It was obviously not the answer he had expected. For a moment he looked nonplussed, then he quickly recovered and took a step closer to her. “I’m afraid I really must insist, Lady Augusta.”
She, too, crossed her arms. “Oh? And just how do you plan to do that? Whips and chains? The rack and thumbscrews?”
“Don’t tempt me.” There was a brief pause, then he tried another tack. “I don’t know what you are up to, but whatever is, it’s a dangerous game, one you have no business playing.”
“Why? Because I am a female?” she asked. “It seems to me, milord, that it wasIwho had the forethought to set a watchman, it wasIwho jimmied the drawer, and it wasIwho had a planned route of escape.”
“You should not have been there in the first place.” He shifted uncomfortably from one foot to another. “I had my own plans for making a quick exit,” he muttered. “And I could have opened the damn drawer just as quickly as you did.”
“Well, I do have to admit that the idea of making things look like a simple burglary was fast thinking on your part …” Her words trailed off as a sudden smile blossomed on her lips. “Good Heavens, sir, itwasa burglary. Do you think our hosts realize they have invited a hunted criminal to their gala? Why even now, the Runners are probably combing the stews, looking for you and the missing silver.”
His lips twitched. “It was extraordinarily ugly. It deserved to disappear.”
“Hideous,” she agreed, trying her best not to laugh aloud.
“By the by, shouldn’t you be making the word “criminal” plural?” Try as he might to remain stern, a chuckle escaped his lips at the notion of how absurd they must have appeared, in their haste to throw the study into disarray. “The porcelain was no doubt priceless.”
“It was hideous as well.” Her eyes were alight with humor. “But I didn’t abscond with it.”
For a moment their muted laughter mingled with the distant notes of the musicians. Then Marcus became serious again. “You may not have purloined any family heirlooms, but I did see several of the papers disappear into your, er, shirt. I should like to ask you again what exactly you were doing there.”
Augusta’s face became a stony mask. “I should like to ask you the same question. I assume you aren’t in the habit of climbing into strange houses and making off with assorted geegaws, no matter how ugly.” In truth, she was just as puzzled by his presence in the study as he was by hers.
They both eyed each other warily, each seeming to wait for the other to speak.
Finally,the earl gave a harried sigh. He had known she was obstinate, but he hadn’t realized just how obstinate. Short of resorting to the methods she had mentioned earlier, it looked as if he had precious little hope of forcing any information out of her. So this time, he tried a compromise.
“If I give you—in broadest terms, mind you—an explanation, will you agree to do the same?”
Augusta pursed her lips. “I shall consider it.”
He resisted the urge to stamp his foot. He hadn’t done that since he was six and hadn’t yet learned to charm women in general and his nanny in particular. “Confound it, Lady Augusta. That’s hardly a fair answer.”
“Perhaps not, but it is the best I can do until I hear what you have to say.”
He rubbed absently at his jaw. “Hell’s teeth. I suppose?—”
The earl’s words were cut off by a violent shove from Augusta. He staggered backward, so that the falling coping stone merely grazed his head. Even so, the force of the blow was enough to knock him, half dazed, to the graveled path.
Augusta quickly knelt down beside him and took his head onto her lap. “Lord Dunham!” Her hands smoothed away the thick raven locks from his brow, revealing a nasty cut at the hairline just above his temple. “Good heavens, you’re hurt.”
His eyes fluttered open. “Yes,” he muttered faintly. “I seem to be risking life and limb every time I get near you.” He struggled to disengage one of the thorny branches of the rosebush from the lapel of his coat, which only widened the tear it had caused in the fine fabric. “Not to speak of my wardrobe. You aren’t perchance in the employ of Weston, hired for the sake of increasing his trade? The fellow makes enough off of me as it is.”
She had already fished a handkerchief out of his coat pocket and had it pressed up against his wound. Her other hand moved around to cradle his shoulders. Although he had recovered his wits, Marcus found himself strangely loath to remove his head from her lap.
“Really, sir, that is most ungenerous of you! I didn’t dislodge that stone from the roof.”
He sat up abruptly, the sudden movement causing him to wince in pain. “Son of a—” He caught himself on seeing Augusta’s face quite close to his. “—of a dog,” he finished lamely.
Her lips quirked. “No, what you really mean to say is, Goddamn spawn of Satan.”
“What?”
“I said?—”
“Yes, yes, I heard what you said. What I meant was, where on earth did a gently bred female ever hear such language?”
“Why, from you, sir, when you stepped in that pile of decayed cabbage.”
