“I would hardly say that,” I said, and dropped the subject like a live coal. “How did the meeting with your literary friends go, Lord Paton?”
“Fine. You have made a remarkably speedy recovery, Miss Nesbitt. I had not thought to have the pleasure of actually seeing you this evening. I hoped for no more than a word with Miss Potter.”
“I am feeling very much better, thank you.”
“I wonder your cousin didn’t accompany you to the Lower Rooms for the assembly, as you are so wonderfully cured of whatever ailed you,” he said in an ironical tone.
“Oh, Geoffrey is in mourning,” I blurted out, and blushed again.
Paton’s eyes narrowed. “So I gathered by the lavish display of crape. Is it for anyone we know?” he asked in a peculiarly insinuating voice.
My guilty answer came out in a muffled whisper. “Yes.” I would reveal all to Paton, and try to enlist his support.
To my utter astonishment, he leapt from his chair and lunged in my direction. Before I knew what was happening, he was at my feet, grabbing me by both hands. It was in this melodramatic pose that Annie saw us when she arrived with the wine. She took one open-mouthed look and disappeared. I knew perfectly well she thought she was interrupting a proposal, and wished she had stayed.
“Emma, tell me the truth,” Paton said in impassioned accents. “Is that man the bounder who stole your fortune in an effort to make you have him?”
“Geoffrey is my father’s heir, but really the situation is of my own making.”
He was suddenly on the sofa beside me. First he lifted my hands to his lips and kissed them warmly. I cannot imagine how I must have looked, but I felt shocked and thrilled to death. Paton put an arm protectively around my shoulders and pulled me against his chest, murmuring in my ear, “It’s not your fault, Emma darling. I know none of this is your fault.”
“It is really not Geoffrey’s either—”
He straightened himself up and said more loudly, “Don’t try to protect him! I’ll call him out, the bastard! How dare he come here, trying to coerce you into marrying him.”
“No, Paton. You misunderstand. It is not marriage he has in mind.”
His eyes flew open. “Good God! He didn’t try to
force
himself on you!”
I opened my lips to object, and was suddenly wrapped in a crushing embrace that took the breath out of me. Paton’s lips moved in a frenzy of nibbling kisses over my ears and eyes and lips. “Poor Emma! And here I have been thinking ill of you. I should be beaten. I should have remained that first night. I was half afraid he’d try something, but you told me you could handle him. And Miss Potter was here. That will teach me to hold back my feelings. Emma—” He gazed at me from darkly glazed eyes.
I was speechless at this unexpected outpouring. I felt hot tears gathering in my eyes. It was all so strange and surprising and lovely to be loved. I felt a smile tremble on my lips. Before I said anything, Paton lowered his head and firmed my quivering lips with his. It was like a spark to tinder. A flame leapt between us, and for a long moment we were locked in a burning, passionate kiss that slowly subsided to mere ecstasy.
Paton looked a little embarrassed when he realized how he had gotten carried away. “It is half your own fault for being so irresistible,” he said softly. “I can hardly believe your cousin had the temerity to suggest moving you into a lovenest. Why did he not have the wits to marry you?”
“He did not suggest a lovenest!” I gasped. “Where did you get such a idea?”
“You said he did not intend marriage.”
“But he did not intend—that.”
A frown creased Paton’s brow. “What was all that about hiring a house? That has the ring of a man taking a mistress.”
A spurt of anger invaded my happiness. “You would know all about that, of course!” I had intended to sound teasing, but the tinge of anger was evident.
“I never propositioned a
lady
at least!” he defended himself.
“You were within Ame’s ace of it the day you took me to visit Angelina’s cottage, and don’t bother to deny it. If Lady DeGrue had not happened along...”
Paton gave a conscious, guilty start, but soon recovered. “So you
did
see through my little ruse. You are not as innocent as I thought. Odd you neglected to mention it.”
“I saw no point in embarrassing us both.”
“It was a misunderstanding. What was I to think when I found you amidst the rabble of Mrs. Speers’s cohorts with some uncertainty as to your name? She had already hinted me in the direction of one of her tenants. I thought the place a sort of literary brothel.”
“No doubt that is why you accepted her invitation!”
“She was writing a piece of fiction which she described to me as a biography of Madame de Stael.
That
is why I went, but it didn’t take me long to get the aroma of the place.”
“The aroma was familiar to you, I assume? If you did not like it, why did you linger?”
“To meet you.”
“I didn’t try to engage your interest.”
He examined me with an insolent stare, and when he spoke, it was in his drawling, literary lecture voice. “Ladies have two modes of attracting a gentleman’s attention. The first is by flirtation and insincere flattery. The second, used by more seasoned ladies, is to present a challenge. You seemed a past mistress of the latter sort.”
“And you decided to egg me on by that patronizing lecture on literature!”
“Oh, no, that was to warn you off from expecting a review in the
Quarterly.
I keep business and pleasure separate when possible. I soon realized that you were a cut above the others at that rout. Why do you think I was so eager to get you out of here?”
“Into your own private brothel, you mean?”
“I am referring to Mr. Percival’s flat. Not quite the mansion you and Miss Potter were so eager to boast of, but better than this.” He gave a disgusted glance around the room. “I soon understood what you were trying to accomplish. To create a reputation for yourself in the literary world, by the shortcut of my infatuation. You had some strong words to say about Rousseau, but you have no more notion of his philosophy than I have of ladies’ bonnets. That much was clear the day we drove to Corsham. However, I acquitted you of being a lightskirt.”
“Generous of you!”
“I was happy to learn you were—respectable.”
“A
lady,
Lord Paton, is the word you are looking for, or perhaps hesitate to confer on me.”
“By God, you don’t act like one! Why did you permit Nesbitt in the door after the way he has treated you?”
“He has treated me fairly. A good deal better than some!” I added with a blistering glare.
“Then why did you leave your home? It is inconceivable to me that a rational woman would flee from her home to live in a hovel, unless something was very much amiss. Why did you come to Bath? And having once chosen the most conventional, hidebound, gossip-ridden city in the kingdom, why did you proceed to flout every convention known to civilization? Why did you go to parties and balls when your father had just died? When I read your impassioned essay, I found it nearly possible to forgive you. I thought you had indeed been hard done by; now you calmly tell me your cousin, whom you libeled in your essay as ‘a conspirator to the infamous practice of selling daughters,’ has treated you fairly. Did it not occur to you to discuss your situation with him before taking off, to learn what precautions had been made in case you did not wish to marry him?”
Being revealed as a headstrong fool made me lose the last shred of my temper. “I don’t have to explain my actions to you! I did what I thought best.”
“You could hardly have done worse. Has he got some hold over you, Miss Nesbitt?” he asked in a last desperate attempt to explain the inexplicable.
“No. I was mistaken about Cousin Geoffrey. He came to clear up the misunderstanding.”
“As it is apparently cleared up to your satisfaction, why does he return?”
“Other details remain to be ironed out. I must find a new place to live, and explain somehow why I have not been in mourning.”
“If it is your intention to establish yourself as a decent woman in society, you will require a powerful iron.”
“Bath isn’t the only city in England. I can go somewhere else.”
“People’s tongues have a long reach, their pens even longer. This scandal will be known the length and breadth of the island before you’re through. I don’t know what is going on between you and your cousin, but it is not something I wish to be involved in. I regret I ever fell into your orbit.”
“You don’t regret it any more than I do! I don’t need a sanctimonious hypocrite to read me lectures in propriety. You are a lecher, sir! You may have as many lightskirts as you please, but
I
am beyond the pale because I don’t wear a black gown to mourn a father who hated me. It’s ridiculous!”
“Ridiculous or not, it is the custom of our society.
The Ladies’ Journal
may rant till the cows come home, it won’t be changed in our lifetime. I shall tell Mr. Percival you won’t be requiring the flat. Good evening, Miss Nesbitt. Pray give my best regards to Miss Potter.”
He left, and I stood staring at the door, not knowing whether I was more relieved to be rid of him, or sorry that I could not explain. After a thorough review of his various insults, I tried to view the situation objectively.
My behavior must appear irrational to someone who had never been in the suds. What would Paton know of a lady’s feelings upon her father’s death, to find herself disinherited? He thought me either a fiend or a fool, and would in all probability warn his close friends to have nothing to do with me.
I had hoped that with his protection I might tell the whole truth and face down the quizzes of Bath, but without his friendship, it couldn’t be done. I would return to Milverton with Geoffrey. Not to Nesbitt Hall, but to some hired mansion in the vicinity, amidst all my old friends. My past was not sullied with any freakish behavior there. If rumors trickled back from Bath, they would take it for unfounded gossip, and accept me.
All this madness would be left behind, and with it all the fun and excitement. No more writing for
The Ladies’Journal,
no more visits from Paton or Isabel. No balls at the Upper or Lower Rooms, no tour of the Pump Room, no drives in the Crescent Gardens. My recent folly would be the scarlet secret in my past. Ladies had recovered from worse.
Annie heard the door close and returned, wearing a roguish grin. “Are congratulations in order?” she asked hopefully.
“Hardly. Paton thinks I am a Bedlamite.”
“But he was on his knees, Emma! And with such a look on his face, I made sure he was proposing. A man doesn’t look like that if he is not in love.”
“Or in hate. He despises me. I am beginning to sound like Lord Ronald.”
“Did you tell him about your fortune?”
“Not specifically. I hinted at it.”
“But what put him in a pucker, my dear?”
I leaned my head back against the sofa. “Everything. I begin to think continuing here at Bath is impossible. Would you mind very much if we returned home, Annie? Or are you and Arthur ...”
She blushed and simpered. “He hasn’t asked me. The threat of leaving might very well turn the trick.”
“I shan’t urge you to refuse if you really care for him. I’ll go home alone.”
“Oh, Emma! You make me feel like a beast. Not that you would miss me once you got back to Milverton! Mrs. Stacey would be happy to act as your companion. In any case, you cannot leave till Geoffrey has a crack at Miss Bonham. There is no hurry to leave Bath. You can sulk in your room as well here as there.”
I had expected more sympathy from Annie. Love had turned her into a monster of selfishness, to go telling me the truth. Annie carried the clean glasses, and I poured more wine. Would I turn into a gin drinker, like Mrs. Speers, as old age and disillusionment came upon me? Perhaps I should buy a rooming house and enlarge my fortune. But all I felt up to was crawling into my bed and pulling the covers over my head, which is what I did.
Paton had come this evening to proclaim his love. He had kissed me madly, and told me none of it was my fault. And I had reveled in those brief moments of glory. How had I turned his mission into a debacle?
Where had I gone wrong? Should I have let him believe Geoffrey was a scoundrel, and he a knight to rescue me from perdition? Obviously that was unjust to my cousin. Did Paton expect me to apologize and grovel while he called me a conniver and a user and an ignoramus? I never claimed to be a scholar of Rousseau’s infamous philosophy. I never tried to conceal that I wished to get a review in his magazine. I did not try to engage his interest by some cunning trick, as he imagined.
Paton was in the wrong as much as I. He was a lecher, and I loved him so much that my whole body ached.
Chapter Fifteen
My major activities over the next few days were harping on Paton’s last, calamitous visit and fashioning a dowdy black gown from a bolt of bombazine purchased by Annie. The tedium of this job was interrupted upon occasion by various minor irritations in the form of visits from Mrs. Speers and Mr. Bellows. Geoffrey called often, usually alone but twice with Isabel. I could not go on being ill with an unidentified malady forever, so I was now officially in mourning for the death of an unspecified cousin, who had left me a small fortune. That much unsteady groundwork was laid for my rehabilitation.
I saw that Geoffrey was falling into the abyss of love. He looked like a moonling when Isabel spoke. His eyes lingered on her, and his lips were perpetually lifted in a witless half smile. He was scarcely aware of anyone else’s presence when she was with him.
No such reciprocal tokens of lunacy adorned Isabel’s visage. She treated him not quite like a dog, but like a hired companion. It was taken for granted he would do as he was bid, which was about the worst mistake he could make. He had not convinced her he was a dashing rake. I dare say it was impossible, when he had simultaneously to fulfill Lady DeGrue’s notions of a proper suitor.
I took him to task for it one morning when he dropped in without her. “I can’t be savage with her. She is too sweet” was his excuse.