Sweet Laurel
Page 34
Conveying his apologies to the group of men and women who had come to greet him, the duke issued orders to the man at his side, who Rose assumed was one of his servants, then clasped her upper arm rather firmly and led her off to the side of the platform where he could speak to her in private.
Alexander’s gaze slid over the woman, and he wasn’t overly impressed by what he saw. She was taller than a woman ought to be, and definitely a bit more well-rounded than he liked, but it wasn’t her physical attributes that put him off. It was her damnable big mouth!
Who did this annoying chit think she was anyway? He bit the inside of his cheek to keep his temper in check. Obviously she had no respect for simple courtesy, and no respect whatsoever for his superior position and intellect.
Americans! he scoffed silently, then wondered for the millionth time since beginning this wretched journey what had possessed him to purchase a wheat farm in Kansas, and cursing the fates, and that devastating scandal, that had forced him from his home.
“Don’t ever presume to speak for me again, young woman,” he said finally. “You’ve overstepped your bounds.”
He removed his leather gloves and slapped them against his left palm, and Rose had the distinct impression that Alexander James Warrick was trying to intimidate her. Fortunately she wasn’t easily dissuaded from her goals. And getting rid of Alexander Warrick was definitely her main priority for however long it took.
“Custom dictates that I take charge, your royal highness,” she called him, hoping to annoy the duke further, and was gratified to see that the vein in his neck pulsed like oil gushing from a well.
“The telegram I received from your business factor stated that I was to greet and guide you to your new residence. If that’s being presumptuous, your dukeship, then I guess I am.” She smiled sweetly at him and was immediately rewarded with a dark scowl.
“Where is your conveyance, young woman? I’m tired, and I am in need of a bath and a hot meal.”
“Really? Well, if you’ll just follow me, your royalness, the farm wagon’s out behind the station.” She couldn’t wait to see how he would manage to fit his rather well-developed backside into the old tin tub. No doubt he had a porcelain, or even a gold one, back in England.
“I hope this wagon has a cover. It’s deuced hot in this Kansas.”
“This is nothing, your dukeship. Wait until the temperature really starts to sizzle. Why, you’ll think your drawers are on fire for sure.”
Years of breeding kept Alexander from commenting on the chit’s lack of decorum, but they didn’t keep his eyebrows from arching up to meet his hairline. “If I didn’t know better, Miss Martin, I would think that you were trying to scare me off.”
Rose shrugged. “Just trying to be honest about things. If you don’t want to know the truth . . .”
“And are you a great teller of truths, Miss Martin?” Somehow, he thought not. Her lack of response only proved to confirm his opinion.
* * *
They had been riding in silence for almost two hours, when Alexander mopped the sweat off his brow with a pristine linen handkerchief and said, “This is a strange land. I can’t ever remember seeing anything so lacking in vegetation or so blasted flat.” It was a harsh, unforgiving land, save for the fragrant wildflowers that bloomed in great profusion. Heat, wind, and miles and miles of nothingness stretched out before him. Erect windmills stood forlornly against the monotony of the azure sky, and tall-stemmed prairie grass swayed gently in the breeze.
“My pa used to say that if you stood at one end of Kansas, you could probably see all the way to the other. Of course he was just joshin’. Kansas ain’t really that flat.” Rose Elizabeth smiled at the memory, knowing that her father’s love for the land flowed staunchly through her veins. “Pa also said that living here cultivates patience, a hide so thick you couldn’t stick a knife through it, and a considerable sense of humor. Kansas ain’t for everyone, that’s true enough.”
He winced at her fracturing of the English language. “I suppose not, but you seem quite taken with it.”
“You’ve got to be born to this land to love it. Foreigners, such as yourself, don’t usually fare well here.”
“Indeed?”
She nodded. “Especially Englishmen. They’re the worst of the lot, I’m afraid. With no great abundance of trees to speak of, no pretty green hills, no babbling brooks at every turn, like there is in England, Kansas is just too alien a place for most Englishmen to adjust to.”
“You seem quite familiar with my ancestral homeland.”
She clucked her tongue to prod the mules along. “I can read, your majesticness.”
He cast her a sidelong glance of pure irritation. “Alexander will do quite nicely, Miss Martin.”
“I guess you might as well call me Rose Elizabeth, or Rose, if that’s easier. That’s my name.”
“Ahh,” he said. “That explains it then.”
She looked at him, and her brow furrowed in confusion. “Explains what?”
“Why, the thorns of course.” He smiled for the first time, and Rose’s breath caught in her throat. Lordy be, he was a handsome devil. It was just plain sinful for a man to possess such long thick lashes and eyes the color of robin’s eggs.
“On Richmond Hill there lives a lass more bright than Mayday morn; whose charms all others maids’ surpass—a rose without a thorn.”
“Why, you’re a poet, your imperial highness,” Rose quipped to hide her embarrassment. “Let’s hope you’re as poetic about your new abode.” She pulled the wagon to a halt at the end of the lane leading down to the sod hut, waiting for the duke to catch a first glimpse of his new home. His white-faced, eye-popping reaction was everything Rose Elizabeth could have hoped for.
“Bloody hell! Bloody blasted hell!”