The Wood Nymph

by Mary Balogh

  He feared there was no doubt that he had. She had given herself to him without thought or conscious decision there in the woods. It had been an unreal atmosphere, in which she had been unable to apply the codes that her upbringing must have instilled in her. And clearly she was bitterly regretting what had happened. She felt herself ruined, no doubt, unable to throw herself wholeheartedly into the life of the ton, unable to encourage any other man. Yet she would not accept his offer. She saw him as her seducer and hated him for it. She would not marry him even for the sake of restoring respectability to her Life. Dear Nell! She was high-principled, after all.

  The ladies rode in two carriages, while the men rode close to them. Helen and Elizabeth had each made an effort to be in different carriages. Neither felt comfortable at the prospect of being thrown into company with the other for almost two whole days. Helen, in fact, was badly shaken. She had not known who Lord Harding’s guests were to be. It had never once crossed her mind that perhaps William and the marquess and marchioness would be of their number. She knew of no friendship between her sister’s suitor and them. It took her a while to realize that it was her sister’s connection to them that had caused them to be invited. Of course. Lord Harding was clearly trying to fix his interest with Emmy. He had invited those three because they were her earliest acquaintances in London.

  Helen felt utterly trapped. It was a relatively small party. It would be impossible to avoid them for all the hours that lay ahead. And it was too late by the time she knew the truth to find a way out of going herself. She was already at Lord Harding’s London house. So she sat in the carriage, listening halfheartedly to the animated conversation between Sophie Lane and Janet Ashley, sitting side by side on the seat opposite. Emmy and Melly were in the other carriage with the marchioness. Helen was suffocatingly aware of William, tall and handsome and grim on his horse outside, in view almost every time she looked out of the window, though he did not approach the carriage once during the journey.

  The afternoon and the formal dinner passed agreeably for almost everyone. A late luncheon was awaiting them when they arrived, and afterward the ladies retired to the rooms that had been prepared for them to rest after the journey. Later Lord Harding took some of his guests on a walk around his very large garden, while the less energetic stayed, in the house to play billiards or merely to converse around the cozy fire that had been lit in the drawing room. They all retired again before dinner in order to rest and get ready for the evening.

  Lord Harding was feeling pleased with himself by the time dinner was over. Lady Emily Wade had behaved with the modest self-assurance that he desired in a wife. She had admired his home and his garden, yet with a restraint that did not suggest a greed to make them her own. She had sat to his right at both luncheon and dinner and had conversed sensibly with both him and her near neighbors. Perhaps, if the opportunity presented itself, he thought, he would talk to her later in the evening. She was, after all, of age, and talking to her father was a formality rather than a strict necessity.

  Melissa was feeling moderately contented. She had succeeded in singling Mr. Rodney Ashley out from the rest of the group that had gone walking earlier and found him to be an agreeable young man, even if not a particularly forceful character. She had made a point of being close to him when dinner was announced, and he had led her in and seated himself next to her. At least she was showing Mr. Mainwaring that she was in no way pining for his attentions.

  William Mainwaring himself was beginning to breathe more easily. So far he had succeeded in keeping both himself and the Hetheringtons away from Nell. All three of them had chosen to remain at the house during the afternoon. He was not sure if Elizabeth and Robert, like him, had deliberately stayed back when it became clear that Nell intended to go. It hurt him more than he would admit to feel that perhaps his friends were deliberately avoiding her, but it was nevertheless a relief. She was very quiet today. He had hardly heard her voice, even at the dinner table, when she was sitting two seats removed from his. But it was not a contented quiet, he felt. Her face was pale and rigidly set. He did not wish to provoke any unpleasantness in public.

  It had been a nightmare of a day for Helen. She had held grimly to her self-control, but she felt like an animal caught in a trap. She felt suffocated for air. If only she could get away! She had thought of pleading illness and returning home, but doing so would attract too much attention. She had flirted desperately with Mr. Simms over luncheon but had realized with dismay that he was very responsive. She must not deliberately capture the poor man’s heart when she knew she might leave him hurt. She knew too well what such treatment felt like.

  Unfortunately, Mr. Simms had stayed close to her all through the afternoon, and he had led her in to dinner and talked to her throughout. Perhaps it was a good thing. At least his presence gave her good reason to stay away from the three people she wished to avoid. But now she had the added problem of being civil to him while not in any way encouraging his advances. And she could not avoid watching the Hetheringtons in the drawing room before dinner, her arm linked through his, conversing with perfect amiability to all around them, but occasionally glancing at each other with open affection. And she was forced to watch William cross the room to Janet Ashley and offer her his arm in to dinner, and to listen to his voice as he talked to her during the meal.

  Yet, by the time dinner was over, she was at least pleased that there had been no confrontation. If they could just get through the evening as they had the day, they could all go home in the morning and breathe easily again. Emmy at least looked happy. It was clearly only a matter of time before she was betrothed to Lord Harding. He was a thoroughly dry old stick in Helen’s estimation and not without a large sense of his own importance. But he would, undoubtedly, be a good catch for Emmy. Life as Lady Harding would suit her down to the ground.

  Sophie had risen from the table, and Helen took her cue, as did the other ladies, to leave the gentlemen to their port. She followed the others to the drawing room. Most of them immediately clustered around the pianoforte. Helen would have sat down close to the fire had not the marchioness done so first. Helen had no desire for a tete-à-tete with that lady. She lingered close to the others while it was decided that Melly should play first and Emmy sing.

  They were still arranged thus when the gentlemen joined them. Mr. Simms immediately singled out Helen.

  “Do you play?” he asked. “I am sure we would all like to hear you.”

  “Yes,” she said, “I do play, but only for my own amusement, sir.”

  Lord Harding was standing close, having approached the instrument to congratulate Emily on the song she had just finished. “I’ll wager you are being too modest, Lady Helen,” he said. “Your sisters are both accomplished musicians. I would expect that you are in no way inferior. Please favor us with a piece.”

  “I would rather not,” she said. “Really, I have not been used to playing in public as my sisters have.”

  “Then sing for us at least,” Mr. Simms persisted. “I am sure you must have a sweet voice. Your sister will remain at the pianoforte and accompany you, I am sure.” He smiled at Melissa, who still occupied the stool.

  Helen’s hands were opening and closing at her sides. She was trying hard to maintain her control, though she felt as if the nightmare of the day were reaching a climax. “I don’t sing,” she said.

  “Perhaps a duet,” he suggested. “I sing a little myself. Surely we can find a song that we both know. You can play while I sing.”

  Her hands were clenched into fists now, her knuckles white against the sides of her gown. “I think not,” she said, forcing a smile. She could feel her control slipping.

  Mr. Simms smiled back and opened his mouth to continue his persuasions.

  A hand grasped Helen lightly by the arm. “Lady Helen is tired, I believe,” William Mainwaring said. “It has been a long and busy day.” He turned to smile down at her. “Perhaps you are ready for that walk in the garden we talk
ed about earlier? Or are you too tired?” He would allow her a way out if she wanted it.

  She looked blankly back at him for a moment, but he felt the muscles of her arms relax as she unclenched her hands. “No, I am not too tired,” she said. “Fresh air and a walk are just what I need.”

  “Go and fetch your cloak, then,” he said. “It will be chilly outside, I think.”

  She went from the room in a daze.

  CHAPTER 13

  H e held the front door open for her, waving aside the footman who jumped forward for the purpose. It was not a dark night. The sky was still as clear as it had been all day, and the nearly full moon and the stars gave enough light that they did not need to stay on the terrace that circled the house. When they had descended the stone steps to the cobbled courtyard before it, William Mainwaring took Helen’s arm and linked it through his.

  She felt herself grow tense. He had touched her briefly before, when they were introduced at the ball and when he had helped her into and out of his curricle the afternoon they had driven together. But those had not been prolonged contacts. Now she could feel the muscles of his arm through the thickness of his greatcoat, and her shoulder rested against his upper arm. She felt small and fragile again, as she had when they had become lovers. And she wanted above everything else to close her eyes and lay her head against his shoulder and trust to his strength to bear all her burdens.

  She had very nearly cracked back there in the drawing room. One moment more and she would have been screaming with fury at poor Mr. Simms and Lord Harding. And over what? Just a small matter of playing the pianoforte and singing. It was too ghastly a thought to bear contemplation. She would have horribly embarrassed both herself and everyone else present. But more serious than that, she might have jeopardized Emily’s chances with Lord Harding. He might not want a bride with a sister who could so lose all sense of propriety. Though soon enough he would know anyway. William had saved her on this occasion. There could be no doubt that he had sensed her mood and had done what he could to avert trouble. She had to feel some gratitude.

  They walked in silence for several minutes, threading their way slowly among the graveled walks of the formal gardens that stretched for several hundred yards before the house. He was the first to speak.

  “What is it, Nell?” he said quietly. “What is it that is making you so very miserable?”

  She wanted to give him a tart answer. She opened her mouth to do so. But the words would not come. The fight had gone completely out of her for the present. She hung her head and said nothing.

  “Is it me?” he asked. “Have I caused all this change? I can hardly recognize in you the carefree little wood nymph that I once knew.”

  “Don’t,” she murmured.

  “What?”

  “Don’t,” she repeated. “Don’t, don’t!” She tried to pull her hand free of his arm, but he would not let her go.

  “Nell, you are not crying, are you?” he asked, turning to her and trying to see into her face.

  “No,” she said, but her voice came out on such a quaver that she gulped and made matters worse.

  “You are crying!” he said, aghast, and he finally let go of her arm and drew her into his arms, cradling her head against the capes of his coat. “Don’t. Oh please, don’t. Tell me what I can do, Nell. I know I have hurt you dreadfully, but I do not know what I can do to make amends.”

  “There is nothing,” she said into the cloth of his coat. He had to bend his ear closer to hear the words between her sobs. “There is nothing you can do for me, William. Neither of us is quite the person I thought, and it is too late now to change that. There is nothing you can do. Take me back, please.”

  “You are in such pain,” he said, laying his cheek against the top of her head. “And you have been like this since I met you here. I have to do something, Nell. I cannot see you destroy yourself like this. Will it help if I tell you something about myself and why I left you as I did in the summer?”

  “No, it would not help at all,” she said, pulling her head away from his coat, though he still held her firmly against him. “I do not want to talk about that.”

  “Would you believe me if I told you that I was planning to leave for Yorkshire to find you and ask you to be my wife before ever I met you here and discovered who you really were?”

  “Oh, no,” she said wildly. “Don’t say that. Don’t lie, William. I have little enough to admire you for as it is.”

  “You have cast me in the part of the villain, I see,” he said sadly, “and I can say nothing to redeem myself in your eyes, Nell.” He reached up a hand and put behind her ear a lock of wayward hair that had worked loose from her braids. “We were friends once.”

  She stared back at him, feeling more miserable than she could ever remember feeling. He could be so convincing when one was close to him. She was suffocated by regrets for what might have been.

  And then he was kissing her. And she was quite powerless to resist him. She was too tired and too weak to do anything but put one arm up on his broad and strong shoulder and thread the fingers of the other hand through his wind-ruffled hair. And she relaxed her body full against his and surrendered to his embrace. He was so much bigger than she, so much stronger. His hand on the back of her head was warm and steady. His mouth covered hers with firm assurance, and his tongue gently caressed her lips before taking warm possession of her mouth. In a moment she would begin to think ... in a moment she would push away from him.

  “Nell,” he said, his lips against her throat, “let us put the past behind us. Let it be as if we met but today. We will start anew and I shall court you as I should. Let us forgive and forget. Shall we?”

  The words were hypnotic. More than anything else in the world she wanted to agree with him, to look up and abandon herself to her love for him. But she could not, dared not trust him again. He could not love her. He wanted to do what was proper because she was Lady Helen Wade. She hardened her heart.

  Helen pulled her head back from him so that they were looking into each other’s eyes. Hers were clear again. Gone was the languor of a few moments before. “The past is with us whether we wish it to be or not, William,” she said. “I at least can never be free of it. And I can neither forgive nor forget. I did not meet you today. I met you several months ago and I know too much about you to wish for any courtship.”

  He took a deep breath. “I see you are inflexible,” he said. “You want someone perfect, Nell, and perfection does not exist in this life. Can you not make allowances for my weakness when you have been weak yourself?”

  Her eyes flashed. “My only weakness was to be deceived by a man like you,” she said.

  “No,” he said. They were standing facing each other now, no longer touching. “Your upbringing must have taught you that even to be alone with a man without your parents’ close chaperonage was unacceptable behavior. Yet you did not avoid a second private meeting with me. You did not try to prevent me from kissing you, and when I gave you the chance to avoid lying with me, you did not take it. You quite knowingly gave me your virginity, Nell. You did wrong according to the code by which our society lives. A serious wrong. Can you not, then, have more sympathy with me?”

  “How dare you stand there and point out my transgressions!” Helen said, her eyes blazing. Her hands were clenched into fists at her sides again. “You sinned equally, sir. You sought me out a second time and you chose to kiss me. You chose to come back yet again and . . . and m-make love to me. I believe we are equal on that score. It is not for that that I have come to hate you. What I cannot forgive is your dishonesty and cowardice. You could not face me and tell me that you had grown tired of me, that you felt no responsibility for a girl of my apparent station in life.”

  “Dishonesty!” he said. His face was very grim. “I do not believe I have any monopoly on dishonesty, ma’am. I do not believe I am too hard of understanding, but it seems to me that you spoke not one word to suggest your real identity. Indeed, I a
m convinced that you deliberately set out to deceive me. Even your voice was different. You did not speak there as you do here, in the voice of an educated and cultured woman. How could you have allowed me to go on believing a lie when we had become lovers? I felt close to you. I thought there were no barriers between us.”

  “Obviously there were,” she said. “You did not know I was living a lie, and I did not know that you were merely using me because you thought me a girl of no account.”

  He made an impatient gesture. “Do you know,” he said, “I am glad now that you did not accept my offer. I do not think I would want a wife who believes only she has the right to err, and who has no tolerance at all for the failings of others. I would not want such a woman to be the mother of my children.”

  “Ohhh” she cried. It came out on a long wail. “Oh, how could you? How could you!” She began to sob again, loud uncontrolled sobs, which sounded almost as if they were tearing her apart.

  Mainwaring reached out for her. She was clearly beside herself. But she slapped his hands away and turned from him.

  “Nell,” he said.

  “Leave me alone!” she cried. “Oh, how could you! I’ll kill myself. I swear I’ll kill myself.”

  He reached for her again, in real alarm this time. But she tore her arm out of his grasp and started to run toward the house. She stumbled once, but she picked herself up before she fell completely to the ground, and continued to run. Mainwaring stayed where he was, watching her panicked departure and listening to her sobs. Finally, as she disappeared through the door, he began to hurry and then to run after her.

  Two tables had been set up for cards in the drawing room. The only guests who were not playing were Elizabeth Denning and Mr. Simms. The latter was seated at the pianoforte, playing apparently for his own amusement. Elizabeth was standing behind her husband’s chair, looking at his hand of cards, when William Mainwaring entered the room. He crossed to the tea tray, which was still set on a table close to the fireplace, and looked speakingly at her.