by Lisa Berne
Naturally she and Julian couldn’t go a little apart for an intimate conversation immediately, as that would have been impolite, but it seemed to Gwendolyn like years—decades—eons before they were finally seated together on a small sofa toward the distant end of the drawing-room.
Only a few inches separated her from Julian, and Gwendolyn was vividly aware of how much she hated those dreadful, hideous, torturing inches.
She wanted to be closer to him, wanted to slide herself over until they were side by side, body to body.
How warm Julian made her feel, with a sort of lovely tingling heat that surged through her from head to toe, an extremely pleasant sensation unlike anything else she had felt before. She had met some very interesting and attractive men while traveling under the aegis of the Marksons. She had talked and even flirted with some of those men. But none of them had sparked in her a response this powerful. This exciting. Transforming her from the ordinary, everyday Gwendolyn into a new, vibrant version of herself.
And yet . . .
And yet she was hungry for more. For an embrace. A kiss.
She found herself staring at his beautifully molded mouth, and wondered what he tasted like.
A new wave of warmth flooded her. If she were a betting woman, she’d lay odds that he would be . . . delicious.
Gwendolyn pulled her fan from the white satin reticule looped around her wrist, snapped it open, and began waving it vigorously in front of her face.
These were, she supposed, highly unladylike thoughts, especially in the context of a crowded drawing-room surrounded by other people. But this was how Julian made her feel, from the very first moment she met him, and why try to deny what she thought and felt?
Suddenly she thought of other places, other rooms in this vast townhouse. Many of them were empty. Why couldn’t she and Julian slip away to one of them?
It would be a highly indiscreet thing to do.
Particularly as they were the guests of honor.
Gwendolyn smiled mischievously.
Why not?
Even if only for a little while.
“How beautiful you are, my dear Gwendolyn,” said Julian softly. “You quite take my breath away.” Leaning just a bit closer, he went on:
“Hear my soul speak:
The very instant that I saw you did
My heart fly to your service; there resides
To make me slave to it . . .”
“The Tempest,” said Gwendolyn instantly. Wasn’t it splendid that the Earl knew his Shakespeare? And could quote it to her so romantically? She had always hoped her one true love would do that.
“Just so, my Miranda. And I your Ferdinand.”
She smiled back at him and said:
“What I desire to give, and much less take
What I shall die to want. But this is trifling,
And all the more it seeks to hide itself
The bigger bulk it shows. Hence, bashful cunning,
And prompt me, plain and holy innocence!
I am your wife if you will marry me.”
“‘Ay, with a heart as willing,’” Julian answered, “‘as bondage e’er of freedom. Here’s my hand.’”
Only, of course, he didn’t hold out his hand, as that would have been improper.
Bother propriety!
Gwendolyn thought again about an empty room somewhere, where they might do more than clasp hands. “Julian, do you think there’s a copy of Shakespeare’s plays in the library? Shall we go see? There’s probably nobody else there.”
His eyebrows went up. “Leave our own party, my darling?”
“Just for a little while,” she said coaxingly. “We could be alone. We’re engaged. Surely no one would mind.”
He smiled. “I wouldn’t. But I daresay plenty of sticklers would. And even if we tried to slip away, we couldn’t—there’s a gauntlet of guests between us and the door.”
Gwendolyn gave a little sigh. He was right, of course. But still. She wanted to kiss him in the worst way, and right now, and for a long time. She found herself staring again at his mouth, made herself wrench her gaze away, but she couldn’t stop looking at his eyes—his nose—his hair—and then back again to his mouth, which she wanted but couldn’t have. Stupid propriety.
“By the way,” Julian said, “I’ve some delightful news.”
She gave herself a mental shake, telling her sulking inner self to stop it, and answered, “Oh? What is it?”
“I’ve just today heard from m-my mother, who’s very anxious to meet you. She’ll be arriving here in Town by the end of the week. She’d have come sooner, she said in her letter, had it not been for a sudden illness.”
“Poor lady,” said Gwendolyn with quick sympathy. “I do hope she’s quite recovered.”
“Oh, she never complains. Rupert’s accompanying her, she says, and will be a great comfort to her on the journey.”
At this mention of Julian’s younger brother, Gwendolyn nodded and smiled. “I’m sure he will. I look forward to meeting them both. Which of your sisters are coming too?” For the Earl had—almost unbelievably—eight older sisters, and all of them still living at home.
“Oh, none, they’re country girls, you know.”
“Can’t you persuade—well, some of them to come, Julian? I should so like to meet my sisters-to-be.”
“If you wish it, I’ll write to them,” he said smilingly.
“Thank you! And please send them my love.”
“I will,” he said, and then they were interrupted when Étienne de Montmorency came strolling over, saying in his languid way:
“Ma foi, how wonderfully confortable you appear, mes chers. The very picture of affianced bliss. Julian, I felicitate you yet again.”
The Earl smiled up at him. “Thank you, Étienne. I’m the luckiest man in England to be marrying this beautiful goddess, and I know it. I was just telling Miss Penhallow that m-my mother and Rupert are coming to Town.”
De Montmorency looked at the Earl with brows slightly raised—a slow and penetrating gaze—and then his lips curled in a smile of faint amusement. “The Countess is to grace us with her presence? How delightful.” He turned to Gwendolyn and bowed courteously. “A compliment to you, mademoiselle, without doubt.”
He said it with every appearance of affability, which signified, Gwendolyn hoped, that he bore her no ill will for choosing his friend the Earl over himself: she had, in fact, been dancing with him on that fateful evening at Almack’s, and by the time de Montmorency had escorted her back to the Duchess she had frankly forgotten his name. Prior to that he had presented himself, very plainly, as a candidate for her hand with flattering promptitude following her first appearance in Society. A scion of the French aristocracy, a crony of the Prince Regent, and one of the chief arbiters of fashion after Brummel’s disgrace and exile, Étienne de Montmorency traveled in the highest circles of the ton; he was famed for his elegance of person, his cultured address and charm. She liked him well enough, but no better than any of the other gentlemen she had met. It was only the Earl who had captured her heart.
“Thank you, monsieur,” Gwendolyn said, just as a little stir across the room attracted her attention. Two men had entered. One was her brother Percy, she saw with gladness, and the other—
Gwendolyn stared. And gasped.
Christopher Beck paused just past the threshold of the Egremont drawing-room. A huge, elegantly furnished and brightly lit room, crowded and cheerfully noisy. As loud as any busy Greek taverna or osteria in Italy. A reassuring similarity, he thought, amusement rising in him. Well, should it happen, being cold-shouldered by aristos might be unpleasant, but it would still be better than being kicked by a horse. An experience with which he was all too familiar.
Occupied at first by being introduced to his hostess the Duchess, her daughter-in-law Lady Almira, and some elderly friends of theirs—“I say, do meet this chum of mine from home, Christopher Beck,” said Percy breezily—all of whom, rather than looking
down their noses at him, instead greeted him cordially, Christopher finally advanced some ten paces into the room and accepted a glass of champagne offered to him by a liveried servant.
He nodded his thanks.
No cuts direct so far, he thought, and smiled a little to himself. He wouldn’t have cared if there were. Having lived for years by one’s wits, as well as fighting for one’s life against a pack of savage freebooters, certainly provided one with a helpful perspective on things. If nothing else, it had given him a self-confidence he had badly lacked as a youth.
Percy said, nudging him, “There’s my cousin Helen over there by the window. Not an actual cousin, really, but we’ve never stood on ceremony. Let’s go and talk to her. She’s a good fellow, but rather awkward at parties. Doesn’t know how to talk to people.” Wielding his own glass of champagne, Percy nimbly made his way through the crowd toward a short, round, sturdy-looking girl with bright red hair who stood alone. Christopher, following more slowly in Percy’s wake, saw how the girl greeted Percy with obvious relief, then he himself stopped when he heard someone—with a youthful female voice—saying:
“Christopher. Christopher!”
He turned and saw a young woman coming toward him.
She was breathtakingly lovely, golden-haired, blue-eyed, slim, dressed all in white and moving with what struck him as unselfconscious grace. She was smiling at him with such evident friendliness that he couldn’t help but smile back.
And then it hit him.
Of course.
It was Gwendolyn Penhallow.
In his lively careless way Percy had failed to mention that his sister would also be attending the Duchess’s party, though he had during their dinner together earlier that evening regaled Christopher with amusing barracks tales along with some suggestions as to where they might go after leaving the Egremont townhouse.
Christopher took another swallow of his champagne and put the glass onto the tray of a passing servant.
The last time he’d seen Gwendolyn, it was back in Whitehaven and he had been little more than a rude, restless, hostile boy—angry and lost. He had left England the very next day and, every once in a while, when his spirits had sunk very low, he’d thought back to that moment, years ago, when she had taken his hand in hers, and with such kind sweetness that he had been rather paralyzed. And here she was, graceful, radiant, coming close, holding out her gloved hands to him, saying warmly:
“Christopher! You’re alive!”
“As you see,” he said, smiling down at her, and, recalling her sweet gesture all over again, he took her hands in his own, as if it were the most natural thing in all the world.
“I’m so glad! How long it’s been! But—are you all right? Your cheek—”
“Oh, a few pirates, on the way from Portugal” was all he said, because it was easier to be honest than to make up some story or another, and he was surprised when the poised, elegantly clad young woman before him—rather than recoiling with horror or distaste, as he supposed well-bred ladies might—instantly replied:
“Pirates! How splendid, Christopher!”
He laughed. “How bloodthirsty you Penhallows are. Percy said much the same thing.”
Gwendolyn laughed too. “When I was fourteen I so much wanted to be a pirate, do you remember? Or at least a sailor. Hugo gave me a hat that looked like an admiral’s bicorne and oh, how I swaggered about in it!”
“I remember seeing you in that hat. You looked very dashing in it, as I recall.”
“I felt so, at any rate.” Then Gwendolyn squeezed his hands, sobering. “But Christopher, are you really all right? Perhaps it was dreadful fighting pirates, and you were badly wounded and nearly made to walk the plank . . . Was there a plank? I’ve always supposed pirates all have planks, but how could one know for sure?”
Christopher laughed again. “No, there wasn’t a plank. Not a single peg-leg or eye-patch among the lot, or even a mention of buried treasure. I’m afraid you would have found it an entirely dispiriting affair.”
Her vivid blue eyes were fixed on his face. “Dispiriting? It sounds very exciting! Did it hurt a great deal? The wound on your face?”
“It wasn’t so bad. The cook, as it turns out, had a little experience as a surgeon during the war, and stitched me up straightaway.”
“He did a marvelous job, I think.”
“I’m glad you think so. Percy says I look Gothic. Whatever that means.”
Gwendolyn giggled, an infectiously charming sound between a chuckle and a laugh. “I suppose he means that with your intriguing wound and your long hair, you look like a character in one of those eerie stories—you know, with mysterious castles, ghosts clanking chains about, fog-covered moors, helpless heroines fleeing unutterable evil, enigmatic brooding heroes . . . All you need is a swirling cape, Christopher! Very romantic.”
He grimaced. “Oh God, no. I’ll crop my hair tomorrow, if that will help.”
“No, don’t. It suits you. Oh, I can’t wait till Francis gets here—he’ll be so pleased to see you again!”
“Likewise,” he said, glad to his soul that the old resentments had faded away over the years. “Are any other of your family here?”
“No, just Percy and Francis,” Gwendolyn answered, and began to animatedly tell him about how Hugo and Katherine and everyone else at home was doing, but soon her bright cheerful flow of words was abruptly stemmed by a deep, pleasant voice which said:
“My dear Gwendolyn, introduce me, please, to your friend.”
Christopher watched as Gwendolyn’s face lit up again, rendering her yet more lovely, and quickly she turned her head to look up into the face of the tall man, whose age he guessed to be thirty-five or so, who had come to join them. Christopher was no judge of masculine good looks, but here was, plainly, a female’s beau ideal, and, he thought, someone Gwendolyn admired very much. He suddenly realized that he still held her hands in his, and released them. She smiled at him and then at the other man.
“Oh, Julian, I’ve been prattling on, for here indeed is someone from home, whom I haven’t seen in forever! May I introduce to you Mr. Christopher Beck? And Christopher, this is the Earl of Westenbury—my fiancé.”
Christopher was surprised all over again—Gwendolyn engaged?—but it took only the briefest moment of introspection to move beyond his surprise. Why not? She was all grown up and no longer the giddy fourteen-year-old girl who had so audaciously, so fancifully, proposed marriage to him. Her joy was obvious, almost like a visible nimbus around her. Good for her, he thought, to have found someone who makes her so happy. He smiled and held out his hand to the Earl. “How do you do, sir,” he said, and then, looking between them: “My congratulations to you both.”
He and the Earl shook hands and Gwendolyn said, “Thank you, Christopher,” and to the Earl she went on, “Only think, Julian, Christopher’s been fighting pirates. Isn’t that marvelous?”
“Indeed,” said the Earl, in that deep pleasant voice. “A particular ambition of mine in my long-ago youth. Alas, I never fulfilled it, and now I indulge in the tamer sport of boxing. Do you box, Mr. Beck?”
Christopher wanted to laugh. Excellent—high-society brawling, even for men long past the university age! But he answered politely, “I have, sir, but only in a manner of speaking.”
“Perhaps you’ll join me at Jackson’s Saloon sometime.”
“Thank you, sir, that’s kind of you.”
Gwendolyn looked pleased. “You’ll be in London for a while, Christopher?”
He said, “I believe so,” and Gwendolyn said, “I’m so glad,” and he was amazed by how glad he felt, too. If he hadn’t happened to bump into Percy this morning . . .
“I say, Gwennie, what about a jaunt to Richmond Park tomorrow?” It was Percy himself, with the short red-headed young woman—his sort-of cousin Helen—at his side. “Helen and I are longing for a good gallop somewhere. Oh, hullo, Westenbury.” Adroitly Percy plucked from a passing servant’s tray a new glass of champ
agne and deposited his empty one.
“Oh yes, let’s,” agreed Gwendolyn, “if Cousin Judith will chaperone us,” then exclaimed, “Francis is here, and Owen!” She waved, and it wasn’t long before Francis—just as tall as his brother, with the same blue eyes and golden hair—joined them, along with Owen FitzClarence, the Marquis of Ellington, who had the same distinctively red hair as that of his sister Helen, as well as a similar riot of freckles upon his long, pale face; where Helen was short and rounded, Owen was taller and skeletally thin.
Amidst the volley of cheerful greetings and introductions, no one noticed that Helen, standing quietly between Percy and Gwendolyn, was looking up at Francis as if he entirely filled her vision. Francis himself was oblivious to this as he was meeting his sister’s fiancé for the first time and shaking his hand; when his glance fell upon the red-haired young lady in the pretty white gown he had to be reminded by a waggish Percy as to her identity.
“Of course now I remember you, Lady Helen,” said Francis. “From our visits to your estate several years ago.” Like Percy, Francis was plainly a schoolboy no longer; he had about him a new air of reserve and gravity. In itself that might suffice for the observant to distinguish him from his livelier twin, but for others it perhaps helped that Francis’s hair was longer.
“Oh, don’t call me ‘Lady,’” said Helen, “it sounds so stuffy,” and then flushed very red.
“He’s practicing to be one of those elevated scholarly parsons,” Percy remarked, “so there you are.”
Francis only smiled at his brother, and Gwendolyn said:
“Don’t be ridiculous, Percy! Not all parsons are stuffy. And I think it’s wonderful that Francis is going to be a vicar like Grandpapa—who’s not the tiniest bit stuffy, as you well know!”