Baroness in Buckskin

by Sheri Cobb South

  “Of that, Sir Matthew, I am certain,” she murmured, determinedly avoiding the gaze of Richard, who glowered at his neighbor from a wingchair on the opposite side of Jane’s sofa.

  Sir Matthew, surprised and gratified by her unexpected agreement, might have pressed his suit in spite of Lord Ramsay’s rather daunting presence, had the butler not appeared at that moment to announce a bevy of new callers.

  “Mrs. Cummings, Miss Cummings, Miss Lydia Cummings, and Miss Hunsford,” Wilson proclaimed, then stepped back to allow the vicar’s wife and her charges to enter.

  “How kind of you to call,” Jane began, struggling to sit upright and thus make room for at least two of the newcomers at the other end of the sofa.

  “No, Jane, stay where you are.” Richard rose and offered his chair to Mrs. Cummings, and Sir Matthew was quick to follow his example. “Wilson, bring chairs from the dining room—and the tea tray, if you please.”

  Any hopes Jane might have entertained that Sir Matthew would take his leave with the influx of new callers died when the additional chairs were brought and he planted himself in the one nearest her head.

  “Your cousin Miss Ramsay told me you had fallen on the stairs,” Mrs. Cummings said, accepting Jane’s invitation to pour out the tea. “I was never more shocked!”

  “Where is Miss Ramsay, anyway?” piped up Lydia, taking a cup of tea from her mother’s hand and bearing it precariously across the room to Sir Matthew.

  “She and Mr. Ramsay have gone out riding,” Jane said. “He had to see to the thatching of one of the cottages, and has taken her along to introduce her to some of the tenants. I daresay they will return shortly.”

  The vicar’s wife nodded in approval. “A capable young man, and a very pretty-behaved one, too.”

  “Most of the time,” Richard muttered under his breath.

  The young man in question looked into the drawing room a short time later accompanied by Susannah, the latter looking charmingly windblown in a stylish riding habit of bottle green velvet which had been delivered by his lordship’s tailor only that morning, said tailor having been paid a premium to complete this order ahead of several other projects.

  “I beg your pardon, Cousin Jane,” Peter said, drawing up short at the sight of no fewer than three young ladies giggling up at him. “I didn’t know you were entertaining callers. If you will excuse me, ladies, Sir Matthew, I will change out of my riding clothes. Cousin Susannah, you had best do the same.”

  He took a step backward, but was forestalled by a chorus of female protests. “Pray don’t go on our account, Mr. Ramsay,” objected Miss Cummings, speaking for the group. “Surely you need not stand upon ceremony with such old friends as we are.”

  “I daresay I can claim a longstanding friendship with you and your sisters, Miss Cummings, but I have only just met your cousin,” Peter pointed out. “I should hate to prejudice Miss Hunsford against me by sitting down in all my dirt.”

  “And how are we to further our acquaintance, Mr. Ramsay, if you insist upon spending all your time changing clothes?” Miss Hunsford asked, smiling coyly up at him in a way that, to one pair of eyes at least, somehow appeared both demure and predatory at the same time.

  For Susannah was experiencing a most unwelcome epiphany. That unlikeliest of possibilities, that an unattached heiress should appear in rural Hampshire, had apparently come to pass—and the heiress in question appeared to take more than a passing interest in Peter’s beaux yeux. Since Miss Hunsford would not be travelling to London until the spring, he would have plenty of time to fix his interest with her before the more comfortably circumstanced gentlemen of the ton would give him any competition. It seemed to Susannah that he might be able to achieve his dream of becoming master of Fairacres after all. Surely anyone who claimed friendship with Peter must be happy for him; why, then, did she suddenly feel like scratching the heiress’s eyes out?

  She shook off the question for which she could find no satisfactory answer, and focused her attention on the conversation just in time to hear Mrs. Cummings address Jane.

  “I’m sure this forced inactivity must be difficult for you, Miss Hawthorne,” the vicar’s wife was saying. “You are not the sort to be content with idleness.”

  “No, indeed I am not! Fortunately, Miss Ramsay has been invaluable as far as the daily running of the household is concerned, so I need have no concerns on that head.” She glanced at the little pile of vellum cards on the writing desk. “But I have not been idle, for there is to be a ball in two weeks’ time to introduce Miss Ramsay to the neighborhood gentry, and I have been making out the invitations. You may expect to receive one within the next few days; do say you and Mr. Cummings will accept, and bring Miss Cummings and Miss Hunsford.”

  Mrs. Cummings glanced uncertainly at her elder daughter and niece. “Certainly we would love to attend. I don’t doubt it will do the girls a great deal of good to break in their dancing slippers, so to speak, at a country ball before they are presented in London next spring. I only hope their lack of experience in such matters will not make you regret extending your kind invitation.”

  “Not at all,” Jane assured her. “In fact, Miss Ramsay shares their dilemma, so I have conceived the notion of having a small party one afternoon next week to allow the young people to practice their dancing before the event. I had hoped to make up one of the set myself, but since Dr. Calloway forbids it, I wonder if you would allow Miss Lydia to take my place. It is not like a formal ball,” she added quickly, anticipating the objections inherent in issuing such an invitation to a young lady not yet out in Society, “and I should not press you to allow it if you cannot like the idea. But it would, as you say, allow Miss Lydia to gain a little experience in such situations before she makes her own come-out in a few years, and, well, I should be very much obliged to you.”

  “Oh, do say I may, Mama!” begged Lydia, bouncing up and down on her chair in excitement.

  “Hush, child, and be still, lest you demonstrate to Miss Hawthorne just how unprepared you are to make such appearances.” Having reduced her middle daugh-ter to anguished silence, she turned back to Jane. “I cannot agree to such a thing without discussing it first with my husband. Still, he is usually guided by me in matters concerning the girls, and I suppose I can have no objection, since your injury will leave you one female short of a set otherwise.”

  Lydia collapsed against the back of her chair, heaving a sigh of patent relief. Sir Matthew, seeing this, chuckled.

  “I hope I am to be invited to this party as well, Miss Hawthorne. If not, I shall be quite as devastated as Miss Lydia, should our good vicar deny her such a treat.”

  “Why, you are welcome to come, Sir Matthew, if that is what you wish,” Jane said, surprised and not at all pleased. “But it is to be little more than a school-room party, you know. I fear you will be shockingly bored.”

  “I am sure no man could be bored in the midst of so much feminine beauty,” declared Sir Matthew to the room at large, then bent an avuncular smile upon Lydia. “Although I’m sure I must seem quite ancient to Miss Lydia here, I hope she will honour me with a dance.”

  Lydia giggled at the novelty of being solicited for a dance just as if she were a grown up lady, but (it must be noted) made no attempt to deny the charge even as she agreed to Sir Matthew’s request.

  The matter of the dancing party being settled, Peter and Susannah excused themselves to their respective rooms to change clothes and the vicarage party soon took their leave, punctuated by urgings by Mrs. Cummings that Miss Hawthorne was to send to the vicarage should she find herself in need of anything its inhabitants could provide. The door had hardly closed behind them when Richard rose from his chair.

  “I hope you will not think me shockingly rude, Sir Matthew,” he began, although a more astute listener than Sir Matthew might have been aware that nothing in Lord Ramsay’s voice or bearing indicated great concern on his part, “but it is obvious all this enter-taining has exhausted Miss Hawthorne.
I think we must bid you good day now.”

  “What? Oh, yes, of course. I should not like to think of poor Miss Hawthorne suffering on my account. I shall take my leave at once, and hope to find you in better spirits tomorrow.”

  “Thank you, Sir Matthew,” Jane said, offering her hand.

  He bowed himself from the room with disjointed apologies for disturbing Miss Hawthorne’s peace and promises to call again upon the morrow, if he had not utterly worn out his welcome that afternoon.

  “Impossible,” Richard told Jane once they were alone. “His welcome was worn out years ago.”

  She smiled at this assertion, but made no attempt to dispute it. “Poor Sir Matthew! I could almost feel sorry for him, being dismissed so summarily. So I am ‘exhausted’ by the simple act of taking tea with fewer than half a dozen neighbors? I hope I am not so frail a creature!”

  “Perhaps not, but you cannot tell me you are not tired, for I have only to look at your eyes to know better,” he said with mock severity.

  “And now you are telling me I look hag-ridden!” Jane chided him. “It is no such thing, but I confess I did not sleep well last night. The sofa is comfortable enough, but it cannot take the place of my own bed.”

  “In that case, you shall lie on your own bed.”

  He took her hands and pulled her to her feet. Recognizing that it would be pointless to argue, she positioned the crutch under her arm.

  “You realize, of course, that by the time I make it all the way up the stairs with my crutch, it will be time to come down again.”

  “Damn your crutch.”

  He pulled it from beneath her arm and tossed it to the floor, then swept her up in his arms.

  “Ah, there you are, Wilson,” he said, seeing the butler standing in the hall goggling at them. “I am taking Miss Hawthorne up to her room to rest. Pray have her woman attend her there.”

  “Er, yes, my lord,” said Wilson, and promptly made himself scarce.

  “Richard!” Jane protested, half laughing as he started up the stairs. “Put me down at once!”

  “I will put you down on your own bed, and not one moment before. Now, stop struggling before I lose my balance and fall, and then we will both be laid up lame—and that, I fear, would be rather difficult to explain to the neighbors.”

  “Yes, Richard,” she said meekly, and allowed herself the luxury of resting her head on his shoulder.

  It was rather ironic, she thought, that he could be so attuned to her physical condition as to be able to look into her eyes and know she was tired, and yet be wholly oblivious to the state of her heart. And a very good thing, too, she reminded herself sternly, or it would have been most uncomfortable for both of them, being obliged as they were to live beneath the same roof. Still, she wished he might be less considerate, less concerned for her comfort. For with every such demonstration, it only grew harder to face the prospect of giving him up.

  Chapter 14

  Yes, I’m in love, I feel it now

  And Caelia has undone me;

  And yet I swear I can’t tell how

  The pleasing plague stole on me.

  WILLIAM WHITEHEAD, The Je ne sçay quoi song

  The day of the dancing-party dawned cloudy with a promise of rain in the air, but within the walls of Ramsay Hall, spirits were high in spite of the gloomy weather. Susannah had progressed in her lessons to the point where, instead of viewing the exercise with dread, she actually looked forward to the opportunity to put her newly acquired skills to the test. Peter expressed his intention of catching up on his work before the guests arrived, and so spent the morning shut up in his office, but the yoke of his labours was apparently light, for snatches of cheerful whistling could sometimes be heard issuing from this chamber. Richard, for his part, determined not only to send his carriage for the Aunts lest they be caught in the rain while making the trek from the Dower House on foot, but to go himself and offer the elderly ladies his escort. Jane, while still not up to dancing, was now able to walk short distances without the aid of her crutch, and could even mount the stairs by leaning heavily on the same banister that had once proved her undoing. All in all, she thought there was much to be said for a small, informal party. She suspected the mood would be quite different on the night of the formal betrothal ball a se’ennight hence; she knew her own sentiments on that occasion would be far from cheerful.

  These suspicions were further bolstered by the appearance of Susannah in the music room. Of course, ballroom attire would be highly inappropriate for an impromptu party of this sort, but the girl was disturbingly appealing nonetheless in one of her new morning gowns, this one of green sprigged muslin that emphasized her trim, rounded figure and brought out the coppery highlights in her hair. Peter, rigged out in a double-breasted blue tailcoat that would not have shamed Old Bond Street, bowed deeply before her.

  “I hope you will do me the honour of standing up with me for the waltz, Miss Ramsay,” he said.

  “The honour will be all mine, sir,” she said, sinking into an exaggerated curtsy.

  “Trying to steal a march on me, are you, Peter?”

  Both young people turned toward the door and beheld Lord Ramsay, resplendent in a mulberry tailcoat of Bath superfine, framed in the aperture.

  “As if I could, Richard!” Peter retorted, grinning. “Have you brought the Aunts, then? Aunt Charlotte, Aunt Amelia, how very fine you look! You put us all to shame.”

  “How gallant of you to say so, Peter!” exclaimed Aunt Amelia, blushing like a schoolgirl.

  Aunt Charlotte, whose mind was of more practical a bent, merely shook her head. “If you think that, Peter, it only confirms what I had suspected: the lighting in this room is insufficient for a morning function, for it will not have full sun until the afternoon.”

  “In that case, we shall have the candles lit,” promised Richard, and rang for a servant.

  The answer to this summons came, however, not from the footman, but from Wilson, who paused in the doorway with Sir Matthew at his heels. “Sir Matthew Pitney,” he announced.

  Sir Matthew made his bows, then charted a direct course for the place where Jane sat against the wall on a striped satin sofa. “My dear Miss Hawthorne, I hope I find you sufficiently improved to perform the waltz with me.”

  “Alas, no, Sir Matthew. That is, I am improving, and can now walk a little without using a crutch, but I fear dancing is still beyond me. I am being very careful to follow Dr. Calloway’s instructions, in the hopes that I might be able to dance at our ball. I trust you received the invitation I sent?”

  “I did indeed, and I share your hope that you will be able to dance by that time.” He leaned nearer and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “In anticipation of that happy outcome, may I request that you honour me with the first waltz? I confess, I am deeply resentful of the accident that robbed me of the opportunity to hold you in my arms.”

  Jane, recalling that in the aftermath of that accident she had been held far more literally in the arms of another, blushed crimson. “You must not speak so, Sir Matthew. As for my granting you the first waltz, I should hate to make such a promise and then be unable to keep it. If I were to agree to such a request, and then be obliged to sit against the wall—”

  “In such a case, I should consider it a pleasure to sit with you,” promised her swain. “But I see that I have said too much, although your charming blushes en-courage me to hope.”

  “Really, Sir Matthew, I don’t—”

  Jane’s protests were interrupted by the arrival of the vicarage party, and although Aunt Charlotte might scowl her disapproval at the boisterousness of the giddy trio of girls who entered the drawing room in Mrs. Cummings’s wake, Jane would willingly have fallen on their necks in gratitude.

  “I fear you have a great deal to answer for, Miss Hawthorne,” chided the vicar’s wife with a twinkle in her eye. “This morning at breakfast, I made the observation that it looked like rain and wondered aloud whether this party would
be better postponed. I have never heard such a display of filial disobedience in all my life! Anyone listening would have supposed I had threatened to confine the girls to their rooms with only bread and water.”

  “I am very glad you brought the girls in spite of your misgivings, for I am persuaded there is no need for concern,” Jane told her, rising gingerly from the sofa to greet them. “My gardener says the rain will not arrive until later tonight, and he is right about these things more often than not.”

  “No, no, Miss Hawthorne, you need not get up,” objected Mrs. Cummings. “As to the weather, I daresay your gardener is quite correct. It has often been my observation that those who work closely with God’s creation seem to have an unusual instinct for such matters.”

  “And if inclement weather should indeed threaten, I shall send you all home in my carriage,” promised Richard.

  “I hope you will permit Mr. Ramsay to accompany us,” Miss Hunsford put in, smiling coyly at Peter. “I am quite terrified of thunder and lightning, you know, and there is something so comforting about a man’s presence.”

  “Am I to understand then, Miss Hunsford, that you consider my cousin more suited to fill this rôle than I am?” inquired Richard with a twinkle in his eye.

  “Oh, my!” exclaimed the heiress, all aflutter. “I meant no such thing, my lord. I only thought, well, a baron must have a hundred things to do more important than escorting a carriage full of females home through a thunderstorm.”

  Richard nodded in understanding. “Whereas Mr. Ramsay has nothing more than the administration of a large estate to occupy his attention.”

  “Just so!” agreed Miss Hunsford brightly, oblivious to irony.

  “You hear that, Peter? In case of inclement weather, I shall depend on you.”

  Peter nodded. “I shall almost hope for rain, then, so that I might have some way of filling the empty hours.”