Two Hearts

by Barbara Miller

  But the die was cast. He would either accept or not. If he did, they would dine and come to the theater for a pleasant evening. And that would be that. Except that the gossips would say she was pursuing him. Well, she had always proved them wrong before when they had predicted she would fall to the charms of this or that man. All it took was time. By next season no one would remember the dinner but her.

  “Why the heavy sigh?” Maria asked as they went downstairs to the wardrobe room.

  “So much to do.”

  “There you are,” Stone said as he rolled into the low-ceilinged room crowded with costumes and props. He was a large man and brushed against the racks of colorful clothes sending a spool of thread under the work table. With thinning hair and a gutter accent, he would never have made it as an actor but he seemed to have a talent for bringing the disparate parts of a play together. “We need a different backdrop for Act II of Two Hearts.”

  “I thought we were going to use the same one as for Act I.”

  “It’s the author,” Stone said hollowly. “He says it won’t do.”

  “William Marlowe? I have not been allowed to read the script. What does it say?” Stone handed her a single page with the stage directions for the beginning of Act II. “He’s right. There’s no time to do a painting and grid it for enlargement. I’ll start on the set myself. We still have almost a week.”

  “But where are we to get another large canvas?” Maria asked.

  “Paint on the back of one of the Blackwell canvases,” Stone suggested, “but don’t ruin it. We may need it again.”

  “Oh, very well but this is not how I meant to spend my day.”

  “You are a paragon. Miss Montrose.” He took her hand and patted it affectionately, running his eyes over the lace and gold trim she had bought so dearly.

  Grace pulled out a large apron she carried for such emergencies. “When will I get to meet this paragon of an author?”

  “Oh, he’s very shy,” Stone assured her.

  “Not in his scripts,” Grace said thinking over some of Marlowe’s more torrid scenes. They gave her shivers of delight.

  “He’s too busy.” Stone slid toward the door. “Has no social life at all.”

  “I was told I would be disappointed in him. I should like to see for myself.”

  Stone hesitated his eyebrows marking his face with confusion. “Who told you that?”

  “Lord Morewood. Since you introduced Marlowe to Lord Morewood, the least you can do is let me meet him.”

  “Impossible!”

  “I know. I am giving a theater party for the opening of Two Hearts. Marlowe could come to that.”

  “Oh no, bad idea. He will be far too busy with his next play.”

  “Does he not attend the rehearsals?”

  “Never.”

  Stone slipped out of the room before she could continue her interrogation. Just what didn’t he want her to know about William Marlowe?

  * * * * *

  While Maria set to work with the wardrobe mistress, Grace had two of the prop men help her reverse one of the Blackwell backdrops and hang it behind the Act I scenery. Going up and down a ladder she sketched the rolling hills dotted with sheep, the middle ground trees and finally the garden walls. If all went well she might have it done in four days provided the author did not see it. If he did he would probably change something. But since this required her presence here for many hours her chances of meeting Marlowe were increased.

  You would think any young playwright would be glad to meet his patroness, the woman who made it possible to get his plays produced but she had never so much as caught a glimpse of William Marlowe. Sometimes she thought him a fiction, that Stone wrote the plays himself but she shook her head at that notion. If Stone could write like that he would boast of it, not hide it.

  And no one else besides Morewood had ever met Marlowe either. Now if she wanted to pursue a man, that would be a quest, for she knew him from his work, understood his feelings. He hated women who betrayed men and men who betrayed woman. The few snatches of Two Hearts she had overheard the actors rehearsing made her think that this play would be even more revealing of Marlowe’s character.

  “Oh, miss,” one of the seamstresses said. “Was you wanting to see the writer?”

  “Yes, is he here?”

  “I think so. Leastways, there is a gentleman here who calls now and again. He just went into Stone’s office.”

  “Tell me when he comes out. I’ll get a peek at him anyway. But I don’t want him to see me like this.” Grace straightened the kerchief she had bound around her hair but that would not have made her more presentable to any gentleman.

  She had just finished dotting the hills with sheep when the girl hissed at her. Grace crept around the edge of the curtain and saw Stone nervously talking to Lord Morewood. She heaved a sigh. But it was not one of disappointment.

  “The extra boxes will be no problem,” Stone said. “I will reserve them now. Good to see you again. No, go this way. It’s safer.”

  Morewood looked at him strangely and came toward Grace instead of the way Stone pointed. She spun on her heel and walked between two hanging curtains, only peeking out when the tramp of boots hesitated at the canvas she had been painting.

  “One of the new backdrops,” Stone explained nervously.

  Grace risked a peek and saw Morewood smile and nod. “Very nice. You have a good designer at work here.” He went out the back door and Grace stood there, stunned. He liked her work. Her heart bounded with a warmth that crept up to her throat and lips. He had admired her work and no one else ever had. Small chance of that when all her small paintings were confined to her own house. The only other things she did were sets at the theater. Why did it mean so much to have Morewood’s approval?

  She was going to have to shake this man from her head. That might be hard to do if he was coming to her dinner next week. She wondered what he would think if he could see her now. No doubt she had paint smudges on her face. And the linseed oil had stained the edge of her gown in spite of the apron. Well, he had not seen her. And even if he came to dine one evening he would probably never see her again except casually. He would keep to his box and she would keep to hers. Would he smirk to think she had tried to trap him? Yet she did not want him as a husband. She simply wanted to know him better. It was worth risking his disdain for a few hours in his company.

  Chapter Three

  Brand sat at his desk not yet ready to write but certainly not up to opening the post which lay before him in a neat pile. He wondered why his butler cheerfully threw open the draperies in his office, nearly blinding him, when he could not even stomach tea at this hour of the day. The topmost card looked like an invitation. He should know since he got many. In spite of his slightly tarnished past, there were plenty of mothers willing to sell their daughters to him for a settlement. He opened it finally and read in disbelief. It was an invitation to one of Grace Montrose’s exclusive theater parties—and for next week. She also wanted to thank him again for rescuing her and her companion.

  He sat for a time thinking about those large hazel eyes as they had looked in the torchlight. She had been frightened but had neither screamed nor bolted. She had looked as though she was about to defend herself and her companion. Something burned in that woman that wanted release. It was a damned shame she had never married. He wondered why. Indeed it was a miracle she had escaped marriage considering the size of her fortune. If he recalled correctly, her parents had been doting and liberal. They had died in their old age, leaving her brother the country estate and Miss Montrose the house in Town, plus half a large trading fortune.

  He heard a knock and said, “Come.”

  “The stationary and fresh ink,” Stoddard said with a stiff bow.

  “Hmm?” Brand glanced up at the impassive old face, weathered by something other than weather into a mask of imperturbability. “What stationary?”

  “For the invitations for your party. You asked me to pr
ocure some for you first thing this morning.”

  Brand observed a crease between his butler’s brows that could only be irritation. “Oh, I have decided against it,” he said.

  The man gaped, clamped his jaws shut, tucked the parcel under his arm and turned to leave. Brand stood up, dumping the pile of mail he had been holding on the floor. “Wait, are there any other invitations?”

  Stoddard turned slowly. “I beg your pardon, sir.”

  “Other than what came today.”

  “If you are referring to the pile of mail that you routinely open and leave scattered on your desk it is here.” Stoddard plucked a sizeable basket of neatly arranged mail from the top of a bureau and plunked it in front of him. Brand dumped it out on the large desk and began sorting through it pleased that someone had carefully put the right cards back in their envelopes.

  The butler cleared his throat. “Is something missing, sir?”

  “No, no, I’m sure there are plenty here.”

  There was a pregnant pause and Brand looked up to discover the older man regarding him with concern, as though Stoddard felt he was dealing with a lunatic.

  “Will that be all then?”

  “Paper,” Brand gasped. “I need writing paper.”

  “Yes sir, more paper.” Stoddard rolled out the lower right desk drawer where Brand discovered a large pile of serviceable paper. Of course but not what he needed. Why was the man so dense?

  “No, not the paper I usually write on but good writing paper to answer these and envelopes, seals, the lot. And some coffee.”

  Silently Stoddard pulled the box of stationary from under his arm and placed it on the desk, then stood with his eyes turned toward heaven and his mouth twitching.

  “Thank you, Stoddard.” Brand looked at the paper, then glanced back at his butler. “Are you developing a tick?

  “No sir.”

  “You may go.” By the time the man returned with his coffee, Brand had discarded the invitations for events past and sorted the others into two piles, boring and not so boring. These later ones were engagements he thought might be attended by Miss Grace Montrose. He began writing brief notes of acceptance and marking them on his calendar. When he came to Lady Charlton’s invitation to dinner and dancing for this very night he almost discarded it but he had remembered seeing Grace talking to Lady Charlton.

  Dare he accept an invitation no more than five hours from the event? He wrote what he thought was an extremely good story about losing the card in a book and sent his acceptance around by hand with several bottles of good wine.

  He then pulled a blank sheet of paper toward himself and stopped just short of jotting down some revisions to the play. The copies for the actors were already made. If he changed it now Stone would turn purple and the actors would lose confidence in him. No, the play was well enough but he itched to write something. He could begin to create the characters for his next work.

  Instead he wrote The Ideal Woman at the top of the page and realized he was about to compose a poem. Then he began to catalogue her virtues. At the end of an hour he had too many and began striking out those that did not matter. Then he thought he had not described her enough. He turned to the physical and wrote down hazel eyes. Hair, deep brown with a touch of auburn. He tried to conjure her up, his ideal heroine but the surprised face of Miss Grace Montrose kept swimming before his eyes.

  She was beautiful and courageous, he gave her that, but not passionate enough for his purposes either on the page or, he’d wager, in bed. Thinking of her in bed was not a wise thing, not when he might have to face her in a few hours but beyond a sexual yearning it aroused something else in him. A blatant curiosity as to why she had never married.

  He was sitting back in his chair, feet up on the desk and the ink dried on his pen, when his valet came to see if he was ready for his bath. Fortunately his household staff gossiped about him so they knew he meant to go out.

  After a bath and another shave he was combing his wet hair into order when he caught sight of himself in the glass. His bronze skin was unfashionable, probably repugnant to some women. But he had never let it worry him before. He would not give up any of his pursuits to please a woman. But what about the perfect woman? Would he give up his freedom for her? And what were his intentions toward Miss Montrose? Could he in good conscience pursue her? As Thomas had said, if he planned to marry and was considering her a possibility, then his campaign to meet her made some sense. If not he was doing her a disservice for she would suffer far more from a flirtation than he would.

  He shook his head as he donned his evening clothes. He had no doubt that once he got to know her, he would be as disillusioned with her as with any other woman. Why this quest then? He could only think it was to prove he could create a better woman on paper than existed in real life.

  * * * * *

  They had stayed at the Pantheon far too long completely missing tea. In her haste to dress, Grace had put on her least favorite ivory muslin gown and she and Maria argued in the carriage the whole way to Lady Charlton’s.

  “I could have finished a third of that backdrop today if I hadn’t had to go home and clean up for this dinner,” Grace whined.

  “You miss too many dinners. Besides you already accepted the invitation.”

  “I am here, so let us cease to discuss it.”

  When the butler showed them into the drawing room, Lady Charlton was still alone and rose to greet them with some trepidation, her orange silk dress shimmering as her hands shook. Her brassy locks had been over-crimped and Grace wondered why the woman was in such distress.

  “I must warn you the unexpected has happened. Lord Morewood has accepted my invitation.”

  Grace swallowed her surprise. “Oh, I did not know you invited him.”

  “I always invite him. He simply never comes, until tonight. Do you suppose this means he might be interested in Lucy?”

  Grace coughed. “I have no idea what might be in his mind.” She wanted to ask if Morewood knew she had been invited but could think of no way without it sounding erratic or vain.

  Maria sent her a knowing look which Grace ignored seating herself on the sofa near Lady Charlton in order to calm her nervous friend. “Why do you always invite him?”

  “He knows everything about the theater. If you have guests who like to discuss plays and acting he will keep your conversation going. I confess I had hoped to make him a regular visitor before Lucy’s come out. Now it will look like he is pursuing her.”

  “Surely not. Perhaps it is you he wishes to further his acquaintance with. You have become one of the literary hostesses of London.” This was a high flight of fancy and Maria rolled her eyes at the statement. That was Lady Charlton’s goal but both Grace and Maria knew she was far from achieving it.

  “Kind of you to say so. I just thought I should warn you, since he did intrude into your box last night. What was that about?”

  “Uttermeyer’s talking over the actor’s lines was annoying him and he asked him to leave.”

  “You don’t say. It looked more as though he threatened Uttermeyer for his attentions to you.”

  Grace avoided Maria’s knowing look from across the room.

  “That would seem odd coming from a man with Morewood’s reputation.” Grace thought that if she took a disapproving position against him then no gossip would arise about her from Lady Charlton’s lips. How odd that she should have to guard against gossip from a woman she regarded as a friend. But was she? When Grace thought about it the only person of ton she trusted was Maria.

  “Perhaps he has been misjudged,” Maria volunteered ignoring Grace’s warning look.

  “They say he is a great rake,” Lady Charlton mused. “A great catch for the woman to tame him but a great rake all the same. And any woman who thinks marriage will change him is dreaming.”

  Grace had the distinct feeling she was being warned away from Morewood. “But why would you want him for Lucy?”

  “My dear, they say
he has fifty thousand a year.”

  Grace blinked and probably gaped at her hostess which the woman must have interpreted as awe at Morewood’s fortune rather than shock at her statement. For she nodded archly and went off to greet the Fergusons who had just arrived. Grace thought she liked Morewood a great deal more than she liked Lady Charlton.

  “He’s coming to see you,” Maria whispered.

  “How could he even know I would be here?” she asked. Was her companion right? Could Morewood be pursuing her? She was distracted from the conversation by thoughts of that dark blond hair of his that shimmered in the candlelight, his penetrating gaze but mostly those muscular thighs. She told herself that she would have to be dead not to be attracted to such a man but there was something else. The way he treated her. Not as though she were some china doll that would break under the slightest stress. He treated her with respect, as an equal. And he had no particular reason to do so. In fact it was his lack of regard for her as a woman that attracted her to him. That was a coil. The only unmarried man in London who did not fawn over her and she was falling in love with him?

  No, she was experiencing a physical attraction. It had happened on rare occasions before usually in the spring when she had eaten too many strawberries. It never lasted beyond finding out the man was a damn fool for all his handsome ways.

  But she had not had any strawberries.

  When he arrived she nodded at him. His eyes lit up when he saw her there. But was it surprise or satisfaction that he had been right? He smiled and came to greet her looking as handsome in blue superfine as he had in his black evening coat. “How is your hand?” he asked taking it gently as he surveyed the lace half gloves that incased her forearms and wrists but left her fingers free.

  “Fine. I was able to ride today.”

  He raised his brows in surprise.

  “Well, I used my right hand only to steer. I find my mare neck-reins very well which they told me when I bought her.”