The Ardent Lady Amelia

by Laura Matthews

  The hood of the cloak concealed her bright locks fairly well if she drew it forward until it nearly blinded her. She disposed of her shoes before peeking out into the hall to see that there was no one around. The corridor to the back was in almost total darkness because the kitchen area would ordinarily be empty for the night. Amelia remembered that Mrs. Lawson would be there now, though, boiling the towels for Lord Verwood, so she slipped out the side door instead. This put her in the courtyard she had shown the viscount the previous day.

  One wall ran along the ornamental garden where Chartier and Upham should still be strolling as they talked, and she avoided the gravel path as she made her way to the five-foot balustrade. There was a good deal of vegetation planted alongside the stone wall and she found the going rather difficult in her bare feet (and because she didn’t see quite as well at night), to say nothing of the cloak being continually snagged on the budding branches of straggly bushes. Because she could hear no voices, she began to worry that the men had wandered farther afield, away from the forecourt toward the pond across the large lawn. Peeking over the railing, she could see nothing but the clipped yews and the serpentine balustrade around the water.

  Once her ears had become accustomed to the usual night sounds and to the relentless beat of her own nervous heart, she could distinguish the murmur of voices in the direction of the pavilion. The growth near the pavilion was at its thickest, and she found she could not penetrate it without causing herself a great deal of injury and making a great deal of noise. She regarded the stone pile with a sigh and decided the only way she was going to get close enough to hear them, in safety, was to enter the wretched building.

  Amelia was beginning to wonder if this had been such a good idea after all. Probably Chartier was merely touting his sister’s virtues, and the suave Mr. Upham was considering the possibilities of attracting a woman some twenty years his junior. Or they were discussing whether Chartier would be interested in purchasing inexpensive French material and fashions for his sister. Amelia reluctantly edged out onto the gravel path in front of the heavy oak door. That door creaked, she remembered with a shudder, and the interior was full of cobwebs and heaven knew what little crawly insects that would be waiting there for her to step on them with her naked toes. Besides, the windows didn’t open. Probably she wouldn’t be able to hear the men through the glass in any case.

  The doorknob felt icy cold and damp in her hand. It was only the image of herself conveying important information to Verwood that gave her the courage to pull it cautiously toward her. From her childhood she recalled that if one didn’t want a door to creak, one pushed hard toward the hinges, and she managed to swing the heavy portal far enough to slip through without its giving forth a wail of protest. Inside was total darkness, at least until her eyes became used to the creepy blackness. Then she could distinguish that there were faint panels of lighter hue, where the windows were.

  Each footstep made her shudder with the anticipation that she would set her poor unguarded toes on a slimy snake or a crunchy beetle. Fearless she was not, but determination drove her on. She lifted and set down each foot with the slow deliberation of someone sloshing through oozing mud, but finally found herself beside the leaded windows closest to the garden. To her amazement and relief, she found she could hear two distinct voices, though their words were slightly blurred.

  “... fifty pounds, half beforehand... two trips… can’t... there... not safe. Take it or…” Definitely Mr. Upham speaking.

  “… more than I’d... When could...?”

  “Thursday... give you... days. If you weren’t there, they couldn’t... Best I can…”

  There was silence for a minute; then Amelia could hear a distant shout that sounded like Peter calling to them. Chartier said hurriedly, “All right. I’ll have… by tomorrow. We can discuss… when I see…”

  Peter’s voice was closer now. “How about... brandy?”

  Since Upham raised his voice to answer, Amelia could hear him quite clearly. “Sounds just right. How’s Lord Verwood?”

  She would have been glad enough to hear her brother’s reply, but the three men walked off toward the house, leaving her to the spooky darkness of the pavilion alone. There seemed to be rustling sounds around her, and she made a hurried dash for the door, only to realize that she should remain there long enough for them to get out of hearing distance before she crept out and pushed the door closed. There was definitely something in the building with her, though it might have been as innocuous as any army of ants. She could feel it, and her back prickled with fright. Even a rat would have been too much for her to contemplate, so she slid out through the door and left it open. No one was going to notice, and if they did, they wouldn’t think a thing of it, she assured herself.

  Keeping to the grass just off the gravel walk, she hurried back to the side door she’d come through only a few minutes before. Really, it could only have been a very short time, though it seemed like hours. She could feel the perspiration cooling on her brow under the heavy hood. There must surely be a better way to serve one’s country, she decided as she padded along to the closet. Perhaps she wasn’t cut out for this kind of thing after all.

  The men’s voices drifted down the hall from the earl’s library as she quickly disposed of the cloak and tucked her feet back into her shoes. Bighton must have left the door open when he carried in their brandy. If she hurried, she could be around the curve of the staircase before he came back out again. It wasn’t all that comforting in the dark closet, either.

  Amelia picked up her skirts and dashed across the short length of hall, feeling slightly ridiculous. There was no need for this cloak-and-dagger stuff in her own home, surely. If Bighton caught sight of her he was likely to say no more than, “Can I be of some assistance, Lady Amelia?” But she was fired with excitement now, and even the end of her expedition didn’t seem to cool her down. She skittered up the stairs, flushed with her triumph. Most decidedly there was something to tell Lord Verwood.

  In her room she couldn’t settle down, but paced forward and back on the thick patterned carpet. After a while she decided the professional thing to do was to write down precisely what she had heard. Her mahogany escritoire stood against the north wall of her room and she sat down abruptly, drawing the inkwell toward her so quickly that the ink sloshed over onto the blotter. Undeterred, she whipped out a sheet of paper and began to scribble the half-sentences. When she sat back to look at what she had, she sighed. Not exactly a confession signed in blood.

  The exercise hadn’t exactly calmed her, either. She was bursting with the need to tell someone, preferably Lord Verwood himself. Hadn’t she at least come up with more than he had, sitting behind hedgerows near Bournemouth? And she had done it at absolutely no risk to herself, so he could hardly complain, could he?

  There he was sitting in his room, no doubt in awful pain, nursing his bad leg and thinking that he was getting no further in his attempt to learn something of the Chartiers. And here she sat (well, actually, she had begun to pace the room again, waving the sheet of paper to dry it) with information which would so enthrall him that he would quite forget his pain. And possibly praise her for her efforts.

  It was too much for Amelia. She knew he was in the same wing; he had been put in the Oriel Room because it was one of the largest of the guest suites, and one of the handsomest. She would just walk down the corridor and slip the sheet of paper under his door. He would find it in the morning and seek her out, eager to hear how she had accomplished such a feat.

  There was light coming from under his door. Amelia convinced herself that if she put the paper under the door, he would see it and possibly hurt himself trying to walk over to pick it up. It would be much better if she simply handed it to him, with a brief explanation. Otherwise, he might wonder all night what the meaning of it was. And that was hardly fair to him, with his injured knee and all. He needed a good night’s sleep.

  She knocked on the door.

  Chap
ter 15

  “Come in.”

  It didn’t occur to Amelia that he wouldn’t be decent. Peter never called to her to come in unless he was completely dressed. Of course, she had to admit, as she stared at Verwood, seated in a wing chair with his leg up on a hassock, that he probably hadn’t expected the knock to be hers. Undoubtedly he expected it would be Peter, or one of the footmen bringing more boiled towels. And he couldn’t very well treat his poor knee with his breeches on, could he? Still, she was rather taken aback to find him there in his shirtsleeves and drawers. No particularly important part of him was left exposed, to be sure, but “For God’s sake, Amelia!” he exclaimed, making a desperate attempt to rise and find something to cover himself with.

  “No, don’t do that!” she insisted, turning her back on him. “I won’t look. Just don’t get up and hurt yourself.” She’d already seen what there was to see, anyhow. Large feet, and strong hairy legs, and nothing more. She heard him sigh behind her.

  “Why don’t you hand me my dressing gown from the wardrobe... if you intend to stay?”

  “Well, I had something to tell you. Something important,” she said diffidently. “But if you want me to leave…”

  “The maroon one, at the end.”

  Amelia walked stiffly to the oak wardrobe and pulled open the single wide door. His clothes, all neatly pressed, were hanging there in great profusion. Apparently he didn’t travel light. Or he had intended to make a rather long stay. There were two dressing gowns. The one on the end was maroon. She lifted it down, holding it awkwardly away from her body, as though it were something not quite nice, and returned to him, her eyes studiously trained on his bed, where the rest of the clothes he’d been wearing that evening were strewn. Someone should have hung them up for him.

  “Didn’t you bring your valet?” she asked as she set to work gathering them up.

  “No. You needn’t do that, Lady Amelia. Peter’s valet will be in later to get me into bed.”

  “I could do that.”

  “No, you couldn’t.”

  There was a sharp edge to his voice, but she didn’t face him until she’d found room for his coat and breeches in the wardrobe. “Are you ready?”

  “Yes, I’m ready,” he said, his voice sounding suddenly amused.

  He was still seated in the wing chair, the maroon dressing gown with its black velvet collar now carefully tied about his waist. It came down past his knees, in fact almost to his feet. “Would you like your slippers?” she asked.

  “Not unless my feet offend you.”

  “Of course not,” she replied stoutly, retracing her path toward his chair, where she hovered uncertainly at his elbow. “Would you rather I waited until morning?”

  “Not if you have something really important to tell me. And please sit down. You make me nervous standing there.”

  Amelia perched on the edge of the rosewood armchair he indicated, and gripped her sheet of paper tightly in her lap. “I was just so eager to tell you what I’d learned,” she tried to explain. “About M. Chartier.”

  One brow rose skeptically. “You found it suspicious that he spent so much time talking with Mr. Upham.”

  Amelia remembered his blank look when she’d tried to call the matter to his attention, and sniffed. “I learned a great deal more than that. After you were injured and Peter brought you in, Trudy and Mlle. Chartier and I came in, too. Which left M. Chartier and Mr. Upham in peace to plot something between them.”

  “They don’t even know each other,” he told her reasonably. “I don’t think you’d be able to convince me that they did, my dear. That would be far too great a coincidence.”

  “Of course they don’t know each other. Did I say they did?” she demanded, annoyed with his skepticism. She dropped her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “I spied on them.”

  The black eyes widened. “Spied on them, Amelia? God help us, what next? just how did you manage this from your bedchamber? The garden’s on the other side of the house.”

  “I think the pain has clouded your brain, Verwood.” She made a negligent gesture with her empty hand. “Are the towels hot enough? Shall I get you more?”

  “They’re fine. Go on with your story.”

  He made it sound as though she was entertaining him with a fairy tale. Irritated, Amelia wiggled back into the chair, which was so deep her feet just barely reached the floor. She scowled at him, which had no noticeable effect. Finally she said, “I didn’t go to my room. I put on a cloak and left my shoes in the closet and went out into the courtyard. Only the parapet on the wall divides it from the ornamental garden.”

  He frowned. “Did they see you?”

  “No, certainly not.”

  “But what if they had?”

  Amelia became very haughty. “There is surely no reason why I shouldn’t take a stroll at night in my own courtyard.”

  “Without your shoes?”

  “They wouldn’t have noticed I didn’t have shoes on.” Amelia was feeling slightly impatient. “Do you want to hear what I discovered or not?”

  “I’m all ears,” he assured her.

  “It’s treacherous out there in the dark. I was extraordinarily brave. They were talking down by the pavilion and it was necessary for me to go in it to hear them, you know. I couldn’t catch everything they said. And then Peter came along.”

  “So you actually heard nothing at all,” he suggested, impatient in his turn.

  “I most certainly did. And I’ve written it all down.” She bent forward to hand him the sheet of paper. “That is exactly what they said.”

  Verwood scanned the short entries quickly. “This is it? This is what brought you to my room in the dead of night?”

  Amelia flushed. “Well, it’s highly suspicious, isn’t it? Perhaps you don’t know that Mr. Upham is a smuggler and could very easily arrange for transport for M. Chartier to France.”

  The viscount once again read the hurriedly penned lines. And shrugged. “My dear Amelia, they could as easily be speaking of some shipment of brandy or clothing that Upham could get for him. If Chartier wanted to get to France, he wouldn’t be likely to take a chance on a stranger.”

  “Yes, he would,” she said stubbornly. “He’s really not at all bright, Verwood.”

  The viscount grinned at her. “I’ve noticed. Which is one of the best arguments I can think of against his being a spy.”

  She thought about that for a minute, but shook her head. “It could just be a trick of his. And English people think anyone who speaks some other language is missing a little something upstairs. Look, you told me the revenue officer in Bournemouth was suspicious. If Chartier needs to get to France, he really has to take a chance somewhere else right now, doesn’t he?”

  “Possibly.”

  They sat in silence for some time, staring at each other. It seemed to Amelia that for the first time he really noticed her jonquil gown then, and the way it faithfully clung to her figure. His gaze kept straying from her eyes down to her bosom, to immediately swing back up. Eventually he cleared his throat and said, “You really shouldn’t have come here, my dear. Your brother might misunderstand.”

  “Oh, Peter knows me very well. He wouldn’t misconstrue the situation.”

  He offered her a rueful smile. “I’m sure you overestimate his tolerance, Amelia. Even the most carefree of brothers wouldn’t be best pleased to find his sister in a gentleman’s room so late at night.”

  “Oh. Well. I shall go, then. But you’ll think of how we can find out more about M. Chartier’s activities, won’t you? It would be a great pity to let my information go to waste.

  “Indeed.” She had left her chair and was passing by him when he caught her hand, gently pulling her toward him by drawing it up to his lips for a light kiss. His eyes, softened in the mellow light of the room, held hers as he said, “Please don’t do anything foolish, Amelia. Desperate men are dangerous. Trust me, confide in me. Promise me you won’t act on your own anymore. Being brave isn�
��t all that important, you know. I’d hate to see any harm come to you.”

  Amelia smiled a little tremulously. “I wasn’t really brave at all,” she admitted. “The pavilion is bad enough in the daytime; at night it’s positively threatening.”

  Verwood chuckled and drew her down onto his lap. His arms went around her in a tight hug, pulling her close against his chest. “Goose. Being brave is doing things that frighten you. If they didn’t frighten you, it wouldn’t be brave to do them, would it?”

  “I suppose not,” she whispered. She straightened abruptly, saying, “I’ll hurt your knee.”

  “My knee feels just fine.”

  He tilted her head up and bent to kiss her. Amelia loved the warmth of his lips on hers, the urgent pressure that made her feel expectant and eager. She thought probably she could indulge in this kind of heady glory for four-and-twenty hours on end. So she was surprised, at first, when she felt his tongue tracing her lips, teasing at the corners, sucking little puffs of her lip into his mouth. It was a delicious sensation, one that made her feel giddy with pleasure.

  Tentatively she extended her own tongue to taste his lips, and somehow his tongue slid right into her mouth. She thought, for a moment, that this was a mistake, that he hadn’t meant to do it, that it had just slipped right in along the line of her own tongue. Her error was clear to her soon enough, as he explored the mysteries of her mouth, touching her teeth and the hardness of her palate, the softness of the insides of her cheeks. She felt literally dizzy from the stroking of his tongue, and then its playful darting about. But most of all she knew he meant it when he began a rhythmic inserting and withdrawing that made everything inside her strain with unfamiliar desire.

  Her breathing became rapid but erratic; she found her hands clutching fervently in his thick black hair. Unconsciously she pressed her breasts more tightly to him, rubbing against the hardness of his chest. Her whole body felt tight to the bursting point. Dazed though her mind was, she knew this couldn’t be quite the right thing to be doing. It felt far too good. She pulled back just as a knock came at the door.