“How the bloody hell can he clasp Morag with a great wet mutt between them? What happened to the dog?” asked Lord David testily.
Roddy scanned a few pages with a puzzled eye. “That’s funny. This writer can’t be a dog lover. He presses his firm masculine lips against her soft yielding ones and… curtain. That’s it.”
“But doesn’t he ever—”
“No, he doesn’t. Just kisses her-and after all that!”
“Here, give me that book,” said Lord David suddenly. “Now let me see…”
He read for some time. Roddy watched him with amusement, wishing he had brought a camera. The sight of Lord David Manley poring intently over The Highland Heart was a sight worth seeing.
“I’ve got it!” said Lord David at length. “There’s a lot of crushing to bosoms goes on in this. Strong, silent stuff. That’s obviously what appeals to Miss Maguire. You must lure Mary away somewhere this afternoon and leave me alone with Miss Molly to do some strong, silent crushing.”
“Right-ho,” said Roddy amiably. “But don’t be surprised if she slaps your face!”
* * *
Lord David Manley was brooding exactly like Angus. The foursome of himself and Roddy and the sisters Maguire were seated in a perfect sylvan setting. The sun slanted through a stand of tall, slim birch trees, the river tumbled and sparkled between large boulders. Shy clumps of speedwells and ragged robins peeped out from the shady undergrowth. Bees hummed around the white bramble flowers and birds sang merrily overhead. There was nothing to do on this lazy afternoon but sit and watch the servants unpacking the picnic things.
The servants!
Lord David Manley had not counted on those. Flushed with the triumph of having both protégées escorted by two of England’s most eligible bachelors, Lady Fanny had decided that they must have a picnic. The girls could not possibly sit on the grass in their new gowns. Table and chairs must be provided. And so the charming little open carriage bearing the happy foursome had been followed by two carriages of footmen with all the necessary accessories.
The only strong, silent crushing going on was made by the army of footmen as they moved around the small sylvan glade, breathing heavily through their noses, and trying hard, without much success, not to bump into each other.
“Why don’t you all go and take a walk somewhere?” David heard Roddy saying to the head footman. “Come back in a couple of hours.” Several coins changed hands. The head footman gave a satisfied smirk and soon the carriages bearing the servants could be heard creaking off at a comfortable distance.
Lord David poured out the wine thoughtfully provided by Lady Fanny and set himself to please. Both American girls, he realized with amusement, had easily adopted the speech and manners of their English counterparts. But there was something about them that was still undoubtedly American, apart from the younger one’s slight lapses in grammar. He decided it was their open friendliness. There was also a freshness about them and an almost seductive smell of lavender soap and clean linen. He realized with a little shock that some of the debutantes of his acquaintance were not as clean as they might be.
Mary was flirting prettily with Roddy, but Molly seemed unable to relax. Lord David noticed that she kept watching her sister with a little worried expression behind her eyes.
He decided that the time for the strong, silent treatment had arrived. “Miss Molly,” he leaned forward. “There is a very pretty path along by the river. Would you care to see it?”
“Oh, yes,” said Molly with depressing enthusiasm, “let’s all go!”
“Oh, you two go on,” said Roddy languidly. “Miss Mary and I will sit here and admire your energy.”
After a slight hesitation Molly allowed herself to be led away.
“What a strong character your sister appears to have,” said Roddy idly, his long fingers playing with the stem of his wineglass. “But I suppose she’s really very romantic.”
“I suppose so,” said Mary doubtfully.
“You don’t seem too sure,” teased Roddy. “I’m quite certain that your sister would really fall for the strong, silent, masterful type of man.”
“Oh, I shouldn’t think so,” said Mary. “I guess Molly will always want to help lame ducks. A strong, masterful man would probably just seem like a bully to her, I reckon.”
“What about The Highland Heart?” demanded Roddy. “Mrs. Pomfret assured me that Miss Molly adored it. Had a look at it, you know. Well, the chappie in the book, Angus, you know, seemed to spend his time either brooding or crushing young ladies to his bosom.”
“Wasn’t it awful.” said Mary, failing to note the slightly stricken look on the face of her companion. “Of course Molly did not want to hurt Mrs. Pomfret’s feelings so she told her it was marvelous. But how we laughed at that terrible book. She said that Angus obviously had something up with his liver and that if she ever met a man like that, she would be tempted to punch him on the nose.”
Roddy stirred restlessly on his seat. They were, of course, correctly seated at a picnic table. Lady Fanny had recently seen the famous painting of Un Déjeuner sur l’Herbe and had since considered picnicking on the grass the next thing to immorality.
Roddy got to his feet. “Come along, Miss Mary. A walk by the river is just what we need to wake us up after lunch.”
Mary was disappointed. This handsome marquess had, until a few minutes ago, seemed perfectly happy to have her all to himself. But she docilely tripped along beside him, trying to match her small steps to his great strides. It was not so much a stroll beside the river, she decided, as a race.
Roddy hoped fervently that Lord David had not gone in for any strong, silent crushing.
Lord David had not yet made any move but was about to do so despite the so far tepid response from his companion. The narrow path had become tortuous and rocky, and there were excellent opportunities for helping her over small obstacles with a strong hand. Molly had looked at him crossly several times and had said something like, “I can manage by myself,” but with the noise of the rushing stream he couldn’t be sure. There was a large boulder blocking the path. “I had better lift you over that,” murmured Lord David seductively.
“What did you say?” demanded Molly.
“I said I’d better help you over that,” roared Lord David, beginning to feel like a fool.
“I am perfectly able to manage myself,” said Molly for the umpteenth time. “Anyway, I think we had better be getting back.”
But Lord David decided to take the plunge. Women usually melted in his arms, didn’t they? He was reaching out to grasp Molly by the waist when he heard his name being called.
He swung around, cursing under his breath. Roddy and Mary were hastening up to them, and Roddy’s large eyes were signaling warnings for all they were worth.
“I wouldn’t exert yourself, David,” yelled Roddy. “Remember your condition.”
“My condition,” repeated his lordship stupidly.
“Yes,” roared Roddy, above the noise of the rushing water. “After all, you have got tuberculosis.”
“But I thought he was cured,” said Molly, staring in amazement at the healthy, tanned face of Lord David.
“Not a bit of it,” said Roddy. “Doctors say he could pop off anytime.”
Lord David was about to howl that he was perfectly fit when he saw that Molly was looking up at him with a glowing, tender expression.
“We had better go back,” said Molly, this time taking Lord David’s arm in a comforting clasp. Lord David shut his mouth and allowed Molly to lead him slowly back along the path. At the picnic table she fussed over him like a mother hen, her beautiful eyes wide with sympathy. It was all very pleasant.
He felt a bit of a cad, but Molly’s sympathy for the dying man had brought out her feminine side. She had never looked more beautiful. Every line of her strong young body seemed to have grown soft and seductive. As she bent solicitously over him, pouring him a glass of wine, Lord David stared in fascination
at her rounded bosom and thought how splendid it would be to put his head down on it and sleep, and hear that gentle American voice cooing in his ears.
On the road home Molly sat very close to him in the carriage. Little black curls escaped from under her frivolous hat. Her mouth was soft and her eyes wide. Lord David was conscious of a heady, exciting sensation. He could feel the response of her body to his, and although they did not even hold hands, he knew that they were making love.
When they reached the Holden home, Lord David sprang out of the carriage, despite Molly’s protests, and helped her down. He bent his head and kissed her gloved hand and then looked deep into her beautiful blue eyes. For a long moment, a strong thread of emotion seemed to join them and Lord David realized with a start that for the first time in his life, his heart was in danger. Reluctantly he released her hand and stood watching her while she walked into the house.
Jennifer Strange prized herself out of the shrubbery, her little freckled face screwed up in a rather nasty way. Molly Maguire was a beast! What right had this foreigner to go out driving with Lord David when she, Jennifer, had already told Molly her heart’s desire. Molly must be punished. Lord David must be punished, and Jennifer Strange would see to that! She tripped demurely home to write a letter to Lord David’s fiancée, Lady Cynthia Whitworth.
“Well, well, well,” Lord David was saying. “What was all that about?”
Roddy told him. “Mary told me that she only likes lame ducks so it seemed like a stroke of genius. Did you see how she looked at you when she thought you were a dying man?”
“Yes,” said Lord David, frowning. “And what is Miss Maguire going to do when she finds out we have tricked her?”
“Oh, she won’t,” said Roddy blithely. “Well just change the date of your recovery. But what about Cynthia? She knows you’re cured, doesn’t she? She’ll expect you to make the engagement official.”
“That won’t be for some time,” said Lord David, after some thought. “Cynthia never rushes into anything.”
“Well, be careful and don’t queer my pitch. I’m getting very fond of Mary. In fact,” said Roddy suddenly, “I think I’m in love with her.”
Lord David laughed indulgently. “When weren’t you in love, Roddy, my boy? You fall in love the way other people catch colds.”
“I think I’m serious this time,” said Roddy. “Lady Fanny is giving this ball for the girls. You know what? Think I’ll pop the question.”
“I’ll believe that when it happens,” said his friend cynically. “Don’t spring any surprises on me. Remember, I’m a dying man!”
Lady Cynthia Whitworth slowly put down the letter from Jennifer Strange and touched the bell at her side. “Ah, Bland,” she said when her butler answered the summons. “Do we know where to find a detective?”
The butler thought for a minute. “I think, my lady, that there was a certain person who was called in privately to solve the mystery of the Duchess of Earlston’s diamonds.”
“Oh, that one. Yes. Turned out her son had pinched them. Well, get on to him and ask him to find out all he can about a couple of American heiresses called Molly and Mary Maguire. And tell him I need the information urgently….”
Lady Fanny put down her coffee cup so that it rattled in the saucer. “Oh, dear,” she said faintly. “Toby, do listen.”
Lord Toby looked at her rather wearily, wondering which facet of his life was about to be disciplined.
“I’ve a letter here from Lady Cynthia Whitworth. Remember there were rumors that she was to marry Lord David, and then it all petered out?”
“No,” said Toby, picking up the morning paper.
“Put that rag down,” snapped his wife in her best parade-ground voice. “Pay attention! Lady Cynthia now more or less says that the engagement is still on and that she is coming here for the gels’ ball. Oh, dear! And I shall have to invite her to the dinner beforehand. And Molly has been making sheep’s eyes at Lord David. I don’t know what has got into her. She seemed to be such a sensible girl. And what does Lord David mean, pray, if his intentions are not honorable?”
“Don’t know,” muttered her spouse in a voice that clearly meant “Don’t care.”
“Toby! Come to attention! You are to go ’round there this morning and ask Lord David what he thinks he’s playing at.”
But for once her husband stood firm. “No, I won’t. He’s done nothing wrong. He hasn’t courted Molly. Only taken her out driving now and then. Not the thing at all, Fanny,” he added severely. “You should know better.”
“I suppose you’re right,” conceded Lady Fanny sulkily and then said, “I’ve got it!”
“Got what?”
“Giles.”
“Giles? Your nephew? That’s the last person we need,” said Lord Toby, stirred into rare animation. “Sent down from Oxford because of some barmaid. Tomcat around the casinos. What on earth has got into you, Fanny?”
“I’m sure he has reformed,” said Lady Fanny in a grim voice that clearly meant that if he hadn’t, he was going to. “And don’t you see, he is very attractive. I’ll get him here for the night of the ball and get him to pay court to Molly. That way she won’t have time to notice David’s engagement.”
Lord Toby gave up. Life had a way of coming between him and the sports pages of his morning paper. He was fond of Molly, but the report of yesterday’s racing at Sandown came first.
“Do what you want,” he said. Dammit, if there hadn’t been a horse called Broken Heart—a rank outsider that had galloped home—Now, if he had put a fiver on that, he could have won….He lost himself in pleasant meditation, unaware that his wife had left the room.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Lord David Manley and the Marquess of Leamouth were getting ready for the ball. Both men had also been invited to the preball dinner. “Do you think,” said Lord David, wrestling with a recalcitrant collar stud, “that the ladies realize what we have to go through? Do they for one minute consider the hell and discomfort of a collar stud?”
“Shouldn’t think so,” said Roddy, lounging elegantly in a chair. As usual, his evening clothes looked as if they had been molded to his form. “Think of what the girls have to go through themselves, what with stays and all that.”
Lord David suddenly thought of Molly and undergarments, and the thought seemed to be doing something to his breath. “I hope I don’t have to go around punching anyone in the head tonight,” he said. “How did you manage with young Bingham, by the way?”
“I did what you told me,” said his friend simply. “I appealed to his better nature.”
“Well, I couldn’t appeal to Cuthbert’s better nature,” said Lord David, pulling on his white gloves. “He hasn’t got one. Don’t worry. That was a master stroke of yours… about me having tuberculosis, I mean. I don’t anticipate any difficulties this evening.”
But as he and Roddy walked up the long drive toward the Holden mansion, he was once more aware of that feeling of heady excitement. What would she be wearing? Would she look at him so? Feathery pink clouds were spread across the heavens, and the formal gardens of Lady Fanny’s estate blazed with color behind their rigid borders of shells.
The band could be heard rehearsing in the ballroom. There came the sweet, lilting strains of a waltz, and Lord David’s nostrils were filled with all the evening scents of the garden mixed with the exotic smells of French cooking from the kitchen: wine and roses, sweet-smelling stock and garlic, herbs and dew-laden grass, and damp leaves. Lord David experienced a sudden feeling of tremulous anticipation. He wanted suddenly to stay where he was, in the driveway, experiencing this novel feeling, being aware of every scent and sound of the summer’s evening. “I never realized before,” he said quietly, “that England was so beautiful.”
With strange reluctance he followed Roddy into the house. And there she was. He reflected briefly that Lady Fanny was a genius when it came to choosing clothes for the Maguire sisters. Instead of dressing Molly in debutante whit
e, Lady Fanny had chosen a dress for her in deepest crimson chiffon. It was cut low at the bosom, emphasizing the whiteness of her neck and shoulders. It was swept up at the back into a saucy sort of bustle reminiscent of the 1870s, and her glossy curls were dressed high on her head without any of the fashionable frizzing to spoil them. One deep-scarlet rose was placed behind her ear. Her eyes were like sapphires and just, he noticed with a start, as hard.
A devastatingly good-looking young man appeared at her elbow and led her away. He was about to follow when a well-remembered voice said, “Darling!”
One little word and the enchantment fled, leaving him standing in an overfurnished house, wondering how soon he could escape.
He turned around, and Lady Cynthia Whitworth stood smiling into his eyes. She was nearly as tall as he and built on Junoesque lines. Her blonde hair was worn fashionably low on her brow, her skin was like an enameled rose leaf, and her gown screamed Paris with every stitch. She was all his—and he was suddenly miserable.
He became aware that she was speaking. He had forgotten how ugly her voice was. She had a high, affected drawl.
“Glad to see you back from the land of the dead, darling,” she was saying. “I sent the notice of our engagement to the papers. Now, aren’t you thrilled?”
“Devastated,” he said politely, kissing her porcelain cheek. “There goes the dinner gong.”
“You must tell me all about the Maguire sisters,” drawled Cynthia as they walked toward the table. “Quite characters, I imagine. Is that them? How very dark, to be sure, but I’ve heard it said that a lot of those American girls have Negro blood in them.”
“Nonsense,” said his lordship with a cutting edge to his voice. “Whitest skins I’ve seen in years. Anyway, the latest rage of Paris has Negro blood in her. Skin like honey. All the fellows are mad about her.”
“Dear me,” said Lady Cynthia, raising her penciled eyebrows. “How democratic you have become. It must be the American influence.”
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