Suzanne Robinson (18 page)

Edging around her, he could see that her tears were still falling, slowly, and that she appeared to be in some grave discussion with herself. As a precaution, he nudged the sword out of her reach with the toe of his boot. Then he eased closer. She seemed to have forgotten him in her agitation.

“He’s turned you into a barbarian,” she muttered. “Soon you’ll be stealing jewels and paintings from the finest houses and taking drink with those—those creatures at the Black Fleece. Abominable! Look what you’ve become, crawling across the rooftops of London, consorting with fishmongers and ruffians. To actually attack him with a weapon. It’s not to be believed. Lost to all propriety and decency. Stripped of decorum. Mad. Utterly mad.”

He remained silent while she scolded herself. Ever since he’d kissed her, he’d had trouble with Miss Primrose Victoria Dane. After that, she’d gone all proper on him, like some clergyman’s wife. Now he realized he’d underestimated the burden she’d been under for so long. Separated from everything she’d known, everyone she was used to, no wonder she had lost her temper.
I suppose now is not the time to tell her how much I liked it
. No, that might give her a brain fever. At least he could stop her from berating herself.

“Now, Primmy, there’s no call to go thrashing yourself.”

She jumped and whirled to confront him. Her hair swirled in from of her face, and she appeared to notice it for the first time. She began frantically gathering it at the back of her head again.

“Indeed there is every reason to thrash myself, as you put it, Sir Lucas. Although your behavior was reproachable, I should not have descended to such an ill-conditioned response.”

He watched her struggle with her hair, then stooped and gathered a few pins. “Here, let me help.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“No need to apologize.”

“I wasn’t. I was trying to let you know how improper it would be—sir!”

He scooped great lengths of soft hair in both hands as he stood behind her. She tried to pull away and cried out when he didn’t let go.

“Daft creature, hold still.”

“Sir Lucas, you mustn’t touch my hair.”

“Quit yer wiggling.”

When he didn’t let go, she had no choice but to turn from him and allow him to smooth her hair away from her face. While she kept up a stream of protests, he caught silken tangles and unsnarled them. Each time his fingers brushed her shoulder, her cheek, her neck, she jumped. The first time she started, he was jolted by his awareness of her. Her taut wariness only provoked a wild urge to capture her. He could smell the scent she used in her bath—honeysuckle.

His fingers worked through the softness of her hair, making trails through its thickness. It took all his resolve not to sink into a haze of downy texture, sunlight, and honeysuckle. From his position behind her, he could see the curve of her cheek, the blush of her porcelain skin. It was like the breast of a little robin. The thought diverted his attention to the way her breasts rose and fell. Touching her this way was like the first time he’d heard a symphony by Mozart—exhilaration almost unbearable. And he didn’t want it to end. He twisted a length of hair around the knot he’d placed at the nape of her neck. The gauzy tendrils there distracted him.

He wasn’t sure how long he would have remained with his hands on her neck if he hadn’t noticed that they were trembling. What was he doing? Any moment she would fly into a rage at his ruining her propriety again. He made himself step back and lift his hands. She remained where she was for long moments, testing his control, so he said something in a voice made rough from craving.

“Done.”

“What?”

He cleared his throat and tried again. “I’ve finished, Miss Dane.”

She turned, but he looked away from her because she was still standing in the white light of the windows and looked like she belonged in one of the stained-glass windows in the castle chapel. And because she seemed as dazed as he was. She recovered first.

“Please accept my regrets for my conduct, Sir Lucas”

“Now, don’t go all proper and etiquettey on me.”

Her shoulders drooped and she sighed. “I have been too long separated from the necessities of genteel life, thrust among people it is necessary to detest. Oh, not you, Sir Lucas.”

“Right.”

“I seem to have lost the principles expressive of good breeding, my refinement of mind.” She threw up her hands and gave him a lost look. “All I ever wanted was a home of my own and the opportunity to study.”

“Study? What, book study?”

“That’s why I was carrying the book of hours, you see. I am greatly interested in old books, manuscripts, history. Our library at home was quite good. The family had many old documents and books from Elizabethan and earlier times.”

She threw up her hands. “But, of course, I don’t really belong at home. The lot of a daughter, you see. Daughters must go away.” Her gaze suddenly darted to the tips of her boots. “And if they don’t, they are an inconvenience and a burden.”

“Whoever told you that, Miss Prim?” he asked gently.

Tossing her head, Prim smiled and didn’t answer his question at all. “Do you know how rare my book of hours is? The quality of the illuminations, especially of the calendar, is almost unequaled.”

She was grieving inside. Why hadn’t he noticed
before? Too busy thinking of himself. This valiant little Miss Prim, she wanted to belong somewhere. Rot her blighted family. Brother too selfish to give up a few pleasures at university to afford her a home. Aunt too illiberal to provide her with the means to attract marriage offers, but only too willing to use her as an unpaid companion.

“Curses on their heads and black death on their hearts.”

“Sir Lucas?”

“Oy! I got an idea.”

“Please, Sir Lucas. I have spoken to you about your expressions.”

“Oh, I say” he said in a nasal whine. “I’ve got a most convivial idea, Miss Dane. Would you like to see the library?”

“If you will refrain from speaking in that odious manner, but I’ve already seen it.”

“You mean the one downstairs. That’s the New Library. I mean the one upstairs, the Old Library.”

“There are two?”

“As far as I know. Could be more I haven’t found yet. Come along, Miss Prim.”

He offered his arm in the most gentlemanly manner he could summon. Prim gave him an agitated look but took his arm and walked with him to the rooms above the great hall. After taking time to light a lamp, they came to a door larger than most, its oak panels shining with age and bound in iron. Luke took a key from his pocket and opened the portal. It swung back to reveal what he always thought of as a cavern lined with shelves.

“Featherstone says this was once the lord’s chambers.” Luke followed a silent Prim into the Old Library.

“Heavens,” she said faintly.

Luke stood beside her and surveyed the shelves of books that reached to the ceiling. A balcony had been added to give easier access to the topmost racks, and it extended around the perimeter of the library. Long tables bore document boxes, caskets, reading stands, and glass display cases. He set down the lamp and opened several shuttered windows. Then he went to a pedestal bookstand and opened a thick volume bound in stained leather that had been chained there.

“Have no notion what this thing is.”

Prim joined him and turned several pages. She stopped and closed the book to examine its binding.

“Dear heaven,” she breathed.

“What?”

“My, my.”

“What? Is it bad?”

She opened the book again and pointed to a yellowed page. “You see that this book is written by hand, not printed.”

“Yes.”

“On parchment with these faint guidelines. There are eight leaves to each gathering or signature—a gathering of pages. The signatures are laid on top of each other and bound.”

“But there aren’t any pictures like in your book,” Luke said. “Can’t be as valuable.”

She turned to stare at him with wide, sparkling eyes.

“Oh, I think it is probably as valuable or perhaps more valuable, Sir Lucas.” She pointed to the writing, which was still clear despite its age. “This is a later script. Later than the seventh-century insular majuscule or Caroline minuscule. It is, perhaps an eleventh-century clerical style, and it’s in Latin of course.”

“Of course.”

Luke stuck his hands behind his back and watched her pore over the book. He loved the way she seemed to brighten just from looking at the old thing. When she glanced up at him, he assumed an expression of polite interest so that she didn’t become offended at the way he was staring.

She turned her head to the side and gave him an amused look. “You still don’t understand, Sir Lucas.”

“Yes, I do. It’s an old book.”

“Eleventh century.”

“A very old book.”

“Sir Lucas, this book most likely dates from the years shortly after 1085.”

“Right.”

“The reign of William the Conqueror.”

“Good man, William.”

Prim shook her head and pointed at the lines of Latin. “Sir Lucas, I think this is a copy of a portion of the
Domesday Book
.”

“Sounds dreary.”

“The
Domesday Book
, Sir Lucas, is the only record of its kind in the world, a complete survey of the lands and resources of England commissioned by William the Conqueror, and it’s almost eight hundred years old.”

Luke narrowed his eyes and repeated, “Eight hundred.” He looked at the book, at the script written with a quill on animal hide, and the antiquity of the record before him finally came home. “Did you say eight? Eight hundred years old?”

Prim nodded. “It’s only a portion of the whole. The entire survey comprises many books. We must be certain to close the windows when we leave. The light isn’t good for old documents.”

Luke was still staring at the
Domesday Book
, but Prim was moving among the tables and shelves. Her cries of delight attracted his attention, and he found her leafing through a book with illuminations similar to her own.

“Look,” she said. “A book of carols.” She picked up another volume. “This is a psalter, and here is an herbal. See the drawings of plants and herbs? It’s written in Secretary script, which has spiky letters. Did you know—” She stopped and bit her lip.

“Know what?”

“I shouldn’t babble on so.”

“You’re not babbling. I’m interested. Go on.”

It was too late. She was conscious of herself, blushing and uncertain. He had to distract her.

“You know, Miss Dane, I know almost nothing about you except what little Ross Scarlett told me.”

“You know my father was a baronet, Lord William Harold Dane. My mother was Frances Cornwallis.”

“That’s not what I mean. What was it like growing up a lady?”

She smiled and sat down with the herbal in her lap.
“Not nearly so wonderful as you think. When I was born Mother handed me over to a nurse, and later to a governess. My parents might as well have lived on a remote mountain, like the Greek gods. Father had a temper, and everyone crept around the house like ghosts when he was angry. Mother used to signal to us when he was in a temper by tugging on her sleeve three times.”

“What a blighter.”

“My brother and I had the whole east wing of the house to ourselves when we were growing up.” Prim rested her clasped hands on the open herbal in her lap. “We had Nanny Peace, who was more like a mother to us than our real one. She used to feed us porridge and toast for breakfast. She sliced the toast into strips and called them little soldiers. ‘Do you want your toast in little soldiers?’ she would ask us.”

Prim lapsed into silence and lowered her eyes.

“What happened to her?”

“Oh, nothing terrible.” Prim pressed her lips together. “We grew too old for a nurse. My parents sent Nanny away, and I never saw her again.”

“You mean they sent away the only person you had for a mother?”

She gave him a pained smile. “They didn’t mean to be unkind. They didn’t think of it that way.”

“Right. So then you went to school.”

“No, I had a governess. My brother went to Eton and later to university.”

“And you studied with the governess.”

“I suppose one could call it study. Lessons in
languages, grammar, spelling, geography, music, deportment, dancing.”

“More studies than I got,” Luke said.

“Hardly any mathematics, no politics, no classics or science, very little literature. My father said that boys should go everywhere and do everything and that girls should go nowhere and know nothing.”

Luke gestured toward the
Domesday Book
. “But you know a lot, Miss Prim.”

“I used to study on my own. I would stay up at night reading. Until the housekeeper had to account for all the candles I used. Then Father ordered that my candle was to be taken away once I was in bed.”

She sighed and ran a finger down the spine of the book. Her shoulders slumped, and Luke swore under his breath. She looked up in surprise.

“Sorry.”

“What’s wrong, Sir Lucas?”

“I just reasoned it out, Primmy.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I was thinking about your grand house and blue blood and fine breeding, and then I realized what made you so sad.”

She looked away, but he went on.

“I was thinking how terrible it would be to grow up in such a fine place and have everyone assume your existence was trifling or inconvenient, like you were a pet goose with a limp, or something.”

Lifting her head, she turned glittering eyes on him.

“Sorry, Miss Prim. I’ve offended etiquette again.”

He was startled when she placed her hand on his and whispered, “Do you know what a rare, fine soul you have, Luke?”

“Primmy, no one has ever bothered much about my soul.”