Woo'd in Haste

by Sabrina Darby

  John Dunnett, oldest son of the Dunnett family, was a year younger than Alice and about to start Oxford. Over the years, they’d all been thrown together at the occasional “children’s” balls. He was athletic and handsome, but a boy at seventeen was not focused on love and marriage the way a girl was. Other than practicing flirtation, there was little point in forming any sort of tender for someone like John. At the same time, the community had been decimated by the Napoleonic wars and local assemblies were low on eligible men ready to settle down.

  “I think he’s—”

  “Yes, I know he’s young,” Alice said. “But it isn’t as if I’m going to marry him. At least, not yet, and not likely. But he’s grown at least three inches since last summer. And his muscles bulge. He must be quite the athlete. I bet he kisses divinely.”

  Bianca laughed.

  Alice batted her lashes. “Take the bet, would you? Then I have a reason, no, a mission, to discover how he kisses.”

  “I’m not making that bet.”

  “Pfft,” Alice dismissed her. “You’re no fun at all.”

  For a moment they worked on reworking last year’s hats in companionable silence.

  “What about Thomas’s new tutor? Is he handsome?”

  “He’s a tutor.”

  “He’s a man. And young, I hear. Come, fill me in.”

  That was Alice’s minimum criteria. She was interested in any young man, be he butcher or prince. She often compared it to being a connoisseur of art, only she appreciated the male species.

  “He is tall,” Bianca said grudgingly, imagining Mr. Dore as she had seen him just that morning at breakfast. She had been inordinately aware of how tall and broad he was. Sitting next to him, he seemed to take up so much space. “And his shoulders . . .”

  “Broad? Muscular?” Alice sighed with pleasure. “What color is his hair, his eyes? Does he have a cleft in his chin?”

  “Brown. I don’t know. And no.”

  She hadn’t really had much of a chance to look at him despite their proximity. But she had been aware of him. How could one not be aware of such a giant? Or of a newcomer to one’s home?

  “And? What is he like?”

  Bianca sighed and pushed the thought of him to the side, just like she did everything else that had to do with Watersham. Her life wouldn’t really begin until she hit London. Until Kate married.

  “He’s a tutor. What does it matter?”

  After breakfast, Luc was shown to his room, a small chamber just a few steps away from the schoolroom. It was neither the meanest nor plainest of places in which he had ever stayed. There had been that boardinghouse on the border of the relatively new principality of Serbia, an excursion not on the original agenda but half the charm of a Grand Tour was throwing detailed plans away and simply following one’s wont. Regardless, he would be comfortable enough in this narrow room with its narrow bed.

  He put away his belongings and then went to the schoolroom where Miss Smith and Thomas were in the midst of a lesson on geography. Silence met his entrance as they both stared at him. Miss Smith’s gaze was no less assessing than it had been in the morning room. She would not be easy to impress. He focused his attention on the boy.

  “Well, then,” he said, clapping his hands, remembering the gesture from teachers during his own schoolboy days. “I thought today I would observe.” He had formulated the plan overnight, designed to give him time to acclimate to his new position.

  Miss Smith smiled thinly. “An admirable idea.”

  Despite her words, he had the distinct impression she didn’t care for him. The dislike could hardly be due to professional jealousy as he had overheard her the very day before asking Mr. Mansfield to hire a male tutor. Which Luc was. Or was pretending to be. Not the male part.

  Maybe she suspected.

  “I find observation is the key to all manner of study.” Now he sounded pompous, and the little boy was looking distinctly disappointed. As if he didn’t care for his new tutor, either. This was not the best way to begin his employment, or to make a good impression on Bianca. “What do you observe, Thomas?”

  “About what?”

  “About what, Mr. Dore,” Miss Smith corrected.

  “About anything. When you go outside to . . . what do you like to do, Thomas?”

  “Fish. I like to fish.”

  “Very well.” Unfortunately, that was one pastime Luc knew very little about. “When you are out there . . . fishing . . . you decide if you have found a promising spot how?”

  “We always go to the same spot. The stream has plenty of trout.”

  “So you know because you repeat the experiment again and again and get the same result. How would you determine if a different spot had a good supply of fish?”

  “I’d ask my father?”

  Luc laughed. “What if you were by yourself?”

  Thomas’s forehead crinkled as he thought. “I suppose I’d observe.”

  “Observation is very good,” Luc agreed. “For example, today I am observing you and Miss Smith so that I know best how to teach you.”

  Miss Smith laughed and Luc relaxed a bit inside. His very first lesson taught. That hadn’t been so bad after all.

  The day passed painfully slow. He had hoped teaching would not be as interminably boring as he remembered being the student to be. Instead, the day was stressful, as if he were still a student about to undergo exams. At some point during each lesson, Miss Smith turned to him and asked him to elaborate on some small detail. Thankfully none had been about anything he did not know, but there had been a close call with a discussion of Pompeii. Luc had avoided providing the specific year of Mount Vesuvius’s eruption by describing his experience when he visited the archaeological site.

  That offered only brief respite from the agony of his return to the schoolroom, and from being so close to the object of his affections and yet so far. However, after lunch, when he learned Bianca had left to visit a friend and was not expected until the next morning, the rest of the day was like walking through Vesuvian lava.

  Not that he had anything against Thomas.

  In fact, the next day, when Miss Smith left them to their own devices for the morning, Luc started to relax. No longer performing for show, Luc found himself appreciating details of Latin over which he had despaired as a youth. Somehow everything was much easier and it was strange to think it had ever been difficult for him. Better yet, Thomas was clearly intimidated and impressed, and it was fun having a young boy look up to him.

  It was just after lunch, after realizing that once again a day would pass without so much as a glimpse of Bianca because she was attending the dinner at the Colburn house to which Reggie had invited the Mansfields but not their new tutor (an ironic injustice that knifed at Luc incessantly), it occurred to Luc that he could mine Thomas for information. Surely Thomas would have insights into Bianca’s likes and dislikes, dreams and more.

  “Does your sister like lavender biscuits as much as you?” he asked over tea.

  Thomas shook his head. “Much more. Bianca loves anything sweet. Miss Smith says she keeps the sugar trade afloat.”

  “Is there anything else she particularly likes?”

  “Books.”

  “Any hobbies?”

  Luckily Thomas didn’t seem to identify this interchange as out of the ordinary and as the interrogation it so clearly (to Luc) was.

  He thought of the pastries he’d tasted in Vienna, Budapest, and Paris, each more decadent than the last. And there was a little patisserie in London that made a decent effort of his favorite tortes and cakes. If he were not pretending to be an impoverished tutor, he’d send for a box of delicacies with which to woo Bianca.

  Over the course of the afternoon, he peppered in a dozen or so little questions. And by the end of dinner he knew that Bianca preferred cocoa to tea, loved anything a particular shade of yellow, enjoyed walking across the property and the three-mile walk into town (which Thomas didn’t like as much). She hated
to be confined for too long and even if the weather was bad, would often take a turn in the garden.

  Her closest confidante was Alice Lovell and Miss Smith let her call her Lottie. The one time Thomas had attempted the familiar address, he’d been punished for impertinence.

  He knew all sorts of details about Bianca Mansfield, but he was bereft of what he wanted most, the pleasure of her company.

  Dinner was the same as usual. Except . . . now there was Mr. Dore. Sitting on the other side of Thomas, recounting to her father how bright he thought her brother was. Buttering him up.

  Smart to do that, she supposed.

  “You didn’t come today,” Thomas said accusingly. “We always go fishing on Thursdays.”

  She frowned. It was Thursday, wasn’t it? She’d completely forgotten. “You have your new tutor, Tom. You could hardly skip lessons.”

  “But I want to go fishing with you. Can we go tomorrow?”

  She shot a look at Mr. Dore, who was watching her rather intently. She flushed. “I hardly know. Mr. Dore? Will he have time tomorrow?”

  “Please?” Thomas begged his tutor before sending pleading eyes at Bianca. “And can Mr. Dore come? I promised I’d teach him about fish.”

  Bianca raised an eyebrow. That was a rather manipulative little technique to try and get his tutor to agree. “And here I thought he was to tutor you.” She slanted a glance at the new tutor.

  “Master Thomas speaks highly of the time he spends with his sister.”

  It was the first time, other than being introduced, that he addressed her directly. There was something about his voice, the precise, cultured deep tones that, partnered with his tall, large physique, made her want to look at him a little bit longer.

  Which she did.

  He was looking at her a little bit longer, too.

  Bianca glanced at Lottie, who raised an eyebrow, her version of what she considered to be indelicate shrugs.

  After wanting life to be different for so long, suddenly everything was changing. Yes, she was part of that, but there was another part that was entirely outside of her control. Unease fluttered in Bianca’s belly with a quiet mix of fear and anticipation. “Very well, then,” she agreed. “Fishing on Friday it is.”

  After breakfast, Lottie pulled her aside, clearly upset by something. It was unusual for her erstwhile governess to show any strong emotion whatsoever.

  “I don’t like it. He’s hiding something.”

  “Who? Thomas?”

  “Mr. Dore.”

  Was there any weight to Lottie’s concerns? True, Mr. Dore was like no tutor Bianca had ever seen before, but then again, her only exposure to tutors were the ones who had worked for the Colburns.

  “He came highly recommended. Granted, from Lord Reginald, but nonetheless.”

  “When I suggested your father hire a male tutor, I did not mean for him to pick the first one who walked by!” Lottie said. “And yet your father, ever looking to walk the easiest path, did just that.”

  Bianca bristled at the insult to her father. She wasn’t blind. She knew the man had failings, his inability to say no to Kate being one of them, but it was hardly Lottie’s place to point them out. Then she felt bad for the very thought. True, Lottie was employed by them, but she was nearly family. Perhaps, though Lottie had suggested the change, she had expected a slower transition. To have time to make plans for her future.

  Her future. Lottie would likely be moving on soon. After ten years. After being more of a mother to Bianca than her own mother and stepmother and more of a friend than her sister. Lottie’s duties were of necessity fewer now. Bianca hardly needed a governess for anything other than propriety, and when Thomas left for Eton, Lottie would be completely superfluous. Assuming Bianca was out in society with her stepmother by then. Not that one could assume that with Kate as a sister.

  Lottie could always act as Bianca’s companion.

  After years of nothing happening at all, too much was changing too fast. Or maybe it was simply that Bianca was changing inside. Growing up, restless, no longer content to wait on someone else’s whim. No longer needing to keep the peace.

  “Will you be my companion when I do have a Season?” she asked, following her thoughts, the original impetus nearly forgotten.

  Lottie looked surprised. “I imagine so,” she said slowly. “We shall see, when the time comes, what your father and stepmother choose to do.”

  Bianca nodded, feeling tremulously near tears but unsure why.

  Lottie stared at her, and then offered a tight smile. “I shall see you at dinner. I must go discuss Thomas’s schedule with Mr. Dore.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  * * *

  It was cold on Friday morning. And early. No one had any business being up at this hour, let alone exerting themselves out of the house. Luc hunched in his overcoat, despite the fact that it was summer, the warmest time of the year. Of course, he would have to fall in love with a woman enamored of the outdoors. In the morning.

  He liked the outdoors, too, by horseback, at a decent hour. After one had slept off the excesses of the night before. Not that he’d had any excesses last night, but he could still feel the effects of the night before that, when the disappointment of not seeing Bianca had sent him in the direction of a large quantity of brandy. He’d only considered afterward that a tutor probably should not be helping himself to the stock of spirits kept in the library.

  Regardless, Thomas was far too lively. Bianca was far too cheery, as well. Perhaps she was not perfect.

  Admittedly, this spot on the stream that edged the Mansfield estate was lovely. All dewy green grass and sparkling water. Sunshine filtering through a perfect haze.

  And Thomas digging his elbow into Luc’s thigh as he tried to explain about the fishing pole.

  He kept starting and stopping his explanation, getting flustered much the way he had the day before when Miss Smith had asked him to explain to Luc how he knew that four times three was twelve.

  Finally the little boy stopped, took a deep breath, and turned to him with a furrowed brow.

  “It’s best if my sister teaches you, I think. She fishes better than anyone I know. Even better than Father.”

  “Is that so?” Luc eyed her speculatively. Fishing certainly wasn’t a talent he had ever imagined her possessing. A fair hand at a canvas or an instrument, perhaps, or a pretty singing voice and a knowledge of French. But she was currently handing her brother an ugly bit of matter, of which he could only distinguish a feather, without the slightest quiver of disgust.

  Bianca laughed. “It is, though my father would never admit to it.”

  He averted his eyes from the thing hanging from her fingers and focused on her beautiful eyes. Yes. That was why he was here. “So will you? Teach me?”

  “Yes.” But she sounded a bit reserved.

  Thomas grinned, grabbed his angle-rod and bucket, and ran off a few feet to take his position by the stream’s bank.

  “The hardest part is knowing what to use when,” she cautioned, expertly fitting the fly as bait to the hook of the angle-rod. “Some people think this barbaric, but it really is no different from hunting.” She handed him the rod and he took it with false confidence. When she turned from him to outfit her own rod, he glanced to where Thomas stood casting his line into the water for a hint of how to go about the activity.

  Then out of the corner of his eye he caught Bianca matter-of-factly lifting up the hem of her dress and fastening it up to little hooks in the side of the garment that he hadn’t previously noticed. But the hooks hardly mattered to him when he could now admire the curve of her stocking-clad calf, the lovely indent of her ankle.

  When Bianca picked up her rod again and turned toward the stream, he quickly averted his eyes.

  He took a deep breath and swung the rod. The line sailed and plunked down in the water, sending up a spray of water. A small spurt of satisfaction filled him. Not so bad. He could do this.

  “Oh no!” She was nex
t to him in an instant. “Not like that. You’ll scare off all the trout. Now come here. Carefully.”

  He followed her a few steps into the stream, wincing at the squishing of his leather boots through water. This would be the ruin of them.

  “Mr. Dore, this isn’t a game of cricket. You mustn’t think of it as swinging or bowling. Although, perhaps a little bit,” she amended. “Angling is . . . is about peace and elegance . . . and calm. One’s mind clears in focusing on the arc of the cast and the way the line, the fly, falls onto the water. Here, stand behind me. Let me show you.”

  He handed over his rod happily, taking position a mere step behind her. She kept speaking, describing in great and rather poetic detail about the art of this sport, but the words washed over him, like the sound of the water lapping against the stream’s bank. He was all too aware of her, of her scent, her heat. The way her dress, hiked up to keep the hem from dragging in the mud and water, brushed against his leg, a lock of her hair against his arm. Not that he could feel those strands of hair, but he saw them. Wanted to run the silk of it across bare fingers. He turned his face slightly so that he could look down at her face.

  Her head tilted up. Blue eyes met his.

  His breath caught in his chest.

  She looked away.

  Took a step back.

  His cheeks felt hot and he focused on the pole, on the line he’d flung into the water. On the ripples that suggested fish might be near.

  Out of the periphery of his vision, he saw her pick up her own pole, heard the zing of the line being thrown.

  “So tell me, Mr. Dore,” she said, her tone light. “What were your plans had you not taken this position?”

  “I was headed home,” he admitted, quite truthfully. “I haven’t seen my family in nearly three years.”

  “And now it shall be longer.”

  “Yes. Longer.” But worth it, he hoped. He had sent his parents a letter explaining his prolonged absence. Not, of course, the details of this odd situation, but that he would be a few weeks more. A few weeks, surely, would be long enough to have given love its chance.