How To Rescue A Rake (Book Club Belles Society 3) (10 page)

Nathaniel, however, said whatever he wished to say. In the past, his ebullient nature had forced her to speak even when she should have remained silent. She knew that was part of what made him dangerous, as far as her mother was concerned. He made Diana want to say things she ought not to. His spirit was infectious.

The balance of the world was unfairly tipped to the benefit of men, she thought with a burst of sharp anger. They could come and go when they pleased, say and do much as they wanted without reproach. She, for instance, had broken off an engagement in the most polite and kindest way possible with a man who clearly did not care much for her anyway and who became engaged to another much younger and richer woman within a fortnight. Yet
Diana
had been the target of gossip; she was the one who was punished. Her behavior was tut-tutted over, not his. Apparently William Shaw was merely doing what came naturally to the male animal.

Speaking of which…oh Lord…Nathaniel was advancing toward her. “Prowling toward her” might be a more accurate description for this particular animal.

Her heart thumped, obscuring all other sound in the room.

Once again, escaping from the corked bottle in which she kept it, the memory of his forbidden kiss seized her in its heated grip. As her lips touched the rim of her wineglass, she felt his flesh instead of cut crystal. The savage desire in his kiss haunted her. Why had she not prevented it? He’d kissed her
after
she rejected his proposal, when she could not possibly have expected it. His audacity had left her frozen in astonishment. So much so that she was unable to sleep that night after it happened. Instead she’d lain awake, reliving his proposal and fighting strange sensations of which her mama would never approve.

The next morning her friends came to tell her that Nathaniel was gone without even saying good-bye. That kiss was all he left behind, and Diana had resigned herself to never having another like it.

Nor did she want one, thank you very much.

Now he came here again to torment her and reopen that dangerous memory. Did he remember the stolen kiss, or was it just another mistake regretted the next morning?

On his course across the room Nathaniel was halted a few times by ladies eager to converse with him. As always he charmed and joked. The ladies ate it up. It was thoroughly ridiculous, really. An embarrassment to womanhood.

His progress had begun again and he was looking at her. Diana looked around for somewhere to go, away from his trajectory. She should have found an escape by now since it was taking him long enough to arrive before her, but her legs refused to take her away.

He stopped again to whisper something to his brother-in-law, and then Lucius Wainwright nodded and left the room.

The troublesome rogue male had not taken his eyes off her and continued to advance toward her.

Perhaps he intended to pour himself some wine. She finally moved away from the decanter of Madeira, but he did not reach for a glass. He stopped and it was plain that he meant to speak to her.

The scoundrel seemed taller than she remembered. Was it the new clothes that gave him such a powerful aura this evening? The high collar of his dark burgundy evening jacket, the ruffled, cream silk cravat, the waistcoat patterned with lines of vertical gold thread, the perfectly fitted breeches that showed off the fine musculature of his thighs? He’d always been handsome in his uniform, but this was new and different. It didn’t shout for attention, but instead gave him an air of quiet confidence and authority.

Superficial change, of course, as her mother said.

“Miss Makepiece,” he murmured, “I have taken the liberty of asking my brother-in-law if the carriage might be brought around for you and your mother.”

She squinted, not really wanting to take all of him in. This close. “Oh. Yes?”

“You’ve been here quite long enough, I think.”

He was getting rid of her, pushing her out the door, the sight of her heinous to him now. All the blood seemed to have drained out of her. All the life.

“How nice of you to see me off, Captain.” Unlike three years ago, she thought angrily, when he didn’t even say good-bye. Just because she had told him a few unvarnished truths he didn’t care to hear.

“My sister tells me you walked here in the rain and that you are only recently recovered from a bad cold.”

“That must have been a very dull conversation for you.”

“I was told I should stick to your health and the weather.” He gave her an odd, brief smile. “So I thought I did rather well by combining the two subjects.”

“I appreciate the thought, Captain.” She hoped he had not seen her hand trembling, but as she tried to set the glass down, he reached to take it. The tips of his fingers touched hers and wine spilled on the sideboard.

“Sarah was about to ask you to play again, and I saw you were not up to it,” he said.

Diana stared at his long fingers touching hers, the skin several rich shades darker than her own. She couldn’t breathe. Once when she was very young, a lightning bolt had struck the ground not far from where she stood. It had made her entire body sing and the little downy hairs on her arm lift. Nathaniel’s touch had an identical effect.

“But I knew you could not say no,” he added. “Not to her, in any case.”

Looking up, she was caught in the blue flames of his regard as they tore into her briefly and then his eyelids lowered. Just in time, because Diana’s mother was upon them in the next moment.

Nathaniel bowed sharply and walked away.

“What did
he
want?” her mother demanded.

Diana took a breath at last, life returning to fill her lungs. “He has asked for Mr. Lucius Wainwright’s carriage to take us home. He must have seen that I was tired, I suppose.” She still felt that purring hum vibrating through her bones. It made everything in the room seem brighter and louder. Herself included.

“You have not had anything to eat. Your health will not improve if you don’t eat, Diana. There is plenty of—”

“Mama, I have no appetite. Please don’t fuss! For pity’s sake, I don’t want anything to eat.”

Her mother’s eyes sharpened. “There is no need to raise your voice, Diana.”

Contrite, she closed her lips tightly.

“It is just as well we are leaving,” her mother remarked with a sniff. “You must be overtired. I knew we shouldn’t have come, and against my better judgment, I let you persuade me.”

Diana wanted to laugh. As if
she
had ever wielded the force of persuasion. She wouldn’t know how to begin.

On the journey home, she stared through the carriage window, her head spinning, her heart beating like an overwound clock that would soon burst a spring and send cogwheels flying all over.

He had touched her fingers and looked at her with those stormy eyes full of…what? Anger? Scorn? Nathaniel seemed altered in some ways. Older, calmer, sterner. She almost caught herself wishing he had not changed so much, for the changes confused her. She knew how to manage the merry, carefree Nathaniel of years past, but this one presented challenges.

Exhausted by the many different pains he’d caused simply by saying a few words to her, Diana was relieved to be leaving his irritating presence. She pressed her aching head back against the swaying wall of the carriage, hoping this dizziness would soon pass.

“So this is the Wainwrights’ new carriage,” her mother muttered, running a gloved hand over the well-padded leather seat. “Astonishing what some folk will waste their money on. But then the Wainwrights have no need to budget.”

Diana sighed. “Doesn’t it make you wonder, Mama, why God lets some folk become so rich while the majority of us are poor?”

Her mother’s answer was a pert: “It’s not the money one has that is important, Diana, but what one does with it. How one acts when in possession of wealth.”

Diana let her head roll from side to side with the motion of the carriage. “And what would you do with it, Mama? If we were rich?”

There was a lengthy pause. Just when she thought her mother would dismiss the question as frivolous and accuse Diana of drinking too much wine, she was surprised to receive the sudden, loud, and adamant response, “I would not shell another pea. I know that much!”

While Diana choked on a chuckle, her mother added, “And I would get a peacock.”

“To eat?”

“No, foolish girl! To walk about the lawn with its pretty tail on display.” Her mother’s voice had turned positively dreamy as she looked out the window at the dusk-shaded view. “I always rather fancied having a peacock when I was a girl.”

Diana stayed silent, too amused by this odd confession to risk spoiling the moment.

…He was not altered, or not for the worse. She had already acknowledged it to herself, and she could not think differently, let him think of her as he would. No; the years which had destroyed her youth and bloom had only given him a more glowing, manly, open look, in no respect lessening his personal advantages…

“So altered that he should not have known her again!” These were words which could not but dwell with her. Yet she soon began to rejoice that she had heard them. They were of sobering tendency; they allayed agitation; they composed, and consequently must make her happier.

—Persuasion

“It’s been decided! We are holding our book society meeting out of doors today,” Sarah exclaimed, dashing through the door. “We’re having a picnic! Isn’t it a wonderful idea?”

Diana frowned. “What if it rains?”

“Oh, it won’t,” replied Sarah with the blissful naiveté of the very young. “Look, the sun is out.”

As if that ever meant much at all. Sometimes Diana thought she was the only Book Club Belle with caution in her soul these days. Again she missed Cathy. “Yes, but—”

“Come on, Diana, make haste! Put on your bonnet. We are all going to Raven’s Hill in the cart. What fun we shall have. This will surely put some color back in your cheeks, poor Diana!”

Poor Diana.

How often had she heard that lately? It may as well be marked on her forehead.

There was barely time to slip into her coat, grab
Persuasion
from the parlor table, and let her mother—who was working in the vegetable garden that morning—know she was going out.

Mrs. Makepiece looked up from pulling weeds, shaded her eyes from the sun with one hand, and advised Diana not to sit on any damp grass. In a tolerant mood for once, perhaps enjoying the improved weather, she raised no objection to the idea of a picnic or of her daughter going out without her. She didn’t even feel it necessary to warn about suspicious gypsies or unscrupulous strangers they might meet on the road.

Since last night and the party at Willow Tree Farm, Diana’s mother had been full of gossip about Nathaniel, harvested mostly from the parson’s chatty wife.

“Mrs. Kenton saw him at the Manderson assembly dance with an infamous adulteress,” she’d told Diana at breakfast. “Naturally he had the gall to deny his own name when she confronted him there, but she knew who he was. He couldn’t fool her. He’s up to no good, of course. Why else would he pretend to be someone else? He keeps his common mistress shut away in Manderson, out of sight, while he parades about here in those fancy clothes waiting for fish to bite. I knew he had not changed.”

Thus Diana learned of the existence of his tawdry companion ensconced at the Royal Oak. It was no more or less than she should have expected from the rake, and it barely caused her an intake of breath. She was able to ask her mama which jam she wanted from the pantry without even a blink or a long pause to betray her reaction to this news.

“What would Mr. Bridges have to say if he knew about the adulteress, I wonder,” her mother had added.

“Mr. Bridges? What could it signify to him?”

“Captain Sherringham came back here in fancy clothes to court an unsuspecting bride. And we may all guess who he has his eye on now. That flirtatious, idle creature at the tavern. He ran off with her once before, if memory serves.”

“Mama, that is a slight exaggeration. Lucy rode to Manderson one morning without telling anyone, just because she was feeling ignored and unappreciated. Captain Sherringham happened to travel the same road that day when he left Hawcombe Prior. He found her and sent her home again quite safe.”

“That’s the formal story her family came up with. You mark my words, there can be only one reason for the captain to call on Mr. Bridges while the tavern is closed for business. I daresay the family would welcome anybody taking that girl off their hands. They cannot afford to be too particular.”

She had buttered her toast with firm swipes of the knife. “At least we know the captain will not bother you again. He told Sarah Wainwright that he found you so altered he would never have recognized you.”

Diana caught her breath and spooned a large helping of jam onto her toast. “I neither expected nor wanted to be noticed again by Captain Sherringham. The thought never crossed my mind.”

“I would hope not. Don’t use too much jam, Diana. We’re almost out of the raspberry, and there won’t be any more until it’s made this summer.”

As her mother’s thoughts turned to making jam, she was almost cheerful for once—an unnatural state that hovered precariously like a china cup on an ill-balanced saucer. Diana felt it necessary to be as quiet as possible and do nothing to upset the tilt of that delicate saucer. Perhaps leaving the house for a few hours would be a good thing.

As she followed Sarah out the front gate, she saw her friends gathered in “the cart”—a sturdy but not very comfortable vehicle generally used to transport Luke Wainwright’s pigs and sheep to and from the market. Today it was filled with fresh straw bales and loaded with a different, more fragrant cargo. Apparently the fine new carriage could not be spared for their jaunt—or else Rebecca and Jussy had decided this would be more fun. The latter was the more likely scenario.

The group gathered in the back of the cart was rather noisy and excited that morning, because all the children had been brought out too. Justina explained, “My Wainwright simply refused to have the girls at home with him again today, and it’s the nursemaid’s half day.”

Rebecca sat in the front to drive the horses, and Justina leaned out from the back to help Diana up. She was immediately clambered upon by the children, of whom she was very fond. The little ones did not care what clothes a person wore or how much of a fortune they had, or whether they had a great number of clever things to say. As long as there was a warm, welcoming lap and the possibility of a game or two, they were happy.

Lucy was already seated on a straw bale, eagerness adding natural color to her cheeks today. As she said, at least this meeting was taking place in a new location and therefore had a sense of novelty about it. “Your mama’s parlor can get awfully stuffy, Diana. And goodness knows, you could benefit from some spring air too! Poor thing. How wilted you are from the lack of sun.”

The cart pulled forward with a sudden jerk that almost knocked her off her straw bale seat. Everyone else squealed with excitement, Rebecca yelled a hasty apology, and then they were off at a slow, rather bumpy pace.

The air was warm that morning, the birds singing merrily. Diana glanced up at the sky and saw only a few fleecy clouds rolling by, nothing to threaten rain. Yet. She tried to be as carefree as the others, for they would not want her dour warnings casting a shadow on their day out.

“I know,” shouted Sarah, “let’s sing a song!”

Inwardly Diana cringed. She loved her friends dearly but few of them could hold a note. The more excited they were, the noisier they were, and they liked their music the same way. Diana had been told that she had a very musical ear, but since she was rarely given the chance to hear music played flawlessly, or without someone yelling or stamping over it, this advantage seemed destined to be wasted.

She had seen a sketch once in the newspaper of a concert performance, during which the audience was seated and apparently attentive while the orchestra played and a luxuriously curved Italian lady sang.
That would be nice
, she thought wistfully. Just to listen to the music for once and not be correcting someone’s playing.

Her friends, meanwhile, made their own music fearlessly, not caring who heard or how offended a sensitively tuned ear might be.

At least her mama needn’t worry about highwaymen and bandits on the turnpike road, Diana mused. Anyone who thought of apprehending them would hear this noise and surely run for cover.

* * *

Nathaniel called at the tavern that morning to leave his condolences for the family. Mr. Bridges, he soon discovered, was out—called to a meeting with the solicitor in Manderson—but his wife was more than happy to welcome a visitor. She was very like her daughter: she loved company and her spirits had suffered from the loss of it during this mourning period.

“You must come to dine with us, Captain,” she exclaimed, eyeing his fine suit of clothes and the silver pin in his cravat. “I know Lucy will be overjoyed to see you. She has talked about little else since you left. It’s Captain this and Captain that. Never stops!”

“Really?” He smiled at that, doubting it very much. Lucy was the sort to forget about anything once it was not immediately before her, and it had been more than three years since he was last in her presence.

“Although she will be disappointed that you are no longer in your red coat. My daughter has always had a great fondness for soldiers.”

Now that he
could
believe. He’d met a lot of young girls like Lucy hanging around army camps. But he suspected it would not be considered gentlemanly to make such an observation, so he said, “Are you sure your husband wouldn’t object if I join you for dinner? You are, after all, still grieving for your mother’s passing.”

She flapped her hand at him. “I think we’ve all suffered enough for it, and he cannot begrudge us ladies a little good company.” Again she eyed his silver pin. “The best sort of company. For our dear Lucy.”

After agreeing to join them for dinner the following evening—thinking he might afterward have an opportunity to discuss business with the tavern keeper—Nathaniel took his leave of Mrs. Bridges and steered his horse across the common to find the carpenter, Sam Hardacre, standing outside his workshop with a very peevish expression on his face.

“Cap’n Sherringham,” he muttered in sullen greeting as Nathaniel’s horse drew near. “So it’s true and you
are
back.” It didn’t sound as if this caused the fellow much pleasure.

“Mr. Hardacre, I see you’ve expanded your shop premises. I heard about your father’s passing. I’m sorry. He was a good man.”

“Aye, he was.” Sam’s brow darkened in a heavy frown. “Not enough of
them
about.”

“Very true.”

Sam wiped his hands on a rag and glowered up at Nathaniel. “Planning to stay long, Cap’n?”

“Just until I conclude some business with Mr. Bridges.” He was accustomed to people thinking they had some grievance against him. Apparently he had the sort of face that caused people to distrust his motives even when he was perfectly innocent, but he had no idea what he could have done to Sam Hardacre. In fact, as far as he recalled, he’d lost quite a bit of coin to the young man in the past over card games at the tavern. In all likelihood he’d paid for part of the carpenter’s expanded premises, he mused. “I’ll soon leave you all in peace again, never fear.”

“Good. And hopefully as you found us.”

When Nathaniel asked if he’d seen a cartload of young ladies driving by recently, Sam replied snappishly, “I have.” He pointed with the business end of a hammer. “Went up Raven’s Hill.” Then he turned away, shoulders rounded. “I daresay there’s naught I can do about it.”

“Mr. Hardacre, do you have something you wish to say? I believe in a man speaking aloud if there is something preying on his mind. Nothing can be done for those who do not help themselves.”

Sam growled, “I’ve naught to say to you.”

“Excellent. Well, I shall bid you good day.” Frustrated, Nathaniel tipped his hat to the back of the other man’s head and rode off to follow the Book Club Belles on their jaunt.

Gentlemen were usually strictly banned from their little society, but Nathaniel wasn’t one to let rules get in his way. Besides, it had been his idea that they take their meeting outside for a picnic today. He had suggested it to Sarah when they were thinking of ways to get Lucy Bridges out for an airing to improve her spirits.

“What you all need, young lady, is a picnic in the sun,” he’d said. “If Mr. Bridges only lets your friend out for book society meetings, then that must be your chance to cheer her up.”

“Yes,” Sarah had exclaimed, “and how much nicer than sitting in Mrs. Makepiece’s stuffy parlor with her listening through the walls.”

He couldn’t agree more.

Urging his horse into a gallop, he headed for Raven’s Hill.

* * *

It was Diana’s turn to read aloud, although she was constantly interrupted by one or another of her friends’ children, who could not sit still but had to be chasing birds, collecting worms, or drooling on somebody’s muslin every few minutes.

She plowed onward with the bright sun beaming down upon the page. Earlier she’d felt a little improved and had thought the warmth of the day could only help. But nothing worsened a stuffy head more, she now found, than sitting outside surrounded by noisy children and pollen.

Sarah very sweetly offered to hold her parasol over Diana’s head to keep the glare off her page, but the girl was every bit as distracted and inattentive as the little children. Since she kept letting the beaded fringe of her parasol descend over the words being read, it was, all things considered, more time consuming and interruptive than it was useful.

And it was during one of those moments—just as the wobbling, ill-managed parasol tipped once again over Diana’s head, bumped her in the eye, and obscured the words of her book—when a horse could be heard thudding through the grass toward them. Hidden behind this fringed obstruction and waiting for her eye to recover, Diana was prevented from recognizing the new arrival immediately. Therefore, she was also the last to offer any sort of greeting.

Not that the unexpected guest waited for a welcome or apologized for interrupting.

Under the fringe of the parasol, with her smarting eye closed, she watched Nathaniel’s boots dismount, leave his horse in the shade of a tree, and bring his arrogant carcass to sit on the blanket among her friends. His presence stole their attention from the characters in the book, so Diana paused a moment until they were all settled again. Then she read on.

The evening ended with dancing. On its being proposed, Anne offered her services, as usual; and though her eyes would sometimes fill with tears as she sat at the instrument, she was extremely glad to be employed, and desired nothing in return but to be unobserved.