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“Well, that’s all right then.” Tibby dismissed the whole matter with a wave of her hand. “As long as there’s no curse, and you didn’t accept him. Now tell me everything he said.”
Angela scarcely heard Tibby over the sudden uproar of her own thoughts. Had Lord Daventry assumed her question indicated distaste on her part for the possibility of kissing him, because of his reputation…or his injuries?
She shot to her feet. “I must speak with him, at once.”
“No, you mustn’t!” cried Tibby. “You said he’d changed his mind. You don’t want to risk offending him worse, do you?”
“I’ll be back in time for dinner,” Angela called over her shoulder.
As she dashed up the stairs, Tibby called after her, “Don’t do anything foolish, now, because you feel sorry for him. You’ve too soft a heart for your own good!”
A soft heart? Angela popped back into the sitting room to retrieve her bonnet and gloves. She hadn’t shown Lucius Daventry much sympathy this afternoon.
Just because he hid his hurts behind a facade of cool irony did not mean he felt them less keenly or deserved less compassion than others who freely bared their wounds. She of all people should know that.
If only she could convince Lord Daventry to give her another chance.
Chapter Three
Damn his fool pride! Lucius chided himself as he strove to ignore the hopeful light in his grandfather’s eyes.
“Carruthers tells me you went out riding this afternoon.” the earl glanced up from his book. “In the direction of Netherstowe.”
Lucius glared at the ancient valet who stood behind his grandfather’s chair. “Plenty of places lie east of here besides Netherstowe.”
“True.” The faint specter of a smile passed across the earl’s face as he cocked one gray brow. “But that is where you went, isn’t it?”
“What if I did?” Lucius turned to stare out one of the tall narrow windows of Helmhurst’s library. A thick bank of clouds had blown in from the west, shrouding the sun’s earlier brilliant glare. “Perhaps I was curious to discover whether Miss Lacewood bore any resemblance to the paragon you’ve been touting so continuously.”
He’d discovered that Angela Lacewood bore a strong resemblance to the sunshine from which he shrank—too warm and bright for a creature of the night to bear.
“And what was your verdict, my boy?” Beneath the mild, polite-sounding inquiry, Lucius detected a gloating note in his grandfather’s voice.
He meant to dismiss the young lady with some wry quip, only to hear himself murmur, “You scarcely did her justice.”
“I beg your pardon?” said the earl, though Lucius suspected he had heard.
Turning back toward his grandfather, Lucius spoke louder, exaggerating his words. “Pleasant enough, I suppose, if one’s tastes are that way inclined.”
The earl closed his book. “And yours are not?”
Lucius knew his grandfather well enough to read the subtle signs of disappointment on those wrinkled patrician features.
“Once, perhaps.” Moving toward the old man’s chair, Lucius shot Carruthers a look that bid him leave the two of them alone.
“Ring if you need anything, my lord,” muttered the valet as he shuffled out of the library.
Lucius settled himself onto the footstool by the earl’s favorite chair. How many hours of his boyhood had he spent on that footstool, while his grandfather had read to him?
A raw place in his heart gave a twinge. Too soon his grandfather would be gone and he would be all alone in the world. By his own choice, but alone just the same.
“I suppose you won’t leave off asking until I tell you about it.” A rueful sigh escaped from Lucius. “The truth is, I went over to Netherstowe to propose to your delightful Miss Lacewood.”
Perhaps if he admitted what had occurred—an expurgated version of events, at least—it would lay the earl’s matchmaking schemes to rest once and for all. Then Lucius would proceed to do everything else in his power to make his grandfather’s last months happy.
“Well done, dear boy!” The earl’s face remained impassive, yet it lit with a joyful radiance that Lucius regretted he would soon have to snuff out. “You’ll never repent your choice, I promise you. My young friend is a rare jewel.”
Lucius did not tell his grandfather that he already repented his interview with Angela Lacewood. She had provoked a vague sense of discontent within him, one he could not afford to entertain.
“She has certainly improved since I saw her last.” Lucius knew he must disabuse his grandfather of the ridiculous notion that Miss Lacewood had accepted him, but he could not bring himself to do it straight away. “She used to remind me of a plump brown rabbit with her round face and long teeth.”
“Winsome little creatures, rabbits,” said the earl. “Soft. Timid.”
“Not quite as helpless as they look, though.” Lucius remembered having one as a pet in his younger years. “Those back legs can deliver a nasty scratch if you’re not careful how you pick them up.”
The earl gave a soft, wheezy chuckle. “Even the meekest of creatures must defend itself when cornered.”
He reached out and patted his grandson’s hand. “Turned you down, did she? Well, never mind. I proposed to your grandmother four times before she got tired of refusing me. Fortunately we Daventry men are a patient lot.”
Lucius glanced up at the portrait of his grandmother that hung above the library mantelpiece. Though not strictly beautiful, she’d had a certain glow the artist had managed to capture.
“You had so little time with her,” Lucius mused aloud. “Did you ever wish you’d married a lady with a more robust constitution?”
For a moment, he wondered if the earl would answer so intimate a question. They had never been given to speaking of such matters. Lucius could not suppress a sense of gratitude to Angela Lacewood for having opened a door that had previously been closed between them.
“At first,” the earl admitted. “But less and less as the years passed. Certain people burrow themselves deep into one’s heart, and their going leaves a greater void on that account. Better a heart riddled with such holes, I think, than one perfectly intact…untouched.”
His grandfather made it sound so simple. Lucius knew better.
When a man’s heart was in danger of becoming nothing but a collection of holes, wasn’t he obliged to protect the tattered remnants he had left?
“About Miss Lacewood, Grandfather…”
He’d better have out with it—admit he’d fled like a coward before Angela Lacewood had a chance to refuse him a second time. Somehow he must make his grandfather understand that he could not go begging her repeatedly.
Before he could finish what he’d started to say, a discreet knock sounded on the library door and the earl’s valet peered in. “Miss Lacewood to see you, my lords.”
The earl set his book aside and rose to his feet rather unsteadily. “Bring her in, Carruthers, by all means. The dear girl hardly needs to stand on ceremony after all these years.”
Angela Lacewood breezed into the library, looking a trifle windblown but all the more attractive for it. “I hope you don’t mind my arriving out of the blue, my lord, but this seems to be a day for unexpected visits.”
When she held out her hand to him, the earl raised her fingers to his lips. “The only thing more pleasant than anticipating a regular visit from you, my dear, is receiving a surprise one.”
As she lavished the earl with a fond smile of dazzling intensity, Miss Lacewood cast Lucius a fleeting glance in which he perceived sorrow, valiantly restrained. So she did have some skill in masking her emotions, as she’d claimed.
Lucius was grateful that her pretense of felicity appeared to convince the earl.
Carruthers fetched her a chair and set it close to his master’s. When she thanked him with greater warmth than so small a service merited, the desiccated old stick beamed from ear to ear as he tottered back out of the library.
To his bafflement, Lucius felt a sharp, savage little twist deep in his gut. Surely it could not be anything so absurd as…envy?
“Do sit down, my dear.” The earl indicated the chair his valet had brought for her. “You sound a trifle winded.”
Angela had run most of the way from Netherstowe, yet it was only when she’d caught sight of Lucius Daventry again that she had found herself unaccountably breathless.
“Thank you, my lord.” She lowered herself onto the seat, as the earl settled back into his favorite chair. “You’re always such an attentive host.”
Lord Daventry did not resume his seat on the footstool from which he had risen so abruptly when she’d entered the room. Instead he skulked some distance away with his hands clasped behind his back, regarding her with an expression of thinly veiled wariness.
Clearly her unexpected arrival had put him on his guard, the way his appearance at Netherstowe had put Angela on hers. Forgetting for a moment her intent to show the man some compassion, she wondered how he liked this taste of his own medicine.
Perhaps he feared she might break down and tell the earl of his doctor’s dire prediction. If so, Lord Daventry had vastly underestimated her.
The next words out of his mouth disabused Angela of that notion. “Shall I give the two of you some privacy to enjoy your visit?”
Though the stiffness of his question irritated her, she saw past it and silently chided herself. Lord Daventry had been enjoying a quiet, private moment with his beloved grandfather, which she had interrupted. How many more such moments might they have in the coming weeks?
“Please don’t go, my lord!”
“No indeed,” insisted the earl in a voice that must have once been rich and resonant like his grandson’s but which now put Angela in mind of threadbare satin. “It is not as though Miss Lacewood has come courting me. I should be the one to withdraw and give the two of you a private moment.”
He shook his head and gave a soft chuckle. “But I don’t intend to.”
Angela fought a losing battle against the stinging blush that crept into her cheeks. At the same time, a yawning emptiness gaped within her, one that she sensed was but a foretaste of the bottomless void her dear friend’s passing would create in her life.
“I leave subtlety to the young,” said the earl. “You have time for it. At my age, I fear one must be indelicately frank if one expects to achieve one’s aims.”
He wagged his forefinger at Angela. “So no maidenly evasion about what brought you to Helmhurst, my dear. I hope you won’t hold it against my grandson that he told me he proposed to you.”
“Grandfather!” barked Lord Daventry.
The earl dismissed his grandson’s protest with a slight wave of his hand. “Carruthers and I extracted the confession under torture, of that you may be certain.”
For some reason the dry quip made Angela’s eyes prickle with tears she dared not shed.
Perhaps Lord Daventry sensed her distress, for he provided her a reasonable cover. “Please, Grandfather, you are embarrassing Miss Lacewood.”
She raised a hand to shield her brow, which gave her the moment she needed to compose herself.
“Is that so, my dear?” The earl sounded both surprised and contrite. “Well, you must pardon me as an old friend and an old fool. You know I’d never willingly do anything to distress you.”
Angela reached for his hand. She would not see the earl’s final months marred by the least shadow that was within her power to dispel.
“I’ve never doubted your kind intentions toward me, sir.” She hoped he would attribute any slight moisture in her eyes to excessive modesty. “It’s just that this has all taken me so greatly by surprise. I had no idea Lord Daventry knew of my existence, let alone that he entertained…tender feelings for me.”
She stole a glance in the baron’s direction only to find his gaze averted. His demeanor appeared as imperturbable as ever, yet it reminded Angela of the smooth surface of simmering water just prior to boiling.
She almost fancied she could hear his thoughts—Tender feelings, indeed!
Somehow, believing she had flustered him, even a little, restored a bit of her composure, which he had so thoroughly rattled.
The earl seemed to enjoy sporting with his grandson, too. “You may depend upon it that I have made my grandson favorably aware of your existence, dear child.”
“I hope you have not sung my praises so loud that Lord Daventry finds I cannot live up to your account of me.”
“On the contrary,” replied the earl with obvious relish. “He said I failed to do you justice.”
“Really, Grandfather!” cried Lord Daventry, confirming Angela’s suspicion about the simmering water. “If you mean to go on like this, then perhaps one of us should make himself scarce.”
“Nonsense.” The earl showed no sign of repentance. “What is wrong with relaying a word of praise to a young lady so vastly deserving of it.”
He turned to Angela. “No wonder you refused him, my dear, with that attitude. I expect his marriage proposal had all the romantic trappings of a legal writ.”
“Enough of this.” Lord Daventry stalked toward the library door. “I shall leave the pair of you to abuse me to your hearts’ content.”
A sickening tide of shame propelled Angela out of her chair to come between Lucius Daventry and his means of escape. “Please, my lord, don’t go.”
Though she knew her next words would probably vex him, she could not fathom why. Not that it mattered, for she could not bite them back. “I’m sorry. We didn’t mean to torment you, truly.”
“Speak for yourself, girl.” The earl leaned farther back in his chair, resting his chin against his clasped hands. “I have been chaffing my grandson like this since he was half his present size. He’s never taken an ounce of umbrage until today, which may betray his partiality for you.”
Angela cast the earl a look of pretended severity. “I think you had better stop it before you change his opinion of me.”
She raised her eyes to Lord Daventry. “Shall we punish your grandfather by going away to talk in private?”
The corners of the baron’s firm lips raised ever so slightly. “It would serve him right, the old meddler.”
“Away with you, then.” The earl made a great show of picking up a book from the small table beside his chair. “Be warned, though, I am apt to sulk.”
He was only teasing, Angela knew, but since this was all meant to be for his benefit, she did not want the earl to miss a moment of their performance.
“In that case—” She addressed herself to Lord Daventry “—I came to tell you that I hope you did not mistake my hesitation in accepting your proposal as a sign that I meant to refuse. From what your grandfather has said, I fear you have.”
“I could scarcely blame you,” the baron replied. “My grandfather is right—it was badly done on my part and far too precipitous. I…apologize.”
“Does that mean you wish to withdraw your offer?” she asked, not entirely certain how she hoped he would answer.
Before Lord Daventry could reply, the earl spoke up. “Not unless he wishes me to hurl this book at his head.”
Perhaps the baron heard the gleeful ring in his grandfather’s voice, for his compelling green gaze searched hers, wordlessly inquiring if she could tolerate the two of them going on like this for…as long as necessary.
He had said her face was an open book. Now Angela hoped he could read her unspoken response, for suddenly she knew what answer she wanted from him.
“My offer stands, Miss Lacewood.” He held out his hand to her. “And not because I entertain any fear of my grandfather braining me with his volume of Rasselas.”
When she placed her hand in his, Lord Daventry bowed over it, grazing her fingers with his lips. The chaste gesture made Angela feel as if she were a saucer brimming with syllabub—frothy and intoxicating.
“In that case, Lord Daventry, I accept.” Before she realized what she was doing, Angela raised his hand to her lips to seal their bargain.
