Page 19 of London Holiday (Sweet Escapes Collection #2)

Chapter nineteen

I t was well into the middle of the afternoon when Edward Gardiner returned to his warehouse desk. This day had decidedly not gone as intended! He felt like a winded racehorse who had a heat yet to run. Wearily, he tugged his pocket watch forth to stare at its face and shook his head.

“Haskins,” he signalled to his clerk as the man walked by, “will you have a note sent to my house, please? I am afraid I must disappoint Mrs Gardiner and my nieces this evening. I ought to send word, although they likely already expect it by now.”

“Sir, Mrs Gardiner has already sent word here for you. There is a note on your desk from her. Oh! And Miss Elizabeth called while you were out.”

“Lizzy? Why would she have come here?” he wondered, turning to find his wife’s note.

“She did not say, sir, but it seemed to be some business connected with one of your household servants.”

“How strange!” he murmured, then his fingers tore into the sealed paper. He had not read more than two lines before he groaned audibly, and in the tones of a man in genuine pain.

“Sir?” Haskins stepped back into the room in concern. “Are you unwell?”

He glanced up, barely suppressing a grimace. “As well as a man with an infested household can be.”

“Infested! Sir, I know of an excellent rat catcher. He set my mother’s house right last winter. Would you like me to send for him? ”

“Unfortunately, it is quite a different sort of rodent which has installed itself at my residence. I think I no longer regret the additional hours this shipment crisis has required of me. But my poor wife and nieces!”

Haskins looked politely unconscious of his employer’s musings. He knew nothing of what Mr Gardiner might have meant, and so he went on about his tasks as if nothing were amiss until his attention was called back again.

“What is this?” Gardiner had reached the bottom of his note and looked up to Haskins in confusion. “What time did Miss Elizabeth call?”

“I am not certain, sir… I believe it was just before eleven. Half ten, perhaps?”

Gardiner stared at his note, his features pinched. “And she had one of my servants with her?”

“Yes, sir, a strong-looking footman. I am sure she was quite safe, sir.”

“Oh, it is not that. Mrs Gardiner said Lizzy had left the house, and that I should try to keep her busy here for the remainder of the day, for she would spare her some of the company at home. But you say she left directly when she learned I was out?”

Haskins frowned in thought. “I believe so, sir. She may perhaps have sought the newest book shipment in the warehouse before she left. You know how she indulges that enjoyment upon each visit. Perhaps one of the stock boys might have seen her.”

Gardiner turned the note over, scratching his head. “No, more than likely she returned to the house directly. When did this note arrive?”

“Not ten minutes after she, sir, I am quite certain of it. Perhaps she passed the messenger on her way.”

Gardiner grunted and tossed the note to the side, then drew a stack of invoices into its place. “Yes, I am sure that is it. Poor Lizzy! Stuck all day with such a disagreeable fellow. It is a pity I could do nothing to get her out of the house this evening.”

“Have you never been on the water before?” Darcy was watching his feminine companion in some amusement. The barge which was to carry them across the Thames was met with equal parts delight and trepidation, and once aboard, she had secured the hand railing as if her very life depended upon its stability.

She offered him a guilty smile. “Only small fishing boats, in shallow streams. I have always found them somewhat unreliable, even when piloted by skilled hands.”

“And you find this craft to be less seaworthy than they?”

“Oh, I should think not, but the water here is deep and unfamiliar. Let me accustom myself to the rocking below my feet before I let go this railing, then, I promise, I shall enjoy the crossing.” She closed her eyes then, as if she were insisting upon absolute silence during this moment of reflection and composition. Her fingers gripped and readjusted themselves on the rail, and her shoulders rose and fell in deep, rhythmic breaths. After a moment, her eyes cautiously blinked open.

“Better?” he asked, helpless to keep the laughing smile from his face. She possessed all the seriousness of a sage when she chose, and then the mercurial capacity to will it away at an instant’s notice. He had never known anyone more intriguing, and it was all artless sincerity on her part. It would be a long while before he tired of her company.

She ignored his question, perhaps because of the playful note in his voice when he had asked it. Instead, she was slowly stretching her frame, standing taller and daring to throw back her head slightly to admire the sky and trees lining the river. There was a lithe, graceful quality to her bearing—almost as a dancer in repose, or a yearling stallion just discovering his own charisma. Darcy sensed that strange magnetism again, the longing to savour and indulge, to discover and claim… .

He shook his head, feeling as if some physical force had commandeered his senses. His vision was even dazed for an instant, so harshly was he bound to reprimand himself. The sudden thickness of his tongue gradually subsided, but the stirring from other regions of his being was more difficult to ignore… and none more so than the pang in his chest. What could he possibly be thinking, even to look at her? He had settled with himself at first glance that she would be unsuitable as a wife, and he certainly would never ask anything less honourable of her. Why, then, could he not look away?

He clenched his fists, biting his lip and trying to turn his head even as his eyes stubbornly locked on her, admiring the energy and life sparkling in each look and gesture, and seeming to snap even in the air all about her. Perhaps if he punished himself severely enough when standing beside her, the arrangement would become less appealing. His nails dug deliberately into his palms, and his tongue began to bleed.

“William, are you also distressed at being on the boat? See, we are well over halfway across. It can be only a moment more, and we will be safely on dry land again.”

Despite himself, the corner of his lip curled upward even as he tried to straighten it out from within by clamping it with his teeth. The wicked enchantress, did she not know that it was not the boat ride which caused him to quail in his dreadful shoes, but she herself? And she had the temerity to speak gently to him! Would that she would behave, even for one moment, as the debutantes and heiresses he had met. A glimmer of some dross tainting the sterling, something less than her quaintly charming virtues, so that he could recover his equilibrium and treat her with the proper disdain.

“William?” She touched his arm, true concern in her voice.

Damn.

He drew a slow breath, gave up fighting the impudent smile which had mutinied against his directives, and opened his eyes. She returned the warmth he felt from his own traitorous face like a ray of sunshine dancing on the waters behind her.

He was in grave danger. This was why his father had cautioned him so sternly against permitting even the breath of suspicion in his associations! All his life, he had assumed those words as a warning against those who would take advantage of him, but now he was in as much danger from his own sentiments as from anything his aunt could devise. And he was enjoying it.

“William, look!” Innocent to the turmoil within his own mind, she pointed across the water to the white steps which led up the river bank to this fantasy land she had so longed to explore. “What shall we see this early in the day, do you think?”

Darcy adopted an air of conscious nonchalance, not a little unsettled by how well he liked hearing her using such an intimate name. It was safer, he decided, to play the all-knowing guide rather than the comrade in adventure, so he tipped his brow upward and frowned thoughtfully. “Oh, many of the performers will already be about. Have you ever witnessed magic tricks or a man who can turn flips?”

Her eyes widened. “Do you mean he….” She turned her index fingers over one another in a circular motion. “There really are men who can do that?”

“And women too, but I doubt we shall see them today. Of course, they sell their famous punch and ‘invisible’ ham at almost all hours, so we may find our purses lightened, but we shall not be hungry. Oh, and like enough we will see a few painters out during the daylight hours, trying to pretend they are communing with nature here in the city, and selling their work for far more than it is worth.”

“And musicians?”

“Perhaps, but I would expect little in that way until later. The real evening entertainment usually begins about an hour before sundown. ”

Her face fell slightly, but only for an instant. “And we shall have to depart well before that. We ought not to stay long, of course, but a small sampling of the sights will be a great treat.”

“On the contrary, I told Wilson that this is where we would be found. Perhaps we would be foolish to leave it too soon.”

“ ‘We?’ ”

Darcy looked uncomfortably down into her face. “I did not mention that, I suppose. Yes, I told him of your name and your uncle’s address, so that if the need arose, your family might be contacted. I do not expect that to happen, for I should not like to give undue alarm, but I did not like leaving it to chance. I hope you have no objections, Miss Elizabeth. Wilson is trustworthy and discreet.”

She turned from him and gazed over the remaining few feet of water, watching the boat hands as they began the task of drawing up to the bank. “I wish you had said something before potentially exposing me. You had no right.”

He winced. “No right?” he asked with slight annoyance, but her tone had been gentle, so he took care that his was as well. “I view it as a responsibility, Miss Elizabeth. I promised you that you would be safe in my company. Should circumstances demand my immediate presence elsewhere, I would insist that you be given proper escort and security against malicious talk or bodily harm. Wilson has not the authority to act on his information, save at the point of greatest need.”

She drew a long breath, her fingers flexing on the rail, and he could see that she was clamping down on her own lip to prevent any unseemly outburst. After a moment, she was steady enough to answer. “I believe I can understand your reasons, but that does not change the fact that you did not consult me on something so materially important to my own interests. Were I any less convinced of your good intentions, I believe you would have seen a bit of my unfortunate temper. ”

“I am sorry that my actions gave offence. It was not my wish, Miss Elizabeth.”

She turned back to gaze up at him, a light of cheerful absolution in her eyes. “It was apparent to me from the first this morning that you were accustomed to your own way. At the time, I supposed it pure arrogance, but I could be persuaded to understand that you are not in the habit of sharing responsibility or losing control.”

“Losing control can prove disastrous, and as for sharing responsibility, I have never been able to cast all my cares on another. Their weight is too great, and the consequences too severe.”

“And we established this as the reason that you are in great need of a day of amusement. Come, let us speak no more of unpleasant things now, for the boat has docked and the other passengers are stepping off.” And just that swiftly, their little argument ended.

Darcy marvelled, shaking his head and laughing silently to himself. He fell easily into the queue behind her as the handful of others made their way off the barge. They followed up the steps to the main Vauxhall Walk, and he tipped her parasol back so that she could look all above and beyond the heads of those in front of them. They approached the imposing brick edifice which stood as the last barrier before them of the sombre, everyday world, and Darcy drew out his coin purse. A silver tag embossed with the mythical Atlas on the front and his name on the back for himself, and a polished shilling for her. Before she could trouble herself to search within her own purse, he had paid their admission, and in such a casual manner that the bored attendant never bothered to check the name on the back of his tag.

She caught his eye in sweet gratitude, but he directed her gaze forward again. Through that grey portal could be seen an expanse of glittering pavement, bordered by towering elms. “The Grand Walk,” he murmured lowly to her. “And there on the left is the Rotunda, where my father and mother would take in the concerts on occasion. ”

She seemed to surge forward, as if she wished to admire everything at once, then, within a few steps, she slowed. They were well inside the gates now, and the passers-by circulated easily around them as her steps drifted to a halt. She turned, looking puzzled and not a little disappointed.

“Miss Elizabeth? Is something amiss?”

“I suppose I had built it up so in my imagination,” she sighed. “It looks… rather tired, does it not? The grass is a little unkempt, that paint there is peeling….”

“I did relate that the Garden is not what it was in its glory days.”

“I ought to have listened!”

“Only think, Miss Elizabeth, how it appears at night. That arch there,” he pointed to the right, “will be adorned with blazing torches, as will the Pavilion there,” he gestured to the distance on the left. “Everything will be cast with mystery and intrigue, and the music will be gay, the entertainment lively. What matter a bit of dead grass and peeling paint? Are they vital to your enjoyment?”

She chuckled. “You begin to sound like me.”

“That is well, for you frightened me when your words sounded a little too much like my own.”

“A travesty, indeed!” she laughed more heartily. “Very well, I shall look beyond superficial appearances and appreciate the venue for what it is; a chance to set my cares aside for a while and to mingle among those I might never meet otherwise. Shall we, William?”

Too late, he caught himself. He looked down into her face, felt the unbridled pleasure beaming from his own and the lump which seemed to swell in his throat. Devil take it . He had never wanted anything more in his life than to please her. An hour. Two, perhaps. Three, at the outside; he would be hers for a short while, and then he would be rational again.

He gestured before him, down the length of the Grand Walk, and adjusted the white parasol so that it offered her the appropriate shade in the afternoon sun. “I am at your service, Miss Elizabeth.”