Someone Perfect (Westcott Book 10)

by Mary Balogh

  She had already conceded, though, had she not, that she might be attracted to him? Whatever did that say about her?

  “I love bluebells,” she said.

  “Sometimes,” he said, “one could wish to grasp time within one’s two hands and hold it there for a good long while before releasing it. The bluebells bloom all too fleetingly.”

  “But there are the snowdrops and primroses before them,” she said, “and the roses and so much else after. Everything is precious in its season. Perhaps we would be less appreciative if we had the bluebells with us all year long.”

  “The voice of good sense,” he said. “But you are right. If we could find a way to manipulate time or weather to suit our preferences, can you imagine the wars that would have to be fought against people with different preferences?”

  “Farmers with their pitchforks wanting rain for their crops against the idle rich with their dress swords wanting sunshine for their spas and seaside promenades?” she said.

  They both laughed.

  It was a horrible moment. She had no wish to enjoy any moment of shared amusement with this man.

  “I owe you an apology, Lady Estelle,” he said.

  Two robins had landed on a frail branch of one of the trees near the house. It swayed beneath them, like a swing. They did not fly away to a steadier perch, though, and it occurred to Estelle that perhaps they were enjoying themselves. Could birds enjoy themselves? But why not?

  Had there not already been apologies enough for one day? This was at least to be a private one.

  “I do not believe it is necessary,” she said. “If you refer to your offer of marriage, that is. You asked; I said no.”

  “For kissing you,” he said. “Without permission. After you had refused my offer and it was unlikely you would welcome a kiss.”

  She drew a breath and released it without saying anything.

  “I was fortunate,” he said, “not to have my face slapped.”

  “How did you get your broken nose?” she asked, and was appalled as she heard the words come out of her mouth. She had not even been thinking them.

  “You are imagining that perhaps someone else did slap me?” he asked her. “And very hard?”

  “Please ignore the question,” she said. “It was impertinent.” The vegetable garden was not at the back of the house, but she could see now over to her left what looked like a knot garden close to the house. An herb garden, perhaps?

  “I was unwise enough,” he said, “to suggest to a loudmouthed yokel in a village tavern that perhaps the barmaid did not enjoy being fondled as she delivered his ale. Another patron, altogether larger and more formidable than the loudmouth, took exception, not so much to what I said, but to how I said it. Mr. La-di-da, he called me among other, less complimentary things. I made the mistake of inviting him to stay out of my business. I would like to say that I gave a good account of myself in the ensuing fight or that at least it lasted an hour while we slugged it out. Alas, it was not so. I went down within moments to ignominious defeat— and a face swollen beyond recognition. And a broken nose.”

  She turned to look at him. “You were not an accidental hero in that particular incident, then?” she said.

  “Neither accidental nor heroic, alas,” he said.

  “Did you at least have the man arrested for assault?” she asked him.

  Something happened to his very dark eyes. They laughed. Just for a moment, but she was sure she had not been mistaken.

  “I realized sometime afterward,” he said, “that he quite purposely avoided damaging my teeth. It had to have been deliberate. Nothing else above my neck was spared. I do not believe I would have been so fortunate had I provoked a second fight— at that point in my history at least. Perhaps not even later. No, there was no official complaint and no arrest. He became my best friend.”

  Oh.

  “Lord Brandon,” she said. “I have the feeling that if you were to write your own story, it might be twelve volumes long. Perhaps longer.”

  “Ah,” he said. “But would you wish to read it, Lady Estelle?”

  His eyes were no longer laughing or even smiling. They were fathoms deep. It would be awfully easy to lose herself in them, Estelle thought, a little horrified. Whatever that meant.

  “It would have to be written first,” she said.

  “By which time you would be an old lady seated by your fireside, your grandchildren gathered about your knee,” he said. “But perhaps it would not be suitable reading for them.”

  She drew a breath. “Did you steal the countess’s jewelry?” she asked him.

  “Ah,” he said, and his eyes narrowed somewhat. “You are picturing me living a life of luxury for six years at the very best inns on their proceeds, are you? Perhaps simply buying the inns so that I would not have to share them with lesser mortals?”

  His hands were clasped behind his back. He stood with his booted feet apart and leaned slightly toward her. And she could not tell whether his dark eyes were now intense with anger or … laughter. Certainly there was no smile on his face.

  “Did you?” she asked him.

  He moved back to stand straight. “None of those things,” he said.

  She nodded and was aware of voices and laughter coming from the adjoining room. They seemed very alone together here in contrast.

  “But do you believe me?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said. She somehow could not see him as a thief. She did not like him. At least … No, she did not like him. He had done something terrible, though it was long ago and was really no concern of hers. But whatever it was, it had turned him into a hard man who found it difficult to smile or to relate to others with any degree of amiability. He would be a difficult man with whom to live. And that was true, despite the frisson of attraction and sexual awareness she felt suddenly, standing here looking at him. She had never looked at any other man and wondered what it would be like to go to bed with him. She had thought of kisses and romance, but not of that except in vague terms associated with wedding nights. It was a bit horrifying that she was thinking of precisely that now.

  “It is not my business what you did or how you spent those years or what you lived on,” she said.

  “It would be your business,” he said, “if you had agreed to be my countess.”

  “Yes,” she said. “But I did not.” Those large, powerful-looking hands. That broad-shouldered, broad-chested body. Those powerful thighs. That harsh-featured, almost craggy face and those intense dark eyes. No, it would be impossible. Too intense. Too far beyond her control. “The state apartments are all on the lower level of the north wing, are they not? What is on the floor above?”

  He accepted the abrupt change of subject without comment. “The portrait gallery,” he said.

  “It must be a very large collection,” she said, “if it stretches the whole length of the wing.”

  “The room was designed as a long promenade for the family during inclement weather,” he told her. “And as a place to take guests too fearsome of slopes and steps and what the outdoors might do to their hair or their complexions. As a play area for children to roar along. As a retreat for anyone wishing for some quiet exercise and solitude. And, incidentally, as a family portrait gallery. I will not show it today. People who visit the state apartments have their heads stuffed with what they have seen and heard by the time they reach the last room. I believe all my guests are very ready for tea in the grand reception hall. I will show you the gallery another day.”

  You as in her, Estelle? Or a collective you as in all his guests? He did not say and she did not ask.

  “Shall we?” He gestured with one hand toward the dining room, and she walked there beside him. He did not offer his arm.

  It was a long room, quite breathtaking in its size and splendor, as were all the apartments. The sound of voices now came from the room beyond it. There was no one else left here. They walked slowly but did not stop, and he did not point out any features of th
e room. Estelle was sure she had never seen such a large table. It looked as if it would accommodate at least fifty diners without any clashing of elbows.

  The rest of the party was in the ladies’ withdrawing room beyond the dining room, some sitting, some standing. They looked expectantly at the earl when he appeared in the doorway.

  “What does it feel like to be the owner of all this, Lord Brandon?” Gillian Dickson asked. “I cannot even imagine it.”

  “Oh, I can, Gill,” her brother, Wallace, said. “I would feel like a prince.”

  “When one inherits something like this,” the earl said, “one realizes that one has done nothing to earn it, that one owes it all to an accident of birth. It is an enormous privilege and a weighty responsibility. Is anyone ready for tea?”

  Everyone was, it seemed. Energy was instantly restored and they were all on their feet in moments.

  The earl crossed the room to a closed door and spoke to the footman who was standing beside it, waiting to open it. The young man hurried away, back through the state apartments, and the earl opened the door himself and stood back to let them through.

  And so they entered the room with the dome, which Estelle had been longing to see since her arrival yesterday. It was a vast round hall with a tiled mosaic floor and a high balcony that ran all about the circumference and that was held up by marble pillars and made safe by a marble balustrade, which must be at least waist-high. The great glass dome above it filled the room with light. Even as Estelle looked up, clouds must have moved off the sun and a shaft of sunlight beamed downward, to be fractured into all the colors of the rainbow as it caught walls and balcony and pillars and floor.

  “Now that,” the earl said to the whole group, “was perfect timing. This is sometimes a grand reception hall, occasionally a ballroom. Today it will be a tearoom.”

  “A ballroom,” Estelle said, looking up and about her at the fractured light. She spread her arms wide and turned once about. “It would surely be the most wonderful place in the whole world in which to dance.”

  Maria laughed. “Oh,” she said, her voice filled with delight. “I had a birthday party here once. It was my eighth birthday. How could I have forgotten until now?”

  Perhaps, Estelle thought, because not long after there had been a great upset in the house and her brother had vanished. She wondered what it had been like here then, after he had gone. How upset by it all had Maria’s father been? And her mother? And Maria herself? It must have been a life-changing event for all of them.

  “I remember it well,” the earl said, looking at his sister with what was surely fondness. “The room was filled with squealing little girls, and I had been put in charge of organizing games and entertainment for you all.”

  “I can just picture it,” Mrs. Sharpe said, clapping her hands once before clasping them to her bosom and beaming at her nephew. “I suppose you performed your magician’s act, Justin? You were always so good at it. I never knew how you could produce an endless stream of ribbons from an empty hat or gold coins from behind people’s ears.”

  “It was pure magic, of course,” the earl told her. “Maria, this is your tea, I believe? You are the hostess.”

  The center of the room had been set up with several square tables covered with crisp white cloths and laid with gleaming china and crystal and silverware. Maria moved toward them.

  “Ah, and here comes Lady Maple,” the earl said.

  She was being ushered into the room from the entrance hall by the young footman the earl had sent upon an errand a short while ago. The Ormsbury uncles and aunts came in behind them.

  “A private showing of the summerhouse this morning, complete with a marriage proposal,” Bertrand murmured, coming up behind Estelle and setting his hands upon her shoulders. “A private moment in one of the sitting rooms this afternoon while everyone else moved on. Do I smell a romance after all, Stell?”

  “If you do,” she said, “there is something drastically wrong with your nose. But, Bert, have you ever in your life seen anything more splendid than all this?”

  “Yes,” he said, grinning at her. “Elm Court.”

  She laughed. “Splendid?”

  “It is a sizable manor house,” he said. “More important, it is home. This is a magnificent showpiece, though. I was particularly impressed with the half-square rooms with their perfect mirror imaging. Twin rooms.”

  “We are an imperfect example of the type, alas,” she said. “We are not quite mirror images of each other.”

  “Sometimes,” he said, squeezing her shoulders, “imperfection can be more interesting than perfection, Stell. It is something you may wish to keep in mind, actually, when you continue your search for your Mr. Perfect.”

  “Continue?” she said. “Have I started?”

  Maria was approaching them. She had already seated most of the other guests. “Lord Watley,” she said, “would you care to sit beside my aunt Margaret at that table?” She indicated it. “And, Estelle, will you sit with my cousin Megan? She admires you greatly but is also a bit in awe of the fact that you are the daughter of a marquess.”

  Servants were bringing in plates of sandwiches and scones and various dainties. Others were carrying in teapots and hot water jugs.

  They took their places and Estelle spread her linen napkin across her lap. She turned to make conversation with the very young, blushing daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Chandler.

  The Earl of Brandon’s best friend had been— and still was?— a man from a tavern somewhere who had taken exception to his cultured accent, got into a brawl with him for no other reason than that, and broken his nose.

  Really?

  Estelle would be willing to bet the earl had not been so large and well muscled at that period of his life. So what had happened during those years? Where had he gone? What had he done? What had he lived on? What had he been like before? He had told stories to his young sister out in the summerhouse. He had entertained her and other little girls with a magic act at a birthday party. He had told a man at a tavern not to molest the barmaid.

  Who exactly was the Earl of Brandon?

  “Which was your favorite room?” she asked Megan, and determinedly gave the girl the whole of her attention.

  Twelve

  The weather remained fine for the next few days, and Justin found that his guests did not need to be entertained at every moment. There was much to explore and much to do, both indoors and out, and most of them were content to do it all in small unstructured groups.

  The disaster that had happened in the drawing room on the first full morning of their stay seemed to have had no serious consequences. Maria’s apology at luncheon afterward had undoubtedly helped, and everyone’s determination to put the embarrassment out of their minds made it possible to carry on as though none of it had happened.

  But almost everyone now probably believed he was a thief, Justin thought, and a cruel one at that. There was nothing he could do about it, though, since he was certainly not going to tell the truth. All he could do was continue regardless. As for what Lady Maple had said about his father having been trapped into marrying her niece … Well, that also must be set aside for now and pondered at some later date.

  If her story was true, though, it would change a great deal. Everything, in fact.

  Meanwhile the house party continued.

  The children’s early-morning ride and playtime with Captain became a daily event and sometimes included more than just the original two. There were also Olwen and David Ormsbury, aged five and three, children of Justin’s cousin Bevin and Esme, his wife. All of them enjoyed the usual activities as well as trudging out to the sheep pens to watch the sheep and lambs being released and led out to their pastures. They all enjoyed being taken to the smithy out behind the stables to watch the blacksmith at work at his anvil.

  And at other times of the day the children never tired of running through the maze and getting hopelessly lost. Even when by sheer accident they arrived at the cente
r, it was still difficult to find their way back out. Some of the young people tried it too and fared no better. Even Watley got lost when Gillian Chandler and Rosie Sharpe persuaded him to go in with them because they were scared to go alone. They had giggled and clung to his arms and looked anything but scared.

  Justin took a party of youngsters up over the wilderness walk behind the house one morning. Some of them had pulled faces at the initial suggestion, and he had agreed with them that they might indeed be wise not to come. It involved the climbing of a few steep slopes that might tire them needlessly, after all, and even a bit of a scramble up a rocky series of steps that were not for the faint of heart. Also there was a tall lookout tower near the top with dark stone stairs spiraling about the inside of it that might be too scary for some. And there was a hollow dragon amid some dark, dense trees that one could climb right inside if one could get up the courage. Then one could roar to create deep, hollow echoes that would scare birds and wildlife and unwary passersby for miles around. There was one lookout point that offered a view of a church spire all of twelve miles away down the valley, if one could imagine being able to see such a distance. He would take a telescope for anyone who wished to verify that it was indeed a spire with what looked like a miniature church below it. At the end of the walk, he told them, there was an easy way down a gently sloping path, and there was a dangerous, scary way down a sheerer, grassy slope. They would doubtless consider rolling down it beneath their dignity, of course. They were undoubtedly right to turn up their noses and go find some safer, more sedate amusement elsewhere.

  Everyone below the age of thirty joined the walk, as did Justin’s cousins Ernest and Sidney, who remembered persuading Doris to climb those steps inside the tower when they were all children, though they had had to half carry her down again. She might otherwise have stayed up there for the rest of her life.

  Captain went too, and the children enjoyed making him bark and bare his teeth at the roaring dragon.