Maggie MacKeever (4 page)

That the landlord meant to take exception to this highhanded manner was obvious, but the words died unborn in his throat as Lady Tess stepped into the taproom. Not only did all eyes turn to her, there they remained.

Tess grimly supposed that she must be a curiosity unviewed by such provincials except in a traveling freak-show. Accustomed to considering herself in such a light, the countess possessed no idea of how she appeared to these rough men. Though she did not know it, Lady Tess outshone mere beauty and cast even her sister into the shade. The clouds of fair hair that tumbled to her waist, unfettered by bonnet or pins, the old black pelisse that enhanced her slender fairness, gave her a fairy-tale appearance that was only strengthened by her characteristic look of faint surprise, as if she had stepped unwittingly into another world.

Clio was not at all pleased at this reaction to her sister, who was too shy to tease and sparkle and thus unworthy to hold men so spellbound, and quickly hurried to her side. “Tess!” she exclaimed with fine, if unaccustomed, solicitude. “The most terrible thing! The landlord says there is no room.”

Lady Tess was as guilty as any other of pampering Mistress Clio, but at this moment she was too exhausted to concern herself with that maiden’s pretty ploys. “So I heard, child,” she said absently, and shook off her sister’s hand. Clio, her charming act of sisterly concern thus brought to naught, looked outraged. Tess did not see, being concerned with navigating the uneven floor. It was an act of the utmost bravery, conducted under the weight of countless curious eyes.

“Sir,” said she, halting at last before the landlord, “I understand that you have no room for us. But perhaps a private parlor, and some food? When my horses have rested, and we have refreshed ourselves, we will proceed on our journey.”

“Nonsense!” came a voice behind her. Startled, Tess spun around so quickly that she would have lost her balance if not for the strong hand that supported her arm, and gazed up into a pair of oddly familiar amber eyes. “Sir Morgan Rhodes at your service, Countess!” he remarked, maintaining possession of her arm. Tess was speechless. “I fear mine host has misled you. It is not that he lacks rooms, but that he fears his accommodations are far inadequate for a lady of quality.” The tawny eyes moved to the landlord. “Isn’t that so, Jem?”

The man shuffled uneasily. “As you say, Sir Morgan,” he muttered. “It ain’t fitting that Quality should stay here. There’s no one to wait on them, for one thing.”

“It is up to my lady, surely,” suggested Sir Morgan, in a mild voice that held more than a hint of steel, “to decide what is proper. I daresay her woman can see to her needs.”

“How
kind
you are, sir!” cried Clio, skittering gracefully across the room to hover by Tess. “My sister, as you can see, is not strong. If we were forced to continue our journey tonight, she would be all pulled about.”

This intervention gained for Clio no more than Sir Morgan’s idle glance, which flickered over her with as little interest as if she were a piece of furniture, before returning to Tess’s face, an act which earned for him Delphine’s wholehearted approval. “Lady Tess?” the abigail inquired briskly. “Do you choose to stay?”

“Yes.” Tess was rendered unaccountably shy by Sir Morgan’s glance. “You will see to the luggage, Delphine?”

“
I
,” muttered Clio sullenly, “wish to be shown to my room. At once!” Tess was roused to worry by that tone, which betokened an imminent tantrum, but Sir Morgan once more intervened.

“Follow me, ladies,” he suggested, with an enchanting crooked smile. Now that he no longer stood so close, Tess had ample opportunity to observe her rescuer. Sir Morgan Rhodes was a man of perhaps forty, swarthy of complexion, with raven-black hair, clad carelessly in expertly cut buckskin breeches, riding boots, and pale cloth coat. He was tall and muscular, with the air of an outdoors man; his features were aquiline and saved from harshness only by the humor in his odd-colored eyes. Such details did not paint a true picture, Tess thought. There was a charm about the man that was no less effective for being indescribable. She followed him into the hallway and gazed with dismay at a steep, dark staircase.

“Poor Tess!” cried Clio, with a malice that was not entirely excused by piqued vanity. “I fear you will never be able to climb the stairs. Shall I call Daffy? Perhaps between us—”

“No!” Considering her sister with something closely akin to dislike, Tess grasped her cane. “I shall manage quite well, thank you.”

“Suit yourself, then.” With a rather immodest display of pretty petticoats and neat ankles, Clio ran up the stairs.

But this was a challenge that Tess was not to face. “That chit,” remarked Sir Morgan, “needs turning over someone’s knee.” Without further ado he swept Tess off her feet and into his arms and proceeded up the staircase. “Shall I offer you my assistance? It would render me no small gratification to administer the brat some salutary discipline.”

“She is a trifle spoiled,” admitted Tess, stricken almost breathless by his audacity. It seemed only natural that she should secure her precarious perch by grasping his board shoulders. “She is also very young. My sister means no harm, I assure you! And now, sir,” for they had gained the upper hallway, “you may set me down!”

“I might,” agreed Sir Morgan, treating her again to that devastating smile. “And then I might have the privilege of watching you march down the hallway. You do it well, of course, but why bother when there is no need?” Tess frowned at him, but to no avail. “The rear bedchamber, I suppose,” he added, after a cursory glance along the hallway. “Your graceless sister will have appropriated for herself the front room, it being altogether larger and more commodious.” Tess was summarily borne to a small chamber at the back of the house.  It contained little more than a narrow chest of drawers and a chintz-hung bed, where she was deposited carefully. “There!” Sir Morgan’s amber eyes were alight with amusement as he divested her of the shabby pelisse. “See how I exert myself to make you comfortable?”

“You are all kindness!’ retorted Tess and reached resolutely for her cane. “Tell me, sir, are you always so insufferably overbearing?”

“I am,” admitted Sir Morgan cheerfully, and deftly twitched the cane from her grasp before busying himself with a bellows at the grate. “And you are uncommonly lovely, Lady Tess!”

In such a situation, Mistress Clio would have fluttered her long lashes, blushed over and over again, and uttered faint and patently insincere protests. Lady Tess, a stranger to the art of flirtation, merely stared at this bold gentleman and broke into her deep, husky laughter. “Compliments amuse you?” inquired Sir Morgan, quirking a brow.

“Oh, no!” gasped Tess. “I mean, yes! You see, I have never before made the acquaintance of a rake.”

“So I am no better than one of the wicked?” Having successfully accomplished his mission, Sir Morgan abandoned the fireplace to prop a heedless boot on her bed. “Having never before been exposed to such, how would you know?”

“It is obvious!” Tess propped herself up on one elbow, her shyness forgotten in the pleasure of the exchange. “I have read a great deal, and you have about you an air of profligacy akin to that of the French aristocracy before the Revolution. I daresay you fell into licentious ways when very young and are now entirely preoccupied with sin.”

Sir Morgan’s lips twitched, for she sounded quite delighted with her discovery. “Are you not frightened,” he inquired, “to find yourself alone with a libertine?”

Tess’s look of surprise grew more pronounced. “Gracious, no! Why should I be? A man of the world is hardly like to waste time on a poor creature like myself. No wonder Clio was so miffed! Your casual air of indifference would be irresistible to her.” Her glance held a trace of worry. “You understand that for myself such things do not signify.”

“Of course they do not,” Sir Morgan conceded politely. “What happened to your leg?’

The countess was quite morbidly sensitive about that appendage, and Sir Morgan’s impudent query caused her to scowl. “A carriage accident when I was but a girl,” she replied coolly. “It need not concern you, sir.”

“No?” So far was Sir Morgan from being snubbed that he leaned forward to take her ankle in his hand. “I think it concerns
you
overly, little one! I suppose it aches abominably?”

“No,” said Tess faintly, amazed not only by his temerity but by his gentleness. She tried once more to track down that elusive memory, but could not pinpoint the resemblance that was so naggingly familiar and at the same time so vague.

“It is entirely your own fault,” Sir Morgan remarked, relinquishing the ankle, “for straining it in superhuman feats that no one expects of you. Never mind, I know just the thing to make you comfortable.” He turned to the door.

“I will not,” announced Tess gruffly, “be coddled, sir!”

Sir Morgan paused at the threshold, brows raised. “You misunderstand. I have not the least intention of coddling you.”

It was some time later when Delphine puffed up the steep staircase, having at last bullied the unamiable landlord into providing additional accommodation for the coachman, the postilions, and the groom; it was later still when Clio had grown reconciled to the fact that, due to the advent of yet another overnight guest, she must share with the abigail her room. These matters satisfactorily arranged, Delphine proceeded down the hallway to check on her mistress. She paused aghast on the threshold, for before her was a truly bacchanalian scene. Lady Tess lay on her bed, skirts up to her knees, while Sir Morgan massaged her lame leg with what smelled strongly like horse liniment. Nor did the countess appear in the least disturbed by the impropriety of the situation, a fact perhaps accounted for by the bottle of Old Constantia that she and Sir Morgan had shared between them. Indeed, so far was Tess from shamed awareness that she was discussing with great enthusiasm the new regent’s retention of his father’s advisors.

“It is perfectly reasonable,” commented Sir Morgan, very much at ease. “Prinny had made up his mind to dismiss the Tory government as soon as he was installed as regent, but the queen advised him that such a move was certain to retard his father’s recovery. Or so our regent claims. Myself, I suspect Prinny is more afraid of rousing his father’s wrath.”

“A fine regent!” Tess drained her glass. “I do not know what that concoction is, and it definitely smells vile, but it is nigh miraculous. I vow I could dance a jig!”

Delphine deemed it time to make her presence known, lest her misguided mistress attempt that very thing. “Humph!” she ejaculated disapprovingly.

“So you’ve chosen to make an appearance at last.” Sir Morgan was obviously no stranger to compromising situations: he winked at Tess. “I will take my leave of you; doubtless your woman wishes to read you a terrible scold. And I will leave the liniment since it has done you so much good.”

“Thank you,” murmured Tess, a wary eye on the frigid Delphine. “I am indebted to you also for your company.”

Delphine waited for Sir Morgan to depart, then firmly closed the door before turning on her mistress a wrathful countenance. Tess forestalled the lecture by simply holding up a hand. “Dear Daffy,” she murmured, “you are very cross! I assure you I have conducted myself with perfect prudence—and really Sir Morgan’s lotion did me a world of good! It was very kind in him to offer it to me. Now, would you help me into my nightdress?”

It was not the liniment but Sir Morgan himself, thought Delphine sourly, that had brought that flush to Tess’s cheeks and that sparkle to her eye, and a most damnable event it was.
Tres seduisant,
that one, an artist in the matter of feminine seduction, but of course the countess would not realize. Tess appeared sleepy, and Delphine reluctantly held her tongue.

In point of fact, slumber was elusive that night, and Lady Tess passed much time wistfully contemplating the carefree life of dissipation that a splendid sinner like Sir Morgan must lead. Consequently, she was very much alert when the door to her chamber swung open. Stealthily she gripped her cane. The intruder had little chance to escape from such a weapon, and little hope of evading it in a chamber so small. Though Tess’s leg might be weak, her arms were correspondingly strong. She waited only for the man to draw nearer to her bed, then brought down the cane with considerable force over his unwary head. He fell with a heavy thud.

It was one of the men from the taproom, candlelight revealed, and the force of the blow had shattered her cane. With some vague idea that she might have killed him, Tess bent over the inert body. No, he still breathed. But how the devil was she to go for help without the aid of her cane? In any event, it was unnecessary to do so. Fully dressed, Sir Morgan stepped into the room. Tess, unaware that she looked quite charming
en déshabillé,
thought it queer that he gazed, with a thoughtful expression, not at the unconscious man but at her.

“An intruder,” explained Tess unnecessarily, and sank back down on her bed. “I fear I may have injured him.”

Sir Morgan glanced around the small chamber. “Was anything disturbed?”

“I think not.” Tess frowned at her opened portmanteau, which Delphine seemed to have packed with unusual carelessness. “He hardly had time. I heard him enter, you see.”

“Could you not sleep, little one?” Sir Morgan seemed unaccountably amused. “I suppose I must rouse Jem and dispose of this brigand.”

“Do you think he meant to rob me?” Tess queried. “Poor man! He is probably very poor, with a large family to feed.”

“He is more likely,” retorted Sir Morgan wryly, “a smuggler or a highwayman. This place is notorious for such and possesses for their convenience five entrances and exits, passages within the walls, and cupboards with false backs. You may note tomorrow that a gibbet stands outside. More than one villain has dangled there.”

“Fascinating!” commented Tess.

“Highwaymen!” shrieked Clio from the doorway, and turned a becoming ashen shade. She swooned but, since after a cursory glance Sir Morgan ignored her altogether, it was into Delphine’s arms.