As if she had not spoken, Jack said, “I shall have a bite of supper, and be sure the sheets are aired.Do send someone to see to my horse.There’s no one in the stables.”
Mrs.Rains scowled direly, her mouth opening and closing several times.Jack raised his eyebrow as though surprised to see her still in the room.She threw up her hands and stormed off to the kitchen, muttering.
Jack who, much to Tabitha’s amusement, carried the important gentleman role with surprising splendour, looked about him in a leisurely fashion.He nodded distantly to the Frenchmen, and to those now seated at Tabitha’s table.
Tabitha’s lips twitched uncontrollably.
Mr.De’Ath—now apparently Mr.Johns—gave no sign of recognition, but hung his hat on the stand by the door and languidly unbuttoned his overcoat.
Mrs.Rains re-entered the room with surprising speed, and this time the huge barrel-shaped figure of her husband followed.Both bore trays and looked thunderous.The woman slapped two mugs of milk in front of Tabitha and Lily, and one of watery beer before Lieutenant Meade, then stepped aside to let her husband deliver a plate of familiar mutton stew to the officer.
Rains was breathing quickly, and his greasy hair was damp.But though his eyes were like flint he turned politely enough to the newest arrival.“Where would you care to sit, sir?”
“You are welcome to join us, sir,” Tabitha said amiably.
Jack inclined his head.“You are kind.”He sat in the vacant chair beside her.“My name is Johns.”
“So I heard.Mine is Sark.This is my stepdaughter, Lady Lily, and Lieutenant Meade.”
At least she had the pleasure of surprising him.His widening eyes flew to Lily and fixed upon her face.And that was when she felt her first ever pangs of monstrous, unbearable jealousy.
***
JACK HAD RATHER ENJOYEDplaying the haughty nobleman that his uncles and tutors had always wanted him to be.If he felt any resentment to see the dashing young officer sitting on Tabitha’s other side, well, he had always known his limitations.Who the devil was the man to her?
But it was the presence of Lily that made him gawp so stupidly when he should have been prepared for it.Tabitha had told him when they first met that she was going home to collect her stepdaughter, but the fact had got lost somehow in the affair of the smugglers and the ridiculous, blazing happiness of being with her again so unexpectedly.
Lady Lily was still a remarkably pretty girl, though he doubted he would ever have recognized her from the six-year-old in pigtails and short skirts.There appeared to be some lively humour in her eyes and good nature in the curve of her lips.
Pulling himself together, he inclined his head to her and to Lieutenant Meade and let the innkeeper set a plate of stew in front of him.
“Wine, if you please,” he said in the tones of one who is always obeyed.“And don’t forget my poor horse.”
The innkeeper’s smile was so fixed that it looked more like a snarl, though he said, “Of course not, sir, we’re seeing to him now.”
Thewetroubled him.He hoped it was not the smugglers helping out for they were rough fellows, and he had grown fond of this horse.He resolved to go and check on him as soon as the meal was finished.
He barely noticed what he ate, although his entire household would have been scandalized by its plebian nature.He was too overwhelmed by his internal rejoicings to have Tabitha beside him, by the discomfort of Lily’s presence, and by the mystery of the smuggled Frenchmen at the next table.
He observed the three of them from the corner of his eye while the conversation went on around his own table.He had the impression that the silent Frenchmen were listening too, though what they could learn from the tale of Lieutenant Meade’s injury on the Peninsula several weeks ago, or the expected company at Lady Hawthorn’s party, was debateable.
He was, however, glad to hear that Meade was not the ladies’ escort, but someone merely encountered at the inn, who had got lost while making his own way to Hawthorn Court.He also noted that the young officer’s eyes tended to stray more often to Lily than to Tabitha during lulls in the conversation.Perhaps another man making sheep’s eyes at the ducal betrothed should not have pleased him.It could certainly make things more messy in the future.
For now, he decided to concentrate on the more urgent matter of the smuggled Frenchmen who, when they did speak to each other, did so in such low voices that he could not even make out which language they were speaking, let alone what they said.He was mulling over a few conversational gambits to draw them in when the oldest of the Frenchmen rose from his table and walked purposefully toward them.
He bowed.“Lady Sark.”
“Mr.Smith,” Tabitha returned graciously.
Smith?Seriously?
“Forgive my intrusion, but you may have gathered your name was familiar to me.I used to know a Lord Sark, many years ago.Althorpe was his Christian name.”
“My late husband.”
“Ah, I am very sorry to hear that.My condolences.”
“You are too kind.”Tabitha met the Frenchman’s gaze limpidly.“I am surprised you did not know.It was more than two years ago.”
