“Pointless!” Ainsworth’s voice rose. “The point is that you are…”
“Oh, no! Not ruined.” She assumed a rigid, corpselike pose on her bed and declared to the ceiling, “Have no fear, I won’t perish for lack of my virginity, Your Grace. I’m an independent woman who didn’t want to die a virgin spinster. Now, thanks to your kind offices, I won’t. As I said at the time, there’s no obligation. We can agree to say nothing more about it.”
“We’ll do no such thing, Prudence Haversham,” he sputtered, in equal parts panic and fury. “I’m going to marry you, damn it. And you are going to marry me!”
A beat too late, Ainsworth realized he hadn’t posed it as a question much less proposed it in a romantic manner befitting his tender feelings for her. He bellowed his heart’s desire but, devil take it, his blood was up.
She crossed her arms and refused to look at him. Without raising her voice, she said, “No, I will not.”
He bellowed back, “Why in God’s name not?”
“You know why.”
His chest rose and fell as he heaved great lungfuls of air through his nose to calm himself. Closing his eyes, he ground out more quietly, “No, Prudence, I haven’t the slightest notion why you refuse to marry the man who’s bedded you and wishes to wed you. Enlighten me.”
To his condescension, she said with dignity, “You’re only offering for me because you’re a gentleman.”
“I am not offering for you because I am a gentleman.”
She sighed. “And you deny it because a gentleman must.”
“Bloody hell!” He threw up his hands. “Prudence, can’t we resolve this simple, straightforward issue between us sensibly?”
“We could if you’d go away and leave me alone.”
“That is not sensible at all!” he cried his voice an octave higher in frustration.
The stiff figure on the bed said nothing.
“Fine. I’ll go but we are not done, not by a long shot,” he declared as he stomped to the bedroom door muttering, “You’ve done nothing but vex and confuse me from the start. Except when you’re torturing me with your God-awful tools!” He threw the door open with a bang, stomped to the top of the staircase and called out, “I was addled to think I would be the one to astonish you!”
“Oh, I’m astonished,” she retorted, “astonished you’re here and not in London with Lady Jane.”
He strode back into her bedroom doorway, “What?”
“You should be in London with Lady Jane Babcock.”
“What has she to do with anything?”
“All of England knows the Duke of Ainsworth, or rather the Mayfair Stallion, is about to be saddled by Lady Jane.”
“Rubbish!”
“It’s been published. My felicitations by the way!”
“It’s published rubbish! Empty speculation, nothing more. It’s not as though I’m parading down the street with Lady Jane on my arm for all your friends to see.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning you and that bloody,” he sputtered as she slung a pillow at his face, which he ducked. “Ship out, will you?”
“And why not? I’m free to go where I will.”
“But why set your cap at that bug-eyed barnacle? Have you no social ambition?” He exclaimed sarcastically.
“No. I do not,’ she retorted with heat. “Again, I wish you joy. Now get out.”
It was like stumbling into a bog, he thought, the more one struggles, the deeper in peat one sinks. He lurched out the door as a second eiderdown missile splatted against the back of his head. From there, he hurtled down the stairs to retreat in disarray.
Chapter 28
In which the Succubus of Bath perplexes all Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
Ainsworth rampaged back to the house on Morford Street, tossed back a few — quite a few more than a few — therapeutic brandies in the study and fell asleep sprawled in a dainty chair.
In the morning, a bleary eyed duke followed the grating sound of laughter to the blindingly bright morning room where his three friends were mocking one another at a barbaric volume.
“Look what the dog dragged in!” Seelye piped up. Ainsworth grimaced and ran his hands through his bedraggled hair. He made his way to the sideboard and helped himself gingerly to eggs and bacon. When he sat, a footman filled his cup with tea. He shook his head slightly. The footman removed the cup, fetched a clean one and filled it with black coffee. Even this, Ainsworth eyed with misgivings.
“Raising a rumpus without us?” Clun frowned.
“Was a certain apothecary involved?” Percy teased.
Ainsworth grumbled something unintelligible.
“Pardon?” Clun asked.
“I said, I don’t want to talk about it.” Ainsworth growled.
“Trouble in paradise?” Seelye perked up. “What happened?”
“Refused me,” the duke mumbled into his cup before taking a sip and wincing.
“Pardon?” His friends asked, suddenly alert.
“Brought up marriage. Said no.”
“Females do that. Part of the ritual to play coy,” Percy consoled.
Ainsworth snorted. “Not her.”
Seelye smiled.
“You’re a free man, Ainsworth,” Clun said. “Congratulations.”
“Perhaps it’s for the best,” Percy suggested.
“Bloody hell,” Ainsworth groaned and drank more of the bitter brew.
“She give a reason?” Clun inquired.
“No,” the duke griped, “two. First, she accused me of being a gentleman. Should I deny that?”
“Had manners drilled into us,” Clun commiserated through a mouthful of bacon. “Otherwise we’d behave like a bunch of savages and females wouldn’t like that above half.”
“Never saw it as a handicap myself till she rang a peal over me for it,” Ainsworth complained.
“Can’t be that,” Percy concluded.
“Well, second, she got a maggot in her head I’m Lady Jane Babcock’s beau simply because George bloody Cruikshank has a jolly time mocking me in illustrations. Blasted man can’t resist taking pot shots at me whenever I pop up in public like a woodchuck from his burrow.”
“You had to go, dance and what have you,” Seelye consoled. “No choice. Blakeley Ball after all. Everyone shows up.”
“Only Clun gets away with standing around looking surly,” Percy said sympathetically.
“I’d like to know why Clun’s not dragged out and set upon like fresh meat?” His Grace groused. “Or you, Seelye! You and Percy wear out your dancing shoes prancing about doing the pretty. Why don’t Cruikshank or the others mock you in print?”
His idiot friends grinned at him.
“Not a duke or a stallion. Makes you irresistible.” Clun chuckled. “You’re the prettiest of us, too.”
“Which I resent,” Seelye drawled. “You hardly make an effort with your cravats.”
The duke glowered at them.
Kill friends.
After a desultory effort to eat, Ainsworth excused himself from the table and stalked from the room.
“Didn’t expect that. You?” Seelye asked, turning to the others. “Probably too good to be true.”
“Or she’s not the Succubus we assumed,” Percy said.
“Only one way to know,” Seelye responded. “Direct observation.”
“She’s met us, Seelye,” Percy reminded. “She’ll be on her best behavior.”
“Doesn’t know Clun.”
Clun slitted his eyes and gave a wicked, rumbling growl.
“For God’s sake, don’t go terrifying the chit with your surly glowering, will you,” Percy warned him. “Jem might not like you scaring her witless.”
“I’m not surly,” Clun growled, glowering at his friends with obsidian-hard eyes. “Or intimidating.”
“Of course not, you’re a mouse among men,” Seelye smiled and patted him on the shoulder.
“Come back with shield or on it, Clun,” Per
cy exhorted.
Having left his friends to their own devices, Ainsworth made his way to the cottage, knowing Prudence wouldn’t be there and Mrs. Mason would. He hoped the talkative housekeeper might help.
Not finding her outside, the duke knocked on the kitchen door.
Mrs. Mason opened it drying her hands on her apron. “Oh, Your Grace!” She stammered and stumbled back into the kitchen before executing an awkward curtsey.
“Mrs. Mason, may I ask your advice?”
“Oh, I don’t know about that, Your Grace,” she demurred uneasily as he stalked in after her through the low doorway.
“About Miss Haversham,” he persisted.
“Murphy did mention spying you walking down the hedge of a morning. But I told him it weren’t any of our business, unless you were to harm Miss H.” She gave Ainsworth a pointed look. “And you’re too fine a gentleman to do such a thing.”
“I wish to marry her.”
At that, she clasped her hands to her breast, grinning ear to ear. “See? Where’s the mischief I say?”
“She won’t have me.”
“Won’t she?” Mrs. Mason studied him for a moment then turned to the big table in the center of the room. She stuck a knife into the butter crock and put down a loaf of fresh-baked bread. She nodded to the duke to sit. She started a pot of tea brewing and brought it over.
“Dead set against me,” Ainsworth summarized. Mrs. Mason cut into the loaf, buttered a slice and offered it to him.
As she poured tea into two cups, she said, “Never seen her in such a state as she’s been lately. Been talking about running off to Italy. Had to be something serious making her so agitated.”
“Italy!” His head shot up. “Agitated?”
“Weeping like a stuck spigot, poor thing. Never was a weeper but they that are crossed in love indulge odd fits and fancies, don’t they?” Mrs. Mason continued without elaborating on Prudence’s present frame of mind. She stood in contemplation, with her hand on the knife now stuck into the table. “Saturdays are half days at the shop and Murphy manages it. She and I do the distilling here till late afternoon. We start early in the morning to pick the plants what need picking in the dew and distill the essentials in that stone shed in back. There’s a great copper contraption in there. Don’t know how we’ll move that, come to think of it.”
“You won’t move it, Mrs. Mason. I’ll make it well worth your while to stay! You and Murphy must do whatever you can to stall her. I need more time with Miss Haversham.”
“It’d be my pleasure, Your Grace.”
Ainsworth left his bread untouched, “I’ll speak to her Saturday and that will be that.”
Chapter 29
In which Lord Clun confronts the Succubus of Bath.
“How may I help you?” Miss Haversham asked Lord Clun as he entered the light-filled apothecary shop.
She was of average height but that was the only thing average about her. Her eyes in particular drew Clun’s attention. She regarded him steadily, with blue-green eyes that met his own gaze squarely. A faint almost-smile curved her full lips. Her brown hair was glossy, put up in an unfussy style of understated elegance. Her skin was translucent, her slightly flushed cheeks, very touchable. She was, the baron acknowledged, delectable. Nothing like the shifty-eyed, bracket-faced conniver Clun imagined.
“I fear I have the advantage of you, Miss Haversham. May I introduce myself?”
“Please do.”
“I am William de Sayre, Lord Clun. I understand you have a liniment for sore muscles. I rode down from Town recently and need relief.”
“Strange, I would expect you to be accustomed to riding great distances on horseback, Lord Clun.” She gave him a wry look. She knew perfectly well who he was. Interesting.
“This salve will suit.” She picked up a squat glass jar and placed it in his huge palm. “This is for muscle strains and bruising. Rub it wherever it aches.”
“Does it smell ‘pretty’?” Clun scowled at the jar.
“No, my lord,” she smiled, “you won’t find it objectionable.”
Clun unscrewed the lid and took a tentative sniff then smiled. “Delightful.”
“I’m glad you approve,” she said.
He noted she spoke as a lady in a gentle, but not submissive, manner.
She regarded him with her neat head tilted slightly. Her eyes narrowed and she tilted her head in the opposite direction. He had the disquieting sensation she thoroughly analyzed him. She bent quickly to a shelf nearby and retrieved a smaller tin and handed it to him as well. “I would like you to have this too, Lord Clun. It relieves muscle tension, also headaches.”
“I don’t suffer from tension or headache, Miss Haversham,” he huffed and straightened to his considerable height. “I cause them.”
Not daunted in the least, Miss Haversham continued, “No doubt you do, Lord Clun, but you’ve been clenching your jaw since you entered. That indicates tension of some kind. You could simply unclench it but I suspect it’s a habit and hard to regulate by choice.”
“My jaw is perfectly relaxed,” Clun said. He worked it side to side slightly and frowned.
“Humor me, if you would. Rub a bit on your temples and jaw where it hinges, before retiring.” She reached up and lightly touched the corner of his chiseled jaw near his ear.
“Won’t my ladies object?”
“Not if you pay them enough,” she retorted wryly.
Clun chuckled, “I don’t have to pay…”
“Yes, yes, I know,” she waved dismissively, “you don’t pay them, they pay you. Very amusing.” An instant too late, she recollected that the giant standing with his mouth agape was not her usual foot soldier or seaman and slapped a hand over her mouth.
“Oh dear,” she chuckled, “Aristocrats rarely avail themselves of my services, Lord Clun. I must hold my own with a considerably coarser crowd. Have I offended you?”
“Indeed, Miss Haversham, you’ve lacerated my finer feelings,” the baron said, with a hand fluttering to his chest as if suffering palpitations. “Perhaps if I sit a moment, I’ll recover. Please see to your patients.”
“Kind of you,” drawled Miss Haversham in wry reply. She turned to greet an elderly couple that had entered moments before. The man’s wife fussed over him, much to his disgust.
“He’s been uncomfortable since last night. Terrible dyspepsia, Miss H.,” the older woman said.
“Wife’s been nagging me to come and I told her there’s no need to bother you,” the man complained.
“She isn’t nagging you, Mr. Brown. She’s offering you sage advice, repeatedly.”
“Ain’t it the truth, Miss H.,” Mrs. Brown agreed.
“Come this way and we shall put you to rights.” Miss Haversham took the man’s other arm and the two women led him down the hall.
Clun watched Miss Haversham closely. To his surprise, he quite liked her. She was a bossy bit of a female but then the Mayfair Stallion needed a firm hand, he chortled.
While she was occupied, Clun put a guinea on the counter and took his leave.
Back at Morford Street, Clun found Seelye and Percy in the front salon where they lounged waiting for Ainsworth to return from another of his mysterious errands.
“I like her,” Clun announced, “She’ll do.”
“She’ll do? Percy, the she-devil’s vanquished our champion in their first encounter! How are we to save Ainsworth from her clutches?” Seelye asked.
“Not the type to have clutches, Seelye.” Clun stated. “And if I were Jem, I shouldn’t wish to be saved from her. I’d let her have at me. In fact, I’d insist on it.”
Chapter 30
In which our hero tries again.
Perhaps Prudence Haversham was losing her mind.
This morning, nothing worked properly. Not her hands, which dumped some of the delicate, just-picked rose petals on the shed’s packed dirt floor. Not her hearing, which miscalculated the amount of steam in the distiller. Most certainly not
her eyes, which leaked incessantly. Or her nose, which sniffled and dribbled for no good reason. Nothing functioned as it ought in Prudence’s well-ordered, high-functioning mind since the duke came into her life. Most recently, he bellowed at her about marriage, which caused her current dysfunctions.
The copper essential oil distiller stood in the center of the old dairy shed. It consisted of a large lidded, copper tank with coils of copper tubing spiraling from the conical top and descended to a ceramic outlet below. On the floor beneath the contraption, a brick-lined fire pit glowed with red-hot coals. The cheery sound of boiling water and the hiss of steam came from within the body of the distiller. She opened a hatch to add more rose petals.
It was the same process for most of the flowers and leaves from which she extracted essences. Why was it so much harder today? She knew how to add the flower petals and had done so a thousand times. The answer was obvious; yet, she refused to acknowledge it. To do so would only make her eyes and nose malfunction more dramatically and she had no time to waste. She finished the Clary sage yesterday, but still had the bulk of roses to distill.
For mysterious reasons, Mrs. Mason was nowhere to be found this morning. Even if Prudence could focus her mind, she couldn’t hope to produce the usual output on her own. Of all the blessed mornings to turn up missing, she fumed. Come to think of it, Murphy had become downright recalcitrant about packing up cabinet contents at the apothecary shop. Prudence became proportionately more frantic the longer he and Mrs. Mason took to do whatever she asked. That is, if they were present to do anything at all.
How could she impress upon them the need for haste? They must relocate in a matter of days and there was still the distiller to disassemble before it could be carted off to Lady Abingdon’s townhouse. Her head throbbed.
Perhaps this dislocation upset them as much as it did her. She’d found a suitable shop near Sydney Gardens with rooms upstairs and a small garden allotment available. It was not as centrally located as Trim Street but it would have to do. She asked Murphy to negotiate the lease with the building’s landlord, who refused to negotiate with or rent to any female, apothecary or otherwise.
The Duke's Tattoo: A Regency Romance of Love and Revenge, Though Not in That Order Page 21