The Courtship (6 page)

“I have a use for him, Father. But I just don't know him well enough. The fact is, I want to see what you think of him. If you do not wish me ever to see him again, you will tell me, and I will show him to the door.”

He beetled his thick arched brows, sleek and white. “I have heard all about Lord Beecham. I have heard no scurrilous tales about him. He appears honorable, though he is a renowned satyr. At least he is tall, I'll give you that. He's rich, but you don't care about that. Are you thinking you'll marry the fellow, Nell?”

“You know I don't wish to wed, Papa.”

He looked at her thoughtfully for a long time, then turned and said over his shoulder, “I'll order two bottles of champagne.”

Of course he had not thought to order the dinner with the champagne. She smiled as she rang the bell for their butler, Flock. Flock, so small he fit quite nicely under her arm, could deal well with the Prince Regent himself were the need to arise. He said to his mistress, “Miss Helen, I understand that Lord Beecham is a very intelligent man.”

“Yes, I have heard that too, Flock.”

“You will not worry. I will speak to him when he arrives. If he impresses me with his wit, I will give you a single wink. If he does not impress me, I will open the windows so Lord Prith may toss him out.”

“I could do it just as well, Flock,” she said mildly.

“Yes, I know, but I fancy you will be wearing a lovely gown and I wouldn't want you to wrinkle it.”

“Very well, Flock.” She couldn't wait to see whether she got a wink or an open window.

Helen spent more time than usual on her appearance that evening. When her maid Teeny fastened pearls around her neck, Helen said to her image in the mirror, “Have you decided to marry Flock?”

There was a big sigh behind her. “Oh, Miss Helen, I can't do it, I just can't.”

“Why ever not? He is an excellent man. He is kind, he is competent. He is ever so forceful, and I have seen you shudder in delight when he tells you he will discipline you if you don't do as he wishes. He would take good care of you.”

“I know all that, Miss Helen. But don't you see—my name would be Teeny Flock. It makes my teeth ache just to say it.”

“Good God,” Helen said as she rose and smoothed her skirts. She leaned down to give Teeny a hug. “I hadn't realized. Let me think about that. It is an obstacle, you're right about that, but it is not insurmountable.”

When Flock announced Lord Beecham, Helen was already on her feet. Why the devil was she nervous? It was absurd.

Flock gave her a wink.

Lord Beecham, wearing evening clothes that perfectly complemented the arrogance of the man, strode into the room, spotted her, and was before her quickly. He bowed over her hand but didn't kiss either her hand or her fingers or her wrist. He just smiled at her and stepped away to shake hands with Lord Prith.

“I had the great pleasure to see you once, sir, in White's. May I inquire the height of your wife?”

“Ah, my sweet Mathilda, named after the conqueror's wife, you know. She was just a slip of a girl when I met her. No taller than my elbow when I married her. I swear, though, that she grew through the years just to keep up with her daughter. Helen, how tall was your mother?”

“My mother, Lord Beecham, was perhaps an inch taller than I. She swept through East Anglia, gentlemen in her wake, begging for her attention, but then she saw my father, and she stopped sweeping.”

“It is just the same with you, Nell,” Lord Prith said. He added to Lord Beecham, “So many fellows wanting to marry my little Nell. Sad thing is, though, most of 'em are short, more's the pity. Short men take one look at Helen and swoon. Of course, neither Helen nor I see them when they collapse.”

“Because they're so short.”

“Exactly,” said Lord Prith. “Flock, bring on the champagne.”

Now, Helen thought, with a smile toward her father, they would soon see what Lord Beecham was made of. She didn't know what Flock used to measure a man's wit, but to her father, it was, and always had been, champagne.

Lord Beecham eyed the beautiful goblet filled to its very brim with perfectly chilled champagne. He smiled at Flock as he shook his head. “Forgive me, but I would very much prefer a brandy.”

Lord Prith choked and spewed champagne bubbles.

Helen shook her head sadly. “Are you certain, Lord Beecham? You don't care for champagne?”

“It isn't that I don't appreciate it, it's that champagne, particularly very fine champagne like this obviously is, makes me very ill. When I first drank it at Oxford, I believed I would die, I became so very ill. I tried one other time since then. It was not a pretty sight. It is an even worse memory, still.”

“Here is brandy, my lord,” said Flock. “It is the finest French brandy, smuggled in to a very private cove on his lordship's estate.”

“Lord Beecham may decide to inform on us, Flock,” Helen said as she sipped her champagne.

“No, he won't,” said Lord Prith slowly. “He may be dangerous, but he's tall and he's straight. A pity about the champagne, though. There is nothing more splendid than a half dozen glasses—that quite sees you through the darkest times.”

“So I have heard, sir. However, I have found brandy an excellent substitute. I may have dark times, but I am not dangerous, sir—at least not in the normal course of events.”

“It is better for your reputation if you don't disagree with that,” Helen said, and poked him lightly in the arm. She looked glorious tonight, her gown a soft ivory, the lovely pearls around her neck luminescent. Her hair was piled high atop her head, making her taller than he, which amused him.

“Very well,” he said, “I am so dangerous that highwaymen see my carriage and ride directly to the magistrate.” He wondered what she would taste like. Her gown wasn't cut particularly low, just low enough so he could see the lovely roundness of her breasts.

“Stop that,” she said under her breath.

“If a woman did not want a man to admire her attributes, why then would she wear a gown that was halfway to her knees?”

“I selected that gown, sir.” Lord Prith paused then and looked at his only offspring. “I say, it is somewhat revealing, Nell. Perhaps I could give you one of my scarves to tie around your shoulders. Flock! Fetch one of my wool scarves to cover Miss Helen.”

“Hoisted on my own petard,” Lord Beecham said and drank down the rest of his brandy.

“Papa has excellent hearing. One must always think before speaking if he is anywhere in the vicinity. Hearing even a whisper isn't beyond him.”

“I will be more careful in the future.” Future? It was possible he would not see her again after tonight, but he wanted to. He wanted to bed her, nothing more to it than that. Sweet, simple lust, a fine thing, something a man could see to without much difficulty, and then it was over and done with and a man could go about his business again, unburdened for a goodly number of hours.

“Dinner is served, Miss Helen.”

When Flock opened the dining room door, frowning because it was closed in the first place, he stared in perfect horror.

The small dining room was fast filling with smoke.

“Oh, dear,” said Flock. “Oh, dear.”

Lord Beecham quickly moved Flock to one side.

“It's the buttock of beef that's burning,” Lord Beecham said. He picked up a bottle of wine and poured it over the roast. He then removed a silver dome from another platter and set it over the meat. There was a hissing sound. More smoke gushed out from beneath the dome, then it stopped.

“Open the windows,” Lord Prith said to Flock. “How did this happen?”

“It is the hotel, my lord,” Flock said as he pulled the draperies back and shoved up the three side-by-side windows. “The chef is extremely voluble and quite French. His name is Monsieur Jerome. He saw Miss Helen when we arrived, lost his head, and has begged me to allow him to cook for her. This is his latest attempt to impress her. He called this his
feu du monde
.”

“World fire?” Lord Beecham said and coughed. He picked up a napkin and began flapping it against the smoke. “I don't suppose the chef is short?”

“Yes, my lord. Jerome doesn't even come to Miss Helen's chin. I do, however, pass her chin on most occasions.”

“Eh? What does that mean, Flock?”

Flock said as he rubbed the burned spots on the lovely white linen tablecloth, “It means, my lord, that Miss Helen is safe from me. I define a short man as not coming to Miss Helen's nose. I am there, my lord. Nearly.”

Helen was batting at the smoke as well. “I thought you told him that I was married, Flock, and thus his ardor was sufficiently cooled.”

“He informed me that if you weren't married to a Frenchman, you had no idea what
l'amour
could possibly be like.”

Lord Beecham laughed and lifted the dome from the blackened buttock of beef. More smoke wafted out. “Miss Mayberry, regard a Frenchman's masterpiece. World fire—it is too much.”

“I don't think I will ever look at a buttock of beef again the same way,” Helen said.

There was a stain of ashes on her nose, a small streak down her cheek. Lord Beecham lightly rubbed it off with his fingertip.

He said close to her hair, which smelled a bit like smoke, “Not only am I to your nose, I can even see the ribbons you've threaded through your hair.”

Flock cleared his throat. “I believe, Miss Helen, that you should repair once again to the drawing room. I will bring what food is edible and you will dine there. However, I must first go outside, where Monsieur Jerome is very probably pacing nervously, the poor Frog, to tell him that his
feu du monde
was an unexpected surprise.”

“Bring more champagne,” said Lord Prith. “It is one of those dark moments.”

L
ORD BEECHAM STRETCHED out in his bed, his head pillowed on his arms, and watched the thin, lazy light from the one candle beside him curl upward to form vague outlines of exotic shapes above his head.

It was the strangest thing. Tucked in among those weaving, ever-changing shapes above him he again saw Helen Mayberry with her father's bright-red wool scarf tied around her neck, the knot right in the middle of her breasts. He had wanted to laugh his head off, but managed to hold back, nearly choking when he swallowed the wrong way.

She had worn that ridiculous scarf the entire evening, tied between her breasts, its tails hanging down nearly to her thighs. They had finally dined on potatoes, beautifully stewed and smoked, three different oyster dishes, also richly and unintentionally smoked, and some dressed green beans that looked gray. Lord Prith had sighed. The damned Frog chef was always making Helen oyster dishes, he told Lord Beecham, to tantalize her more base desires. He supposed that Helen had base desires, but understandably he did not like to think of his only precious little girl in that light.

“Poor Jerome,” Helen had said, taking her father's words in affectionate stride. “Flock said he has written to all his relatives in France to learn more recipes for oysters. Since we are at war with France, I doubt he will be receiving additional cooking instructions anytime soon, at least, I hope, not until after we have left London.”

Lord Beecham nearly laughed again, but caught himself in time. “Perhaps he needs a touch of discipline,” he said after swallowing a singularly doughy bite of a roll that was so filled with smoke it turned the butter black.

“Eh?” said Lord Prith. “What is this, boy? You know about discipline?”

“Certainly, sir. I am an Englishman.”

But there had been no further discussion of discipline because Flock had come into the drawing room at that moment to inform his lordship that it was time for their walk. Lord Prith shook Lord Beecham's hand and bade him good night, kissed his daughter and bade her sleep well, straightened the red wool scarf around her neck, and left the drawing room, whistling. It was close, but Lord Prith's head missed the lintel by a good inch.

“Flock and my father take a twenty-minute walk every night that it isn't raining. It was getting late and Flock needs his sleep. Nine hours a night, he tells my father.”

She laughed, shook her head, and showed him out not five minutes later.

And now he was in bed, lying there, seeing her twining in and out of those damned smoky shapes over his head in his bedchamber. She was still wearing her father's red wool scarf and he was still thinking about inching his fingers down beneath that lovely ivory gown of hers to touch her warm flesh.

“She will give me excellent sport,” he said, blew a kiss to Helen in and among the shadows overhead, blew out the candle, and smiled as he watched the dash of candle smoke explode into the air.