Elisabeth Fairchild (20 page)

“What a question!” he bit out fiercely, allowing her to slide to the ground.

It dawned on her that she had done or said something wrong. She wished that she might take it back, might unsay the words.

“Good God! What a question to pose in such a moment, Patience!”

The breeze cooled her legs, cooled the fiery damp as her dress slid back down again.

He buttoned the flap, tucked himself in, every movement hard and angry—a rejection. “Next you’ll tell me you are a virgin.”

He shamed her with the word.

Of course she was a virgin! What sort of woman did he take her for?

Confused by such thoughts—embarrassed by all that had passed between them, by her inability to cease the throbbing heat between her legs—she smoothed her skirt with shaking hands, and groped for the top of the stocking that had fallen down about her ankle.

“But of course you are, aren’t you?” He grew angrier by the minute, more distant. “And I almost . . .” He stopped, unable to meet her gaze, then raggedly whispered, “Good God! What am I about?”

He smoothed his hair back out of his eyes with an angry flick of the wrist. “What in heaven’s name am I doing? Richard will kill me.”

Richard!

In her memory she saw the knowing look in Richard’s eyes as he had turned his back on her, on the staggered rows of cards, on the knowledge that Pip lurked beneath the table. She knew in that instant, with a terrible sinking feeling, that she loved an illusion, not the man before her. And she knew she could not bear to see Richard give her such a knowing look again, could not bear that he should turn his back on her as Pip turned his back on her now.

“Do you mean to ruin me, Pip?” she whispered.

He seemed not to hear. His head was turned as he buttoned his waistcoat, as he pushed a tree branch out of his way. He bent for the shuttlecock. “Damned thing!” Arm arcing, he threw it deep into the woods, a tumbling flash of birdlike white. And then, with a single guilty glance in her direction, and a muttering of “I do beg your pardon. Unforgivable really!” he snatched up his racket from the ground and set off for the house, leaving her standing there, back braced against the tree, knees trembling with mortification, legs still spread.

Chapter Thirty

Patience straddled the branch, skirt rucked up, bare legs and bare feet dangling, bare toes waggling in the breeze. Pennies of light and shadow fell lightly on her face, gold and copper on her eyelids. The breeze sighed among the branches, set the leaves to whispering. Above them a squirrel cluck-chucked, and leapt from high branch to high branch, sending a small cascade of broken branches and bruised leaves clattering through the swaying roof of green.

“Patience,” she heard a familiar voice murmur.

Pip, she thought. That was Pip’s voice, long ago, the voice of the boy she had fallen in love with.

“Are you sleeping, Patience?”

She did not respond, pretending she was asleep, pretending so he would call out her name as sweetly again.

Something tickled the arch of her foot. A leaf? A fly?

“Leave her alone, Pip.” Richard’s voice this time, an uncertain, broken voice that leapt, like the squirrels, first high and then low.

“It is only a beetle,” Pip said, and she remembered—remembered even as her nerves jumped and she sat up too abruptly, and teetered on the branch, on the bed, ready to fall, already tumbling, the bedclothes sliding, her balance gone, Richard’s arms steadying her—and his eyes—oh, how he had looked at her from ageless agate eyes!

A dream. No, not a dream—a memory of childhood.

She wiped the beaded sweat from her upper lip, and thought of Pip’s touch, and the image from childhood rose again, swimming before her eyes, blotting out the afternoon.

Pip had held a handful of leaves, tickling her foot, giggling at her terror—not a beetle, not a bug at all—and she need not be frightened, might still the frantic beating of her heart, for she had not fallen, would not fall, with Richard ready to catch her. Dear, dependable Richard.

She flushed with fresh shame as she recalled how close to falling she had been that afternoon—no Richard to save her—not even her own common sense to the rescue.

Patience pushed back the covers and sat in the middle of her bed, heart thudding, feeling foolish. She closed her eyes and saw him look at her again—that look—so long ago, and still she remembered. She had not wanted to see what his eyes had to say. Not then. She had turned away and slapped at Pip, that she might touch him as he continued to tickle her toes with the leaves, and together they had burst out laughing, falling back against the tree trunk giggling as Pip continued to tickle her toes, and she, jerking her foot at first away, and then back again, had teased him to continue, making a game of it, unable to face Richard, unable to thank him for stopping her fall.

Had she seen that look again? Had she surprised it on occasion in the deep green of his eyes? When she had jumped down from the carriage on the night when he had taken her to see Pip? When she had looked up from spinning the dice cage for Chase? At the foundling house garden party? Did he cast such looks upon Lady Wilmington when she caught his eye?

What was it he had said in the gardens, against a starlit sky? “Love follows desire. If one is lucky.”

Did love follow her desires?

Her heart ached to think her dream so hollow, a tin cascade rather than the rush of a rain-fed stream. She thought of the screech of a cockatoo named for a man who no longer marveled at its cleverness. She thought of Toby Smith, who had not come up trumps at all with Pip as master. She wondered what had become of the beautiful blond-tailed pony. Would Pip cast love aside as cavalierly?

Did love follow her desire? Had it ever?

Heart aching, tears clouding her eyes at thought of facing Pip again so soon, Patience wondered how she might gracefully excuse herself from Melanie’s garden party.

How could he?
she kept thinking. How could he touch her as he had? Kiss her? Speak of his desire for her—indeed, demonstrate that desire—if he did not love her? If he meant, as he had said, to marry Melanie?

The entire exchange seemed to her completely, absurdly illogical. It pained and exhausted her trying to make sense of it. Even more frustrating, she could speak of it to no one—certainly not her mother. Prudence, the sister older than she and, as wife and mother, wiser in the ways of men, would undoubtedly carry the story back to Mama. She and Patience had never been close enough in years to exchange many confidences. She had always considered Patience her baby sister. It was probable she always would.

Richard came to call. She stood at the top of the stairs and listened to the familiar timbre of his voice below, and sent her maid rushing down to tell her mother she was feeling indisposed, and had no wish to be disturbed.

It occurred to her, as she remained closeted in her room, that she might have found some roundabout way to ask for Richard’s opinion and advice, but she was unable to face him—afraid she would burst into tears with the slightest provocation, in front of her mother, who would demand an explanation.

She refused to so much as come down for dinner, so that her father, who rarely asked after her, startled her mother by making inquiry. She went down to tell him she did not feel like eating. Her mother said she was looking quite pale, and though Patience insisted that there was nothing wrong, she simply did not feel like eating and had a touch of the headache—Mama sent for a physician.

Patience dutifully stuck out her tongue for him when he arrived, and repeated to him that there was nothing really wrong.

The physician gave her a powder to put into water before she slept, and informed her mother that he did not think it serious, merely a touch of the melancholy, but that if her spirits did not improve in a few days’ time to send for him again.

Patience watched him leave from her bedroom window. She did not want to be fussed over. All she wanted was time in which to ponder her sins, to consider every word, every gesture, every caress and kiss Pip had offered, and she had accepted.

Surely one must begin to understand the incomprehensible before one could begin to set it right.

And if she could not see clear to setting it right, she needed time in which to mourn the death of dreams. It seemed odd that this confusion of feeling should be inspired by that which she had wanted more than anything for as long as she could remember—an afternoon in which she had seen more demonstration of Pip’s affections for her than on any other.

That aspect, more than any other, tore at her heart, at her confidence in the very fabric of her world. She seemed trapped in a game in which vital cards had been hidden from her, a game she was not meant to win.

A bouquet of flowers arrived the following morning, roses and nodding bluebells, rare at this time of year, a message of constancy lifting her spirits, allowing her a moment’s soaring hope that they were from Pip, that he meant to set her world in proper orbit again. But they were not from Pip. Richard had sent them, hoping she felt more herself today. Dear, dependable Richard.

She must warn him! He stood to lose as much as she if Pip had his way and married Melanie.

Chapter Thirty-one

Patience considered not going to Melanie’s garden party. It promised only pain and embarrassment.

Her mother would not allow it.

“I have nothing to wear.” She regretted the words as soon as they left her lips.

Her mother laughed and said, “I told you so. You will recall I warned you this would happen.”

Patience wished she might retrieve the words—a stupid excuse, not the reason at all. And thus the night of the garden party found her parading downstairs in her mother’s perfumed wake, forced to agree that deficiencies in her wardrobe did not offer reason enough not to go to a once anticipated gathering.

“You look lovely in that,” her mother insisted as Richard arrived to act as their escort. “Doesn’t she look lovely, Richard?”

“She looks . . . tired,” Richard said, such concern in his eyes, in his voice, Patience wanted to throw herself upon his shoulder and sob.

She would have loved to have turned and run up the stairs again, to fling herself facedown upon her bed, but Richard waited for them at the foot, hands clasped in the small of his back, blackbird wings folded. His familiar strong-boned face met them with a smile. Something was changed in his features, a special brightness captured there; all of his goodness, the kindness of his heart, shone from the dark green of his eyes. It drew her gaze as never before.

“I have not slept well of late,” she said faintly. “Thank you for the flowers, Richard. You are very kind. Most considerate. I cannot imagine where you managed to find bluebells this late in the year. You look happy.”

This last came almost as a complaint, for how could he be smiling when, like she, he stood poised to lose love?

“I am happy.”

His smile took firmer hold of his chiseled lower lip. Light from the chandelier played softly in the gleaming darkness of his hair.

“I have been looking forward to Melanie’s party. New dress, Lady Ballard?” He honored her mother with a formal bow.

Her mother beamed and twirled away from the bottom stairstep, saying, “The very latest mode, dear Richard. So kind of you to notice.”

“And Patience.” His gaze swept over her, the green eyes narrowing. “I have always had a fondness for the sight of you in those cherry red trimmings.”

“Do talk to her, Richard.” Her mother took his arm, her voice lowered as if to reveal a shameful secret. “You see before you a young woman who has thrown away a six months’ clothing allowance. I tried to talk her out of it, but she will not listen.”

“The thing is done, Mother,” Patience protested quietly. “And no great hardship.”

“Thing?” Richard asked. “What thing have you done, Patience?”

“Nothing, really,” Patience muttered, the words a lie. She had done many things since last they had spoken—unmentionable things that made her palms sweat, and hidden parts of her body begin to tingle. Things she would know more of. She had no desire at all to discuss a subject her mother had already belabored ad nauseam.

“Patience allows her heart to rule her head.”

Splitting head
, Patience thought, as she watched her mother’s chin wag, her curls bouncing, feathers bobbing.

Richard turned to tuck Patience’s hand into the crook of his arm. “What’s this? Trouble in love?”

Patience stared at him a moment, wondering if Pip had said anything to him, hoping he had not, and at the same time longing to tell him how she suffered, the sad, confused state of her heart. If anyone would understand it would be Richard.

“She has fallen in love most inappropriately,” her mother said disapprovingly.

Patience frowned, stunned. Had the dreadful truth of her daughter’s disgrace somehow reached her mother’s ears?

But no, Mama’s head was bobbing again as she scolded Richard. “It’s those foundling lads of yours, Richard. Fully half of her clothing allowance has gone to put clothes on their backs rather than her own. And I blame you, in part, for her foolishness.”

Winged brows rose. Deep green eyes blinked in dismay.

Patience snapped her mouth closed, took a breath, rearranged her thoughts. They did not know. No one knew. Just she and Pip, to their private shame.

“My going without dresses for a Season seems small price to pay,” she said quietly. “Indeed, I considered my purchases quite a bargain. The price of a single ball gown alone provided all of the lads with wool coats.”

“My dear Patience!” Richard’s sudden smile was so broad, so completely pleased with her that it stirred in her a momentary answering smile. “How very kind.”

Oh, but I am not
, she thought, smile fading.
I am so very stupid of late.

“’Tis nothing but foolishness.” Her mother echoed her contempt. “Today she tried to convince me she could not go to this garden party because she had nothing to wear.”

Richard met these words with raised brows. “You did not wish to go?”

What would you think of me if you knew the real reason I do not wish to go?
Patience thought.

“Oh, dear!” her mother exclaimed as they reached the door. “I must run fetch my shawl. I am sure to need it.”

In the silence that followed the flurry of her footsteps upon the stairs, Richard asked again, “You did not wish to go to Melanie’s party?”

A thousand thoughts raced through Patience’s head as he stood regarding her with an intensity she had so long taken for granted. “I did not want. . . could not face . . .” She stopped, unable to explain.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Oh, Richard,” she said with a sigh.

“What is it? Did Pip . . . ?”

Her gaze rose to meet his, startled. “Did Pip what?” she whispered, afraid for a moment. Reason returned, and logic. She said, “Did he tell me he means to marry Melanie? Yes.”

He held the door wide. The evening’s breeze washed her in the scent of his cologne, cedar and lime. A comfort, that scent.

She turned, eye-to-eye with him in the doorway. “Do you want to go?”

“Yes.”

She sighed, wondering how he could bear it that Pip should love the woman he had so long waited for. She studied his face, looked deep into his eyes a moment, and thought of Pip’s touch, his kiss. Was that how it had been between Richard and Melanie?

He looked back at her most intently, his gaze guarded, questions in his eyes, and she had no answers for him, only more questions. So many she dared not ask.

“Who am I?” she said at last, stepping into the last of the day’s sunshine, a golden wash of it, the slanting light momentarily blinding her.

He tucked her gloved hand into the crook of his arm, brilliant light gilding raven black hair, gleaming golden in green eyes. “Is this a riddle?”

“Perhaps it is.” She nodded, looked away. “Life’s riddle.”

He opened the door to the carriage. The footman let down the step.

She gathered her skirt in her free hand as he handed her in.

“You are Patience,” he said with gratifying certainty as she sank into the seat, the carriage swaying as she arranged her skirt.

“Am I?” she asked as he darkened the door in following her. “I feel more like heartbreak than patience.”

He said nothing until he was settled, dear Richard, reliable Richard. She could count on him to make her feel better. He always did. He knew what she was after with her question.

“You are allowed to be both, my dear, under certain circumstances.”

“And you, old friend?”

For a moment his eyes narrowed, his gaze quickened. He seemed to hold his breath.

“Are you impatient with your Patience?”

He cocked his head, gaze guarded, hints of something waiting there, in the shadows that claimed his features, in the stillness that momentarily claimed his limbs. Questions, perhaps, waiting to be answered.

Who held the answers?

His chin rose, light catching the line of his cheek, the tip of his nose. “I am the soul of patience.”

She blinked, considering this, and thought of Lady Wilmington and said, “Ah, yes. I suppose you are.”

He nodded. “Oh, these many years.”

She sighed again, envying him, envying Melanie to have aroused the lasting passions of such a man. She forced a smile. “Do you enjoy being the soul of patience? You are rather good at it, I think. So good, few notice your Patience.”

He smiled, relishing this double-talk. His eyes danced with mischief. “I prefer it that way. There is only one I would have notice.”

She puzzled over that a bit before she said, “Of course. And she has been unable to look too much in your direction, distracted by another.”

She reached out to give his gloved hand an affectionate pat.

He blinked at her, as if in touching him she startled him. Light flashed in his eyes. His lashes fluttered like dark moths. A hesitant smile lifted the corners of his lips.

She smiled. “Has Melanie not told you?”

“Melanie?” He frowned, and bit his lip, and cocked his head in the inquisitive way that made her think of crows. “What was she to tell me?”

“She said—”

They were interrupted by her mother’s inquisitive, “Did I miss anything?” at the window.

Richard sat staring at Patience, questions bright in his eyes, the smile that had so warmed his features earlier completely disappeared.

“Nothing,” Patience said.