The Mischievous Miss Murphy (21 page)

“Shoulder to shoulder, eh, Hugh?” Tony teased. “No closer than that? I’ve always known Patsy to be most demonstrative in her affections.”

Hugh blushed scarlet to the roots of his hair. “If I had known you were going to be crude I would have sought out your father, wherever he might be at the moment. As she’s a widow, asking formal permission for Patsy’s hand is only a courtesy, but I thought it fitting to consult you in the absence of the duke.”

“In that case, Hugh, I’ll be more than happy to give you my blessings, just as my father would do—right after he fell on your neck in gratitude. Lord, he was so worried he’d never marry off my adorably dim sister that he gave her to Harry Dillingham. Widow or not, I wouldn’t be surprised if the old man sprang for quite a wedding present, so grateful will he be.”

When Tony saw that Hugh’s usually placid face was taking on the look of an approaching thunderstorm, he added, “Besides, I couldn’t think of another man more suited to making Patsy the happiest woman on earth.”

“You really think so?” Hugh’s expression suddenly became as bright as the sun breaking through after the rain. “Fool that I am, for a man of my advanced years, I do love her. It’s strange, don’t you think, this love business?”

Tony stared at his friend owlishly. “How am I to know?”

Hugh shrugged, trying to be subtle as he, like many a moonstruck man before him, tried to ensure that all his single friends should be made as happy as he. “Will says you’re in love, seeing as how you’re camping on your sister’s doorstep while Candie is in residence.”

Now it was Tony’s turn to resemble a thundercloud.

“Ah well,” Hugh hastened to add, “you know Will. Jumping to conclusions as usual. Only exercise he gets, I dare say.”

Taking another long drink from his glass, Tony then mumbled something unintelligible as he slid lower in his chair and stared into the middle distance.

Hugh watched his friend anxiously. This was not the Tony he knew. Oh yes, he had seen him upset before, in moments of frustration or boredom. But never before had he seen Tony evince self-doubt, which was how Hugh chose to interpret Coniston’s strange expression.

“Well,” Hugh challenged, deciding to take the bull by the horns, “is Will off the mark as usual, or did he strike a nerve? Are you just hanging round Candie’s skirts because you’re afraid she and her uncle are out to fleece Patsy? If so, I believe I already told you I don’t believe a word of such nonsense. Candie’s a good sort, I can tell, although I’ll admit she’s a rare handful, no thanks to her uncle’s upbringing of her. But Patsy and I both think she’s a grand girl. Perfect for you, actually.”

“You’d think so, wouldn’t you?” Tony retorted acidly, stung into absolute honesty. “Then how do you explain the fact that the chit has refused to marry me? Twice!”

Hugh’s estimation of Candice Murphy, already complimentary, went up another notch. He had known from the beginning that Tony was more than casually attracted to the girl, but to have brought the great Mister Overnite to his knees was no mean feat.

“Does she know that you love her?” he asked after a small silence.

Tony banged his glass down on the table with unnecessary force. “What the blue blazes does that have to do with it? I wouldn’t have asked her if I didn’t mean it.”

“Mean what?” Hugh persisted. “That you want her in your bed, as you so arrogantly announced to me that first night, or that you love her with all your heart and can’t imagine life without her?”

Now Tony sneered. “Coming on a bit strong, aren’t you, Hugh? Next you’ll be penning novels for the Minerva Press.”

Hugh just smiled and shook his head. Poor Tony, alternating between balancing on his high ropes and bawling like a sick calf. For as mad a rake as Tony to be so laid by the heels was a gratifying sight to see. “You love her,” he said now with soft conviction.

Running a hand through his hair, Tony blustered, “All right, all right. Have your pound of flesh, Hugh, you deserve it after all my teasing about Patsy. Yes, damn it all, I love her!”

“Does she know?”

“Of course she knows!” Tony fairly bellowed, sending yet another servant scampering for cover.

“You’ve told her?” Hugh urged reasonably.

“Of course I’ve—good God!” Tony leaned toward his friend, grabbing Hugh’s arm and giving it a shake. “Wouldn’t she have already figured it out? I mean, Candie’s very bright. Do you really think she doesn’t know?”

Extracting his arm and making a point of smoothing his crumpled sleeve, Hugh drawled, “As I believe you have just found it out for yourself, how could she? She’s bright, Tony, but she ain’t a mind reader. Here now! Where are you going?”

Tony had risen so abruptly that his chair went crashing to the floor. “Where do you think?” he called back over his shoulder as he fairly trotted toward the door. “Oh yes,” he added, halting for a moment. “Put your drinks on my bill. You might as well be there—everyone else is!”

“I love you.”

Candie, who had been curled up in a huge chair in the corner of the library pretending to read a book, looked up at the sound of Tony’s voice. Slowly shaking her head, half in disbelief of what she had just heard, and half in amazement that he was somehow standing in Patsy’s library at all after their argument earlier, she whispered, “What—what did you say?”

“I said I love you,” he repeated calmly, striding toward her, one hand outstretched. “Hugh said you might want to know.”

“That—that was very considerate of him,” Candie responded, her heart beginning to beat quite wildly in her breast.

Drawing Candie to her feet, Coniston smiled and amended fairly, “Actually , it was Will who first noticed it. But that’s not important. Hugh says you were to know, so that you might understand why I want to marry you. Honestly, Candie, I thought you knew.”

Candie’s hands slipped up to cup his chin and he felt himself drowning in the deep-brown pools that were her eyes.

“I knew,” she confessed breathlessly. “Or at least I thought—hoped—you did. But I didn’t think you knew.”

Tony, who had been in the process of drawing Candie more firmly into his arms, checked his movement and became quite still. “But if you knew that I loved you why did you refuse to marry me? Or don’t you love me?”

“I love you, Tony. I have, for a very long time. I simply can’t marry you.”

He didn’t understand, not even a little bit.  He’d always been quite good at bedding women, but talking to them would appear to be another matter entirely.  Loving one of them was proving damn near impossible.

“Blister it, Candie, you’re not making any sense. And don’t hand me any more of that claptrap about you being beneath me. Oh yes,” he continued before she could say anything else, “I wasn’t so drunk that I don’t remember you spouting all that drivel that night in your chamber. I love you, damn it,” he argued in a very unloverlike fashion, “and anyone who dared to take exception to our marriage would have to deal with me!”

“I’m more than simply poor or underbred, Tony,” Candie supplied tonelessly when he had calmed sufficiently to release her arms and reposition himself in front of the window, where he stood glaring at her. “I’m a bastard.”

There. It was out. Now he would understand. The Gunning sisters may have been poor when they married their titled husbands, but they weren’t bastards. She couldn’t bring unknown, possibly tainted blood into the Betancourt family. She loved Tony too much to do that.

“That’s it?” Tony asked coldly from his battle station in front of the window, the late afternoon sun that had finally appeared pouring through the panes to make him look even more the handsome devil than he was. “My God, girl, so what? So you’re a Fitz-Murphy. I could name you a half dozen respected English families who had their starts as bastards.”

“Not from their female side, Tony,” Candie pointed out. “There’s a great difference in being the male by-blow of some prince and being the careless result of a nameless scamp and some gullible Irish girl of no background.”

“But you’re one of the Donegal Murphys,” Tony pointed out, trying a stab at levity. “According to Max, you’re descended from Irish Kings. Who gives a tinker’s curse who your father was?”

Tears threatened to overtake her as she tried to make him see sense. “Max does, for one. He knows who my father was, but he’s always refused to tell me. He must have been an awful man. Loving you as I do, I could never inflict his bad blood on your children.” And now the tears did begin to fall. “Can’t you see, Tony, ours is an impossible situation.  It’s why I’ve vowed never to marry.”

Whirling away from his accusing eyes, she begged brokenly, “Please. Go now. When Max returns we’ll both be leaving London anyway and you’ll soon forget me.”

His hands grasped her at the shoulders and he turned her around so that he could look into her eyes. “I’ll go, love, but only to find Max and make him tell me your father’s name. Your fine Irish imagination has turned the fellow into the worst of horned demons, and no demon could have fathered so sweet a girl as you. Max will tell us the truth, if only to put all your bogeymen to rest, and then there will be nothing to keep us apart.”

He lifted her chin with his fingertips and smiled down into her face. “Unless you really don’t love me?”

“Oh, Tony,” Candie whispered, flinging her arms around his neck and drawing him down to her, “I love you so very much!”

Their kiss was charged with all the passion two desperate people were capable of, and it was a thoroughly shaken Candice Murphy who watched Tony stride purposefully toward the door, a man with a mission.

He would find Maximilien P. Murphy and drag the truth out of him, if need be. By this time tomorrow he and Candie would be betrothed, and nothing and nobody would stand in their way!

Tony was confident, sure of his ability to bring Candie around to his way of thinking. Loving him as she did, loving each other as they did, Coniston had no reason to doubt that there would be a speedy resolution to all their troubles.

But then, Tony had never heard of one Mr. Malcolm P. MacAdam, Esquire, and his plans for an opal mine (of all things) in far-off Scotland.

T
ony’s confidence, which had been so high upon leaving Portman Square, began to flag a bit when he had sought out Max at all his usual haunts and come up empty. The rooms on Half Moon Street were dark and deserted-looking, and no one could remember seeing the Irishman at the Cocoa Tree or a half dozen other taverns for several days. Candie had already told Tony that Max had gone off on one of his sulks after berating her for not confiding in him as she had always done before Coniston entered her life, and she had admitted to being afraid Max could have succumbed to two of his greatest weaknesses— drinking and gambling.

After a full night and half a day spent in fruitless searching, Tony repaired to his town house for a change of clothes before heading back out onto the streets. It pained him that he had nothing to report to Candie, and he swore a silent oath that the sun would not go down on this day until he had ferreted out her delinquent uncle and pried loose anything the man knew about her parentage.

He was just about to set out once more when Will Merritt came in unannounced and plopped himself down on a chair. “Came to tell you I’m not such a loose screw as you and Hugh think, old sport. Almost got myself all rolled up in some nasty scheme Geoffrey Billings told me about, but I was too smart! Knew there was something havey-cavey about the thing. Trickery, that’s what it was. Base villainy. But I was too awake to fall for such nonsense. Opal mines in Scotland? Ha! That’d be the day!”