The first of the London balls, at Lord
and Lady Clayton’s, was tomorrow night. Her heart took up
a frisky tempo at the thought. With whom would she dance first?
She impulsively seized her pelisse to
use as a partner and waltzed it around the room, singing: “‘Have
pity,’ he said, ‘have patience, I pray, I’ve a
stick up me CLAP and gray in me hair!’ La la la la—OH!
Ow! Oh no—”
She’d spun herself and her pelisse
partner into the desk chair.
Which teetered drunkenly, then toppled
onto its back with a mighty crash that made her flinch.
She dropped her partner on the bed and
crouched, rubbing her shin. “Good heavens, sir. It looks
as though you may have imbibed too much this evening. Let me help
you up,” she said to amuse herself as she righted the chair.
A moment later she whirled again at a
vigorous rapping on her door.
Lovely! Dot had arrived with her tea!
Beaming, she flung it open.
And beheld a man.
He was coatless. His cravat dangled as
if he’d been interrupted in the act of clawing it off, his
striped waistcoat hung open, and his thick, black hair was dashed
into peaks, very like he’d plowed two tormented hands through
it. A shocking, tiny little V of bare skin was visible at his
throat. He also had the shoulders of someone who could effortlessly
hurl a trunk up onto a mail coach, and the sculpted cheekbones
normally sported by statues of deities.
She wasn’t proud of it, but these
last three things were what made her close the door only most
of the way instead of slamming it.
“I came as quickly as I could, madam.
Shall I send for a doctor?” His voice was a rumbling bass
she could feel in her sternum. His tone was all urgent, hushed
sympathy.
“I—I beg your pardon, sir?”
“Surely one only caterwauls past
midnight if one has suffered the loss of a limb, or has inadvertently
run one’s self through with a fireplace poker.”
He sounded so earnest, and his Welsh accent
was so beautiful—the “s’s” caressed, the “r’s”
gently rolled—it was a full three seconds before she realized
this was a grave insult, not a benediction. He’d made the
word “caterwaul” sound like a poem.
She was mute with astonishment.
Through the crack of the door, his fierce
dark eyes seemed as endless as the universe.
“I—I’m terribly sorry if
I disturbed you, sir. You see, I’m new to London and—”
He held up a hand. “Ah. Say no more.
You hail from a place where you can freely wail the song of your
people to the hills, like a wolf. Mere walls cannot contain your
exuberance. Sleep is as nothing when you are filled with song.
One simply must twirl.”
Her stomach contracted against the sardonic
onslaught. He was so beautiful and colorfully mean. Despite herself,
she was perversely thrilled. He was an entirely new creature to
her experience, and she’d come to London for new experiences.
He gazed back at her, radiating enough
impatience for the entire human race.
“How did you know about the twirl?”
She almost whispered it.
“Something caused the crash. I suspect
cavorting.”
Oh no. “You heard the crash, too?”
Her cheeks were fully aflame now.
“The building juddered like a ship
in a storm.” He explained this slowly, as if to a child.
They regarded each other through the four
inches of open door while a series of eloquent and scathing little
rejoinders sparked and died in her mind. He was rude. She was
no coward.
But her sense of fairness was powerful.
However ignorant she was of the thickness of the walls, it was
no excuse; she was in the wrong. And this man appeared to be under
some sort of duress.
She cleared her throat. “Well,”
she said humbly. “I am abashed. I apologize. I was unaware
of your proximity, sir. Thank you for calling it to my attention.
I shall endeavor to be quiet.”
“If you would be so kind.” These
last words were briskly, exasperatedly delivered.
His point unforgettably made, he spun
and vanished from the doorway as if he’d never been.
She stared, blinking, into the space he’d
left, her ears ringing as if he’d been a cymbal clash, instead
of a man.
Presently she heard a clinking and rattling,
which turned out to be Dot proceeding at a stately, cautious pace
down the hall, bearing a tray of tea.
“Dot . . . who was that man?”
Dot glanced stealthily over her shoulder.
“Lord Kirke.” She said it very quietly. “He arrived
late this evening.”
Cat was stunned. “The Lord Kirke?”
Dot nodded slowly.
An eloquent look passed between them as
Cat took the tray.
“Mr. Pike let him in,” Dot told
her with a certain grim satisfaction, as if this explained everything.
