Cynthia Bailey Pratt

by Splendid You

  “Twenty-seven.”

  “How, pray, do you know that?”

  “She told me.”

  “Oh, then she is more than thirty! No woman ever gave a man her age without shaving off a few years.”

  “I don’t believe she lied, Mother.”

  “Oh, it’s not a lie to flatter yourself a little. I don’t blame her for it. Being so old-maidish, one can’t blame her for trying! But I’d be remiss if I didn’t warn you, dear. You’ve been away from England so long ...”

  “Only six months ...”

  “It always seems longer. But you don’t know what girls like this Miss Hanson are like. Any man will do for a girl who is facing permanent spinsterhood. You might find that she tries to compromise you. You should lock your door.”

  “Mother, I’m not a virginal maid in the house of a rake. I doubt Miss Hanson has any thought of seducing me.”

  “Oh, Simon! Your language!”

  He stooped and kissed her softly scented cheek. “Go back to bed, you dear goose. I need no protection from the likes of Miss Hanson.”

  “You only say that because you don’t know how handsome you are! Like an angel.”

  “Good God!” Simon said, revolted.

  “But you are! Every woman I know agrees with me.”

  He escorted her to her door, kissing her forehead as he bid her good night. Her eyes, only slightly lined, looked at him anxiously but he did not try again to dispel her worries. He might as well have saved the breath he’d expended thus far.

  Back in his room, he tore off his brown silk cravat and removed his collar. Kicking off his shoes, he eased his feet into a pair of red morroco slippers. It had been a long day.

  Yet he puttered about his room for a little while. It was quite the largest in the house, having been his father’s. The furniture was all ebony-painted wood, popular in the last century. It was comfortable enough, but made the room rather dark, even with the gas jet on full.

  He smiled to think that his mother was afraid that Miss Hanson meant to compromise him in some way. Though he did not know the girl well, he guessed that such tactics were too underhanded and subtle for her.

  He thought that if Miss Hanson had seduction on her mind, she would go about it in as straightforward a manner as possible. Flirtation and hints of undress were not for her—she’d drive toward her goal relentlessly, flattening everything in her path. No doubt she’d feel that the mere sight of her naked form would be enough to bring a man to his knees.

  The picture that rose before his eyes sent a jet of desire flaring up in him, taking him completely by surprise. It was as if a hard crust over a stream of lava had suddenly broken, letting a burst of heat surge through. He imagined her generous mouth opening under his as he crushed her full bosom against him. His chest felt tight as his body clamored for the woman.

  Then it quieted, and he told himself that Miss Hanson had nothing to do with this chaos. It had been caused by a combination of exhaustion and abstinence. He could hardly remember the last time he’d coupled, having too much self-respect to visit any brothel and his previous “dear friend” had reconciled with her long-estranged husband while Simon had been away.

  He really should lie down and go to sleep. Thinking about women was not restful after so disturbed an evening. “An-ket!” he said in disbelief. “Twice!”

  Usually, after his mother and sisters had retired, he would remove to the little den he kept at the side of the house. Here he kept his private papers, the manuscript for his book, and his cigars. He only smoked one a day, but the hour dedicated to the cherishing of the ash he held sacred. He only ever drank then, too. One glass of whiskey, one cigar, a few crackers munched, one hour to himself alone....

  Thinking of the crackers reminded him that he’d had nothing to eat since luncheon. He’d been so busy arranging the exhibit that he’d not even stopped for tea. Now as he thought about the crackers and smoked salmon the cook laid out for him every evening, his stomach made a sound like a snarling tiger.

  That decided him. Very carefully, he opened his door. His mother had ears like a cat and she’d be waiting to see if there was any traffic between his room and Julia’s. He’d had enough scenes for one night.

  Downstairs, all was quiet. The ticking of the clock in the parlor sounded like a distant drumbeat. Simon knew the cook would not have allowed his after-supper rations to sit out in his den, but it was just possible that she’d covered the plate with a cloth and left it in the kitchen. He turned to pass through the door, but as he pressed it open, he heard voices.

  One was plainly Julia’s. “I almost hate to do it. He’s been so kind to me this evening. I quite forgive him for thinking I’m mad.”

  The second voice was low, hardly more than a purring current of sound. Simon couldn’t make out a word.

  “If only I knew more about this sort of thing,” Julia said, seemingly in reply. “Perhaps my aunt is right and girls ought to make men their study.”

  Again came the second voice. Simon strained his ears, not daring to open the door and stroll in. What was it that Julia “almost hated to do”?

  “No,” she said. “We choose our own husbands, although few girls marry without at least some thought of pleasing their parents. No one likes to disoblige them, for if the marriage turns out badly, where can most girls go but to their former homes? I haven’t married yet because of my poor father.”

  Simon thought, poor father!

  Apparently the unknown second person said something similar, for Julia replied easily, “Because he’s hounded, poor darling. After my mother died, all the women expected him to marry again fairly quickly. Being left a widower with such a young daughter and all.”

  A few words from the purring voice led to the answer, “I’m afraid I don’t remember her at all. I was hardly five years old when she died together with her baby, but, you know, I think I miss her.”

  Strange how Simon could hear her sigh so clearly, yet the other voice remained difficult to catch. He pushed the door open a trifle farther. Perhaps he could catch a glimpse ...

  Julia said, “At any rate, soon the ladies started calling, some for themselves, and some in representation of their unmarried daughters. Father says he was nearly caught several times but he always managed to escape. He said that he wouldn’t make me grow up under a stepmother. It was a long time before I found out the real reason why he didn’t choose any of them.”

  The whisper made her chuckled warmly. “That’s right. Her name is Ruth, half French, half Irish ... not that that means anything to you! But she’s fascinating. Black eyes and black hair; I’d make two of her.

  “Of course, I’ve met her. She comes to stay at the house. Father would have married her any time these last twenty years but her husband wouldn’t divorce her. Not that Ruth would be divorced, cither. Her religion forbids it. It’s called Catholicism and I can’t really explain it all to you now.

  “But I have to find somewhere else to live and something else to do besides excavate the garden midden and scare off women who want my father’s fortune. Ruth’s husband died a few months ago, so Father wants to marry her as soon as she’s out of mourning. No, we don’t shave our heads....”

  That was unexpected, but what made Simon fall forward, slamming the door against the wall, was Julia’s calm, matter-of-fact voice saying, “So that’s why I must marry Simon Archer as soon as possible.”

  Chapter Eight

  The noise he made seemed to set up an echo; a second clatter followed hard upon it. He heard Julia’s sudden exclamation as he staggered against the wall, only staying on his feet by luck. If only he could have whisked out of sight, back up the stairs or around a corner. There was no time, however, to employ discretion. The only thing to do was pretend he’d heard nothing.

  But all such pretense was as irritating to him as desert sand between his toes. He shoved open the door and marched into the kitchen.

  Julia sat at the big worktable, quite alone. In one glan
ce, Simon took under consideration every corner of the room. He even pushed open the pantry door to see if anyone was hidden in there. “Who were you talking to?”

  “Talking?” she asked, her eyes wide.

  “I heard you talking to someone.”

  “There’s no one here.”

  He leaned one hip against the table and looked down at her, his arms folding across his chest. She wore only a white nightgown of some dense material, its placket securely buttoned to her smooth throat. He could see nothing of her body, yet the very fact that she wore nothing but that, sacred to the bedroom, was enough to unnerve him. But he refused to show it. “You were talking to yourself?”

  “I suppose I must have been, since there is no one here but me.”

  Simon took a deep breath, then let it out gustily. ‘Then you are barking mad. Miss Hanson. I will take you back to your room and lock you in, lest you do me or my family a mischief.”

  “Barking mad? I’ve never heard that one before.”

  “Come along,” he said. He stood up and gripped her by the upper arm as though he’d pull her to her feet.

  She smiled at him as though he’d just offered her a lump of sugar for her tea. “If I told you that I was talking to An-ket, here in the shape of a cat, you wouldn’t change your mind about my mental condition.”

  “You still persist in that fantasy? First thing in the morning, I’ll call Dr. Machines. He helped Lucy when she turned so melancholy last year.”

  “Why did she?”

  “Blighted affection. Come along.”

  “Who blighted it?”

  “A friend of mine. Are you coming?”

  “Are you hungry?”

  He released her arm. He was enjoying the feel of her muscles beneath the sleeve a trifle too much. Besides, women weren’t supposed to have muscles. Muscles weren’t built by shopping, supervising servants, or lifting teapots. These were the things women were supposed to do. They were supposed to be dainty, readily shocked, and easily led.

  Simon sat down across from her. She said, “I’m sorry I ate the last biscuit. I hadn’t had anything to eat this evening.”

  “I should have thought of that. I hadn’t had anything, either.”

  She looked about her. He realized that she seemed quite at home in these simple surroundings. “I suppose your cook would be justifiably distressed if we made a mess of her kitchen. I know Mrs. Finch would be.”

  “Is she your cook?”

  “Yes. A fine woman—she taught me a very great deal—but she does so hate to have anyone else cook in her kitchen. Rather the way the queen must feel about other people sitting on her throne.”

  Simon found the crackers and salmon in the pantry, then brought out the plate.

  “You do know how to cook, then?”

  “Yes,” she said, then the merest twitch of her brows showed that she’d caught his tone.

  “I thought perhaps you despise all the things of a woman’s natural sphere.”

  She said levelly, “I cook very well indeed. I can also shoe a horse, if need be, and spin wool.”

  “Astonishing.” He poured two glasses of water, setting one before her.

  “Not at all. I have had many fine opportunities to learn things. I have tried not to waste my time.” Then, more animatedly, she said, “By the way, I do not believe that a woman’s ‘natural sphere’ is as limited as you apparently do.”

  “I confess I shouldn’t like to see my sisters shoeing horses—or tramping about London at night in the company of a charwoman.”

  “But what would your sisters say about it?”

  “They’d be even more shocked than I am.”

  Now, when he didn’t want her to leave, she rose to her feet. “You’re a very narrow person, aren’t you, Mr. Archer?”

  ‘Then you’ve changed your mind.”

  “No. I thought you were narrow from the moment we met. However, I have changed my mind about one thing. I am going to bed.”

  “I meant... you’ve decided not to marry me?”

  She sat down slowly, as though all the stiffening were leaking out of her knees. A warm blush suffused her cheeks and, for the first time in their acquaintance, she could not meet his eyes. “When did you guess my purpose?”

  “Only a moment ago. I suppose I should tell you that I’ve been laughing up my sleeve at you ever since this afternoon, but it wouldn’t be true.”

  “Wouldn’t it?”

  “No. It was only now that my thoughts became clear. I couldn’t imagine why you would think we could travel to Egypt together, because the scandal would prevent either of us from accomplishing anything.”

  “Surely in a land as distant as Egypt, no one would care.”

  He smiled at her and tried not to sound too patronizing. “The community of Europeans in Cairo is tiny. Everyone knows everyone else’s business with an intimacy only rivaled by the smallest of provincial towns. For two people of—pardon me—different genders to attempt to work together without being married... but you must know this, or why else would you have proposed?”

  She seemed to want to protest his use of the term. He said quickly, “It was a proposal, Miss Hanson, wasn’t it?”

  Rather to his surprise, she said unblushingly, “Yes. It was.”

  “I quite realize,” she went on, “the impossibility of which you speak. I believed from your letters that you wouldn’t be adverse to finding at once a companion and a colleague. Often in your letters I felt that I... that we had much in common, not the least of which is loneliness.”

  “Loneliness?”

  Her brown eyes looked black in the gaslight as she looked past him. She seemed slightly fey. He could almost believe she had spoken with a priestess three thousand years dead, just as she now conjured with words his own memories. “ ‘These desolate sands seem to echo with the sounds of the lost cities that lie beneath them. I am often aware that once, where I now walk alone, friends met, merchants haggled, and passing lovers spoke only with their longing eyes.’ “

  Now it was Simon’s turn to blush. “Did I write that?”

  “December fifteenth of last year. Of course, I realize now that you never would have revealed so much of yourself if you’d known you weren’t writing to an old lady. But I am very glad that you didn’t know. Your letters came to mean a great deal to me, for while you walk alone in Egypt, I am alone in Yorkshire.”

  “But your father ... your aunt?”

  “I have friends, too. Dear friends, really. I went to school with some of them and have known others since I was a little girl, but...” She shook her head, her rippling hair glinting with chestnut lights.

  “But?” he prompted.

  “Some are married and all they want to talk about is the servant question or clothes. They won’t talk to me about their husbands because I am a spinster and mustn’t know the things wives whisper about.”

  Simon cleared his throat. He quite agreed with those unknown matrons.

  With that lilt in her voice which told him he was being narrow, she said, “They will talk to me about their babies, though it is a subject of which I know very little. I know which goddess to invoke for their health, yes, or the proper prayers to the crocodile god for easier teething, but somehow they never show much interest.”

  “How odd,” he said, and meant it.

  “My unmarried friends are worse yet. They will talk of men; what clothes will entice them, what foods one should feed them, what this word or that gesture meant, everything under the sun to do with men. And yet they never once touch upon the subject of how to embalm one properly.”

  When he laughed, he saw her smile in relief and realized that her friends probably never understood her when she made a joke.

  “And when you raise the subject?” Simon asked.

  “I don’t dare. I am already thought quite the eccentric in our circle, and it is true. Sometimes I think I have no heart. Certainly it has never beaten at alt for the things ladies are commonly held to ado
re ... not even for a curate.”

  “No? Any curate in particular?”

  “Oh, young Mr. Bixby was adored by all the proper young ladies in church. He sang hymns on summer evenings to a sighing crowd of maidens. I tried to sigh, feeling it obligatory, but I’m afraid they were not sighs of rapture.”

  “What does your father think of your interest in things Egyptian?”

  “He doesn’t mind it. He realizes I must have something to occupy my mind. He has the mill and Mrs....” She shut her lips so tightly on the name that their edges turned quite white.

  “And Mrs.... who?” Simon said, interested almost despite himself. She was shedding her reserve very quickly and while he was charmed, he also wished for her to protect herself against regret.

  She leaned forward confidingly. Simon tried to ignore the shifting of her figure as she moved, but the quilted jacket he wore suddenly seemed both too hot and too tight. He gulped some water.

  Julia said, “I may as well tell you everything. My father hasn’t wanted me to leave home. So long as I am there he has an excellent excuse for not marrying again. When ladies pursue him—and they do!—he says that he feels he cannot marry until I do. Something about always having promised me a home, or that I will always come first with him. Oh, I have been stared out of countenance many, many times by frustrated women! You can’t blame them, I suppose, for feeling that only my selfishness stands between them and the ownership of Father, Dalton Manor, and his twenty thousand pounds a year.”

  “Twenty thousand pounds?” Simon echoed, hoping his voice didn’t squeak.

  She nodded glumly. “The mill always shows a good profit and now that Father is trading so heavily with the Americans ...”

  Reminding himself that she was an irritating woman and that nothing, not even unlimited funding for his expeditions, was worth marrying for, Simon managed to put his feet once more on solid ground. He asked levelly, “If you are not the check on your father’s remarriage, what is?”

  “At first, I think it really was that he couldn’t bear the thought of replacing my mother. They’d been childhood sweethearts, you see, and neither of them had ever wished to marry another.”