by Mary Balogh
He chuckled softly.
“But most men would argue,” he said, “that educating girls gives them brain fever at worst and makes them unattractive at best. Or perhaps I have got the worst and the best mixed up.”
“I daresay,” she said, “those men are insecure in their masculinity and fear that women may outshine them. How mortifying it would be if they had to ask a woman for the square root of eighty-one.”
She was a delight. He had already seen several different facets of her character, but he could always rely upon the prim schoolteacher to keep making an appearance. The square root of eighty-one, indeed!
“Ouch!” he said, wincing noticeably. “But would there ever be such an occasion? I cannot for the life of me think of one. What is the square root of eighty-one anyway?”
“Nine,” they said in unison.
He laughed, and after a brief moment so did she.
He wondered if she realized what a dazzling combination laughter was with her looks. He wondered too how often she laughed. Perhaps it was more often than he had suspected the day before yesterday. Perhaps she brought light and joy to that school in Bath.
“But that is not your cue,” he said, deliberately sobering, “to fire all sorts of obscure and tricky questions at me. My masculinity is a fragile enough commodity without being put to that sort of test.”
“I doubt that,” she said fervently, and then laughed again when he looked at her sidelong and pulled an abject face.
He chuckled once more before turning into the lane from the village that would eventually bring them to the fork into Barclay Court. “And in case you are neglecting to ask for fear of the answer, Miss Osbourne, I detect no signs of brain fever in you, and you are certainly not unattractive. Quite the contrary, in fact.”
“I would rather,” she said after a brief silence, “that you not try to flatter and flirt with me. You must speak sensibly with me if we are to be friends.”
“We are to be friends, then?” he asked her. “Very well. Let me be honest. You are quite devoid of any discernible attraction. A small, slender stature combined with shining auburn curls and sea green eyes and regular features is all quite unappealing, as I am sure you must be aware.”
When he turned his head to snatch a look at her, she was smiling broadly and looking straight ahead.
“Friends need not be unaware of each other’s attractions,” he said. “Tell me how you occupy your time when you are not teaching.”
“You do not know much about the world of employment, do you, Lord Whitleaf?” she asked. “There is not much time that is not taken up with work. When I am not in the classroom I am supervising games in the meadow beyond the school or organizing dramatic presentations or watching over the girls during study sessions or marking papers or examinations or…Well, there is almost always something to do. But when there is some leisure time, usually late in the evening, I spend it with my friends, the other resident teachers. We usually gather in Claudia Martin’s sitting room. Or sometimes if it is daytime and there is the rare luxury of a spare hour I go out walking. Bath is a lovely city. There is much to see there.”
Ah, yes, they were from different universes. But he admired her sense of purpose.
“Now it is your turn,” she said. “You must tell me something of yourself.”
“Are you sure you really wish to know about my idle, empty life?” he asked her, his eyes twinkling.
“You were the one who thought there could be a friendship between us,” she reminded him. “There can be no friendship if only one party gets to ask the questions. Tell me about your childhood.”
“Hmm.” He gave the matter some thought. “It was filled with women-a familiar pattern with me, Miss Osbourne. My father died when I was three years old. I have no memory of him, alas. I do think it unsporting of him not to have waited at least another two or three years. I was left with my mother and five elder sisters. I daresay my parents had despaired of producing an heir and were jubilant when I finally put in an appearance. By that time my sisters too must have been aware that a family without an heir was a family headed for certain disaster. And indeed I came along only just in time to avert it. I was the apple of every female eye as I grew up. I could do no wrong in their sight. I was petted and cosseted and adored. No boy was ever more fortunate than I.”
She had turned her head and was looking steadily at him.
“There was no man in your life, then?” she asked.
“Oh, several,” he said. “There were official guardians and self-appointed guardians, all of whom ruled my estate and my fortune and me and arranged everything from my education to the reading and answering of my mail. It was all done for my benefit, of course. I was very fortunate.”
“I suppose,” she said, “they did no more than your father would have done if he had lived.”
“Except that then there would have been a relationship,” he said. “Perhaps there would have been some sharing. Some love.”
He was turning at the fork in the lane as he spoke. Perhaps he would not have spoken so unguardedly if he had not been thus occupied. Good Lord, he did not usually even think such abject thoughts. He felt quite embarrassed.
“You missed your father,” she said softly.
He glanced down at her. “You cannot miss what you never had, Miss Osbourne,” he said. “I do not even remember him.”
“I missed my mother,” she told him. “Yet she died giving birth to me.”
Ah.
“It is odd, is it not,” he said, “to miss people one never knew-or knew so far back that there is no conscious memory left. I was inundated with love from my mother and sisters, and yet perversely I wanted a father’s love. Did your father love you?”
“Oh, yes,” she said, “but I ached for my mother. I used to weave dreams about her. I could always picture her arms reaching out to me, and I could always hear her voice and smell roses when she was near. But I never could see her face. Is that not strange? Sometimes even the imagination lets one down. How foolish!”
She looked away and fell silent, and it seemed to him that she was suddenly as embarrassed as he had been a couple of minutes ago at making such an admission about the child she had been.
Neither of them said any more on the subject-they were approaching Barclay Court, and Edgecombe and the countess were walking across the lawn before the house to meet them.
But something subtle had changed between them, he sensed.
Perhaps everything.
They had shared something of themselves with each other and he would never be able to return to a relationship of simple banter with her. They had, in other words, taken a step toward friendship with each other-as he had wanted. And yet the realization was slightly unsettling. Banter was safer. So was flirtation.
“Miss Osbourne,” he said as he drew the curricle to a halt just before the others came up to them, “ is it possible for us to be friends, do you think?”
“But we are to be here for only twelve more days,” she said.
“You brought her back in one piece, I see, Whitleaf,” Edgecombe said, striding up to the vehicle and reaching up a hand to help her down. “Congratulations. Frances would have been upset with you if you had not.”
“And you are not looking nearly as frightened as you were when you left here, Susanna,” the countess said. “Did you enjoy the ride? And your visit?”
Peter declined their invitation to go inside the house for refreshments. He would be expected back at Hareford House, he told them, and left after bidding them all a collective farewell.
This time, he noticed, Susanna Osbourne did not hurry into the house without a backward glance. She stood with the other two to watch him on his way.
He had also noticed she had not said that it was impossible for them to be friends.
Or that it would be possible either.
It struck him as he drove away that perhaps it would be better if she had protested. He was not at all sure that friends
hip was safe.
It was a surprise to Susanna to discover that she had actually enjoyed the afternoon-not just the part of it she had spent with Miss Honeydew, but all of it.
She was even more surprised to discover that she actually rather liked Viscount Whitleaf. He might be a basically shallow man who liked nothing better than to flirt with every woman he set eyes upon, but he also had a good sense of humor. More important, he was definitely a kind man-and not totally indolent either. He had actually mended Miss Honeydew’s fence and cleaned out her old stable. He had taken her bad-tempered little dog for a walk. He had been careful not to embarrass her when he had discovered her asleep in her chair while Susanna was still reading to her. And then, at her urging, he had eaten three of the cakes she called her housekeeper’s specialty even though it must have been clear to him after the first bite that they were undercooked and doughy at the center.
She had discovered when she had found herself quite unable to resist asking him about his childhood, just as if she knew nothing at all about it, that indeed he had been cosseted by his mother and all his sisters and ruled by his male guardians. He could not be blamed in any way, then, for what had happened to her father. And she could not blame him simply for having the name Whitleaf.
But despite the softening of her attitude toward him, Susanna could not see any possibility of their becoming friends. It was an absurd idea. They had nothing whatsoever in common.
And yet the idea had a certain appeal. She had never had a male friend. Mr. Huckerby and Mr. Upton, the art master, were not quite friends, though they were colleagues with whom she shared a mutual respect. And Mr. Keeble was just a friendly acquaintance, a sort of father figure as he guarded the door of the school from every imaginable or imaginary wolf.
In the coming days she saw further evidence of Lord Whitleaf’s kindness. After dinner at the Raycrofts’ one evening, he offered to take the one empty place at a card table that no one else seemed eager to fill even though he knew that his partner was to be old Mrs. Moss, who was deaf and indecisive and invariably played the wrong card when she did make a decision. And though the two of them lost all five of the hands they played, he succeeded in keeping everyone at the table amused and in convincing Mrs. Moss that it was his clumsy play that had ensured their defeat.
And when, after church on Sunday, Susanna overheard the vicar greet Miss Honeydew and tell her how gratifying it was to see her at church despite the rain that had been falling earlier, she also heard Miss Honeydew tell him that Viscount Whitleaf had brought a closed carriage to her cottage early enough that she had had time to get ready to come.
The Earl of Edgecombe told Frances and Susanna after he had taken Mr. Raycroft and the viscount on a tour of the home farm one morning that when they had passed the laborers’ cottages and he had stopped to call upon one of his men who had cut his hand rather badly the week before, the viscount had wandered off to talk with some of the wives who were outside their homes pegging out their washing, it being Monday and therefore laundry day. He had been discovered half an hour later, without his coat or hat, perched on a ladder held by one woman and two children and making an adjustment to a line that dragged too close to the ground when weighed down by wet clothes. All the neighborhood women and children had been gathered around, calling up advice.
“And of course,” the earl added, chuckling, “they were all gazing worshipfully up at him too-when he did not have them all doubled up with laughter, that was.”
And he did not forget that he wanted to be Susanna’s friend.
She saw him every day. They never spent longer than half an hour alone together at a time-he was too discreet for that, and if he had not been, she would. She certainly did not want to arouse any gossip in the neighborhood. Nor did she want to make Frances uneasy. But almost always when they met he contrived to exchange a few private words with her or to take her apart from the company for a short while.
She came to look forward to those brief interludes as the highlight of her days.
After playing cards with Mrs. Moss at the Raycrofts’ dinner, for example, he approached Susanna, asked if he could fetch her a cup of tea, and when she said yes, told her that perhaps she ought to come with him if Dannen would excuse her so that he would be sure to add just the right amount of milk and sugar.
She had been seated beside Mr. Dannen for all of an hour, listening to stories about his Scottish ancestors, some of which she had heard before.
“You were beginning to look cross-eyed with boredom,” Viscount Whitleaf told her.
“Oh, I was not!” she protested indignantly. “I would not be so ill-mannered.”
“But it is interesting to note,” he said, “that you do not deny that you were bored. Anyway, I have rescued you. What are friends for?”
She laughed, and they stood talking to each other for a while beside the tea tray until Mr. Crossley and Miss Krebbs joined them.
One afternoon he rode over to Barclay Court with Miss Raycroft and her brother, and the three of them stayed for tea. But when Mr. Raycroft rose to leave, his sister protested that she wanted to see some watercolors of Vienna the countess had brought back from Europe and promised to show her since Vienna was where Alice Hickmore was spending the winter. Mr. Raycroft sat down again to continue his conversation with the earl, Frances took Miss Raycroft up to her room, and Viscount Whitleaf invited Susanna to stroll out on the terrace with him until his companions were ready to leave. He told her-at her prompting-about his years at Oxford, where he had studied the classics. It seemed from what he said that he actually had studied, not merely used the years away from home to kick up his heels and enjoy life.
Her opinion of him took another turn for the better.
The next day was chilly and blustery, but Susanna and Frances decided to walk into the village anyway for fresh air and exercise and for Frances to deliver a basket of food to a former housekeeper at Barclay Court who had celebrated her eightieth birthday the month before when Frances and the earl were still away. Susanna wanted to buy some new ribbon to trim the old gown she would wear to the assembly.
She explained that to Viscount Whitleaf, whom they met as he was striding along the village street after escorting two of the Calvert sisters home from Hareford House, and at his suggestion Frances proceeded on her way to deliver her basket while he escorted Susanna to the village shop, where she made her purchase before being taken to the village inn to be treated to a glass of lemonade and a pastry.
And then he offered to escort them both back to Barclay Court, insisting when Frances protested that he could never deny himself the pleasure of having a lady for each arm as he walked-and that he hoped she would not deny him that pleasure.
“Far be it from me to cause you any such misery,” Frances said with a laugh, taking one of his arms while Susanna took the other. “And thank you.”
He talked about music with Frances, skillfully drawing Susanna in too. He had, she realized, considerable conversational skills when he chose to use them. And considerable knowledge too.
If Susanna felt some small disappointment in the friendship, it was in the fact that Viscount Whitleaf had not solicited her hand for any of the sets at the assembly, which was fast approaching. He was, of course, engaged to dance at least the first four sets-she remembered that from the day they had met. Perhaps he had promised all the others too.
Or perhaps friends did not feel the need to dance with each other.
No one had yet reserved any sets with her. She was almost sure, of course, that the earl would dance with her, and probably Mr. Raycroft too. Perhaps even Mr. Dannen. But how lovely it would be-what a crowning delight-to dance with Viscount Whitleaf. It would be something to tell her friends about, something to relive in memory all the rest of her life. And if it happened also to be the waltz…
But she would not dwell upon that slight disappointment. Already this was turning into a holiday that would buoy her spirits all through the autumn term at school. She
must not be greedy.
Perhaps he would ask her when the evening came.
Or perhaps, if he had no free sets, he would at least find some time to come and talk with her so that she would feel less of a wallflower.
It did not matter. She had a gentleman friend. What startling stories she would have to share with Claudia and Anne when she returned to Bath.
In the meantime, the holiday was still not at an end.
6
The whole neighborhood had been invited to an afternoon picnic at Barclay Court, and fortunately the good weather had returned for the occasion after a few days of clouds and winds and chill.
Peter was greatly enjoying himself despite memories of an affectionate, subtly reproachful letter that morning from his mother, whose house party was proceeding without him. If he were there at Sidley Park now, he thought, he would very possibly be attending just exactly the same type of event as he was here. Except that there he would know that one in particular of the young ladies present had been selected as a potential bride for him-Miss Rose Larchwell. And he would know that his mother’s fond, anxious eyes were following him wherever he went. There he would feel all the burden of being loved dearly by someone he had forgiven, though he had not forgotten.
Perhaps it would have been better not to have forgiven, or at least to have forgiven conditionally. Perhaps he ought to have made it crystal clear to her that he would not accept any further interference in his life, especially as a matchmaker. Perhaps he ought to have told her that Sidley could no longer be her home. But she had been so brokenhearted-for him as well as for herself. And he had been only twenty-one. Besides all of which, he had loved her and still did. She was his mother.
And so she seemed to feel it was her mission in life to atone, to find him a bride in place of the one she had lost for him.
He shook off the thought of what might be proceeding at Sidley and concentrated on what was happening at Barclay Court. Here he could relax and enjoy himself with whomever he chose-or with whoever chose him.