Page 83 of Barbarous

“My lady?” Rowena held out her hand to relieve Daphne of her spectacles.

“I will wear them, Rowena.” She ignored her maid’s look of disapproval. Why walk through the world bumping into doorways when the only person whose opinion mattered loved the way she looked wearing spectacles—and nothing else.

Cherishing that thought, Daphne hurried from her room on a rare cloud of bliss.

* * *

The breakfast room was empty when she arrived. She was just about to ring and ask if Lord Ramsay had come down when two footmen entered. One bore fresh coffee and the other a letter.

“Lord Ramsay said to wait until you’d come down to breakfast to give you this, my lady.”

Daphne forced herself to take a sip from her cup of coffee and order some fresh toast from the remaining footman, waiting until he’d left before tearing open the letter:

My Beautiful Lover,

It was wretched work leaving you lying so warm and soft in bed this morning. Only the knowledge that I must secure the means to have you in my bed and arms every night and morning caused me to make indecent haste and leave you. I am off to procure a special license. I will not rest easy until I can call you my own—in law as well as deed (are you blushing at that thought, my beautiful darling?).

Yours alone,

Hugh

As love letters went, it was not a long one. However, his desire to wed her so speedily told her everything she needed to know about his feelings for her.

* * *

Despite her best efforts to move the morning’s activities along, it was past noon before Daphne, Rowena, the two boys, and one boomerang set out from Davenport House. They took the barouche and enjoyed a leisurely if overcast ride to the park.

Since the item Lucien and Richard would be hurling might cause harm to bystanders, Daphne had the coachman set them down in one of the less frequented areas of the park.

She took one of the footmen with her but waved away the other. “We will not be long,” she told the coachman. “Return for us in three-quarters of an hour.”

They walked a short distance from the carriage path to a clearing that was well shaded. Daphne and Rowena settled themselves on a blanket while the footman led the boys through the trees toward the nearby clearing.

“Do not throw that instrument at one another, and take turns,” Daphne called after them.

Rowena took one of the boys’ jackets from her large canvas bag and began darning one of the tears or holes they made in every garment they possessed.

Daphne leaned back against a tree and opened Herr Goethe’s Zur Farbenlehre, which she’d purchased at Hatchards. She read, listening with one ear for any howls of pain or arguments.

She couldn’t have said how long they’d been seated thus when an angry shout came from beyond the trees.

Rowena frowned. “Oh, Lord. It sounds as if they might have hit someone.” She began to put down her work but Daphne stopped her.

“Don’t disturb your labors,” she said, getting to her feet, “I am much less profitably employed. I will go see what they have got up to.”

The first thing she saw when she emerged from the trees was Richard running toward another small stand of oaks on the far side of the clearing. Lucien was nowhere in sight; neither was the footman.

Daphne cupped her hands around her mouth and called out, “Richard! Please tell your brother to fetch his toy and come back!” Richard either didn’t hear her or didn’t heed her as he, too, disappeared into the trees.

“Disobedient little wretches,” she muttered beneath her breath, walking faster than was easy in such a form-fitting dress and becoming uncomfortably warm in the process. As she neared the trees she heard the sound of boyish squealing followed by adult voices. Without any thought for her dress she broke into a run, rounding the trees in time to see a burly man grab Richard. A second man was vainly attempting to drag a flailing, kicking, and yelling Lucien toward a large rickety coach. Her footman lay in an unmoving heap.

Daphne’s body was already in motion. “Stop! Release him at once!” She lunged at the closer man—the one holding Richard. “Let him go!” she shrieked.

“That’s the one—grab her,” the other man yelled, and then let out a blood-curdling shriek. Daphne saw Lucien’s mouth was attached to the man’s arm. His captor drew back his free hand and struck her son hard enough to send him reeling.

“You brute!” she screamed, grabbing Richard’s arm with one hand and lunging toward Lucien. She’d taken only a few steps when a hand like a vise grabbed the nape of her neck and stopped her in her tracks.

“Now ear then, missus, you howd on a minnit! We don’t reckon to arms the boys or you neever. Jes’ calm yerself, luvvy,” he crooned in a reasonable tone as he effortlessly drew her toward him, in spite of her struggling and flailing.