Elisabeth Fairchild (3 page)

Nell jerked at her skirt, rending fabric again. “Father would not be tickled to see me displaying so much leg, Cat. Do help me free.”

Cat laughed and stretched up on tiptoe to reach the tangle of traces. “You are hanging out a bit here, aren’t you?” Her glance flicked up over Nell’s shoulder. “Deets is getting an eyeful. Aye, Mr. Deets?"

Deets laughed drunkenly.

Nell hated the sound of that laugh. She tugged at her petticoat. Cloth tore again.

“Here, stop that. You’re only making it worse.”

Defeated, Nell threw an unhappy look over her shoulder in Deets’s direction. He had stopped yelling to concentrate his open-mouthed attention on the amazing display of silk-stockinged ankle to be seen. Nell could be thankful that she had chosen to wear her best, undarned white stockings, with their fine yellow clocking at the ankle, but she was disgruntled to discover that Deets was not the only gentleman enjoying the unexpected delight of ogling them.

Two great-coated gentlemen emerged from the mist behind the phaeton, one of them followed by a black-and-white Shetland sheepdog. When they caught sight of her situation, they stopped to take it in. The dog trotted into the ditch, sniffing enthusiastically.

The first gentleman was short and slight, with thinning hair and a chiseled nose. He wore the dapper white greatcoat, black-spotted cravat, and Allan-brimmed hat that marked him for a member of the prestigious Whip Club, in which Cat, who had always wished herself born a boy, had more than once informed her sister she aspired to become a member. Eyebrows raised, a look of arrested interest about his half-open mouth, his gaze traveled with lingering appreciation over Nell’s exposed limb.

Insulted by the liberty of such a look, she turned a hostile glare on the second intruder, prepared to dislike them both. This gentleman’s appearance was neither dashing nor prestigious. She would have liked to take a comb to his tousled locks, yet Nell found something fascinating in him. His hat, coat and boots, all spoke of hard use, but his posture, and he was a tall, spare fellow, was graceful and proud, his hair thick and lustrous.

His eyes, once met, proved the most arresting feature she had ever encountered. A singular shade of clear aquamarine, they were so pale their color might be considered more of a liability than an asset, had there not lurked in their depths a vibrant hint of empathy, as if the man who looked out of them understood completely her moment of dire humiliation, and yet found room to be amused. A contagious candor sparkled in those pale, blue eyes, lively and knowing and likeable. The humor they shared, drove all other thought from Fanella’s head.

For a moment, time stood still. Forgotten was the predicament of straddling a horse with skirts flung high, forgotten for that instant of eternity was the sadness and frustration of father’s death, and the loss of house and circumstance. All was well with Nell as long as those pale blue eyes communed with hers. A window of truth and understanding had been encountered in a shuttered world. The power of a soul spoke to her through the peaceful blue. She abandoned herself to it.

Those eyes took in the condition of her skirts, and the reaction of both Deets and his companion, with darting glances and a final, more lengthy look that would seem bent on discovering just what the victim herself thought of her predicament. The blue-eyed man smiled a slow, sweet, contagious smile, as if the two of them shared a funny secret.

Extraordinary, how handsome an ordinary fellow might look when blessed with such a smile. Nell could not stop herself from dimpling in surprise. She was not much in the habit of smiling since father’s passing.

“May we offer a-a-assistance?” he asked.

Nell, as surprised by the faltering of his tongue, as he was embarrassed, watched the stout column of his neck flush scarlet. The question, for which he had removed his hat, received

answer, in a bit of a garble, from both Cat, and Deets.

Catherine sounded relieved. “As a matter of fact, help would be vastly appreciated. This mess is out of my reach.”

Deets bellowed, with belligerent bad humor. “Get the gel off of my horshe, if you will, gentlemen.” He leaned out of his phaeton to peer intently at the great-coated figures who offered assistance. “Four-in-hand are you, then?”

Nell could see the two men understood Deets’s condition in an instant. They exchanged a meaningful look.

“I shall never let you live down the embarrassment of that hat, Beau, if we miss the mail,” the dapper gentleman said enigmatically as he pulled an elegantly embossed watch from his waistcoat pocket. “We shall be hearing the yard of tin in less than ten minutes. Will you see to the ladies, while I assure myself that no one means to come tearing into the lane? I have no desire to risk wrecking the phaeton again this morningheight="0pt" width="2em">The blue-eyed man smiled.

Nell’s breath was stolen away by that smile. Beau meant beautiful in French, and for this smile alone one might justify the name. And yet, when the smile faded, there remained an air of unprepossessing gentility, a quietness of thought and speech and manner, that made this man handsome in a way that was based more on the collective whole of him, than on any one aspect.

His expression underwent a change in the instant his gaze took in the fact that her skirt was hitched much higher between the horses, than on the side where he had already had the privilege of examining her ankle. Eyelashes, thick and golden brown, starred out around his aquamarine eyes as they rose to hers. A wave of ruddy color washed his neck and face.

Her cheeks burned with what she was sure must be equal hue.

“Mr. . . ?” she paused, watching him, waiting for his name.

He did not drop his eyes to stare, either at her stocking covered knee, or the shocking bit of flesh and garter-tape that peeped ever so slightly from beneath the froth of petticoat. She appreciated his restraint, and yet could not help but feel that he was fully conscious of the exposed state of her leg, for his pale eyes seemed to grow larger, and warmer, and regarded her face with such unguarded admiration that she had to look away.

“I am Beau-ford,” he said, very slowly.

Nell’s mouth felt suddenly quite dry. She was both mortified and wickedly exhilarated by the awe with which his eyes met hers.

“I shall require your overcoat, Mr. Ferd,” she said in as quelling a manner as she could muster.

Ferd? The Duke of Heste enjoyed his disguise immensely. His adventure began, it appeared, rather ironically, that he had run head-on into the very elements of life he fled. A brush with death in fleeing mourning, seemed strangely appropriate. There was something poetic too, in being placed in the role of rescuer of a damsel in distress, despite the fact that this female seemed quite capable of rescuing herself. She had about her the look of Joan of Arc, straddled as she was across the stout back of the carriage horse. She needed but a lance, and armor.

Beau relished this young woman’s cool, detached attitude regarding her predicament. He relished too, what he could see of her leg. This was the leg of a young lady unafraid of jumping astride a horse, unafraid of facing down a drunken fool, unafraid and unabashed when three men stood staring at her indiscretion. There was something very remarkable about such a young lady-- about such a shapely leg.

He looked up in the instant that thought crossed his mind, to discover huge, black-lashed eyes contemplating him, judging his interest. There was a sense within him that she understood the very thoughts that crossed his consciousness.

Beau stripped off his second-hand greatcoat and handed it to her. She covered herself, and granted him a little smile, as if he had been judged worthy of favor in restoring her dignity. It pleased him that he managed to generate admiration in the stranger’s beautiful eyes.

“You are very kind, Mr. Ferd.”

He could not bring himself to explain that she misinterpreted both his motivation in helping her, and the pronunciation of his name. He could not bring himself to say anything at all. Lord Beauford could only stare, and wonder if Charley was right about the strength of his opinion against women.

“She’s caught. There.” The freckled young miss who stood beside the team pointed. “Shall I hold your hat?”

Self-consciously removing the secondhan hat, Beau handed it over. Wondering why he had been granted such a breathtaking privilege, he reached up under the blue cloak to fumble with the wads of muslin beneath.

With a gasp, the young woman on the horse whirled her dark head to see what he was doing as his hands stirred the fabric of both dress and petticoat. The heat of her agitated breathing lifted the hair on his forehead. The delicate odor of violets reached out to tickle his nose.

Charley’s gloves made him clumsy. They grazed against some part of her anatomy as he searched for the snare. She yelped, and exhaled heavily, her breath smelling of tea, and cinnamon.

Embarrassed, for he had no idea what part of her he had so inadvertently encountered, he stepped back from the nest of fabric into which he had delved, and stripped the gloves from his hands. Dropping them into the hat that the girl called Cat held so patiently for him, he reached back up under the curricle cloak.

His palms were sweaty. The heat of the horse’s back matched the heat rushing into his face and lower extremities. He was required to lean very close to the agitated rise and fall of the young lady’s chest, in order to reach the caught petticoat. Cheek brushing soft velvet, hips lost in the tumbled wealth of her skirts, he closed his eyes, pulse pounding.

Affected as profoundly as he by the captive embrace in which they both unwittingly participated, he could hear her every breath. The intimacy of witnessing such a fragile sound stirred him.

“It’s a good thing you jumped up here—”

“Otherwise you should never have had an opportunity to fiddle about under my skirt,” she said waspishly, clearly outdone with her obligation to his assistance.

“Otherwise,” he corrected her, calmly, “I might have killed you. I should never have forgiven myself that.”

The words sank home. The erratic rise and fall of her breast diminished.

“Also, two of the best lead horses in a-a-all of England would have been injured, perhaps m-m-mortally. My companion, Mr. Tyrrwhit should never have forgiven me that. They a-are his p-pride and joy.” He listened intently, curious to hear if she judged ill of him for his stumbling tongue. She seemed more concerned with what he said, than how he said it.

“That would have been a dreadful waste,” she agreed. “Cat tells me they are magnificent animals.”

“A frightful waste,” he agreed. He leaned back to look up at her. He was not referring to Charley’s chestnuts.

She was beautiful, not in a conventional way, but in a vibrant manner. Her features harkened back to Romans come long ago to Britain to build roads and walls, baths and cities. Her nose, prominent but regal, spoke of such bloodlines, as did the lack of a proper British paleness in the tone of her complexion. Her eyes too, large and brown and liquid, framed by long black lashes and dark, finely shaped brows, reminded him of an Italian master’s brushwork. Her cleft chin bespoke strength of purpose. Heavy brown hair, uncut or curled at the temple as was popular these days, just smoothed back on either side of her face, from two perfectly symmetrical widow’s peaks, in the style of a Madonna, gave evidence of flouted conventions. He could see that when brushed out of the wealthy knot in which it remained fairly contained at the nape of her neck, it would hang, thick, course and healthy, with little of the tendency to fly away like most fine, truly English hair was wont to do. He longed to release the hair from its constraints, longed to test its weight and texture with his hands.

He realized he stared. Dropping his gaze, he held up the frayed bit of petticoat that had been caught on the harness. “Ripped, but not beyond mending.”

“I am free?”

He withdrew his hands from their happy task of rummaging about in the welter of her garments, and helped her dismount.

Her color was high. “Thank you, Mr. Ferd.”

He reached for his hat. “You a
-a-are welcome, Miss . . .?”

The little girl returning hat and gloves to him answered, “Quinby, sir. I’m Catherine, but you can call me Cat. Everyone does. That’s my sister, Nell.”

“Qu-Quinby?” Beau dropped one of his borrowed gloves, so great was his surprise. How very odd! In fleeing one Miss Quinby, he ran smack into two more.

“Have we met?” Nell regarded him in a probing manner, as if indeed she recognized something in him.

“No. I could not have forgotten that,” he said, with unwavering conviction.

Her eyes changed. Lashes fluttering, her pupils widened until he seemed to swim in them. He stood, one glove on, one glove off, entranced.

The plump partridge of a woman, who had at first been shrieking at them from the ditch, and then fainted away when it looked as if the two vehicles were about to collide, came tottering around the side of the phaeton, bonnet knocked askew another in her hands, mangled almost beyond recognition.

“Fanella,” she cried, “Catherine, what’s happened to Fanella?”

“I am quite safe, Auntie Ursula, unlike my poor hat.”

Nell--she was Nell to him now--placed the warm weight of both her hands quite unexpectedly on Beau’s shoulders, and looked down into his eyes very gravely.

“Will you help me down, Mr. Ferd?”

Heart singing, for he was more than happy to assist, Beauford lifted both his hands to span the warmth of Nell Quinby’s narrow waist. Pulling her toward him with the pressure of one hand, he reached out with the other, to guide the falling fabric, as she swung--gracefully, despite the wadded material she dragged with her-- across the horse’s rump, and into his arms. His hands, one gloved, the other still blessedly bare, made sure her skirt fell free.

Lord Beauford had the strangest sensation of drowning as the scent of violets and the wickedly arousing weight of her legs, along with his greatcoat, her cloak, skirt, and petticoat, washed over his waist, his thigh and his own braced leg, in a knee-weakening wave of muslin and velvet.