by Cheryl Bolen
She called his name again.
Then with a disappointment deep and gnawing, he realized Louisa was asleep.
"Harry!" she said once more, urgency in her voice.
He placed his arm around her. That it was his name she called – and not that beast Godwin Phillips's – pleased him. His own comfort was far from his thoughts. He was consumed with the urge to take care of Louisa for the rest of her days. To protect her from men who would use her. Or abuse her. To let her know what it was to be cherished. To awaken the passion of true love he knew budded within her soul.
For in this passionate little bluestocking lay the promise of all his dreams. Louisa Phillips was the only woman who could ever replace his mother as the Countess Wycliff.
* * *
Edward stopped to change horses at Woking. Because of the fair weather, he had made excellent progress. He was going to push himself to make Salisbury by nightfall, and if he continued at this pace, he could be deep in Cornwall tomorrow. With his riding crop in one hand and his unraveled woolen neck scarf in the other, he jumped from the box and strode toward the tavern. A drink would do his parched throat good.
Then he heard it. A small voice had said his name. And the deuced thing about it was the voice sounded like Miss Sinclair's. "Mr. Coke."
There it was again! Couldn't be the young lady's. She was miles from here, safe and snug at Wycliff House. Nevertheless, he decided to turn around to see who it was who was calling his name.
Had the king himself been standing there addressing him, he could not have been more taken aback. For the quite lovely Miss Eleanor Sinclair faced him, and she was dressed as a tiger! And from the direction she had come, he realized she had been perched for the whole world to see on the back of his curricle! That is, the whole world except him.
For a moment he scowled at her, completely seized with anger. What could she possibly be thinking of to come all this way with no chaperon? Whatever was he to do now? Two days could be lost in taking her back to London, and he had no assurances the foolish chit would even go.
What a fool he'd been to trust her to be complacent and stay behind. After listening to those radicals she surrounded herself with, how could he have been stupid enough to think the girl would do the conventional thing?
"You are angry," she said feebly, walking toward him in her masculine togs.
Where ever did she find them? From a distance she would be taken for a boy, but no one seeing that lovely face could have any doubt as to her gender. He wished for a fleeting second that she could be ugly. Then this would be much easier.
"Course I'm angry. You've cost me valuable time."
"How so, sir?"
Did the deuced girl have to gaze at him in such an innocent manner? Blast her! "Naturally, I'll have to take you back to London."
She huffed and stuck out her flattened chest. "I will not go."
Were she really a boy he would have been able to speak authoritatively to him, but he couldn't do so with Miss Sinclair. She was, after all, a lady. "Now see here, Miss Sinclair, you cannot travel with me."
"Why not?"
"Because you're a lady." He swallowed. "And I am a gentleman."
"My sister, sir, is a lady, and your cousin is a gentleman, and they are travelling together, and you yourself admitted there was no lewdness between them."
"But I never said it was appropriate. In fact, it would be extremely inappropriate if it weren't for the fact your sister's been a married lady."
She thought on all this for a moment, standing there in boys' clothing that was still too big for her. "There will be no impropriety if people think I'm a boy."
"But you're not a boy!" Seeing a man leave the tavern and not wishing to be overheard, Edward rushed toward Miss Sinclair and walked her back to his curricle. "See here, Miss Sinclair, it ain't proper for you to be traveling with me," he said in a voice that was barely above a whisper.
She looked up at him, those blue eyes of hers flashing. "What is proper and what is improper is merely in the eye of the beholder. Do you not agree?"
"I agree," he said, rolling his eyes.
"You and I know there is no impropriety between us, do we not?"
"We know there is no impropriety."
"Then as long as others believe that I am a boy, there will be no impropriety! So it's all settled."
"What's settled?"
"I'll continue to act the part of your tiger all the way to Cornwall."
"Can't have you sitting behind on that rail," he uttered.
She shrugged. "Could I be your little brother, then?" she asked meekly, her voice like that of a much younger girl. She stuck out her chest. "See, I have bound my breasts so I look like a lad."
He turned away, an unfamiliar flush creeping into his cheeks. "I will not look at your breasts."
"Oh, you cannot see them," she said cheerfully.
"I should hope not!" he exclaimed, turning back to face her, a scowl on his face.
"Oh, Mr. Coke, I have put you to the blush!"
"You have not," he snapped.
She linked her arm through his. "Then it is all settled."
God in heaven, what have I ever done to be saddled with the likes of Miss Ellie Sinclair? he asked himself.
* * *
When Harry awoke Louisa with a cup of hot tea the following morning, she nailed him with an accusatory stare and said, "Confess, my lord, when I slept last night you brought a hammer into our chamber and pounded my head soundly with it."
He laughed. "I fear you consumed far too much wine."
She raised herself to a sitting position. "How did I get to bed?"
"I carried you up the stairs."
Her face was inscrutable.
He thought he liked it better when she blushed. Her complacency disturbed him. This was not his Louisa.
His Louisa. He cherished the idea. To the very core of his soul, he cherished Louisa Phillips. She was undoubtedly the finest woman he had ever known.
He knew Louisa was the only woman who could ever claim his heart. The only woman – indeed, the only person – whose life was more precious than his own.
Chapter 21
At breakfast – which Louisa and Harry again took in the private parlor of the Speckled Goose Inn – Harry ate heartily, but Louisa had little appetite.
"Has my special elixir helped your head?" he asked softly.
She nodded. "The head's better. Would that I could say the same for the rest of me. Why did you allow me to drink so much, my lord?"
"I am not your master, Louisa."
She could have sworn he said those words with regret. The effects of the wine must be lingering, clouding her thinking.
When the innkeeper's wife brought another pot of hot tea, Harry questioned her. "I say, my wife and I are trying to decide if Lord Tremaine is the same man we once met in London. Tall, distinguished looking with a beard."
"That sounds like him," the woman said. "Only saw him once meself. At St. Stephen's Church the day they dedicated the new windows. Lord Tremaine paid for them himself. 'Twas the only time I know that he set foot in the church. The family pew sits empty as you please at the front of the church Sunday after Sunday."
Harry gave her a shilling and lavish compliments over the comfort of their room.
Louisa could barely contain her excitement until the woman left the parlor. "Oh, Harry! Lord Tremaine has to be our man."
He nodded solemnly. "A good thing today is Public Day at the castle."
* * *
Since the weather was fair, they decided to walk to the castle, which perched on a cliff above the village of Falwell.
"I understand it dates to the twelfth century," Harry remarked as Louisa gazed up at the stone fortress.
A mighty fortress it must have been, guarding much of the Cornish coast through the Middle Ages. Its battlements had eroded over the centuries but were still plainly visible even from a half mile away. Bulky round turrets anchored each corner of the sq
uare castle grounds.
As Harry and Louisa wound their way through the cobbled streets of Falwell, Harry found himself wondering if there was a moat around the castle. Moats and castles had fascinated him as a youngster. He had more than once lamented that Cartmoor Hall was not a castle.
The sun was high in the sky when they strolled up to the gate to Gorwick Castle, which did have a moat that appeared to have dried up centuries earlier.
They weren't sure where to go once they were within the castle walls. Then they saw an old aproned woman with a throng of girls around her.
"Must be a school trip," Harry muttered.
They walked across the yard and stood waiting with the group of girls, whom Harry judged to be somewhere between ten and twelve years of age.
They only had to wait a few moments before the housekeeper opened the huge timber door and welcomed them into the castle, gratefully accepting their shillings.
She led them to the great hall first and gave accounts of the days when oxen were roasted in the massive fireplace. Despite his childhood fascination with castles, Harry found snippets about the inside of the castle exceedingly dull. When would they get to the interesting things like armor and buttresses?
He was rather amazed at Louisa's interest in the building, but he supposed women liked that sort of thing. He was a bit embarrassed at being the only man in the group.
Partly out of boredom, partly because he had not forgotten their reason for coming, he was careful to glance down every hallway and into every room, looking for signs of the lord of the castle.
Nearly an hour elapsed, and no luck yet. If only there were a painting of Lord Tremaine. That should be enough for Louisa to make her identification.
When they made their way to the second storey, his interest perked. Surely this was the floor where Tremaine resided. Harry continued to eagerly look down each hall and into each room, even if they were not on the tour. He sincerely hoped the housekeeper did not think he was scoping out the place with an eye to burglarizing it.
Then he realized the foolishness of his idea. The place practically crawled with big, bulky liveried servants. Why would a man need to keep so many strong men in his employ?
At eleven o'clock in the morning, it was far enough removed from mealtime to give the housekeeper liberty to show the group the castle's massive dining room.
"The table seats sixty," she said with pride as she led her group into the rose-coloured room. She reminded Harry of a mother duck leading the way for a trail of ducklings. The room was carpeted, and the smooth walls had been covered with silk damask. Everything was the same soft shade of red. The housekeeper had called it rose. He called it red. Mindful to stand behind the girls so as not to obstruct their view when the housekeeper began her recitation, Harry strolled into the room and stood behind the students.
Harry's glance swung to a portrait that hung above the marble fireplace, and a chill sliced into him. His heart began to drum, and he swallowed hard. He almost questioned his sanity. Was he actually standing in Gorwick Castle, or was he standing in the dining room of Wycliff House in Grosvenor Square a decade earlier?
For the portrait was the missing portrait of his mother.
This image on canvas was the closest thing he had of his beloved mother. Tears pricked as he studied the full-length painting. No woman had ever been more elegant. From her softly powdered hair piled high over her oval face to the pale pink of the gown that draped loosely over the smooth curves of her slender body, she conveyed femininity. A lump balled in his throat as he eyed the Wycliff sapphire adorning her delicate finger.
His eye was once again drawn to her beautiful face. For a fleeting, heart-stopping moment he felt as if those pale blue eyes were studying him. He could almost hear his mother's honeyed voice. His gaze shifted to her mouth. Though she'd attempted a serious expression, Gainsborough had skillfully captured a hint of the playfulness of her smile.
Louisa guessed that something was wrong with him. She moved to his side and lay a gentle hand on his arm. "Are you unwell, Harry?"
He shook his head. "The bloody bastard has stolen my mother's portrait."
Louisa gasped, her glance shooting to the painting that dominated the room. "She's. . .beautiful."
* * *
That afternoon and evening, Harry drank with a vengeance. So much that Louisa worried about him.
She watched him as he sat beside her on the upholstered bench not five feet from the blazing hearth that lighted their parlor. His face took on a gold cast from the light of the fire. His brow was moist with perspiration, and his dark hair was tousled.
"It was almost like seeing her again," Harry said.
He wasn't really carrying on a conversation with her, Louisa knew. He was merely thinking aloud.
Louisa's voice was soothing when she said, "You were very close to your mother."
"Everyone who knew her counted her a friend. She had that way about her. Everyone loved her."
"With such a disposition as well as beauty, I think she must have had an army of suitors – before she married your father, of course."
"Her suitors all came before my father. You can be assured once she wed him, she never looked at another man. She was completely devoted to him." His tone sobered. "You know she died but one month after my father died."
Louisa nodded sympathetically as he continued.
"She defended him when I berated him for losing everything. At the time I thought perhaps she would have been better off wedding the first man she had been engaged to."
Louisa's brows lowered.
Harry gave a little chuckle. "She actually ran off with my father. She had become engaged to a wealthy suitor – she called him George – but had not really been in love with him. Then she met my father and knew she belonged with him, not George."
Louisa asked, "Is there a possibility Lord Tremaine could be George?"
He shook his head. "They would have referred to him as Lord Tremaine."
"Perhaps he had not succeeded to the title until after your parents were married."
He thought on Louisa's comment for a moment, then hurled his glass into the fire.
The fire surged and sputtered, then died down to normal.
Harry turned to her. "You must be right."
They sat there in silence, Louisa watching light from the fire dance along the strong planes of his face.
His face grew solemn. "Killing him would give me great pleasure."
She curled her hand around his arm. "Don't talk like that. There are other ways of reaping vengeance upon him."
"Such as?"
"You could expose him for ruining your father."
"My dear Louisa, there are no laws against taking a man's money and possessions at a gentleman's club."
She thought some more. "We can steal back your mother's portrait."
He searched her face from beneath hooded brows. "You would do that for me?"
"It wouldn't really be stealing. The painting belongs to you. Besides, he is a vile man. We don't want Lady Wycliff's portrait in his possession."
He lifted both of Louisa's hands and kissed them.
It was all she could do not to throw her arms about his neck.
She was drinking nothing stronger than warm milk tonight. No more morning-after headaches for her. She watched with worry as Harry continued to drink hour after hour. At midnight she finally persuaded him to come to bed. With one arm around him, she helped him climb the stairs to their room.
On his own, he staggered the short distance from the room's door to their bed and fell upon it. His eyes were shut and his breathing was deep but steady.
Louisa closed the door and walked to the bed where she pulled off his boots, then placed a single blanket over him.
A moment later, wearing her woolen night shift, she slid under the covers beside Harry. As she lay there, a feeling of comfort swept over her. Why couldn't she have been pledged to a man like Harry? How different her life would hav
e been.
Her hand possessively stroked over Harry's rock-hard shoulders. She could see herself happily lying beside him for the rest of her nights, but such thoughts – such torturing pleasure – must not be invited. For Harry Blassingame, the Earl of Wycliff, was as far removed from her touch as the stars in the heavens.
With the Cornish winds howling outside their casement, the smell of salt air flooding their chamber from the half-open window, and the warmth of Harry beside her, she fell into a contented sleep.
* * *
It was Louisa who brought tea and elixir to Harry the next morning. Harry was in the same position he had been in when he sprawled on the bed the night before.
"Can you not close the curtain?" he asked, refusing to lift his head from the bed. "The blasted sun's far too strong."
"As well it should be," Louisa answered. "It is almost noon."
"Our daylight grows short," he exclaimed, moving to sit up and force down the elixir Louisa offered. Then he laughed at himself. "I was thinking we were still on the road to finding our mysterious lord." He finished drinking and sat the glass on the table beside the bed. "Now, there's no longer a need to make tracks during daylight."
Louisa stood beside the bed and looked down at him. "Now, I think, we will need night, rather than day, to accomplish our mission."
He looked puzzled. "What mission would that be?"
"We're going to reclaim your mother's portrait."
His lips curved into a smile. "You are a positive vixen."
She laughed. "That's what all you aristocrats say about me."
He made room for her to come and sit beside him on the bed while he finished his tea.
It felt perfectly natural for her to be sitting here with a barefooted lord, on a bed, in the village of Falwell, carrying on a conversation about stealing a painting. Everything she did with Harry seemed perfectly natural. As if they were meant to be together. Which, of course, could never really be. Harry was an aristocrat, and she was a bluestocking, and the two did not get on. Add to that the fact Harry didn't really like her. He had made that perfectly clear when he had recovered from his grave illness.