So Worthy My Love (42 page)

Nicholas peered upward into the hazy gloom and made his own conjecture. “It vill continue for a vhile longer, I think.” Tugging a glove more firmly over his hand, he lowered his gaze to her. “I'm here to carry yu back to the coach,
vrouwelin.
”

“Oh, but there's no need, Captain,” Elise assured him hastily. She was reluctant to have him perform such a service for her, especially now when she was seeking to find a way to turn aside his affection. “I'm quite sound of limb.”

“I vould not see yu ruin yur gown in the snow,” Nicholas argued, advancing a step.

A soft rustling sound came from the growth of trees behind the captain, drawing their attention to the recently formed path, then a snuffling snort intruded into the stillness of the forest. Elise watched through the trees until she spied Maxim coming toward them leading the huge black steed, Eddy, behind him. When she saw him, she experienced a burgeoning relief that gave evidence of where her affection was solidly centered.

“The men are ready to leave,” Maxim announced as Nicholas met him with a sharply questioning stare. “They're wondering whether to ride on ahead to patrol along the road or to stay with the coach. I believe they're waiting for your direction.”

In some frustration Nicholas faced Elise. It was not the manner of a gentleman to seize a maid in a rush and carry her back to a camp full of men who would likely make much of the matter. After all, their curiosity had already been aroused by her rather noteworthy exit from the coach. Nor could he again press the advantage of being the only escort available when Maxim's presence prevented such a claim. Thus he had to yield the day to his lordship when that one offered to take the girl back on Eddy.

“We'll ride beside the coach for a space,” Maxim threw back over his shoulder as he lifted Elise to the back of the steed. A broad, flat saddle accommodated the pair of them as Maxim swung up behind her.

The animal flagged his tail and pranced sideways for a moment, making the captain retreat to a safe distance. Nicholas clamped a bridle on his growing irritation and kept his silence, realizing that any invitation for the maid to wait and ride with him would appear provoked by an overly possessive nature. Still, when Maxim tapped his heels against the steed's flanks and set him into an easy canter, he was sorely tempted to act the outraged suitor, for the maid fell back against that sturdy frame and there she stayed within those encircling, protective arms as they rode back through the trees.

Maxim's arm tightened about Elise, tucking her closer against him as he whispered close to her ear. “I was fraught with jealousy when I thought of another holding you close, even for such a service as carrying you back to the coach. I had to come back for you.”

Elise laid a hand upon his arm, tempted to confide in him that she had been much relieved that he
had returned for her. “Nicholas has become a good friend. I would not see him hurt.”

“If you love him, Elise, then tell me, and I will go away.” Maxim's voice rasped in her mind. “There needs be no word of explanation. But if what I sense is true and there is something growing between us, then a kind word spoken to him now is better than a belated apology. That, my dear, would lend the same effect as a full broadside from a large carrack upon a small cog.”

T
HE
R
IVER
T
RAVE
and the battlements laid out by Hansa burghers several centuries prior had made Lubeck an easily defended port. Before the walled city, the stout twin towers of Holsten Gate stood guard, its guns visible and ready to challenge whatever enemy would dare approach. Set beneath a sky inflamed by the lowering sun, the city gleamed like a multi-jeweled brooch, its steeply jutting rooftops and the lofty pinnacles of its churches reflecting the dwindling light and piercing the gloom with shards of radiant color.

“Lubeck!
Unser aller Haupt!
” Nicholas exclaimed as they approached the gates on horseback. “Head of us all! Queen of the Hansa!” He grinned at Elise who rode beside him on her mount. “She is a jewel, is she not,
vrouwelin?
”

“Truly,” Elise replied in much admiration and awe. Once past the Holstentor, Nicholas led the way through a confusing maze of streets and finally brought his troop to a halt before a large, timber-supported house. Inside the structure a young man pressed close to a lower window and peered out. A smile quickly broke upon his face as he caught sight of the approaching entourage, and he disappeared in
an instant. Hardly a moment's pause later, an upwelling of excited cries issued forth from the dwelling as the front door burst open to spill forth two women and the youth, all waving and calling out vociferous welcomes.

Nicholas slid from his mount and, spreading his arms wide, roared out a greeting. Rushing forward like excited children, the women gave glad cries and flung themselves into his embrace, while their young companion, of an age near, clapped the captain eagerly on the back. For a moment Nicholas seemed lost in a veritable tangle of reaching arms and clasping hands.

“Nicholas's family appears to be as exuberant about life as he is,” Maxim observed with a chuckle as he lifted Elise from her mare. Setting the maid to her feet, he paused a moment to stare down at her as his eyes conveyed a volume of wondrous things. Though his outward manner was most decorous, she read the heat in his gaze, and it was like being hit with a full volley. An invading weakness began in the pit of her belly and spread like quicksilver through her veins. On its heels was born an exciting warmth that embraced her whole being. If she wanted to, a wayward thought slyly tempted, she could call him into her bed and have done with these childish pangs that left her hungering for something more. He could teach her all there was to know about . . .

Elise mentally shook herself, amazed at where her thoughts were leading her. With such suggestions flowing into her mind, she would be hard-pressed to resist his arguments. Her defenses would
crumble like towers of sand, and passion would be allowed to range where it would.

Curbing what seemed to be a rather ribald wandering of her imagination, Elise took a secure hold of the arm he offered and strangely felt a growing ease with his nearness. When she remembered that Arabella had rejected the manly favor of this one for wedlock with a boorish clod, she could only wonder if the woman was made of stone.

“Arabella was a fool,” she breathed, hardly aware that she had spoken.

“Madam?” Maxim frowned at her in dubious wonder. “Whatever brings Arabella to your mind?”

Elise released a soft, quavery sigh. “I doubt if you would really understand, my lord. ‘Twould take a woman to fully fathom my thoughts.”

“You're being most elusive,” he accused with a grin.

“ ‘Tis the way of women, my lord.” She cast a sidelong glance at him as her mouth curved upward. “ ‘Tis our only defense.”

“I'll probably never know what goes on in that fine and lovely head of yours.” His hungering eyes caressed her face, prompting a blush to rise to her cheeks before she carefully lowered her gaze. His words came to her as a whisper. “Perhaps you do not completely share what I feel toward you . . .”—then his voice deepened as he continued—“but I can teach you many things . . .”

Elise's head snapped up in surprise. He had penetrated so deftly into the pattern of her own musings, she was pricked by a sudden fear that he could read her mind. It was an immense relief to her when
a young, fair-haired woman, of about a score or so years, separated herself from the welcoming party and approached Maxim with an exuberant smile.

“You must be Lord Seymour,” she greeted in crisp, fluent English. “Nicholas has told me so much about you I've been most anxious to meet you. I'm his cousin, Katarina Hamilton . . .” She paused and, giving a quick shake of her head, laughed as she corrected herself. “Actually, our mothers were very distant cousins, which makes us”—she chuckled again as if the

thought delighted her—“barely even kin.”

Maxim responded debonairly, showing a fine leg as he swept into a courtly bow. “The pleasure is mine,
Fraulein
Hamilton, I assure you.”

“And this must be Elise,” Katarina surmised, assessing the beauty of the younger woman. Though it gave her heart little ease, she could clearly see why the captain had become infatuated with the maid. “Nicholas wrote and said he would be bringing you here for a visit. Did you have an enjoyable journey?”

“Quite enjoyable, thank you,” Elise responded graciously, realizing her moment of panic was safely behind her, at least for the present. “I'm much relieved to be able to converse with someone. I was afraid I'd not be able to understand a single word that was spoken.”

“It must be difficult living in a foreign country when you've no knowledge of the language, but you seem to have fared well. You've obviously been well-protected by Nicholas and Lord Seymour.”

“Once upon a time I was sure I was watched too closely,” Elise quipped as she tossed Maxim an accusative
glance. He inclined his head briefly to acknowledge her genteel barb, but Katarina frowned, somewhat bemused by the remark, and Elise rushed on to forestall any inquiry by presenting one of her own. “But how is it that you speak English so well?”

“My father was an Englishman who chose to remain here after he married my mother,” Katarina readily explained. “My brother, Justin, and I were little more than children when my mother died, and when my father passed on much later, Nicholas's mother took us in and treated us as her very own.” She lifted her slender shoulders in a casual gesture. “It has been dreadfully boresome since Nicholas left. I must confess I've been most envious of you.”

“Of me?” It was Elise's turn to be bewildered. “How so?”

“Why, to be surrounded by so many handsome men has to be the fantasy of every maiden in the world. I'd leave Lubeck in a moment had I such an escort, but as you see, I'm naught but an aging spinster.”

“Katarina! Vhat vill Lord Seymour t'ink of yu?” The plunipish, white-haired woman who had greeted Nicholas came forward on his arm. Claiming Maxim's gaze, she slashed her hand back and forth as if to erase all that the younger woman had said.
“Nein! Nein!
Yu must not take to heart Katarina's vords,
mein Herr.
She know not vhat she say.”

“Oh, but Katarina has alvays spoken her mind quite vell,” Nicholas interjected, his eyes glowing with humor.

“And yu!” The ancient jerked on his sleeve as she scolded, “Shame on yu for encouraging her! Yu
put ideas in her head effer since her poor
Vater
vas killed and she come to liff vit' us. If yu vere not my son, I vould bar yu from t'is house!”

Justin was eager to join ranks in teasing the elder. “
Ja,
if not for Cousin Nicholas, Katarina and I would be a pair of blessed saints. He fills our heads with such wild notions, we cannot help ourselves.”

“Bah!” the old woman scoffed. “The two of yu haff no need for ot'ers to put vayvard t'oughts in yur heads, Justin Hamilton. Yu make t'em vell enuff on yur own.”

Justin grinned as he reached out to gently tweak the elder's nose. “You shall ever be our conscience,
Tante
Therese, especially since your eyes throw sparks when you're angry!”

“Keep to yurself, young man,” she warned direly, but her chuckle dismantled her rebuke as she slapped his hand away. “Yu not so big t'at I cannot take yu ‘cross my knee.”

Nicholas laid his arm around his mother's shoulders and gave her an affectionate hug.
“Meine Mutter! Es ist Wonne sehen Sie.”
He placed a kiss upon the white head. “
Acb,
but I'm forgetting our guests.” He raised his hand to indicate Elise who was delighted with the good-natured bantering of the family. “Mother, these are two of my very good friends, Mistress Elise Radborne”—he swept his hand onward to the one who stood beside the maid—“and Lord Maxim Seymour.”

“How goot of yu to visit us,” Therese declared, and fondly patted Elise's hand. “Velcome to our home,
Fraulein
. . .
mein Herr.
” Beckoning to them both, she
bade cheerily, “
Bitte, Kommen Sie ans Feuer
. . .
Kommen!
Come varm yurselves by the fire.” Lifting the hem of her skirts, she led the way into the house. Passing quickly through the hall, she directed a maidservant to help the guests as they entered, and clapped her hands to signal another two to begin setting out a feast in an adjoining hall. With quick and kindly attention she watched over the gathering as cloaks were doffed and boots were wiped clean.

Katarina tugged playfully on Nicholas's fur-lined cloak as he moved past her. The captain paused, torn between the need for replacing Maxim as the gallant who was at present helping Elise off with her boots and a desire to answer the impish challenge sparkling in the blue-gray eyes of his cousin. He postponed his first objective and yielded to the temptation of the taunt. Sweeping off his cloak with a flamboyant swirl, he flung it over Katarina, enveloping her completely within its voluminous folds. In an instant an uproar of guffaws, shrieks, and muffled threats filled the hall as Katarina gave vent to promises of dire recompense to a brutish cousin. She tried to escape the heavy wrap, but Nicholas swooped her up with unbridled gusto and, tossing her over his shoulder, turned to leer at Elise.

“Remember vhen ve first met,
vrouwelin?
”

Laughing at the captain's antics, Elise balanced herself with a hand on Maxim's shoulder as she slid a slender foot into the slipper he held. “ ‘Tis an event I shall never forget.”

Therese had paused behind the English couple to take careful heed of the Marquess's solicitations.
Now she bustled past the two in her haste to reach the melee. Snatching a broom from a maid who had been sweeping up the loose snow, she came around and applied it with merciless force to the rear of her son, drawing a feigned wail from him.