A Lady in Love Read online

  Sure-footed and easy, Sarah gathered apples, holding them in a fold in her dress. She glanced down to see if he were watching and felt a thrill of surprise to find that he was. Stepping lightly down, she went to sit by him on the log. “Here,” she said, holding out another apple. “This one is bound to be sweet. See how red it is?”

  “It looks dirty.”

  “No! We had rain last night. Just rub off the spots on your sleeve.” She showed him how on her skirt. “I love apples,” she said indistinctly, for her mouth was full. “I'd eat them every day, if I could.”

  “I prefer pineapples,” the earl said, though privately he admitted that a wild apple had a flavor no other fruit could match.

  “That's not my favorite fruit,” Sarah said, tossing her second core away. “They're not too bad candied, though,” she added, reflecting that she would have to learn to like them now. She “cleaned” another apple.

  “You'll need a doctor all right before you're through, if you keep eating those.”

  Sarah laughed, but did not lift the fruit to her mouth. “I'm Sarah East. Who are you?”

  “My name ... most people call me Reyne.”

  “Reyne?” She shook her head.

  “You don't like it?”

  “No. Is it your first name or your last?”

  “Neither. It's my title.”

  “Oh, then I've no objection to it. You couldn't help it anyway.” All the same, she could not help repeating it, tasting his name on her lips. “Reyne.”

  “My first name is Alaric. If you don't like that one, I've got five or six more.” He shook his head in disbelief. It was impossible to continue sitting here conversing with a female, who, though her figure might suggest otherwise, was obviously no more than a child. He stood up. When he thought about all the women who would have been in high flight to have kept him chatting for one-tenth as long, what else could he do but shake his head?

  “Five or six? I've only three myself.”

  “What are they?” Alaric asked, sitting down again, hardly noticing the absence of pain. A gentleman could not abandon her, though it was plain she needed no doctor. He wondered if she ever had, for she was obviously in the rudest health.

  “Sarah Marissa Clivenden East.”

  “You weren't very lucky either.”

  “No.” Sarah liked that he listened to her pleasantly, not avidly as if her every utterance were of worth, as did Harcourt and Harold. Nor did he talk to her with the abstraction of a parent or other authority. Sarah tried to think of when she had last spoken to a man who was neither a relation nor in love with her. She had not wished to be agreeable to any of the presentable young men introduced to her at Aunt Whitsun's. None of them had been remotely like this.

  Sarah looked at him openly. His face is thin, she thought, and the rest of his hair is darker at his temples. There were lines carved about his mouth and beside his eyes, yet he did not seem an old man. Not very old. Not forty. She decided she liked the lines just as they were. They made his eyes seem kind.

  He turned his face to meet her gaze. Sarah smiled. She'd been right. They were the same color as the autumn sky.

  “Atwood's taking a devil of a long time,” he muttered.

  “They'll be here soon,” Sarah said. “I only hope they don't bring Harcourt and Harold.”

  “Who are ... ? Oh, yes, the younger sons. How many children have Sir Arthur and Lady Phelps? There seemed a great crowd of young people at dinner last night.” He thought he sounded just as old as he felt: ancient, desiccated like some Egyptian mummy slowly dropping to bits.

  “There are five children. Harvey, Harriet, Harcourt, Harold, and Harmonia. Harriet married Mr. Randolph and they are visiting too, for a few weeks, with their two-year-old son, Harpocrates.”

  “Good God,” Alaric said reverently. “Is it a mania?”

  “They named Harvey after an uncle and the habit seemed to grow upon them,” Sarah said in explanation.

  “Let it be a lesson to me to know when to quit.” Somewhat stiffly, he stood up again. “As it seems Atwood and the doctor have lost their way, let us go to meet them.”

  “I don't actually need a doctor,” Sarah confessed. “I think I was only stunned by the suddenness of my fall. I'm not used to being shot at, you know.”

  “One never gets used to it. Miss East. No matter how hard one tries. If you please, will you pick up Atwood's gun for me?”

  The grace she'd shown while ascending the tree was no less when she bent for the unwieldy weapon. Alaric put the stocks together and laid the barrels against his shoulder in a soldierly way. “You know these woods well, I take it?”

  “Yes, I've played here since ... as long as I can remember.”

  “Then you may lead the way. Guide me to Sir Arthur's, if you please.”

  “I'll take you to my house. You can ride back.” Sarah noticed that he had frowned with discomfort when shouldering his arms and that he did not walk easily. “I'm certain my father will lend you a horse, or even—”

  “No, thank you,” Alaric said not unkindly. “After the Peninsula, I swore never to ride on a cart horse again.”

  Sarah pushed her hair back. For the first time, she realized what she must look like to him. Her dress was torn and muddy, her face grimy, and she could feel the twigs and broken leaves in her hair. He must have mistaken her for a yeoman's daughter, or even a gypsy. With a blush, she knew her behavior had done nothing to disabuse him of that notion. Without speaking, suddenly ashamed and self-conscious, Sarah showed him the way.

  Alaric felt tired. He'd walked farther than he'd wished, in search of nonexistent game, on top of traveling which had wearied him more than he'd ever known it to do before. And the previous weeks had not been conducive to rest. He'd left London for Brighton on a repairing lease, only to find it madly giddy, with routs, races, and revelry every night and day. He'd met a thousand old friends, some with the regiment there, and had been swept into a social round he'd all but forgotten existed.

  Then a chance invitation to join a party traveling to visit Harvey Phelps, whom Alaric had never met but heard described as an out-and-out cock of the game, though he'd not seemed so last evening. Sir Arthur was undoubtedly plump in the pocket, and his wife, an old tabby, seemed more than pleased to entertain a houseful of eligible young men, though she only had one unmarried daughter herself. The noise and hustle at breakfast had tempted him to go out for a peaceful morning's shooting with Atwood, though he'd soon lost patience with the silly fellow. And then to be left with this strange girl who he half-expected to see turn into a wood elf at any moment.

  They topped a low rise at the rear of a sprawling two-story house, a grey slate roof blending harmoniously with the stone walls and shaven grass. From where he stood, still among the trees, Alaric smelled roses and smoke. Off to the left, he saw a neat stable, topped by an octagonal dovecote.

  In answer to his look, Sarah said, with unconscious pride, “This is my house.”

  “Your house? You mean you work here?”

  Though she'd hoped he had not assumed what he'd so obviously assumed, Sarah could not help laughing at the surprise on his face. “No, I live here. With my father and my mother. I have two brothers as well. They're both lieutenants in the navy. Mortimer, he's with His Majesty's ship Restitution and Sam is in Ganymede. We received a letter from Mortimer last week. He's just put in to Constantinople.”

  A female figure with a basket over one arm left the house and, walking on a few steps, bent down over a patch of green. “There's Mother,” Sarah said. “She mustn't see me looking like this. She worries, you know. Listen, go down there and tell her who you are and that you'd like to borrow a horse to take you back to Hollytrees.”

  “I can't do that. She doesn't know me.”

  “That doesn't matter.” Sarah gazed at him in wonder. Was it possible he did not realize that he could have anything he wanted just for the asking? “Tell her you're staying at Hollytrees, and she'll probably give you half a
dozen commissions to Lady Phelps. Don't take any notice. She'll have forgotten most of them by the time they see each other tonight.”

  “Tonight? Oh, yes, there's some kind of entertainment. ...” The long grey house, viewed through a haze compounded of autumn air and wood smoke, was like an image from a half-remembered dream, or a picture glimpsed long ago. Alaric started down the hill and never heard Sarah say, “I'll save you a dance, shall I?”

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  Chapter Two

  “What in the name of mercy happened to you, Miss Sarah?” Molly asked, catching sight of the girl slipping up the stairs. “If one of them boys ... what's that there on your skirt?”

  Sarah put her back against the wall and looked down at the broad face of her mother's servant. “Mud, I think. Oh, Molly, Molly, what shall I wear tonight?”

  “Tonight? I thought you weren't going to Hollytrees tonight.”

  “Not go?”

  “That's what you said this morning. Talking on about how dull it all was likely to be.”

  “But that was this morning.” Sarah dashed away to her room, leaving the heavier woman to climb up after her. By the time Molly came in, Sarah had shrugged off the yellow gown and was scrubbing her face in the basin with more enthusiasm than she'd ever shown before. Drying her face, she peered at herself. “I'm not absolutely ugly, am I?” she asked in sudden doubt.

  “Handsome is as handsome does,” Molly said, sniffing. “If you'd keep yourself neat and wear your stays, you'd be the better for it, though I don't hold with looking at yourself every moment.”

  Groaning, Molly leaned down to pick up the discarded gown. “Take me the good part of tomorrow to wash this, and look at what you've been an’ done to your shoes!”

  Sarah was not listening. Her quick ears had heard the sound of a horse's hooves, and she went to the window to look out. The shortest road to Hollytrees ran beside the house. Lord Reyne rode by, the sun striking red from his dark hair. He half-turned in the saddle to wave to someone out of her sight and then went on. Sighing happily, she saw that he sat the horse better than any man she knew. Sarah watched until she could see him no longer but, remembering they would meet again tonight, let him go with no more than a single pang.

  Harmonia Phelps had sent a note earlier in the day, requesting Sarah to come over before supper, so they might have the fun of gossiping together while they dressed. Sarah now replied to the invitation in person, with her mother's approval.

  Unfortunately, as Sarah crossed the grounds of Hollytrees, Harmonia glimpsed her from an upstairs window. Throwing up the sash, she leaned out and hallooed. “Sarah, Sarah! View Halloo!”

  Waving frantically for her friend to shush, Sarah hurried forward, clutching a brown-paper parcel under one arm. The sandy drive to the front door of Hollytrees seemed beyond human scale, like a never-ending path in a nightmare.

  “Sarah!” her friend called again with a laughing face.

  Increasing her pace, Sarah shot glances at the wood beyond the house, at the lake, at the stables just in view. She gained the safety of the pedimented portico and paused to catch her breath before entering the house.

  Just then, Harold emerged from the small Grecian temple by the artificial lake. At the same moment, Harcourt sprang up from the bank, hurling aside his fishing rod. Like a thief seeking sanctuary in a church, Sarah turned the knob and burst, regardless of etiquette, into Sir Arthur's home.

  “They're after me, Smithers,” she panted as the butler came forward.

  “Up the stairs, quickly. Miss East. Once you've reached Miss Harmonia, you'll be safe.”

  She raced for the stairs, hiking her skirts nearly to her knees so that she could leap them two at a time. Yet Harcourt's legs were longer even than her own. She'd lost too many races to the boys to hold any false hopes she could beat them without a longer start than she had.

  Their voices, calling her name, echoed from the hall below. Sarah beat a fierce tattoo on Harmonia's door. When it was jerked open, she all but fell into the room.

  “Harcourt first to the door, Harold next by seven seconds! Remind me I owe Smithers two pence. I can't help wagering on an outsider. I think the trouble with the odds is we have no third party. Do you think you could make Harvey fall in love with you too, Sarah? It would improve the turf enormously.”

  Taking the glass of water Harmonia held out, Sarah sank gratefully into an armchair. “I wish you wouldn't do that,” she said. “If not for my sake, for your brothers'. It can't be good for them.”

  “They don't seem to mind. I'd say they need more exercise, after all their mooning over you.” Harmonia turned to look out of her window. “They've gone back to whatever they were doing. Are you going to dance with them tonight?”

  “I suppose I'll have to, won't I?”

  “Yes, I don't see how you're to get out of it, but I'd limit them to one set each. There's quite a few eligible gentlemen visiting Harvey. That's why Mama's giving this house party. She hopes one will want to marry me.”

  “Well, why not?”

  Harmonia smiled at her friend. “Because one look at you, my dearest, and there lives not a man who'd look twice at me.”

  “Don't be so silly. Besides, do you want boys like Harcourt and Harold falling all over you? If they weren't your brothers I'd give them to you gladly.”

  “No, thank you. I don't care for hordes of young men, but it would be very pleasant to have one.” Wistfully, Harmonia sighed. Her smooth brown hair and short, plump figure had never troubled her until this year, when Sarah had blossomed into such overwhelming beauty.

  “Well,” Sarah said lamely, “if you should like any of my admirers—though I don't see how you could—just name your choice and I'll give him to you.”

  Harmonia smiled again with mischief. “I'll remember that. There are second sons and lords aplenty. We've even a real earl staying here.”

  “An earl?”

  “Yes, the Earl of Reyne. They say he was terribly wounded in Spain. Harcourt says he's going to try to get the earl to talk about it; you know how wild he is to join the army.”

  With a shake of her blond head, Sarah dismissed Harcourt's plans. She had not considered Reyne's rank, not caring whether he was a king or a woodcutter. She hid that she'd met him, for the hour in the woods was too precious to share with anyone, not with Harmonia, not even with her own mother. “This earl ... what is he like?”

  “Oh, I don't know. Handsome enough, I suppose. He was at dinner last night, but I didn't pay much attention. Harriet kept me busy, moaning about how sick little Harry is. The doctor told her it's just the chicken pox, but you'd think it the end of the world. He's been confined to the nursery, poor little fellow.

  “Oh,” she continued, as Sarah unwrapped the gown she'd brought and shook it to release the wrinkles, “I was hoping you'd wear that instead of your muslin with the blue sprigs. Remind me that Bumbleton owes me four pence; she said you'd wear the other, as it's only a family party.”

  After showing Sarah her own choice for the evening, Harmonia asked, “Are those the sandals you bought while you were away?” She came around to the other side of the bed to admire the cut steel buckles flashing in the late sunlight. The sandals were no more solid than a soft sole of wash-leather could make them.

  “Yes, my aunt insisted they were the latest mode. They're rather too big for me, though. I almost have to shuffle, and if I wiggle my toes, the buckles come open.”

  “But they are beautiful.”

  “Yes,” Sarah said, poking the silver satin with one finger. “I suppose they are.”

  As the hour for dinner drew closer, more young ladies of the county began to arrive, some already attired for the evening, others taking advantage of Harmonia's invitation. Soon her chamber was a riot of white muslin and giggling voices. In the window seat, Sarah nodded to the other girls, for she'd known them forever. She could not help but notice, however, that not even her most particular friends si
ngled her out for a private coze. She shrank farther back into her corner, while the laughter went on without her.

  Sarah came down the stairs as elegantly as a tall ship amidst a flotilla of lesser girls, all but a few dressed in pure white. The girls who had a Season already drifted last, languidly experienced if unwed. Sarah did not think for even a moment of her own Season, soon to come. She was looking for Lord Reyne.

  As soon as she entered the salon, however, Harcourt and Harold came to her side.

  “How are you, Sarah? You look ...”

  “I swear there's not another girl here to touch you. What's that, Posthwaite? Of course, too pleased. Sarah, this is ... certainly. Sir Francis ... and this gentleman is ...”

  Though they frowned horribly at their brother's friends, crowding about, they introduced them each in turn. Sarah quickly lost any sense of which face went with what name. To them, she seemed a remote goddess, wreathed in sky-blue ribbons, dreaming of her lost home on some mountaintop.

  In all, twenty-four pairs of seats were filled. Though comfortably casual in most regards. Lady Phelps was not as yet certain she approved of promiscuous seating, so a long row of women faced an equally long row of men. As was usual at an evening at Sir Arthur's, there had been no pairing off in order of rank, so it was not until they were all seated that two members of the party were found to be missing.

  “Smithers,” said her ladyship. “Kindly go tell Sir Arthur that we are all waiting. Politics,” she said with an apologetic laugh, echoed by her guests.

  The empty chairs were at the end of the table, far from Sarah. She hardly noticed the soup ladled into the bowl before her. Every nerve awaited Lord Reyne's entrance. He would walk in, sit down—or perhaps his eyes would wander over the assembled guests until he looked upon her. She could not imagine what would happen when he saw her, but as she picked up her spoon, her neighbor said, “Sarah, are you quite well? Your hand trembles.”

  Sarah looked at the quivering spoon in surprise. “Yes, thank you, Mrs. Flint. I'm ... I'm a little cold.”