Page 37 of The Song of the Siren (The Venturesome Ladies of Little Valentine #2)
So, what had happened? Had Stonehaven overcome his inclinations in the light of his accident?
Had living at the vicarage brought them closer together?
It was a reasonable assumption, proximity being a great help or hindrance in any love affair—or so Clara supposed, having no experience on such matters outside of books.
Worry nagged at her, and she picked Benny up, heedless of his wet paws as he reached up to lick her chin. “Yes, darling, I adore you too,” she said with a sigh. “But what should I do? Do you think I ought to speak to the reverend?”
Benny gave a little yap and wagged his tail.
Clara nodded. “I agree, Reverend Honeywell is quite the kindest and wisest man we know. Yet isn’t it rather like telling tales?
I ought not to have been there, that scene was private, and surely Bea is a sensible girl who has earned the right to her own secrets.
I think perhaps I should keep it a secret too. ”
Benny yapped again, wagging his tail harder.
Clara sighed. “Well, a great help you are,” she said ruefully, bending to set the little dog down again. “Go on, run and play. I need you to wear yourself out, so you sleep all afternoon, and my aunt doesn’t get suspicious.”
Benny ran back to the sea, barking at the waves and running pell mell away from them as they surged upon the shore. The moment they retreated, pulling shells and pebbles in their wake, he rounded on them again, yipping happily.
Clara watched for a while and then called him, carrying on her walk up the beach.
Benny came, though slowly and reluctantly, playing his game as they walked.
Clara stopped now and then to call him on, and then looked up, her heart giving an erratic thud as a figure appeared farther along the shore.
Striding purposefully, greatcoat flapping like the wings of some monstrous beast from the underworld, was a man dressed all in black.
He was staring at the sand ahead of him, his face set in a scowl that was at once menacing and familiar.
“Oh, drat,” Clara said crossly, surprised that her knees did not turn to water or that her first instinct was not to flee. “Here, Benny, come, boy.”
To her relief, the puppy hurried over. Perhaps he too had noticed the oncoming storm.
Clara stood watching, well aware that the man had not noticed her presence upon the beach, his irritation at whatever was vexing him holding his attention completely. If she had an iota of sense, something Clara had never before doubted, she would have kept still and held her tongue. As it was….
“Good day, sir. It is a fine morning for a walk, is it not?”
His head swivelled, though for a moment he did not stop walking.
Confusion lit his severe features, and Clara knew he had not the slightest idea who she was.
It was not an uncommon reaction. She possessed neither beauty nor fortune and was eminently forgettable.
Then his gaze fell to Benny. Oh, he remembered her dog well enough, she thought in amusement.
“You,” he said, his tone icy.
“So you see,” she replied amiably, wondering what in the name of sanity had got into her. “I am glad to see you walking about with such vigour. I do hope you took no injuries from your tumble. Nothing was hurt? I’m afraid you landed with rather a heavy thud,” she added with undisguised glee.
His expression darkened a degree. “Only my pride,” he gritted out.
Clara nodded, completely disregarding the way her skin prickled at his growing annoyance and that anyone with half a brain would recognise as their cue to run away.
“Hardly surprising. It was a rather ungainly fall and was it a very large wager you lost?” she asked, adding fuel to an already inflammable conversation and blinking up at him in a parody of guilelessness that wouldn’t have fooled the veriest nodcock, let alone a man of his obvious standing.
“Very.”
The word was curt, bitten off, and filled with repressed fury. He looked like he wanted to murder her, Clara thought cheerfully.
“Ah, well. The perils of gambling. I am sure the experience taught you a valuable lesson,” she said, grinning at him. “Well, I am sorry, but I cannot stay and chat today, for I have so many things to do. Good day, sir. Perhaps I can spare more time when next we meet.”
With that, Clara sailed off, carrying Benny, who scrambled up to her shoulder to watch the fellow as they walked off. “Does he look like he’s contemplating digging a Clara-shaped hole in the ground?” she asked Benny in an undertone.
The little dog barked.
“Excellent,” she said with satisfaction, and carried on with her walk.
Bea could not help but wonder if the good lord was having a little chuckle at her expense, for her longing for peace and quiet was thwarted at every turn.
Upon leaving the beach, she walked towards Madame Auguste’s, intending to take the road that ran behind her shop up to Summer Hill.
Perhaps the quiet that had eluded her on the beach could be found up there, away from the town.
But, before she got there, Mrs Doomsday flagged her down, wanting to know how Lord Stonehaven was and asking a good many impertinent questions that Bea refused to answer.
Finding Bea unhelpful, the lady stalked off, most dissatisfied—but before Bea could even turn around, Madame Auguste appeared, having hurried over from the doorway of her shop.
“Miss Honeywell, but what is this you are wearing, ma belle?” she asked, clicking her tongue disapprovingly. “You have family connections now, remember. You cannot go out and about looking so… so…”
Madame, dressed in a glorious confection of amber silk that seemed to echo the changing season, gestured at Bea’s ensemble and made a little moue of distaste.
“I am sorry to disappoint you, but I will not allow my brother-in-law to spend such a lot of money on my wardrobe. I am not his responsibility. If you will excuse me,” Bea said, trying and failing to keep a thread of irritation from her voice.
It was unlike her to lose patience, and guilt pricked at her conscience.
It was her own inappropriate behaviour making her short-tempered and irritable and she ought not allow others to suffer for it.
As it appeared speaking to no one else was safest option, Bea decided upon the route through Winsham Woods and changed direction, only to almost collide with Anne, who was juggling a large parcel.
She almost dropped the package, but righted it just in time, and gasped as she looked at Bea.
“Good heavens! You look dreadful. Whatever is the matter?”
Bea, who had never heard herself described in such terms before, gave a mirthless laugh and fought the desire to weep.
“Come along,” Anne said briskly, taking her arm. “I have just the thing for what ails you.”
“Oh, but—”
“No buts,” Anne said, her voice so full of determination Bea had neither the energy nor the will to fight her.
Anne hustled her indoors and then up the stairs, and through a door Bea had never entered before.
It led into a lovely living room with a small balcony and an adjoining bedroom.
It was clearly Anne’s private quarters and Bea felt yet another surge of guilt at being here when she had harboured so many jealous thoughts towards the woman. What a wretched creature she was.
“Sit down,” Anne said, casting her elegant hat carelessly to one side before heading to a beautifully carved cabinet.
She unlocked an expensive looking tantalus and poured amber liquid into two glasses, then brought them over and handed one to Bea before folding into the chair beside her.
“To what ails you,” she said, and took a healthy swallow.
Bea watched her as she savoured whatever was in the glass and let out a deep sigh.
“Oh, that’s better,” she said with sincerity.
“I tell you, I could just murder Clementine for going off and getting married. Since she’s gone, Mr Allenby has decided I’m his best prospect, despite my rather sordid reputation —his words, not mine—and now he believes he can save me.
No matter how many times I tell the wretched man I have no desire to marry him, he keeps proposing. Three times this week alone!”
“Good heavens,” Bea said, shocked by this revelation. The schoolmaster was a rather humourless fellow, and Clemmie had not been any more of a willing fiancée than Anne, but Bea had not realised how very persistent he was. “I had no idea.”
“Well, now you do. Drink up,” Anne added. “You look like you need it more than I do.”
Bea laughed sadly and sniffed the glass with suspicion. “Brandy? I don’t like—”
“Never mind liking it, drink it,” Anne said with a wry smile. “It will make you feel better.”
Deciding there were few circumstances under which she could possibly feel worse, Bea took her at her word and downed the entire glass. Fire exploded at the back of her throat, and she coughed and spluttered.
“Good Lord, not all at once!” Anne exclaimed, and then burst out laughing. “Oh, well. It won’t kill you. Here, have a drop more, but slowly this time.”
Bea accepted the top up, feeling a puddle of warmth bloom in her belly, spreading out and warming her limbs, easing through her blood. “Oh,” she said, regarding the glass with greater interest. She took another sip, cautiously this time, and felt the puddle spreading farther out.
Anne smiled, refreshing her own drink and settling back in her chair.
“I suppose Stonehaven broke your heart,” she said, the comment startling Bea so deeply she almost dropped the glass.
“W-Whatever can you mean?”
Anne returned a grim smile. “Men may be idiots, and blind to what’s under their noses, but I am not. Admittedly, Stonehaven has an excuse, being actually blind, but still. He’d have not realised you were in love with him even with his sight intact, so I feel no shame at condemning him.”