She could not see Rick when she arrived back and delivered the reels of ribbon her aunt had needed. Bosville was there, instructing a bemused undergraduate on the correct tying of a cravat. Enid had finally found common ground with one of Aunt Theo's daughters, vigorously discussing how to attach the swags of evergreen, ribbons, and bells to the picture rail of the main parlor.
When Mary went upstairs to take off her bonnet and pelisse, though, Enid came too. "Mary," she said, "I found something I want to show you. Come this way."
Mary, curious, if a little cautious, followed behind, out the side door and into the garden. "What is it, Enid?" Enid said nothing, just lead Mary down a path until they came around a hedge, and there before them was a small tower, perhaps as tall as the house, but less than ten feet in diameter.
"How charming," Mary said. "What is it for?"
"I have no idea," Enid said, "but I found it yesterday when I walked this way, and I remembered it when you mentioned the dance floor. Wouldn't lanterns up there by the window light this part of the garden?"
It could work. Mary opened the door with some difficulty, because it was stiff, and stepped inside. The tower was hollow, and blank walled until just below the roof, where a series of window spaces let light in. They could easily also let light out, but getting a lantern up could be tricky. Though she could see some possible handholds and footholds…
At that moment, the door shut behind her with a tired groan and then a thud. Shut and—from the sound of it—bolted.
She called out, but Enid was gone, and Mary was well out of earshot of anyone else in the house. What was Enid up to? No good, that was certain. Mary frowned. She would not let her cousin get away with it.
She examined the inner wall of the tower again. Moments later, she'd stripped off her dress and petticoat and was climbing the wall in her stays and under-drawers. It was as tricky a climb as she expected, and Enid was out of sight by the time she reached the windows.
Now what? The outside of the tower was smooth, and besides, she could not climb in the open air in nothing but her undergarments.
Rick came into view, entering the garden through the gate from the road. She smiled. He must have found a way to elude the two cousins and followed her. What a pity she came back the other way.
The next moment, she frowned again. Bosville appeared from the direction of the house, and approached Rick. A few moments of conversation and Bosville handed Rick something—a note, it looked like—clapped Rick on the shoulder, and went off.
Rick stood there, reading the note. He frowned at the path that led down the garden, and then back at the house, clearly suspicious.
Whatever those two were up to, it was time to stop it. Mary, with some effort, managed to push out the ornamental trellis that blocked the window. As it crashed to the ground, Rick stopped in his tracks, looked up at the tower, then turned and went hurrying back towards the house.
Bother. Was she going to have to rescue herself? But as she thought that, the top legs of a ladder appeared. Looking over the side of the tower, she saw Rick holding the ladder steady.
"Your stair awaits, fair princess," he joked.
Dressed, or rather undressed, as she was? She looked back at the inside wall. Perhaps she could climb back down, and he could let her out. But she'd only just made the climb, and her arms were still trembling; she wasn't sure she could get back.
Rick was looking anxious. "Is there a problem?"
"Shut your eyes, please?"
His face cleared. "Of course." And he screwed his eyes shut, rather more dramatically than she thought necessary.
The ladder made the descent easy, and she breathed a sigh of relief as first one foot, then the other, reached the ground. She stopped breathing altogether when Rick's arms came round her waist.
"Do you have any idea what it does to me to see you clambering around a roof, Mary Pritchard?" he asked, holding her so tight she squeaked. He didn't release her, but, instead, bent his head to rub his cheek on her hair. "I'm confident you had an excellent reason, but I swear, I've aged ten years in the last five minutes."
She had had a reason, but for the moment, it escaped her. "Rick?" she asked.
He let her go, stepping backwards. "I beg your pardon. For a moment I… I take it you didn't send the note your nasty cousin gave me?"
He pulled it from his pocket and handed it to her.
"Dear Rick," she read, "please meet me in the summerhouse. With all my love, Mary."
Mary saw red. "That weevil," she hissed. "That sneaky, mean, two-faced little maggot!"
Rick caught her around the waist again before she could storm down the path. "Whoa, Mary. Who is a maggot? Not Bosville, I take it?"
"Him, too," she fumed. "They're both in on it. Enid locked me in the tower, and Bosville gave you the note."
"Ah," Rick nodded. "Husband-hunting. I thought that might be it. You want to tell them what you think of them, I take it? You might want to get dressed first."
Mary felt the heat of her blush, but Rick the Rogue barely looked her way. He opened the tower door and waited outside while Mary changed.
Chapter Twelve
Rick needed the time on his own to recover. Mary felt every bit as good in his arms as he had imagined, and her state of undress disclosed a shapely form, to which the high-waisted fashions did not do justice. Thinking about the blush that had covered every inch of skin he could see, and clearly carried on where he desperately wished to see, was not helping him calm himself.
Think of something else. Anything. Ah. Here was the perfect distraction—Bosville, rounding the corner and stopping to gape at Rick, the tower, the ladder, and again at Rick.
"What are you doing here?" he asked.
"Waiting for Miss Rumbold, Bosville. She is in the tower, but I'm expecting her to join me."
"But… but my cousin, Mary…"
Rick chose to take that as a question. "Miss Pritchard? She went that way." He pointed down the path.
Bosville opened, then shut, his mouth and hurried away down the path.
Moments later, several other people rounded the house: Dr. and Mrs. Wren and several of the students. "Come along, Theo," said Dr. Wren impatiently. "That young pup insisted on us seeing the surprise in the summerhouse."
Rick and a somewhat-rumpled Mary joined on the tail of the group, and arrived at the summerhouse to find Miss Rumbold in Bosville's arms, her dress drooping to display a naked shoulder and quite a lot of her chemise.
"What, young Bosville, is the meaning of this?" demanded Dr. Wren.
"She just… I just…" Bosville glared at Miss Rumbold in a far from lover-like manner. Clearly, she had decided a viscount in the hand was worth more than a cautious sailor in the bush. "What Lord Bosville is trying to say, Dr. Wren, Mrs. Wren, is that he has asked for my hand in marriage, and I have accepted."
"That isn't… that is to say…" Bosville started, but Dr. Wren shook his hand, Mrs. Wren kissed them both and said she would write immediately to Bosville's mother, and the students declared tonight's Christmas celebration should also be a betrothal party.
"Bosville does not look happy," Rick whispered to Mary.
"How awful Enid is," Mary replied. "I don't like cousin Bosville, but to trap him!"
"They intended to trap us both," Rick pointed out. "They were in it together. She locked you in the tower, and he sent me to the summerhouse."
He had little sympathy for the viscount, and even less as the day wore on. Bosville, at least, had secured a bride, if not the one he intended, but Rick couldn't find even a moment alone with Mary.
She was everywhere, always busy, always in company. More of the Wren offspring arrived, with spouses and children, all delighted to meet Mary, the cousin whose letters from far-flung places had enlivened their lives for many years. She was in demand in the kitchen, where she was making and icing gingerbread shapes for the party supper. She was involved in the last of the decorating.
He gave up, and deci
ded to move his baggage to the inn where he was booked for the night.
"Rick? Are you leaving?" Mary. She stopped in the parlor doorway.
"I'll be back for the party, Mary, but I'll leave from the inn in the morning. My father expects me in London tomorrow night. Mary? Will you walk into Oxford with me?"
Just then, Mrs. Wren and two of her daughters came down the stairs.
"Mary, dear, would you help with the kissing bough in the garden? Lieutenant Redepenning, you're off to the inn? What time do you expect to be back, dear?"
Rick gave some kind of an answer, watching Mary slip away from him again, carried off by her cousins.
Tonight. At some point tonight, he would find her alone, if he had to carry her off into a dark corner of the garden across the dead bodies of all her relatives.
***
Rick wanted to see her alone, and Mary had a fair idea why. He thought he'd compromised her when he helped her out of the tower, and he wanted to do the honorable thing. Mary wasn't having it. Enid might be satisfied to trap a husband, but Mary would rather stay single all her life than be married to someone reluctant to have her. Not that Bosville was reluctant anymore. Someone—Enid probably—had told him about Enid's trust fund, and he was as happy as a dog with two tails.
Mary wished them well. She did. But if Rick insisted on proposing, she would turn him down, even though it would break her heart. How she wished he wanted her. For a while, she had hoped… but he had said nothing.
She made her way back to the kitchen. Baking always made her feel better, and gingerbread brides would be a fine betrothal addition to tonight's Christmas party.
The kissing boughs had all been hung, making it perilous to traverse the house and garden. By the time the party started, Mary had been kissed at least twenty times, all polite salutes on the cheek.
The party spilled all over the house and beyond: carols around the pianoforte in one of the parlors, silly games in another, a continual feast in the dining room, and dancing outside in the crisp night air. Mary managed to avoid being alone with Rick until almost the end of the evening, when he cornered her in a temporarily deserted parlor, most of the party out on the dance lawn in the garden.
"Mary." There it was again. Her name, hummed in that beautiful voice of his, sounding like music. She turned her face upwards, tipping her cheek within easy reach, but he curved his neck as he bent, so that his lips touched hers.
They felt warm and soft and so gentle; as light as a feather, brushing along her mouth as if they would flutter past, then returning to settle. She stood frozen, all consciousness focused on the point of connection. Persuasive lips grazed against hers, until she responded, softening against him.
He moved closer then, sliding his hands around her waist. His mouth opened, and his tongue swept along her lower lip. Startled, she drew back, and he let her go, though his eyes clung to hers.
"Mary, dear Mary, may I…?"
"Don't, Rick, please?" After that kiss, her wits were scattered to the four corners of the garden. All she knew was that she didn't want to hear him propose. She couldn't bear to say no to him, and she had to.
"Rick, I know what you want to say, and you mustn't. There is no need. Really, Rick. We are friends, are we not? We have always been friends. You mustn't try to make it more."
"But, Mary…"
"No. I'm not Enid. I wouldn't do that to you. Please, Rick. Just leave me be." Her eyes were swimming with tears. She would not cry. She never cried.
One of the Wren cousins came in, thank Heaven above, stopping whatever Rick was going to say next. "Oh, excuse me, I was looking for Mama."
"In the garden, I think," Rick said. Mary took the opportunity to sidle to the door and make her escape, hurrying up the stairs to the safety of her bedroom, where she sat, holding in the tears, listening to the sounds of jollity from the garden, remembering Rick's kiss, and trying not to imagine what might have been.
It seemed like hours before the party slowly wound to a close, but the house was silent when the knock came on her door. It was Aunt Theo, who said, without preamble, "You seem to have successfully chased off your dear lieutenant, Mary. He left very subdued. You have been running from him all week, and what I do not understand, is why you do not let him catch you?"
"He is not my lieutenant. I have not been running. And I do not believe he wishes to catch me."
"I beg to differ, Mary. Young Redepenning is in love with you, or I know nothing about young men. And I have raised six of my own, not to mention all Dr. Wren's students and the strays that find their way here. And you, dear, are in love with him."
Mary picked at her nightgown, not meeting her aunt's eyes. "He… Did he tell you he loves me?"
"He does not need to, Mary. I have eyes in my head. His eyes follow you whenever you are in the room, and he follows after you whenever you leave. When he cannot be with you, he talks about you, and when anyone flirts with you—not that you ever seem to notice—he glares until they slink off."
Mary shook her head. "But, Aunt Theo, he has never said a word."
"Have you let him, Mary, dear?"
She hadn't. She'd seen the look Aunt Theo mentioned and had been afraid to believe it was true. So much so, she had gone out of her way not to be alone with him, had changed the subject whenever he seemed ready to say something serious, and the rare comments she'd been unable to deflect, she had dismissed as Rick the Rogue, flirting as usual. Even tonight, she had refused to let him speak.
But she had to admit he had flirted with no one else. He had been polite and friendly. But he had been attentive only to her. And that kiss…!
Aunt Theo bent over to give her a peck on the cheek. "Think about it, Mary, dear. And pleasant dreams."
Chapter Thirteen
There were no dreams for Mary that night. She lay awake, turning over in her mind all that Rick had said and done since she first met him two and a half months ago in a field in Sussex. In the early hours of the morning, she gave up on sleep and lit her candle to wash and dress, then crept down to the kitchen. Rick would probably leave the inn at first light for his trip to London, but perhaps, just perhaps, she could reach him first.
***
Rick spent the night awake. Mary's rejection hit him hard; he'd been so sure that she still cared for him, and not just as a friend. Had he been imagining the sideways looks when she thought he wasn't watching? Were the thousand small services she rendered him, the kindness she always showed him, just signs of affection? Did the blush he could provoke with a compliment mean nothing?
He'd been halfway back to Oxford before the remark about Enid started to bother him, and all the way to his room at the inn before he made sense of it. His foolish Mary thought she had been compromised, and that he had been trapped into proposing. Of course. She had a sense of honor equal to his own, and never a thought of taking advantage of circumstances beyond their control.
He almost turned back then and there, but she had gone to bed. He wouldn't be able to see her until the morning. By everything holy, he was not leaving for London until he got Miss Mary Pritchard on her own and made her listen to him.
In the half-light before dawn, he set out for the Wrens' house, walking his horse carefully on the icy surface of the road. He'd covered perhaps half the distance when he saw her trudging towards him. He knew her immediately, even from several hundred yards in uncertain light.
He dismounted, and waited for her, the anxious uncertainty in his chest easing a little further when her face lit up at the sight of him.
"Running away, Miss Pritchard?"
"Running towards, Lieutenant Redepenning." She blushed then, stopping several paces away, just out of reach. Some perverse imp, still smarting from last night's rejection, kept him silent.
"I brought you a present." She came close enough to hand him a box, tied shut with a ribbon. His heart sank, then. A present. One friend to another. He was reading the signals all wrong, it seemed. He mastered his disappointmen
t enough to smile, to thank her, to hand her the reins, so he could open the box.
It was one of her gingerbread biscuits, cut in the shape of a lady, with an icing dress and bonnet and currant eyes. "A gingerbread lady?"
"A gingerbread bride, Rick," she corrected. "If…" She blushed and stumbled a little over her words, "If… you h-happen to be in n-need of a bride."
"As it happens, I am," he said. Could a man survive such a rebound? From despair to jubilation in a few short words. The birds were beginning their dawn chorus, but none of them sang as loudly as his heart. "I am in need of you, Mary, my love."
Who reached for whom remains forever a mystery, but the box dropped onto the path, unheeded, as their arms wrapped around each other. Their lips met for the second time in their lives, and for many minutes, nothing further was said.
Eventually, Rick found himself considering the logistics of icy roads and wet hedgerows, which recalled him to himself enough to impose discipline on his wayward impulses.
"Mary, I had better put this precious little gingerbread bride safely back in her box before I crush her, and take my own dear runaway bride home to her family. Do you think they will let you come to London with me? If we take Polly, for propriety's sake?"
"To London?"
He put the bride in her box and kissed Mary again. "To stay with my sister while I arrange the wedding. You will marry me straightaway, will you not, Mary? As soon as I can arrange it? So we can spend the rest of my leave together?" He kissed her again, before she could answer.
"Yes, as soon as we can," she affirmed when she was able.
"My dearest love," Rick said.
"Am I your love?"
He loosened his hold enough to lean back so he could see her face. "Surely you know you are."
She shook her head. "I thought I was just the nuisance you had to keep rescuing."
He bent to kiss the tip of her nose. Tall as she was, he was taller.
Mistletoe, Marriage, and Mayhem: A Bluestocking Belles Collection Page 33