He had been charmed by that. What soldier would not be?
How he had gotten her home was beyond him; he had moved in a daze, dragging her along, and she had grumbled with every footfall, yet too dignified to tug at his grasp. He had introduced her to his mother and discovered her name when she had been forced to relinquish it, and had seen the solution instantly.
Miss Montford had, of course, gone along with it all without hesitation and without giving the game away. She was that kind of woman.
And then there was the matter of his mother. Miss Montford had managed his mother.
She had actually managed his mother!
It bore repeating. In fact, he had been repeating it for the past hour.
He didn’t know how it had happened or how she’d done it, but Miss Elaine Montford had, without any outward show of force or any female theatrics of the brand he was most familiar with, managed to outwit his mother. By the end of a quarter hour, Miss Montford had learned the jealousy guarded family recipe for blood sausage, effortlessly diverted a conversation about a neighbor in Cornwall whom his mother was particularly annoyed with for some reason having something to do with hyacinths, and related some bit of trivia from The Iliad that made his mother laugh.
The Iliad.
He and Miss Montford had departed with the promise of a dinner together to renew the old family connection warm on her lips, then the smile she threw to his mother dashed to the cobbles the moment the door closed behind them. The footman, who had witnessed both the throw and the dashing, had retreated a step, a shocked look on his face.
Roger was familiar enough with Miss Montford by this time to not be shocked by anything.
And then there was that damp spot on the nape of her neck, the barest inch of fabric of her fichu showing a water mark. Miss Montford’s shawl was midnight blue, yes, he was to the point where he used romantic adjectives where none would have occurred to him a mere day before, her dress was peacock blue, and her fichu was creamy white. Her shawl matched her eye color precisely.
Yes. He had noticed.
Her skin was just a shade darker than her fichu.
Yes. Noted.
Her hair was straight as a lance and so light a brown as to have the odd golden streak of color running through it.
Noted. All noted. All most abysmally and uncomfortably noted.
He could not have Miss Montford. He would be a very fortunate man indeed to be able to afford any wife at all, but a wife such as Elaine Montford? He could never reach so high. Her uncle was the Earl Aysgarth and her father wanted another earl in the family, in his family, and Elaine was the only one who could perform that miracle of transfiguration.
He knew all this from his mother, naturally. His mother had it from Edwina Ardenzy, an old spinster who was possessed of a wealthy brother who had two marriageable twin daughters of rare beauty who would not be interested, quite logically, in anything less than an earl, what with their father’s wealth being what it was. All that was to say that Roger had nothing to fear from the Ardenzy twins, as if that had been upmost in his thoughts.
Edwina Ardenzy had heard about Elaine Montford from her milliner, who was quite in the pocket of the Countess of Helston, who as her husband never left his Cornwall estate left her quite free to spend the Helston money on fashionable articles, most especially hats. As Lady Helston lived in Cornwall, at least on holidays, and the Montfords were from the same general district, it was all on quite good authority and in the realm of general knowledge that Elaine Montford must marry into the peerage or her father, who seemed so very genial on most occasions, but had, according to one stableboy and one cook’s assistant, a very violent temper, so that Elaine knew better than to cross him in this of all things. The most important thing. The thing being to marry well.
He remembered it all clearly. He did not attend to everything his mother said, the stories tending to ramble so, but he did have the odd knack of hearing and remembering things without being much aware of doing so at the time. He might have made a good priest, if England still maintained a fashion for priests. Obviously, England had not.
The curious thing about his situation with Miss Montford was that he had not wanted her upon first sight, and he had not wanted her upon learning her name and family, both very ordinary things when men wanted women, he had to assume. For him, he had wanted her with the sting of a bee, with the abrupt efficiency of the strike and the cool reaction to attack.
If he paused to think about it, he might consider that highly irregular.
He decided not to think about it.
He was not going to marry Miss Montford. Her father wouldn’t allow it. She wouldn’t allow it.
He rather liked that about her. The sting and then the strike. Yes, that was Miss Montford, precisely.
He could help her, and would help her. He would enjoy every moment of helping her and then, when her reputation was clear of all possible scandal, he would fade out of her life. That is, if she didn’t shove him out of it first.
“How will you do that, Captain Ellery?” she said, her beautiful mouth the most plummy shade of red.
Yes, he used the word plummy. Let no one say that when Roger Ellery fell in love that he did not fall hard and fast. Actually, let no say that Roger Ellery fell in love in any manner whatsoever. That was how he must save her.
“By creating and then firming that familial connection which we began today. My family is from Cornwall, as is yours. We must build upon that connection until it seems to the idle gossips that we have been neighbors from childhood and are old friends. Nothing more. Nothing scandalous.”
“We live nowhere near each other.”
“No, but how many people have ever been to Cornwall?”
She smiled and her eyes shone. Hell, even her hair shone gold when she smiled.
Hard, fast, and foolishly.
“We met in the Park and we walked together to see your mother. It was entirely innocent, even mundane.”
It had not been mundane. It had been the opposite of mundane. She had to realize that. He could not be so alone in this.
“I think, Miss Montford, that we must be content with innocent. I cannot convince anyone that anything about you is mundane, I fear.”
Her eyes glowed. Her skin glowed. Her lips looked like ripe . . . . He was not going to say it, even to himself.
“The invitation to dine will be sent immediately,” she said.
“Your father will allow it?” he said.
Her eyes shimmered, the light of her intellect shining out like starlight. “Of course. It is the only way to quell all rumor, is it not?”
“The rumor is that he swept in and carted her off without so much as a by-your-leave,” Elena Ardenzy said. “It sounds simply marvelous.”
“You don’t mean that,” Elizabeth Ardenzy said.
The Ardenzy girls were twins. They were identical twins, yet they were not identical in any way that mattered. Lady Sarah Godwinson, younger daughter of the Earl of Aysgarth, had learned that nearly instantly. The Ardenzy twins, blond, blue-eyed, and porcelain-skinned were ravishingly beautiful in that most perfectly English manner. Sarah and her elder sister, Susan, were black of hair and of olive complexion. It was not the English standard definition of beauty. Still, as they were the daughters of an earl, they should do well on the Marriage Mart. As their father was Aysgarth, that dimmed their chances slightly.
“I do mean that,” Elena said. “I should love to be carted off. By the right man, of course.”
“And there’s the problem,” Sarah said. “I don’t believe the girl gets to choose.”
“That is a problem,” Elena said, scowling slightly.
They were in Madame LaCroix’s millinery shop, huddled in a corner, away from their chaperones so that they could indulge in a good gossip. They had not known each other before coming Out, Aysgarth being most particular regarding his daughters’ acquaintances, but as they were all Out this Season, they had formed a loose and entire
ly cordial connection. They were nothing so serious as a coalition, but they were casually in league, one girl helping the other in whatever manner she could, the sharing of gossip being the most useful thing they did for one another. At least so far. Who knew what the Season might bring?
They were Susan and Sarah Godwinson, Elizabeth and Elena Ardenzy, Emeline Harlow, Camille and Delphine Thorn, and Eleanor Kirkland. Of course Eleanor Kirkland. She was the one who had rounded them up and made them a not quite coalition.
Lady Eleanor was of a most ambitious frame of mind, in everything, but most particularly in marriage. Eleanor thought that a woman should choose a man and not the other way around, an idea that Sarah had come to at the age of twelve but was helpless to put into practice. Eleanor had ideas about that, ideas that Sarah strongly suspected came directly from Sophia Dalby.
To say that Aysgarth detested Lady Dalby was putting it sweetly.
Aysgarth had no use for female nonsense, as he put it, and so did not know which females were friends and which were not and so he was quite ignorant of nearly everything that mattered to his daughters, which had its advantages.
“Eleanor was there. What did she say happened?” Elizabeth asked.
“I haven’t spoken to her,” Sarah said. “Susan saw her at an At Home at Helston House but couldn’t get a moment alone with her. Del whispered something about an Indian and Lord Raithby’s horse, but that was all she could say before Lady Helston swept us apart.”
“Lord Raithby’s horse?” Elizabeth said. “I hadn’t heard about a horse. Was the gentleman on a horse? I thought he was afoot.”
“There’s always a horse when Lord Raithby is mentioned,” Elena said. “I can’t think what Lord Raithby has to do with any of this.”
It was well known that Camille Thorn, third daughter of the 6th Earl of Helston, was hopelessly in love with Lord Raithby, only son of the 3rd Earl of Quinton. As Delphine and Camille were sisters and both Out, it was not hopelessly off the mark to conclude that Camille had added Raithby to the story. She was fixated.
“It seems beside the point. Lord Raithby is not the man who carted Elaine off,” Susan said. “What I can’t understand is why she is not ruined by it. Isn’t being swept away by a strange man the very definition of ruination?”
Because if there were a way to be swept away and not be ruined, she was definitely interested.
“Hadn’t you heard that part?” Elena said, blue eyes glittering in excitement. Her aunt, the dour Miss Ardenzy, lifted her head from a bolt of fabric on the opposite side of the small shop and gave the girls a searching look. They all instantly smiled and looked as innocent as possible. Susan had always said that Sarah had a talent for looking innocent. It did come in handy.
When Miss Ardenzy returned to her fabric study, Elena continued, “They are neighbors in Cornwall, though they had not seen each other in years and there was some confusion as to identities at the start. He rescued her because she was stung by a bee; he escorted her to his home to be attended to by his mother.”
“Confusion as to identities?” Elizabeth said. “I suppose that means they did not recognize each other? That he did, in fact, make off with her without knowing her name?”
“Don’t forget the bee,” Sarah said. “I’m sure there must be some importance placed on the bee.”
“A bee and a horse,” Elena said. “I think there is entirely too much animal involvement in this story. It sounds like a particularly odd fable.”
“We need to talk to Emeline and Eleanor. They were there. They will know what happened,” Sarah said.
“I haven’t seen Eleanor since it happened,” Elizabeth said.
“Lady Jordan is likely keeping a close watch on her,” Sarah said.
“That sounds immensely unpleasant,” Elena said.
It most certainly did.
“I only have a moment before my aunt drags me off,” Eleanor said, “but did you really get stung by a bee?”
“That’s the part of the story that concerns you?” Elaine asked. “You astonish me. And I don’t know why I’m still speaking to you. I could have been ruined by that little adventure in the Park!”
Eleanor smiled, an impish smile that contained not a whisper of guilt. “Admit it. It was the most fun you’ve had this Season.”
“It would have been a fine ending to a Season barely begun,” Elaine said.
“But what an ending,” Eleanor said, again, impishly.
Elaine couldn’t help herself. She laughed. Eleanor Kirkland was impossible to dislike or distrust, though she did give one the shivers from time to time. She was fearless and she encouraged all around her to be equally fearless. Shivers, indeed.
“I was stung by a bee. We are, in case you are interested, neighbors in Cornwall.” Eleanor raised her narrow brows. “Though we didn’t know that at the time. But it’s the only thing keeping me from ruin. You do understand that, don’t you? I can’t be ruined now. My father would have a roaring fit.”
“Perhaps he’d be the better for it,” Eleanor said with a shrug.
“I’m not willing to take the chance,” Elaine said. “You understand, don’t you? I must marry well. My family is depending upon it.”
“Yes. Families are like that, aren’t they?” Eleanor said. It did not sound a bit encouraging. “But what is Captain Ellery like? He looks divine.”
“He’s the furthest thing from it,” Elaine said, willing herself to believe it. Something had happened to her, something odd and unexpected and uncomfortable. Roger Ellery had a way about him, a quiet, nearly sneaky way of diving under her hostility and coming up on her soft side. The side which couldn’t remember the sort of man she must marry and the well-trod path to finding him.
A Season in Town, coming Out, attending parties and assemblies and musicales, meeting a man who was willing and appropriate and then allowing him to lead her to the altar, her father brimming with approval, her mother looking relieved, and her brothers looking satisfied.
That was the story she had been taught since the cradle. Her nanny had endorsed it, approved it, smiled upon it. Elaine was to be the salvation of her family. She was to raise them up and keep them up. Up, into the upper reaches of Society. Up, where they truly belonged.
She had never, not really, balked against the story. She had an important part to play and she had been equipped since birth to play it. She was born to do this. It had felt natural, logical, and morally unassailable.
Until Captain Roger Ellery had taken her arm in the Park and walked off with her in his grip.
Until Captain Roger Ellery had introduced her to his mother and smiled in childish delight to see them get on so. She had never felt such approval over such a small act. Mrs. Ellery was a talkative, sociable woman stuck in a life of lonely solitude. She was bored. She was restless. She made the best of her situation and the worst of her health, and loved her son with all her heart.
Naturally, Elaine had seen almost immediately that Captain Ellery did not understand his mother in the least. Sons were often that way about their mothers; she had seen her brothers perform the same sort of mistaken assumptions upon her mother, a woman who loved her family even as she feared her husband’s displeasure. Women were far more nuanced than men liked to think. She had decided that early on; it was why she was able to manage her father even as he thought he was managing her.
Oh, she, like her mother, did not enjoy the fury of her father’s temper, but she also knew it was a storm that passed, as all storms do, and that she would still be standing at the end of it. If her father lost control of his emotions, that did not mean that she must lose control of hers.
She would not fear him. But he did not need to know that. It gave him an odd sort of pleasure to think that he was feared. Men were often that way.
But Captain Ellery was not. One had only to see him with his mother to understand that. He was bemused by her but not enraged. He wanted to please her but would not succumb to her pleadings. He was gentle with her
, loving, kind, and patient.
In a word: chivalrous.
It was what he attempting in the Park, an act of chivalry that came naturally to him, even if it was misguided.
Chivalry. Did anyone ever speak of chivalry anymore?
There as an odd, old-fashioned glimmer in the word. It made a glow around her heart.
She did not have room in her life for glows that did not come with titles.
“The furthest thing?” Eleanor said.
“Perhaps not the furthest,” Elaine allowed, smiling a bit. “He was trying to do the right thing, I must allow, and he continues to do so. We are to have Mrs. and Captain Ellery over to dine tonight, to perfect the story and put an end to all gossip.”
“Oh, I don’t think there can ever be an end to all gossip,” Eleanor said. “That defeats the entire purpose of having a Season in Town. No one would spend all that money if there were no gossip.”
“Lady Dalby?” Elaine said.
Eleanor laughed. “Yes, she said it first, but it is so true, isn’t? I think it must be a motto for us. Spend Money, Spread Gossip? Does that work?”
“Not for me. The motto for my Season is Marry Once, Marry Well.”
“That’s everyone’s motto.”
“For good reason,” Elaine said.
“Perhaps it should be, Carried Off On Wings Of Love.”
“That sounds terrifying.”
“I was trying to work the bee in,” Eleanor said, giggling.
“Miss Montford,” Lady Jordan said, interrupting them at the glovers display case. “Where is your chaperone? You have not wandered again, I trust.”
“Worry not, Lady Jordan. My mother is resting in the retiring room. She will out again directly.”
Lady Jordan, a woman of diminutive statue, gave Elaine a cold, hard look and then nodded briskly. “I’m relieved to hear it. Come, Eleanor. We have other stops to make.”
Eleanor smiled at Elaine and followed Lady Jordan to the door. At the door, she turned and said, “Enjoy your dinner, Miss Montford. Remember the motto.”
Which motto? The one she had been born to fulfill or the other one that cast a glow around her heart?
An Encounter at Hyde Park Page 4