at the foot of the Branscombes’ drive, tethered the horses and stole on foot up the drive and round to the south side of the house. A gray light was beginning to pierce the darkness of the sky in the east. Placing himself in the shadow of a clump of shrubs, he threw a handful of dirt up to a curtained window on the second story. It took three more careful tosses before he saw the curtain being drawn. The window opened and Julie leaned out. “Is it you, Tris?” she called in a hissing whisper.

He stepped out into the faint predawn light. “Who did you think it was? Hurry and let me in before the whole household wakes.”

“Yes. Go round to the veranda. I’ll come down and open the door.”

She came to the door wrapped in an old wool robe and worn slippers, her hair in two plaits, like a child. It was strange, he couldn’t help thinking, how careless she was about her appearance. Cleo would never permit herself to be seen looking so pathetically dowdy.

Julie, not at all conscious of how she looked, led him up the stairs to an unused room that had once been her schoolroom, and carefully closed the door. “There!” she sighed in relief. “No one will discover us here.”

He perched on the child-sized table that still occupied the center of the room, while she blew out the candle she carried. They could talk in the darkness; she didn’t want any servants discovering candlelight seeping out through the crevices of the door frame. Besides, it would soon be light.

“Well, what’s amiss?” Tris demanded, his arms crossed over his chest. “This had better be serious ... at least serious enough to warrant my traveling all night without sleep.”

“It’s serious enough. Our mamas have decided to give me a London come-out.”

“What?”
He gaped in astonishment at her shadowed shape looming over him. That she could have such a ridiculous reason for summoning him had never occurred to him. He wanted to murder her! “A
come-out?”
he ranted. “You summoned me here about a come-out? Are you
mad?
I thought that someone was deathly ill! Or that one of our houses had burned to the ground! Or—at the very least—that one of our mothers had lost a fortune on the ‘change.”

“Hush, will you?” Julie hissed. “Someone will hear you!” She sat down on the table beside him. “You don’t realize how serious—”

“Serious? You call that serious?” He grasped her by the shoulders and gave her an angry shake. “Dash it all, Julie, do you realize what you’ve done? You made me lose my chance to win the most magnificent woman in London just so that you could tell me you’re having a come-out. I ought to wring your blasted neck!”

She flung his hands from her arms. “What do you mean? How could I have affected your suit?”

“Never mind how! The fact is you did.” He got up and strode over to the window, where he stood glowering at the slowly brightening landscape, feeling very sorry for himself.

She stared for a moment at his form silhouetted in the light seeping in from the reddening sky. Then she rose, came up behind him and put a hand on his arm. “I’m sorry, Tris. I never meant to cause you harm. I thought I was helping you.”

“I know,” he said softly, his anger melting away at her gentle touch. “I’m sorry I shook you. But how on earth did you think you’d be helping me by sending for me to talk about your damnable come-out?”

“It’s not the come-out that’s the problem. It’s the ramifications. They are dreadful.”

“Ramifications? What ramifications?”

“You’ll be expected to play a part in the affair, don’t you see?”

“No, I don’t see. What has your come-out to do with me?”

“Everything. You see, the trip to London is intended to affect
you,
not me. Our mamas mean to make you escort me everywhere. To every ball, every dinner party, every gala and rout for which I’ll require a partner. And furthermore, they’ll see that I’m thrust in your way wherever you go. They’re determined to make you see me in a new light ... a London light.”

“Good God!” he swore, gaping at her with sudden comprehension.

“Good God, indeed.”

“It’d be worse than being betrothed!”

“Yes, just so! That’s why I sent for you. It’s the very situation we’ve been trying to avoid all these years.”

They eyed each other in silence, each trying to envision being perpetually yoked to the other.

“You were right,” Tris admitted at last, crossing back to the table and sinking down upon it. “Something must be done.”

“Yes,” Julie agreed. “But what?”

“I don’t know.” Tris stared down at the floor glumly.

“You know, Tris, I’ve been giving the matter a great deal of thought ever since I heard them making their blasted plans, and I think the best solution is for you to wed your Miss Smallwood as soon as possible. Once you’re wed, as you yourself pointed out to me, our mothers will be forced to give up.”

“Yes, that
would
have been a possible solution yesterday,” Tris said in disgust, “but didn’t you hear what I said a few moments ago? I can’t wed Miss Smallwood. I’ve lost her.”

“Oh, Tris, no! Are you absolutely sure?”

“As sure as one can be in such matters. I fully intend to try my luck with her again, but at best I’ve set my chances back by weeks, or even months. It will take time to win her again. And my cause will not be helped if, while I’m courting her, they drag you to London, and I’m obliged to squire
you
about right under Cleo’s nose.”

“Yes,” Julie sighed, despairing, sitting down beside him, “I see what you mean.”

Tris turned to her. The light was now bright enough for him to see her plainly. Despite her plaited hair and shabby robe, she was undoubtedly a lovely girl. “It’s
you
who must be wed, Julie,” he said, taking her hands. “And quickly too.”

She snorted. “Now you’re grasping at straws. Who is there to wed me?”

“I don’t know. Isn’t there anyone in all of Derbyshire who’s caught your eye?”

“You know perfectly well there isn’t. Except of course...”A picture of Lord Canfield astride his horse, with rain pouring from the brim of his beaver, flew into her mind. “No, no,” she muttered, shaking her head vigorously, “he wouldn’t ... he couldn’t—No... it’s impossible.”

Tris’s eyebrows lifted in immediate interest. “There
is
someone? Who?”

“No one. Nobody. Never mind. I was just jabbering. There’s no one.”

But he could see her cheeks redden. “Come now, my dear, this is no time to be coy.
Tell
me!”

“I’m
not
being coy,” she declared, wrenching her hands from his hold and turning away. “It was very silly of me to even
think
of him.”