Barbara Metzger (8 page)

When St. Cloud came back, Juneclaire found it the most natural thing in the world that he should hold his arms open and she should walk into them. He wrapped his greatcoat around her, rubbed her back, and feathered kisses on the top of her head until the trembling stopped.

“I’ll never be a disbeliever again, Junco,” he murmured into her hair, sending shivers through her again, but not from the cold this time. “And you must have been very, very good to compensate for my wickedness, to get our wishes answered so quickly.”

“I don’t understand.” She didn’t understand any of the feelings she was feeling either.

“Your wish, Miss Beaumont, for a place of your own. It’s cold and dreary, but I’m sure you can change that in jig time with one of your smiles. They work for me, you know.”

Juneclaire looked up at him in such muddled confusion, he had to kiss the tip of her nose, which was cold, so he held her closer still. “My house, goose. Your house when we marry.”

She pulled back as far as his arms would let her, perhaps a quarter of an inch. “Oh, pooh, you don’t have to marry me. I know you were being honorable and all that for Ned’s benefit, but he’ll never talk. You put the fear of God into him.”

“God would be more forgiving if he doesn’t get back. And I was not being honorable just for Ned. I am a gentleman, as I keep reminding you. The boy won’t talk soon, but someone might see us in the morning, and sooner or later he’d mention your name. You have to be a respectable married lady by then.”

“But you cannot want to marry me.”

“To be honest, I haven’t wanted to marry anyone, but why not you? You are kind and brave and loyal, and handy with a bucket. You’re beautiful and you make me smile. What more could I ask? You’ll be getting the worst of the bargain, but I need you to make my wish come true.”

“All those responsibilities and people dragging at you?”

“Exactly. One of my responsibilities is to produce an heir, and now you’ll keep me safe from all the match-making mamas and predatory females.”

“Silly.”

No one had ever called the Earl of St. Cloud silly before. No female had ever fit so perfectly next to his heart before. No matter what he told Juneclaire, he’d known their fates were sealed from the moment she stepped into his carriage and proved to be a lady. The matrimonial noose had been tightening around his neck with every mile until he could barely draw in his last gasps of freedom. Now the idea did not seem so bad, as he whispered reassurances in her ear until she fell asleep in his arms, his greatcoat spread over both of them. The pig whiffled in the corncrib.

T
he earl awoke to the sound of church bells. The sun was well up, but St. Cloud did not want to disturb Juneclaire by searching out his fob watch. She still slept next to him under the greatcoat, not even the top of her head showing. St. Cloud shut his eyes again to savor the feeling. He almost never woke with a woman in his arms, never caring to stay the night with any of his paramours. Now he thought he might enjoy starting the days this way. Not with unfulfilled desires, naturally, but a special license would take care of that problem. He expected the other, the feeling of comfort and joy, just like the old carol they sang last night, to last for the next fifty or sixty years. God rest ye merry gentlemen.

Time didn’t matter anyway. St. Cloud was already long overdue at the Priory, and Juneclaire had no coach to catch in Bramley, even if they were running. And the boy had returned. He could hear Ned whistling about his tasks and jingling harness. Tactful lad.

St. Cloud wondered what Juneclaire would be like in the mornings. Some women, he knew, were querulous if roused early. Not even the earl dared approach the dowager Lady St. Cloud until Grandmother had her fortifying chocolate. Others, like his cousin Elsbeth, were vain of their looks until safely in their dressers’ hands, and his mother had to lie abed all afternoon if forced to bestir herself before noon. Junco was not temperamental, conceited, or missish. St. Cloud could not wait to find her reaction to being kissed awake like Sleeping Beauty. He himself woke up amorous.

He raised the coat to stroke her smooth cheek—and his hands touched hair more bristly than his own side-whiskers. His eyes jerked open to stare into little red-rimmed beady ones, with absurdly long white eyelashes.

St. Cloud jumped up. Pansy jumped up. St. Cloud shouted: “What the hell!” And the pig raced off with a piercing whee that sounded like the gates of hell swinging shut.

“Stop that, you confounded animal,” the earl ordered. “You weren’t hurt, so quit overplaying your part, you ham. Your mistress must be out talking with Ned, so you’re wasting your time trying to get sympathy.” St. Cloud felt he was the one who deserved pitying, denied the pleasure of waking his bride-to-be. On his way out of the barn he tossed Pansy an apple saved from Juneclaire’s hoard the night before. “There, and don’t tell anyone I tried to kiss a pig good morning!”

Juneclaire wasn’t polishing tack with Ned. She must be using the convenience, or be out by the pump, washing. This would be the last time in her life she’d use icy water or sleep on the ground, St. Cloud vowed.

Ned jumped off the upturned barrel and touched his cap. Then he fumbled in his pocket and withdrew St. Cloud’s ring. “Here, my lord. I was back by first light, I swear, but you didn’t say nothing ’bout waking you up.”

The earl could see that the curricle was clean and shining in the wintry sun. The boy must have been back for hours, working outside in the cold. “Thank you,” he acknowledged, nodding toward the equipage, and Ned blushed with pride. He was no more than twelve or thirteen, St. Cloud saw now by light of day, though tall for his age. He shouldn’t have been out riding the roads all night, damn it, but he shouldn’t have been mixed up with highwaymen either.

“Did you have any trouble?” the earl asked.

“Nary a bit. That widder lady went back toward Bramley, and the innkeeper sent her to Lord Cantwell at High Oaks to report the robbery. She was still kicking up a dust over to the manor. Magistrate was having to give her hospitality for the night, it seems, ’cause she was too afrighted to go back on the roads and had no money for the inn. He was right pleased to see me with the widder’s purse and sparklers, I can tell you that.”

“And what did he say about Charlie?”

“He said good riddance to bad rubbish, is what. Charlie’d been poaching up at High Oaks for as long as I can remember, only Cantwell’s man could never catch him. His lordship being magistrate and all, he had to have proof. Charlie Parrett was too smart for that.”

“If he was so smart, he should have stuck to poaching instead of going on the high toby.”

Ned scuffed his worn boots in the dirt. “I reckon. Anyways, Charlie was right about his lordship and his Christmas dinner. Magistrate said he’d come out tomorrow to look over the place. No hurry today, with Charlie dead and the killer long gone, he said. And the widder had her money back, so he could stop her caterwauling and send her on her way before she curdled the cream for his pudding. Takes his supper serious, Lord Cantwell does.”

“Very well, and if you just volunteer as little information as possible when he does arrive, the whole thing should blow over shortly. You can play dumb, can’t you?”

The boy grinned at him. “Seems I’ve had a heap of practice, my lord.”

“Quite. And did you do as well at the Fighting Cock?” He hadn’t put his ring on yet, just turned it in his hand. “Did that innkeeper give you any trouble?”

“Nary a bit, once he saw the brass. And I saw your groom, too.” Ned looked away. “I wanted to make sure he was, you know, not mangled or nothing. He was sitting in the taproom, happy as a grig, Wilton’s daughters making a fuss over him on account of the bandage on his head. Said he slept the day through, then woke up for supper right as rain. He was glad to get your letter, I could tell, and wanted particular to know the horses was safe.”

“Trust Foley to care more for the chestnuts than for me.”

“Prime ’uns they are for true. I brushed them down quietlike this morning while you were sleeping. But he asked about you, too. Said he didn’t recognize me a bit, so I was thinking I was home free, till he wanted to know why I wasn’t wearing livery, and if I wasn’t from the Priory, where’d I meet up with you and where’d you get the blunt to pay his shot and hire him a carriage. I didn’t know what you wanted me to say, him being your man and all, so I did what you said just now and played dumb. He thinks I’m stupider’n a rock,” Ned complained, “what doesn’t even know its way home.” He paused to look up at the man who towered over him. “Is it true you’re St. Cloud? The earl hisself, who owns half the county?”

St. Cloud cursed. He wished Foley’s head had been hit just a mite harder. “I am the earl, yes, but nowhere near as wealthy as all that.”

The boy whistled through his teeth. “St. Cloud hisself,” he marveled. “And I brushed your horses. Wait till I tell Ma.”

“You’ll tell her nothing of the sort,” the earl ordered, but knew the boy would burst if he didn’t tell his mother, so tacked on, “until I am long gone. You’ll have to figure a way to tell her without mentioning the robbery. A carriage accident, I think, and you helped. That way you can explain about the money for her doctor.” He flipped the boy two gold coins. “But don’t mention the lady with me.”

Ned looked confused. “The lady?”

“Excellent, boy. You’ll have that rock perfect yet. Now tell me, did you send Miss Beaumont to the farmhouse to freshen up? We should be on the road soon, lest Cantwell decide to do his civic duty between meals after all.”

Ned was shaking his head no, and St. Cloud suddenly felt an emptiness in the pit of his stomach that had nothing to do with hunger. “She’s not at the house?” He raced around the barn to the well, Ned and Pansy on his heels. St. Cloud spun back and grabbed the boy’s thin shoulders. “Tell me you gave her directions to a stream or something where she’s gone.”

White-faced, Ned shook his head again. “She . . . she wasn’t here when I came back, sir. I thought you knew.”

The earl ran back to the barn to search the stalls in case she woke up and realized the impropriety of sleeping next to him. Maybe he snored. Maybe . . .

Her things were gone, except for Pansy and the blue blanket. And a page from his notepad, stuck on a nail in the stall where they’d slept. St. Cloud sank down on a bale of hay while he read.

St. Cloud cursed and threw his ring across the barn, the ring he was going to give her as proof that
her
Christmas wish was coming true. Pansy chased it, chuffing at the new game, nosing in the straw until she found it.

“Botheration,” he raged. “The blasted animal will likely eat the damn thing and choke. Then Junco will have my head for sure.” As he traded the last apple for his ring, St. Cloud realized he was thinking of Miss Beaumont in the future, not the past. Never the past, gone and forgotten. He was going after her.

He wiped his slimy, gritty ring on his sleeve—the once elegant greatcoat was ready for the dustbin after these two days anyway—then put it on his own finger, until he found Juneclaire and could place it on hers. After he strangled the chit.

“Fiend seize it, she must have been gone for hours! She could be halfway to London by now if Bramley is as close as you said.” The boy nodded from the doorway, miserably aware that he should have awakened the gentleman ages ago. He wiped his nose on his shirtsleeve, to his lordship’s further disgust. The earl stomped back to the stall where his pistol and his flask lay.

“After all my efforts to keep her out of this scandalbroth,” he growled, “she has to go make mice feet of her reputation. The Devil only knows what she’ll say about Charlie Parrett or you.”

Ned was inching along the railing in the barn, not sure whether to flee his lordship’s wrath or stay to take the pig home after the furious gent butchered it. Ma’d be right pleased to have fresh ham for Christmas dinner and bacon for Easter. Mention of Charlie Parrett stopped him in his tracks. “Me? You think she’ll go to the magistrate and turn me in?” His voice was so high, it cracked. “But she didn’t want to last night.”

“No, brat, she won’t peach on you on purpose. She’s got bottom. But if she comes from this way, the good citizens in Bramley are bound to ask if she saw anything. And how is she going to explain being on her own? And if I go after her, there are certain to be more questions.”

“Naw, no one’d dare quiz a fine swell like you.” Ned didn’t mention that most of the villagers would run inside and slam their doors rather than ask such a fierce-looking, arrogant nobleman what he was doing in their midst.