The Lord Who Sneered and Other Tales (14 page)

She took the stairs very slowly so as not to be unbalanced by the hammering of her heart and made her way to the library. To her relief she encountered none who might attempt to prevent her from meeting with the vilified Marquis and, with a deep breath, she pushed open the door.

Lord Trevelin, adorned in buff pantaloons and an azure blue coat that did much to lighten his visage, stood by the fire, his face in profile against the glow of the flames. He turned when he heard
her enter, and his eyes widened in disbelief. “Lady Sophie! You have come!”

“But of course. Why should I not?”

“When I was not shown upstairs, I rather expected your father to chase me from the house with a flea in my ear. Isn’t a nobleman’s library reserved for dealings with unreasonable tradesman and other distasteful interludes?”

Lady Sophie was taken aback. It had not occurred to her that she should shame the Marquis by relegating him to the library or that it would be so revelatory of her desire to keep his presence well disguised from her parents. “I do your beg your pardon, my lord. It is only that our dinner guests are about to descend upon the drawing room. We might go up if you prefer.”

“No,” he said slowly, his eyes burning with a light she had never before had occasion to witness. “I don’t prefer it. It’s only that I can hardly credit it.”

“Credit what, my lord?” she asked as she took a seat by the fire and indicated that he should sit, as well.

He eyed the chair across from her before he allowed his gaze to return again to her face. “Am I to be so well trusted, then?”

“I have never been given reason to do other than trust you,” she said with a dismissive shrug, then remembered her father’s admonitions. “That is to say,
you
have never given me reason.”

Still, he hesitated to sit until she rose and shut the door so that none should spy the evil Marquis in attendance on the daughter of the house. She swallowed her delight at his wonderment and returned again to her seat. “You must sit, my lord. I trust it has been a Happy Christmas.”

With a slight air of incredulity, he sat in the chair she indicated and placed upon his knee a small packet he had been concealing in his hand. It consisted of two tiny boxes, each cheerfully adorned with a red bow. “Thank you. It has been the happiest I have known in many a year,” he said with a steady look into her eyes that caused a blush to heat her cheeks. “Happy Christmas to you, also, Lady Sophie. You have been well?”

“Yes, quite well, thank you,” she replied just as she ought, though she wondered if a lack of appetite, a loss of interest in all things homely and a decided yearning for the company of a stranger could possibly be considered ‘well’. “And you?”

He seemed not to have noticed that she had asked after his health and sat regarding her as if she were cast in bronze or the subject of a painting.

“My lord? I see you have gifts,” she pointed out in hopes her words might claim his attention. “How good of you to stop by on your way to dinner with friends, perhaps?”

“Not at all,” he replied and looked away. “I have no friends, certainly not amongst those who think me the worst of mankind while I find I have no taste for those who would befriend me in spite of my woeful standing in society. There is only yourself,” he added quietly as he picked up one of the identically sized square parcels and held it out to her.

“How lovely!” she said, her very soul aching in compassion for him. “But I have no gift for you. I am persuaded I should not accept it,” she said, pressing the little box into his outstretched hand.

“My dear Lady Sophie, I beg you, open it. If it does not please you, you may cast it into the fire.”

“Oh, no, I am persuaded it should prove inconceivable that I should dislike any gift from you,” she insisted, then feared she had revealed too much of what was in her heart. “That is, all gifts should be received with gratitude.”

“Then, pray open it,” he urged as he favored her with a smile so broad that the scar she no longer noticed slipped into obscurity.

Silently, she observed that her short acquaintance with this man had not previously included any scene of benevolence so long lasting; his appearance was naught but pleasing when he smiled. As she untied the ribbon, she yearned for the continued convenience of ensuring he smiled more often than not. However, she was all bewildered once she had opened the box and saw that it contained a signet ring with which she was most familiar.

She looked to the Marquis in consternation. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“You will.” He leaned towards her, took the ring from the box and held it against the light of the flames in the fireplace. “See here? The band is inscribed.”

She took the ring and peered at the inscription. “
Indignus
. What does it mean?”

“It is the answer to your question, the reason I kept it always where I might see or touch it.
Indignus
is a Latin word meaning unworthy.”

Lady Sophie felt herself frown. “But, whom do you deem unworthy? Mr. Rogers-Reimann? Is this why you cannot forget? Because you cannot forgive?”

He sat back in his chair, the smile wiped from his face. “No! My dearest Lady Sophie, no. It is only myself, my faults and my folly, of which I need reminding.”

“Yet, you told me, that night on the veranda, that the ring was to remind you of impossibilities.”

He leaned forward again and took her hand lightly in his own. “Yes, impossible dreams, because I believed myself unworthy of them.”

“You? Unworthy?” she demanded. “You have committed no sin, no crime, and rather than use this ring to commemorate how you were wronged, as would so many, you instead operate it as a memorial of your unprofitable shame!”

He seemed undaunted by her outburst. “What then, Lady Sophie, do you think of my gift?”

“That it is no gift at all,” she stated and cast the ring into the fire.

He seemed not the least astonished by her actions and together they watched the ring blacken in the flames until finally, he stirred and handed her the identical package. “You are most correct; that was no gift, at least, not one meant for you. Do you recall, when we leaned against the parapet, how I claimed you had given me a great gift?”

“Yes,” she admitted and bowed her head. “I confess I did not perceive what it was you meant by it.”

He leaned closer and tilted her face to his so that her gaze caught in his own. “None but you has
asked to know the truth from my own lips. All assumed they knew, but
you
did not. The evening we spent on the veranda was the first I have spoken those words to a living soul. I have passed the last fortnight imagining my life without the gift you have given me and I confess, I cannot.” He took the box from her and pulled off the red ribbon. “Take it, Lady Sophie, take it—and know the gift you have given me.”

With trembling fingers, she opened the box. Inside was a simple band, too large for any woman, which bore the image of a golden shield; inscribed thereon was the word
misericordia
. “I regret that I was not taught Latin, my lord,” she said as she willed away her disappointment. She had not known until that moment how much she wished to find a ring meant for her own finger. “If I were to guess it’s meaning, however, I should be most distressed. It was never my intention to cause you misery.”

He threw back his head and laughed, and she knew then that she loved him most desperately.

“But of course!” he exclaimed. “How could I have been so simple? I beg you, dear lady, do not feel reproached for your error; I thought the same when first acquainted with this word. However, I know you shall discover it’s true meaning if you but ponder upon it for a moment.”

She took the ring and turned it over in her fingers as she tried to learn what he would have her know. Though crestfallen that his gift did not suggest a declaration of love, she was thoroughly intrigued. She thought about the word’s possible meaning, but did not feel confident enough to speak until she pondered on how her words and actions might have seemed a gift to the Marquis.

Suddenly, the roots of the Latin word began to take form in her mind; to have accord in misery was to be drawn together in sympathy and compassion. Tears started in her eyes as she dwelt on how she had listened to him, had treated him as a human being rather than an object to be reviled. She had commiserated with him in his sorrow, and she had shown him…“Mercy? Is that the true meaning of the word?” she asked as the tears ran freely down her face.

She was astonished when he slid to his knees and took her hands in his. “I shall wear it always,
and each time my glance falls upon it, I shall be reminded of how I have been twice blessed. Not only has your mercy freed me of my self-reproach with regard to the past, it has filled me with hope for the future. If one such as yourself is willing to see so far past that which I allowed, perhaps there are others who might do the same. Though, I am persuaded none of them should possibly prove to be so good, so beautiful, nor so courageous as you, Lady Sophie,” he murmured, bowing his head over her hands in his own.

Lady Sophie knew she should have been shocked by the sight of his head nearly in her lap but she was not. Nor did she feel ill-used by his trespass of her person. Indeed, she felt she ought to be, but was not in the least, alarmed. Briefly she wondered if she had lost all sense of propriety but how could she doubt when his display of affection felt as welcome and fitting as the breath that filled her lungs? Her gaze fell to the dark locks that curled along his neck and, drawing free one of her hands that trembled without his steadying grasp, she placed it on his head and caressed the waves of brown.

He froze under her hand; too late she recalled his previous distress at her touch and wondered if she hadn’t finally offended him past bearing. She had not the opportunity to repent before he lifted his head in astonishment, sending her hand to slip along his brow and downwards, her fingers coming to rest at the corner of his scarred mouth. She felt his muscles stiffen under her caress as if willing himself not to falter, and she wondered how much time had passed since he had last born the weight of any hand to his face but his own. Yet, there was no anger in his eyes as he gazed unwaveringly back at her.

Cautiously, in the case he should object, she ran her fingers across the puckered crease as she had often longed to do and, with a silent sob that convulsed his entire body, he caught her hand in his and pressed it full against his cheek. He closed his eyes, but not in pain or displeasure; there was too much of peace in his expression. When he opened them, the tinge of wariness she hadn’t, until that moment, realized was ever-present, had disappeared.

Very slowly, as if she were a bird that might startle and fly away, he drew her hand across his
lips to envelop them fully. He watched carefully for her reaction and gently, his eyes welling, kissed the palm of her hand, allowing her to know the full sensation of his damaged mouth upon her flesh. Rather than draw away in revulsion as he seemed to anticipate, she smiled her joy and felt the answering curving of his lips against her skin as tears slipped down his cheeks and over their fingers.

She would have been content to continue as they were forever, and so, when he removed her hand in the same manner as he had the night they had met, her heart sank. She expected him to rise, then, but instead he bent his head and touched his lips to hers. As he moved over her mouth with the same measuring hesitancy as he had her palm, she took care to give no indication that should lead him to believe she could not abide the feel of his scarred lip against her own. In truth, there was naught but the pleasantest of sensations in his touch. When she steadied herself with a hand at the nape of his neck, he renewed his kiss with a startling intensity that left her in no doubt as to his feelings.

When his breathing became ragged, he gave her a final kiss of surpassing tenderness and pulled away. Reclaiming the gold-shielded ring that had dropped to the folds of her skirt, he placed it on his finger, took her hand and drew her up to stand where he could gaze, once again, into her eyes. “Lady Sophie, I scarce dared to hope, much less believe, that you should look on me with any favor. I arrived here today with the longing that you might see fit to stand my friend, with no expectation that you might return my affections. If I lived with naught but your mercy for the rest of my days, it would be enough, my love for you notwithstanding. But now…” he said, his face alight with awe, “dare I ask if it is too much to aspire to
your
love, as well? That you might take my name, fill my house with children and banish my solitude?”

Her throat drawn too tight to speak, but happy beyond bearing, Lady Sophie put her hands to his face and gathered it close to anoint his scar with a lingering kiss. His breath caught in his throat as he threw his arms about her and pulled her tight so that the thundering in his chest could be felt against her own. To her delight, he kissed her again but with a passion that had been previously withheld as, locked in his arms, she surrendered to the answering passion that rose within her. They clung to one
another so long she was bound to be made late for Christmas dinner but, rather than feel distressed, her heart filled with elation as she realized her touch would never again be rebuffed.

“My darling,” he murmured, his eyes bright with a radiance that could have come from nowhere but within, “should I prove ungrateful if I dared hope for more bliss than I enjoy at this moment?”

Lady Sophie gazed at the face she had come to know so well in so short a time, a face that belonged to a changed man, one who had clung for so long to the shadows in his heart and who had finally stepped into the light. “You need not hope,” she said, brushing away the last of his tears. “You need only believe.”

The End