The Sensible Courtship

by Megan Daniel

  herself to be led to the golden animal. The next thing she knew, his lordship’s hands were under her boot and up she went onto the horse’s back.

  The movement caused the animal to prance playfully. Priscilla went dead white and gripped the pommel. She did however, manage to keep her seat while Devlin quieted the horse.

  He chuckled. “She is itching for a good run, as I am sure you are. She is playful but really a quite well-mannered little lady. Just keep a firm hand on the rein and let her know you are in control, and you will go on delightfully.”

  Priscilla tried to make some answer, but her teeth were clenched so tightly shut that she could not speak. Devlin moved away and mounted the stallion. The field trotted off.

  The run was a good one, promising to outdo even the opening day. Devlin, on the compact little stallion, easily led the field. The horse was incredibly agile, would jump anything without hesitation, and could turn so suddenly and without a check as to take one’s breath away.

  Despite her solid intention of staying back beside Caspar all morning, Francesca allowed herself to be swept up in the excitement of the chase and took off after Devlin, leaving Mr. Maltby in her dust. It took every bit of her skill as a horsewoman to stay anywhere near Devlin, but she would not have missed the sight of that magnificent horse for anything.

  Priscilla would clearly have chosen to remain far back in the group, somewhere back by Mr. Maltby and the other sluggards. But she was given no choice in the matter. Morning-Sun-on-the-Water did not much like tasting another horse’s dust. Moreover, she and Arapaho had run together ever since they had roamed the Great Plains free and wild. There was no reining her in, and Priscilla, terrified, could only concentrate her attention on simply holding on.

  Apparently, however, her concentration was not

  enough. It was a rather low gritstone wall that was her downfall, quite literally. The golden horse sailed over easily enough. Priscilla held her breath and held on. They landed together and Pris opened one eye in relief and relaxed her vigilance. But the horse, agile as her mate, turned quickly to the right after him. The girl, her attention slackened, flew just as quickly to the left, her habit sketching a perfect blue arc through the air before she landed with a thud. She rolled a little way and came to rest at the base of the wall.

  Devlin saw her fall and immediately turned Arapaho in a quick turnabout that would have been impossible for any other horse in the field. The rest of the group was pounding along at such speed that none of the riders could stop. Priscilla had lost consciousness momentarily, but she came quickly to again and shook her head as if to clear it She was beginning to rise just as the first horses headed into the jump.

  “Don’t move!” shouted Devlin over the thunder of the approaching hooves. He sprang from his horse and dived for the base of the wall, pulling Priscilla flat down onto the grass and covering her with his body. Clods of earth flew onto them as the horses cleared the wall and landed only inches from their heads. The sound of hooves crashed beside them, outroared only by their own rushing blood.

  It had all happened so quickly that few of the riders were at first aware of just what had occured. Francesca, however, had been riding close behind Devlin and had seen the whole. She could only marvel at the man’s quick thinking and courage. And thank goodness for the speed and agility of Arapaho. What a horse!

  When a relative silence had descended again, Devlin slowly raised his head, then allowed Priscilla to do the same. “Are you hurt?” he asked, real concern in his voice.

  “I... I don’t think so,” she managed to answer, turning her pretty eyes up to his. “I ... I am so sorry, my

  lord,” she added as the blue of those eyes became washed with a film of tears. “I tried to hold on.”

  “Of course you did,” he answered gently. “But are you truly all right?”

  By now most of the rest of the field had turned back, abandoning the chase. The fox was to be allowed a day’s reprieve. While Priscilla tested her limbs, Francesca slid lightly to the ground. “Of course she is not all right, Devlin!” she exclaimed, moving to the prostrate girl. “That was very well done of you, I grant you But you would have done better not to practically force an obviously inexperienced rider onto such a horse! It is a marvel the girl wasn’t killed.”

  “Well, how the devil was I to know?” he exclaimed, and turned back to Pris. She looked so woebegone that he could not be angry with her. He took her trembling hands in his. “Forgive me, Miss Pennington. I ought to have known better.”

  “Oh, no, my lord!” she cried. “I mean . . . my fault ... so stupid ... so sorry.” The tears had begun to roll down her cheeks now' as she gulped out her apology.

  “Oh, go away, do, Devlin,” said Francesca impatiently. “You are only making the poor thing feel worse.” She sat beside the girl and brushed a wisp of hair from her face. Priscilla’s hat, thrown off in the fall, lay some yards away, and Devlin, feeling very much out of his element, went to retrieve it.

  “Now, Pris,” said Francesca in bracing tones. “Do you think you can walk? Shall I send for a carriage to carry you back to the house?”

  “Oh, no! Please,” said Priscilla, hating to have such a public fuss made over her. If given the choice, she would simply have sunk into the ground under the wall and stayed there. “I am all right. Truly I am.” She looked over at the palomino mare, placidly nibbling at some clover a few feet away. “It is only that...”

  “Of course. You need not get back onto the horse. I am sure Lord Devlin will be more than happy to take you up with him. If you feel up to it, that is.”

  Priscilla glanced at him, standing there looking so worried with her hat in his hands. “He saved my life,” she said soflty and with more than a trace of wonder in her voice.

  The tone and the expression were not lost on Francesca. Since it turned out that Pris was not seriously injured, this accident might prove to be exactly what Devlin needed to finally win the girl. There was no worship, exactly, in Pris’s face, but there was considerable awe.

  “That he did,” said Francesca, forbearing to mention that there would have been no need for such heroics had his lordship been a little more perceptive to begin with.

  And so it was arranged. Pris was boosted up onto Ara- paho’s back, with lord Devlin’s strong arms firmly around her, to be carried back to Hockleigh. “So kind,” she muttered as they trotted away.

  The great to-do made on their return can well be imagined and need not be described in detail. Suffice it to say that the placid atmosphere of Hockleigh erupted into a minor uproar. Sarah, in superb manner, took things efficiently in hand. The doctor was sent for at once, Mrs. Pennington fluttered her gratitude all over Lord Devlin until he thought he would scream. Pris was tucked up in bed, thoroughly wretched at being the cause of such commotion.

  At last Mrs. Pennington gave over her grateful effusions to go upstairs with the doctor, accompanied by Sarah and Francesca, and Devlin was able to escape. But he got only as far as the crowd still milling about in the great entry hall. Here he was accosted again.

  “Quick thinking that was, Dev. Probably saved the girl’s life!” exclaimed Graham Symington.

  “Shows what happens when you let women join the field,” muttered Dudley Dalton with a purist’s scowl.

  “Remarkable horse, that, Devlin. Never saw such a

  turn in my life,” put in Lord Jersey. “You’ve won my bet, even if the fox did get off.”

  “And mine,” added Lord Poole and several others.

  “Thinking of putting him out to sire, are you, Dev?” asked Sir Algernon. “Got a promising mare I’d like to see mated with that one.”

  “Demned fine horses, the both of them,” conceded Lady Braethon, sitting magisterially in a straight-back chair. She had been a notable horsewoman in her younger years. “But that’s not to say you should have put the Pennington chit on that filly, Devlin. Any fool could see she’s not a horsewoman, never will be.”

  “But
then, Lord Devlin is not a fool,” cooed Roxanna Gordon. “So he could not have known it. I’ll wager the girl fell on purpose just so that she could be so dramatically rescued by his lordship. No doubt that mother of hers put her up to it, poor thing.” She laughed her fluty laugh, working her crop as if it were a fan, and laid a hand on Devlin’s arm in a possessive fashion. “Only imagine! A silly miss like Priscilla Pennington setting her cap at you, Devlin! She would do much better to put her sights a bit lower. Such a sophisticated gentleman as yourself will have quite other ideas of what he requires in a wife.”

  Roxanna conjured up an image of Francesca Waringham and studied it intently, the face, the clothes, the manner. Obviously that was what Lord Devlin did appreciate in a woman—enough to steal into her bedchamber late at night—and Roxanna would be happy to oblige him in his tastes. Except that she would be far more clever about it than Francesca had been. When she drew him to her bedchamber—as she had no doubt she could do—he would not leave without an offer of marriage being made, and accepted.

  Though unaware of her thoughts, Devlin could not help but understand her words. He sprang to Priscilla’s defense. “Miss Pennington would never think to act so

  deviously, ma’am, I am sure. It is all my fault for not noting her inexperience with horses. I shall undertake to teach her to handle them better in the future.”

  No one could mistake the intention of a future and rather prolonged relationship with the young lady that his words implied. No one except Roxanna. So deeply convinced was she of his intentions toward Francesca, and with good reason as she thought, that she only half- heard him.

  In a moment, Francesca herself appeared on the stairs, and a babble of voices began inquiring into the condition of the young invalid.

  “The doctor is convinced that there has been no permanent damage. Priscilla should be perfectly restored to health after a good night’s sleep and a day or two of inactivity,” she said to a general chorus of “Thank Gods.”

  “Thanks to Lord Devlin’s quick action,” she added with a smile for him. He was the only person in the group that saw the cynical glint behind the amber eyes.

  For the benefit of the others, he nodded his appreciation of the compliment, adding a wry smile just for her.

  Thus relieved of worry, the company filed into the drawing room for a much-needed restorative cup of tea. But Devlin thought he would scream if he had to spend another moment with any of them. Any except one.

  “Let’s get out of here,” he murmured to Francesca as he headed for the door.

  She watched his retreating back a moment, smiled, and followed him out the door and across the lawns. They did not speak until they reached the White Garden, now blooming with the last dahlias and some hardy carnations. Francesca seated herself on a gleaming marble bench, her habit of celestial-blue velvet a vivid counterpoint to the snowy blooms and the dark green foliage.

  “Is she truly all right, Cesca?” he asked at length. “You must tell me.”

  Once again she felt her heart leap at sound of the affectionate nickname on his lips. In defense against the emotion it conjured up, she answered more briskly than she intended. “She is quite all right. Don’t worry, Devlin. You have not killed her.”

  He finally sat, dropping his hands between his knees and hanging his head and looking very much like an errant schoolboy. “But I have certainly killed my chances with her. I’ve botched it good and proper now, haven’t

  I?”

  “On the contrary. Since she is unhurt, I rather think you could have found no better way to win her regard. Priscilla has a romantic nature, I think, beneath all that shyness. You are now beginning to look very like a knight in shining armor to her. If she is not yet in love with you, at least you are no longer the dragon. She will accept you out of simple gratitude.”

  “You think so?” His tone was an odd mixture of hope and despair.

  “Undoubtedly. I would advise you to waste no time in offering, once she is up and about again. What is the old adage about striking while the iron is hot?”

  “You know, the Orientals have a notion that if someone saves your life, you then belong to him forever. I might just mention it to her.”

  She laughed a sad little laugh. “Then your fate is sealed! I shall dance at your wedding before the year is out.”

  “And I at yours, I imagine. By the by, what has become of Maltby? I haven’t seen him since we rode

  back.”

  “Good God! I am supposed to be touring the succession houses or some such thing with him. I had quite forgotten him!”

  He looked at her with a slowly growing smile. “I hope,” he said in a soft, seductive voice, “that I can as easily make you forget him after you are married.”

  A thrill went through her, but this time she did not blush. Instead, she smiled back at him. A realization stole into her mind: she very much hoped that he would do just that.

  13

  Despite a great deal of rather furious thinking and planning, outwardly the next pair of days passed in relative calm. The dual wooing moved onto another level, but progressed apace.

  Lord Devlin was, by circumstance, forced to limit his contacts with Priscilla, as she was still recovering from her accident. The first day she kept to her room until dinnertime, came down to eat, and retired again after but a short interlude in the drawing room. Devlin, to Francesca’s amused satisfaction, was all solicitous kindness yet without crushing the poor girl with his concern for her well-being. She even smiled shyly up at him once or twice. She was as good as won, thought Francesca, no longer smiling.

  The second day found Pris even less reclusive—she came down to breakfast at her mother’s insistence—but still so unwell as to be allowed to skip the hunt, much to her relief.

  Her presence in the field was scarce missed. The hunting was good, the riding hard, and everyone was in excellent spirits. Everyone, that is, except Lady Francesca. She had realized and accepted that she really must restrain herself enough to ride beside Caspar in the hunt. But what a sluggard the fellow was! It had been Devlin’s suggestion, of course, delivered with a distinctly malicious grin. He had casually mentioned that constantly outstripping the object of one’s supposed affections in the field was perhaps not the very best of strategies. Odious man! Why must he always be in the right of it?

  The result was a very irritable Francesca, deprived of her chief joy and exercise and forced to smile constantly at Caspar’s increasingly annoying inanities. The day’s run was a particularly good one. Consequently, Francesca was particularly vexed to have missed the best part of the sport.

  So preoccupied was she with her annoyance, and so wrapped up was everyone else in the thrill of the chase, that no one noticed the disappearance of Roxanna Gordon from the field. She had taken off from the covert with the rest of them. But after a few minutes’ run, she was nowhere to be seen if anyone had been looking, which no one was.

  She turned her horse unobtrusively into a stand of trees just as the others were setting themselves for a jump over a low hedge. She reined in under the almost bare branches and waited quietly until everyone was well away, then spurred her horse into a trot in the opposite direction.

  A quarter-hour’s ride brought her to a seldom-used road. This she followed for some time, making several turns and following the directions she had received in a letter that morning. Soon a small overgrown lane branched off from the road. She made the turn and rode another pair of miles before emerging at last into a small clearing graced by an even smaller structure, a tiny stone cottage with boards nailed over the windows.

  The clearing seemed as deserted as the house. Silence hung about it except for the soft wind high in the treetops.

  “Jerry,” she called softly. No answer came. She slid silently to the ground, reins in hand, and started walking toward the cottage. “Jerry,” she called again, louder this time. Still no answer. Her horse whinnied gently, breaking the heavy silence. There came an echo of the sound,
another horse, very close behind her. Roxanna jumped and spun around to face the sound.

  Behind her the door to the cottage was flung open and a pair of rough strong arms encircled her tightly, nearly taking her breath away. She opened her mouth to scream, but before any sound could escape, she was spun around. Her protest was stopped by her assailant’s mouth coming roughly down onto hers.

  She tried to break free; her eyes flew to his. Then she saw that his were not full of fear or contempt or danger, but held only amusement. When he finally released his grip on her, he was laughing.

  “Hallo, Roxie, love,” he said with a grin.

  “Oh!” she exclaimed indignantly, and stamped her foot—rather ineffectively, as it happened, since there was nothing beneath it but dead ferns and dry leaves. “You nearly scared the life out of me, Jerry. I could kill you.”

  “Ah, but then, you always was prettier when you was mad, Roxie.” He looked her over appreciatively, grinning as her annoyance melted away under his obvious admiration. “Widowhood don’t seem to have done you no harm, girl. You be pretty as ever was.”

  Her good humor was soon completely restored, and she gave him a deep curtsy. “I thank you, sir,” she said elegantly, then grinned. “Ain’t so bad yourself, you know.”

  Indeed he was not In fact he was quite the handsomest lover Roxanna had ever had. Gordon had found him for her in some cockpit or other. He’d polished the fellow up a bit with some decent clothes and presented him as a birthday gift Quite the nicest present she’d ever had, was Jerry.

  There must have been a bit of the Gypsy in Jerry Parsons, for his hair was black as midnight blacker even than Roxanna’s own. Jet-black eyes glittered in his bronzed face, and perfect teeth flashed snowy white whenever he laughed. Jerry laughed a lot