A pair of windows on the third story lit up, and he stood there, neck craning, waiting with bated breath for the curtains to part. Would she see him? Would she know him? Or would she let the butler or the housekeeper or whatever self-righteous servant who was even now flinging back the brass bolts of the door send him back out into the night with a stinging ear and a stern warning to never darken these steps again?
The curtains parted, and he saw her. Saw her eyes like lights in the darkness, saw the tilted cap letting curls of gilt ringlets fall alongside her face, saw her rosebud mouth fall open in an “o” of astonishment.
And he could wait no longer.
“Lydia!” he cried, giving himself up like the madman that he was. “Lydia, my God!”
And then he stopped, because he didn’t know else what he could say. Lydia, my God — didn’t that say it all? Didn’t that say enough? Didn’t that go too far, too far, as he had been doing since the day he had decided to light out from Longcastle and come to her?
The curtains closed; she disappeared. He stood staring up at the golden windows, body trembling as if he had caught an ague, lost in his despair. If she put the candles out, if she went back to bed, if she turned to her cold pillow and away from him… well, then, at least he would know and he could go drown himself in the river with a clear conscience.
“What is the meaning of this!”
It was an icy, brassy voice, as icy as the river’s waters he had been imagining. The housekeeper was standing in the doorway, a dressing-gown pulled tightly around her chin by one hand, a guttering candle flaring in the other. Stout as a barrel and terrifying as a school matron, she glowered at him with the eyes of a woman who does not give up her warm bed easily. “Explain yourself at once or I shall send for the magistrate! And he does not like to be bothered after his evening cognac, I can assure you!”
Peregrin opened cracked lips to speak and found that he had no voice. His senses were deserting him one by one, his faculties disappearing. Dying from heartbreak was a very cold experience, he thought grimly. A river would be a blessing compared to this misery.
Then there was a light behind the housekeeper’s prim cap. He lifted his chin as if to see over her, hopeful, heart thudding, breath short and fast. Had she come — had she really?
The housekeeper heard the footfall and turned to see who was behind her. When she spoke again, her voice was more reverent. “Oh! Her ladyship. My lady should not be out of her bed. What if you take cold?”
“Hush, Hatter. Who is out there? Who woke the house?”
Her voice was as he remembered it, silken, sensuous, and yet girlish and young. He remembered the way she had purred his name in his bed. He remembered her touch as she whispered that she loved him. His body stirred; he remembered everything, everything, everything.
“Lydia,” he called, in a voice almost normal, his tongue restored to him by her presence. “Lydia, it’s me. It’s me.”
He saw her gently push the housekeeper out of the way, and then her little form emerged from behind the bigger woman’s shadow. He gasped; she had grown so thin, like a little wraithe. But still beautiful, despite the bony shoulders that pushed at her filmy night-gown. He saw her shiver. “Lydia, go inside,” he urged. “It’s a cold night.”
“You’re out here,” she chided him, but didn’t come any closer. She stayed in the doorway, the lady of the house in her night clothes, and he stayed in the drive, the mad visitor who had come unwanted and unheralded in the middle of the night.
“My lady, come now, come inside — this is most improper —” The housekeeper seemed to be stopping just sort of flailing her arms, but Lydia was unimpressed.
“Hush,” she said gently. And then: “Did you come about the position?”
He stared. He could not help but stare in silence. The position — oh certainly, perhaps once he could have pretended it was about the position, but that was before he had lost his head and started shouting for her in the moonlight. Surely she understood all that. Surely she knew it had only been a pretext to come to her and beg to be forgiven, for not putting love above all and making her his wife when he had had the chance. But — “I came for the position,” he agreed hoarsely. “I came to work for you. If you’ll have me.”
And Lydia nodded gravely, as if it was no more than she had expected. “I’ll have a footman show you to the stables,” she said serenely. “I expect you have horses?”
“Two,” he answered, without bothering to mention that one was stolen from Lord and Lady Archwood. He wondered how close she was to them, or if the friendship had been dropped after she had married Sutton. Things had been so very uncomfortable after the wedding. It was possible she blamed Grainne for the whole damn mess.
But Lydia only nodded again, without asking for particulars. “Wake a groom and have boxes made up. He’ll show you to your apartment.” And she turned.
She actually turned away. He swallowed painfully. “Lydia,” he called once more, and watched her shoulders stiffen. Then she turned again, and fixed upon him a look of disappointment.
“It is Lady Sutton,” she reproved him, and then went into the house.
A few minutes later, the lights in her room were extinguished.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Lydia waited until the first light of morning was peeking through her windows before she gave in and got out of bed. Thrusting her feet into slippers and her arms through her dressing gown, she padded across the Turkey carpets and polished wooden floor, out her door and across the hall, and into the guest room which was directly opposite. There, she flung open the curtains and gazed out at her land.
The paddocks that spread out to the west of the house were dotted with grazing horses, with a few already waiting at the fences for their morning oats. The stable-yard spread its brick wings in either direction from a central cupola, wrapping itself around the cobbled yard in a solid embrace. It had become such a favorite sight for her every morning that she was considering moving her apartments to this side of the house. The tree-lined drive and rolling parkland that curved down to the country road beyond had been a pretty view when she had come here back in the winter, but now she had grown so fond of her horses that she wanted them to be her first sight. The road only led to London and bad feeling, to her bewildered mama and her gossiping rivals, and she wanted nothing to do with any of it. Widener Grange was her home. Her horses were her friends. It was good enough, although a year ago, flirting, giggling, eyelash-batting Lydia Dean would never have believed such a life was possible.
Or so good.
And now — her eyes narrowed as she looked towards the stable, trying to catch the moment when the stable lads came pouring out the apartments above the boxes. Now it was growing more difficult.
Had she always known he would show up on her doorstep one day? Lydia chewed at her lip. The first figures were appearing. The feed room door was opening, buckets were being carried to the boxes. He was down there, one of the lads, feeding the horses.
Unless he was still asleep. It had been the middle of the night when he had come. She yawned just thinking of it. Today would be a long day.
And she would have to see him.
The truth was, Lydia thought as she went back to her chamber to ring for an early pot of tea, the truth was that she hadn’t expected him. Why should he come? She had as good as told him that he had disappointed him by not stealing her away, and then when the poor man tried to live up to her expectations, she flung it in his face.
He must have been disgusted with her.
But now he was here.
Mary came into the room with a teapot. “You’re up early,” she observed archly.
“I suppose you know why,” Lydia said, settling upon the bed and kicking off her slippers. She wriggled her toes and sighed. “I am exhausted. I didn’t sleep a wink after he came.”
“Servants are all abuzz,” Mary reported, pouring a cupful of amber tea. “Wanted to know why on earth you let some ragamuffin with a skinny hor
se in tow go straight to the yard without so much as a reference letter.”
“Did you tell them?”
“Naw. More fun to let them jaw. Bunch o’ country bumpkins, what do I care what they think? And what are you going to do next? That’s what I want to know.”
“I wish I knew.”
Mary looked over at the empty grate, shook her head, and went to the door. “Briggs!” she shouted. “Briggs!”
“Such manners,” Lydia complained, tasting her tea. “You wouldn’t shout like that in a proper household.”
“Luckily, I live here,” Mary said with a grin, ushering in the luckless little Briggs and her coal-scuttle. “And this room is freezing. You need a fire. Good for thinking, a fire. You can gaze into it like a poet and see the answers in the flames.”
“Oh, hush!” Lydia nodded at the house-maid, who was furiously brushing the ashes from grate. “I don’t need to gaze at a fire, at any rate,” she went on. “I have a new horse-trainer; I shall go and give him his instructions, that is all. I wanted to hire one, after all. It is hardly out of the blue that I should take him on.”
“After you turned away five others,” Mary said mercilessly. “Let’s find you the right dress then. Wouldn’t want you to look frumpy before the fella that trains your horses.”
***
Lydia had made a daily practice of walking down to the menage to watch her horses train every morning, and to stroke and say good morning to the more polite of her young-stock. So no one thought any thing out of the ordinary when the lady of the house came down to the yard to see the morning riders strapping down and mounting up. “Morning miss,” they said as they passed her and filed down the lane, six young lads on six young horses, all blood-horses with their names down in the Stud Book, all bound for racing meetings later in the year. It was early spring yet, and the ground was only recently softened enough for galloping, and every horse was prancing and bouncing, ready for the excitement of training.
When they had passed her, the last horse excitedly throwing his head up and down and tossing a gob of white foam onto her bodice, she flicked away the drop of saliva without a second thought and continued on into the cobbled yard. The stable-boys were already throwing soiled straw out of the boxes and the air was sharp with the scent of manure. She sniffed it happily. This had become the aroma of her life, and it was as far from the soot and smoke of London as a girl could go. It reminded her, every morning, of what she had escaped. There was no falsity or artifice to life out here. Just hard work, and horses, and her own house with her own hours and her own business to keep. It was a dream come true.
If a lonely one.
He came out of the tack room then, and stopped short. He sees me, she thought, and put her hand to her bonnet automatically. Old and rather shapeless, with its feather long gone, it was a bonnet for the stable yard and the lads, not for the man who had sworn to love her forever, who had offered to carry her away and face a lifetime of exile from the Society that was all they had ever known, whom she had turned down, and walked away from.
Lydia’s step faltered a little, but she carried on, chin high. Bother the bonnet. Bother Peregrin. He had cared enough to come here. He must have something he wanted to say to her. But the closer she grew, the more uncertain her step grew. It was a fine thing, she thought, to think that you have the upper hand, to think that you’ve whistled and he’s come for you. But what comes next? He didn’t look like a man enraptured in love, to be honest. He looked rather like a storm-cloud. Lydia had the sudden, quaking realization that he was furious with her. This was not a man who was planning on professing his undying devotion anytime soon.
She stopped a few yards away from the tack room and waited for him to say the first words.
He just looked at her, stoney-faced, unreadable. His chin was set; his lips were down-turned. And he raked her from bonnet to boot with an inscrutable expression before he finally said “I’m here at your service, my lady.”
Lydia bit her lip. He felt ill-used from last night, she thought tiredly. When she had instructed him to call her Lady Sutton. “I’m sorry, Peregrin,” she burst out. “I only meant, in front the servants — I didn’t want —”
“No, no, you were right,” he interrupted her smoothly. “I should speak according to my place. That is, if you wish to continue with me in your hire.”
“Of course I do!” Lydia snapped. How tiresome he was going to be about all this. Lydia was suddenly very nostalgic for the peace she knew she was losing. Oh, certainly it had been a lonesome time out here alone, but at least she hadn’t had to deal with anyone else’s hurt feelings or emotional outbursts. “Of course I want you in my hire,” she went on, trying to control her temper. “But I do not think we need to behave as if — as if there is nothing — as if we have never —” And here she ran completely out of any control over her speech, and she just looked at him helplessly. “As if nothing was ever between us,” she finished softly.
Peregrin nodded stiffly. “If you think it will go easier with the staff, by all means, let us address one another as friends.”
Lydia sighed.
“And what shall be my first duty?” Peregrin asked after a moment’s silence had gone by, punctuated by the whinny of a horse left behind for the second training set.
Lydia smoothed the dark wool of her riding habit and smiled at him as if nothing was amiss. “Why, to teach me to ride, of course.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
She looked fairly comfortable up there, he had to admit.
Peregrin had watched with interest while Lydia had groomed and saddled a pretty bay mare she called Lady. (“It’s not the most creative of names, I’m afraid, but I bought her from a squire whose little daughter had named her and I thought it would be unkind to change the poor thing’s name,” she had explained.) There was no doubt that in the months since he had seen her last, she had been busy learning her way around a horse — all of the things he had watched her shrink from in the yard at Tivington were now second nature to her now, even cleaning the hooves and brushing out the tail. She took a damp sponge and tenderly wiped the mare’s eyes and nostril to finish the job, then stood back for Peregrin’s assessment.
“She looks fantastic,” Peregrin said honestly, and was touched to see Lydia breathe a sigh of what was obviously relief. She cared what he thought! Just that excited him. Maybe this hadn’t been a mistake.
And he’d certainly had his doubts since last night, when she had cast him aside with that snide remark about her name. Banished to the stables, told to call her by her title instead of by the easy familiarity they had enjoyed before — it was enough to keep him wide awake all night, bunked down on a bed of horse blankets in the tack room lest he awaken the stable lads in their apartments above the horses. Maybe she hadn’t asked him to come before because she genuinely had moved on, her feelings for him extinguished; perhaps, he had thought, breaking out in a cold sweat all over, perhaps she was in love with some other swain, waiting for her mourning period to end so that she could marry him…
But now, helping her mount Lady, he was feeling his confidence flicker up into a gentle flame again. She was smiling at him with a certain tenderness, she was watching him with a little uncertainty, looking for his approval, wondering what he thought of her skill. And that was enough to bring the smile back to his face and the life back into his eyes. As long as he had a chance — that was all he could ask for. It had been long months, and her life had been hard since she had been married. Wanting the Lydia he had first met at Tivington was crying for the moon — he wasn’t going to get that.
But he was equally in love with this Lydia, who seemed strong and in control in a way the girl had never, but still, he thought, still as if she wanted him nearby. To save her, if she needed saving.
Though he supposed she was a lot less likely to need saving these days.
She sat very still in the side-saddle and looked down at him. “Well?” he asked her.
“Well
?”
“What do you want to do now?”
She looked exasperated. It was adorable, he thought. “You have to teach me to ride,” she said. “I can do everything on the ground now. But I haven’t been on a horse since last year. Since we were — since that day.”
Peregrin was astonished. “You’ve never gotten up on this horse before?”
“No.” Lydia stroked Lady’s mane; the placid mare stood still, eyes half-closed as she dozed in the early sunlight. “I didn’t have an instructor.”
Peregrin stepped close to the mare’s shoulder and reached up. He took Lydia’s hand in his and clenched it tight. “Lydia,” he said hoarsely. “Why didn’t you write to me?”
She shook her head a little, her eyes bright with unshed tears. “I didn’t think you’d come,” she whispered.
“Why would you ever think that?” Peregrin shook her hand a little, impatient. “I told you I’d come to you, I told you I’d wait for you.”
She tried to smile. “Because I told you not to,” she explained. “I thought you would grow angry with me, and grow to hate me… not go on loving me.”
“But I do,” Peregrin said urgently. “I do love you.”
Lydia closed her eyes for a moment, and Peregrin thought for a terrified moment that she was about to dash his hopes forever. A second passed like a lifetime, his heart had given up beating, and the world was starting to rock around him when she finally opened them again, tears spilling down her white cheeks, and said “Of course I love you too, Peregrin.”
He groaned and hauled her off the horse, ignoring her squeal as her skirts were thrown up and her petticoats were showing, and held her in his arms. He put his face very close to hers, so that he could drown in her sapphire eyes, and said it again. “I love you, Lydia.”
And she smiled tremulously. “I love you, Peregrin,” she replied gently, her heart in her words.
The Honorable Nobody (Heroines on Horseback Book 2) Page 27
