How to Treat a Lady (18 page)

“About what?”

“About making you work so hard.”

“You
should
feel guilty about that. It has been intolerable.”

Her guilty look disappeared. “You haven't worked any harder than the rest of us.”

“Yes, but you benefit from my work. I don't benefit from it at all.” He looked down at his blistered
hands, now oily from the smelly balm she'd applied to them.

“Haven't we housed you and fed you and tended your wounds?”

“With sheep ointment!”

“With
good
sheep ointment.”

“I don't think there is such a thing as good sheep ointment.”

Derrick yelled something from across the field to Harriet. Something about the last railing on the fence he and the hands had just fixed. Harriet shouted back an answer while Chase waited.

She turned to face him. “We should be able to begin the shearing tomorrow.”

“It's about time.”

“So we think, too. We've never done this before, though Stephen and I have concocted a system.”

She was always the practical one, except for that streak of passion that shimmered just below the surface. Chase wondered what she'd do if he kissed her once more. He stepped a little closer, but yet another shout sounded from across the field.

Harriet leaned over the fence and shouted back an answer. Frustrated at the interruption, Chase had to constrain himself from yelling an answer himself—something rather unworthy.

Finally, Harriet glanced back at Chase. “What were we—oh, yes. Our shearing system.” She tossed her head slightly, a tendril of brown hair escaping over one ear. “We built some narrow pens that will only hold one sheep. You just have to loop a rope about its neck and it will be held in place so you can shear it. It should be ridiculously easy.”

“One can only hope,” Chase replied, though he
had his doubts. “So far, nothing about the sheep business has been what I'd call ‘easy.'”

Her chin seemed to jut a bit at that. But after a moment, she said in a rather genteel voice, “You are right. Mr. St. John, you have been most helpful this week. Please accept our thanks for your assistance.”

Her tone was almost warm. Chase was impressed. It must have cost her pride plenty to be able to pull that off. “You are quite welcome, Miss Ward.”

“It was no problem, I assure you.” She peered up at him, all wide brown eyes and thick, curling brown lashes. A faint scattering of freckles decorated her nose. “I assume that since you will continue being the captain, you will also continue to help us with the shearing.”

Chase almost choked. “Isn't it enough that I am willing to play the part for your nosy neighbors?”

“It's only for a week and since you, yourself, said you weren't on a schedule—” She met his gaze with a hopeful look.

But for the first time, Chase saw a flicker of uncertainty. “Miss Ward—Harriet, if you need money for the bank payment, I could—”

Harriet's shoulders stiffened. “No. I already had to pay back the bank; I will not owe money again.”

Blast it all, who said anything about a loan? “Wait a moment! You don't understand. You won't owe me a thing—”

“I don't take charity, either, if that's what you are going to suggest.”

Bloody, stiff-necked fool. Chase's temper began to simmer. “Look, it's not as if—”

“It's not as if we need it.” Her mouth thinned with displeasure. “Do you think we are not capable of
making the final payment? For I assure you that we can and—”

A jangling sound made Harriet turn. Ophelia rode up on one of the farm horses, the old animal plodding along.

Chase gritted his teeth. Yet another interruption. Bloody hell, could no one in the family do anything without turning to Harriet for advice? It made private speech with the woman almost impossible.

Ophelia pulled the horse to when she reached the wagon. “There you are, Harri. I was looking all over for you.”

“And now you've found me. What do you need?”

Chase scowled. They were in the middle of a field, for chrissakes. How
could
they get interrupted so oft?

“Something's wrong with Stephen. Mother asked him to accompany Sophia to Colonel Parker's to visit the colonel's wife, and he refused quite rudely, then stomped off to the library.”

“That doesn't sound like him.”

“No, it doesn't. I asked him what was wrong, but he will not say. Mother wants you to speak with him when you come home. Are you almost done?”

“Almost.” Harriet appeared concerned. “I could leave now, I suppose. I really should see what's amiss—”

“Nonsense,” Chase said. “Your brother is a grown man. Leave him be.”

Harriet appeared offended. “Even grown men need comfort at times.”

“When you've made a mull of things, it's your responsibility to fix them. Your responsibility and no one else's.”

“You, sir, are wrong. If I made an error, I would think nothing of asking my family for help.”

Chase met her gaze with a flat look. “We never know what we'll do until the circumstances arise.”

“I know what I would do under any circumstances. And anyone who keeps secrets from his own family is a selfish wretch.”

Chase stiffened, a thousand rejoinders burning a way to his lips, though they remained stubbornly closed.

“Uhm, Harriet?” Ophelia said, looking interestedly from one to the other. “Shall I tell Mother you are on your way?”

“Please do,” Harriet said shortly, her gaze still locked with Chase's.

“Very well.” Ophelia waited a moment more, but when nothing else was said, she gave a sigh and kicked the horse into a lumpy trot.

Chase wrenched his gaze from Harriet to see if Ophelia was yet out of range. When he turned back, Harriet was already gracing the seat of the cart, her gaze fixed straight ahead, the reins in her hands.

“I'm off to the house,” she said, without looking at him. “If you wish a ride, climb on.”

She said the words as if they had been wrenched from her.

Chase planted his hat more firmly on his head. “I'll walk.”

“All the way to the house?” She started to say something, then stopped and shrugged. “Very well. I will see you at dinner. Don't forget Lady Cabot-Wells is coming to make an inspection of Captain Frakenham this evening. It won't do for you to arrive smelling like sheep ointment.”

The harridan, ordering him about as if she owned him. “It won't do for her to see you in that gown, either,” he retorted. “It's hideous.”

She turned slowly and eyed him from head to foot, stopping to gaze at his sagging boots, faded breeches, and ragged hat. “It's a good thing I have such a qualified fashion advisor.” She smirked and then turned away to set the farm horses into motion.

Chase watched, fuming, as she drove to the opposite field, picked up Derrick and the two hired hands and, without so much as a glance his way, headed the cart down the path toward Garrett Park.

Chase was left, standing by the mended fence, reeking of sheep ointment, and facing a long, long walk back to the house. Teeth clenched against a stream of scathing invectives, he began walking.

S
elfish? How dared she? Chase threw open the door of the house, his boots ringing loudly on the polished wood floor. It had taken him almost two hours to reach the house on foot. He was tired, sore, dirty, and far too aware of the odiferous waft of sheep salve to be comfortable.

Damn Harriet and her narrow view of things. He wasn't selfish. Why, how many times had he come to the rescue of his own brothers and friends? Not that many of his friends required much in the way of rescuing—except Harry Annesley, of course. Chase paused in the hallway at the thought of Harry, but he quickly shook it off. He was not selfish. The entire idea was ludicrous.

Leave it to Harriet Ward, the most obstinate, outlandish, prone-to-exaggeration female of his ac
quaintance to toss off an ill-conceived word like “selfish” without so much as a second's worth of consideration for his feelings.

The faint sound of girlish voices reached his ears—Sophia and Ophelia deep in conversation. Chase paused, glancing up the stairwell.

He didn't like to think of bringing anyone pain, but God knew he'd already caused far more than his fair share of it. If he closed his eyes, he could still see the white face of the woman his carriage had run down, hear the clack of the hooves on the cobblestones, feel his own rising panic as he realized she could not have escaped.

The memory of that pain held him in place at the foot of the stairs. The voices from upstairs settled into a low murmur, while golden dust motes floated through the air. The hall was silent but for those voices, a faint scent of beeswax and plaster filling his senses.

The library door swung open and out stepped Harriet dressed in a gown of cool blue muslin. She'd had time to bathe and change, and pin her hair atop her head. Except for the telltale pink of her cheeks from being in the sun and the fact that her arms and nose were sadly tanned, she looked as if she belonged in a drawing room and not a pasture.

She was closing the door, but she stopped as she caught sight of him, a guilty expression crossing her face, followed quickly by a mulish jutting of her chin.

“I made it back,” he said grimly, aware that he looked and smelled atrociously. “In case you were concerned for my safety.”

“I wasn't.” She snapped the door closed behind
her. “Even a braying ass can walk a fathom without falling in a ditch.”

The little minx. Chase closed the space between them, pinning her to the door with only an inch of space between her fresh skirts and his muddied breeches.

Her nose curled. “You smell like—”

“I know exactly what I smell like. I haven't had time for my bath. Not yet.”

“Pray feel free to rinse in the trough by the barn until your bath is ready.”

“You are incorrigible.”

“Do you ever say anything nice about people?”

That hurt. “I was only trying to make a point. Your family leans on you far too much.”

“They do no such thing. Doesn't your family mean anything to you?”

Of course it meant something to him. He had a family—a very close one, in fact. He couldn't imagine life without them. But he was beginning to be aware that part of his problem was that they had taken perhaps too good care of him. Their motives had been pure, of course—love and concern. But their actions hadn't always turned things for the better.

Now that he thought about it, whenever things went wrong, his brothers were always there and not just to support him, but often actively fixing things so that Chase didn't have to. Perhaps that was why he'd been unable to face his problem—until that one instant, he'd never had to.

He shook his head. “You aren't doing your brothers or sisters a favor when you run around correcting every difficulty they might face.”

She pressed her hand against his chest. “I hate to be rude, but could you step back a little. The smell…”

“If I have to smell the sheep ointment, then
you
should have to smell the sheep ointment. After all, you're the one who slathered it all over me.”

“Piffle! You had blisters. What else was I to do?”

“Not a damn thing. Fortunately for you, I'm too tired to argue with you more.” He stepped back and allowed her room to escape.

She moved in a rustle of fresh muslin. “I'll ask Jane to have a bath drawn for you.”

“Thank you.”

“Don't thank me. Mother will expect you at dinner since Lady Cabot-Wells is on her way. Besides, I, for one, have no desire to sit next to you while you smell like a sick sheep.” With that, she turned to the stairs and made her way up.

Chase watched her go, her trim backside perfectly outlined under her skirts. His body, tired and aching as it was, reacted instantly. Bloody hell, what was it about her that heated him as flame to tinder? He'd had so many women…more than he cared to count. But Harriet Ward, prim and proper and totally unlike any woman he had ever met, inflamed him to uncomfortable heights just by the simple act of walking up a flight of stairs. Damn it, he would not think about that. Not now.

Meanwhile, he'd slip into the library and retrieve the tome he'd been reading about the sea captain. He'd need some fresh “memories” of life at sea if he was to feed the rumor mill yet again.

Besides, it would be a while before his bath was ready, and it would be nice to relax with a book before he had to don his official Captain Frakenham
garb and entertain the community. Chase turned to the library door through which Harriet had come, and pushed it open.

Stephen stood in the room, one shoulder against the mantel, his crutches to one side. His head was bowed, a mulish expression on his face, a glass clutched in one hand. Chase hesitated, recognizing a crisis in the making.

He really didn't want to get involved with Stephen's contretemps, but his book sat on a table just past the youth. Chase wondered if he could retrieve it without getting sucked into a lengthy conversation about whatever was paining Stephen.

He must have made some noise, for Stephen lifted his head, his gaze landing on Chase. “Oh,” he said in a sullen tone. “It's you.” He lifted the glass and tossed back the contents, gasping a little as he did so.

Chase caught the scent of brandy and raised his brows. “Does your sister know you are drinking?”

“Yes,” Stephen said, his eyes blazing. “She is not my keeper and neither are you, sir. I am nineteen years of age and may do as I please.”

Chase opened his mouth, but then stopped. Normally, he would have met such pretension with a swift and brutal rejoinder, one guaranteed to put the insolent pup in his place. But somehow, in the back of Chase's head, he heard the words “selfish wretch” spoken over and over.

Chase sighed. He really didn't have a choice. “Very well. Let's start anew. Stephen, how nice to see you.”

Stephen gave a bitter laugh and turned away. His face was flushed with drink, his eyes glittering.

Chase rubbed his chin. What should he do now? Just take the book and leave? But no, that's exactly
what Harriet would expect him to do and he'd be damned if he'd prove her right. “What holds you here, in the library? I believe dinner is served shortly.” He ambled closer to the table.

“I don't care—” Stephen grimaced. “What is that smell?”

“My hands. I had blisters and your sister used the sheep ointment on them.”

Stephen pressed a hand to his nose. “How horrid. I do hope you mean to bathe.”

“As soon as the water has been heated.” Chase eyed Stephen for a moment, noting how the lad's gaze rested on him with sullen intent. “Harriet told you my true identity, eh?”

Stephen nodded. “And that you've known all along who you are. Harriet seems to think you didn't act with malice and I—” He bit his lip a moment, then said, “Allow me to apologize on behalf of the family for our deception, as well. I'm sure it must seem very odd to you.”

“Nonsense. It made perfect sense or I'd have never agreed to assist you. I daresay that if I'd been in your shoes, I'd have made up a Captain Frakenham, too.”

“Thank you all the same,” Stephen said stiffly. “You are too kind.”

Chase eyed the lad curiously. Despite the boy's frigidly polite tone, there was an underlying expression of agony. What did one do when one actually wished to encourage confidences? Chase wondered what Harriet would do in just such a situation.

After a moment, he sighed. There was nothing for it but a direct attack. “Well? What's wrong with you?”

Stephen stiffened. “Nothing is wrong with me.”

“Nonsense. I'm usually unaware of people's feelings and such, but even I can tell you're suffering from the doldrums.”

Stephen flushed. “There's nothing—I don't—you wouldn't understand.”

Chase eyed the book with a gloomy gaze. If things had worked out his way, no one would have been in the library and Chase would even now be paging through the book, looking for just the right sailing yarn to spring on Lady Cabot-Wells.

“It's a woman,” Stephen blurted out.

“Of course it's a woman.”

Stephen sent him a sharp glance. “What do you mean ‘of course.'”

“What else would send a man into a full-thrown gloom in the middle of the day? Has to be a woman.”

“I suppose,” Stephen said without enthusiasm. He stared down at his hands, his bottom lip softened and then quivered ever so slightly.

Chase watched, horrified that the young man might actually burst into tears. “Here, now! See what brandy will do to you?” He sent the book one last regretful glance, then took a chair near where Stephen stood, shoulders slumped. “Tell me about this paragon of yours.”

“Tell you?” Stephen's bitter laugh grated along Chase's nerves. “I can't believe this! You, who can barely set a fence rail, are offering me advice. By gad, that's rich.”

Chase managed a grin. “Trust me on this; if there is one thing I do know, it's how to deal with the fair sex.”

“You forget that I've seen you with Harriet.”

Chase's grin disappeared. “Your sister is not an
ordinary woman. She's—” Stubborn. Intractable. Condescending when she had no right to be. And intolerably prideful. All told, Harriet Ward was impossibly argumentative. Chase caught Stephen's questioning gaze. “Your sister drives me mad.”

A faint smile touched Stephen's mouth, softening his haggard look. “She has that effect on all of us. Father used to say she had an iron spine and, when disgruntled, could freeze the pond with a single look.”

“Your father was a very wise man.”

Stephen looked at the worn carpet beneath his feet and grimaced. “About some things. Had he had a better head on his shoulders, we wouldn't be scrambling to make this payment.”

“We all have our shortcomings.”

Stephen's gaze met his, hard and unflinching. “What are
your
shortcomings, then?”

The insolent tone in his voice sent a hot rejoinder flying to Chase's lips. He wasn't used to being spoken to in such a summary fashion. Especially not by a whelp who was still wet behind the ears. But just as he opened his mouth to send a sharply worded retort, he caught a glimpse of pain in Stephen's gaze.

Somewhere in the back of Chase's mind, a faint memory began to hum. He'd been fifteen, a few years younger than Stephen, and hopelessly, relentlessly in “love” with the divine Miss Leticia Over-hill, a plump beauty with flaxen hair and blue eyes and the most ravishing dimples.

The fair Leticia had been several years older than he and had her sights firmly fixed on Viscount Ripley, eldest son of the Earl of Snowton. Chase had no title, and was a younger son, as well—though he was infinitely more well-to-do than the Ripleys would ever be.

Still, Leticia'd had her heart set on a title and a title she was determined to have. Chase had been devastated. Of course, now he thanked the stars for his lucky escape, though at the time he'd sworn never again to smile.

“I have many, many flaws. Not the least of which is a tendency to see things from my own stance and no one else's and a sad propensity to convince myself that certain problems will disappear if I can just outrun them.” Inwardly Chase winced at how true this profession was.

Stephen eyed him with interest. “Those are grave indeed.”

“I'm trying to overcome them. Besides, no one is perfect. Even my father, who was the most generous man I ever met, had his shortcomings. He loved us all dearly, but he had very little patience with children.” Chase gestured to the chair opposite his. “Come. Sit. You're giving me a neck ache.”

“I don't want to sit.”

Chase made an exasperated noise. “Must you argue with every damn thing I say? You are far more like your sister than you realize.”

Stephen's lips twitched. “Harriet would not agree.”

“All the more reason to believe it's true.”

Stephen sighed. “I suppose you are right.” He gathered his crutches from the wall and made his way to the chair Chase indicated, stopping to refill his glass.

Though he winced to see how much brandy the lad splashed into his glass, Chase wisely refrained from commenting.

Stephen propped his crutches beside the chair and sank into it. Brandy in one hand, he eyed Chase
with a complete lack of respect. “This is asinine. How could you possibly understand my situation?”

“I'm older, a male, and I was once your age.”

“What does that prove?”

Good God, this helping thing was most unpleasant. Chase thrust his feet out before him, settling them on the small brass trunk that served as a tea table. Gad, but the lad was full of pride. “Stiff-necked as your sister, aren't you?”

“What if I am?”

“What indeed,” Chase muttered. “Tell me what bugs have infested your lady's bonnet.”

“She wouldn't like to hear you refer to her in such a manner.”