Sir Thomas, whose legs had been particularly painful the last day, remained seated and excused himself for the discourtesy. “I think Millie has been studying La Belle Assemblée,” he teased. “Mary Rose is quite right, my dear. You look charming.”
Hally thanked him and allowed Marchwood to hold her chair for her. She was not able to look him in the eye, but muttered her thanks and immediately began to eat her breakfast. The talk that she had interrupted gradually revived around her, and she heard Marchwood tell of his plans to drive his curricle into the village. “And I had hoped you’d come with me, Hally,” he said. “Perhaps you have some shopping left to do.”
It was the first time he’d called her Hally in front of her family, and she could see John’s brows rise. Brigid giggled but Ralph frowned slightly. The baronet’s smile was kindly but a bit absent. “Won’t the snow be a problem?” she asked, stalling.
“My pair are accustomed to it. I could use your help with some purchases I have in mind.”
There was a determined light in his eyes that Hally could not ignore. “Very well. Right after breakfast would be best for me.” She did, certainly, have household duties but nothing that could not be delayed for a few hours. And she wanted to see some of this famed driving ability of his.
Which was immediately apparent when he brought round his curricle from the stables. If Hally had known there was a pair of matched bays of that distinction in the Porchester stables, she would have paid them a visit before this. Their spirits were high enough to require a firm and experienced hand. But they were glorious! Watching from the stairs as Marchwood brought them under control was spectacle indeed. His lips twisted quizzically as a footman handed her into the curricle.
“They’re a bit fresh! My own fault, of course, for not taking them out yesterday. I had intended to, but other matters claimed my attention. You won’t be too alarmed, will you?”
Hally, allowing him to tuck the rug around her, assured him that she wouldn’t. And neither was she, though all things considered it might have been wise. The lane was icy from an overnight freeze, and the horses occasionally slid. But Marchwood kept a steady hand on them, and by the time they reached the main road the traveling was easier. Marchwood gave the bays a little more room and their gait stretched out to a remarkable smoothness.
“I’d like to shake them out a little. Show me a more circuitous route than this, would you?” he asked.
She would have been willing to drive with him for hours. There was something about his competence as a whip that thrilled her. His spirited horses gave him no trouble, even once when they passed another carriage that was taking up far more than its share of the road. She could only guess the strength in his hands and arms that held the bays steady even as they attempted to shy from the approaching vehicle. A lesser whip would have had them in a ditch, no doubt about it. Hally wished her brother John could have seen Marchwood’s feat.
But the viscount seemed hardly to notice as he kept up a stream of questions about the neighborhood. Within the span of half an hour she had pointed out all their neighbors’ homes and her favorite summer rides and the spot where foxes invariably went to ground. Eventually they ended up in the village, where there were not really more than half a dozen shops, and only two of those a place where they might find the gifts Marchwood was intent on buying for her siblings.
She led the way into a general mercantile business where bolts of cloth were heaped high on shelves from front to back of the room. There were also bonnets and muffs and gloves and ribbons and a variety of trims. Marchwood paused in front of the bonnets, reaching one down from its stand and turning it from side to side. “For Brigid,” he explained.
“It’s a little grown-up for her,” Hally protested.
“That’s why she’ll like it,” he rejoined. “Show me what it looks like on.”
He placed the bonnet of white watered gros de Naples on her head. Hally knew Brigid would love the turned-up brim and the ornamental band of blue tufted gauze. Mrs. Windom, the shopkeeper, came over to point out unnecessarily that the gros de Naples at top and bottom was cut in the form of leaves, with a bunch of the leaves and a bouquet of marguerites placed on one side of the crown. Marchwood tied the white satin ribbons in a full bow on the left, as Mrs. Windom instructed him.
“Very fetching.” He turned to Mrs. Windom to say, “It’s not actually for Miss Porchester, but for her sister Brigid. Just the sort of thing she shouldn’t wear for another few years, don’t you agree?”
“Oh, decidedly.” Mrs. Windom smiled. “And if you purchase it for her, you will win her heart forever.”
“Just so. I shall take it.”
Hally shook her head in mock disapproval as she removed the confection, but she was charmed. He did seem to have an understanding of people that impressed her. And when he took her next to the almost hidden section of books Mrs. Windom kept at the back of her store and ran his finger along the titles, she knew he was looking for something in particular. At length he shook his head. “Well, I don’t suppose I should have expected to find it in a village,” he said as he straightened up. “How far is it to Winchester?”
“Much too far to go in a morning.”
Mrs. Windom asked if she might know what book it was his lordship was seeking. When he had given her the name and author, she excused herself to look through a ledger she kept with her accounting materials. Smiling rather delightedly, she came back and pointed to the entry. “I got it for James Bilbury just a month ago. If you wouldn’t mind its having been read already, I daresay I could cozen him into parting with it on the promise of another copy. I could have it sent up to the Hall.”
Marchwood agreed to it, explaining to Hally that he most particularly wished to give the book to Ralph. “Because it’s all about going away to school and the mischief they get up to there. The author describes cricket matches and hockey games and football matches. Ralph would find it very enlightening, I think.”
Hally felt that peculiar palpitation in her heart that was becoming more familiar to her. She hadn’t expected someone like Marchwood. She wasn’t aware that people like Marchwood existed, handsome and funny and thoughtful and interesting. Surely he was too good to be true. He would either disappear in a puff of smoke or turn out to be a highwayman.
“Did you wish to look for something for John or Papa?” she asked through a constricted throat.
“No. I brought their gifts with me.” And yours, his eyes seemed to say.
Hally’s eyes dropped before his. There was still time to get him a gift, of course, but she wouldn’t be rushed into it. It made no sense to get him something meaningless, and she could not for the life of her consider getting him something important. “Then let me stop at the butcher for the veal cutlets for cook, and we’ll head back to the Hall.”
He tucked her hand through his arm. “It’s all right, Hally. I don’t expect a gift from you.”
“I should think not!”
Chapter Seven
The saloon was a fairyland of twinkling candles, silver paper bells and bright red holly berries nestled on prickly green leaves. Swags of evergreen boughs hung everywhere and the room was redolent with their scent. Marchwood had insisted that this was the perfect time for them to learn the waltz. Miss Viggan, who had settled Sir Thomas comfortably in a chair by the fire, agreed to play the pianoforte, and John reluctantly assented to make the fourth in their group.
“Mary Rose is a superb dancer,” Hally pointed out to the viscount when he approached her. “She will learn the waltz a great deal easier than I. John and I will watch and attempt to copy what you do.”
Marchwood regarded her with his usual good humor and presented himself to her cousin, who shyly allowed him to take her in his arms. They glided effortlessly about the room; Mary Rose seemed to follow with no difficulty. Hally could hear Marchwood talking with his partner with his usual ease.
John was a stiff dancer, and when he realized that he was being asked to ta
ke his sister in the next best thing to an embrace, he was properly shocked. “No wonder they don’t do it at the Winchester assembly,” he grumbled.
Hally laughed. “Don’t be so stodgy, John. It’s quite like skating, actually.”
“Indeed it is,” Marchwood agreed as he and Mary Rose passed by.
John was watching the other couple and his foot tangled with the base of a plant stand. “I’m no good at this,” he declared, moving toward the side of the room. “You and Marchwood have a go at it, Hally. He’s the expert, and you’ll not learn how to do it properly with me as your partner.”
Mary Rose instantly offered to watch with John. Marchwood opened his arms to Hally, who reluctantly came to him, placing her hand in his. Marchwood said, “Look at my eyes, Hally. Let me guide you just by my touch and the music.”
Hally, who had been trying to puzzle out just where they were to move next, as one might in a country dance, regarded him with skepticism. “I’ll fall flat on my face.”
“No. I wouldn’t let that happen, my dear. Trust me.” He hummed the tune in her ear and swung her around the floor in flowing circles. Hally moved like a skater now, grasping the essence of the dance, and bringing her own special zest to it.
“I want you to call me Frederick,” he said.
“Why?”
“Because I’ve asked you to, of course. And because you haven’t objected to my calling you Hally. Hally suits you.”
John and Mary Rose had begun to dance on the opposite side of the room and Hally gave a tsk of annoyance. “Now why will he listen to her and loosen up when he was stiff as a poker dancing with me? You know, John didn’t seem at all keen on my inviting Mary Rose for the holidays, but he gets along swimmingly with her.”
Marchwood regarded her curiously. “Yes, I’ve noticed that myself.”
“I suppose you’ve also noticed that Mary Rose is the most beautiful girl. And so very ladylike, don’t you think? Her family, though astonishingly large, is quite respectable. My father could tell you anything you wanted to know about her family.”
“I know everything I need to know about Miss Nichols’s family.”
“Are you going to call her Mary Rose?”
“No.”
Hally was actually relieved to hear him say it. The time had long since passed when she really wanted Marchwood to be interested in her cousin. She said, rather diffidently, “Did it bother you that I won the race, Lor . . . Frederick?”
He smiled. “Very good. No, but I think I deserve a rematch.”
“Oh, I never give rematches,” she said airily.
“I’m not surprised. You wouldn’t win another time, would you?”
“Not against you,” she admitted. “I probably wouldn’t have won the first time if John’s skates hadn’t been so large for you.”
“Well, you’re hampered by your skirts, so it was an even handicap. Only next time I wouldn’t underestimate you.”
Hally kept her eyes locked on the neat folds of his neckcloth. “Did it shock you, being raced against by a woman?”
He considered this seriously for a moment. “Not particularly. I like you just the way you are, Hally. Dancing, skating, sleighing, singing. Your vitality is infectious. I don’t know any other young woman who could bring such exuberance to her pursuits.”
Hally frowned. “From what I hear, London ladies are very stiff and proper. Which sounds very boring, but I imagine you would require that kind of behavior from someone of interest to you. Such as a sister,” she hastened to add. “Otherwise she would be looked at askance and considered a hoyden, wouldn’t she?”
“Probably.”
“Well, that is how it would be with me. I would be considered a hoyden in town.”
“I imagine you’re considered a hoyden in the country,” he retorted.
“Well, and if I am, so what? My family accepts me. This is the person I am. I don’t want to change.”
“No, but you will as you get older, Hally. It’s inevitable.”
“I’ll never be suitably refined for a London drawing room, Frederick.”
“Perhaps I should be the judge of that.”
He had continued to guide her effortlessly over the floor. When Miss Viggan appeared about to pause at the end of the waltz, Hally caught Marchwood’s entreating glance at the governess, and Miss Viggan, being a very perceptive woman, had straightened her narrow back and started in again at the beginning. Marchwood returned his attention to Hally, a slight frown pulling his brows together.
“I understand what you’re saying, Hally. You think London society would be too restrictive for you. But London is an exciting place: the sights and the theater and the opera and all manner of other activities to catch your attention.”
“It simply wouldn’t do,” Hally said, with regret in her voice. “I would get restless and shock everyone by riding through Hyde Park at a gallop.”
“You underestimate my resourcefulness in keeping you distracted, Hally.” She flushed, but Marchwood continued, “I do not envision spending the rest of my life with a woman whose every thought is of balls and gowns and receiving morning callers. I want someone out of the ordinary, a wife with a mind of her own, even if she does sometimes offend the finer sensibilities of the ton. Someone bright and vivacious and dashing. Someone like you, Hally.”
“Oh,” she cried, “but you hardly know me, Frederick! You cannot realize what you are saying.”
“But I do.” He drew her closer. “I’ve known you for a very long time. Let me show you something.”
With very little commotion he guided her to the pianoforte, thanked Miss Viggan for her playing, explained to Sir Thomas that he wished to show Hally something in the library, and drew her away from the saloon. Hally followed him, curious but with great trepidation. He really was talking about marrying her and taking her away with him. She could scarcely bring herself to consider the implications of this. When he left her alone in the library after starting the fire and lighting a branch of candles, her heart was beating so quickly she had to calm herself with words of sternest good sense.
When he returned, he was carrying a very small case that he set on the oak table. “My mother had this done when she visited here years ago. You were ten at the time.”
From the box he drew a miniature Hally had never seen before. It was a picture of herself astride her favorite pony, McDougall, flying over a small hedge. Her black hair streamed behind her and her cheeks glowed with excitement.
“My mother kept it in her dressing room, and she would tell me tales about you. She used to say, ‘Oh, Frederick, you would have had such adventures with her had you been there.’ Apparently all in the space of a month you managed to get lost in a cave, find three stray kittens, scare your brother John by pretending to be the ghost of a former resident of the Hall, build a secret fort in the woods that you took her to see, race every boy who would accept your challenge, and insist on going pigeon shooting with your Papa.”
Hally smiled reminiscently. “They were wonderful times.”
“They sounded wonderful to me, too, growing up alone in that huge house at Millway Park. I envied you your brothers and your cousins and all the companionship that I missed so much. Your family sounded so warm and happy and special. And you, you sounded like the most delightful free spirit, so unconventional and so full of boundless energy. I’ve wanted to meet you for years.”
“You could have come any time.”
He brushed a lock of the raven hair back from her face. “But I’d built up a boy’s fantasy. Coming here was likely to be such a rude shock.”
She swallowed against the lump in her throat. “And wasn’t it?”
“You know it wasn’t.”
His voice, soft as a caress, reached her through her growing panic. Hally was trying to keep her mind clear but his nearness was undermining her resolve. She believed him, how could she help but believe him? “But, Frederick, we aren’t children anymore. You can’t have the kind of child
hood I had.”
“No, but together we could give it to our children.”
When his lips came to meet hers, Hally felt excitement race through her body. This time she had no hesitation in kissing him back. In fact, she would have been quite incapable of restraining her natural urge to indulge fully in the experience. The thrill she felt was so overwhelming that it almost frightened her. Every sense seemed alive to his influence, his lips against hers, his arms around her body. Nothing had prepared her for the total involvement she felt. And it alarmed her into drawing back from his hold.
Marchwood studied her face in the candlelight. “I think perhaps your papa would wonder at our staying here any longer, my dear. Would you like to join the others in the saloon for tea?”
“Yes, please,” she said, shaken. “I need time to think.”
Chapter Eight
The next morning Marchwood had allowed Hally to take the reins of his spirited bays once he had seen them past their freshness. He had not pressed her about other matters, and she had been grateful. Because it all seemed so new to her, so impossible that this could be happening. And yet it was. Alice Halliston Porchester, who had never given a serious thought to marriage or the possibilities of finding a man to her liking, had fallen head over ears in love with this curly haired, provocative, laughing stranger.
It was possible that he was deluding himself about her, she reminded herself. That he had built up an image which she didn’t really fit and that she should warn him away from. But she had tried, hadn’t she? She had offered him Mary Rose, the dearest, prettiest woman in Hampshire—and Marchwood would have none of her. Was it possible that he wanted Hally herself in all her imperfection, in all her boisterous exuberance?
She remembered the previous evening and the way he’d looked at her, the way his voice had caressed her and the way his lips had roused her. Nothing had prepared her for someone like Marchwood. Nothing had prepared her for falling in love.
The Viscount and the Hoyden Page 5
