Only a Kiss

by Mary Balogh

  “What?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” she said.

  “Something.”

  “I was reminded,” she said, “of a picture Aunt Lavinia has hanging in her bedchamber. It is a sentimental depiction of Jesus holding a lamb.”

  Good God!

  He set Hector down on the sand, and the dog gamboled off to visit a pair of seagulls, which did not wait to be greeted.

  “It is to be hoped, ma’am,” Percy said, “that you never have a chance to make that observation in the hearing of any of my acquaintances. My reputation would be in tatters.”

  “Your reputation for manliness, I suppose you mean,” she said. “I daresay that is more important to you than anything else.”

  “You have a caustic tongue, ma’am,” he said, clasping his hands behind his back and squinting down the beach toward the sea. Actually, everything looked a bit better from down here. The sea was still far enough away to seem unthreatening.

  “I merely meant to suggest,” she said, “that there is nothing particularly unmanly about caring for a dog that cannot care for itself.”

  He had no desire to pursue that particular line of conversation. “I can see,” he said, “that this would be a perfect spot for smugglers.”

  “Yes,” she agreed. “The bay is sheltered, and there are no dangerous rocks to make a landing treacherous. There is a way up the cliffs too. There is even a cave.”

  “Show me,” he said.

  It was a large one and conveniently close to the path up to the top. It stretched deep into the cliffs. Percy stood on the threshold, peering in.

  “Does the tide reach this high?” he asked.

  “Almost never,” she said. “The high-tide mark is well below here.”

  Yes, he could see the dividing line between soft, powdery sand and hard, very flat beach that got watered every twelve hours by the tide.

  “There is no smuggling in this particular bay any longer?” he asked.

  “If there is,” she said, “they do not come up onto Hardford land. Not that I would know for sure, I suppose, unless I sat at a darkened window deep into the blackest nights. They certainly do not use the cellar of the dower house any longer.”

  “Why did you use the word vicious?” he asked her as they turned from the cave to stroll along the beach, the chilly salt breeze in their faces.

  She shrugged. “The leaders can be bullies and tyrants. They sometimes press men into service, I have heard. And they have been known to enforce loyalty and secrecy with threats and even violence. There was a young groom here who worshiped my husband and loved to work for him. He begged to go to the Peninsula as his batman, but he was only fourteen at the time and his father refused his permission. He remained here in safety. I do not know exactly what his transgression was—we were away from here by then—and he would not say the only time I asked him after I came back, but they broke both his legs. He still works in the stables—Aunt Lavinia saw to that. But the bones did not set well. And his spirit was broken.”

  Lord, he did not need this, Percy thought. His life to the age of thirty had been remarkably serene and trouble-free. He had been careful to keep it that way. And he had no wish to change things. Why should he? He liked his life just the way it was. Well, except for the boredom, perhaps, and the general feeling of uselessness and time passing him by.

  “Wenzel fancies you,” he said, bending to pick up a piece of driftwood to hurl for Hector’s entertainment.

  She turned her head sharply toward him at the sudden change of subject. “He is a good man,” she said. “He was my husband’s closest friend.”

  “But you do not fancy him?” he asked her.

  “I do not believe, Lord Hardford,” she said, “my personal life and fancies are any concern of yours.”

  “Ah,” he said, grinning at her.

  Her cheeks were pink—from the wind rather than from indignation, he guessed, for her nose was a bit rosy too. She looked very wholesome—neither marble nor granite. Though definitely peeved. “But you are my third cousin-in-law once removed and therefore of familial concern to me.”

  “I am not at all convinced Aunt Lavinia is certain of her facts,” she said. “But even if she is right, it is a very remote connection and not one of blood. I do not fancy Mr. Wenzel or any other man, Lord Hardford. I have no interest in courtship or remarriage, as I believe I have told you before.”

  “Why?” he asked. “Oh, yes, I know we started this conversation before, but it did not progress very far. I asked your age, I recall, but you would not give it, and who can blame you? It is impolite to ask such a question of a lady. I am guessing you are about my age. I celebrated my thirtieth birthday two days before I set out for Cornwall.”

  “There is no shame in being thirty,” she said, “even for a woman.”

  Which, he supposed, provided him with his answer.

  “In my experience,” he said, “there is a marked difference between men and women when it comes to matrimony. Women want it, full stop; men want it or at least will tolerate it in their own good time.”

  “And will you tolerate it in your good time?” she asked.

  Hector was standing before him, panting and gazing upward with his bulging, ever-hopeful eyes. That dog was not going to be pretty even when it had fattened up. The stick lay on the sand between them. Percy bent to pick it up and hurl it again.

  “Probably,” he said. “There is the succession to secure and all that since there appears to be an alarming dearth of possible heirs at present. How long has your husband been gone?”

  “More than eight years,” she said, turning to walk onward.

  She had probably told him that before too. “So you were about twenty-two,” he said.

  “According to your calculations,” she said, “I suppose I was.”

  “And how long were you married?” he asked.

  “Almost four years.”

  “Eight years have not been a long enough time in which to heal?” he asked. “Twice as long as you were married?” He was genuinely puzzled. He could not imagine a love quite so enduring or a pain quite so intense. He did not particularly want to imagine it either.

  She stopped again and turned to look out to sea. “Some things do not heal,” she said. “Ever.”

  He could not leave it alone. “Is there not some . . . indiscipline?” he asked. “Some self-indulgence? Have not other people suffered widowhood and got over it? Is there not a point at which continuing to suffer becomes . . . almost ostentatious? Worn like a badge of honor to set you above other, ordinary mortals whose sufferings cannot possibly match your own?”

  He was being markedly offensive. And with each added word he was making things worse. He was almost angry with her. But why? Because he had once kissed her for all of two seconds and could not seem to put the kiss out of his mind? Because she had once laughed at something he said but had not laughed since? Because she was the one woman out of the legions he had known who was quite impervious to his charms?

  He was beginning not to like himself a great deal.

  He ought to have apologized, but was silent instead. Hector was panting at his feet again, and once more was sent in pursuit of the stick. Where did such a skeletal creature find the energy?

  “Have you seen me on any occasion display open suffering, Lord Hardford?” she asked, her eyes on the incoming waves—they were definitely incoming. “If you have, I beg you to inform me so that I may make the necessary adjustments to my behavior.” She waited for an answer.

  “You have shown none, of course,” he admitted. “But one cannot help wondering when one meets a young and beautiful woman who has clothed herself in marble what lies within. And one cannot help guessing that it must be suffering.”

  “Perhaps,” she said, “there is nothing. Perhaps the marble is solid, or perhaps it is hollow an
d there is nothing but emptiness within.”

  “Perhaps,” he conceded. “But if that is the case, where did the laughter come from two evenings ago? And the kiss? For a moment on that evening it was not just I kissing you. We were kissing each other.”

  “You have the imagination of a thoroughly conceited man, Lord Hardford,” she said.

  “Ah, and you have a lying tongue, Lady Barclay.”

  Hector appeared to have tired himself out. He fetched the stick and plopped down at Percy’s feet. He became instantly comatose.

  “If it is any consolation to you,” she said, “my total lack of interest in you has nothing to do with you personally. Without any doubt, I have never met a more handsome man than you or one more capable of charm. If I were interested in flirtation or courtship or remarriage, I might well consider setting my cap at you, though I am fully aware that doing so would be inviting certain disappointment and heartache. Fortunately, perhaps, I am not interested. Not in you and not in any other man. Not in that way. Ever. And if it offends your manly sensibilities to hear me say it, then comfort yourself with the thought that within a week I will be back living at the dower house.”

  “Total lack of interest,” he said, “yet you kissed me.”

  “You took me by surprise,” she said, and the words hung between them almost as though they had some significance beyond their surface meaning.

  What did her self-discipline hide? Why would she not let go of it? Mourning for eight years after a four-year marriage surely was excessive and self-absorbed. But he would not pry further. She would not tell him, and if she did, he had the feeling he really, really would not want to know.

  What had happened to her when she was in captivity?

  “If I wear marble as an armor,” she said, breaking the strange silence, which had made him very aware of the elemental roar of the sea and the harsh, lonely cry of seagulls, “then you wear charm, Lord Hardford. A careless sort of charm. One wonders what lies behind it.”

  “Oh, nothing, I do assure you,” he told her. “Nothing whatsoever. I am pure charm through to the heart.”

  Although the brim of her gray bonnet half hid her face from view, he could see that she smiled.

  And it somehow made his heart ache—his very charming heart.

  She turned her head to look at him. The smile was gone, but her eyes were open. Well, of course they were. She would hardly look at him with closed eyes, would she, unless she was inviting another kiss, which she decidedly was not. But they were . . . open. The only trouble was that he could not interpret what he saw inside them.

  She really was quite incredibly beautiful. He clasped his hands behind his back to stop himself from touching one finger to that tantalizingly curved upper lip.

  “I believe,” she said softly, “that after all you are almost likable, Lord Hardford. Let us leave it at that, shall we?”

  Almost likable.

  Foolishly, he felt that it might be the most precious compliment he had ever been paid.

  “Am I forgiven, then?” he asked her. “For kissing you?”

  “I am not sure you are that likable,” she said, turning to make her way back toward the path to the top.

  She had actually made a joke, Percy thought, looking down at Hector, who had awoken from his coma and was scrambling to his feet.

  “I am not going to have to carry you up, I hope,” Percy said.

  Hector waved his stubby tail.

  8

  I believe that after all you are almost likable.

  It embarrassed Imogen to recall that she had said that aloud. It puzzled her that she might have meant it, with the reservation of that almost, of course.

  She would love to have seen him confront Mr. Tidmouth in his shop. It would have made a delicious anecdote with which to regale her friends at Penderris next month. She would wager he had neither blustered nor raised his voice. She wondered what he did hide behind his surface charm, if anything. He had not always been charming with her, of course. It would be a long time before she forgot his very first words to her—and who the devil might you be? He might be nothing but empty conceit. That poor dog was firmly attached to him, though, and dogs were often more discerning than people. Of course, Hector did nothing to enhance his chosen master’s manly image. Imogen found herself smiling at the thought—and she must remember to tell her friends how he had resembled that very sentimental painting of Jesus cradling a lamb in his arms and how thunderstruck he had looked when she told him so.

  She found herself thinking altogether too much about the Earl of Hardford during the rest of that day and the next. His very masculine presence in the house, though she did not see much of him, was altogether too suffocating. But she could not resent it or, ultimately, him. For this was his home. The hall and the park and estate belonged to him. Even the dower house belonged to him—as he had not scrupled to point out to her on more than one occasion. The title belonged to him.

  How she longed to be back in the dower house, where she would have to see the Earl of Hardford far less frequently. She hoped he would not stay. But surely he would not. The new parliamentary session and the Season would begin in London after Easter. Surely he would not wish to absent himself from either. Perhaps by the time she returned from Penderris he would be gone. And perhaps he would never come back. He seemed not to be overfond of the sea. She would swear he had had to steel his nerve to descend the path to the beach, as though it were a challenge he had set himself. And he had stood gingerly on the threshold of the cave rather than going inside to explore it. He had eyed the incoming tide with noticeable unease.

  He was not finding the house too comfortable either. He had told Aunt Lavinia that he intended giving the order to have all the chimneys cleaned and had looked surprised when she informed him that they had all been swept before Christmas. Apparently a whole shower of soot had fallen from the chimney in his bedchamber one night and blackened half his room. And he had also mentioned the damp bed linens he had had to have replaced on his first night here, a fact that was puzzling, since Aunt Lavinia had been so sure those sheets had come directly from the airing cupboard. She had even checked them herself. The dampness had probably been his imagination. Bed linens could be cold on a winter night and seem damp.

  Imogen checked her appearance in the pier glass in her room. Fortunately, one did not have to dress with any great formality for an assembly at the village inn. Her sage green silk with its overdress of silvery gauze, always one of her favorites, would do nicely, even though it was almost two years since she had bought it in London for Hugo’s wedding, and she had worn it to a number of village entertainments. She adjusted the silver ribbon about the high waist and shook out the skirt, which fell straight and loose before flaring slightly at the hem. The sleeves were short, the neckline square and low but not immodestly so. She ran her hands lightly over her smooth chignon to make sure it did not need any more hairpins, and then drew on her long silver gloves and picked up her fan.

  He had asked her to reserve the first waltz for him, Imogen remembered with a slight lurching of the stomach as she left her room. It would be the only waltz, actually. There was always only one, since most people here had never learned the steps and a few outright disapproved of the dance because of the intimacy it forced upon the partners. Fortunately, other more liberal opinions had prevailed, thus far anyway.

  Imogen liked waltzing, even though there was no gentleman here who could perform the steps with true grace.

  Tonight she would waltz with the Earl of Hardford.

  He was waiting in the entrance hall with Cousin Adelaide, who looked formidable in purple, her usual outfit for the assemblies. It included three tall purple plumes, which stood straight up on her head. Two circles of rouge had been painted onto her cheeks with admirable geometric precision.

  The earl’s eyes swept over Imogen from head to toe. She return
ed the compliment and saw his lips purse as he understood what she was doing.

  There was nothing with which to find fault in his appearance, of course. He was dressed immaculately in black, white, and silver and looked quietly elegant as a true gentleman ought. With his looks and physique, of course, he needed no padding.

  “No jewelry, Lady Barclay?” he asked. “But then, you do not need any. Or frills and flounces either.”

  Actually, she was wearing the small pearl ear studs her father had given her on her marriage, and her wedding ring. But . . . had she just been complimented? She thought she had. And he did it awfully well. One felt a certain warmth about the heart without realizing just what had caused it. A certain warmth toward him. He had, she supposed, perfected the art of gallantry—probably of seduction too.

  Aunt Lavinia appeared on the stairs before she could answer him, and she turned to take her cloak from Mr. Crutchley. But another hand took it from the butler instead, and the Earl of Hardford wrapped it about her shoulders while at the same time complimenting Aunt Lavinia upon the evening gown she had had made earlier this winter.

  And then they were crammed inside his traveling carriage again, with the same seating arrangement as before. They arrived at the inn just before the journey could become too uncomfortably cold. There was already a crowd in the assembly rooms upstairs. Imogen noticed the extra buzz of excitement the appearance of the Earl of Hardford caused as he stepped into the rooms, all charm and ease of manner. Fans began fluttering at a fast pace.

  “You put us all to shame as usual, Imogen,” Lady Quentin said, linking an arm through hers while her husband undertook to introduce the earl to some people he had not yet met. “You always make simplicity look quite exquisite. However, you have the face and figure to carry it off. The rest of us would merely look plain or worse if we tried to imitate you.”

  “You look perfectly wonderful, as always, Elizabeth,” Imogen assured her. Lady Quentin was on the small side and on the plump side too, but she had glossy dark hair, worn in intricate curls and ringlets tonight, and she had a pretty, animated face.