Married by Morning (20 page)

Catherine was cautious but willing as she and Leo followed Dr. Schaeffer to the rooms at the back of his shop. Whenever she had purchased spectacles in the past, the optician had simply brought out a tray of lenses, handed her various ones to hold up to her eyes, and when she felt she had obtained sufficient vision, he had proceeded to make spectacles for her.

Dr. Schaeffer, however, insisted on examining her eyes with a lens he called a “corneal loupe,” after putting drops into her eyes to dilate the pupils. After pronouncing that there were no signs of disease or degeneration, he asked her to read letters and numbers from a series of three charts on the wall. She was obliged to reread the charts with various strengths of lenses, until finally they achieved a near-miraculous clarity.

When it came time to discuss the frames for the lenses, Leo surprised both Catherine and Dr. Schaeffer by taking an active part. “The spectacles that Miss Marks wears at present,” Leo said, “leave a mark at the bridge of her nose.”

“The contour of the support arch must be adjusted,” the doctor said.

“Undoubtedly.” Leo withdrew a slip of paper from the pocket of his coat and placed it on the table. “However, I have a few more ideas. What if the bridge is built up to hold the lenses a bit farther away from her face?”

“You’re thinking of a design similar to the clips of a pince-nez?” Schaeffer asked thoughtfully.

“Yes, they would fit more comfortably and also stay in place.”

Schaeffer stared closely at the sketch Leo had given him. “You’ve drawn curved earpieces, I see. An unusual feature.”

“The intention is to hold the spectacles more firmly onto her face.”

“This is a problem, keeping them on?”

“Without question,” Leo replied. “This is a very active woman. Chasing animals, falling through rooftops, stacking rock—all an average day for her.”

“My lord,” Catherine said in reproof.

Schaeffer smiled as he examined the contorted shapes of her spectacles. “From the condition of these frames, Miss Marks, one could almost believe Lord Ramsay’s claims.” His mustache curved upward. “With your permission, I will instruct the jeweler I work with to build the frames you’ve drawn.”

“Make them in silver,” Leo said. He paused, regarding Catherine with a faint smile. “And have him put a touch of filigree on the earpieces. Nothing vulgar … keep it delicate.”

Catherine shook her head immediately. “Such adornment is expensive and unnecessary.”

“Do it nevertheless,” Leo said to the doctor, his gaze still holding Catherine’s. “Your face deserves adornment. I would hardly put a masterpiece in a ordinary frame, would I?”

She sent him a reproving glance. She neither liked nor trusted such outrageous flattery, nor did she intend to melt at his charm. But Leo gave her an unrepentant grin. And as he sat there and surveyed her with wicked blue eyes, she felt a painfully sweet contraction of her heart, followed by the sensation of being knocked off balance. Such a long distance to fall … and yet she couldn’t seem to back away from the danger.

She could only stay there with her precarious equilibrium, suspended in longing and peril … unable to save herself.

“I’ll deal with the questions,” Harry said. “All you have to do is behave in the aforementioned decorous and refined manner when Poppy and I take you to the theater.”

“When are we going to the theater?” Poppy asked, popping a last bite of honey-soaked crumpet into her mouth.

“Tomorrow evening, if that pleases you.”

Catherine nodded, trying not to look troubled by the prospect. People would stare, and whisper. Part of her shrank at the idea of being on display. On the other hand, it was a play, which meant the audience’s attention would focus mainly on the activity within the proscenium.

“Shall we invite Leo?” Poppy asked. She and Harry both looked at Catherine.

She hitched her shoulders in an unconcerned shrug, although she suspected it didn’t deceive either of them.

“Would you have any objection?” Harry asked her.

“No, of course not. He is Poppy’s brother, and my former employer.”

“And possibly your fiancé,” Harry murmured.

Catherine looked at him quickly. “I haven’t accepted his proposal.”

“You are considering it, however … aren’t you?”

Her heart gave a few thick beats in her chest. “I’m not sure.”

“Cat, I don’t mean to harass you about this, but how long do you intend to wait before giving Ramsay an answer?”

“Not long.” Cat frowned into her tea. “If there’s any hope of retaining Ramsay House, Lord Ramsay will have to marry someone soon.”

A tap at the door heralded the entrance of Harry’s right-hand man, Jake Valentine. He brought Harry a stack of daily manager’s reports, as well as a handful of letters. One of these was addressed to Poppy, who received it with a warm smile.

“Thank you, Mr. Valentine.”

“Mrs. Rutledge,” he said with an answering smile, bowing before he left. He looked the tiniest bit smitten with Poppy, which Catherine couldn’t blame him for in the least.

Poppy broke the seal and read the letter, her fine brows inching higher and higher as she neared the conclusion. “My goodness, this is odd.”

Harry and Catherine both looked at her questioningly.

“It’s from Lady Fitzwalter, with whom I am acquainted through some charity work. She asks me in this letter, very earnestly, if I will prevail on my brother to call upon Miss Darvin and Countess Ramsay, who are in town. And she provides the address of the house they have let.”

“Not so very odd,” Catherine said pragmatically, although the news caused a stir of anxiety. “After all, a lady may never call on a man for any reason, and therefore it is certainly not unheard-of for one to prevail upon a mutual acquaintance to arrange the meeting.”

“Yes, but why does Miss Darvin wish to speak to Leo?”

“It might be about the copyhold clause,” Harry said, looking interested. “Perhaps she wishes to offer some manner of concession.”

“I’m sure she means to offer him
something
, ” Catherine said sullenly. She couldn’t help remembering how beautiful the dark-haired Miss Darvin was, and what a striking couple she and Leo had made as they had waltzed. “However, I doubt she intends to discuss legalities. It’s something personal. Otherwise she would allow the solicitors to deal with it.”

“Cam and Merripen were terrified by Miss Darvin,” Poppy told Harry with a grin. “Amelia wrote that her ballgown was trimmed with peacock feathers, which the Rom view as an omen of danger.”

“In some Hindu sects,” Harry said, “the peacock’s cries are associated with the rainy season, and therefore, fertility.”

“Danger or fertility?” Poppy asked dryly. “Well, it should be interesting to see which one Miss Darvin will evince.”

“I don’t want to,” Leo said immediately upon being informed of the necessity of calling on Miss Darvin.

“That doesn’t matter, you have no choice,” Poppy said, taking his coat as he entered the apartment.

Seeing Catherine seated in the parlor with Dodger in her lap, Leo came to her. “Good afternoon,” he said, reaching for Catherine’s hand and brushing a kiss on the backs of her fingers. The feel of his lips, so warm and soft against her skin, caused a quick indrawn breath.

“May I?” he asked, glancing at the place on the settee beside her.

“Yes, of course.”

After Poppy was seated in a chair by the hearth, Leo sat beside Catherine.

She smoothed Dodger’s fur repeatedly, but he didn’t move. A sleeping ferret was so limp and impossible to awaken that one might have reasonably assumed he was dead. One could pick him up, even shake him, and he would slumber on undisturbed.

Leo reached over to toy with the ferret’s tiny arms and legs, lifting them gently and letting them drop back into her lap. They both chuckled as Dodger remained unconscious.

Catherine detected an unusual fragrance about Leo, a scent of feed and hay and some pungent animal scent. She sniffed curiously. “You smell a bit like … horses … Did you go for a ride this morning?”

“It’s
eau de zoo
, ” Leo informed her, his eyes twinkling. “I went for a meeting with the secretary of the zoological society of London, and we toured the newest pavilion.”

“Whatever for?” Catherine asked.

“An old acquaintance of mine, with whom I apprenticed for Rowland Temple, has been commissioned at the Queen’s behest to design a gorilla enclosure at the zoo. They keep them in small cages, which is nothing short of cruelty. When my friend complained to me about the difficulty of designing a sufficiently large and safe enclosure without costing a fortune, I suggested that he dig a moat.”

“A moat?” Poppy echoed.

Leo smiled. “Gorillas won’t cross deep water.”

“How did you know that, my lord?” Catherine asked in amusement. “Beatrix?”

“Naturally.” He looked rueful. “And now after my suggestion, it seems I’ve been recruited as a consultant.”

“At least if your new clients complain,” Catherine told him, “you won’t understand what they’re saying.”

Leo smothered a laugh. “Obviously you haven’t seen what gorillas fling when they’re displeased.” His mouth twisted. “All the same, I’d rather spend my time with primates than pay a call to Miss Darvin and her mother.”

The play that evening was mawkish but highly entertaining. The story was about a handsome Russian peasant who was striving for an education, but on his wedding day to his true love, the poor girl was assaulted by the prince of the domain, and while she swooned, was fatally stung by an asp. Before death overtook her, she reached her home and told her fiancé what had happened, whereupon the handsome peasant swore revenge against the prince. These efforts led him to impersonate another nobleman in the royal court, where he happened to meet a woman who looked exactly like his dead love. As it turned out, the woman was an identical twin of the murdered peasant girl, and to further complicate matters, she was in love with the evil prince’s honorable young son.

Then it was intermission.

Unfortunately Catherine’s and Poppy’s enjoyment of the drama was hampered by low-voiced comments from both Harry and Leo, who insisted on pointing out that in her death throes, the asp-stung woman was clutching the wrong side of her body, and furthermore, a person dying of poison probably wouldn’t cross the state back and forth while uttering poetic declarations of love.

“You have no romance in your soul,” Poppy told Harry at intermission.

“Not in my soul, no,” he replied gravely. “However, I have a great deal of it in other locations.”

She laughed, reaching up to smooth an imaginary crease in his crisp white cravat. “Darling, would you please have someone bring champagne to our box? Catherine and I are thirsty.”

“I’ll send for it,” Leo said, standing and buttoning his coat. “I need to stretch my legs after an hour and a half in that absurdly small chair.” He looked down at Catherine. “Would you care for a promenade?”

She shook her head, feeling much safer in the confines of the theater box than out walking in the crowd. “Thank you, but I am comfortable here.”

As Leo pushed aside the curtains at the back of their box, it was evident that the hallways were exceedingly crowded. A pair of gentlemen and a lady came through the curtains and greeted the Rutledges warmly. Catherine tensed as Harry introduced her to Lord and Lady Despencer and Lady Despencer’s sister, Mrs. Lisle. She anticipated a cool reception from them, perhaps a dismissive remark, but instead they were polite and affable. Perhaps, she thought wryly, she should stop expecting the worst of people.

Poppy asked Lady Despencer about one of her children, who had been ill recently, and the woman listed all the medications and precautions it had taken for their ailing son to get well. Another cluster of people entered the box, waiting for a turn to speak to Harry, and Catherine moved to make room for them. She stood at the back of the box beside the curtain panels, waiting with forced patience as conversation flowed in currents in the hallway, in the box, large swells of noise rising from the audience below. The relentless clamor and movement irritated her. It was stuffy in the theater, the air warm from the mass of human bodies crowding everywhere. She hoped that intermission would conclude soon.

As she stood with her hands behind her back, she felt a hand reach through the box curtains and close around her wrist. A masculine body pressed behind hers. A smile touched her lips as she wondered what game Leo was playing.

But the voice that slithered into her ear wasn’t Leo’s. It was a voice from her nightmares.

“How pretty you look in your fine feathers, my pigeon.”