Page 12 of A Marriage of Convenience with a Rake
“Papa,” he objected as Lord Ramsgate pushed back his chair.
“I’ll only be over there,” Lord Ramsgate replied, making a gesture towards a desk across the room by the window over the street.
“Oh.” Lord Glenfield sounded relieved.
“We’re just going over there,” Lord Ramsgate repeated, and gestured to Papa to go and join him by the desk, and the two of them wandered over to it together. Eleanor watched them settle down at the desk, almost immediately falling into earnest talk as Lord Ramsgate gestured to a piece of paper that lay on the table between them.
“So,” Lord Glenfield said loudly. Eleanor jumped. She had been watching the other side of the room and had not expected that he might speak with her.
“Sorry?” Eleanor asked, not sure if she had missed whatever it was that he’d said to her.
“So,” he repeated. “Perhaps, um...perhaps we could look at the pianoforte. Mayhap you’re interested.” He sounded even more discomforted than she did, and she wanted to chuckle.
“Perhaps,” she said, and pushed back her chair, standing up and following him across the room. The drawing room at Ramsgate House was big, with a fireplace, padded chairs and bookshelves on the right of the door, the tea-table and atall clock on the left, and behind the tea-table stood a small pianoforte, the lid open and the wood polished to a smooth sheen of wax.
“Here it is,” Lord Glenfield said, standing beside it. “It belonged to my mother.”
“Oh,” Eleanor murmured, meeting his gaze. “It’s beautiful,” she said, feeling her heart twist. She had no idea how old he had been when Lady Ramsgate passed away. She could detect sorrow in his voice, though, and it stirred compassion in her.
“Thank you,” he said softly.
Eleanor rested her hand on the keys. She could feel the cool ivory under her fingers and the smell of the wax that was used to polish it was in her nostrils. It was a beautiful instrument, inlay sparkling above the little shelf where the music would stand, the wood a fine hardwood.
“You may sit down,” he said lightly.
Eleanor drew out the piano stool and sat down, resting both her hands on the keys. She looked around the room, seeing it from this new perspective. It was paneled on the outer walls, the inner walls decorated with wallpaper of white flocked silk. It was a fine house, but no finer than Woodford House.
She looked up at Lord Glenfield, and felt her cheeks redden.
“I am happy to study the instrument, my lord,” she murmured. “But please, don’t make me play it.”
He chuckled aloud. “It can’t be that bad, Miss Montague.”
“It is,” she said. “Trust me.”
They both laughed. Eleanor felt her heart lift. When his eyes sparkled, and his grin tugged at the corners of his lips, he was most handsome. It was that cold, unreadable expression that he wore most days that she did not like.
“...and if you read here, it seems like it’s a sound prospect,” Lord Ramsgate was saying to Papa across the room. Papa was poring over the papers with him, not paying the slightest heedto Lord Glenfield and herself across the room, five or six yards from them both.
“Do you like London?” Lord Glenfield asked, surprising her.
“I have never liked the city half as much as the countryside,” she told him firmly. She looked up at him, daring him to laugh at her. His gaze was bright and she half-expected him to tease her, calling her a hoyden for loving the rougher countryside more than the sleeker, more stylish city.
His smile widened. “I am of like mind,” he murmured lightly.
“You are?” Eleanor blinked in surprise. She had not expected him to share her fondness for the countryside. She wanted to ask him what he enjoyed about it, but Lord Ramsgate called them.
“My dear young people!” he called. “It seems we need a sharp pair of eyes. Might one of you come over here and read this print for us?”
Eleanor pushed back her chair at once, but Lord Glenfield was faster and he hurried over to the desk, lifting up the document that his father handed him and staring at it as he tried to read the tiny letters.
“In the case of loss of profit due to accident, we will ensure that...” he began reading.
Eleanor listened distantly; her mind focused on Lord Glenfield. She watched him surreptitiously as he read, her heart thudding for some reason as he walked lithely back over to where she sat after passing his father the paper.
“Were you listening?” he asked lightly. “Or was it tiresome?”
“You...” Eleanor glared up at him, her cheeks reddening again, this time with annoyance. He was impossible.
