The Courtship (7 page)

Lord Beecham knew women. He knew strategy. He was a master hunter.

He made no effort to see Miss Helen Mayberry for three days.

 

On Thursday afternoon the small park across from Lord Beecham's town house on Grosvenor Square was rioting with spring flowers—sunny daffodils, pale lavender lilacs, creamy red azaleas. There were other richly bloomed flowers peeking out here and there, but he didn't know what they were called. It was a beautiful day, and he decided he had worked enough on the estate accounts. He informed his secretary, Pliny Blunder (an unfortunate appellation that the man did his best to overcome by working harder than any three secretaries in London), to leave him alone, that he was pale from being locked up in this damned estate room for so long and that he was going riding.

Pliny didn't want him to quit working, however, having produced a thick pile of accounts and correspondence that would surely prove his worth, if only his lordship would put off—for just another hour, maybe two—his quite unnecessary ride in the park.

“My lord, you are not at all pale. Look yon at the accounts for Paledowns. Well, not really that many accounts from tradesmen and that sort of thing, but I have many recommendations, my lord, that have added excellent bulk to the pile.”

“Recommendations, Blunder?”

“Yes, my lord. Your aunt Mabel is so very frugal that now she is refusing to buy new sheets even after Lord Hilton put his foot through one when he was visiting just last month.”

“Prepare a very civil letter to my aunt Mabel telling her that you are ordering new linen and it will be delivered to her.”

“But my lord, I know nothing about linen.”

“That is why God created housekeepers, Blunder. Speak to Mrs. Glass. Now you will leave me alone. You may torture me tomorrow morning, but not before ten o'clock, do you understand me?”

“I understand, my lord, but I cannot be happy about it.”

“Get Burney to saddle up Luther now, Blunder. Run to the stables—you are on the pale side yourself—to inform him. I am leaving right now. My eyes are crossing, my fingers are numb, my brain is an ascending balloon—all hot air. Leave me alone.”

Pliny Blunder sighed deeply and, taking his master at his word, ran out of the estate room. For the first time, Lord Beecham noticed that his secretary was on the short side. So short that he would fall in love on the spot with Miss Helen Mayberry, as it seemed all short men who saw her did?

Lord Beecham threw up his hands, snagged his riding crop and jacket from his acting butler, Claude the footman, because Mr. Crittaker, the butler at Heatherington House since before Lord Beecham had come into this world, had finally died peacefully in his lovely room on the third floor with Mrs. Glass on his left side and Lord Beecham on his right side. All the other servants were ranged in a line according to rank, from right to left at the foot of his bed. Mr. Crittaker's last words had been: “The upstairs maid should not be standing next to the tweeny, my lord. Claude, you must do better than this.”

“Er, have a nice ride, my lord.”

“Thank you, Claude. How are you doing with the polishing of the silverware?”

Claude's narrow shoulders rounded themselves. “My fingers are rubbed raw, my lord. It is beyond me how Old Crit ever got those spoons so shiny you could see your own dear ma's heavenly soul shining back up at you.”

“Keep trying, Claude. Speak to Mrs. Glass.”

“Old Crit always said that a housekeeper, being a female and all, had no notion of how to provide a good polish, my lord.”

“Old Crit was from the last century, Claude. Bring yourself up to modern times.”

“Mrs. Glass doesn't like me, my lord. She will not tell me the proper silver procedure.”

“She simply misses Crittaker. She will adjust, if you are properly deferential.”

“But Old Crit said—”

I am surely in Bedlam, Lord Beecham thought, waving Claude away. He walked down the front steps of his town house and turned right toward the small stables, set beneath newly leafing oak trees, some twenty feet from the house.

Lord Beecham would say one thing for Blunder—when he set his mind to something—he got it done quickly. Luther, his big, mean, graceful gelding, was saddled and waiting for him.

He was enjoying the cool spring air on his face as he cantered through the park. He waved to friends, paused to speak to ladies, who laughed and waved at him from their landaus, and then spotted Reverend Older. The two gentlemen reined in and rode side by side for a while. Reverend Older was a distinguished and popular churchman, a fine orator, an eccentric, and a horse-racing fanatic, who, Lord Beecham had heard from a St. Jude sexton whom the reverend had fleeced, spent some of the money from the collection plate to wager on the races. Reverend Older had called it a rotten lie and given the sexton a bloody nose.

“I am thinking about traveling down to the McCaulty racetrack next week,” Reverend Older said. “Not on Sunday, of course. That is the one day I am simply too busy.”

“True enough,” said Lord Beecham, trying not to laugh between Luther's big bay ears. Was this the way it would be from now on? There would be a laugh behind every tree to ambush him? He supposed he could accustom himself. “I didn't know you had any interest in the cat races, sir, just horse races.”

“Ah, the little nits can run faster than the wind, my boy. The trick is to keep them focused, many times difficult since they get distracted so easily. Have you ever attended a cat race?”

Lord Beecham shook his head. “Not yet. Perhaps one day. A friend of mine, Rohan Carrington, Baron Mount-vale, is one of the major patrons of the cat races.”

“Yes, indeed. His racing cats win regularly. Also two of the preeminent cat trainers, the Harker brothers, are gardeners at Mountvale's country estate. That is certainly to his advantage.”

Everyone had heard of the cat races at the famous McCaulty racetrack. Actually, huge sums of money were won and lost at the cat races. Lord Beecham, however, couldn't imagine such a thing.

Lord Beecham had been to one horse race in his life—at the racetrack in York—and had found it a dead bore. He had even won a hundred pounds betting on a horse he had never heard of, but the horse's name had appealed to him. It was Muddy Boy, a huge, rawboned gelding who looked more vicious than his great-aunt Honoraria when she had caught him as a lad walking behind her and pulling stuffed birds out of the massive wig she wore.

“True enough. I once stayed with Rohan Carrington for the cat races. Nearly lost my clerical collar when a thin little white tube of a cat streaked past the favorite—and the racer I had laid fifty guineas on—in the home stretch.”

They rode alone together for some minutes before Reverend Older, sawing on his horse's reins, shouted, “Oh my! I very nearly forgot. The dear ladies of Montpelier Place are giving me a tea this afternoon and I must attend. I can't disappoint the sweet dears. I am even thinking of marrying one of them.”

Now this was a shock. Reverend Older also had something of a reputation, not for debauchery, naturally, but the fact was that over the years, the good reverend, in addition to all his other achievements, had become an accomplished flirt.

“Which good lady, sir?”

“Why Lilac Murcheson, Lady Chomley. You remember Chomley, don't you, Spenser? He was a loose-mouthed codbrain who thankfully croaked it before he had gone through his fortune. As I recall, he fondled a man's wife in the very nave of my church, and the husband was forced to call him out. Put a bullet neatly through his forehead. Lilac's son gave her a neat little stud in Wessex. I fancy I will retire there when the holy words dry up in my brain, and breed my own horses one of these years.”

Lord Beecham just shook his head as he watched Reverend Older canter away, his bottom bouncing up and down on the saddle. It had to be painful. He couldn't imagine the reverend no longer exhorting sinners from his pulpit, then laughing when the choirmaster tripped on his gown and fell into the organist, who brought forth a chord that had the entire congregation covering their ears.

He just could not understand how his own father and Reverend Older could have possibly been friends. The reverend Older was eccentric and enjoyed betting perhaps a bit too much, but he seemed to be awash in good humor and honor, unlike Gilbert Heatherington, Lord Beecham's sire.

He breathed in deeply as he turned Luther off the well-trod path into an area of the park that would allow him to gallop for just a bit. “All right, Luther,” he said close to his stallion's ear, “do what you will.”

Luther, nothing loath, stretched his neck, kicked back his hind legs, and shot forward. Lord Beecham laughed aloud, a good clean sound and he liked the feel of it. He leaned down close to Luther's neck, breathing in his horse's clean wild sweat. “I might enjoy watching you race,” he said. “You could have raced that damned Brutus into the ground. If you do ever race, I will ride you myself.”

He was thinking that perhaps he should give racing another chance when suddenly, without a hint of warning, a female body slammed into him from out of nowhere and sent him crashing to the ground.

He saw white bursts of light. He couldn't breathe. A weight was crushing him.

The lights dimmed. He swallowed. He slit open his eyes, all he could manage. Miss Helen Mayberry was all in a heap on top of him. A thick blond braid was wrapped around his face. Her riding hat tipped over her right eye. Her nose wasn't an inch above his.

“Oh, dear, are you all right, Lord Beecham? Please say something. Can you look at me?”

His wits were still on the jagged side, his brain hovered in the ether. He couldn't quite breathe yet and he wondered if his leg was broken. But he was a man of strong parts, strong will, and he realized his leg wasn't broken, thankfully, just twisted a bit. Finally, not two minutes later, he managed to blink a couple of times and focus on the lovely face above his.

“Did I not tell you that I wouldn't care for the process of you bringing me down, Miss Mayberry? Just the end result?”

“But, sir, my horse threw me. I was riding happily along, saw you out of the corner of my eye, started to wave at you, and just in that split second, a bee stung my poor mare on the neck, she raced up close to you, and then tossed me right into you. It was all a ghastly accident. I haven't broken anything, have I?”

“My leg was in question for a bit, but I think no bones are snapped in two. Please remove yourself, Miss Mayberry. If you remain where you are, then I will probably get myself back together well enough to start caressing you. My hands are very close to your hips as we speak. Do you want to be caressed in the park? Or would a lady from East Anglia shrink from that?”

“It would be a novel form of discipline,” Helen said slowly, still not an inch from his face. She felt all of him beneath her. He felt quite nice.

He lightly touched her chin with his fingertips. “Actually, I would call it discipline only if the pleasure you took from me was balanced by the imminent chance of discovery by one of society's matrons, say, for example, Sally Jersey. Have you met Sally?”

“No, but I fancy that my father would like to meet her. I understand she adores champagne.”

“It's true. I can even see them together. Yes, there he is, carrying her under his right arm, and she has a bottle of champagne tucked close. Now my body has recovered from its appalling shock, Miss Mayberry, and is more than eager to commence.”

“I had no choice, Lord Beecham. I had to act. You have kept your distance for three days. I suppose you were punishing me.”

He lightly touched his hands to her hips. She jumped, then didn't move a muscle. “Not at all, Miss Mayberry. It is psychological discipline. I am a master at it.”

She felt him against her belly, felt his large hands now caressing her bottom, and quickly rolled off him. She imagined he was a master at many things. She came up, clasping her arms around her knees.

He took a very deep breath, then whistled. Luther, cropping grass some ten yards away, looked up and whinnied. “No, stay there, boy,” he called. “Where is your horse, Miss Mayberry?”

She whistled through her teeth, just like a boy, louder than he had whistled. A chestnut mare with a white star on her forehead and four white socks cantered over to within a foot of them and pulled up sharp.

He had never heard a woman do that before in his life. She had whistled louder, he thought, than he had been able to, even as a boy, when no one could best him at it.

No, surely that was impossible. She was a big girl with big lungs, but he was a man. He decided he would practice when he was alone. “Your hair is falling down,” he said, pulling up a spike of grass and chewing on it.

She calmly wound the thick braid of hair round and round her head, tucked it into itself, then smashed her riding hat down over it.

“My mare's name is Eleanor, named after the wife of King Edward the First.”

“You are a historian, Miss Mayberry?”

“In a manner of speaking, sir.”

“I was lucky this time, Miss Mayberry. I don't believe you broke anything when you landed on me. Come now, what did you really do, hurl yourself off Eleanor's back?”

“Yes. It gave me a bit of a scare. I was surprised you didn't hear me.”

“I was hunkered down against Luther's neck, breathing in his sweat and thinking about my mistress and the many ways she teases me to distraction.”

Her voice was colder than the wooden floor beneath his bare feet in February when she said, “You don't currently have a mistress.”

“Why don't you give me a list of your sources and I can provide them accurate information for you?”