by Lynn Kerstan
Jillian’s lips curled as she met his gaze. “By all means, Anna, show His Lordship the puppies. And later, perhaps the two of you can creep up on Ramses and hear him sing.”
“S—sing?” Bewildered, the Earl stared across the field at the brooding animal. “You don’t mean that sheep?”
“Ram,” Jillian corrected. “Ask Jock. He’ll tell you about it. Meantime, I’ll see that rooms are prepared for you and Mr. Foxworth. And Anna, do not tease the Earl into escorting you to a concert this evening. His Lordship is a London gentleman, and such are not generally interested in the musical aspirations of livestock.”
On their way to the barn, hand in hand, Mark and Anna agreed that “Uncle Del” sounded much better than “Your Ship.” Foxworth had discreetly vanished, while Jock contrived to look busy tossing straw from one pile to another, wielding the pitchfork adroitly with his one good arm.
Mark slouched against a stall gate, watching Jock work as Anna brought out what seemed like a vast number of puppies one by one, introducing each by name, although the frisky black-and-white furballs looked exactly alike. Border collies were amazingly prolific, he thought, which reminded him of something else that had bothered him since Ivor Malory brought it up. While Anna was out of earshot, he put the question to Jock.
“You mean three lambs and two tits?” the Scotsman translated after Mark had stumbled through several oblique inquiries. “Always some ewes what lose their lambs early on. Sometimes they’re born dead. Anyways, we skin ‘em, tie the pelts around the extras, and match up the fleece to the proper ewe in a closed pen. Most times she takes the scent, thinks she’s got her own bairn, and lets it suck. If she don’t, the wee thing dies, but most of the ladies want to mother.”
Like Jillian with Anna, reflected the Earl. “Tell me about Ramses,” he said, wondering at his sudden unnatural preoccupation with sheep. “He’s ill, right? Not actually sulking over a . . . lost love.”
“Aye, he’s sulking all right. More’n a week now. I says cut his parts off and buy a ram with some meat to him, but Miss Jillian thinks we should give him a chance to get over it. Women!” He spat a wad of tobacco.
“I don’t suppose he actually . . . sings?”
Jock glanced over at him, frowning. “Now who’d be telling you about the Sulky Song?”
“Miss Lamb mentioned it to me. Not that I thought she was serious, of course. Sheep bleat, or so I believe.”
“Aye, they do,” Jock agreed, stabbing his pitchfork into the hay as if ending the discussion.
“And nothing else,” persisted the Earl, all the more fascinated because the Scotsman was so evasive.
“English sheep ain’t much for singing,” Jock said after a moment of consideration. “No spunk to ‘em. In the Highlands, many a shepherd tells of the Sulky Song, but I never heard of it here. Truth be told, Ramses is the first balky ram I run into since I come to Kent, so mebbe he’s singing up a storm out there.”
“I see,” the Earl said thoughtfully. “Only a sulking ram sings the Sulky Song. Miss Lamb suggested that if Anna took me closer, I might . . . hear him.”
“Mebbe. Mebbe not. They only sings at sunset, if they sings at all.”
Feeling ridiculous, the Earl was nonetheless wildly curious. “Have you heard it yourself?”
The scarred face twisted into a smile. “I got work to do, Your Lordship. No time for crawlin’ through pastures.”
“Right. Well, it’s probably an old wives’ tale, anyway. I’d wager that ram never sang a note in his life.”
“Most likely,” Jock conceded with unnerving complacency. “But if you’re a betting man, I’ll put down five quid says he sings at sunset.”
“You’re on,” Mark concurred at once, welcoming a reasonable excuse to find out for himself.
Anna jumped with glee when he requested her escort, then became very solemn. With Jock’s assistance, she tested the wind and selected a route.
“Won’t sing a note if he knows you’re there,” insisted the Scotsman. “Stay out of sight and downwind. No talking, mind you. Gotta sneak up and wait.”
Anna was able to bounce along easily, since her head did not reach the top of the hedgerow, but Mark had to bend himself double as he crept into the pasture adjacent to the ram’s solitary province. At the other end was a gate, so Anna told him, where they would enter the. next pasture and turn right toward the corner where Ramses slumped with his nose to the ground. Tuning up his vocal cords, the Earl hoped.
When his back ached from the strain, he was forced to his hands and knees. Crawling behind the impatient little girl, he felt cool grass against his hands and moisture soaking through his doeskin breeches. A small pocket of grazing ewes edged out of the way and he did not dare imagine what they had left behind. Watching carefully where he placed his hands and knees, it took him a long time to reach the gate and even longer to paw silently along the hedgerow toward the sulking Ramses.
About midway, he sat back on his heels, raking filthy fingers through his hair. What the hell was he doing? Was it only a few weeks ago he’d been cheered in the House of Lords? If the Peers could only see him now, skulking through mushy grass, trying not to land in sheep droppings, on his way to play audience to a crooning ram! No question about it, he was stark raving mad.
“Come on,” Anna charged impatiently, glaring at him over her shoulder. “It’s nearly sunset.”
In for a penny, he decided, resuming the quest. At least he’d collect five pounds from that insolent Scotsman if Ramses failed to generate a little night music.
At long last Anna signaled a halt, crouching just in front of him. “We have to be quiet,” she warned in a loud whisper.
Mark positioned himself with his arms wrapped around his knees, settling in to wait. The bright blue sky had paled to a translucent wash of azure and pink. In the distance, fleecy clouds were limned with gold. The countryside was really beautiful, he thought, rubbing damp palms against his breeches. How long since he’d taken time to enjoy a sunset? In the stillness, he could hear the lowing of cattle and the gentle whir of insects, but as the light faded, the pleasant whir became an obnoxious cloud of gnats all bent on whipping his face with their wings. He swore under his breath.
Anna turned to glare at him. “Shhhh!”
“Nothing is going to happen,” he whispered back. “Let’s go.”
Ignoring his protest, she resumed her vigil while he batted at the gnats and eased his cramped legs. Endless minutes later he was certain the effort had been wasted. That damn ram was no better at singing than he was at , . .
Oooooooo.
At first he wasn’t sure he’d heard it. The sound seemed farther away than he’d thought the ram to be, but he couldn’t see anything over the hedgerow.
Ooooooooooo.
A chill crept up his spine. The vibration was eerie, but not really a song. More like a moan. Well, what had he expected, a Mozart aria?
Ooooooooooooo.
A lonely, unhappy noise. All things considered, a Sulky Song. Not worth a crawl through wet fields, but he’d pay Jock his five quid. Mark rose to his knees and was reaching to pluck at Anna’s sleeve when a loud, clear soprano trilled over the meadow.
“What will I do, oh, what will I do, without my one and only ewe?”
Instantly on his feet, Mark looked first to the ram, already bounding away at the sudden burst of song, and then to Jillian. In the adjacent pasture, her head barely visible above the hedgerow, she was convulsed with laughter. Anna jumped up and down just out of his reach, giggling uncontrollably.
There was more noise behind, and he swung around to see Jock and Foxworth perched on the wooden fence, observing him with patent glee. From nowhere, a horde of onlookers had appeared—shepherds, most of them missing a limb; maids; Mrs. Enger; farmers, housewives, and a veritable-pack of children—all of
them laughing. Pointing and laughing.
He’d been had!
Red to the tips of his ears, the Earl stood helplessly while all around him laughter—at his expense—echoed from a little girl and a one-armed shepherd and a dour housekeeper. From half the county of Kent. From his own bloody valet. Even the sheep seemed to enjoy his discomfiture, heads for once raised at the commotion. Loudest of all rang Jillian’s laugh, and he cursed the thorny hedgerow that formed an impassable barrier between his hands and her throat.
He jabbed a hard finger in her direction. “I’ll get you for this,” he called, running back the way he’d come.
The multitude had departed to safer pastures by the time he cornered her, and with a skill worthy of Jock’s border collies, he herded the miscreant Lamb into the barn. Swiping an imaginary moustache with villainous anticipation, he turned for a moment to watch the orange ball of the sun disappear over the horizon, pleasurably contemplating his revenge.
Chapter Twenty-Six
TWILIGHT CAST shadows into the stalls as Mark planted himself inside the barn with his fists curled on his hips. “Show yourself, you infernal witch!” he thundered.
“Oh my,” came a voice from overhead. “A Sulky Man.”
The Earl looked up to see Jillian grinning at him from the loft. “Get yourself down here, fiend,” he charged. “There’s no escape. Come face the music.”
“You sing, too?” she inquired pleasantly. “How nice,”
“I play the drum,” he corrected. “Prepare yourself for a tattoo on your impertinent behind.”
“Uh-oh!” Without another word, she disappeared.
Grim-faced, Mark scaled the ladder and found himself chest-to-prong with a pitchfork.
Jillian’s eyes flashed wickedly. “I thought you had a sense of humor,” she chided.
“I do,” he replied between his teeth. “When you are bent over my knee, you’ll hear me laugh molto fortissimo.”
She looked startled. “Good grief, it was only a joke. Surely you can’t be angry!”
Ignoring the pitchfork digging into his coat, the Earl advanced inexorably, backing her toward a large mound of hay. “Angry? Because you conspired with a mad Scotsman and an innocent child to humiliate me? What was it, Miss Lamb? Some standard rustic plot to play a Maygame with the London slowtop?”
“Jock told us about it,” she admitted. “So many Highland farms are bought up by the English, and the Scots can’t resist having a go at the new landlords. It’s such a ridiculous notion, though—a singing sheep. No one ever falls for it.” Still retreating, poking the pitchfork at his chest, she chortled gleefully. “But you did.”
With a fierce growl, Mark seized the pitchfork and wrenched it away. Then he propelled Jillian onto the mound of hay and launched himself on top of her, planting his knees against her thighs as he pinned her wrists over her head with one hand and grappled her throat with the other. “Got you now, she-devil!” She gazed up at him with wide, astonished eyes. “Oh dear, you really are furious,” she sputtered. “I’m sorry, My Lord. No insult was intended, and truly I thought you’d find it funny. Hell’s bells, it was funny. If you could have seen yourself . . . but I never meant to embarrass you. Well, yes I did. But we should not have done it.”
For a long moment the Earl glared murderously at her, but face-to-face he could not maintain his composure. His eyes began to water. His lips quivered. He tried to hold back, but seconds later he was laughing uncontrollably while Jillian gaped at him in wonder. “Vengeance is sweet!” he declared when he could speak. And then, unable to resist the soft, moist open lips inches from his own, he lowered his head and kissed her.
Nothing, not even Ramses warbling “God Save the King,” could have astonished him more than her immediate response. At first she seemed to melt under him, and then she freed her arms to wrap them around his neck. He felt her fingers tangle in his hair as her warm mouth welcomed him. She tasted of ginger and honey. “Oh, Jillian,” he murmured, pulling away to catch a harsh breath . . .”This is impossible.”
“This is wonderful.” She drew his hand to her breast, moaning as his fingers closed around it. “Oh, yes,” she whimpered when his thumb caressed her nipple. “Better than wonderful. Now kiss me again.” Her lips parted, demanding and receiving the intimate caress of his tongue.
In the dim bam, in a heavy silence broken only by the shuffling of animals below and their own rasping breaths, Mark was closer than he’d ever been in his life to losing control of himself. Only his certainty that Jillian’s passion was as inexperienced as it was unrestrained gave him strength to lever himself up and hold her eager hands away. “We cannot do this,” he said firmly.
“Whyever not?” she countered in obvious confusion. “No one will know, and if they suspect, they will never say so. Certainly, I’ll not claim to being compromised or blackmail you into marrying me.
“But I want to marry you.” He heard her gasp and wished, he could see her eyes in the gathering darkness. He could only feel her, and at the moment that was impossibly dangerous. With careful discipline, he moved away. “Every other man in London has proposed to you,” he said, fingering a handful of straw. “Why shouldn’t I? God knows if I’d approve of me as a suitor were I still your official guardian, but the choice is wholly yours now.”
“You w—wish to marry me?” she stammered. “You?”
“Yes, Miss Lamb,” he said stiffly. “With all my heart. But there are many things for you to consider. I cannot live on a farm, so you will have to come to London. And I wish a career in politics, which means you’ll be forced to preside over a great many dull dinners and boring parties. I expect you’ll contrive to make them otherwise, with my blessing. Furthermore, I have some influence where it counts, so we could adopt Anna without difficulty.” He grew even more stiff. “Certainly, I do not wish you to marry me only to provide her with a father.” He retracted that immediately. “Yes, that would be reason enough. I won’t hesitate to use her as a bribe. We’ll be able to educate her properly and bring her out in style. Perhaps you will agree to marry me if only for Anna’s sake.”
He heard her move and made out her shadow rising up next to him. “I would never marry for such a reason,” she said quietly. “If I’d wanted to do that, I’d have taken Ivor. He was willing to adopt her, too.”
“You told Blackstone?” Mark felt a sharpness in his chest as he fingered the pitchfork. “Am I the only one you could not tell, Jillian?”
“He came to call the last day, just as I was leaving, and I was crying like a baby, so he climbed into the carriage after me and swore he wouldn’t leave until he got the truth. What could I do? Besides, he already knew the most important thing. He never said so, but I’m certain he realized I was in love with you.”
“You . . . love me?” He shook his head. “But you don’t even like me.”
“I did not,” she admitted, stroking her fingers down his taut cheek. “I’ve puzzled over that since the night we watched the fireworks together. How could I want you and love you and not like you? It’s all very confusing in my head, Mark, but all so very clear in my heart.”
He tasted salt on her fingers as they brushed his lips. “When I think how I behaved every time we were together, it’s a wonder you can bear to touch me.”
“Oh, I’ve always wanted to touch you,” she said in a husky voice, “and at the oddest moments, too. You’d be ringing a peal over me and I’d be thinking how nice it would be to unbutton your jacket, and your waistcoat, and then your shirt—”
“Miss Lamb!” He summoned the Voice. “You shock me.”
“It is lowering,” she continued, “to reflect that you’ve never given the slightest thought to undoing my buttons.”
He grinned. “My thoughts, I’m afraid, did not allow time for such niceties.”
“My Lord!” She tried the Voice and
ruined it with a giggle. “Now you shock me.” Her fingers toyed with his jacket. “Do it again.”
“You have not said that you will marry me,” he reminded her.
“Of course I cannot, my love, as well you know. I am no fit consort for the Earl of Coltrane. Someday you might want to stand for Prime Minister, and you could never do so with a farm girl for a wife. For that matter, how would you explain raising another man’s bastard child?”
“The Earl of Coltrane,” he informed her in his most lordly tone, “is not required to explain himself.”
“I am very serious, Mark, and I suspect you are teasing me.”
“Well, yes, I am,” he confessed. “I dared not hope you would wish to marry me, Jillian, but I rather thought you’d devise a better excuse. Prime Minister, indeed.” He crossed his arms. “You know, when the Times discreetly hints that a certain demented Earl of C—fancies creeping through meadows on his hands and knees to be serenaded by a lovelorn sheep, his career will be much compost.”
“Dear Lord, Mark, you can’t imagine any of us would ever tell!”
“Perhaps not,” he agreed with a secret smile. “But I would. Blackmail, Miss Lamb, should bribery fail. Give Anna a father. Save my career—such as it becomes—for believe me when I tell you I’ve never wanted the limelight. Behind the scenes will do well enough.” His voice grew serious. “I’ve a great deal to learn, my dear, and you will have much to put up with, but you’ll never regret marrying me. I promise you that.”
She threw her arms around him. “Unconscionable wretch! Blackmail and bribery from a belted earl. How can I be noble and save you from yourself when you are so determined to do yourself in?”
“I am done in, Jillian, and have been for some time. I was simply too blockheaded to realize it.”
“That,” she said tartly, “I can well credit.” She nuzzled his neck with her chin. “And I was a trifle blockheaded, too, you know. I’ve felt so guilty for lying to you, Mark, and so full of secrets, I sometimes thought I’d go off like firecrackers. Forgive me?”