Improper Ladies Read online

  “Lord Lyndon,” she called, “is it not a fine day?”

  “Lovely,” he answered, coming forward to sit down on the grass at her feet. He stretched out his legs along the ground, enjoying the warmth of the sun.

  “I cannot thank you enough for inviting us today. Phoebe looks much better in the fresh air. I feared she would never quit crying yesterday.”

  “And Harry looks much chastened.” Justin gestured toward where Harry sat with his mother, Lady Bellweather, and the two younger Bellweather girls. Harry was apparently meant to be minding the girls while the ladies gossiped, and he held a large wax doll on his knee while one of the girls gave it tea from a tiny cup.

  “Well, playing with dolls will do that to a man, I suppose,” she said wryly, whirling her parasol about by its carved handle.

  “It is good for him. And those girls are absolute tartars; if anyone can keep him out of trouble, they can.”

  “Let us hope so.” She turned her gaze back to her sister, the frown returning. “Phoebe is so very . . . lively. I do not want to curb her spirit, but I fear what trouble she may run into.”

  Justin nodded in deepest understanding. He felt exactly the same about Harry.

  He glanced over at his brother and saw that Harry was watching Miss Lane again, his face full of longing. Justin knew that Harry fancied himself quite in love with her already, and certainly Justin was tempted to hand Harry and all his problems over to the care of a wife.

  The only problem was that Miss Lane appeared to be every bit as prone to flights of fancy as Harry was. With her as a sister-in-law, Justin would not be solving his troubles; he would just be doubling them.

  It was the very devil being the responsible one. Mrs. Aldritch looked at him, her expression startled, and Justin realized with chagrin that he had spoken aloud.

  He opened his mouth to apologize, but she forestalled him by saying, “It is the very devil, isn’t it?”

  Justin nodded. “When I was younger, I never dreamed I would be in this situation. Father and Edward, my older brother, took care of everything. Edward was just like Father—always steady and reliable, always getting me out of scrapes. Then they died.”

  “And you found yourself as the earl.”

  “Yes. With Harry to contend with. I know Mother wants me to solve everything for her, as Father did—be the ‘head of the family.’ But I lived alone for so long in India. I am not used to worrying about other people.”

  He looked down at the grass, suddenly ashamed at his outpouring of words to a near stranger. It was not seemly for an earl to appear unsure, and Mrs. Aldritch must be bored to hear him ramble on of his troubles.

  But she didn’t look bored. Her dark eyes watched him sympathetically, and she leaned toward him as if to hear all his words. He felt so very comfortable with her, felt he could tell her anything, and she would not judge as other people would. He felt as if he knew her.

  She nodded. “Phoebe and I also lived apart for a long time. She was at school after our parents died, and I was with Lawrence, and then . . . then with relatives. I fear I concocted a perfect sister in my mind, one who was dutiful and obedient and always cheerful.” She laughed humorlessly, mocking herself. “Things have not turned out the way I planned! Phoebe has her own way of doing things.”

  “That could describe Harry perfectly. His own way of doing things.” Justin watched as Harry walked over to where Miss Lane and Miss Bellweather were still exploring the villa, the two little Bellweather girls tripping along behind him. He said something to Phoebe, who nodded, shook her head, then laughed. “My brother obviously admires your sister.”

  “Yes. But Phoebe is too young yet to be married.”

  “So is Harry. I wonder if a time in India might not be good for him, as it was for me.”

  “India?” Mrs. Aldritch tilted her head, looking on as Phoebe hauled one of the children up into her arms and twirled her about, the two of them giggling merrily. “You mustn’t say anything about India in front of Phoebe. She would get visions of ivory palaces and rubies as big as hens’ eggs into her head, and she would marry Mr. Seward just to go see them.”

  “At least if they were in India we wouldn’t know what they were up to,” Justin suggested. “Out of sight, out of mind?”

  Mrs. Aldritch laughed, the worry fleeing from her face like the clouds from the sun.

  Phoebe turned to look at them at the sound of that laughter, and waved. “Caro!” she called. “Do come and see these mosaics Miss Bellweather has been showing us. Those Romans were ever so naughty. Why didn’t they teach us this at Mrs. Medlock’s?”

  Mrs. Aldritch waved back, then looked at Justin, one golden brow arched inquiringly. “Shall we join them, then, Lord Lyndon?”

  “Of course.” He leaped to his feet and held out his hand to help her rise from the rock. “I confess myself quite fascinated by, er, naughty Romans.”

  The “naughty” Roman mosaics were indeed fascinating, and quite extensive. Before Caroline realized it, they had left the others behind and found themselves in a quiet glade of trees. The green branches arched over the ruined tile floor, enclosing it in a thick silence.

  Only the muted murmur of distant voices, the whisper of the wind through the leaves, and the click of their shoe heels on the tile reminded her that she was still in the real, human world. She felt as if she had fallen into some enchanted realm.

  She lowered her parasol and stepped carefully over the cracked mosaic, acutely conscious of Justin close behind her. After their conversation, she felt strangely intimate toward him, bound in silken cords of understanding. She knew she could grow to understand him very well indeed, and he her.

  That was a dangerous feeling. She could not afford to let him, or anyone else, truly know her. Truly know what her life had been about. It was a very lonely feeling.

  Caroline stabbed at one of the tiles with the tip of her parasol. Well, she had been lonely for many years now; nothing would be different. She would just go on as before.

  Justin knelt down beside her to examine part of the mosaic, interrupting her increasingly maudlin thoughts. “I cannot be sure, of course,” he said, “but I do believe this scene is not quite as naughty as the others.”

  Caroline leaned over, pushing some of the tiles into place. “I believe you are right. It looks like a supper scene. See these grapes here. The colors are so vivid! As lovely as if they had been made yesterday.”

  “Lovely,” he murmured. He was so close, his breath whispered coolly across her cheek.

  Caroline pulled back, startled. She had not realized she had leaned so near to him.

  She looked at him warily, to find that he watched her with equally startled eyes.

  “Where did you come from, Mrs. Aldritch?” he whispered.

  Oh, dear Lord, he knew. He recognized her; he knew the truth. It could be the only explanation for his astounded look. She fell back a step, away from him.

  “C-come from?” she said. “Whatever do you mean?”

  He shook his head in a bemused way, as if to clear it. “I am sorry. It must be this place, it seems so ... otherworldly. You just don’t seem quite like everyone else. Not quite human.”

  Caroline was confused. What did otherworldly glades have to do with gaming hells? “Not ... human?” she said.

  He laughed self-mockingly. “Now I have insulted you. Please believe me, Mrs. Aldritch, that is the last thing I would want to do. It is just that earlier I fancied you looked like a fairy queen, examining her domain. You seem to belong here, with the trees and the sky.”

  Caroline’s tense shoulders slowly relaxed. Did this mean that he did not recognize her? She sat down on a crumbling old marble bench. “My mother used to say I was her changeling child. No one else in our family has such pale hair and such dark eyes.”

  “Perhaps that is it.” He sat down next to her on the bench. “You must forgive me, Mrs. Aldritch. I promise you I am not generally prone to such flights of fancy, and I never speak
to people I have just met in such a way. I think I must still have some of India in my blood. There everything seemed otherworldly, fraught with spirits.”

  “What is there to forgive?” Caroline answered, with a small laugh. “Most people see me as a dull old matron now, as Phoebe’s chaperon. I would much rather be a fairy queen.”

  “And that you are,” he said, still looking at her with that bemused expression on his face. “That you are.”

  He looked as if he wanted to say something more, but a burst of chattering voices interrupted them. Phoebe, Sarah, Harry, and the two little girls came hurrying en masse into the glade.

  “There you are, Caro!” Phoebe cried. “We feared you had fallen through these old floors or something. Lady Lyndon says we must hurry if we want our sweets.”

  “Yes,” said Sarah, “or my mother will surely eat them all.”

  Caroline gave Justin one last smile, then went to take Phoebe’s arm and go with her out of the glade. “Of course, darling. We were just enjoying the cool shade here.”

  “Oh, my dears,” Lady Lyndon sighed, leaning back under the shade of the trees. “I cannot remember when I last had such a splendid afternoon.”

  Caroline had to agree with her. The afternoon had indeed been splendid. New friends, good food, sunshine—and Lord Lyndon.

  She looked over to where he sat with Harry, Phoebe, and Sarah Bellweather, playing a game of Beggar My Neighbor with them. The afternoon breeze kept lifting the cards from the blanket, and he caught at them, laughing. A lock of sun-burnished hair fell across his forehead, and as he reached up to brush it back he caught her watching him.

  He smiled at her, and his face, weather lined as it was from the Indian sun, looked endearingly boyish.

  She could not help but smile back.

  Then he turned away from her, back to the game.

  “Would you tell me more about your mother, Mrs. Aldritch?” Lady Lyndon said, reaching for the last of the berry tarts. “After she married your father and I married Lord Lyndon, I fear we rather lost touch. I did receive a letter announcing your birth, and I sent one when each of my boys were born, but that was all.”

  “Mother was not much of a letter writer,” Caroline answered. “We lived so quietly in the country that she feared to bore all her friends with her news.”

  “Now, that could never have been! Dear Margery was never dull. Your sister rather reminds me of her.” They watched as Phoebe won the last of Harry’s cards and crowed over her victory.

  “Phoebe does look a great deal like Mother,” Caroline answered uncertainly. She remembered her mother as being always quiet and proper, not vivid and crackling with energy as Phoebe was.

  “As do you, Mrs. Aldritch,” said Lady Lyndon. “When I heard of your birth, I must say I harbored a little dream that one day, when you were older, you would come to see me in London. I never had a daughter, you know, and I did so long for one. And you would meet Edward, my eldest, and then . . .” Her voice faded away, and she gave Caroline an embarrassed little smile. “But that was silly of me. I am very glad we have met now. Very glad indeed.”

  Caroline was surprised, and very touched, by her words. “I am glad we have met, too, Lady Lyndon.”

  “Then, my dear, perhaps you would like to accompany us to a concert on Saturday evening? It is a program of Renaissance songs. Not to everyone’s liking, perhaps, but it should be quite fine.”

  Caroline remembered long evenings when she had been alone, Lawrence off heaven knew where, and her only solace was in volumes of poetry by Sir Phillip Sidney and Edmund Spenser. “I adore Renaissance songs.”

  “Do you? So does Justin. You will both have to explain the songs to me, then. And the next week there is a large assembly planned. You will have to go with us to that, as well. I intend to enjoy your company as long as I can.”

  Caroline glanced back at Justin. An evening of music and then an assembly in his company—this summer just grew better and better.

  She let a small, hopeful feeling into her heart, as she had never dared to before.

  Then Lady Bellweather came back from where she examined the mosaics with her younger daughters, and the littlest one sat down on Caroline’s lap to show her her doll. All romantic fantasies were lost in the immediate practicalities of getting the doll’s tiny boot laced up properly.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Two days after the picnic excursion, Caroline found herself standing on a dock, staring at a large, bobbing boat.

  It is a yacht, she reminded herself. Not a boat—a yacht.

  But no matter what it was called, it looked terribly precarious, rolling with the waves that slapped at its wooden sides. And she was meant to be climbing aboard for a pleasure excursion.

  Pleasure? Ha!

  Whatever had she been thinking when she agreed to this? She was not a good sailor at all, and just watching the pitch of the boat—yacht—was making her feel a bit queasy.

  Of course you know why you agreed to this outing, her blasted, ever-present inner voice whispered. It is because the Sewards are the ones who invited you.

  One Seward in particular.

  Lord Lyndon. Justin.

  She had thought about him a great deal since the picnic, gone over all their conversations, every glance that had passed between them. She felt a bit like a silly schoolgirl, prostrate with calf-love for the music master. She wanted to see him again, talk to him some more, maybe have another moment alone with him.

  All of which was a very bad idea. The more she saw him, talked to him, the more she liked him. And the more she felt guilty about deceiving him.

  But she could not seem to stay away today. Even if it did mean she had to get on the boat.

  “Caro, isn’t this fascinating?” Phoebe called, coming around a comer with the grizzled captain of the yacht. She looked jauntily nautical in a blue-and-white dress and matching bonnet. “Captain Jones was just showing me how the boat is moored, and he says I can help steer once we are aboard.”

  “That is very kind of Captain Jones, Phoebe,” Caroline answered with a smile. “I just hope you will not run us aground.”

  “Of course I shan’t! Captain Jones says I am a real sea spaniel.”

  “Sea dog, miss,” the old captain corrected.

  “Yes, of course! Sea dog.” Phoebe looked about happily at the boat and the water, completely in her element.

  Caroline hoped her sister would not take it into her head now to find some Navy man and elope with him. Or worse, disguise herself and join the Navy in her own right!

  These ruminations were cut short by the sound of Harry Seward calling, “Hallo! Mrs. Aldritch, Miss Lane, you are here already.”

  Caroline turned to see Harry, Justin, Lady Lyndon, and Sarah Bellweather coming toward them, all of them outfitted for a sea jaunt. Harry carried a large hamper, trying to balance it and wave at the same time.

  Phoebe rushed over to greet them, and Caroline followed at a slower pace. Her gaze met Justin’s, and he gave her a small smile.

  Her breath caught at that small, secret curve of his lips, and she smiled at him in return. She could not seem to help herself.

  “The water looks calm today,” he said.

  Caroline glanced doubtfully at the still-lapping waves. “Do you think so?”

  Justin laughed. “Not much of a sailor, eh, Mrs. Aldritch?”

  “I’m not sure. I have not had much opportunity for sailing.”

  “Well, I shall help you, then,” he said, a teasing twinkle in his blue eyes. “I often went out on the river in India. I won’t let you fall overboard.”

  Was he flirting with her? Caroline looked at him, at his half smile. It had been so long since she had indulged in harmless, lighthearted flirtation that she could scarce remember how it was done.

  Finally, she smiled, took his proffered arm, and let him help her climb aboard the waiting yacht. They sat down on a bench near the railing and watched as Phoebe, Harry, and Sarah scrambled onto the deck, lau
ghing and chattering boisterously. Phoebe rushed over to climb up on a coiled pile of rope, pointing and exclaiming over something in the water below.

  Harry looked at her with a rapt expression on his face.

  Lady Lyndon sat down beside Caroline and Justin on the bench, settling her mulberry-colored skirts about her. “Oh, my dears,” she sighed, “I feel so very old just watching them. Was I ever so enthusiastic?”

  Caroline nodded in agreement. Once she would have dashed about just like Phoebe, bursting with the joy, the glee, the possibility of life. But years and experience had killed that feeling, had left her feeling numb. Like an old woman.

  Now Justin’s arm brushed against hers as he leaned forward to retrieve something from the hamper. And the cold, hard knot at the core of her seemed to burst open, releasing that old joyful feeling again. She almost laughed aloud with the delightful surprise of it.

  Then the boat began to move, and she was jolted against his arm. She clutched at his sleeve with her hand, catching the smooth wool in her fist.

  Justin’s other arm came around to steady her, and she found herself in an almost embrace with him. Everything else, the people, the sea, the rocking of the boat, faded around her. She only saw him.

  She looked up at his face, so near hers, and wondered dazedly if his lips were as soft as they looked.

  Justin wished, as he had never wished for anything before in his life, that he was alone with Mrs. Aldritch.

  He was acutely conscious of every move she made, every word she said. He waited eagerly for every time she would tilt up her head and he could see her face beneath the brim of her lavender silk-lined bonnet.

  She laughed at something his mother said, her head at a slight angle that caused one pale strand of hair to brush against her cheek.

  It made him want to laugh, as well, even though he had no idea what they were talking of.

  Then he heard his mother’s words.

  “... and there he was, running down the drive without a stitch on, while his nursemaid chased after him.”