Page 19 of The Season for Loving
Chapter Five
Fergus hadn’t said no, which only showed what a fool he was when it came to Miss Georgette Gage. He hadn’t said yes either, but it was clear she’d taken his waffling for an unqualified affirmative. Over the last ten days he’d found himself spending more and more time in her company. They’d stood up a total of five times at two assemblies held in Tunbridge Wells, they’d gone riding almost every day, and they’d tramped through the woods with the local children, collecting mistletoe and holly for the Christmas decorations.
He’d even helped her dig up the old family recipe for the wassail bowl. Eliza claimed it had been handed down from the time of Charles II, scribbled out an old parchment. Someone had apparently misplaced it last year, and Georgie and Fergus had been assigned to look for it. They’d finally unearthed the blasted thing in the family Bible, slipped inside a passage foretelling the birth of the Christ child.
During all those hours spent together, something terrible had happened—Fergus had fallen in love. Pretending to court Georgie had turned into nothing less than an unmitigated disaster. A man couldn’t pretend with someone like her. She was simply too honest, too intelligent, and too sweet.
She was also bloody good fun. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d truly had fun.
“Fergus Haddon, stop lurking behind that pillar like a common thief,” intoned his personal voice of doom—Lady Reese, looming out of the crowd of revelers like one of Macbeth’s witches. “And is that whistling I hear? Stop it this instant.”
“I’m not lurking,” he said. “I’m simply resting between sets.”
“Nonsense. You haven’t danced a step. You’re hiding.”
He gave her back scowl for scowl. “And who might I be hiding from, your ladyship?”
She looked pointedly toward the center of the dance floor. They were in the Great Hall of the Friar’s House, a cavernous room that had once been the refractory of the old monastery. It was normally closed up at this time of year, but the ladies had decreed it be opened for a grand party for the local gentry on Christmas night. They’d spent the last three days decorating the high-beamed room, with its flagstone floor and a fireplace big enough to hold an ox. With swags of greenery and beribboned clusters of mistletoe and holly, it looked splendidly festive.
It seemed every person from miles around had come to celebrate the holiday with the Gages. In the center of those festivities was Miss Georgie Gage, a beautiful Christmas angel in a white velvet gown trimmed with silver spangles and shiny green ribbons.
At the moment, she was dancing with the oldest son of the local squire and enjoying herself immensely. Fergus couldn’t help but notice that her partner was a tall, well-dressed fellow who most girls would consider a fine-looking fellow. He grudgingly had to admit that they looked perfect together and seemed to share the same sort of good-natured personality. By any reasonable measure, Mr. Poppet would make her a more than respectable match.
Mr. Poppet obviously thought so too, since he’d been paying Georgie a great deal of notice this last week, so much so that Fergus could barely keep from hauling the man out to the terrace and throwing him over the balustrade into a thorny bush. Georgie was now attracting more than her share of attention from Hemshawe’s eligible bachelors. Fergus should be happy for her, but it annoyed the hell out of him that the girlhewas supposed to be courting suddenly had a line of feckless youths trotting along behind her.
“Took them long enough to notice,” he grumbled.
Lady Reese cocked an ear. “What was that?”
“I said, I haven’t a clue what you’re referring to,” he said, raising his voice over the music.
She whacked him on the shoulder with her fan. “Stop moping about like a tragedy queen and go ask the girl to dance. Better yet, take her outside on the terrace for a breath of fresh air.”
“Forgive me for saying so, but I always knew you were daft. It’s the dead of winter out there, in case you haven’t noticed.”
“You’re the daft one if you can’t think of a way to keep Miss Gage from getting chilled.”
“Good God, daft doesn’t even begin to cover it. You’re positively demented.”
When she started to starch up, he grimaced. “That was incredibly ill-mannered of me, and I beg your pardon. I’m the last person who should say things like that.”
Her ladyship’s rather stern features softened a bit. “Fergus, you must stop thinking about that. It wasn’t your fault. Well, itwasyour fault that you challenged your cousin to a duel, which was exceedingly stupid, but you were acting on false assumptions.”
Even when Lady Reese was trying to be encouraging, she still managed to insult him. It was a rare talent. “If I hadn’t been so wrapped up in my own anger and resentment, I might have noticed something was wrong with my mother.”
“Lord Riddick and Alec’s father should have noticed too,” she said. “You were a young, hot-headed man, while they had age and experience on their side. And still they failed to see the deterioration in your mother’s condition.”
Fergus sure as hell didn’t feel young anymore. He’d felt weary and old beyond his years ever since the day his life crumbled around him. That had changed when he met Georgie. Then he felt like he might be at the beginning of things, with all sorts of adventures ahead.
Lady Reese poked him in the shoulder, this time more gently. “There is no earthly reason why you can’t court the girl. You’re a respectable man from an exceedingly good family. Even without Miss Gage’s fortune, you are able to support her in good style. I think you’re very well matched.”
When he took in the gleam in her eyes, it finally hit him. “Good God, you planned this all along, didn’t you? That’s why you postponed the trip to Maywood Manor and wrangled that invitation from Bertie to spend Christmas here.”
The bloody woman wasn’t just trying to marry him off—she was trying to marry him off to Georgie.
Lady Reese gazed down her imperious nose. “Mr. and Mrs. Gage were insistent that we remain here over the holidays. And it made perfect sense to change our plans, especially since Will is enjoying spending time with his old friend.”
“I’m not sure your husband would agree with you, since he’s left on his own at Maywood Manor.”
