A Season for the Heart (17 page)

As it happened, Pommy had indeed already eaten, and was sitting in her room crying and mending a rent in the new dress she had worn the previous night. On receipt of the Earl’s summary command, she wiped her eyes, blew her little nose, and hurried down to the drawing room to confront Lord Austell.

After entering the room almost at a run, she halted to stare nervously up at the man who was standing with his back to the hearth, frowning at her.

“You wished to see me, Milord?” she managed to say.

That was the trouble. Derek Masterson had wanted to see Pommy Rand with an urgency which alarmed him. Although he had been a bachelor for enough years to have come to accept it as the most desirable of states, he had been constantly subjected to attack, both open and subtle, from the most beautiful debutantes in the
Beau Monde
, and their determined mamas. He had also been the recipient of lures cast out by a number of highborn ladies who had something other than matrimony on their minds. Through these traps and snares he had woven a wily path of self-preservation for so many Seasons that he had come to accept it as a fact of life that he should never wish to marry. When he had found himself making the incredible suggestion to Pommy that she marry him to save him from Boggs’s machinations, the Earl was more startled than the girl who listened to the outrageous proposal. He knew he should have felt an overwhelming relief when the chit refused to take him seriously. Instead of which he found himself resentful at the complete lack of worldly wisdom she displayed in rejecting the best offer she was ever likely to receive. Of course he had been teasing her, he told himself; yet it was distinctly unflattering to get so prompt and total a repulse.

She has probably been attracted by Gareth’s handsome face, he told himself gloomily, and his youth and charm, into imagining she has a
tendre
for him. But this, as he analyzed it further, would not do, for he knew his Pommy’s quick wits and bright mind, and could not believe that the well-meaning but knuckle-headed Gareth would win her true love.

Still, he chided himself, is not many a bright, even brilliant man ensorcelled by some empty-headed little wanton? He had seen it often enough among his own friends! Why then might not an intelligent young woman lose her heart to a slow top? At this point he recollected Alan Corcran. Even yet he had not admitted to himself that his fury at discovering Pommy with not one but two cavaliers in his own Romantic gardens the previous night had been anything other than a sense of angry disgust that the little Heroine had so easily accepted the first overtures which came her way. And her cavaliers! The most notorious of the younger Bucks and his own nephew, beautiful but stupid. If he had realized, he told himself with searing contempt, that all the little chit wanted was a pair of male arms and lips, he himself could have—

With a feeling approaching horror, the Earl caught himself up from such dangerous imaginings. So the anger which he now proceeded to vent upon the trembling girl was, had she known it, chiefly directed against himself. When she had asked him if he wished to see her, his reply was unnecessarily violent.

“Not very much, after last night, Miss Rand! But since I am responsible for bringing you to London, and establishing you in this house, I must accept the further responsibility of seeing that you do not bring disgrace upon my family.”

This shock of that attack quite drove the color from Pommy’s face, revealing the dark shadows under her green eyes. For the Earl was not the only one who had had a restless night. Pommy had lain awake into the small hours, trying to understand what had made Lord Austell so angry with her in the garden, and crying over lost hopes she dared not admit she had cherished.

After a minute of silence, the Earl said gruffly, “I had not meant to criticize you so sharply, child, but you must be more circumspect in your—Romantic encounters if you wish to escape the censure of the Quizzies.”

Pommy held her head high. “What you observed in the garden was not a Romantic encounter, Milord. I was hot and wished to enjoy the peace and beauty of the place while Gareth—at your instructions, Your Lordship—fetched me a glass of ratafia. I was removing myself from the neighborhood of an arbor in which a couple were exchanging—ah—civilities, when I literally ran into Mr. Corcran.” Recalling their own first meeting at the Climbing Man, she admitted honestly, “I seem to make a habit of running impulsively into someone’s arms by mistake.”

“It is not usually considered necessary to stay there, however,” said the Earl grimly. She had actually been in Corcran’s arms, eh? It was worse than he had thought.

“I did
not
stay there,” retorted Pommy with pathetic dignity. “I discovered very soon who he was, and informed him that his fiancée’s father was about to try to compromise you.”

“Since we know from Isabelle that he had little stomach for the marriage, I’ll wager he was delighted to hear that,” said the Earl angrily. “What other details of my private affairs have you scattered about London?”

Pommy set her jaw against the remorse and shame which swept over her at this scathing denunciation. “Gareth, Alan, and I were trying to find some way to circumvent Mr. Boggs’s dastardly scheme when you—found us,” she concluded miserably.

Although there was a measure of relief in the Earl’s mind at these innocent disclosures, he found it impossible to adopt the softer tone he had begun to wish to use. The sensations he had experienced since coming upon the three in the garden last night had shaken him quite out of his bachelor complacency, and he had not yet been able to regain the facade of easy yet imperturbable detachment which was the face he was accustomed to present to his world. So now he said, rather too brusquely, “It does not do to get a reputation for disappearing into the shrubbery with your cavaliers, Pommy. If you were otherwise circumstanced, of course—” The Earl meant to refer to the fact that this darling girl was an orphan, and lacking the support and protection of a loving family. Pommy, however, who had been too shocked and hurt by Lord Austell’s earlier denunciations to look for a kindly meaning in his words, immediately supposed that he was referring to her position in his sister-in-law’s household.

Drawing herself up with all the dignity her trembling body would support, she said in a cold little voice, “You need not fear that I shall offend or disgrace Lady Masterson, sir! I understand what my position as her companion entails, and I shall not accompany her again to a social engagement. Indeed I would not have gone to your home last evening, except that she insisted you had included me in your invitation. I know my place, sir, and shall not step beyond it in future.”

Her little face was so white that the heavy shadows under her eyes were dark stains, and her soft mouth trembled. “May I be dismissed, Milord? I have work to do.”

Derek cursed himself for a clumsy, heavy-handed fool. What had possessed him, normally an urbane and self-controlled man, to blast the child with such harshness? Before he could reply to her last speech, which revealed that she had quite mistaken his meaning, Mikkle opened the door and announced, “Mr. Alan Corcran, Milord. To see Miss Rand.”

Pommy had thought her situation could not be worsened. She now perceived she had been mistaken. The Earl’s face, which had seemed to soften after her last speech, now assumed a look of such fury that she quaked before it.

“You have given this fellow permission to call upon you here?”

“Indeed, Milord, I have not,” cried poor Pommy.

The Earl, ignoring her, said coldly to the young sprig who, arrested by his icy glare, hesitated in the doorway, “Miss Rand was just about to attend upon Lady Masterson. You may state your business to me, sir.”

“The devil I will,” snapped Alan, who had had all he could stomach of stiff-rumped aristocrats. “You are neither the lady’s husband nor her employer!”

The noblemen glared at one another like two large dogs in dispute over territory. Pommy, horrified at this new contretemps, said in a choked voice, “
Oh, please—!
Alan, thank you for your courtesy in answering my summons. I shall be in touch with you later. I must go to Lady Masterson now.”

“You will be good enough to inform her that I am waiting to see her,” instructed the Earl arrogantly.

Pommy scuttled out of the room. If she had hoped to prevent a confrontation by her lie about summoning Alan, she was far off, for the gentlemen, instead of bidding one another a civil good day, stood glaring as the door closed softly behind the girl.

“So she
did
send for you,” began Lord Austell nastily. “She told me at first she had not.”

“Well, she hadn’t,” retorted Alan angrily. “You’ve got the poor girl so frightened she doesn’t know what she’s saying.”

“Since you are taking such an interest in the ‘poor girl,’ I must ask if your intentions are honorable—
this time
,” sneered the Earl.

“As a matter of fact, they are,” snapped Alan, rather to his own surprise.

Looking as though he had just been tipped the settler Pommy had promised Alan, the Earl rattled back gamely, “I understood you were engaged to Miss Boggs?” he said acidly. “Or do you intend setting up a harem?”

“That will hardly be necessary,” a reluctant grin was spreading over Alan’s rakish countenance, “since I am given to understand that Mr. Boggs has decided that an Earl is better value for his pounds and pence than a mere second son of a Baron.”

“He’ll catch cold at that,” said the Earl grimly.

Alan regarded the big nobleman with a grin. “I told Gareth and Pommy the old conycatcher would never gull you, but they insisted you were hooked.”

“I am,” confessed the Earl wryly, “but not by Mr. Boggs’s beautiful daughter.”

Alan looked as though he would like to inquire further into the matter of His Lordship’s Fair Fatality, but after a shrewd glance at the Earl’s frowning countenance, he forbore. Instead he ventured, “Since I am able to assure you, sir, that my intentions are honorable, may I have your permission to call upon Miss Rand?”

The Earl, who had just moments before Seen The Light, was not surprised at his instant hostility to this callow and presumptuous proposal. “Since I am neither the young lady’s husband nor her employer—as you have been so quick to remind me!—I cannot dictate what she will do or whom she will receive during the hours when she is not in attendance upon Her Ladyship.” He moved toward the door. “Mikkle will show you out. I must talk to Lady Masterson.”

Mr. Corcran took his leave promptly, not wishing to push his luck too far. An hour later a letter was delivered to Miss Rand in her room, to which she had been gently dismissed when Lord Austell was admitted to Lady Masterson’s sitting room. Scanning it with considerable difficulty—for Alan wrote a wretched scrawl—Pommy was startled to read the following:

Dear Pommy: Your employer’s brotherinlaw has given me Permission to court you. As for Boggs’ scheme to trap his l-ship, Austell tells me it has no chance for success, since he has already lost his Heart to another!! With his mony and position, A. could have had any girl he chose this last ten yrs. so I must suppose his Heart is given to One who cannot or will not accept it. He was in such a frett to speke to Lady M that he as good as pushed me out of the house. Could Lady M be the Object of his affections??

I shall hope to see you as soon as you are given a free hour. Send to me when you can—only better not tonight, as I am already engaged for cards with friends.

Forever yrs to command,

Corcran.

Pommy deciphered this missive with mixed feelings. It was balm for her sore heart to know that Alan counted himself “forever hers to command”—with the exception of this evening, of course. It was enraging to be told that the Earl had given Alan permission to press his suit. What had Lord Austell to say about Pommy’s marriage plans? Stirring up righteous indignation at the Earl’s assumption of authority helped a little to ease the pain of knowing he cared nothing for her personally. It gave her unexpected anguish to learn that Lord Austell’s affections were most likely set upon Lady Masterson—although, remembering the dark head leaning so protectively over the silver-gilt one, it was hard to deny the possibility. Yet the Earl had done so! Perhaps he was just brushing aside an encroaching servant who had no right to ask questions. Well, if it was Lady Masterson the Earl wanted, anyone who had the Earl’s best interests at heart must do her possible to further the match, decided Pommy. Facing her own grief at Alan’s disclosure, she was honest enough to accept that her own affections were irretrievably given to the big handsome nobleman who had entered into her fantasies so delightfully during the trip to London. With a pang she realized that actually
being
Blighted was far less amusing than imagining oneself in that position.

It remained now only to decide how best to help Lord Austell. Could it be true that Mr. Boggs would easily be persuaded to relinquish his plan to ensnare the Earl? Better to make very sure of that. Pommy considered that if Isabelle were safely wedded to anyone other than the Earl it would protect him from the vintner’s schemes. Being affianced was not enough, obviously, since Mr. Boggs had callously broken off his daughter’s engagement to Corcran as soon as bigger game was in sight. Pommy was smart enough to realize that she could not hope to reestablish the commitment between Isabelle and Alan—neither of them desired it. But there must be someone to whom Isabelle’s superb beauty and equally superb fortune would be a