No Place for a Dame (16 page)

The game went on past the dinner hour and far into the night. The servants, mindful of their master’s order to leave them strictly alone, did not once offer to tend the hearth, close the drapes, or in any way disturb the pair.

A housemaid was replenishing the water in the vase of flowers outside the library door when a tousle-haired Giles stuck his head out, spotted her, and snapped: “Sandwiches and port. At once.” When she returned as ordered, she managed a fleeting glimpse of what was happening behind those otherwise closed doors and reported later at the servants’ dinner table to an avidly interested group.

“I knocked on the door and Lord Strand himself answers. He steps aside and says where I’m to set the tray and I goes about doin’ so. Straight off, I see Mr. Quinn in that great chair that generally sits by the fire, only it’s been pulled up before Lord Strand’s desk.

“Mr. Quinn’s kicked off his shoes and I can see his stocking feet is curled up beneath his great belly and he’s perched in that chair like… like…” Her eyes lit with sudden inspiration, “that statue of Bud-hah I seen in Prinny’s dining room at Carleton House.”

“When did you ever see Prinny’s dining room at Carleton House?” a scullery maid asked scornfully.

The housemaid lifted her nose. “Last winter when I paid a ha-penny to take a look-see after one of them grand dinners he has, that’s when. But it ain’t right, if you ask me, for a young whelp like Mr. Quinn to sit like that in the presence of his betters.”

“What were they doing?” Burke asked, to keep the story moving along.

“Well, now, Mr. Burke,” the housemaid dimpled at the handsome young footman, “Mr. Quinn is peering ever so hard at a fistful of playing cards and chewing his bottom lip and there’s a pile of walnuts rolling about by his elbow and on the other side of the desk is another pile only somew’at larger.”

“They were gambling,” intoned Mrs. Silcock, just to make sure everyone understood. “Using walnuts as currency.”

Everyone had understood the implications except the second footman, Boote, who nodded his enlightenment. “I see.”

“Well, Lord Strand comes back round the desk and sits down and just stares at Mr. Quinn. But he’s smilin’ and I don’t mind telling you I wouldn’t like it if his lordship smiled at me like that, his eyes all sharp and shining, like a cat’s in moonlight. Would scare the daylights out of me, it would!”

“Now, girl, don’t you be comparing his lordship to some filthy cat unless you want to go to bed with no supper,” Mrs. Silcock scolded then added, “go on.”

“I didn’t mean nothing disrespectful,” the housemaid sulked. “Only meant to say his lordship looked in fine fettle. Like he’s having a fly old time, indeed, and it’s all at Mr. Quinn’s expense.

“And his smile makes Mr. Quinn right nervous, too. You can see that. And I expect it’s
been
making him nervous for some time, for ain’t Mr. Quinn’s cravat been pulled clear off and his collar come undone from ’round his neck? And a right scrawny neck it is, all apiece with his scrawny legs and arms.”

Mrs. Silcock looked disapproving at this criticism of a guest but as it was now an accepted part of the house mythology that she disliked Mr. Quinn, it came as no surprise when she didn’t voice a complaint.

The housemaid continued. “Then, all of a sudden, Mr. Quinn slaps his cards face down on the desk and says, ‘Stick!’ ”

“Ah!” intoned Burke knowingly. “They were playing
vingt-et-un
.”

“Well, ain’t you a one, Mr. Burke,” the housemaid tittered. “And do you play this ‘Vinty Own,’ yerself?”

To which Burke’s only reply was a broad wink.

“What happened next?” Boote asked.

The maid shrugged. “Don’t know. I left.”

“Why?” asked the scullery.

“Because I’d done what I been told and there weren’t no reason to stay. So I left.”

At which point everyone moaned except Mrs. Silcock, who refrained only at the last moment and only because, just in time, she remembered her dignity.

Chapter Fifteen

H
ow many nuts did you say you had over there, Strand?”

“None.”

“Why, begad, you don’t, do you?” Avery’s eyelids batted up and down in a parody of stunned surprise. “Which means… I win!”

Pleasure spilled out of her like light from a lantern. Her head fell back and the low, musical laughter rippled through the room. “I win! I win! I win!”

“And gloat.”

Her eyes grew round as if the idea delighted her even more. “
And
I gloat!” She sobered. Not much, but enough to peep at him sidelong. “You don’t mind, do you?”

How could he? “Not at all. Gloat on. I expect I have it coming. Beside, you look as pleased as if you’d spotted a pony on the lawn come Christmas morning.”

She puzzled over that one. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

Of course not. She had never been the daughter of the house. It would never have occurred to her to ask for a pony for Christmas and suddenly he found himself wondering if she had ever asked for anything for
Christmas and if so, what it had been and if she had gotten it? He wished he had given her something. He hoped his father had.

“I know. It’s part of your charm.”

She went quite still. “You think I have charm?”

“Yes.”

He didn’t know how he’d expected her to react to that. A blush, a humble look to the side, a little modest smile of pleasure, perhaps? He did
not
expect her to leap to her feet with a little shout of triumph. But that’s what she did.

She bounded out of the chair, the hideous stuffed corset wobbling around her, and wheeled around, her arms outstretched and her head thrown back. Comical, ridiculous, absurd. Yet his breath caught in his throat and he found himself wishing she hadn’t cut her hair and that it was streaming behind her, as it had the night atop Killylea when the icy wind had pulled it into long, auburn pennants. “I do, don’t I? I have charm
and
I am a better gambler than you.”

“Now, I never said—”

She stopped spinning, laughing his words down. “
And
now you shall have to pay the forfeit!”

“Which is?” he prompted with a touch of alarm. She’d been sincere in warning him. This woman
was
capable of anything. She might demand a world tour, take his house, his Shakespeare folio… his heart. He scowled at the random thought.

The fake brow had started to come undone. It angled above her natural brow, making her look ridiculously quizzical. “I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.”

“You can’t do that,” he protested. “You have to decide now so I can pay my debt and be done with it.”

“Of course I can and no, I don’t.” She hopped over to where he still sat, putting her palms flat on the desk and bracing herself as she leaned over it towards him. She gave him an entirely mischievous, triumphant grin. “You’ll just have to wait.”

She tapped him lightly on the chest, her teeth flashing white in the firelight, her skin rosy and satiny where it lay exposed by her open collar.

It was late. Going on two o’clock in the morning and he hadn’t had much sleep in the preceding nights. He’d drunk most of a bottle of port. He hadn’t been with a woman in weeks.

But all the reasons in the world didn’t change the fact that he wanted her more than anything he’d ever wanted in his life.

Or could belie the fact that he always had.

He’d been twenty-one, returned home for a short visit from London, when he’d realized Avery Quinn was something extraordinary.

Marooned on England’s shores by his father’s refusal to let him buy a commission in an active regiment, he’d set about becoming in fact what his father always considered him: an ornament, a dandy and a fop, a drunk and a gambler. But then he’d been recruited by the Secret Committee and by twenty-one had already done things of which he would scarce have believed himself capable. So when he had ridden up to Killylea that day he’d been pathetically eager to be home. At Killylea, the sea wind would scour the stench from one’s clothes and heart, one could sleep without dreams and speak to people without wondering what one might be required to do to them on the morrow.

He’d reined in his horse at the bottom of the drive to simply drink in his fill of the sight. On his left was the orchard, on his right the wide lawn, and before him, cresting the prominence that looked out over the sea, rose Killylea, splendid in her great, gray substance, her durability, a castle built not to impress but to shelter.

He was about to remount when he heard wild laughter and a dog barking furiously, and as he watched, a girl dashed from out of the orchard. Hard on her heels bounded an enormous brindle mastiff. The girl was waving what looked like a piece of thick rope over her head and as he watched in growing concern, the dog leapt and seized it, knocking her over. She fell with an
uff!
grabbing the dog around the neck and carrying him with her to the ground.

They tumbled together in a flurry of paws and bare feet, silky brindle flanks and long, shapely legs amidst a swirl of skirts and petticoats. Not a girl, then, but a woman, at least from what he could see of her lithe limbs and pert derriere. Her auburn curls cascaded around her
shoulders, obscuring her face from his view. She was laughing again, a rich, unfettered sound of pure enjoyment.

It drew him like a fire on a cold night, warming and loosening the cold knot that he carried within his chest. He found himself smiling as the wrestling match continued. The dog growled fiercely and the girl laughed louder, leaping to her feet and heaving back on the rope. The dog hauled back as well, pulling even harder. She fell forward flat onto her stomach as the rope was wrenched from her hands and, with a toss of his head, the dog dashed away with his prize.

She flung back her hair, lifting herself up on her forearms and screeching after him, “You come back here, you miserable great cheat!”

He knew that screech.

“Avery?”

Her head swiveled round. Beautiful eyes, deeper than the blue in a peacock’s feather but just as rich, turned towards him and, as he watched, the smile slowly faded from her lips, but, even worse, from her eyes. Her expression grew shuttered and a flush stained her cheeks. She bolted to her feet, dusting the grass and leaves from her skirts, her dress a trifle too tight for the ripe figure blooming beneath. The prickly little girl who’d so enjoyed proving her superiority over him had become a woman.

Of all those who lived and worked at Killylea, Avery Quinn had been the only person whom his much-vaunted charm had failed to impress. She always seemed to go out of her way to pick a fight, or point out an error in his facts or reasoning. He’d found it amusing. So much so that whenever he visited he purposely erred in making some assertion just to give her the pleasure of correcting him.

He’d always felt a little uneasy about her, thinking she must lead a strange and lonely existence, educated like a daughter of the house—no, make that a son of the house—but with none of their expectations. What did his father think would become of her when all was said and done?

But apparently she was not the overly serious, unhappy creature he’d believed. Her laughter had come easily and her glee had been uninhibited and expansive. Perhaps she had finally looked in the mirror and seen what he’d always suspected: that the promise contained in the strong, angular child’s face would be fulfilled in the handsome,
arresting visage of a woman. A woman who looked anything but scholarly, with a gypsy mane of tangled curls and eyes that seemed lit from within by some internal fire. She was regarding him watchfully, as if she expected to be reprimanded. Or mocked.

On any other day, he would have obliged. It was part and parcel of his new persona. But not that day. Perhaps it was precisely because he had so recently played the role of condescending exquisite that he resisted now. Perhaps it was because she’d been so happy just moments before and his arrival had taken that from her, or because he wanted someone to think better of him and it had been a long time since he’d given any one cause to, but for whatever reason he did not say a word. He only remounted his horse and continued on his way.