“Don’t wipe your . . .”
He wondered if all children required constant calibration. It was like learning to manage the ribbons of a high flyer drawn by unpredictable horses.
And then there was the “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” incident. Sally had pleaded, and she’d looked so bloody hopeful . . . but he’d been adamant. In the end those incredibly unfair eyes were at last what did him in. It was like being held at gunpoint by a doe. Those eyes . . .
And he’d sung “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep.” For two. Bloody. Hours.
He cleared his throat. “She is an orphan. I believe her to be about seven years old. She is a cheerful and even-tempered child, with unobjectionable manners. She likes picture books. She enjoys singing. She . . . has a dimple.”
Miss Endicott’s face was a picture as he described her.
And then a slow, amused, faintly wondering smile appeared on her face. Her steely blue miss-nothing schoolmistress eyes pinned him, and he was awfully tempted to squirm.
He felt himself flush. He swallowed. “She was retrieved from a . . . circumstance in which she was ill-treated.”
“Ill-treated in what way?” Miss Endicott was relentlessly crisp.
He hesitated.
Miss Endicott raised a prompting brow.
“She was beaten, Miss Endicott,” he said quietly.
Her features became utterly immobile. And then her head went back, and came down in a nod of comprehension. They engaged, for a time, in what appeared to be a staring contest. Miss Endicott’s lips were pursed in thought.
She longed to ask questions, Jonathan could tell. But she was also shrewd enough to know that his family was instrumental in the continued survival of the academy.
“I shall have to meet her.”
“You can meet her within the hour, if you like.”
“That would be acceptable.”
“I must, however, request that my involvement in her circumstance remain entirely secret.”
“I am nothing if not discreet, Mr. Redmond.”
Which made him wonder just how many other interesting secrets she knew. Then again, when one’s academy is stocked with aristocratic pupils, utter discretion was critical.
“And I suppose we can find room for one more girl. But how do you propose to pay her room and board?”
“Doesn’t my family provide a scholarship for the occasional girl from a, shall we say, more challenging background?”
“The scholarship is awarded at my behest, Mr. Redmond, and my judgment is expected to be impeccable. If your protégé—”
“I hope you do not intend to refer to her as such in the future, Miss Endicott, as it’s critical that my involvement remain unknown. Even to my family.” Especially to my family, was what he really meant, and Miss Endicott, the epitome of astute, grasped this.
Another short silence ensued. As did another short staring contest.
“Very well, Mr. Redmond. If the young lady in question should be found suitable, she will be admitted.”
He had a suspicion, however, that Miss Endicott had already found her suitable.
Chapter 14
AFTER A LENGTHY CHAT with Miss Marietta Endicott—Sally wanted to know if Miss Endicott knew how to sing “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep,” and to her astonished delight, the woman was familiar with the song—Sally became a pupil of Miss Marietta Endicott’s Academy.
Sally gave both Tommy and then him a kiss on the cheek. And Tommy watched a faint flush paint his cheek.
Imagine. Jonathan Redmond, of all people, blushing over a kiss from a girl.
They watched her go off with Miss Endicott, skipping a little, delighted by the idea of having other young ladies for friends, as well as the promise of tea cakes.
She never once looked back at them.
“Out of sight, out of mind,” Jonathan said ruefully.
“They’re resilient, little ones,” she said softly. “Be grateful for that, Mr. Friend.”
But because she couldn’t help it, she watched Sally until she disappeared entirely from view, as if she could make sure, very sure, she would at last be safe from harm. This was one child who would be warm, fed, safe, and one day, hopefully, cherish a family of her own. Just one child. But still.
She exhaled a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. In a sense, a breath she’d been holding for days. She felt both loss and triumph.
When she turned, she found Jonathan staring at her, an expression she couldn’t decipher fleeing from his face. She might have called it rapt. Or surprised. Or thoughtful. Some fascinating hybrid of the three.
“Shall we?” he said simply. And swiveled on his heel. She followed, and they plunged out into the cool bright day. She inhaled with relish the rare clean scent of country air, as if she could store it in her lungs and savor it while she was in London.
“Save some air for the rest of us,” Jonathan ordered mildly.
She laughed. “I’ve forgotten that I do love the country.”
“So do I,” he said simply. But there was a world of meaning in those words. Pennyroyal Green was his home, the place where his ancestors had lived and died for centuries. Eversea and Redmond bones probably fertilized the ground all over the countryside.
What must it be like to feel so part of something? she wondered.
“Mr. Friend . . . will you sing ‘Baa, Baa, Black Sheep’ to me?”
There was a cold silence. “I thought we agreed never to speak of that again.”
Tommy laughed, and she gave a little skip. “Oh, if the ton could have heard you. You have a fine voice.”
“That I’ll agree with,” he said easily. “I’ll escort you back to the carriage, Tommy, but I’ll have the driver take you back to London. I’d like to stop in to see my sister, perhaps ride back to London tomorrow.”
She smiled. “You’re fond of your sister.”
“My sister is a trial. And she is currently immensely with child.”
“In other words, you’re fond of your sister.”
He laughed.
Laughing with him was strangely a bit like drinking champagne. She wanted more of it, and the more she had of it, the giddier she felt.
Interesting to know definitively that Jonathan Redmond was a man who naturally cared. Who put himself in the way of fists out of some sort of moral reflex. Who put his reputation and family name at risk by going to Miss Endicott about Sally. He’d gone well out of his way for both Tommy and a little girl who’d picked her nose, wiped it on her dress, kicked him, smiled at him, and forced him to sing “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” for nearly two hours.
She cleared her throat. “Thank you for what you did for Sally.” She said it softly and rather stiffly, because her gratitude was immense and humbling, and she was unaccustomed to being humble.
He seemed to understand this. “Friends help each other when they can, isn’t that true, Miss de Ballesteros? I’ll stay up nights thinking of ways you might repay me.”
He shot her a wicked sideling glance.
Her mouth quirked. “You’ll make a splendid uncle. You’re very good with children.”
“Bite your tongue.” Somehow his words lacked conviction.
A bird sent a spiraling song into the companionable silence.
“You’re good with them, too, Tommy. Or at least it seems so to me.”
It was Tommy’s turn to shrug.
He reached up and slowly dragged his hand through the leaves of a low-branch. “Why are they so important to you? Do you want a family?” He said it idly.
As if it weren’t a question of monumental import. As if the answer wouldn’t reveal everything important about her. As if it wasn’t the thing she wanted more than anything else in the world.
“I like children,” she said noncommittally. Hesitating to commit herself to an answer that left her open to more questions, to more vulnerability.
He had a way of uncovering her secrets. Perhaps he’d know that one eventually, too.
He looked at her askance, r
ecognizing a dodge, but content to leave it lie for now.
Because he liked walking with her, he realized, on this cool sunny day in this village he knew and loved, just as he loved his own family. He could have found his way back to the carriage in the dead of night by simply listening for the sound of the wind in familiar trees, the timbre of the river’s rush over a particular patch of stones, the rise and fall and texture of the ground beneath his feet.
The world felt somehow larger with her in it, somehow a bit brighter and easier.
She was probably the only woman he knew, apart perhaps from Violet, with whom he felt utterly himself. Ironic, and what did it say about him, given that she seemed to be a conduit for chaos. Though at the moment she, too, appeared to be at peace and content just to be in his company.
They crossed the little bridge over the river, and paused while they leaned over to peer into the water.
“I used to fish from this bridge when I was a boy. I seldom caught anything larger than my hand. My father brought all of us here—me, Miles, Lyon.”
“Are you close to your father?”
It ought to have been an easy question, or one he could have addressed with a pleasantry.
“My father is a difficult man,” he said instead, hesitantly. Not wanting to lie to her.
She didn’t press him. She heard a good deal in those simple words. “And your brother, Miles?”
“Lyon was the oldest, but we always used to turn to Miles for advice. He was always the steady one, whereas—”
“SHITE!”
He jumped and turned, to find Tommy was tearing the laces at the back of her dress. She whipped it over her head, standing in just a shift. She kicked out her legs like a Lippizaner stallion and—one! two!—her slippers flew past his head like satin missiles.
And before he could so much as fling out an arm or make a protesting sound, Tommy clambered over the bridge wall.
“Son of a—” He lunged at the rail.
In time to hear the splash.
All that remained were ripples of water fanning out from the place her body had sunk.
Everything stopped. His heart. Time. His breath.
And then she exploded to the surface, spluttering, bobbing, flailing, and she heaved her body awkwardly forward, her shift floating around her like foam, slim white arms churning the water, determinedly if gracelessly moving ahead.
Ahead of her, just out of reach of her hand, bobbed that bright scrap of ribbon and metal, carried inexorably away by the lazy current.
He was in the water now. He didn’t remember how he got there, or hurling off his own boots. Just the cold, the surrounding green.
He shot to the surface and lunged after her. He was an excellent swimmer, and he quickly overtook her, propelled by foul language and blistering fury.
“You bleeding madwoman. You belong in bleeding Bedlam, you bloody—”
He slung his arm around beneath her arms, pulled her into his body hard, and kicked off toward the bank.
“What are you—let me go! Let go of me, you wretched—”
He wasn’t to hear the end of that sentence, for she writhed and twisted in his arms, dragging them both beneath the surface. River water rushed up his nose, but he hauled them both upward again, spluttering.
She thrashed her arms and actually landed a blow on his ear.
He swore something scorchingly filthy.
She attempted to bite his hand.
That was when he clamped his arm like a punishing vise beneath her breasts, and pushed the two of them backward toward shore. He was stronger and she was small. It didn’t matter what she did, she hadn’t a prayer. She kicked and swore; like retrieved shipwreck cargo, he gracelessly dumped her on the narrow bank.
She pushed herself upright.
He ground out words through heaving breaths. “Move one inch back toward the water and I’ll wring your neck I swear to God, Tommy, don’t think I won’t.”
Her hands were balled into white knots. She tried to get to her knees and stumbled again, coughing and hacking. “Damn . . . you . . . to hell . . .”
The anguished fury in her voice froze his marrow. He nearly stammered.
“Tommy . . . what . . . tell me what’s . . .”
“It’s getting away! Please . . . Jonathan, oh please get it—”
And she pointed a shaking hand at that damned red scrap of ribbon.
And he threw himself back in the water. Fortunately, whatever it was had been enjoying a relatively languid drift up the river, despite their water battle. He was a strong swimmer and he kept it in his sight; it did a pas de deux with a passing floating twig, flirted with some leaves, and was just was about to shimmy between a pair of rocks when he seized it.
Treading water, he held it up high like a torch and waved it at her, amazed at how far away she seemed now. He saw her bring her hands together as if in prayer and drop her forehead down to them, then sink to her knees. From a distance, she looked entirely carved in marble—white arms, shift, toes—a martyred saint. Apart from her hair, that was, which she’d taken from its pins. It poured in a dark river down the front of her.
He pushed off the rock with his feet and began the journey back to her. And now he felt the distance in his arms and legs; the yards seemed to stretch longer and longer. It had been years since he’d had a swim in the Ouse, and he’d never done it in trousers and linen before. He waded to shore and stopped, his lungs heaving, water pouring from linen and nankeen and hair.
He stared at her.
With self-possession and pragmatism, while he’d been swimming back to her, she’d begun to set up camp of sorts. All the pins from her hair lay in a small gleaming pile. She’d peeled off her stockings and laid them out flat to dry, like freshly caught fish. She hadn’t removed a single particle of her wet clothing. It was plastered to her body, and he could see the petite outline of her, every curve of her thighs and legs, her slim arms.
He might have been more than intrigued in other circumstances. Instead, he longed to peel off the clinging linen of his shirt and hurl it at her.
He sank to his knees instead.
She looked at him hopefully. And then very likely alarmed by what she saw in his face, swiftly dropped her eyes and searched his hands. He’d kept the scrap of metal and ribbon tight in his fist.
Her lips were blue and gooseflesh marched up those slender arms. She really ought to take off every scrap of her clothing but he wasn’t about to suggest it, and there was nothing to wrap her in anyway. He could just imagine the reception that suggestion would receive.
“Rub your arms, like so, Tommy,” he said curtly. He demonstrated by chafing his own.
To hell with propriety. It was warm enough to dry them both, and he unbuttoned his shirt with stiff weary hands and shook it off his shoulders. He turned from her and hooked it to some shrubbery, quite conscious she was both staring at him and trying not to. Let her stare. He knew how finely he was built.
And then he looked down at the scrap of ribbon and metal in his hand.
It was, of all things, a Peninsular Medal. It was unmistakable. Struck in gold, with four short arms forming a cross. They were rare, and given only to men who’d commanded battalions.
He turned it over in his hand and read:
Thomas Cantor Moretyon
6th Duke of Greyfolk.
It made no sense.
Had she stolen it from the duke?
The silence while she waited for his reaction—and while he took in the information—was profound. Like a blow to the head.
“I’ve never seen any woman undress so quickly,” he said absently.
She didn’t look at him. “If that was a ploy to get me to ask ‘how many women have there been?’ well, you know how I feel about predictability.”
It was what she would have normally said, but her delivery was decidedly subdued. And wary. And well she should be.
His fury likely rose from him like steam. She could lay her stockings ov
er him and they’d be dry in seconds.
“Fifty-six and a half,” he said shortly. Still absently. Glibness was a reflex for both of them, it seemed.
“I must be the half.”
At any other time he would have said, “Why don’t we make that a full fifty-seven now,” and they would have had a laugh at the utter unlikelihood of this.
But he was shocked by the purity of his anger. He pulled in fresh draughts of it with every breath. He couldn’t think through it, or piece together why she should be clutching a campaign medal with the Duke’s name on it, or why the loss of it should turn the formidable Tommy de Ballesteros into a trembling, beseeching child.
She cleared her throat.
“Thank you for retrieving my possession,” she said humbly and stiffly. Clearly “humble” didn’t come naturally to her. “May I have it now, please?”
“No,” he said instantly.
She turned her head swiftly toward him. Then just as swiftly turned away. She began plucking nervously at the wet shift to cover her knees.
He turned to her and said very slowly, “If you want it back, I’m going to need an explanation, Tommy. And please keep it truthful and simple or I’ll hurl this right back into the river.”
“You’re angry.” She hedged. “About . . . my sudden bridge dive?”
He fixed her with a scorching, incredulous glare.
“I can swim. I learned many years ago.”
“Oh. Well, then,” he said mildly. “That makes everything better. Did you have a lesson?”
“Well, yes, in a manner of speak—”
“Excellent. I suppose they simply forgot to tell you that you aren’t meant to suddenly leap over a ten-foot high bridge into a river and swim in a goddamned DRESS?”
Well. The last word dress cracked like an axe blow.
Birds burst from the shrubbery in alarm.
Dress . . . dress . . . dress. . .
That fury-infused sardonic word echoed in a very satisfying way all about them.
She was wide-eyed as a fawn and frozen in genuine alarm. He didn’t apologize. He inhaled deeply, released the breath slowly. He pressed his fingers to his temples. His voice was weary. “You could have drowned tangled up in your shift. Or . . . dashed your damned head on a rock. You had no idea of the depth of the water.”
Julie Anne Long - [Pennyroyal Green 08] Page 12
