The Irish Bride (8 page)

“We meet again,” he said, emerging.

“Indeed? It is strange to me, Sir Nicholas, that before two days ago I did not even know of your existence. Now you seem to be everywhere.”

“I must say the same. Miss Ferris. Are you haunting me?”

“I? I was here first.”

As he came closer, she rose to her feet, her posture defiant. In the daylight, her skin was unmarked, save for faint shadows beneath her clear eyes. She held her book, her finger marking her place, slightly behind her skirts, as if to conceal it from him. “However, now that you are here,” she added, “I will take my leave.”

“What are you reading?” He reached for the hook; she swung it further behind her. His arm went around her waist. She caught her breath. There was no softening of her expression, no invitation in her eyes. Nick wanted both and couldn’t have begun to say why. She was more than attractive, but prickly as a thornbush. He felt her hand go against his shoulder in a repulsing push.

He retreated. “I only wanted to see which author so engrossed you. He must be fascinating indeed.”

‘There is no name on the book, sir, yet I believe the author to be a woman.” Closing it, she thrust it toward him and took her hand away almost before he’d taken it. He turned the book over in his hands,

“Mansfield Park?
I’ve never heard of it. What’s the story?”

“It’s a tale of a poor relation.”

Was there an emphasis in her words? Nick decided he was imagining things. “What is your reason for presuming the author is a woman?”

“Only a woman could see so much of another woman’s life.”

“Male authors write of such things. Maidens fighting for life and honor abound in novels written by men.”

‘There are other battles to be fought, Sir Nicholas. This author chooses to tell of smaller wars, fought at home and in the heart. She seems to speak of our inner lives. I don’t know quite how to tell you....”

“I shall have to read it.” He liked the color and life that came into her face when she forgot herself in the pursuit of an interesting subject. “You are very interested in literature?”

“Yes.” She drew back, both physically and mentally. He could feel her remembering that they were alone and that his previous behavior had been encroaching.

“I feel I should tell you that your father invited me to dine with him tonight.”

“He did? When did you meet him?”

“At a public house. David Mochrie introduced us.”

“Mr. Mochrie?” Her brows came together in a puzzled frown.

“Yes, we stopped in after meeting at your house. Your father was most pressing. May I come this evening?”

“My father’s house is open to whomever he wishes to invite, naturally. I very much regret that I will not be present.”

“Why won’t you?”

“Really, Sir Nicholas ...”

“Why not?”

“I have another invitation, of long standing. Every Thursday evening.”

“With whom?”

She sighed again, her impatience growing plainer. “You are too inquisitive, sir. Why? Where? With whom? I am not accountable to you, nor to anyone save my father. I know why you take such an impertinent interest in me and I have no wish to further your scheme by answering your questions.”

“Scheme? What scheme?”

She threw him a scornful glance and walked away. Though he was certain she knew nothing of the plot he and David had hatched, he followed her, telling himself he only wanted to be certain.

By the stairs, he caught her elbow. “Just a moment.”

“Release me at once!” she demanded.

He threw his hand back, holding them both in the air as if surrendering. “I won’t touch you again.”

“Indeed you will not. Who do you believe you are? I don’t know you from Adam. You are trying to make a game of me and I will not have it!”

Cold, her face was regular, attractive enough, and pale. In a rage, she was magnificent. Her green eyes burned with a flame while her prideful stance turned her into Aphrodite. Her voice rang clear and bright.

He wondered if other men, knowing they could not win such a woman, had weighted her with cruel names to conceal their own cowardice. He was somewhat in awe of her himself. Yet he felt strongly that he could win her, given time to regain his equilibrium.

“I have distressed you,” he said. “I’m sorry. But won’t you tell me what you meant by ‘scheme’?”

A lock of her bright hair had fallen into her eyes in her anger. She pushed it back. “I know perfectly well that you mean to charm me into allowing you to come and go as you please at our house.”

“That would be delightful.”

Her sneer was not quite so effective as her anger. “I’m sure you would find it so, having gulled the older sister into believing you come to call on her while indulging in flirtation with the younger. It has been tried before this by a man of greater address than you possess.”

“Who would do such a despicable thing?” Nick asked, thinking that somewhere a man needed his backside kicked.

“That’s rather the pot calling the kettle black, isn’t it?”

“He must have hurt you,” Nick said, ignoring his conscience.

For an instant, something bleak and lonely looked out of her eyes. “Not at all,” she said, looking past him. “I knew he could not mean what he said to me.”

Nick wanted to take back his vow. If ever a woman needed to be held, it was this queenly, passionate creature. Then she looked at him again and the full power of her dislike hit him.

“I am going to collect my sister from the milliner’s and then visit the church, Sir Nicholas. I trust I will see you nowhere else today.”

She dipped him a rather ironic curtsey and turned away. “Cat,” he said without heat.

She turned back, her eyes narrowing. “I beg your pardon?”

A mew from the staircase answered her. “I didn’t want you to step on the cat,” Nick said.

Chapter Five

The parcel from
Clarendon’s arrived an hour after she returned home.

“What’s that?” Mr. Ferris demanded. “Another gift for Blanche, eh? The minx.”

“No, Father. It is addressed to me.”

Mr. Ferris looked surprised, then smug. “First lilies, now parcels. Is there something you want to tell me, daughter? An admirer, eh?”

“No, sir, I have no one to tell you of.” Rietta pulled on the string and broke the sealing wax. Three volumes, bound in brown cloth, were stacked inside the smooth paper. They were familiar to her before she picked one up.

“Mansfield Park?”
Mr. Ferris asked, but it was not his voice she heard. “Never heard of it.”

“No, sir. I begin to believe that it is not at all a well-known novel.”

“A novel? Haven’t I told you time and again not to muddle your head with a pack of lies? Novels only lead to unrestrained behavior in young girls—twaddle about love and romance! Marriage is a serious business.”

“Yes, Father. I did not order these books. I cannot imagine what Mr. Clarendon can be about.” She opened the small envelope but her father held out his hand for it before she could read it. She was taken aback by her own sense of reluctance to let go of the little piece of pasteboard within.

Rietta watched her father guardedly. To her surprise, she saw him smile and then chuckle as he read. “Well, my dear, you’ve got a string to your bow after all.”

“Father?”

He dropped the card into her lap and pinched her chin. “Keep your secret, my dear, but not too long, eh?”

“I don’t think I should keep them. I don’t want to be indebted to anyone.”

“Certainly you shall keep them! You don’t want to insult the ... mysterious benefactor.” He gave his inane laugh. “That’s good, isn’t it? Maybe I should take up novel writing.”

Aware that he studied her, she read the card.

So you may read
undisturbed

—N. K.

That was too much to be hoped for. However, Rietta found herself smiling. The gift was thoughtful. Did he guess that her father would permit her to keep the books if they came from Sir Nicholas Kirwan? He could not have been in Mr. Ferris’s company long before realizing her father worshipped rank. To him, a baronet would be as good as a prince.

“A gift to your taste, Rietta.”

“Yes, Father. It’s very kind of him. Yet surely a young woman shouldn’t accept gifts from men.”

“Such scruples! One shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Look at Blanche. Gifts arriving day and night. She thanks the gentleman prettily and makes no commitment. It’s a good thing, too, else I’d be bankrupt from keeping her in flowers. You sit down and write the gentleman a nice little note of appreciation.”

“I shall do so at once.”

“That recalls it to my mind. Sir Nicholas is coming to dine with us this evening. You will naturally put off your other engagement.”

“I cannot do that, Father.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry, sir. I must go tonight. Mrs. Athy has asked her brother to come on purpose to meet me.”

“Such persons can be easily put off in favor of so distinguished a gentleman.”

“I’m afraid it is my only opportunity to speak to her brother. He’s away to America on the next ship.”

“Then let him go.”

“I’m certain Sir Nicholas will be able to dine with us all another night, Father. I will be going out this evening.”

Mr. Ferris paced before the fireplace, flicking little fierce glances at her, his head sunk down between his shoulders like a vulture’s. “It’s my wish that you be here tonight.”

“I hope always to be amenable to your wishes, Father, but I have a prior engagement. Sir Nicholas did not seem to mind when I told him I should be absent.”

“You saw him today ... after I invited him?”

“Yes,” she said, her fingers stroking the gilted edges of the book. “I met him at Clarendon’s.”

“Alone?” The word should have sounded stern. For all his carelessness, Mr. Ferris had considerable regard for his daughters’ reputations. Yet his tone was indulgent.

“We were alone only for a moment.” They’d only been interrupted by the cat, but Rietta kept that from her father. He was acting most strangely.

“You must like him, daughter.”

“Not very much.”

“No, of course not. Well, we shall miss you at the table. Write that note. It will have to serve to satisfy Sir Nicholas, robbed of your presence.”

“Goodness, Father It is not as though he were coming to see me, after all. Blanche will be company enough.”

To her surprise, a smile showed her father’s inhumanly regular teeth. “Very well, my dear. Perhaps you know the best of it. Absence, eh? Absence.”

Some time later, Rietta sat before her glass, brushing out her hair. She played in her mind a pleasant scene in which she informed her father and sister that she, long despaired of, was engaged to be married to Sir Nicholas. Would Blanche scream and drum her feet on the floor? They’d probably have to revive her with brandy. As for her father, he might even elevate her to the rank of favorite child.

Rietta knew there would never be such a scene Sir Nicholas, in every physical respect her ideal, had much too masterful a disposition to ever make her a husband. Just from their brief acquaintance, she could tell that he would not care for a wife who had her own ideas and went her own way. A meek creature, who would make his will hers, would be more to his taste.

“Which is in no way my description,” she told her reflection. “Pleasant to dream of, but there’s no more to it than that.”

“Talking to yourself, Rietta? Better be careful. They say that’s how Mrs. Reedy began, and she wound up in the madhouse,” Blanche said as she entered the room.

“Good evening, Blanche,” Rietta said, beginning to braid her hair. “You should dress for dinner.”

“Oh, there’s more than enough time for that.” Her sister drifted aimlessly about the room, brushing her fingertips over the bed coverlet, dragging a tassel across her cheek, flipping through the pages of a book. Rietta was glad she’d tucked the note into her wardrobe. She tried not to make too much of the fact that she’d chosen the drawer that contained her undergarments, simply reflecting that there it was most likely to remain undetected.

“I needn’t do more than change my gown,” Blanche said.

“You haven’t heard, then?” Rietta said, pinning the braid up. “Father’s invited Sir Nicholas to dine here,”

“Dine here? Tonight?” She stopped drifting and put her hands to her face as though trying to hold on to a whirling top. “You’re joking. He can’t possibly eat here.”

“Why not?”

“Aren’t we having mutton?”

“Of course. Haricot mutton.”

“You mean mutton stew? Oh, my God.”

“Blanche, please don’t take the name of the Lord in vain.”

“If the Lord were here, he’d be swearing Himself.”

“Blanche!”

“Oh, heavens! Why was I born into such a horrible, horrible family? Don’t you understand even the simplest facts of life? When a man like Sir Nicholas comes to dine with you, you don’t serve him whatever has been dredged up in the kitchen. You serve him the finest Galway has to offer.”

“Oysters and Guinness?” She placed the last pin and gave her coiffure a pat. “It’s the wrong time of year.”

“Oh, my God!”

“Blanche, I’ve asked you not to swear.”

“It’s too much. On top of everything else, it’s too much. At last there’s a man worthy to be my husband and you must serve him haricot mutton the first time he dines with us.”

“If you want things done differently, you must do the household ordering,” Rietta said calmly, ignoring the sudden sense of depression that filled her upon hearing the words “my husband” in connection with Sir Nicholas and Blanche. “If not, you’ve no right to complain. Father likes haricot mutton.”

“No right? No right? No right to see my future ruined through your stupidity?”

“That’s enough,” Rietta said sharply. She grabbed at the end of her disappearing temper. “I will not be at home this evening, so you must be Father’s hostess. I’m sure you’ll make a splendid job of it. Father tells me that Mr. Mochrie and Mr. Joyce will also be at table. The numbers will be uneven, but I’m sure you won’t mind that.”

“If you are suggesting that I like monopolizing men ...”