Elizabeth Mansfield (25 page)

When they came together again, Kate broached the subject of Deirdre. "Your affianced bride has brought
your
painting to life. And very beautifully."

"My affianced bride is not—" Harry began, but the movement of the danced separated them again. By the time they came together again, it was time for the final bow. Harry took her arm to lead her off the floor. "As I was saying, my affianced bride—" he began again.

This time, a Marie Antoinette bedecked in jewels and a feathered headdress on her high pompadour pulled his arm from Kate's. "My dance, my lord, I believe," she said in queenly fashion and dragged him off. Harry could only throw Kate a helpless look before disappearing into the throng.

She did not see him again until midnight. When the clock struck the hour, he appeared on the musician's platform and announced the unmasking. This was done with appropriately noisy squeals of surprise and laughter. When the din subsided he cleared his throat. "I think it's time," he said, "for me to tell you why we've invited you all to celebrate with us tonight."

The throng surged forward to hear him.

"You all seem to be under the impression that I'm about to announce a betrothal. But that is not the case. There is no betrothal to be announced."

"Yes, there is," came a voice from the crowd.

Harry squinted into the press of people. "Sir Edward, is that you?"

"Yes, it is." The crowd parted as he pushed his way to the front, pulling Isabel behind him. "I'd like to announce to the world that this lovely lady in men's clothing has just consented to become my wife."

Isabel, as surprised as everyone else by this public proclamation, blushed hotly. "It's because we look so much alike," she muttered with an embarrassed laugh.

An enthusiastic cheer went up from the crowd, as Edward, emboldened by her acceptance of his proposal, embraced her. On her part, Isabel was suddenly shy. Undone by so much attention, she buried her head in his shoulder. “Take me out of here," she whispered in his ear, "or I shall die of embarrassment. This is not a proper way for me to maintain my serenity."

Everyone's eyes followed them as Edward led her out, but as soon as they disappeared, the audience turned back to Harry. Kate, standing at the back, was beset with a confusion of emotions. She was happy for her mother and wanted to run after the pair to wish them well. But she could not move. She had to hear what else Harry would say. What had he meant when he said there would be no betrothal? Had her selfish minx of a cousin broken it off? That possibility was so upsetting she could hardly breathe.

"Happy as I am at the news we've just heard," Harry was saying, "that was not the reason for this celebration. The reason is a birthday. A very special birthday. My grandmother, Charlotte, Lady Ainsworth, was born on this day seventy-five years ago."

Cheers rang through the room. Harry held up a hand for quiet. "You are all invited to go downstairs, drink to her health, and partake of a midnight supper. I've asked the youngest member of the family to lead the oldest down. Benjy, do the honors."

Benjy threw aside his pirate hat and, grinning proudly, gave his arm to his grandmother. The crowd made an aisle for them and applauded loudly as he led her out.

While the revelers gaily followed, Kate stood still, her chest tight with fury. Her eyes scanned the crowd for Deirdre. It didn't take long to find her, for the irritating chit was hanging on to the arm of a tall knight who could not be missed. Kate pushed her way through the press until she reached her target. Disentangling the girl's arm from Leonard's, Kate asked with restrained fury, "You will excuse us for a moment, won't you, Leonard?"

Not waiting for an answer she pushed Deirdre before her to the part of the ballroom that was now deserted. "Blast you, Deirdre," she snapped, "what did you do?"

Deirdre's underlip trembled. "About what?" she asked fearfully.

"You know about what! About Harry!"

Deirdre put up her chin. "I told him the truth. It was the right thing to do. Leonard said so."

"Did he, indeed?" Kate asked icily. “Tell me, Deirdre, why is it that Harry's best friend and the girl he saved from abduction both can care so little for his happiness?"

"I don't see what business it is of yours," Deirdre said with a pout. "Besides, it seems to me—"

Leonard came up behind her and put a protective arm about her shoulders. "I think, Kate," he said, "that Harry is not so very unhappy as you think." With that, Deirdre's knight took his lady's arm and led her toward the door. But before leaving he looked back at Kate with a strange, enigmatic smile. "If I were you," he called back to her, "I'd take myself to the library."

"What?" Kate asked. "Why?"

Leonard pointed to his left. "The library," he repeated and disappeared.

Kate knew she should go down to the buffet and congratulate her mother and new father, but first she had to find out what Leonard was trying to tell her. She made her way to the library with hurried steps. When she opened the door, she was only half surprised to see Harry sitting there, sunk in an armchair with his feet up on an ottoman, his hands behind his head, staring up at the portrait of the Deirdre-like girl. Her heart went out to him. Perhaps Leonard, even though a rival for Deirdre's hand, was still Harry's friend and, guessing he'd be sitting here moping, had sent her here to try to console him.

She came in quietly and went to stand behind his chair. "You may not think so now," she said softly, "but there are many other girls in the world as lovely as she."

Harry turned his head and looked up at her. "Are there, indeed? Do you advise me to start right out and go looking for one of them?"

There was something so sarcastic in his tone that she was taken aback. "I don't... I didn't mean..."

"Do you really think, Miss Closed-minded Rendell, that I was sitting here mooning over that painting? Or the girl in it?"

"Weren't you?"

"No, ma'am, I was not. I don't even like it. Or her, for that matter."

"You don't like the painting that you traveled so many miles to purchase?" she asked. Her heart began to pound, but she wasn't sure why.

"I bought it for Grandmama. It means something to her. Family history or some such rot. My taste in paintings runs to a different sort of work."

"Does it?" she asked in a tiny voice. "And your taste in girls, too?"

He got to his feet and turned to her. "Dash it, Kate, I don't understand what crotchets you manufacture in your maggotty little brain. Didn't you hear me tell you, at the inn that night, that it was you I loved?"

Kate gulped. "You never told me that."

"Not in so many words, perhaps, but what else could I have meant when I said it was you I'd come to rescue?"

"You might have tried to rescue any female, just because you are kind and courageous."

"Kind and courageous, am I?" he sneered. "In addition to being a rake?"

"I may have been wrong about that," she admitted.

"You may have been wrong about a great deal. How can you possibly have taken it into your head that I loved Deirdre, when you were witness to the agony I felt that night?"

"But if you didn't love her, why didn't you tell her so? Why didn't you try to convince Leonard to take your place?"

"Because, my dear blockhead, it is not easy to reject a young lady when she throws herself into your arms with deep expressions of love and gratitude. What I've been doing these last weeks, with Leonard's help, is trying to encourage Deirdre to reject me."

"Oh!" Kate breathed, wide-eyed.

"You could have spoilt everything, you know, when you threatened her yesterday, demanding that she stay faithful to me. Touched as I was by your concern for my happiness, I would have run downstairs and wrung your neck, except that I knew she would not follow your orders."

"You heard me?"

"Every word. Actually, you were magnificent." He took hold of the two ends of the shawl in a tight grip and used them to pull her to him. "So, girl in the Persian shawl, have I managed to convince you that I love you madly?"

"Do you? Arrogant and stubborn and closed-minded and blockheaded though I am?"

"That's why it's madly." Keeping her tied to him with the shawl, he leaned down and kissed her with the intensity of a desire long delayed. Slowly, she inched her arms free of the constraints and wound them round his neck. Locked that way in each other's arms, the shawl was no longer needed. It slipped quietly to the floor.

When at last they stopped for breath, he bent down and picked it up. "It's an amazing piece of work," he said in a choked voice. "I almost can't believe it's real. I almost can't believe
you're
real."

"Come now, Harry, whatever you feel now is not what you felt when you first saw the painting," Kate said, taking the shawl and smoothing it out. "You can't make me believe that you admired it when you saw it that first day,"

"Oh, yes I did. You'll never guess how much." He lifted her in his arms and carried her to the easy chair. Sitting down, he laid her in his lap and threw the shawl over her shoulders. "When I first saw that painting, I was utterly stricken," he said softly, smoothing back a lock of her hair. "I wanted to touch the silk of the shawl, the folds of the dress, the girl's cheeks. I'd never been so drawn to a painting, or to a woman's face. If at that moment a genie had appeared and given me one wish, I would have wished for the girl to be real. And then I turned about and saw you!"

She couldn't quite believe it. "Are you saying you loved me
then?"

"From that moment till time's end," he said.

"Oh, Harry, no," she laughed, trying to keep him from noticing her eyes tearing up. “Till time's end, indeed!"

"I think you'll discover, my love, that I, like you, don't easily change my mind."

Overwhelmed, she buried her face in his shoulder. She tried to tell him her feelings, but he was kissing her again. She let herself respond to the pressure of his embrace. The words would wait.

The library door opened silently, just wide enough for Leonard to peep in. When he saw that his friend was embracing Kate with such fervor that it was apparent even beneath the Persian shawl, he smiled, backed away, and carefully closed the door. But he didn't do it quickly enough to prevent Deirdre from getting a glimpse of the scene. "I declare!" she cried in horror. "Wasn't that Harry kissing
Kate?"

"Might have been," Leonard said.

"Why, the bounder! It's only been a day since I jilted him. He's a more capricious, faithless rattlepate than I am."

Leonard was too wise to disagree. "Perhaps he is," he said, and led her away.