A Country Flirtation

by Valerie King

  Celeste, however, had remained somewhat aloof to his careful attentions. She was in constant pursuit of whichever beau Marianne had at that moment claimed for her own. But

  Sir Henry was a tenacious suitor if not a gallant lover, and Constance hoped that in the end his perseverance would win the day.

  She considered Sir Henry a proper match for Celeste. He had a tidy property some ten miles south of Lady Brook, an easy competence, and fine, gentle manners. She had encouraged him to walk in the shrubberies with Celeste as frequently as propriety would allow, trusting that the baronet, some eight years Celeste’s senior, would know how to make use of the endorsed privacy without going beyond the pale.

  His only flaw, which could not help but sway Celeste’s heart away from the poor fellow, was that he had a common face. His dark brown eyes were nicely expressive, but this feature could not overcome a somewhat bulbous nose and thin lips. He was not in the least beautiful, like Mr. Albion, and Celeste, at two and twenty, was too young in mind and years to realize that a loving husband was far preferable to one who was handsome yet lacked steadiness of character, a kind nature, or plain common sense.

  Celeste could not love Sir Henry, yet she confessed she enjoyed his company and mild sense of humor more than any other gentleman of her acquaintance, so she was not averse to having him underfoot at Lady Brook. Herein lay Constance’s hope that the courtship would one day end at the altar. Or, at least, that was her hope until Mr. Albion arrived. Even though she had spent the past ten days caring in turn for her sickly mother and Lord Ramsdell, her younger sisters had occasionally pelted her with numerous complaints about the conduct of one or the other of her siblings. She did not need to be exceedingly quick-witted to conclude that the source of the tense undercurrents among at least her next three sisters was Mr. Albion.

  On the other hand, Augusta, the youngest, seemed somehow set apart from the competition for Mr. Albion’s attentions, though she was frequently known to spend hours reading to the now nearly recuperated young gentleman. She would have to remember to praise her for her sensible conduct.

  Celeste interrupted her reverie. “I nearly forgot. Mama wishes to speak with you. I had brought her a copy of The Morning Post, but she wouldn’t cast her eyes on it. She seemed distressed, and when I asked if she wished to speak with you she blinked a yes.”

  Constance nodded. Her mother had suffered the apoplexy several years before and could neither speak nor move her limbs. Somehow, over time, however, she had learned to communicate through blinking. One for yes. Two for no.

  The realization that her mother was distressed prompted Constance to immediately slip from bed and don a robe of fine linen which, though patched in three places, still appeared in excellent condition. Celeste, following her from the room, said, “You cannot even tell where I mended it.”

  Constance turned to smile at her. “Of course not. You are the most accomplished needlewoman I have ever known.”

  Celeste smiled and blushed with rosy pleasure. Her dimples showed, and she looked to be about fourteen, except that everything else about her was far too womanly for Alby to set down to indeterminate youth.

  Now that she knew Mr. Albion’s identity, Constance wondered how soon she could send him back to Ramsdell’s home in Bedfordshire. She decided she would broach the subject with the viscount as soon as he appeared to be gaining strength.

  * * * * * * * * *

  Constance held her mother’s hand and smiled lovingly down at her. Mrs. Pamberley was little more than a frail image of her once-beautiful and strong self. Her eyes, however, seemed not to notice that her body was as useless as a limp rag, for they watched Constance even now with sparkling blue intensity, never drifting once from her eldest daughter’s face.

  “You cannot tell me, Mama, that you were worried about my health when you know I am never ill?”

  Mrs. Pamberley blinked twice. No.

  “So what is your concern?”

  Mrs. Pamberley’s eyelids fluttered, an ominous sign that she was indeed distressed. Constance knew to begin pelting her with questions. Her mother held her eyes wide until she mentioned Mr. Albion. She blinked once.

  “Oh, that.” Constance sighed.

  Blink.

  “Well, it was terribly unfortunate that Ramsdell should have arrived, suffering so dreadful an accident at the very moment I was hoping to move Mr. Albion out of the house.

  But there was nothing else I could do.”

  Blink. Flutter.

  “If you are worried about Marianne and Celeste—”

  Blink-blink.

  “Katherine?”

  Blink-blink.

  “Not Augusta?”

  A single steady blink.

  “Augusta and Mr. Albion?” Constance queried, astonished.

  Another steady blink.

  “But how strange. Has Augusta mentioned him to you?” Her mother blinked once. “How curious! To think of Augusta, who is usually so unmoved by masculine beauty and charm, to have been taken in by Alby?”

  A fluttering ensued. Constance laughed. “Have you not heard your daughters refer to Mr. Albion as Alby?” Two blinks. “Yes, it is quite true and excessively absurd.”

  She hesitated for a moment, then added, “Don’t fret, Mama. I shall take great care to see that Augusta does not lose her heart to Mr. Albion.”

  Her mother sighed, and she knew now her parent would be at ease. After tending to her needs, she promised to see for herself the precise state of Augusta’s sentiments toward their impoverished guest and left to dress for dinner.

  When she emerged from her bedchamber an hour later, she was gowned in soft cambric overlaid with a tunic of lavender silk. A matching silk cap covered her light brown curls, which she adjusted with a slight tug before leaving her room. Stepping into the hallway, however, she was greeted with a sight that not only stunned her but set her naturally suspicious mind on edge.

  “Hello, Constance,” Katherine called to her. “Only do but look. Alby is walking.” She had one arm around Mr. Albion’s back and was helping Marianne, along with Celeste and

  Augusta, to aid the young gentleman on what appeared to be a first excursion outside his bedchamber.

  She was struck by many things. The young man’s legs, though lean, appeared quite strong, his face was a perfectly rosy hue that had nothing to do with the exertion of making his way down the hall with the support of four able young women, and he was even more handsome than she had remembered.

  Since Ramsdell’s accident, she had ventured only twice into Mr. Albion’s supposed sickroom, and she realized, each time, she had found Alby in a perfect bloom of health. Her suspicions deepened.

  All the ladies were presently smiling and giggling and offering every manner of assistance as the young gentleman appeared to struggle with each step. Constance scrutinized his efforts. She could not help but feel he was shamming it, but to what purpose? To enjoy the attentions of some of Berkshire’s prettiest maids? Perhaps. Her sisters presented as charming a country portrait as any bevy of youthful females could. Not a one was platter-faced. What man wouldn’t want to be cosseted by so many willing and quite lovely ladies?

  She met his gaze, lowering one of her clearest stares upon him, and did not miss the quick blush that added to the color of his cheeks. “How happy I am to see that you are finally abroad, Mr. Albion, but I am grievously concerned. Because of the way you struggle to walk, when even a simpleton can see that your legs are nearly as firm as iron, I have begun to wonder whether your mind was not more aversely affected than we have supposed. You know, I understand that Bethlehem Hospital is experimenting with electrical shock in the treatment of some of their patients. Perhaps Dr. Kent might know more on the subject.”

  A stunned light entered Mr. Albion’s beautiful eye.

  “I—I don’t wonder if Dr. Kent is well acquainted with such a treatment, Miss Pamberley, but I assure you, I feel quite well and am remembering a great deal—just not my identity. Perhaps I
have been relying too much on the kindness of your sisters, when I should be attempting to walk on my own.”

  “Perhaps,” she agreed.

  “Ladies,” he said, glancing at each sister in turn, meeting each gaze as though that particular female was his favorite. “Do you think I should try?”

  The result was a unanimous ‘no’, followed by a variety of exclamations.

  “You are still too weak,” Marianne said.

  “What if you should fall?” Celeste asked, pressing her hand to her mouth.

  Katherine cast Constance a reproachful glance. “How can you suggest such a thing, when he is just now emerged from the sickroom? Have you no sensibility?”

  But it was Augusta whom Constance watched. The quiet young woman clutched a book to her bosom and shuddered. Her face turned ominously pale. She appeared close to swooning—again.

  Oh, dear, Constance thought. It would seem for the first time in her life that Augusta Pamberley had tumbled violently in love and with a man who by nature and by circumstance was not in any way suited to husband her.

  Mr. Albion protested. “No, no! Your sister is very right. I must attempt to walk without your aid sometime, and it might as well be now.”

  Constance then watched a performance so pure as to make even the great Edmund Kean gnash his teeth with envy. Mr. Albion struggled forward several steps, his knees threatening to give way at any moment. He murmured to himself, appeared to battle his weakness with a supreme effort of the will, then moved in her direction weaving from side to side.

  All four sisters moved as one behind him, their arms outstretched as though to catch him the moment he fell.

  Only he never fell, never tripped, never even stumbled. He merely struggled valiantly on, passing Constance in the hallway but refusing to meet her eye.

  “Fustian,” she murmured to him as he limped by. She watched him start for the barest second, then continue in his forward march as though he were bearing a heavy cross upon his shoulder.

  Constance let them go. She had something of far greater moment to attend to than Mr. Albion’s bamboozling conduct. She would deal with him later, but for the present she needed to see for herself that Lord Ramsdell was indeed recovered.

  * * * * * * * * *

  Ramsdell was irritated as he stared up at the blue canopy. He had never been one to bear even a hint of illness with a proper measure of equanimity. He was a man of sport, strong in body and determined in competition. He never refused a challenge, whether shooting pistols, fencing, riding a race over devilish country, or driving his curricle across England against the clock.

  He was proud of his prowess, but more than that, he loved the sensations he experienced when he gave himself to the heat of the moment. He felt fully alive and something more—a spiritual connection to all the dynamic forces about him— the heat of the sun, the strength of a northern wind, the power of a lightning bolt.

  But staring up at the canopy, his soul was agitated beyond words. Never in his entire existence had he known a moment that he could not control—until now. He was so weak, he could hardly move his head, none the less his arms or legs. He felt as though he’d been struck by lightning and every ounce of energy drained from him in a single swoop. Marchand had to support him so that he could drink the vile potions Dr. Kent had prescribed for him. Marchand had to turn him over in bed to change his sheets. And worse, he knew quite well that Charles had somehow tricked a passel of silly females into believing he was not only ill but that he could not remember who he was, and there was not a thing he could do about it.

  A scratching on the door interrupted his charming train of thought. “Come,” he barked through dry, cracked lips.

  A lady entered the room. A tall lady, the woman from his tortured dreams. His heart turned over in his breast. He had thought he had made up the female, but it would seem he had not. She was striding toward him, her elegant shoulders well laid back, her breasts high and firm, her face as beautiful as he remembered. She could not be the woman Marchand said ruled the household with an iron fist? Impossible! The angel who had spoken softly to him in the midst of his delirium cannot have the raw will to manage the house and so many absurd females as well.

  But if she was, what the devil was such a young and beautiful woman doing wearing a cap? He was irritated all over again as he watched her approach his bed.

  “May I sit with you for a few minutes?” she asked politely. That voice! Something deep inside his chest began to ache at the pure feminine strains.

  “Yes, of course,” he said, swallowing with some difficulty. His throat burned and his chest ached.

  “Would you like some water?” she asked, a slight frown marring her brow.

  How very perceptive of her. He nodded, watching her carefully. She was the eldest daughter of Lady Brook, and from what Marchand had gleaned from the servants, she ran the household with an efficiency matched only by his own housekeeper at Aston Hall.

  She poured a glass of water, and before he could even begin struggling to sit up, she slid an arm under him, cradling his shoulders with expert care and strength, somehow knowing precisely how much water he could manage at a time.

  He drained the glass. He was grateful yet at the same time irritated that she had divined his need and so masterfully provided for him. He did not like being beholden to her, or to anyone. He grunted a thank-you.

  “Cross as crabs this evening, I see,” she said, her lips twitching slightly.

  He sighed heavily. “I beg pardon for not concealing the truth of my sentiments more carefully, but I am not used to being abed.”

  “Never?”

  “Never.”

  She nodded. “Neither am I, so you have my sympathies.”

  He might have been charmed by such an admission, but for the present he preferred to remain irascible, especially since the lady in front of him was so very

  pretty and he was, yes, susceptible to her.

  “Marchand says that you attended me day and night for over a sennight. I am indebted to you and I thank you—very much.”

  She did not respond for a moment, but held his gaze firmly. Some emotion worked in her, but he could not comprehend it. She glanced at her lap and swallowed. Her hands were clasped tightly together. At last she lifted her gaze to meet his and began somberly, “I was never more grateful than when your fever turned last night. You see, I feel partly to blame for your accident. We—I should have had the lane straightened some time past. I have since hired workmen to cut a new lane through the forest. Only, pray assure me that you feel much more the thing this evening, for until I hear you say it, I shall not be convinced you truly are recovering.”

  He shifted his head slightly, better to see her. The light was on the wane and the chamber was filled with the warm glow of fading sunlight. He saw the self-blame in her eyes and felt a new irritation grate within him. He recalled the news Marchand had brought him about Lady Brook, how Simon Pamberley had died at an inauspicious moment, deeply burdened with debt, leaving his wife and children impoverished. In his opinion, Pamberley should have seen to the lane long before his demise.

  He did not, however, voice any of these thoughts to the woman before him. Instead, he answered her plea and related his present condition to her. “Except for a weakness I find appalling,” he said, “I am in excellent health. I’ve little doubt I shall be fit to travel in a day or two.”

  “A day or two,” she said, but a flush quickly suffused her cheeks. “That is, Lord Ramsdell, I don’t mean to give offense, but I shall be astonished if you were ready to travel within a fortnight.”

  “I shall be ready,” he reiterated coldly, “in two days time.”

  He glowered at her, narrowing his eyes and pinching his lips together. Any of his servants—well, any of his London servants—would have been quaking in their boots at such ominous signs.

  Miss Pamberley, however, began to smile, a most unfortunate happenstance to be sure. The smile began as a tightening at the sides
of her lips and then a slight chewing on the inside of her lower lip. Her cheeks strained and her eyes began to dance. She surrendered to her amusement and showed him a row of white, even teeth. Faith, but she was even prettier when she smiled.

  “Now, what have I said to amuse you?” he asked coolly, hoping she did not see any evidence of the admiration he felt for her.

  He watched her swallow and blink. “I have it on excellent authority that you are accounted something of an ogre, m’lord. I now believe it to be true.”

  “And are you always given to listening to gabblemongers?” he snapped, attempting a quelling tone to his voice.

  But the lady was not quelled. Instead, she clucked her tongue. “Pray, do not come the crab with me, m’lord. I have been too used to having my own way to be dampened by a show of your fangs. Besides, I believe we both want the same thing, do we not?”

  He searched his mind trying to determine what that might be. For the life of him, he could not believe that she was at all inclined to permit him to drag her into his arms that he might kiss her. Still, some strange flicker of hope rose oddly to the forefront of his mind and danced there with great enthusiasm.

  “And what is it we both want?” he asked. His gaze fell to her lips, which were rosy and beautifully shaped.

  “We both want Mr. Kidmarsh out of this house as quickly as possible.”

  ***

  Chapter Four

  Constance knew she had given poor Lord Ramsdell a shock, but given his pricklish conduct, she thought it might benefit him to be stunned a little.

  “So, Charles is here,” he said, a quick frown splitting his brow.

  “Yes,” she stated, nodding. “Until your valet arrived, I did not know who he was, since during his accident he struck his head and awoke with a severe lapse of memory. Marchand, however, confirmed his identity a few days past. He also told me of your relationship to Mr. Kidmarsh, that you are his guardian, and that though he is long past his majority, he remains in your care.”

  If she wondered how a man could reach the age of seven and twenty and still require his guardian’s vigilant watch, she kept her musings to herself. However, she felt some of the blame must be laid at Ramsdell’s door, surely, but it was hardly her place to remonstrate.