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Only when the door had closed behind him did his uncle give vent to a low snort of laughter.
“Mr. Langdon,” said the valet reproachfully.
“Yes, yes, I know. My uncle just told me. I suppose I’d better comb my hair,” said Jack, moving to the dresser. “He wants me to deliver an invitation to Lady Potterby. To dinner. Can you believe it?” He stared at his reflection in the glass. “I’ve been coming here since I was in skirts and not once do I recall my uncle entertaining. Not once.”
“If you mean to go out, sir, you had better change. With the Hessians it must be the green coat and buff pantaloons,” said the valet. He collected these objects and laid them out.
“I’m only running next door, Fellows.”
“Indeed, sir, but you are not departing in that costume, unless you plan to muck out Lady Potterby’s stables. As it is you will astonish the horses.”
Plainly, Mr. Langdon’s valet was not of the stoically all-enduring, self-effacing variety. Mr. Fellows had tried that technique early in his employment and found it unproductive. He had learned that if his master was not to disgrace him in public, the servant must speak his mind and maintain a tight rein.
Mr. Fellows was well aware that his employer, having recently suffered a setback in an affair of the heart, required a suitable period of mourning. That is why Mr. Langdon had been indulged a solo trip to his uncle’s. However, in Mr. Fellows’s considered opinion, a week or so was quite sufficient a period of lamentation for a healthy young man. It was now time for Mr. Langdon to be marched back—properly attired—to the world of the living. Besides, there was a young lady next door whose abigail’s acquaintance Mr. Fellows had made this morning and wished to pursue. If the lady thought Mr. Langdon’s appearance shabby, her maid would entertain similar conclusions about the gentleman’s gentleman.
Immaculately groomed but heavy-hearted, Mr. Langdon walked slowly along the path which intersected the graceful line of tall elms forming the boundary between the two estates. Ahead the way cut through a rolling expanse of lawn dotted with oaks and more elms. In the shade of one venerable oak a herd of sheep languidly graced.
All about him was the familiar tranquillity Jack had left London for. He’d come here hoping the serenity and isolation of Rossing Hall would soothe away all memories of his failure with the one young lady who might have made him happy. True enough, the disappointment and shame had subsided—but only because they’d been so violently uprooted and hurled aside by a tempest in the form of Delilah Desmond.
Jack knew he was infatuated with her. He had sense enough remaining to recognise that. But for the life of him he could not understand why. Always before his senses had responded in accord with his character and tastes. Even the impures he’d occasionally taken up with had been the quieter, more genteel of their breed. He loathed noise, confrontation, violence, and argument, yet he was obsessed with a Fury in human form. Well, not exactly a Fury, he amended, but she was at least as capricious and temperamental as any of the ancient female deities.
She screamed at him and struck him and humiliated him and scorned him, and through the turbulence that seemed to whirl constantly about her—even on those rare occasions when she was relatively subdued—he wanted her. That was all, and that was everything.
This morning, after another tormented, sleepless night, he’d reviewed his situation and concluded he must either return to London and trust time and absence to cure him, or offer for her and let her cure him—or kill him. The last, he thought, was a deal more likely.
Though she despised him, she might consent. Given Society’s prejudices, she may not have another suitable offer. He felt, as he always did when he considered her situation, a surge of compassion for her and anger at his fellows.
That was almost the worst of it. If the world had not persisted in visiting the sins of the parents upon the offspring, Miss Desmond might never have crossed his path. She might have been shackled as soon as she emerged from the schoolroom, and he would not be in so pathetic a case as to contemplate wedding a woman so admirably designed to make him wretched.
Besides, he chided himself as he took a shortcut through Lady Potterby’s garden, marrying Miss Desmond was too extreme a remedy, even if she were desperate enough to consent. It was like cutting off one’s head to cure a toothache. He would return to London directly after this curst dinner party.
As he approached the terrace, he came upon Miss Desmond, who, head bent and skirts whirling, was agitatedly pacing. Mr. Langdon had but a fleeting glimpse—though one sufficient to make him groan inwardly—of a pair of exceptionally fine ankles before she became aware of his presence and abruptly halted.
Then she did the strangest thing. She smiled, and the upward curve of her sensuous mouth sent every thought of London flying from Mr. Langdon’s head.
As she stepped forward to greet him, he apologised for interrupting her meditations.
“You’re a very welcome interruption, Mr. Langdon,” said she, to his inutterable amazement. “We’ve been plagued with company all day. I only came out to talk to myself, since that was the only party with whom I could have a natural conversation. Decorum is heavy work,” she explained.
“Then I fear you’ll recall the welcome when you learn my errand, because I’m sent to bring you more of the same.” He held up the invitation. “My uncle desires the pleasure of your company—and that of your father and Lady Potterby as well—at dinner Wednesday evening. I hope this is not excessively short notice. You might have wished more time to plan an escape to Mongolia perhaps.”
Another smile. Mr. Langdon grew dizzy.
“You know there’s no escape for me, Mr. Langdon. Anyhow, I did have notice. Lord Rossing was by earlier in the week to ask my aunt whether the date was convenient. Your errand only formalises the plans.”
Mr. Langdon was too stunned by his remarkable fortune in finding Miss Desmond in gentle humour to think of questioning why his uncle had withheld this information.
“As long as my errand is not urgent, perhaps we might delay the formalities,” he said, moved to unheard-of boldness by her amiability. “May I pace the terrace with you awhile and eavesdrop upon your ‘natural conversation’ with yourself?”
A faint colour tinged her cheeks as she shook her head. Several pins dropped to paving stones, loosening the long black curls they’d held. Jack looked at the pins and at the hair, and he was done for.
“Pacing is forbidden before company,” she answered. “In fact, I’m supposed to restrain myself even in private so as not to feed a bad habit.” She sighed. “The trouble is, I’m so full of bad habits that when I leave them off there’s hardly anything left of me.”
“Only a beautiful shell? Well, I shall have to make do,” said Mr. Langdon. “Since you’re so dangerously inclined to pace, perhaps we’d better avail ourselves of that genteel-looking bench behind you.”
When they were seated, Miss Desmond told him of her trials and tribulations with all the callers who came expecting a “common little baggage,” as she put it, and must be conquered by her unspeakable propriety. “It is perfectly excruciating,” she complained. “After an hour I want to scream. After two hours I want to commit murder.”
“You remind me of my friend Max,” said Jack, smiling. “He’s always complaining that propriety wrings all the spirit out of a chap and Convention is just another word for Strangulation.”
“A man after my own heart,” said Delilah. “You’ve mentioned him before, I think? Is this not the same fellow who claims that if something is pleasant, it cannot be correct?”
Mr. Langdon must have appeared very surprised because she laughed and said, “You needn’t look so stunned. Sometimes I do listen, you know—and when I do, I usually remember. I have an excellent memory—comes of all those card games, I suppose.”
“Then I’ll be sure not to play you for high stakes, Miss Desmond. And I’ll certainly be careful what remarks of Lord Rand’s I share with you. Some of his pearls of wisdom are not fit for feminine ears.”
“Yet you seem to admire him—or like him at least.”
“He’s one of the finest fellows I know,” said Jack, neglecting to add that this noble fellow had stolen away the love of his life. “An old and trusted friend.”
“Lord Berne is another such, I take it? He told me you’ve been friends since you were babies. I find that intriguing. You’re a most puzzling man,” she said. “From what you repeat of Lord Rand’s wisdom and what I’ve seen of Lord Berne, they seem not at all the sort of friends I’d expect you to have.”
