Miracle (45 page)

Clayton's eyes shifted to Miracle, who continued to huddle close, her head turned from the hag, but refusing to look up at him. He felt the granite tenseness of his shoulders relax, and his features softened.
"Meri,"
he said gently, "Is this true?"

" 'Course it's true!" the woman barked. "Do I look like a
bleedin
' liar?"

Raising one eyebrow, he fixed the drab with a stony look that caused her mouth to snap shut.

"Meri,"
he said again, and this time, she pulled away, and tugged loose the ribbon beneath her chin. There came a wiggling between her breasts, then the scrawniest canary he'd ever seen, with a crooked leg, scrambled out of Miracle's blouse, hopped onto her shoulder, then onto the top of her head. It flurried its wings, and proceeded to sing.

Clayton looked around at Ellie.

Ellie covered her mouth with her gloved fingers, her cheeks growing rosy with suppressed mirth.

"We'll reimburse you, of course," he said to the hag.

"Damn right,
ya
will."

"What will it cost me to keep you from pressing charges?"

"I'd say at least . . ." Her mouth screwed to one side and her eyes narrowed. "Twenty quid."

"Twenty . . .?"
He took a breath. "Very well. I'll see to it. Now, if you'll excuse us, the young
lady
has had a trying afternoon."

Mistress
Ellesemere
preceded them from the building and was settled into the shiny, black-lacquered coach with its red and gold coat of arms on the door by the time Clayton and Miracle, with the canary still roosting on her head, exited the institution.

With his arms still around her, Clayton helped Miracle into the coach, sank into the luxurious squabs of the seat, settled her onto his lap, then rapped on the ceiling. As the conveyance rolled away from the hospital, Miracle turned her face into his chest.

"Would you like to cry?" he asked her, and nudging aside the bird, which fluttered onto her leg, kissed the top of her head.

"No," she replied in a muffled voice.

"It might make you feel better."

"I shan't cry in front of you."

"Why?"

"You'll think me weak. And so will I. I could never tolerate sniveling women. I refuse to become one."

"Very well."

They rode through the dark streets a while without talking, then Clayton pushed her away slightly and caught her chin in his fingers, forcing up her face. There were tear streaks on her cheeks.
"Meri
Mine," he said in a voice gruff with emotion. "Do you realize how worried I've been the last hours? When you didn't return to Park House by dark, I didn't know what to think. Had something happened to you? Had you become so angry with me you decided to return to Cavisbrooke? I imagined every sort of catastrophe that could have befallen an innocent who was unfamiliar with this city."

"I wanted to prove to you that I could fit in among these people. That I didn't require the mistress's interference."

He smiled. "Occasionally you're too stubborn for your own good."

"I'm . . . sorry."

"Don't be sorry, my love. It's one of the reasons why I
. . .
care for you so deeply. You're one of the strongest women I've ever known."

"Nay, not today. I was frightened. That terrible place . . . the poor lost souls forced to reside there. This
city . . . I
was invisible, sir. No one saw me. They looked right through me. I was as inconsequential on the street as I was in that wretched institution. I was nothing more than another featureless face staring with vacuous eyes at the humanity swimming around me. It wasn't an experience I care to repeat."

"Therefore . . .?"

"I suppose I shall be forced to concede to your wishes. I'll work with Mistress
Ellesemere
, if I must. But only to satisfactorily achieve my own ultimate objective."

"Which is?" he asked her eyes that were now flashing with the lights glistening from the houses they were passing.

Offering her finger to the canary, her emotionalism obviously forgotten due to the pleasure she found in the tiny yellow pet, she replied stoically, "To make you the perfect wife, of course. That goes without saying, sir. I love you much too devotedly to humiliate you in any manner."

"You could never—"

"Hush," she said, and placed one fingertip against his lips. "Locked up in that fetid, horrible place, I had a great deal of time to think. I asked myself why an institution should be allowed to languish in such a deplorable condition, and I came to the conclusion that such circumstances can be avoided or repaired only by those people in a position of power. Who better than the wife of a duke? Don't you see, your darling grace? As duchess, I could make a difference for those lost souls."

"Such lofty ideals," he said softly, then hugged her close, rocking her gently, staring through the dark at Mistress
Ellesemere's
dim features. "Can you understand now, Miss
Ellesemere
, why this divine little brat has so enraptured me?"

"I understood the first instant I saw her, Your Grace," came the reply.

Clayton sat in the dark, alone, his eyes closed. Behind him, the parlor door opened, then quietly shut. Mistress
Ellesemere
moved up beside him, eased into the chair nearest him, then sat silently for a long while, back erect, hands folded properly in her lap. They listened to the occasional strains of music that danced momentarily on the breeze floating through the open window. The heavy scent of roses permeated the midnight air.

At last, she said, "The young lady is tucked safely into bed. She feels much better after her toilette."

"Is she all right?" he asked wearily.

"Oh my goodness, yes. No
vapourish
miss, that one. But I think you know that. Oh, there are a few bruises here and there, which is to be expected if she struggled as
tigerishly
as Administrator Wilkes claimed, which I suspect she did. She doesn't strike me as the sort of young woman who would play the meek mouse for any man. She loves you devotedly, you know."

"She loves the duke."

"She loves the man. You. It would make no difference to her if you were a bone-grubber, Clay. Why don't you tell her the truth?"

"My brother—"

"It's about time your brother takes care of himself. For heaven's sake! You've continually picked him up by his boot strings since you were children. You are not responsible for his mistakes, therefore it is not your responsibility to amend them. Clayton, from the day the duchess employed me as yours and Trey's nanny, I've watched him manipulate you with unbelievable finesse, just like he does everyone else. Oh, he does it charmingly enough; I've fallen victim to his mesmerizing smile myself, but not any longer."

"He saved my life, Ellie."

"How many times have you saved his, my dear boy?"

"You don't understand." Leaving the chair, Clayton moved to the window. The breeze felt bracingly cool and damp. There would be rain before daybreak, spoiling at least a dozen morning garden parties thrown by matchmaking mamas. "There are times when all I want to do is put Trey from my mind—my life. But how do I do that to a man who is such a vital part of me that when he aches a hundred miles from me I feel the pain? When he cuts himself,
dammit
, I bleed. The time he fell from that horse—"

"You woke up screaming and holding your head. I remember."

"When he came down with that fever—"

"You shook in convulsions yourself for two days, until his fever broke."

"Sometimes I can hear his thoughts before he even speaks them. When I look at him, Ellie, I know the reflection looking back at me is what I could become if I allowed myself. It's in me, you know. The women. The gambling."

"Which is why you shun the city and your peers. Which is why you're so attracted to Miracle. She's the antithesis of everything your brother's lifestyle represents. Yet, you've come to me with this favor. You want me to change her—"

"Not change her, Ellie.
Just . . .
prepare her. He thinks he's going to marry her, put a baby in her, then deposit her in some distant, crumbling old country house, out of his way so he can go about his merry life doing whatever the blazes he pleases. His peers would think nothing of his settling her in the country if she's some drab, dowdy little mouse. It's done all the time, isn't it? Marriages strictly for convenience: for dowries, title,
et
cetera. The society sharks would feast on her—rip her apart. There wouldn't be a door opened to her, which is what he wants, Ellie."

Bending over Ellie, bracing his hands on her chair arms, he regarded her eyes and said, "By the time you and I are through with
Meri
Mine, there won't be a man or woman in this fair city who won't accept her, respect her,
and . . .
love her."

"Love her as fiercely as you?" she said, and covered one of his hands with hers.

"No," he replied after a moment. "No one could ever love her as fiercely as me."

You will find as you look back upon your life that

the moments when you have really lived are the moments

when you have done things in the spirit of love.

HENRY DRUMMOND

Chapter Eighteen

"Lesson one, my dear: A young lady never, under any circumstances, ventures into the city alone. Always her mama is present, even if the young lady is attended by her father. If the mother is unavailable, then she is accompanied by her companion. Therefore, such occurrences as took place yesterday will be avoided."

Miracle gazed out the coach window, noting how people stopped to stare as the duke's finely appointed conveyance wove through the crowded street. The young women's eyes grew wide with interest; their companions, too, craned to catch a glimpse of the passengers within.

"Meri,"
Salterdon said, "are you listening?"

"Yes," she replied absently, then brightening, she turned to him and asked, "Where shall we go first? Are you certain my hair is fine? It feels very odd being off my shoulders." She lightly ran her hands over the coiffure, fingers toying with the short ringlets at the front and sides, then back to the heavy coils of hair that had been swept up to the top of her head and tied with green ribbons, which flowed in streamers over her shoulders.