Sharon Sobel (27 page)

Raeborn laughed again. “I should not want you to make a physician of my lady, Ben. It would be most inappropriate.”

“And yet, my lord,” Miss Hathawae interjected, “before the days of our great universities, women practiced the medical arts almost exclusively. In some quarters they still do.”

Raeborn looked across at Miss Hathawae, and Lark felt the warmth of the connection between them.

“And yet, dear lady, I would not have you do such a thing,” he said.

Lark braced herself for some retort from Miss Hathawae, some reminder to Raeborn that what she did or thought was no concern of his. But the lady only smiled secretively and reached out to pat his blue-veined hand. Doubting the veracity of what she witnessed, Lark looked quickly at Ben Queensman, who seemed very thoughtful.

And so they rode along in silence for some time. The great salt marsh was soon supplanted by a chalky cliff, and the road, strewn with the loose rubble of the lime, grew rougher. Lark gripped the side of the carriage to balance herself, and thereby afforded herself a better view of the water. More boats appeared, several flying the king’s colors. Gulls flew overhead, though probably in greater anticipation of a meal than of viewing the monarch. And, in the distance, the strains of a band could be heard.

Suddenly the ground shook with thunder, and Lark looked worriedly at the sky.

Mr. Queensman, who, she sensed, watched her the entire time, quickly reassured her.

“’Tis the noise of cannon fire, a sound I know only too well. But here we need not fear the enemy as we did in America. We need only worry about the great cloud of smoke arising from the artillery of an overzealous welcoming troupe. The cinders could easily soil the ladies’ dresses.”

“That would be most unfortunate,” Raeborn murmured.

“But we may take consolation in the fact that the king already approaches. The militia would not waste gunpowder for nought,” Mr. Queensman said, as if he knew.

Lord Raeborn looked puzzled.

Lark sighed and then turned a little impatiently to her suitor. Would her good sense and intuition be constrained to providing explanations of the obvious throughout her married life?

“It is a valuable commodity, my lord,” she said quietly. “It is best used against our enemies. Or if, as Mr. Queensman says, there are none nearby, to impress the locals in the presence of their monarch.”

Mr. Queensman scowled at her, a rebuff she undoubtedly deserved, inasmuch as he numbered himself among the locals.

“Oh, look. He comes!” cried Miss Hathawae, sounding something like a local herself.

Lark could not help but be fired by her enthusiasm. She pulled herself up to survey the scene before them, and believed them truly at a vantage point, for the Royal Entourage still seemed somewhat distant. But from their windswept bluff, all the colors and pageantry, if not the king himself, were readily apparent. She could see the lines of red-coated militia, and the glint of their golden buttons in the sun, and the burnished brown of well-brushed horses. A large carriage, festooned with flags and ribbons, moved slowly between them, and one could just make out a wigged figure in a bright yellow jacket with one arm uplifted to the crowd. A great cheer went up from the hundreds of people who lined the dusty road, and the figure stood up unsteadily as the carriage continued to move.

“Perhaps we might stay here for a while, and enjoy the view?” suggested Miss Hathawae.

Lark turned to agree with her, but was instead distracted by Mr. Queensman’s sudden movement. He did not dispute Miss Hathawae’s vote, but Lark could see he was not altogether comfortable with it. He looked from one side of the road to the other, as if expecting to defend himself from some attack. His eyes met Lark’s, and he managed to look a little sheepish.

“Are you not inclined to enjoy a spot of some scenery, Mr. Queensman?” she asked. “Or are you too accustomed to this sort of thing? Those of us who judge splendor by the size of the chandeliers in a ballroom find novelty in the great expanse of sea and sand, you know.”

Mr. Queensman smiled. “I know you too well to believe your world ends at the doorway of a fine townhouse, or that you are still amazed by the prospect of chalk cliffs and beach. But, in fact, I am not so interested in the view we see, as in the fact that others may view us.”

“Are you concerned for our privacy, sir?” asked Miss Hathawae.

“Or for our safety?” Lark asked, more urgently. She finally came to appreciate how vigilant he tended to be and wondered
to what purpose. “I thought you said there were no enemies here.”

“You are absolutely correct. I am being overly cautious.”

Raeborn leaned forward. “An excellent quality in a physician, my boy. One can never be—” But his words were cut off by the sound of a fresh barrage of cannon fire. From where they sat, in the open hand of the cliff, the echoing sound was deafening.

Lark, resisting the impulse to cover her ears, looked down and noticed fine slivers of white chalk lying in her lap. Suddenly the air seemed full of them, dropping down around her like thousands of snowflakes. She turned to Mr. Queensman in wonder when a larger fragment glanced off her cheek, and she heard a rumbling sound that surely was neither thunder nor the cannons below.

He was on her in an instant, throwing her down onto the floor of the carriage with the weight of his body and shielding her from the avalanche of rock and dust. In the second before he reached her, she saw Raeborn move as well, and she thought Ben Queensman might have pulled him down with them. But she felt both arms of his embrace holding her so closely, he could not admit another person between them. He flinched once, and then again, and she wondered what this unexpected bit of heroism might cost him.

“Sir! My lady!” came a muffled sound. Lark thought she recognized the voice of the groom, and wondered if he lay buried in his seat. Then she moved her head and realized it was her hearing and not his throat that was afflicted. She reluctantly pulled her ear away from Mr. Queensman’s chest.

“Are you hurt?” her protector asked, beginning to extricate himself from the tangle of limbs on the floor of the carriage.

Lark blinked and looked around her, and saw Lord Raeborn awkwardly attempting to separate himself from the squirming body of Miss Hathawae. She gave him credit for his own show of heroism and briefly wondered what chivalric instincts made him go for the older lady as Mr. Queensman went for her.

“You seem to spend too much time asking me that question, Mr. Queensman,” Lark said, dusting chalk off her shoulders
and seeing him for the first time. She could not help but grin, as his black hair seemed as powdered as once was fashionable, and his impeccable jacket was dusty and stained. “But it seems that once again I have you to thank for my safety.”

“It is my responsibility, my lady,” he said stiffly, and glanced meaningfully at his cousin. He held out his arm to support Lord Raeborn as he rose shakily to his feet. By now the groom was at the side of the carriage, helping Miss Hathawae regain her seat.

“What has happened, Benedict?” she asked.

Both gentlemen of that name looked at her, but only one spoke.

“I believe it was a—a landslide,” the elder man said tentatively, and looked to his cousin for corroboration. When Mr. Queensman nodded, he went on. “The vibration of the cannons must have loosened the rock, and we just happened to be in an unfortunate place.”

“Oh, dear, how foolish of us,” Miss Hathawae said. “And I only wanted to enjoy the view.”

“Perhaps we will do so while John cleans out the carriage for us and we shake out our clothing on the road,” said Mr. Queensman, and took her hand before alighting from the vehicle. Lord Raeborn quickly followed, but Lark waited patiently, as she knew she must. Then she accepted not only Mr. Queensman’s arm around her, but also his clean handkerchief.

“I might ask you what you find so amusing, my lady,” he growled as he set her down.

She glanced over to the others, convinced of their distraction, before she answered. And that she did by using his own handkerchief to wipe the chalk from his nose and his cheeks in a far too familiar fashion. When he began to pull away, she stopped him with no more than a touch to his forearm and by blinking her eyelids. It was part of the familiar arsenal of flirtation, something she had never used with Mr. Queensman. And he seemed no more immune than most men.

And just now she wanted something of him.

“This is not seemly, my lady,” he began.

“There is no one who cares just now. Perhaps it is my due, anyway. After all these weeks of allowing you to dictate to me, I
believe it is my turn.” Purposefully, seductively, she ran the linen cloth over his lower lip, snatching it away when he tried to bite down on it.

“My safety is no longer your responsibility, sir, whatever you say. You absolved yourself of it and turned me over to your lordly cousin.”

“Then what will you have of me, Lark?” he asked. “For this little scene is being played out for some reason.”

She hesitated, her hand in the air. He was right, of course, but the acuteness of his observation, his cynicism, was too true.

“Must I have a reason?” she asked softly.

“I fear you must,” he said.

She did not speak at first, knowing he was right. It was the only way things could be between them.

“I will have you answer to responsibility of another sort,” she said. “It is unjust of you to be secretive about the strange events that have taken place these past few weeks. A death, an attack on Martha Gunn at sea, this current mishap—”

“I do not believe this anything but an accident, my lady.”

“Oddly enough, I do not believe you.”

“If you will not believe me, I will not bother to explain at all. It will be to no avail.”

“I want to know only one thing, and I desire the truth.”

He looked at her, and she sensed he would be disappointed by her question.

“What is Gabriel Siddons’ part in all this?”

By the expression on his face she knew herself correct. And by his answer she knew why it was so.

“You seem to take an active interest in that man,” he accused.

“No more than I do other men. But that is not the point. I should like to know why you, sir, seem to take an active interest in him. What is more, why you do not trust him nor his uncle.”

The words hung between them like a heavy drapery, admitting no light.

“It is no business of yours, my lady. Your business is only to prepare yourself to return to London and to leave the affairs of this community to those for whom it might matter.”

“And why does it matter to you, Mr. Queensman? What is it you do that makes it so important?”

“You already know what I do.”

She waved her hand dismissively, for it was the easy part.

“You heal people, sir,” she said.

He glanced over to the other side of the road, where Lord Raeborn and Miss Hathawae returned their gaze to the pageantry below.

“And I protect them,” he added.

A
hazy shroud draped the landscape, distorting the crisp colors of the earth and sea and weighing down the bodies of all who passed beneath it. Great clouds of dust were kicked up by the hooves of all the king’s horses and settled uncharitably on dark jackets and hats. And the sun, whose intensity might be seen as a fair omen for George IV’s entrance into the city he had adopted as his favorite, blinded the eyes of those who admired him most and looked up to him for inspiration.

Benedict Queensman licked his dry lips and then regretted it almost at once, for the taste of chalk remained upon them. He had not allowed Lark to tend to him, as she apparently wished to do, nor had he yet taken the time to tend to himself. It was most unfortunate should the king see him in such disarray, but he would have to plead the case of doing the crown’s business.

Yet, even now, he was not sure it was the truth.

He knew they had been watched as their carriage made its way along the cliff road, for he sensed it with an intuition that was once legendary in the encampments along the Hudson River, in America. He also knew there was a reason why the small company in the carriage might be susceptible targets and why there were those who wished them ill.

But small landslides along the chalk cliffs were not at all uncommon, and might be induced by the vibrations against the rock face. Raeborn explained it thus, and it made absolute sense.

Or at least it did to Raeborn and Miss Hathawae.

Without looking down to where she sat beside him, Ben’s selfsame intuition warned him that Lark was more curious about him than about the approaching entourage and that she merely awaited her chance to ask him all the questions he was not at liberty to answer. She was too damned perceptive and
curious—not always the most comfortable companion. And very unusual for a woman.

Of course, if she were a man and a colleague, he would have welcomed her discernment with pleasure and respect. How rich and gratifying it would be to have someone like her as a regular companion, working at his side and continually prompting him to higher levels of endeavor. A woman might do the same, but she must be his wife to be permitted such behavior. And if she were his wife, she should not be required to work.

Of course, someone like Lark would hardly be content to sit in the drawing room, pulling thread through muslin cloth. Nor would she, for she preferred to flaunt the conventions of society and make a claim for her independence. Though true that when they had first met, she seemed no more than a very pretty miss giving herself up to a scoundrel who would only use her, it was now impossible to see her in such a passive role or to imagine her engaging in the frivolity of fashionable behavior.

She had tried it on him not minutes ago, and he saw through it as quickly as he once guessed at her more elaborate ruse. Lark, batting her lashes and cooing as she touched his face, was an entirely unfamiliar creature.

And an utterly charming one.

Of course, he reasoned, she attempted to seduce him to get something from him.