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“Ah.” That was all she said, and Hugh sensed there was a world of meaning in that one drawn-out syllable.
“What doesahmean?”
“Nothing.”
“It means something.”
She stared up at the sky. “It means I understand. You have an obligation to my sister, and you felt sorry for me.”
Hugh bristled. He propped himself up on an elbow and looked at her. “I didn’t feel sorry for you.”
“It’s understandable. Everyone feels sorry for me. I’m a young widow. I’m the object of much pity.”
“I don’t pity you or feel sorry for you. In fact, until a few hours ago, I didn’t much like you.”
She looked at him sharply, but the scolding words he expected didn’t come. Instead, she broke into a smile. “I didn’t like you either.”
“And now?”
She shrugged. “I’m still considering.”
“Bloody hell. What does a man have to do to claim your good graces?”
“It’s not as though you like me.” She glanced at him shyly. “Do you?”
“I do, actually. I find I like you even more as the night has progressed.”
“Really?” Her dark eyes glittered. “Why is that?”
“The mud, I think.” His tone was serious but his expression full of humor. “It’s hard not to like a woman who slaps mud all over herself without a second thought.”
“I had second thoughts. I had third ones as well, but I’d rather be dirty and alive than clean and dead.”
“Hear, hear.”
“I’m sure most women would feel the same. Not most women of my acquaintance, but most women with any sense of reason.”
“The nobility is sorely lacking in reason, I fear.”
“But not you. You tried to warn me, to warn all of us, and we didn’t listen.”
“It’s difficult to believe the earth is round when all you see before you is flat.”
“I wish I’d listened.”
“And what would you have done differently?”
“I might have questioned why so many of my footmen were ill. I might have worried at one of my quartet being absent. Surely these were warning signs for anyone looking.”
“I didn’t see them, and I was looking.”
“It wasn’t your household.”
True enough, but it troubled him now that there had been signs he hadn’t seen.
“Why do you think my servants turned against me?”
“They didn’t all turn against you.”
