Page 67 of Reforming Lord Ragsdale
See here, John, he told himself,it is merely that you are afraid for nothing. Surely every man experiences some little trepidation at the loss of liberty and at the reality of life with a wife.He returned his gaze to Clarissa again, admiring the gold of her hair and her flawless complexion.Clarissa, if you happened to throw out freckles like Emma Costello, you would probably lock yourself in a dark room and remain there.But there was no danger on that head. Clarissa possessed skin that most women could only dream about.
“Don’t you agree, John?”
What? What?Clarissa was gazing at him with something akin to adoration and obviously waiting for an answer. “How could I disagree with you, my dear?” he replied, hoping that would satisfy and wondering to what he had just put his imprimatur.
She appeared satisfied with his response, if he rightly interpreted the little squeeze she gave his arm.Pay attention, John, he admonished himself, even as her voice rippled on and he thought about his departure that morning.
Sally Claridge had met him in the breakfast room with the startling announcement that she was returning to Virginia with Robert. He had sputtered into his tea briefly, reminding her that there were several young bucks—chaps he had handpicked, mind you, because they did not require a fortune—who were hovering on the brink of offering for her. She only treated this magnanimity on his part by a smile and a kiss in his general direction as she breezed by.
“I would rather go home,” she had insisted when Lady Ragsdale added her admonitions to his. Sally smiled at him, then at Robert. “I am mindful of all you have both done for me, but I want to go home.”
His pride piqued, Lord Ragsdale appealed to Robert. “Let me remind you, cousin, that for reasons which you know only too well, Sally will make a much better marriage over here.”
Robert was no help. He only shook his head and dug a little deeper into his eggs and ham. “Cousin, you don’t really argue with women, do you?”
“Well, I, no. . .,” he stammered.
Clarissa looked at him, her eyes wide, her lips in their ready-made pout, and he realized he was talking out loud. “My dear, I don’t think I would be a disappointment to you behind a curricle of my own,” she was saying. “Papa taught me to handle the ribbons.”
“Oh! I am certain you would not,” he agreed. “Whatevercould I have been thinking?”Pay attention, you cloth wit, he told himself, then promptly dismissed Clarissa again.
Sally was not about to change her mind. “I will return home to Virginia,” she had stated firmly, after he went through a patented catalog of reasons why she should remain in England. “Cousin, I do not care how poor we Claridges are, or how everyone else in Henrico County laughs at us because of Robert’s spendthrift ways.” She smiled at her brother. “I know he means to change, and besides all that, I want to be with my family. It’s where I belong.”
Of course she is right, he thought as the carriage traveled through the spring finery of Berkshire. He listened patiently then to Clarissa’s description of the rest of this year’s Season and the twin delights of a ball and a presentation next month, which, he knew in his bones, would somehow involve him to an unpleasant degree. He nodded where he was supposed to and felt some small relief when Clarissa’s eyes closed and her adorable head came to rest against his arm. Lady Partridge smiled indulgently at him and returned to her tatting.
And so he had given his blessing for a happy journey to both of the Claridges, had finished his breakfast, and had adjourned to the book room, where Emma waited with his correspondence to sign. He signed where she indicated and was struck by the fact that if Emma found that her father and brother had indeed been transported, she would probably want to join them in Australia.
The thought was distressing in the extreme. He sat on the sofa and watched her as she finished some last-minute paperwork he had requested. She was young and strong and healthy, but the thought of her going to such a place made him want to rise up in protest. He had heard stories at his club from army officers who had returned from duty in the antipodes, and they had nothing kind to say. It would be the worst exile of all for someone so lovely, vibrant—for someone with such promise—as Emma, he decided. And shewould be fifteen thousand miles away. She might as well be on the moon.
It was a melancholy reflection; the idea of losing his secretary pained him.I could keep her in the indenture, he told himself as he came closer and looked over her shoulder at the ledger and her careful entries.But that would be heartless, and if I have discovered anything this spring, it is that I have a heart. It is a dashed nuisance, but there you are.
But Emma among convicts? Emma condemned to toil for her bread in such an inhospitable climate? Emma so far away?I will not think about it, he told himself firmly.There is no indication that we are any closer to a solution to her mystery, and for all we know, the Costellos went down with theLady Penthyn.
He sighed and kissed the top of Clarissa’s head, then leaned back, closed his eye, and wondered why on earth he had felt compelled to kiss Emma when he left.
They had just finished the most prosaic of conversations in the book room, like many others during the last few months. She had assured him that she would return to the dock for another look and that she would participate in his banker’s upcoming audit. She even promised to go to Norfolk with Lady Ragsdale, if he did not return after two weeks, and check out progress on the construction.
Maybe I shouldn’t have put my arm around her shoulder, he considered as the carriage bowled along. He had thought it was a brotherly gesture, perhaps even avuncular. He had not been surprised particularly when her arm went around his waist as they walked together to the book room door. Truth to tell, they had both been through a lot in the past week.
But why had he kissed her? She had done nothing in particular to encourage it, other than look at him when he was raving on about being pitchforked into a visit to Bath that was destined to end in his proposal to Clarissa. It wasn’t his fault that she got that twinkle in her eyes when he started to complain about exertion and ill-usage. And truth totell, probably nothing would have happened if she had not stopped, put her hand on his shoulder and straightened his neckcloth.
It must have been Emma’s fault, he decided, because I was only falling back on natural instinct.He thought about the matter, concluding that the experience was inevitable, considering that every time previous to his reformation that he got that close to a woman, he invariably kissed her.You put water in a streambed, and it will flow, he reasoned.If you place Lord Ragsdale in breathless proximity to a female who is not a relative, he will kiss her. It happens ten times out of ten, whether kisses or water.“Hydraulics,” he murmured, then nodded and smiled at Lady Partridge when she looked up from the intricacies of her tatting with a faintly puzzled expression.
A mere few months ago, that would have been enough explanation to satisfy him. He would have promptly dismissed the event from his mind and gone on to other conquests.Things are different now, he thought.I am now blessed with a modicum of sense, and my sense tells me that I enjoy kissing Emma Costello.
The motion of putting his hand under her chin and his lips on hers had required not an iota of thought, so practiced was his lovemaking. The part that so unsettled him then, and that was breaking out sweat on his forehead now, was the way Emma’s lips and then her embrace made him feel.
He eased out his pocket watch, so as not to disturb the sleeping Clarissa, and consulted it.Up until half past seven this morning, I kissed females with the idea of what I would get out of the exchange, he thought.Kissing Emma was the first time ever that I wanted to give more than receive. I wanted to let her know that someone cared what happens to her. I wanted to share my strength, I who have never been strong. That one little kiss—well, perhaps it was not so little—made me better than I ever was before.
He looked out the window at the glorious spring and wished himself back in the book room. He tried to imaginehow he would replay that good-bye again, and he could not envision any other conclusion. As surely as God made sinners and fools to test the world, he would have kissed Emma Costello. The thought shook him to his very soul, and he felt tears starting behind his eye.Why did I have to do the most stupid thing of all?he berated himself.Why did I have to fall in love with Emma?
~
At his insistence, they stopped for the night at Market Quavers. “I do not know why we cannot stop at Reading,” Clarissa protested, her pout more pronounced than usual. “I mean we usually stop in Reading.”
Well, too bad, he wanted to say,change your blasted routine.Instead, he kissed his love’s forehead. “I have a banking transaction to undertake in the morning, my dear,” he explained, tucking his arm through hers as he escorted her to the Quail and Covey.
She suffered him to lead her along, pausing only at the doorway for another attempt to reason with him. When it failed, she gave him a searching look. “This quite cuts up my peace,” she assured him.
