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“Then I'll guess,” Liam declared, glancing at her sidelong again.
“You will make a right fool of yourself, listing various things to the air,” she warned, hoping it would dissuade him. She’d fainted in the church just imagining him performing the sort of lurid acts that were in her sketches. What it might do to her to hear him describe them out loud, she might well fall out of the carriage then.
Though she was getting used to looking at him now, it did not pinch her heart and send her into a tizzy just to glimpse him now, only flutters.
“I’ll survive,” Liam shrugged, not knowing the sort of trouble he was getting himself into as he laid down the rules of this dangerous game. “As a lady of particular gentle stock... I would not expect you to give any statement I make a proper answer. However. If you would indicate whether these drawings have such scenes, by humming, I would be most grateful.”
Diane could only bite back the words, ‘I promise, you wouldn’t be if you knew.’
She was, of course, determined not to play his silly game. She would not hum a single note to any of his supposing’s.
“All scenes of a couple standing apart, but nonetheless courting. Like the ‘Receipts for a Courtship’ from the newspaper.”
Diane had seen the very one he spoke of, a Laurie and Whittle engraving of a couple, a man handing a woman a note. Her aunt had shown it to her. During the beginning of her courtship with Martin, when she still was excited, about its potential, she had obsessively poured over it, she had practically memorized the verse printed below it:
'Two or three dears, and two or three sweets;
Two or three balls, and two or three treats;
Two or three serenades given as a lure;
Two or three oaths for how much they endure;
Two or three messages sent in a day;
Two or three times led out from the play;
Two or three soft speeches made by the way;
Two or three tickets for two or three times;
Two or three letters writ all in rhymes;
Two or three months keeping strict to these rules,
Can never fail in making a couple of fools.'
Very little of those gestures were ever made between Martin and Diane, and yet they were still a pair of fools.
She resolved herself not to think too much of Martin, lest she feel pity for the man, being left at the altar like that. She didn’t want to feel any inclination to turn their carriage around and head back.
Liam leaned his shoulder into hers. “Hm?”
She schooled her face forward, expressionless, determined not to make a sound.
He pressed against her side more. She could feel, even with his coat and her cloak between them, the sheer warmth coming off him. He hummed louder, intoning a questioning note.
“By no means would I consider that similar to my drawings. The subjects of mine are not so commonly encountered,” she allowed herself to say, since it was not humming.
“The rules, Miss Carter,” Liam reminded her, as he leaned further over, practically taking over her seat. Any more and he would push her out of the carriage!
Diane grit her teeth together and hummed a no. Her drawings were far less polite than the Receipts for a Courtship.
Liam seemed satisfied with that, settling back into his own seat. “Scenes of couples holding hands?”
“Bare or gloved?”
Liam arched an eyebrow. “Either.”
