The Disdainful Marquis (36 page)

“But you left me,” she whispered, delighting in the warmth that flowed from him.

“Only so that I could save you from my attentions,” he said, “for we have no millpond at Fairleigh to cool my ardors in. And I did not wish to force you to my desire, nor did I want your charity either, Catherine.”

“Oh, that. But then, it was only because I did not wish you to think me like Rose and Violet,” she admitted, still finding it safer to speak into his ear than meet his knowing eyes.

He laughed and she could feel the laughter deep in his chest, where her hands lay.

“And so you came all the way to London to confess your love,” he breathed.

“Yes, and to straighten matters out between us, even if it meant I should have to leave at once. For Jenkins was right, one cannot stand upon air.”

“Jenkins?” he asked, drawing back a space. “What did he tell you?”

“Only,” she said, at last looking into his eyes fully, “that he did not know how you felt any more than I did, but that I could no longer be such a coward. That I should make a push to settle things between us rather than wait for fate to intervene once more.”

The tender look that grew in his softened gray gaze made Catherine's pulse leap.

“Jenkins is a knowing fellow,” he smiled. “Catherine, let us have done with pretense for all time. Will you be my wife because you love me, with no hope for escape in divorce, for I love you?”

“Oh yes, of course, Sinjun,” she whispered, and then he drew her to him gently and kissed her for reply. She gave herself to his embrace and freed herself to give him back kiss for kiss and embrace for embrace.

But as his gentle hands and mouth threatened to drive all further rational thoughts from her, she placed her hands against his chest again and gently pushed him from her.

“Sinjun,” she said, catching her breath, “before we go on, there is something I must tell you.”

“Tell me,” he said into her neck. “Keep telling me while we go on, for I will listen.”

“No,” she said, firmly tugging at his hair. “It is a thing you must pay close attention to. It is a thing Rose and Violet told me about marriage.”

He straightened instantly and looked at her with dismay.

“I was afraid of that,” he muttered to himself and spoke carefully, “Look, Catherine, you must not pay too much mind to what they told you of the ways of love. They are not respectable married females. And many of the things they have…ah…encountered are not things to which a respectable woman is subjected. So you need not fear, for I will never do anything that I think will frighten or distress you. I will only try to bring you pleasure.”

“That's just it,” Catherine said with satisfaction, “just as they said. One afternoon Rose and Violet were speaking of marriage. And they said that the reason they had many clients who were married gentlemen was that so many of them treated their wives with nice notions of what is proper between a man and his wife. And further, they said that if a man would show his wife exactly what pleased him, as if she were a paid companion, they would probably be a great deal happier and the gentlemen would save their money, for then they wouldn't have to seek out special females for their pleasures. But, Violet said, it was as well that they did not, after all, for then she would have to go back to the theater again, having no employment left to her. So you see, Sinjun,” Catherine continued, sincerely, “you must show me everything that you desire, so that you will never have to go to other women again.”

“Everything?” he asked, arching one eyebrow wickedly.

“Everything,” she said staunchly.

“Oh Catherine, my delight,” he said with a look upon his face that melted her resolve to be logical, “I will, and gladly, for I do love you. I shall do my best to make you my own dear doxy.”

“And I love you terribly,” she said as she went back into his arms.

Since theirs was to be a marriage built upon laughter, he paused in undoing one of the tiny pearl buttons on her robe and smiled tenderly. “Then I shall have to do something about that. For I want you to love me expertly, just as Rose and Violet wished. It is only that”—he paused—“I hope I do not disappoint you. For I wonder if I know quite as much as Rose and Violet did.”

And then he found an excellent way to stop her laughter before it threatened to overcome her completely.

*

The morning dawned so gray that Molly, the youngest maid in His Lordship's establishment, grumbled to herself as she groped her way into the kitchen to start the fire and greet the day. She yawned as she opened the back door to the kitchen and groggily watched the lamplighter begin his rounds of damping the glow of the new gaslights that lined the street. As she stood stretching and scenting the air, she heard laughter ring out in the empty street. Craning her neck, she looked up to its source.

The sound of masculine laughter blended with the high sweet trill of a woman's mirth. The sounds came from her own establishment, from the upper regions, where the master's rooms were.

Molly shrugged—that portion of the house was not one she had yet been qualified to enter.

“What I'd like to know,” she grumbled, thinking of the work that lay ahead of her, and speaking to herself as she often did so early in the morning, “is what folks has got to laugh about at this ungodly hour?”

She started, as she saw she was observed, and then ducked her head in embarrassment. For it was Jenkins, that mysterious fellow who was the force behind the master's establishment. He stood on the lower step, his hands on his hips, and a wide grin on his face as he listened to the merry sounds above him. Only when the woman's laughter had ceased and then the man's laughter stopped abruptly, as if cut off at its source, did he turn his gaze from the upper window. Then he came jauntily into the kitchen bound for the servants' stairs, and a short walk to his rooms. But first he turned and smiled at Molly.

“There's a great deal to laugh about in the morning, little Molly, as you will discover one day if you are a very, very good girl. Or,” he added, with a wink, “if you are a very, very bad one.”

Molly flushed and went to close the back door, holding it open only a fraction longer to admit the kitchen cat, in from his night's wanderings. The cat sidled in and made quickly for his basket by the stove, glad to be in from the night, in from his weary travels, in safely from the cold gray of dawn.