Edenbrooke (18 page)

“I am sorry you had to be subjected to his poetry,” I said to Mr. Beaufort. “I tried to stop him, but it was impossible.”

He laughed. It was a pleasant sound. “I can well believe it. But I can hardly blame his taste, even if his poetry is not the finest.” Admiration gleamed in his eyes.

My blush refused to disappear, and I cursed my inability to feel comfortable with handsome young gentlemen. For this gentleman was handsome, although in a different way from Philip. This was the sort of gentleman Cecily probably met every day in London. This was the sort of gentleman my grandmother would want me to feel comfortable with and to learn to flirt with.

Mr. Beaufort leaned toward me. “Tell me, Miss Daventry, do you plan to attend the ball at the Assembly Rooms this Friday evening?”

I glanced at Lady Caroline, who nodded slightly. “Yes, I believe we had planned on it,” I said.

He smiled suavely. “And do you dance as prettily as you blush?”

My gaze darted to Philip. It sounded just like the sort of complimentary thing he would say. I thought he might appreciate Mr. Beaufort’s phrasing, but his eyes were narrowed and his mouth was set in a firm line. He clearly did not appreciate Mr. Beaufort. But did Philip really think he was the only man who was allowed to flirt with me?

I smiled back at Mr. Beaufort, feeling defiant for a reason I couldn’t explain. “Not quite, but much more willingly.”

Mr. Beaufort laughed as if I had said something very clever. My smile grew as I realized I had just flirted for the first time in my life. It was a heady experience, and one not altogether unpleasant.

“Then may I have the honor of the first two dances with you?” he asked.

I nearly looked at Philip again, but stopped myself, realizing that
he
had not asked me for any dances, so it should not matter to him what I answered.

“Yes, you may,” I said to Mr. Beaufort, feeling powerful. A handsome young gentleman wanted to dance with
me.
Not Cecily, but me.

Mr. Beaufort smiled in return, then stood and apologized for not being able to stay longer.

“I will look forward to Friday, then,” he said, leaving us with a bow.

Lady Caroline looked at me, then at Philip, who was still looking unappreciative as he glowered out the window at Mr. Beaufort’s retreating figure.

Lady Caroline abruptly stood. “Well, if you will excuse me, I have . . . something to do.” She hurried out of the room and shut the door firmly behind her.

I only vaguely noticed her departure. Smoothing my hand over the leather cover of my book of poems, I smiled to myself. Was this how Cecily felt when she talked to gentlemen? Did she feel this strong and powerful? I could not blame her for being a flirt now that I had experienced the effect of it myself.

I glanced up when Philip came away from the window and sat next to me on the settee. He held out his hand. “May I?”

I handed him the book, which he opened to the first page. Philip cleared his throat and read the first poem out loud. I was amazed that his voice, rich and familiar, could make even Mr. Whittles’s poem sound almost . . . good. I wondered what he could do with a well-written poem.

My urge to smile disappeared. My feeling of power deserted me. In its absence I felt deflated, and the lachrymose mood I had been trying to fight off earlier returned.

Philip turned the page and read another poem. Gazing at his familiar profile, I thought of the orchard littered with bruised apples. I thought of Miss Grace’s insinuations about my motives for coming here. I thought about how Cecily had danced with Philip and had fallen in love with him in London. I wondered how many hearts he had collected, and how many he had broken.

He glanced at me as he turned the page. “I am surprised you never told me about this admirer of yours—this Mr. . . . ?”

“Mr. Whittles.” I laughed a little in embarrassment. “He was not somebody I wanted to remember.”

Philip looked up from the book, expectantly, sure I was about to entertain him.

“He was twice my age, wore a creaky corset, and had a very wet mouth.”

He laughed. “It sounds like a lethal combination.”

“He was perfectly repulsive. I never understood why my aunt seemed to like him.”

“Did she?” Philip raised an eyebrow.

I nodded. “Yes, but he was very obtuse. It seemed a hopeless case.”

Philip shut the book. “It sounds like you have some matchmaking to do.”

I shrugged. “I would like nothing more, but I have never known how to go about it.”

Philip considered me for a moment. “I have it. Write them each a love letter, as if from the other, and see if it sparks something.”

“A love letter.” I could not even begin to fathom how to write a love letter.

“You do know how to write a love letter, don’t you?” Philip asked with a smile.

“Of course not,” I scoffed.

“Why ‘of course not’? Don’t you think you might write one someday?”

I shrugged, pretending to feel nonchalant about the topic, but inside, I was squirming with awkwardness. “I’ve never considered it.”

“Then I will teach you. But now I’m curious.” He smiled teasingly. “Have you ever
received
a love letter?”

I blushed. “No, I have not. Not unless you count Mr. Whittles’s poems.”

“I definitely would not count those.” His gaze turned provocative, his lips curved into a smile. “Seventeen, and never had a love letter? That doesn’t seem right. Shall I write you one, Marianne?”

I scowled at him. He took such delight in embarrassing me. “No, thank you,” I said forcefully.

“Why not?” His voice was quieter now. He had turned sideways on the settee so that he was angled toward me.

I reminded myself of several things, in quick succession: Philip was a flirt. Philip loved to make me blush. Philip stole hearts he had no intention of keeping. He was teasing me, as he always did. There was nothing more to it than that.

“You know I will leave if you tease me too much,” I warned him.

He turned the book over in his hands, looking at it instead of me. “Why do you think I would tease you?”

I rolled my eyes. “Experience.”

He lightly tossed the book onto the tea table and leaned toward me, his arm along the back of the settee. “But, Marianne, I am always serious when it comes to matters of the heart.”

He was still smiling, but his eyes were serious. It was one of those instances—always unexpected—when I had the feeling Philip’s teasing was a façade, a thin cover for deeper feelings I could only guess at. I studied his expression without success. In so many ways, this man was still a mystery to me.

I might never write a letter to Mr. Whittles as if from my aunt. But I was intrigued. I wanted to know this side of Philip—this side of him that knew how to court ladies and how to write a love letter and how to read a poem so that it melted something deep inside me. I wanted to know the side of him that Cecily knew. It was dangerous, and most likely foolish, but I had only a few short hours before everything would change, and I knew I would never have this opportunity again.

“Very well,” I said, feeling nervousness tremble within me. “You may teach me. After all, it may be a skill worth learning.”

Philip smiled, then stood and walked to the writing desk in the corner. He picked up quill and ink and paper, then carried everything to the round table where we had played whist with Mr. and Mrs. Clumpett last night.

“You won’t learn anything sitting over there,” he said. “Come here.”

I joined him at the table, and he held out a seat for me. Then he moved another chair so that it was right next to mine and sat down. I looked at the closed door of the drawing room. Philip was always careful to keep doors open when we were alone, but he made no move to do so now. My heart picked up speed, and nervousness began to stream through me. He sat so close to me that I could smell a mixture of scents—soap and clean linen and something that smelled earthy, like the grass after rain. I thought he smelled like sunlight and blue skies.

“Are you ready for your lesson in romance?” Philip asked with a teasing gleam in his eye.

Chapter 16

I was not sure I was ready at all, with Philip sitting so close to me in this quiet room. But then I remembered I was supposed to be growing up, and I tried to imagine what an experienced lady in London would do. I tried to imagine what Cecily would do. I imagined I was graceful and elegant and accustomed to handsome gentlemen teaching me how to write a love letter.

I kept my voice casual and said, “Please, go ahead.”

He cleared his voice and spoke in a tutorial manner. “The purpose of the love letter is to convey feelings one cannot say out loud. Here is your first exam: Why would a gentleman be unable to declare himself openly?”

Philip sounded so serious, as if he were a real teacher and I a pupil. I didn’t want him to be serious. So I bit my lip, as if thinking hard, and said, “Um, because he’s . . . a mute?”

Philip’s lips twitched in an effort not to smile. “I see you passed the general and went straight to the specific. The answer, Miss Daventry, is that a gentleman is unable to declare himself openly if his circumstances prevent it.” He raised an eyebrow. “Were you paying attention?”

I nodded. “Yes, but you spoke of a gentleman. Should you not be teaching me how a lady writes a love letter? After all, I will need to write a love letter as if I were my aunt.”

He rolled his eyes. “I am not going to pretend to write a love letter to another man. You will just have to take my instruction and apply it in your own way. Now, how do you think he should begin?”

“With her name?” I guessed.

“Unimaginative.” He picked up the quill, dipped it in ink, and wrote,

To my unsuspecting love.

I had to lean closer to Philip to read the words clearly. “Much more imaginative,” I murmured.

“And now for the essence of the letter.”

I kept my eyes on the paper, waiting for him to write more, but his hand stayed poised above the paper, until I looked up. He gazed into my eyes for a long minute, then said in a quiet voice, “The eyes are a good place to start.”

Oh, no. Now he was going to start teasing me in earnest. I was sure of it.

When I look into your eyes, I lose all sense of time and place. Reason robbed, clear thought erased, I am lost in the paradise I find within your gaze.

Oh, my.

I could never have imagined such words, not from anyone, not from Philip. They burned me from within, and I think if he had read them out loud I would have been consumed by heat. I was grateful that he was silent.

I still felt his gaze on my face—he was so close—but I did not dare look at him again. Instead, I rested my chin on my hand, curling my fingers over my cheek in an attempt to hide my blush.

I long to touch your blushing cheek, to whisper in your ear how I adore you, how I have lost my heart to you, how I cannot bear the thought of living without you.

The tease! I cursed him silently. I was sure he wrote about my blush just to provoke a reaction from me. He loved to provoke me, I reminded myself. He loved to make me blush. He said so himself, that day in the library. But even telling myself that did nothing to lessen the heat of my embarrassment.

I tried to remind myself that this was only a lesson, and not a real love letter.
Not my love letter,
I repeated in my mind while I stared at the paper.

To be so near you without touching you is agony. Your blindness to my feelings is a daily torment, and I feel driven to the edge of madness by my love for you.

The only sound in the room was the quiet scratch of quill on paper as Philip wrote. I stared at the letter as if it was my only anchor to reality. My heart thudded so hard it ached. Without knowing much about love myself, I knew that Philip must have once loved someone this passionately. He had once felt exactly what he had written—that he was nearly out of his mind with love. I choked on a surge of jealousy so bitter it shocked me.

Where is your compassion when I need it the most? Open your eyes, love, and see what is right before you: that I am not merely a friend, but a man deeply, desperately, in love with you.

I was shaking. I gripped my hands into fists and searched for some composure. I should be able to treat this as an amusing lesson in romance—a chance for me to become a little more experienced. Then why did I feel stretched thin, so transparent and tremulous? Why did my heart gallop? Why did I feel I was coming undone?

I knew none of the answers. I only knew that I was greatly disturbed by this . . . lesson. I wanted to find something to laugh about. But the letter sat before me on the table like an intimate glimpse into Philip’s heart. And there was nothing to laugh about. Indeed, I felt strangely close to crying.

I wanted to push the paper away. I wanted to run from the room. I wanted to reverse the clock and never know that Philip was capable of . . . this. I wanted to undo everything, even coming here to Edenbrooke, rather than know this about Philip.

Finally he spoke. “Do you have any questions?” His voice caused a ripple to cascade through me. I closed my eyes and summoned my courage to stay in my chair and not cry. This was my opportunity to prove my maturity. I would not let him know how his words had disturbed me.

I cleared my throat. “How shall you sign it? Your secret admirer?” My voice sounded close to normal, which I was quite proud of.

After a pause he said, “No, that won’t do.” His hand moved again, writing the words

Longing for you.

He signed his name underneath. I stared at his name, my fingers curled over my hot cheek, trying to hide something from him. Anything.

“What do you think?” he asked.

I tried to breathe normally and speak normally, but there was nothing normal about this moment. “Very nice,” I said in a tight voice.