by Edith Layton
They didn’t stare at him in fascination or awe as they did at Julian. This was something, she soon realized as they promenaded toward their hosts, of an entirely different order. It was so discreet that it was no wonder, she thought, that she’d missed seeing it before, when she’d had so much to distract her. For the ladies looked at him sidewise, and then looked away, but not too quickly, with fluttering lashes and pretty blushes when he returned their interest. Although no one of them ever stared in open admiration, they posed for him, she noted, they preened for him, she saw, and they all but, she thought cynically, rang little silver bells and peeped through veils at him like Arabian dancers when he came by.
Miss Fowler, a plain-faced young girl all in debutante’s white, curtsied when Warwick took her hand, and gazed pointedly at that little white hand while it was still held in his, as though to make a point of how delicate it looked by contrast, swallowed up in his large tanned grip. Then she laughed at something he said, and showed all her little even white teeth, and tossed her curly brown hair for good measure when she put her head down to blush at his compliment of her good looks. Her hostess, Susannah thought sourly, as Miss Fowler looked her up once, and then down, before she ignored her entirely in order to smile at Warwick again, was making the most of every good feature she had. She almost warned Warwick to take care, because if the girl believed she had attractive thighs she’d find some way to show them to him as well, before she became aghast at what she’d nearly said out loud.
Warwick took her silence for hurt feelings when they walked away from Miss Fowler, and to reassure her, quickly said, “She’s too confused at her party to take especial care with strangers, she meant no insult.”
“I know she didn’t,” Susannah said easily, while she thought guiltily: But I did.
She gazed at him thoughtfully as he went on to describe some of the other guests before he brought her to them for an introduction. He looked very well, she suddenly noticed, and it wasn’t only because of his gray pantaloons and dark blue jacket, or any other particular of his correct attire. She could see that he stood out even among all these other fashionable persons. Although he was undeniably tall and moved with a certain graceful elegance, it wasn’t because of his personal beauty, as it was with Julian, for his was not a beautiful face, not in that sense. But it was a fascinating one, a blend of strength and intelligence, and humor, she realized, as she saw him smiling at her.
There was something other than humor in his eyes in that moment, after he’d caught her studying him, something amused and sad as well, and he gazed down at her thoughtfully. She braced herself for some acute and probably deservedly embarrassing comment, but he said nothing. He only smiled, and taking her arm again, walked her into the company in order to introduce her to everyone.
They were all monstrously polite, she decided. For they all smiled, and bowed or curtsied and said, “Ah, yes,” and “Lovely day, isn’t it?” and “How charming,” but they were so pointedly polite that by the time she’d met most of them she felt as though she were wearing a placard reading “IMPOSTOR” on one side and “FISHMONGER’S DAUGHTER” on the other. And so she was delighted to see a familiar dark gold crop of hair glowing in the sunlight as Julian stepped toward her through the company. Now, she thought contentedly, now they might all do as they would, for she’d have her two gentlemen with her, one on either side, to protect her. She was smiling widely as he approached, so pleased that it took a moment for her to realize that he had the most beautiful young woman in the ton, if not the wide world, at his side as well.
Lady Marianna Moredon’s cool and lovely face showed serene and total pleasure when she was introduced to Miss Logan and Mr. Jones. She bent like a reed in the wind as she curtsied to them, and when she arose from that graceful maneuver, her thin black brows etched a question over her wide blue eyes as they met Susannah’s.
“Are you related to the Logans of Newton Abbot, Miss Logan? I met Sir Henry Logan some time ago,” she offered.
“No,” Susannah said quietly, as Julian quickly said, “I don’t believe so,” when his lady then wondered aloud if Susannah might be related to the Logans of Wilde Manor.
“I know!” Lady Moredon said pleasantly, “it must be the Logans of Hampstead you’re connected with, you have the look of Lady Cecily Logan, especially about the mouth…”
“No, my lady,” Susannah said very quietly, “I’m afraid I can’t claim kinship with any exalted Logans. No, I’m not afraid to, precisely,” she said on a shrug as the dark-haired young woman gazed at her with interest, “I’m only unable to. My family, you see, has no such connections. We are simply ‘Logans,’ and we are in trade.”
Seeing those beautiful azure eyes widen in surprise and dismay, Susannah, with the remembered insults of many school years to spur her on, decided, in both a sort of celebration of self-denigration and a try at self-esteem, that she wanted to see even more dismay reflected there, and knowing the only way she could inflict it, blurted perversely, “We’re in fish, actually.”
“Not ‘in’ fish precisely,” Warwick said smoothly, to fill the deep silence that followed her words. “I’m sure Miss Logan didn’t mean to imply that her family actually stands about in fish up to their armpits. They made their way in the world via fishing interests, one might say.”
“Precisely,” Susannah snapped, not daring to meet Julian’s eyes and bracing herself for the horror his lady would display at this revelation.
But there was no distress or unpleasantness to be seen upon that lovely countenance.
“I see,” Lady Moredon said calmly before she turned to breathe her joy at meeting the viscount’s famous friend Mr. Jones at last. Then they stood and chatted about the picnic and the warmth of the day and sundry country matters until Susannah let her breath out in a long sad sigh. She understood then that Lady Moredon was all that Julian claimed her to be and more, for she was a true Lady. She also realized that she’d never see any unpleasant reaction to her inferior state registered on that exquisite face. Because as she came to see long before they were finally called to table, Lady Moredon had simply decided that Miss Logan no longer existed. This Miss Logan she’d met, Susannah understood when Lady Moredon took Julian’s arm on her right, and captured Warwick’s on her left, had simply been registered as a non-person in the lady’s mind, like all the other nonexistent persons that had surrounded her for all her privileged life: footmen, maidservants, gardeners, coachmen, shop clerks, street and chimney sweeps. One more common miss, met at an acceptable social affair or not, was precisely the same sort of living, but invisible, unreal being to her.
Or so Susannah grieved to herself as she hesitated before following the others to the table. Or so she continued to think when she didn’t see Lady Moredon glance back to her for a second, and so entirely missed the brief look that flickered in the cool beautiful depths of those famously limpid eyes as they registered every detail of Miss Logan’s face, figure, and mood. There had been more than polite disinterest in that look, there’d been, instead, in that fleeting moment, simple amused triumph clearly registered there.
It was certainly a delightful picnic, Susannah thought as she cut her lettuce leaf into tatters. She sat at Julian’s side, but as Lady Marianna sat on his left, and Warwick on the lady’s other side, she had only young Lord Beccles to converse with. And as Lord Beccles, a perspiring fattish young lordlet, found her entirely lovely, but had a mama who glowered at him from a distant region of the table if he so much as bent his head of thinning hair in the lovely young commoner’s direction, he had to pass all his time chatting up Miss Protherow, who was on his right. And Miss Protherow, he knew, was not only a bluestocking, she hated him, and besides, she wasn’t a patch on the stunning blond thing sitting so silently on his left. But lust ran a poor second to fear of his mama, so Lord Beccles made halting conversation with Miss Protherow and, as always in such situations, entertained himself by thinking up some truly monumentally lascivious fantasies about the fe
male he couldn’t talk to, much less have.
Although Susannah had no one to speak with, she was frustrated in trying to eavesdrop on the three to her left, since the babble of the company was so loud and there was no hope of hearing anything said out-of-doors unless one watched the speaker’s lips. She could scarcely watch Julian’s lips, she thought sadly, when all she could see of him was, however entrancing a sight it might be, the sidewise tilt of his broad shoulders in their snug-fitting brown wool jacket, and the tendrils of curls at the back of his golden head.
She comforted herself with the thought that it was just as well that she couldn’t get a better look at him. Whenever she’d chanced to gaze at him when he’d been with his lady before they’d sat down, he’d looked at Lady Marianna with such pride and with so much tender, wondering joy patent upon his fair face that she could scarcely bear it. But she had borne it, again and again, finding the need to observe them together exactly like the compulsion to dart a tongue into a sore tooth, since every brief glimpse caused her such intense pain it bordered on some sort of exquisitely addictive perverse pleasure. She could scarcely miss that, or at least, shouldn’t miss it, she decided, and as for his conversation, why, since it usually centered on Lady Marianna anyway, she didn’t miss it at all.
Instead, she found herself growing peeved because she couldn’t at least have Warwick’s intelligent conversation to see her through the meal, or have his laughter to leaven the hurt of it, or his wry and sympathetic eye upon her to keep her from brooding, as it always did, or share the foolishness of it all with him, as she always did. But even he, she remembered, had given the lady his warmest smile, and unbelievably, but certainly, she was sure she’d glimpsed a certain voluptuous appreciative gleam in his heavily lidded eyes. Even now, though she couldn’t see him, now and again she could hear the distinctive sound of his laughter joining Julian’s and Lady Marianna’s.
The only thing Susannah had cause to be grateful for was the one deference to informality that having a picnic signified to her hosts. Instead of the courses being served by one remove after another, as they would be in their great dining hall, all the dishes were put out at once. The luncheon itself was not planned to take very long, and took considerably less time than that since so many of the females present claimed to be ladies and so toyed with their food, wishing to show that they had delicate appetites, in the middle of the day, at least. Since the gentlemen couldn’t sit and stuff themselves all afternoon as the ladies looked on, it wasn’t long before the assembled company rose and began to chat, discussing all the things they might do if they weren’t so beautifully dressed, to while away the rest of the glorious afternoon.
Most of the invited guests stood and mingled with each other. Since this gathering was mostly for unwed young persons for the purpose of changing that circumstance for them, it was an approved way to pass the time. Some of the more daring couples left the meadow to stroll to nearby leafy glades, seeking shadows to hide from the sun, chaperons, and mamas within. Since wise chaperons knew such encounters sometimes produced similarly desirable, and perhaps even faster results than the picnic itself, many of them developed cinders in their eyes or pebbles in their shoes. Certainly no one paid much notice, then, when Miss Logan set out determinedly for the depths of the wood, for she was No One. Even her chaperon shrugged and went back to her knitting, for she was also obviously alone.
But not for very long. She’d only enough time to blunder deep into the wood to discover a nicely bubbling brook to cover the sound of her sobs, and find a huge lovely mossy boulder to perch on while sorrowing for herself, and hadn’t the opportunity to settle herself comfortably enough to drop one lonely tear before she heard a familiar voice recite, “‘By the waters of the Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered… Julian?’ No,” Warwick went on, in great mock puzzlement, as he leaned up against a tree to watch her, “I’m sure that’s not how it goes. But is that how it goes with you? 1 don’t see your harp hanging on any willow tree, so I expect you simply were looking for some shade. I’m the one who ought to be chanting about desertion, anyway. Why the devil did you desert me?” he complained.
“I didn’t,” she said, stung, as he raised his shoulders from the tree and came to her side on the rock, and knelt there effortlessly, balancing himself on one knee with his elbow resting on the other, bent one.
“Indeed you did,” he argued, looking from her face into the sparkling water. “I looked around,” he went on as he gathered up a twig and tossed it down to watch it ride the bubbling currents, “and you were hidden on Julian’s other side. There was no way I could snag you without a scene, since the Incomparable Lady Moredon had already wrestled me down at her side. Not nice, Susannah,” he said seriously, “nor polite. I believe,” he went on wonderingly, gazing up at the latticework of leaves above them, “that you’ve insulted me.”
“I didn’t mean to,” she said defensively, all thought of tears vanishing as she looked at him, for he did look terribly wounded, and she’d never meant to hurt him. “It happened so fast. One moment I was near you, the next, she was between you two. Anyway,” she said, gazing into his sad face suspiciously, “you seemed to be having a fine enough time. I never saw so much smiling and laughing, and leering. Yes,” she said, sniffling in indignation, “leering. And who could blame you?” she went on, accusation turning to despair again. “She is divine, as graceful as a swan, just as he says.”
“She has about as much conversation as one, at any rate,” he agreed.
When she looked at him in amazement, he added, “She doesn’t speak much, you see, unless it’s about who’s where, and who did what to whom, although she does agree a great deal,” he mused. “I missed you,” he said simply.
“Because I talk so much,” she sighed.
“Precisely. You,” he explained, “talk constantly, and quite entertainingly. If we are to extend watery metaphors, since you claim to be so used to living among fish, I prefer the company of a lively brook, like this one, to a pool of stagnant water, no matter how limpid.”
She giggled.
“Better,” he said approvingly, “although you looked quite dismal, and nicely poetic, perched here staring into the water.”
She had looked more than poetic, he thought, as she turned to smile at him. He’d seen her sitting in the dappled sunlight, motes of light glancing around her, thin shifting rays that had slipped through the trees to touch her hair, bright bits that reflected up from the dancing water to caress her face, glowing light that had lit her from behind to clearly delineate, through the sheer gauze of her frock, every curving, tempting, swelling, uplifted line of her slender body. He’d been so entranced that he could only hope that his voice would be cool as he’d spoken to her, and now, gazing down at her, he still fought to conceal the emotion that threatened to give the lie to his hard-won calm. He found this so difficult he had to look down at the plain gray worsted fabric stretched tight over his knee, where it touched the smooth stone he knelt upon at her side.
“Warwick,” she said softly, sadly, so quietly, he looked up at once, “this is all very foolish. Of course they looked beautiful together, they’re birds of a feather. They suit. All of them do. But I don’t. I don’t belong here, you know. She does, Julian does, you do, but I don’t.”
“Very foolish,” he concurred, smiling gently, reaching out to lay his hand alongside her cheek. “You belong wherever you wish to be.”
They were very close, and she discovered herself looking deeply into his sad dark blue eyes. It seemed to her then that she’d never actually seen him as clearly before as she saw him now, even in the dappled, changeable moving shade they rested in. He was, she realized, still a very young man, a thing she often forgot because of his poise and his calm, dignified demeanor. But there were no lines on his lean face, and she noted that his skin was fine-grained and pure, except for the spidery thin red line fading on his cheek. His thick hair shone a silvery brown in the leaping light, and
his lips, she noted as his head bent lower to hers, were unsuspectedly full, and shapely and very near.
His lips touched hers and she was surprised at the lightness of that touch as well as the warmth of it and the odd shivery tingling the contact produced.
In a moment, a very brief moment, he lifted his head and shook it ruefully, murmuring, “This is foolishness itself, awkward, dangerous, and unsatisfactory, isn’t it?”
He rose swiftly to his feet and gave her his hand and drew her to a stand beside him. She looked up at him, not knowing quite what to say.
“Yes,” he said as he lifted her down from the rock they’d perched on so that she stood on the firm bracken-strewn ground with him, “much safer,” he said as he kept one hand upon her waist to pull her tightly to him as he used the other to cradle the back of her head and guide her mouth to his again, “much better this way,” he breathed before he covered her lips with his again.
15
The wood was deep and cool and filled with the earthy scents of fern and the compost of last year’s fallen leaves as well as the green odors of moss and crushed bracken and the warm summer-sweet breath of trees. But Susannah noted none of it, being too involved with the man who held her so close, the man who blocked out all sensations further from her than her own skin. For the scent of him was that of good soap and some indefinable masculine blend of spice and cedarwood, and that alone was what she breathed in as he held her, his mouth to the side of her neck, his heart—or was it hers?—beating so loudly that she could hear only it, and not the sound of the rushing brook or the leaves whispering above them.
