In the Brief Eternal Silence (34 page)

“I understand,” Ryan said abruptly. He shook
his arm free from Bertie and repeated, “Damn it. I understand, I
say.”

“I expect you do,” St. James replied, looking
up at him. “Don't ever threaten to call someone out again, Ryan. If
you feel that strongly about something, just remove your glove and
commence.”

“I will,” Ryan answered. He looked thoughtful
for a moment as he stood there, his drink spilled and his feet
still spread in belligerence. Then straightening himself, he said,
“Thank you.”

And St. James, with a little sigh, said, “You
are welcome.” Then looking at Bertie, he told him, “You really
should be teaching him this, you know.”

“I've taught him all I can. He's graduated to
your class, now, St. James,” Bertie answered.

In a much surer voice, Ryan asked, “Are we
ready to leave, St. James?”

St. James threw him a warm, true smile,
downed the remainder of his drink and said, “Yes. Bertie, care to
join us? We'll wait if you do.”

“No, St. James. For if I heard correctly upon
my entrance that you intend to be at Almack's tonight, I have a few
wagers to lay. Just do not kill my brother, is all I ask.”

“Tsk, at the rate he is learning, it will be
more likely that he kills me.”

And Ryan, following milord duke out the door,
had to reflect that for all St. James' roughness, he taught a very
good lesson. But then, he guessed, his lordship had not had a kind
teacher himself.

Miss Murdock looked with disappointment at
the patently uneven stitches on the small doily she had been
working on. Not only was the work tedious, but not surprisingly,
she showed no skill at it. And the back of her neck hurt.

She glanced at Lady Lydia, who had made her
belated appearance at breakfast, apologizing rather vaguely of not
feeling well, and then had gone on to pick at her food. Now, she
was bent over a piece of petit point, as seemed to be her sole
occupation if she were not shopping, receiving callers or calling
upon others. Andrew had left after breakfast to meet with a friend
of his from his 'University Days' which he pronounced in such a way
as to make the listener feel that he had been out for decades
instead of not even a year. The duchess, as was her custom, had
gone above stairs for a nap.

Lady Lydia glanced up at Miss Murdock's
sudden inactivity and said, “It takes time, my dear. Surely your
mother should have taught you all this years ago.”

“Indeed, I'm sure she would have if she had
lived,” Miss Murdock responded absently, her mind more preoccupied
with restless thoughts of the night before and the dreaded evening
she had to look forward to.

“Oh, I am so sorry,” Lady Lydia exclaimed. “I
had no idea that your mother was not living.”

“And how could you?” Miss Murdock replied. In
a sudden yielding to defeat, she placed the doily away from her
onto the arm of the chair. “For I do not recall mentioning it
before to you, and it is not as if you have known me long.”

Lady Lydia continued her sewing even as she
spoke. “Somehow I feel as though I have known you longer.” She
pulled the thread further through. “I had my reservations about
you, Miss Murdock, as I am sure you are not surprised to hear, but
looking at you now, only two short days since you arrived, I must
pronounce myself pleasantly surprised.”

“Why, thank you,” Miss Murdock said, very
much surprised herself.

“You get along quite well with my son the
Earl, do you not?” Lady Lydia asked while continuing to sew.

“Oh,” Miss Murdock said. “He is the most
pleasant sort, I agree.”

Lady Lydia glanced at her again, but Miss
Murdock had turned her face toward the window. “It is such a
beautiful day,” she continued.

“It is,” Lady Lydia agreed.

“Do you think that the Duchess has any
mounts?”

“I expect not,” Lady Lydia said frowning, “as
she has not ridden for many years and I myself have never ridden.”
She gave a slight shudder at the thought. “Of course Andrew rides,
but I can not recommend your riding his horse as he is quite
temperamental even if he did not have it out presently. I have
often told him he should get something easier to control, for I
positively live in dread of his spilling and being seriously
hurt.”

“He is not a child any more. I am sure that
he shall manage,” Miss Murdock responded, uncertain herself whether
she meant to be comforting or critical.

“As he has often told me himself,” said Lady
Lydia, and picked up her small gold sewing scissors and snipped
through the thread with ferocity. “It just goes to show that he
does not fully appreciate how important it is that he does not do
himself harm or take unnecessary chances, despite how often I have
tried to tell him so.”

Miss Murdock turned her head to study Lady
Lydia. “No young man, I expect, ever takes the thought of his
mortality seriously,” she said, sensing that lady's very real
concern for her son. “I am sure he will come around in just another
year or two.”

“If another year or two is not too late. But
it is not your concern, is it, Miss Murdock, and so I do not mean
to burden you with my motherly misgivings. Let me only say I am
glad that the two of you seem to be such chums.”

“Chums. Yes,” Miss Murdock agreed. “Or a
brother. I think he feels it is his responsibility to get me up to
snuff for Almacks tonight, which I think is very dear of him.”

Lady Lydia smiled with a radiance that showed
in detail the remnants of the incomparable she had once been. “It
is dear of him, isn't it?” she asked. “When ever I begin to
positively despair, then he does something like that which
reassures me that. . . well, never-mind. It is just so hard, Miss
Murdock, when so often he seems determined to follow in the
footsteps of his cousin. And as you have had your own experience
with that man, I need not tell you how much I object to Andrew
turning out the same.”

“I can quite understand,” Miss Murdock said
with sympathy, thinking of the conversation she had in this room
with Andrew yesterday afternoon.

“You know, I saw the most odd thing last
night,” Lady Lydia continued. “A carriage leaving here, perfectly
black and plain, I almost think it must have been hired. It was
after two, I believe, and I'm certain it must have dropped someone
at the door, for I saw a groom coming back around from the front of
the house before it left out of our mew.” She glanced in question
at Miss Murdock, but Miss Murdock had decided she might have a
fresh try at her embroidery after all. She picked it up and bowed
her head over it in devoted concentration.

“I asked Andrew this morning if he had
someone drop him off, for I know that he was out quite late, and do
you know, he acted most perfectly surprised and said he could not
guess who it could have been or what it could have been about. Do
you think he may have been lying to me?”

Miss Murdock bowed her head further over her
work in a frenzy of endeavor. “Oh, I do not think he would lie to
you, Lady Lydia. I am quite certain he would not.”

Lydia made a little noise of astonishment.
“Well, I am puzzled then, for if it were not him, whyever would a
strange coach be at our house in the midst of the night?”

“I am certain it is most odd,” Miss Murdock
agreed. She winced

as she bloodied her finger with the needle.
“Ouch!”

“Oh, dear!” Lydia said. “Did you hurt it very
badly?”

Miss Murdock pulled it from her mouth where
she had placed it, stared at it for a critical moment, and although
it was not at all hurt badly, said, “I think perhaps I should go
and get some brown paper on it, after all.” Seeing good her escape,
she set aside her doily once again and left the room, begging Lady
Lydia's pardon.

She did get brown paper on it in the
kitchens, on the off chance that Lady Lydia should remember and
inquire after it later, and then as a means to escape more
permanently until she was certain Lydia's subject of conversation
had quite left her mind, decided it would do no harm to visit the
stables on the off chance that the Duchess did have a decent mount,
for she missed riding very much, and wondered quite often how Leaf
was doing in his lordship's stable.

With this decided, she went to the hall and
front foyer, accepted a wrap from Ashton who appeared silently and
promptly. “Will you be needing your maid, miss?” he asked.

“No. Thank you, Ashton. I'm merely going to
visit the stables and shan't be gone long.” She smiled up at him,
thinking that he really had the most calming effect on people even
when he only spoke a few words.

“As you wish, miss,” Ashton agreed and held
open the door for her.

Lizzie stepped out into the sun, enjoying the
warmth of it on her face as she blew frosty air out into a mist in
front of her. It was a glorious day, as the view from the window
had promised, and she was glad she had stepped out into it. She
followed the walk around the imposing town house and marched along
the mew that she had met St. James in the night before, but now
with the sunlight slanting down, it all seemed very far away and
even unimportant. In the stables, all was quiet except for the
rhythmic munching of horses on their hay, and the warm odor of
their bodies tinged her welcoming nostrils.

It was the closest to being home that Miss
Murdock had found, and she allowed herself a brief moment of
examining the underlying worries she had of how her father was
getting along. He may have been lamentable in her upbringing, but
she did miss him and his takings dearly. After a moment, she
reminded herself that she had come out of the house to leave her
troubles behind, not study upon them, and she went along the center
aisle, stopping at each stall in turn. Those horses that came
forward, she patted and spoke to, eyeing each as a mount. None
added up to what she was looking for, and she sighed, having
expected to find nothing adequate to begin with. The Dowager did go
to the park a few mornings a week, but she was driven in her
crested carriage. Not surprising the only decent mount in residence
should be Andrew's, and of course, he was gone for now at any
rate.

Voices reached her from the tack room, and
she wandered over to stand in the door, loathe to return back to
the house and idleness just yet. She wiped her nose on a hanky,
which had begun running after being outside and then in again, and
peered through the door that stood open. Tyler glanced up at her
shadow, surprising her, and a brief look of consternation flitted
across his face. Then he grinned. “Why if it isn't the little Miss
that slapped t'duke's face,” he said with more warmth than she
would have thought she warranted. “And not a bad wallop you gave
him.”

Miss Murdock flushed a very deep red at his
words and glanced at the older groom beside him, who quit his
saddle-soaping at Tyler's words. “It was just a misunderstanding,”
Miss Murdock stammered, wishing the floor would swallow her where
she stood.

But Tyler didn't seem to think she should be
embarrassed in the least. He spat out a stream of tobacco into the
corner and told her, “No need t'downplay it, Miss, for I'm sure
I've felt like boxing his ears on many occasion. I've never in me
life met anyone as difficult as he, even when he was just a lad.
Took t'his behind with a switch when he was young more than once,
of which t'old Duke, he wouldn't have appreciated, but he drove me
t'the point where I didn't care. Wish I could take a switch after
him now, at times.”

“St. James you be talkin' about?” the other
groom asked in astonishment. “You slapped St. James, miss?”

“She did,” Tyler told him when Miss Murdock
did not seem inclined to answer but only shook her head in
exasperation. “I dare say he'll carry t'mark for at least a day or
two,” he laughed. “And won't that set t'tongues t'waggin'.”

“That may very well be, Tyler,” Miss Murdock
interrupted, “but I see no reason why it need be known that I was
the one that put it there.”

“I wish I'd seen it,” the older groom said
with a great deal of longing in his voice.

“Oh, you've no call t'worry about old Bedrow
here,” Tyler reassured her. “He'll not carry t'tale any further.
And I won't tell another soul for although I know St. James would
skin me for it, I can see by t'look in your eye you would be none
too happy either, and I think I'm rather more scared of you than
him now at any rate,” and he guffawed at his own joke.

“I don't find that amusing, Tyler,” Miss
Murdock said.

“Oh, I'm sure you don't,” Tyler agreed. “But
after you've known his lordship longer, you'll find it a great deal
funnier then.”

She was silent for a moment, having no answer
for that, and as Tyler's amusement seemed to have run its course
and the other groom, with only a shake of his head went back to his
cleaning and did not seem inclined to pursue the topic further, she
asked, “But, Tyler, I was wondering, I thought you were employed by
St. James, not the duchess.”

He looked at her for a moment, his face
unreadable. “So I am, Miss. Just visitin' me uncle here on me time
off.”

“Oh. I see,” Miss Murdock said, wondering how
she had missed Tyler introducing the other groom, whom she had
gathered was named Bedrow, as his uncle before this. “I didn't mean
to pry for of course it isn't my business. I just came down to see
if there were anything worthy of mounting, but alas, I could find
nothing,” she explained. For just a moment, the thought had
occurred to her that St. James had sicced his groom on her to make
sure of her where abouts. Of course, that was silly, as she had
told him she would be here until the end of the week, and surely he
must realize that she would not go back on her word.

Tyler said, “Now, Miss, I know that milord
St. James would see to a mount for you if you merely tell him you
wish t'ride.”