Page 64 of Not Quite a Lady
‘With mummies?’
‘No, Penny. No mummies. But the couches were in black andgold, upholstered with leopard skins, and instead of legs they were supported by gilded crocodiles. The carpets were woven with borders of papyrus and strange birds and the torchères were made like palm trees. Oh yes, and some things had camels embossed on them.’
‘Gilded crocodiles!’ He opened his eyes and saw Penny’s fascinated expression. ‘Whose house was it? The Prince Regent’s?’
‘No, it belonged to a very rich and very fashionable lady.’
He caught Caro watching him, realised he was still smiling and straightened his face. His sister’s eyebrow lifted, just a touch. Caro always could read him better than any of them.
‘I do not think crocodiles would look right in here,’ Susan said doubtfully. ‘And we would have to change all the furniture.’
‘I promise, no crocodiles. But new hangings perhaps?’
Everyone looked cheerful at the thought and Jack grimaced inwardly. He had hardly been home an hour and he had given the family the impression that there was money to spare for redecorating the castle.
That was what came of being so ill-disciplined as to be thinking about Lily when he had promised himself that he would do no such thing.
The trouble was, everything conspired to bring her to mind. He had longed to see her see her sweeping into the coffee rooms of the inns along the way, demanding fresh coffee and her eggs done just so.
He could even imagine her trying to hold up the stage while she finished her meal, blithely confident that even the formidable coachman would sacrifice his sacred schedules if Miss France demanded it.
It was easier to imagine Lily, bossy and demanding, than to recall her face as he had left her on the terrace, flushed and breathless after that cruel kiss, pain and anger in those widegreen eyes.
‘Ssh, he’s asleep.’ It was Penny, attempting a tactful whisper.
Jack opened one eye and found his family regarding him tolerantly. ‘I beg your pardon.’
‘Go to bed, dear,’ his mother said, making him feel eight years old again. ‘And do not come down until dinner time.’
Jack made his way slowly upstairs, exchanging greetings with the servants as he went.
Up the main staircase, installed by the Tudor baron, through the Long Gallery, modernised by the first earl in the early seventeenth century, then up the spiral staircase, part of the original castle.
The weight of his ancestors and their expectations seemed to weigh on his shoulders and he wondered why he had not had the sense to take over his father’s comfortable suite on the first floor.
Still, the tower rooms were every boy’s dream of what a castle should be and he had been too fond of them to move when he inherited.
Lily would doubtless want to add several arrays of armour, a tasteful array of battle axes and some antlers. Lots of antlers.
Stamping firmly on the idea of Lily redecorating his bedchamber, Jack pushed open the door and found the room already occupied.
‘My lord, welcome home. I have unpacked your luggage already.’ It was Denton, his valet.
The contents of his bags seemed to have been divided into three unequal piles. The largest Denton was pushing into the arms of a footman with instructions to have them laundered immediately. Another pile, regrettably torn, was dropped in a corner and the valet was hanging up the meagre remains.
He waited until the footman had closed the door. ‘I collect your lordship has been fighting. Unfortunately I do not believe it will be possible at this late stage to remove the blood, andone does not wish to alarm the ladies, so I will destroy the linen concerned.’
Guiltily Jack remembered throwing his shirt and neck cloth into his bag after his fight in the alehouse. Then there was the shirt which had had all its buttons torn off when he and Lily…and he seemed to recall a neck cloth…and the pile of handkerchiefs which had been the first thing that came to hand when he knocked over the inkwell one afternoon.
‘Yes, well, order me some more shirts and neck cloths, Denton.’
‘Fisticuffs I imagine, my lord.’ There was a faint hint of a question.
‘Yes. I won.’
‘Excellent, my lord.’ The valet shook out one remaining shirt, revealing a thin brown line across one sleeve. ‘This however…’
‘This however is not something we discuss outside this room,’ Jack said firmly, shrugging off his coat and beginning to unbutton his shirt. ‘And yes, I could be said to have won that one as well.’
