For All Eternity (32 page)

“I do hope you sing on key,” Lady Helene murmured, surveying her critically. “My poor darling simply cannot abide off-key singing. She howls quite dreadfully in protest.”

Oh, wonderful! It just so happened that she wasn’t musically inclined. Indeed, her music instructor had pronounced her singing quite impossible; Lydia had declared him kind in doing so. Sensing that her ladyship would take the news rather badly, she curved her lips into an agreeable, but noncommittal smile, and prayed,
Please, God, please let the dog fall right to sleep.

“Good.” The girl nodded, interpreting her smile as one of reassurance. “Now. I shall do everything in my power to return in time to give Mingy her dinner. Dining

with strangers quite spoils her digestion. However, should I be delayed, you are to feed her — when?”
Snap!-Snap!

“Promptly at six-thirty.”

“And what must you do before she eats?”
Snap!

“Give her a spoonful of ginger tonic to stimulate her digestion.”

Snap!
“When?”

“At six-ten, not a moment earlier or later.”

“And if her dinner gives her wind?”
Snap!-Snap!

“I’m to dose her with two measures of peppermint oil.”

Snap!-Snap’.-Snap!
“And?”

Remember the slop buckets.
“Massage her belly.”

Lo and behold, the tyrant smiled. “Yes. Good. Very good indeed.” She nodded, this time with an approval that made her ebony curls bob. “I see that I was wise to demand your services.”

Nodding again, she glanced down at the fluffy white monstrosity in her arms. Her expression that of a mother viewing a beloved child, she crooned, “Mama must go now, Mingy darling.”
Smooch!-Smooch!
“You be a good boo-by … boo-by … boo-by —
Smooch!
— and Mama shall be back before you know it.” After kissing the dog thrice more, she held it out for Sophie to take.

Sophie pasted a wan smile on her face and reached for it.

G-r-r-r!
The evil beast growled and snapped at her hands.

She jerked away, narrowly missing being bitten by its tiny, but alarmingly sharp-looking teeth.

Lady Helene scowled. “Do stop being skittish. Can’t you see that you’re upsetting the poor darling?”

The beleaguered mademoiselle, who now stood behind her mistress, nodded at Sophie and pantomimed a series of actions that suggested distracting the dog with one hand while grasping it from behind with the other.

Smiling her gratitude, Sophie did as demonstrated. First she extended her left hand to the dog.

G-r-r! Yap! Yap! Yap!
It snapped and snarled at it.

Then she slipped her right one behind it and swiftly scooped it up into her arms.

Yip! Yip! Whine.
It thrashed its head and nipped the air several times, then sank its teeth into the ruffle edging her fichu.
G-r-r-r!
It chewed and tore at the delicate fabric, making the most horrendous slobbering noises as it did so.

“Well?”
Snap!-Snap!-Snap!

Sophie sighed and looked at Lady Helene.

She snapped her fingers again, this time to indicate the furiously gnawing animal. “Can’t you see that she’s anxious, girl?” When Sophie merely stared at her, not daring to reply for fear of speaking her mind, the chit made a disdainful noise and said, “Don’t tell me that you have already forgotten what I told you about soothing Ming-Ming’s nerves?”

At a loss Sophie shot mademoiselle a pleading look, who in turn pretended to rock a baby, her lips moving mutely.

She groaned inwardly. Not that. Anything but that.

Snap!
“Well?”

Miserably she glanced down at the dog, which continued to snarl and savage her now ruined fichu. Wanting to die on the spot, she slowly began to rock it, crooning, “Boo-by … boo-by . .

Chapter 17

“Here, Mingy! Here, boo-by … boo-by!” Sophie called, crawling on her hands and knees beside the yew hedge.

Wretched little cur! It had to be in the hedge, it just had to be. She’d seen it dash in there with her own two eyes … right after it had bitten her ankle and tripped her with its leash. Granted, she’d been flat on the ground at the time, and everything around her had been fuzzy through the galaxy of stars shooting about her head, but what else could the white blur with its streak of scarlet have been, if not the dog dragging its red leather leash? A comet?

Her palms itching to strangle the beast, Sophie called again, then sat back on her heels to listen for telltale rustling among the foliage. Nothing. Silence.

Blast! She resumed her crawling, alternately calling and listening until she’d completed a full circuit around the four yew walls that enclosed the small park. Still nothing.

Alarmed now, she hurried through the gate, certain that the animal had burrowed out the opposite side. Her heart in her throat, she walked the entire outer perimeter, more croaking than calling the dog in her anxiety as she went. Again nothing. Wherever had the wicked beast gone?

Her alarm exploding into panic, she turned from the hedge and scanned the landscape around her. To her right lay the Hawksbury stables; to her left the marquess’s favorite fishing lake. Before her, beyond a lush green fairway, was an ancient, densely wooded deer park. Behind her, past the hedges and stretching on for what looked like forever, was a meadow abloom with valerian, cinquefoil, and lady’s-smock.

Nowhere in sight was Ming-Ming.

At wit’s end she looked around her again, trying to decide where to search first. Was the dog in the lakeside pavilion, nibbling on a forgotten picnic delicacy? Or had it seen a hare and chased after it into the deer park? Ming-Ming did, after all, have a most vexing habit of attacking anything that moved. Indeed, according to Robin, one of the four stable boys, she particularly delighted in weaving between horses legs and nipping at their fetlocks.

That recollection made her cast a speculative gaze at the elegant brick stables. A beat later, she sighed and looked away again. Several of the grooms knew of her errand, having commented on the dog as she’d passed by on her way to the park. If it turned up there, they were sure to send someone to find her.

That left only the meadow. She spared the flat tract of grassland a brief glance, then dismissed it as well. She could see for what must be miles, and nothing moved. Ming-Ming had to have run in one of the other directions. The question was, which one?

After a moment of deliberation, she decided to start at the lake. No sense in wasting the hours it would take to search the deer park woods when she might find the dog in the minutes it would take to search the picnic pavilion. Thus, she was off.

But Ming-Ming wasn’t anywhere near the lake.

Or in the woods.

And there was still no sign of her in the meadow.

On the verge of tears now, Sophie rushed toward her last bastion of hope: the stables. Perhaps, just perhaps, the grooms had come looking for her while she was in the woods, and had thus been unable to find her. Praying that such was the case, she ran into the stable yard, calling between pants, “Dicky? Conrad? Joseph?”

No reply.

Fighting to catch her breath, she frantically looked about her. Though she saw no sign of the grooms, she noticed that the door at the end of the far building stood ajar. Certain that the men were within, preoccupied, she hoped, with the dog, she hurried across the courtyard.

“Excuse me? Is anyone here?” she called, stepping through the door. She paused a few feet inside, peering down the wide corridor of brass and mahogany box stalls, awaiting an answer.

Two whinnies, four nickers, and a snort from a fierce-looking stallion on her left were her only responses. Nothing more.

She called again, this time louder. Still no reply — well, nothing human. With tears of frustration and worry welling up in her eyes, she turned to leave, only to stop short in the next instant. The grooms weren’t here, but maybe, just maybe …

Her nerves stretched to the point of snapping, she called, “Here, Ming-Ming! Here, boo-by … boo-by … boo-by! Mingy? Here …”

“Gorblimey! That wee diwil ain’t loose in ‘ere, are it?” exclaimed a youthful voice behind her.

Sophie swung around to find Robin, the twelve-year-old stable boy, standing on the threshold, his freckled face screwed up in horror. Her heart sank to an all-time low at his words. “Then Ming-Ming isn’t here,” she murmured. The utterance was a statement to herself, not a question to the boy.

Robin, however, took it for the latter. “O’ course she ain’t ‘ere. What’d that bugbear be doin‘ out ‘ere?”

She dismissed his question with a shake of her head. “Could someone else have seen her, one of the grooms or under-coachmen, perhaps, and not told you?” Please, God. Make him say yes.

“Nay. It’s Thursday. Ain’t nothin‘ ‘appens on Thursday that I don’t know ‘bout.”

“Are you certain?” she squeaked past the lump in her throat.

“Aye. Thursday’s the day I ‘elp ‘xercise ‘n’ wash the ‘orses. I work wit‘ the grooms, the coachmen, too. I jist left ‘em. They’re all ‘cross the way in the foalin‘ box. ‘Er ladyship’s prize mare, Lily, be givin‘ birth.” He cocked his head, eyeing her curiously. “Why ye askin‘ after diwil dog? Ye ain’t lost ‘er, ‘ave ye?”

“Yes. I-I’m afraid I have,” she whispered, bowing her head to hide her tears.

“Gor! I’d ‘ate to be in yer shoes when Lady ‘Elene ‘ears,” he exclaimed as she turned and walked out the door.

Sophie hated being in her own shoes. What the girl would do when she heard, she didn’t know, but it was bound to be awful.

Weeping with all the despair she felt inside, she ran through the stable-yard gate and down the road that led to the house. So caught up in her misery was she, that she didn’t see the approaching horse until it was almost upon her.

“Whoa!” The rider reined sharply.

Neigh!
The enormous stallion reared, skittishly dancing back on its hind legs.

“Lyndhurst!” Sophie gasped, instantly recognizing both man and beast.

“Whoa! There, now, Tityus! Easy, boy!” his lordship commanded, fighting hard to control the startled animal.

Neighl-Whinny!
The horse bucked, almost unseating him, but he held firm. “Easy, Tityus! Whoa!” The stallion snorted and pranced several more times, then began to calm beneath his master’s skillful handling. When he stood completely at ease, Lyndhurst shot her a furious look. “Bloody hell, woman! What were you trying to do? Kill yourself?”

Sophie returned his glittering gaze for a beat, morbidly viewing his words as a lost opportunity. Then she burst into tears anew and blubbered, “What would it have mattered anyway? All I ever do is make a muddle of things! Oh, why didn’t you just run me down and end my wretched life!”

He was off his horse in a flash, grasping her upper arms. “Good God, Sophie! What has happened?”

She shook her head, too choked with anguish to reply. For a long moment he simply looked at her, as if at a loss as to what to do or say, then he released her arms and drew his handkerchief from his pocket. Pressing it

into her hand, he murmured, “Don’t tell me that you were bitten by another bogle?” When she didn’t reply, he smiled gently and added, “If you were, please be assured that the bite of a Hawksbury bogle is quite free of poison or any other deleterious effects.”

So kind, so genuinely warm and full of concern were both his expression and voice that Sophie impulsively threw herself against him. Burying her face into his shirt frills, she wept in earnest.

He stiffened briefly, as if shocked by her action, then slowly wrapped his arms around her.

She nuzzled yet closer. The feel of him, so warm and solid, gave her the oddest sensation that she’d found something for which she’d searched forever; something that she never wanted to lose.

She felt safe… wanted … loved.

Her desperate longing for the feeling to be fact and the devastating knowledge that it could never be, made her weep harder.

“Hush, now, Sophie. Don’t cry,” he crooned, tightening her into his embrace. “Everything will be fine. I promise.”

She shook her head, wanting to believe his promise, but too aware of the impossibility of it to do so.

He made a soothing little noise beneath his breath. “There, there, now. Nothing can be so dreadful as all that.”

“Yes, it can,” she wailed.

“You weren’t cursed by gypsies, were you?”

She shook her head.

“Did Cook’s old black cat, Abecrombie, cross your path?”

Another head shake.

“No?” A beat of silence, then, “Don’t tell me that you did something to tempt fate and forgot to knock on wood afterward?”