Page 5 of Bewitching Benedict (The Lovelorn Lads #1)
A brief, impressed silence was broken by Dalton's, "Bloody good shot, Benny, bloody good. Didn't think you had it in you today."
Benedict muttered something even he failed to understand and handed the gun to Dalton. "Thanks. If you don't mind, I think I'll call that my contribution to tonight's dinner and…"
He was uncertain whether his plans were to ride with Miss Dalton or retreat to the gamekeeper's house, but neither was to be allowed.
Miss Dalton, somewhat to Benedict's dismay, rode up to them as he searched for a method of escape, and with her words sealed any hope he had of departing unscorned: "Not a bad shot, Mr Fairburn.
I wonder, Charles, if I might have a go? "
"No," Charles replied without a hint of chivalry.
"I recall clearly that it was barely tolerable that you could out-ride both myself and George by the time you were eight, as a fine seat on horseback is a gentlewoman's trait.
I also recall that you were in very near danger of out-shooting us both by the time you were twelve, and my ego cannot bear to find out how badly you have now outstripped me. "
"Ladies do not shoot," Benedict said with such surprise that he sounded to himself like the worst of old aunties, not the rough-and-tumble brassy women of the previous generation, but older even than that, so decrepit their childhoods were long since lost to memory.
Hewitt, as blandly as he had apologized the night before, handed his gun to Miss Dalton. "Show Charles up, Miss Dalton, and shock poor Fairburn. I, for one, am eager to see it."
Benedict's ears flamed. "My apologies. I didn't mean to suggest—it's merely unusual—I have no objection?—"
"How terribly kind of you, Mr Fairburn." Claire Dalton accepted Hewitt's gun, examined it briefly, reloaded it, then with a casual air dipped her hand into her saddlebag to withdraw a small stone.
The bag shifted in such a way as to suggest there were more of the same within it, but before he could pursue curiosity on that topic, Miss Dalton rose a scant inch or two in her saddle—sidesaddles were not as suited for standing in as his own—and proved herself to have a remarkably good arm as she threw the stone into the tall grass of the pasture before them.
Quail erupted upward. She lifted Hewitt's gun, sighted and shot thrice, each shot bringing a bird to earth.
All three men watched in respectful, slightly astonished silence.
Benedict could hardly take his eyes from the girl.
She seemed an entirely different creature from the one he had embarrassed the afternoon before, and he could hardly imagine how he had thought her a mouse.
He had never met a less mouse-like lady in his life, nor even imagined one whose interests might align with his own so closely.
That thought lay perilously close to a path of commitment that might delight his mother but which held no interest at all for Benedict himself.
He shuddered slightly, throwing off the very idea, and in so doing, noticed a dog he had not seen before.
It had, he feared, come with Miss Dalton, suggesting she had intended this encounter all along, for it now rippled through the grass, collecting birds as Charles let forth an explosive sigh.
"I knew it. Claire, you outshine me in every regard. You ought to have been born a man."
"If I had been born a man, my poor mother would never have been able to bring me into this world," Claire said with shocking humor, "and had I been born a boy, which you no doubt meant, cousin, well then, as a second son I would have been destined for the church and would never have learned to shoot. "
"How did you learn to shoot?" Benedict burst out, unable to contain his curiosity.
Miss Dalton's eyebrows lifted. "With practice, Mr Fairburn, just as anyone might."
"I recall," Dalton said dryly, "that she was as contented a miss as ever there was, attending to embroidery and chattering with her friends.
A pretty half-dozen there were, with hair of every hue.
But her girlfriends only visited, whilst her brother George was with her at all times.
He is five years her elder, and I believe Claire was determined from infancy that she should be both entirely at home with the ladies and yet never left behind by the lads.
I fear my own visits only spurred her onward. "
"You gave me another mark to match myself against," Miss Dalton agreed. "With George gone to the Peninsula I've recently been obliged to teach a few of my girlfriends to shoot, though none of them are as fond of it as I."
"Well, I tell you what, Dalton," said Hewitt, "if all the Empire's daughters can shoot like that, we ought to be sending them up against Bonny while our lads stay home and tend the fires."
"I am sure I could not shoot at a man," Miss Dalton said in a quiet and civilized murmur as she returned Hewitt's gun to him.
"It is little enough sport to put a bird on the table, but men shoot back, and I would never cast aspersions on the bravery of soldiers such as Charles by pretending I might stand among them.
And now that I am put in mind of it, this seems little sport to me indeed.
Excuse me, gentlemen. I believe I shall return home and write to my brother. "
Upon this announcement she nodded to each of them, conveying a note of formality that might do a duchess proud, then rode away with her spine straight and the dog trailing after with three birds dangling from its jaw.
"I believe she did that on purpose." Fairburn's usually pleasant tones were strained.
The corner of Charles's mouth twitched, though he did his best to respond evenly.
"I believe she may have done, yes. All of it, although she could not have anticipated Hewitt offering her such an opportunity to castigate him on the matter of warfare.
The reminder that George is at war was masterful.
" By the end of this speech he could no longer help himself, and smiled openly.
"But by the deuce, Benny, you should have seen your eyes pop at her aim.
Yours too, Evan. I did say she was better than I. "
"You intimated she might be," Hewitt protested. "You couldn't expect me to believe it."
"Do I often mislead you, Evan?" Charles asked genially.
"I find the truth generally more efficient than prevarications.
It hardly matters now, gentlemen. I believe we have been thoroughly put in our places, and I can hardly imagine Claire will bother herself with us any more, now that we are all assured that she is by some considerable measure the superior being amongst us. Benny, will you shoot again?"
Fairburn took Dalton's gun this time, but watched Claire's retreating form.
Well, Charles thought, hardly retreating; that implied defeat.
Fairburn watched Claire's departing form, then, and looked a trifle dejected when she chose not to look back at the men.
No confident victor would need to, though, not when there was no chance of attack from behind.
If her brother George Arnold had half her poise and cunning for engagement, he would do well in the war.
Tension drew Dalton's shoulders together, pinching his spine.
He let his eyes close languidly, exhaling to release knots before they formed, then reawakened his gaze to the bright afternoon.
The entire purpose of a country holiday was to put thoughts of the war aside.
It was too much spoken of in London, and too few imagined that a man might not wish to tell tales of what he had seen and done, or why a fit man in his prime might have been sent home when the battles still raged on.
The Lads had not pressed him, though even now Hewitt slid a considering glance his way, as if questions lay unspoken on his tongue.
Perhaps it had been a mistake to bring Hewitt without Vincent or O'Brien along; their presence as men who had fought alongside Dalton kept Hewitt's curiosity at bay.
But there had been other reasons to single Fairburn and Hewitt out.
They were his school friends, representing a time and an innocence Dalton was loathe to lose.
Was eager to reclaim, even, if such a thing was possible.
"The birds, Benny, are the other direction," Dalton said wryly, before Hewitt had got up the courage to breach the topic of war again, close as it lay to the surface.
Fairburn blanched, then blushed—Dalton didn't remember him so inclined to obvious emotion, but then, it had been a long time, and sensibility was highly in fashion—and turned back to the meadow.
"I ought to have borrowed Miss Dalton's bag of stones to flush them out.
Your cousin is well prepared, Dalton. She'll be formidable when she has her Season.
" With that alarming statement—not one of the Lads ought, in Dalton's opinion, be considering young women or the Season—Fairburn nudged his horse into a quick trot that startled another group of quail, and brought down two more before they settled.
"I say, has your uncle stocked these fields for us?
The shooting is more than fair. I'll have to offer him my thanks.
But we need at least five more if we're to make a meal of them.
Hewitt, did you intend on shooting, or just handing your gun off to?—"
"Mice?" asked Hewitt archly, and only pulled a thin smile when Dalton gave him a quelling look. "You're right, Dalton, she had it over all of us. I'll call her my little mouse now if I want to, but I won't mistake her for a creature without teeth."