“Pant like a dog,” the deep voice commanded, “it helps when you’ve been winded.”
She wanted to protest that she wasn’t winded but dying, but could only manage a splutter. Someone stroked her forehead. She smelt the reassuring scent of musk…of Jack, she realized with a thrill, like waking from a nightmare secure in a lover’s arms.
“Jack,” she whimpered, ribs screaming with the effort.
“I’m here. Lie still” Softly, he touched her cheek, brushing aside a stray curl. “Is anything broken?”
Cautiously, she moved her limbs. “I don’t think so.”
A muscle twitched in his jaw. “When I saw you lying there I feared the worst…”
She stared, beneath the dust he was ashen, dried blood coating his cheek.
“You are hurt!”
“It’s nothing, but you….”
“Just winded.” Cautiously, she felt her ribs and satisfied nothing was broken she managed a shaky smile.
“Can you sit?” Huntley eased her up. But then the trees started to spin and to her mortification, she vomited on the grass. ‘There, there, sweeting.” One broad hand rubbed her back, whilst the other lifted hair from her face. “Here, use this.” Jack handed her a silk handkerchief.
“I’m sorry,” she moaned and wiped her mouth.
“No, tis me that should apologize. You weren’t happy about the phaeton.”
“What happened?” Eulogy hugged her knees, waiting for the clammy light headedness to pass.
“Something spooked the horses,” the flat tone of his voice made her alert, “…and the axle broke. We were lucky to be thrown clear.”
“Oh.” Eulogy pondered on his use of the word ‘lucky’. At this particular moment, with every part of her body hurting, she didn’t feel particularly fortunate. Then she peered round his shoulder to the splintered wood and exposed underbelly of the ruined carriage, and shuddered at what might have been.
Miraculously, the horses stood quietly grazing, seemingly unhurt after dragging the wreckage of the overturned phaeton to a halt.
He folded her slim hand in his and pressed her fingertips to his lips.
“My darling Eulogy, I’d be lost without you.”
Her thudding heart, having finally slowed, started racing again.
“Mr. Huntley?”
“Jack,” he corrected, “I prefer it when you call me Jack.”
Dimly Eulogy became aware of voices growing louder. Riders arrived, cutting the greys free, people approaching from all corners of the park, intruding on their intimacy.
“Jack?”
“Yes, Eulogy. May I call you, Eulogy?”
“I’d rather walk home, if that’s all right by you.”
“Of course, anything you want. I’ve been such an idiot.”
“It was an accident, you couldn’t help it.”
“I don’t mean the phaeton, I mean you. That’s why I brought you out today, I wanted to tell you how I feel.” Her heart tumbled afresh, but before he could elaborate, a gentleman reined in his hunter and dismounted.
“I say, this looks a pretty pickle. Are you chaps all right?”
Jack replied, curtly, his eyes never leaving Eulogy. “Shaken, but unhurt, thank you.”
“And you madam, are you hurt?”
“I am fine, thank you.”
Jack released her hand and stood to dust down his coat.
A crowd began to gather, riders assembling from all over the park. Eulogy pulled her shaking legs up under her skirts as people eyed her like a zoo exhibit. Jack helped her up.
“My poor Mr. Huntley and Miss Foster. What a spectacle!”
Hearing the whiny voice of Miss Cartwright, Eulogy’s heart sank. Melissa Cartwright with her heart shaped face and perfect manners, simpering beneath a ribboned bonnet, not a hair out of place—the last person in the world she wanted to see at that moment. As if reading her mind, Melissa twirled a sugar pink parasol and smirked.
Eulogy rose onto her knees, attempting to straighten her skew-whiff jacket and mouthed a greeting.
With a flounce and flick of the chin, Melissa ignored Eulogy and turned her attention to Jack.
“Poor Mr. Huntley, you are bleeding!” Melissa clutched her chest. “To think you might have died.”
“Merely a scratch, do not distress yourself. Now, please excuse me, I must attend to Miss Foster.”
Eulogy shot him a grateful look. Really she did feel unaccountably giddy and an intolerable ringing in her ears.
“Oh but Mr. Huntley.” Miss Cartwright placed herself between them. “This is a disaster.”
“Miss Cartwright? Tis only a phaeton and can be replaced.” Jack’s eyes widened as a tear slid down Miss Cartwright’s perfect cheek. She glanced at him through lowered lashes.
“I wasn’t referring to the carriage, but my heart, which is quite broken.”
“Oh?”
With exquisite grace she fumbled for a lace handkerchief and wrung it like a chicken’s neck. “I had no idea you and Miss Foster were, that you and she were, so close.” A sob wracked her ample bosom.
“Miss Cartwright, pray do not distress yourself.”
Miss Cartwright’s wails grew louder. People who had started to drift away, turned back and stared.
“Once I dared to hope.” Miss Cartwright’s fingers tightened on the strangled handkerchief. With red rimmed eyes her gaze hardened. “When Mama learns that you are escorting Miss Foster, she will be livid. We had expectations.”
Jack tensed.
“Miss Cartwright, just because you and I danced and met socially does not amount to an understanding.”
“But engaged to a nobody.” Melissa sneered. “A country chit of no breeding. You do realize that no one of consequence will receive her if you marry?”
Feeling that she’d been overlooked for long enough, Eulogy struggled to stand. But her head still span and it was an effort to focus on Jack’s emotionless voice.
“Firstly, we are not engaged…and secondly, Miss Cartwright, you mistake my purpose. Miss Foster is the friend of a business partner who deserves reward after working very hard.”
That old familiar coldness, the chilling distance, hurt more than her tumble as she realized. Jack’s tenderness was the product of fear, nothing more. To him she was a business asset. He had been concerned about his investment. Everything fell chillingly into place.
She felt nauseous afresh. Now, more than ever, she would keep the secret of her birth. He would accept her as she was, or not at all.
“Mr. Huntley,” she said coolly, “I’d very much like to go home now.”
“Can you walk?”
She gathered her composure. Melissa Cartwright would not have the satisfaction of witnessing her hurt and she couldn’t bare it if Jack felt sorry for her.
“Of course.” She nodded bravely. “Good day, Miss Cartwright. Most fortuitous meeting you again. Thank you.” And she meant it, for unwittingly Miss Cartwright had shown her the painful truth.
Chapter 14
For once, not even the confines of The Gallery could soothe Jack’s ruffled mood. Seated at his desk, through gritted teeth he re-read the letter he’d been staring at for ten minutes, only to push it away in disgust. It was no good, he just couldn’t concentrate.
His mouth set in a hard line. Miss Foster had done this to him with her stand-offish behavior and inexplicable coolness. Then he groaned and balled his fists. No, that was precisely the point, he was at fault, he should have realized she was terrified of heights, and yet he’d been so determined to make an impression. He laughed bitterly. Oh yes, he’d done that all right and now she never wanted to speak to him again.
He rose, his hooded eyes troubled, as he set to pacing the floor. To make matters worse, it was becoming increasingly clear that the phaeton crash was anything but an accident.
Hands clenched behind his back, Huntley regarded his favorite Reynauld portrait, the one of Emma Hart dressed as a shepherdess, usually guaranteed to calm his mind, but today he saw only a colored blur as the stable lad’s words echoed round his mind.
The boy had found a flint, embedded in the lead grey’s rump, which might not have been so worrying were it not for the fact that there were no stones on the sandy gallops of Hyde Park—so someone had meant the horses to bolt! But it got worse, the axle had been partially sawn through, the phaeton was meant to crash.
The facts seemed clear enough. Someone wished him or Miss Foster harm. The first option made him angry, the second, filled him with dread. And to make matters worse, Miss Foster was blanking him.
“Damn, woman. If only she’d speak to me. Shout even, and we could go back to how we were.”
He resumed pacing. He’d sent her flowers. Not just the odd bunch, but enough bouquets to fill several rooms. Glorious hot house flowers and extravagant blooms: Dahlia’s the size of dinner plates, fragrant roses and exotic camellias. She’d acknowledged them all with the same irritating, distant, politeness. With each perfect drafted note of thanks, Huntley became convinced that he had destroyed her trust in him.
Matters had gone so far astray that he’d even swallowed his pride and called on the pretext of discussing Farrell’s imminent exhibition. She hardly looked at him and left him to talk business with Farrell. Which made the vexing question of how to protect her from harm, even more difficult when she couldn’t bear to be in the same room as him.
A cautious tap on the door interrupted his thoughts.
“Come.”
Williams, his clerk hovered nervously on the threshold.
“Well? Spit it out, what is it man?”
The young clerk cleared his throat. “Ahem, it’s just that your appointment with His Grace…you have remembered?”
Huntley shot a glance at the ormolu clock and groaned. How had it come to this, that his time keeping had become so shoddy?
“Damnation, is he here already?”
“Yes, sir. Mr. Chaucer has been entertaining the Duke these past ten minutes.”
“Blast! Give my apologies. Tell them I have been unavoidably detained and will attend shortly.”
“Very good, sir.” Williams bowed, relief written large on his face.
“Oh, and one last thing.”
“Yes, sir?”
“Have you a sweetheart?”
Williams couldn’t have looked more surprised if he’d been shot.
“Well….yes, sir.”
Huntley gestured vaguely at the air. “And when you have a falling out, how do you make the peace?”
“Oh, that’s easy, sir.” William’s responded brightly.
“It is?” For the first time in days, Huntley felt a smile dawning.
“Oh, yes. Sweetmeats does it every time with my girl. Very sweet tooth she has, you see, sir.”
Huntley’s face fell. “Thank you, Williams. That will be all.”
Somehow, Huntley doubted candies were the answer to his troubles with Miss Foster.
When troubled, Huntley immersed himself in work, which was precisely what he did as Farrell’s exhibition drew close. Time flew and before he knew it the launch came and went. Miss Foster had agreed to attend and the grand opening went without a hitch. She had been like a shining light amongst the dull, dusty critics, as she charmed them with her natural grace.
That afternoon, as Huntley headed back to The Gallery, he felt irrationally excited at the prospect of seeing her once again. On the corner of Bond Street, the barouche rumbled to a halt. Huntley drummed his fingers and, after a short eternity, lowered the window to shout to the coachman.
“What’s the hold up?”
“A crowd in the road, sir. We ain’t going to get to the door, sir, least not until this lot clears.”
“Why the disturbance?” With sudden unease, Huntley shifted in his seat.
“From what I sees, there’s a right ol’ fuss outside The Gallery.”
Huntley became alert.
“Wait here.”
He reached for his cane and jumped down. Alarms sounded in his head, every instinct screaming that Miss Foster was in danger.
“Keep the carriage close.”
Huntley pushed his way through the crowd, past jewelers shops, snuff sellers, tea-dealers and engravers, intent only on getting to The Gallery. Sweat broke across his brow.
If anything happened, he’d never forgive himself. He had debated whether to tell Eulogy about the attempts of her life and decided against it. Now, he cursed himself, he should have warned Eulogy, told her that the phaeton accident was not an accident at all, set her on her guard.
He elbowed a man in a tail coat aside.
“I say!” The man blustered to Huntley’s back.
Noise pressed in from every side. Laughter, chatter and good natured banter. On tip-toe, straining to see above the top hats and bonnets, Huntley glimpsed a red-faced Chaucer. He seemed to be standing on something, waving his hands to get the crowd’s attention. A hush fell as Chaucer spoke.
“Ladies and gentlemen! Patience, I beg you! The Gallery is currently full to capacity. It would not be safe to allow anyone else inside. But if you would be so good as to let people out.”