“Even one with a head full of fluff?” Angeline asked her.
“Your governesses ought to have been boiled in oil,” Miss Goddard said.
They both laughed.
“I like you exceedingly well,” Miss Goddard said. “If I wish to consort with intellectual giants I will return to my father’s home and consort to my heart’s content. I would like to have a friend, even if we must discuss Paradise Lost.”
And they both laughed again—at just the moment the parlor door opened and the Earl of Heyward was ushered in by a servant careless enough not to have come first to see if Miss Goddard was home.
He stood arrested in the doorway.
Angeline’s heart leapt up into her throat and then dived again for the soles of her shoes. It was a most disconcerting feeling. She stood up—as did Miss Goddard, who crossed the room toward him, both hands extended.
“Edward,” she said, “I have been enjoying a conversation with Lady Angeline Dudley, as you can see. We have both been agreeing that the Hicks ball last evening was a splendid event. Indeed, Lady Angeline believes that she has never enjoyed herself more in her life.”
Angeline smiled brightly.
“It was indeed a fine squeeze,” he said stiffly, keeping his eyes upon Miss Goddard. “I am sorry, Eunice. If I had known you had company, I would have gone away. I will do so now and come back another time.”
“No,” Angeline said, “I was just leaving. You must sit down, Lord Heyward. Not that it is my place to offer you a seat in Miss Goddard’s house—well, Lady Sanford’s house, but she is from home at the moment and so it is Miss Goddard’s place to tell guests where they may sit and if they may sit. But you must not feel obliged to curtail your visit just because I am here. I have stayed far too long already, and I daresay Miss Goddard is wishing me to perdition. I shall … go.”
“Lady Angeline came alone,” Miss Goddard said, looking only at the earl. “Her maid is indisposed. I shall send my own maid with her.”
“Oh, no—” Angeline began.
Lord Heyward fixed her with his very blue gaze. It looked ever so slightly hostile.
“Lady Angeline,” he said, “it will be my pleasure to escort you home. I am surprised that the Duke of Tresham and Lady Palmer allowed you to leave Dudley House alone.”
“Oh, they did not know,” she said, “and I have no intention of telling them. They would scold for a fortnight. I am quite capable of walking alone, however. I have not noticed footpads lurking on every corner, have you?”
His stare became icy.
“I will escort you home, Lady Angeline,” he said.
He had no business. He had absolutely no business. He was not her father or her brother or her husband or … or her betrothed. He was nothing whatsoever. And it was not even an offer this time. It was a categorical statement, and his glance did not even waver as she gave him the full force of her haughty glare.
“I do think that would be good of you, Edward,” Miss Goddard said.
And Angeline was the first to look away—in order to glance reproachfully at her new friend, who could have used this visit, her aunt being absent, to further her own courtship with the Earl of Heyward. And to save her new friend from a blatant instance of male domineering.
“Very well, Lord Heyward,” she said, looking back at him. But she would … Yes, she would. She would be damned before she would thank him.
There! She felt marginally better at the shocking language even if it did not find its way past her lips.
Miss Goddard smiled placidly at her.
Traitor! Judas!———
EDWARD WAS NOT in a good mood.
He had not been even before he arrived at Lady Sanford’s, but at least he had expected a nice quiet, sensible conversation with Eunice. He had expected his visit to feel like balm to the soul. Perhaps she would even consent to take a short walk with him again since it was a sunny, pleasantly warm day.
Instead, here he was out walking with Lady Angeline Dudley of all people the day after she had refused his formal marriage offer. She had refused to take his arm, which made walking really quite awkward. And she had dared to give him that same haughty, regal look she had given Windrow during that infamous scene just outside Reading. As if he was the one behaving with deliberate lack of discretion. No proper young lady set foot outdoors without a chaperon or trustworthy companion.
I have not noticed footpads lurking on every corner, have you? As if they advertised the fact upon large boards carried about their necks. And as if footpads were the only danger. Had she learned nothing from her experience at the Rose and Crown?
He was feeling downright irritable. And somehow, grossly unfairly, in the wrong, as though he owed her some sort of apology. He had not told her he loved her—as if those words meant anything. Why should one feel guilty for telling the truth? The world had turned all topsy-turvy. It had been a far simpler place when he was merely Mr. Edward Ailsbury.
“Does Tresham employ no other servants than your own personal maid?” he said, breaking the silence between them even though he had sworn to himself that he would not. “And is this the same personal maid who was conspicuously absent from the taproom at the Rose and Crown Inn a month or so ago? Is she often indisposed?”
His voice sounded as irritated as he felt.
“If this is a veiled comment upon my behavior, Lord Heyward,” she said, “I must inform you that it is none of your business. I am none of your business.”
“For which I am very thankful indeed.”
“For which I will always be eternally grateful.”
They spoke simultaneously.
“At least we are agreed upon something,” he said.
“We are,” she said as they crossed a main road and he tossed a coin to the young crossing sweeper who had cleared a steaming pile of manure out of their path.
“I am delighted,” he said, “that you had such a very happy evening. It was obvious at the time, of course, without Eunice’s having to tell me so.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said. “I was merely being civil.”
“You sounded spiteful,” she said. “I had a wonderful time. I had wonderful partners.”
“Including Windrow, I suppose,” he said. “You looked as if you were enjoying his company.”
“I was,” she said. “Enormously. He is charming and amusing.”
“If I remember correctly,” he said, “you told me just two nights ago at Vauxhall that it was the most wonderful evening of your life. Must every evening exceed the one before it in the pleasure it brings you? Will you not soon run out of superlatives? Or will wonderful suffice for all?”
“I was merely being civil at Vauxhall,” she said. “I thought you might be offended, even hurt, if I did not say I had enjoyed what happened there.”
Good God, he thought, they were scrapping like a couple of petulant children.
Why?
He had offered her marriage yesterday because he considered that he had compromised her at Vauxhall and because everyone seemed agreed that she was the most eligible candidate to be his countess. She had refused. Everything was in order. The story was at an end.