He found her anyway, likely because the scores of footmen were in his employ, and they all remembered the sapphire gown, and the young miss concentrating on becoming castaway.
Arthur took the glass out of her hand, and the other one out of her other hand, and sipped from one before placing both in the palm tree’s pot. “Come. No one should be on the balcony yet,” was all he said, taking her firmly by the elbow and leading her to the opened French doors.
Of course no one would be outside yet; the dancing had not even started. And he, as host, should have been leading off the most elevated female in the room, Her Royal Highness Henrika Hafkesprinke. “The general has agreed to take my place since my leg will not permit,” he said to Hope’s raised brow. “And Lieutenant Durbin is leading out Miss Ferguson, so the other guests of honor are accounted for. Sylvia has
decided
not to
dance,
so she is presiding over the refreshments table. Come.”
The cool breeze felt good on Hope’s cheeks. Lights twinkled magically below from paper lanterns strung among the trees in the garden. The music was inviting. And she wished she were home in her bed. Even if her father’s friend Lord Ormsby was in it, too. Anything had to be better than listening to more lies, more silver-tongued schemes for her downfall. Hope gave Lord Huntingdon her back.
“Very well,” he said. “Don’t look at me. I cannot blame you. Just listen, please. That will be enough. First, you must believe that I never set out to deceive you. I simply did not want to be Viscount Huntingdon. That was my brother, who was raised up for the position since birth. I did not want to be Captain Hunter either, endlessly congratulated for surviving one endless bloodbath after another. Can you understand that I just wanted to hear my own name on the lips of a sweet girl? I did not want to think about my title, my battle record, or my bank account. I wanted someone to look at me, Arthur, with fondness, with respect. Was that such a terrible crime? Dash it, Miss Thurstfield, I would get down on my knees and beg your forgiveness, but I’d never get up, you know.”
Hope turned to make sure he did not try anything so goosish. “I…I think I understand. I was pursued by Sir Malcolm for what I could bring, not for who I was. But what of Princess Henrika?”
“What of her? I knew her in Paris, so the government decided I was the best man for playing escort and keeping her from causing a scandal. She’ll be leaving tomorrow, thank goodness, likely with a Prussian count in tow. She means nothing to me, I swear.”
“But the hotel? What were you doing, pretending to be manager?”
“I wasn’t. I simply borrowed Mr. Simmons’s rooms to avoid climbing the stairs. You have my rooms.”
“Oh, no! If word gets out, I’ll be ruined. Staying in a gentleman’s chambers, or permitting a man to pay my keep! You know how people will talk.”
“Then I am quite prepared to do the honorable thing.”
“Which is?”
“Offer my hand and my name, of course.”
“Heavens, that is not at all necessary.”
“It is to me. You already hold my heart, you know. In fact, I may as well make you a proper offer now. I was going to wait, to court you the right way, as myself. But I am so afraid you’ll disappear back north, or find some handsome buck who can dance and who will never tease you, that I dare not delay.”
“But we hardly know each other,” she protested halfheartedly, for truth be told, he held the other half of her heart and soul, too.
“Then we shall have a lifetime to become better acquainted. Let us not waste a moment of it.” With that he took her in his arms and kissed her, until she felt she was floating, on clouds. And he thought he could not dance!
9
No smoking in bed, no open, unattended flames.
“Hush, my dearest,” he said, placing a finger over her lips. “You don’t have to give me an answer tonight. Just say that you will think about making me the happiest of men.”
It was a good thing he did not expect an answer, for Hope couldn’t have told him her name, not if her life depended on it. Her head felt like a hundred sparrows had landed inside, all flapping about and chirping. Which was more amazing, that her hotel manager was a hero viscount, or that he loved her? And if he’d lied so often and so easily in the past, could she believe him now? And if this was what one kiss could do to her, how would she survive being married to such a man? And, and, and, endlessly.
Then his sister was there. “What are you about, Arthur, sneaking off with a young lady in front of everyone? Do you want to destroy the gel’s reputation? You are Huntingdon now, no ramshackle soldier, and it is time you acted in keeping with your dignities.”
“I am trying, Sylvia. Lud knows I am trying to assure the succession as you keep insisting I do.”
“Not on my balcony!” she shrieked.
It was his balcony, but she was right. This was neither the time nor the place for fervent declarations and fevered embraces. After gently brushing a disordered curl off Hope’s cheek, he led her back into the ballroom, but he stayed by her side for most of the evening, introducing her to all of his friends as they paraded past to beg an introduction and a dance. The way he hovered at her shoulder or glowered at her would-be partners declared his intentions. When Lord Huntingdon led Miss Thurstfield into the supper room, no one doubted that an engagement was imminent, except for Hope. She was still pondering the conundrum of how Arthur could have deluded her by pretending to be someone else, if he loved her. Of course, the someone else was fond of her, too. She was getting a headache from all the questions, from all the champagne, and from all the gentlemen who wanted to meet her, now that she was suddenly in fashion. Still, she smiled at her dance partners, made polite conversation with the ladies, and even discussed the plight of returning veterans with the Duke of Wellington.
Arthur saw how weary she was growing, and how many men tried to lead her out to the balcony. ’Twas a toss-up whether she’d collapse from exhaustion first, or he’d challenge one of his former friends to pistols at dawn. The princess and her party had left, and so had the general. “You could leave now, my dear, if you wish.”
She nodded gratefully, looking around for Lady Leverett for the first time all night. “Your friends left some time ago while you were dancing with that fop in the puce waistcoat. I promised to see you home. Well chaperoned by your Mrs. Storke, of course.”
“But it is your party.”
“No, it is my sister-in-law’s, and has been a marvelous success. The lieutenant’s uncle deigned to appear and has reinstated Durbin as his heir, and Miss Ferguson’s father was closeted with him half the night discussing marriage settlements. And the princess was duly honored, and honored to go off to the next affair—literally and figuratively—with one of the czar’s cousins. So my responsibilities have all been met, except seeing you safely back to the hotel.”
Mrs. Storke was not much of a chaperone, snoring softly in her corner of the coach. She didn’t see Arthur pull Hope closer to his side so she could rest her head on his shoulder, and he could rub his cheek against her soft brown curls. They did not talk, but the silence was comfortable, companionable. Things were not settled between them, they both knew, but this magical night was not to be shattered by any more hard questions.
It was shattered by the fire gongs, instead.
They could smell the smoke from blocks away, and hear the alarm bells ringing. The roads became congested with those trying to flee the fire, those arriving to help fight it, and those coming to gawk at it. Hope and Arthur stared out of the carriage windows, trying to discern the fire’s location. “Dear Lord, it’s the hotel!”
Indeed, the Grand Hotel was burning. Smoke poured out of the upper stories, although they could not see any flames, even when they rushed from the coach to make their way on foot, swerving around firemen and water wagons and lines of men in hotel uniforms and formal dress passing buckets. Arthur’s man Browne was on one of the lines, but he left to report to his master. The fire had started in the kitchens, he told them, and traveled up the walls to the dining room, then to the guest rooms on the floors above. The manager’s apartment was not afire, not yet, and Browne had managed to toss some of the captain’s belongings out the window before the smoke grew too thick and everyone was ordered to evacuate the premises. The firemen were battling to keep the blaze contained at the right wing of the building, and looked to be winning that battle. A few of the guests were overcome with smoke, and a few of the maids were in hysterics. Miss Thurstfield’s friends, the Leveretts, had returned in time to be rousted out, but they were safe at a friend’s house, with whichever other of the guests they could gather into carriages to take to safety.
“Good thing they paid the fire insurance,” Browne noted before he left to rejoin the fire brigade. Arthur said he’d find him as soon as he sent the ladies back to Huntingdon House.
Nancy was wringing her hands. “Oh, my stars and psalms! To think that we could have been in there, asleep in our beds!”
Hope was staring at the building. “But my dog is. I have to go find poor Trumpet.”
Arthur grabbed her arm before she could take another step. “You cannot go in there, Hope. You heard Brownie. They have ordered everyone out. And the smoke would be too thick to breathe. Besides, your dog most likely ran out when he heard all the commotion. We’ll find him around the back or down the block.”
She was struggling to release her arm from his grip. “No, he only hides under the bed when he is frightened, from thunder or fireworks. He’d never leave on his own.”
“Damnation! Very well, I will go, if you swear to stay here.”
“No, Trumpet is my pet, my responsibility. The danger has to be mine.”
He kissed her briefly on the forehead. “Don’t you realize yet, sweetheart, that I couldn’t live without you?”
“You can’t go in there, Cap’n,” Browne protested when Arthur told him to pour a bucket of water over his head and on Hope’s shawl, so he could cover his mouth. “Not after a cursed dog!”
“It’s Hope’s dog.” That was enough for him. It had to be enough for Browne.
“But what about your leg?”
“It will do. You go to the women and make sure they stay put.”
*
The climb was a nightmare, especially after he’d been standing all night behind Hope’s chair. Arthur told himself he’d walk through hell for her happiness, and this looked like it, all smoky and stifling hot, and dark as the inside of a loan shark’s heart. He had to hang on to the banister just to find the stairs. Going down was going to be worse, so he grabbed a coil of rope the firemen had left on the second landing and tossed it over his shoulder.
When he reached the third floor, Arthur could see flames down the corridor, hear the shouts of men with hoses and buckets and axes. Thankfully the fire was in the opposite direction of Miss Thurstfield’s suite, his suite, that he was finally getting to use. He strained to see the numbers on the doors, then fumbled for the key in his pocket when he found the right one. She’d pressed it into his hand with a quick, “Be careful, my love.” Her love dropped the blasted key and had to search for it with his hands along the carpet.
At last he was inside, headed for the bedchamber to the right, where he collided with the large bed. Now was not the time to think of his Hope in that big bed. The deuced dog had better be underneath, or he was leaving without him, before they both perished. “Come on, Trumpet, come to me. I’ll get you out.”
The dog did not believe him. Cursing, Arthur had to take the time to light a candle on the nightstand, muttering about the absurdity of lighting a taper in the middle of a conflagration. Then he had to get down on his hands and knees, with the candle. He’d strangle the little mutt himself, for this. There was Trumpet, cowering beneath the center of the bed, trembling so hard Arthur wondered that the little creature’s bones did not break.
“Come on, Trumpet, come over here. I know you are frightened, but I didn’t die from wounds in Portugal, and I didn’t die from fevers in France. I am certainly not about to die in a hotel in London. Especially not now. Come on, I swear not to hang you with the rope. Blast you, come. Hope is outside. Where there is Hope, there is life.”
Trumpet panted, but did not budge. Arthur reached back for his cane, and poked it under the bed, trying to send the shaggy little dog scurrying. “Come on, unless it’s Gideon’s Trumpet you want to be.” The terrier just backed farther away.
“Of all the miserable mongrels in the world, I have to rescue one so dumb it doesn’t recognize a friend?” Then Arthur recalled what else he’d encountered on the nightstand: a plate of sugar biscuits. He pulled himself up to his feet on the satin bedspread, and grabbed a handful of the biscuits before sinking down again. “Here, you dunderhead of a dog, have a treat, before you are toast.”
The dog sniffed at his outstretched hand and inched closer. Arthur reached with his cane and snagged it in the dog’s collar. He dragged the animal out and wrapped him in Hope’s shawl, because he couldn’t trust the terrorized terrier not to run back under the bed at first chance. But he could not hold to the stair rail, his cane, and the dog all at once. He shrugged out of his uniform jacket, thinking to make a sling with the sleeves, but he could hear the firemen getting closer, which meant the fire was also. So he stuffed the little dog down inside his shirt, held there by the waistband of his beeches. And felt a rush of warm liquid against his belly. “Bloody hell! Is that the thanks I get?”