Chapter 14

C HAPTER 14

Cordelia first saw Lord Evermore as the party assembled before dinner. He was a tall dark-haired man, so thin that it made him look taller still, with bony wrists and deep-set brown eyes. He stood beside Lady Hester's chair, his head bent as he listened.

What struck her most strongly, however, was that he was old. There was silver at his temples and threading his hair. Fine lines had etched the skin around his eyes and bracketed his mouth.

He's as old as the Squire or Lady Hester! Surely Mother can't expect me to marry someone like that?

She knew the thought was foolish as soon as she had it, and felt a flush of embarrassment, even though she hadn't said it out loud. Of course her mother would expect that. A rich man, she'd always said. Not a young man.

"Lord Evermore," her mother said warmly, taking Cordelia's hand and drawing her across the room. "Let me introduce my daughter Cordelia. Cordelia, this is Lord Richard Evermore."

"A pleasure to meet you, Cordelia," said Evermore, bowing over her hand. He had a low, pleasant voice—or at least Cordelia might have thought it was pleasant if she had not been instructed to charm the man.

Evangeline pinched her arm sharply before releasing it. Cordelia, jolted, curtsied more deeply than she probably should have. Lord Evermore's eyebrows went up. Cordelia felt her face growing hot. She took a deep breath and said, "It is very nice to meet you, sir."

That came out all right. I think. Her flush cooled. She wanted to hide in a corner, but with her mother standing right there, she didn't dare. Charming. I am supposed to be charming. "Did you have a pleasant… er…" Too late she remembered that it had rained all day. "A long journey?"

"Neither one, I fear," said Evermore easily. "Only a few hours, but it rained the whole way. Though I have hopes that it will dry out tomorrow."

"I hope so, too," said Evangeline. "I do so love to ride, and staying in these last few days has been dreary."

"I don't mind a few drops, but there's not much point if it's mud halfway to the horse's knees," said the Squire, joining them. "Though the hunting's always good, that first fine day after a spell of rain."

"And now they'll be off on hunting talk," said Hester, casting an amused look at Cordelia, "and we'll get nothing more out of them for the rest of the evening."

Lord Evermore looked over at Hester fondly, almost the way that Lord Strauss looked at Lady Strauss. "I suppose we could talk about breeding geese instead," he said. "Then we'll get nothing more out of you for the evening either."

Hester poked him in the shin with her cane. "How is my flock doing, anyway?"

"Healthy and belligerent."

"Any sign of arthritis in the younger ones?"

Evermore smiled wryly at the others and mouthed, I told you so. The Squire laughed. Cordelia giggled, because giggles were supposed to be charming, and hoped that it didn't come out sounding too strained.

"I had no idea that you were so fond of… fowl," said Evangeline.

"Oh, Hester's a genius when it comes to geese," said the Squire proudly. "Back when they were all the rage, we had people coming and going at all hours, trying to get a pair of her birds for themselves."

"My goodness." Evangeline turned a dazzling smile on Hester and Lord Evermore. "I had no idea you were so accomplished, Lady Hester."

"The geese did most of the work." Hester's tone was dry as snakeskin. "I just made sure we ate the ones who weren't up to snuff."

"How ruthless. " Evangeline put a hand to her mouth.

"Got to be," said the Squire. "Same way with horses. You let one bad sire in and it takes generations to clear up."

"Fortunately goose generations are much shorter than horses'," Evermore said.

"Easier to eat, t-too," said Cordelia, greatly daring. Was that funny? Will anyone laugh or will Mother apologize for me or—

The Squire threw back his head and guffawed. Hester and Evermore both chuckled. Her mother cast her an approving look and Cordelia felt weak-kneed with relief.

Her relief carried her almost through to dinner. Then things took an unpleasant turn, although Cordelia knew that she couldn't possibly be blamed for it.

No, the problem was Mrs. Penelope Green. She swept into the parlor fashionably late and every eye turned toward her. The Squire left Evangeline's side to greet the newcomer, and stayed there, chatting with her.

"Ah, you've invited Mrs. Green," said Evermore. "An excellent choice."

"Such a lovely woman," said Hester. "She livens up any gathering, I've found."

"She certainly seems to be an original," said Evangeline, showing her teeth. "Why, I haven't seen a gown like that since I was a little girl!"

"Oh, indeed," said Hester. "If any of us tried to pull that off, we'd look hopelessly dowdy. But Penelope walks into a gathering and leaves a new fashion behind her." She beamed up at Evermore. "Do you remember, Richard, when she took snuff off Lord Stanville's wrist at the opera? They had to carry his mother off in strong hysterics."

"I remember it well," Evermore said. "The lady's shriek shook dust from the rafters. The soprano was positively anticlimactic afterward."

"Two days later, half the women in the city were carrying a snuffbox," Hester said, shaking her head.

"I've always found snuff to be a filthy habit," said Evangeline coolly.

"Oh, absolutely vile," Hester agreed. "The one time I did it, I had such a sneezing fit. And Richard here had the gall to laugh at me." She thumped his shin with her cane again.

"You sounded like a tree frog," said Richard. " Eh-chee! Eh-chee! Eh-chee! All high-pitched and run together. It was adorable. Well, it would have been, if you weren't turning as green as a tree frog, too."

"Hmmph!" Hester nodded to Cordelia. "Let that be a lesson to you, my young friend. If you are going to take snuff, never do it in front of a man. At least not the first time."

"Applies to cigars as well," said Evermore.

"Cordelia," said her mother blightingly, "would never do anything so unladylike."

Cordelia had only the vaguest idea what was in snuff anyway, but couldn't imagine snorting something that looked so much like finely ground horse droppings. "No, Mother," she murmured.

"I am surprised that so many mothers allowed their daughters to even carry snuffboxes."

"Oh, well, it was all in good fun," said Hester. "I doubt many of them had the faintest idea how to take the stuff. But for a month or two, you positively had to be seen with one. Fashion, you know."

Evangeline's mouth curved down, and then, to Cordelia's intense relief, the bell rang calling them in to dinner.

Unfortunately dinner itself proved no relief. "Is there a Mr. Green?" Evangeline asked Penelope pleasantly. The women were seated on either side of the Squire. Cordelia wondered if anyone else could see how hard her mother's eyes were when she said it, like cold blue glass.

"Sadly no," said Penelope, shaking her head. She put a hand to her heart. Cordelia saw the Squire's eyes travel along her arm to her cleavage, accented in a square bodice that Mrs. Tan would definitely have said was not in fashion. "Poor man. He was a great friend of Samuel's."

"Eh? Oh, yes," said the Squire. "A great gun, old Silas was. Terrible loss."

"You understand, of course," said Penelope, smiling sadly at Evangeline.

Evangeline inclined her head. "It was so long ago," she said. "I remember him fondly, but truly it seems as if it belonged to another life."

"That's lovely to hear. We widows so often find ourselves in such a precarious state."

"Oh yes. Though my lord was good enough to provide for his family."

Cordelia wondered if that had been an insult. It had felt like one, somehow. But Penelope Green only laughed and said, "Poor old Silas was never much good at such things. The most charming man you'd ever meet, but he never thought ahead. Do you remember, Samuel, that time on the hunt that he jumped the hedge when you yelled at him not to?"

"The damn fool," said the Squire, with clear affection. "Swore his horse could clear it. And it did, too, just barely."

"I'm sure the bull in the field was very impressed," said Penelope, with a bubbling laugh. "I know that horse came back over the hedge like his tail was on fire. Now that was a clean jump." The two of them joined in laughing, and Cordelia stared at her napkin so that she didn't have to watch her mother's eyes get colder still.

Hester stood out on the balcony in the late evening, listening to the breeze sigh through the old chestnut trees below.

She was not quite ready to retire for the evening, but she also did not wish to climb the flight of steps down to the library. If only my illustrious ancestors had designed a home with everything on the ground floor. I wonder if any of them eventually regretted it, once their knees started to go?

Her compromise at such times was the balcony off the dining room. Dinner had been cleared away, and all the guests had retired to their own amusements. Hester had done her proper duty as a hostess, and now she could stand on the balcony and stare out over the trees while the stars came out, one by one.

She had just performed the mental calculation of whether sitting down would be worth getting up again, and decided that it was too cold to linger for long, when arms went around her. Her mind tried to be startled, but her body knew exactly who it was. She leaned back against him despite herself. "Richard."

He kissed the top of her head. Hester was perfectly aware that hair didn't have any nerves, and anyway there was a little lace cap between his lips and the hair in question, and she still felt it all the way down to her bones. She sighed again.

Her body wanted to relax, to melt against him like warm butter. Her body was an idiot. She told it sternly that there would be absolutely no melting.

"I've missed you," he said.

"Bah. You can't have. An eligible bachelor with a fortune? You must be knee-deep in marriageable young ladies."

"It's true," he agreed mournfully. "I had to hire an ex-pugilist to sweep them out of my way when I go out. And two footmen to follow after and collect the poor things, give them a little brandy, and release them back into the wild."

Damn him, he could always make her laugh. She smothered it with a cough and pulled away. He released her immediately but didn't step back. She could feel the warmth radiating off him and somehow she didn't seem to be moving away either.

"You look very well," she said, which was an understatement. Age had only improved him. He had always had a boyish face, and the silver in his hair tempered that. How he was not considered one of the most handsome men in society baffled her utterly. True, he was slim and wiry rather than solid, and he didn't bother padding his coats to broaden his shoulders, and no, he'd never fought a duel and you couldn't consider him dashing, exactly, but surely society wasn't that blind, was it? When his eyes were always good-humored and his lower lip curved just so…

"Something's weighing on you," he said, looking down at her. "What can I do?"

Hester rubbed her hand over her face. "You're here," she said. "That helps more than I can say."

"Will you tell me about it?"

She glanced around the balcony. No one was listening here. It would have been ideal, if not so cold.

Richard took off his coat and draped it around her shoulders without a word. The fabric smelled like him, like aftershave and soap and skin. She would have recognized the scent if she were a hundred years old and a continent away.

She hesitated, then shoved her reluctance away, annoyed. Why even invite him if you're not going to talk to him? He's your friend, not your security blanket. If you sound like an old woman afraid of her life changing… well, that's the risk you run.

So they sat down and she told him. She told him everything, even what Alice had said about Cordelia, even the fearful look in her eyes after that very strange dinner.

She told him even of her feeling of doom, though she tried to make light of it, and she didn't say that it had come over her before Evangeline had even arrived. That was too much, even for Richard. She hedged instead. "I had a terrible feeling when I saw her. You know how people talk about love at first sight? This was like… fear at first sight." She forced a laugh. "I know that sounds like I'm being histrionic."

"You are never histrionic," said Richard. "I once held a goose while you cut out an abscess on its foot with a penknife. Then you took off your apron, washed your hands, and went to the ball that we were supposed to be attending."

"The goose recovered, I'll have you know. Lady Mercer gave me updates on him for years, until he finally perished at advanced old age. He was a good sire, too. One of my best lines."

He shook his head and reached out to take both her hands in his. His hands were very warm and hers were cold. Hester stared at the shape they made together, his larger and darker, with a faint smear of ink on the side of his thumb.

"And so you brought Mrs. Green so that Evangeline would not show herself to advantage. Clever Hester."

"It sounds quite calculating, when you say it like that."

"Perhaps. But it's not as if you forced the lady to be so obviously put out by competition." He absently rubbed his thumbs across her palms, and she tried to sit still and not to feel the motion like a burning brand against her skin. "If I invited you to a house party and you did not like someone there, you would hardly glare daggers at her over dinner."

"It's true," said Hester. "I'd be very polite over dinner. I'd simply push her down the stairs later."

"Exactly. This Lady Evangeline is not a subtle creature."

"Is pushing someone down the stairs subtle?"

"I have every confidence that you would do so discreetly." His smile was quick, just for the two of them, there and then gone. Lord, she'd missed that smile. "At any rate," he continued, "I don't know what I can do in this case, but I will try. Would you like me to tell Samuel stories of matchmaking mothers intruding on my pleasant bachelor life? Or about how my cousin wed an utter shrew in his later years and she has made his life a torment?"

" Did your cousin marry an utter shrew?"

"No, he married a rather nice woman from Virginfort, and I'm told they regularly wander through small villages together, looking for interesting cheeses. But I'm sure I could come up with something. Perhaps I'll give her dozens of grasping relatives that descended upon him as soon as the wedding wine had been drunk."

"I don't think Evangeline's got any relatives, except Cordelia."

"The daughter? Yes. She seems very shy, but if what Alice says is true, there's little wonder."

"I'm not sure if shy is the right word, exactly. Scared witless and watching everything she says so that she doesn't contradict her mother, definitely. But she seems to like being around me, and she was definitely charmed by Penelope earlier… but then again, who isn't?"

"Some of us are charmed by other sorts."

Hester knew perfectly well what he meant and went back to staring at their hands. "I worry for her," she admitted. "I want Evangeline gone, but I can't just turn away from the poor girl."

"You can't save everyone, you know."

"I'm not trying to. But if someone who needs help falls in your lap, you help them. It's what you do. "

Richard chuckled softly. "You haven't changed."

"I'm older and fatter and my knee hurts," she said tartly, pulling her hands away. "And I have less patience for fools."

"You look magnificent," he said with absolute conviction, and tore her heart in half without even trying. "And you have never had the slightest bit of patience for fools. I'm sorry about your knee, though. None of the doctors can do anything?"

"It's all laudanum, and it makes me fuzzy-headed. And I need all my wits about me right now." She scowled, pulling her shawl tighter around herself. The sleeve of Richard's borrowed coat slid down her shoulder, and he reached out to straighten it without comment. "And it's cold out here, and I should probably go inside, or my knee really will hurt."

He nodded and rose to his feet, pulling her up without effort. She handed him back his jacket and stood, leaning on her cane, while he put it back on.

"I do appreciate you coming," she said. "I know I'm not always… I know that… well. Thank you."

"Always," he said. "You know that."

"Yes. But I shouldn't rely on that."

He ran his hand through his hair. A stray lock fell across his forehead and Hester's fingers itched to straighten it. She gripped her cane more tightly.

"Hester," he said finally, "you know that if Samuel marries again—if you can't stay here—you know that you'll always have a place with me."

She nodded once, jerkily. She could not meet his eyes. If she did, she would be lost. If he touched her again, she would dissolve completely.

But he did not. He opened the door for her and let her go through first. She made her way up the stairs, holding the rail in one hand, hoping that he was not watching. She did not want him to see how badly her knee pained her. She hated pity from anyone. From Richard, it would be unbearable.

Once she was in her room, in her own bed, she sagged against the pillows. Was she going to cry? No, she wasn't. Damn. Tears might have helped.

He hadn't asked her to marry him again. He hadn't needed to. The offer still hung in the air between them, almost visible, like thunder.

What could she say? I can't marry you, because I look like this, and you look like that. And I will grow older and fatter and frizzier, and eventually I will need a carry-chair instead of a cane. And meanwhile, you will be tall and distinguished and your hair will go to silver gilt and everywhere we go, people will look at us and think, "What is he doing, married to her ?"

She'd told him as much, the first time. He denied it, but he was still a man, even if she loved him, and he did not quite understand. She'd let him believe that she was unwilling to see that question in so many people's eyes.

She had never had the courage, or the cruelty, to tell him the real truth. I don't care about other people. Society can go hang. But if I ever looked in your eyes and saw that question, it would destroy me utterly. I could never pick up the pieces after that. There would be nothing left.

So she did not. Hester could be an eccentric old woman who raised geese and wore peacock feathers in her hat and was happy enough. Better to keep that happiness close. I love you, and I trust you, and there is no one I would rather have at my back. But I cannot expect you to ignore the world forever for my sake. Sooner or later, you will find someone who will not embarrass you in your old age.

Thinking of that other woman, whoever she was, Hester felt a red flash of hatred, and bared her teeth against the dark.