Silver Sea (11 page)

Adrienne could bear no more. Impulsively she walked forward to stand in front of Huntsford Harms. "Sir, I could not help overhearing and thought I should introduce myself. I am Miss Adrienne Beauvisage, your mother's companion. Lady Thomasina asked me to greet you in her stead, and I would like to assure you that she is in fine health and spirits."

Out came his quizzing glass. He raised it with gloved fingers and gave her a long, languid stare, from head to toe. "By Jupiter, what's a beauty like you doing rusticating with an eccentric like my mother?"

Her feminine self could not help noticing that, up close, he was indeed a very handsome man, with a face that reminded her of Greek sculptures. And, as Lady Thomasina had promised, his big brown eyes were quite beautiful. He removed his hat and bowed to her, revealing fashionably windswept golden hair. What could she say now?

Nathan intervened. His fingers touched the small of her back to alert her to his nearness, and then he spoke. "I also should make myself known to you, sir. I am... Nathan Essex, and—"

"Yes?" Harms snapped, glancing at the other man's modest clothing. "Whose companion are
you?"

"There have been threats against Miss Beauvisage. Her family, in France, hired me to ensure her safety. I've been looking after Lady Thomasina as well." Considerably taller and more powerfully built than Huntsford, he consciously used his physical presence to assert himself.

The younger man's eyes darted away. "Why are you boring me with these meaningless details? My guests are tired and hungry." With that, he hurried his friends toward the massive doorway, servants scurrying in their wake.

Nathan and Adrienne stood alone together on the stone steps. After a minute of welcome silence, he muttered, "I despise that imbecile."

She strove for a cheerier note. "At least our situation here won't be dull any longer."

"Might I remind you that Walter Frakes-Hogg is lurking about and I must capture him—with your assistance? I wouldn't call that a dull situation."

Realizing that Nathan meant to be horrid and stubborn where Huntsford Harms was concerned, she made no further attempt to lighten the mood. "Be that as it may, I have more immediate duties. Lady Thomasina is upstairs at the mercy of her son, and I ought to go to her aid."

Nathan stayed behind. The last thing he needed right now was another view of Huntsford Harms ogling Adrienne. It created a strong dark twisting sensation in his chest that bore a suspicious resemblance to jealousy.

* * *

Harms Castle may have been too dusty and tarnished for the taste of its heir, but he and his friends made do all the same. Musty apartments were aired, and under the leadership of Huntsford Harms, common rooms were rearranged by the bestirred servants. The gallery was transformed into a portrait-lined billiard room, chairs were arranged along the walls in the drawing room and saloon to allow for dancing or other entertainments, and dropleaf tables were set up in the dining room so that the number of people dining could be adjusted easily.

Huntsford was supervising and explaining his wishes to Jarrow, while footmen moved furniture this way and that, when his mother appeared in the doorway of the dining room.

"I thought I must be hearing things!" Her massive bosom heaved from the exercise of walking the dozens of yards from her usual station in the library. Angus stood at her side, emitting a low growl. "Hunty, have you gone mad? What are you doing to my beautiful house?"

He chuckled and strolled to her side. "Dear Mummy, you have ever been a great one to tease. We both know that this old tomb could do with a bit of dusting up, hmm?" Coaxing a smile from her and a snarl from Angus, Huntsford continued, "Jarrow and I thought that these tables might make the eating arrangements more efficient. We fellows will doubtless be afield during luncheon, shooting and so forth, thus the kitchen need feed only Lucy and Clair at midday. You see?"

Lady Thomasina's mouth turned down again. "It is my house. You might at least ask."

"Now, now, give us a kiss. You mustn't worry about such nonsense, darling Mummy." Out of the corner of one eye, Huntsford noticed that Angus had discovered one of his prized powder-blue gloves under a cobweb-laced side chair. Glove in teeth, the terrier slunk toward the other door. "You there! Cur! Come here this instant!"

"His name is Angus, Hunty. After fifteen years, you might remember," Lady Thomasina called reproachfully as her son went scuttling after the little thief.

"Quick!" Huntsford shouted to Jarrow. "Someone close the door before he gets away!"

The nearest footman rushed to obey, and Angus dashed under an enormous sideboard. Huntsford, on hands and knees, peered at the terrier, who huddled against the wall and continued to hold fast to his glove while emitting the same disturbing growl.

"Mummy!" He looked back at her. "Can't you do something with this mongrel? I cannot begin to tell you how valuable that glove is. I mean, I have them made to fit only my hands, and it could take weeks to get another pair that color...."

"Angus is keenly intelligent." His mother sniffed. "He must have sensed that you don't like him. He may have been waiting years to have his revenge!"

"Confound it, we're talking about a blasted dog!" Furious, he pushed his own face under the sideboard and glared at Angus. "Give it over, you bastard, or you'll be sorrier than you know!" Then, thrusting his arm toward the animal, he managed to just get hold of the edge of the glove.

"If you touch one hair on my darling Angus's body, it's you who will be sorry." Lady Thomasina had joined them at the sideboard.

"Your shadow makes it impossible for me to see a thing, Mummy! Do let me get on with this!" When Huntsford pulled at his corner of the glove, Angus sank his teeth into his enemy's flesh. The young man screamed, flailing, and felt the seam of his skin-tight coat tear all the way down from under his arm. Uttering a string of epithets, Huntsford withdrew.

Angus snarled, triumphant.

Lady Thomasina shook her head and sent a shower of gray powder over her son. "You really can be the most exasperating child. Do find something constructive to do with yourself, rather than causing problems throughout the house."

"The others are waiting for me in the billiard room."

"We don't have a billiard room."

"We've made the portrait gallery into one. A billiard table was brought from town." Still sulking, he got to his feet. "I ought to go and dust myself off a bit, change this coat, and so forth." Huntsford put on a false smile and strolled to the door. "Oh, Mummy—what's your new companion called? Annabelle?"

"Adrienne, silly child."

He laughed. "Yes, of course. I
am
silly, aren't I?"

Chapter 6

One of the male guests, Sir Blake Smythe, had decided to pass most of his waking hours at Harms Castle painting. He could be found, with his paints and easel, at various sites outdoors when the weather was fair, and while indoors Sir Blake had taken to sketching cooperative human subjects.

Huntsford Harms was extremely put out by his friend's ill-timed show of independence. While it did mean that there were always just four of them for cards and other games, so one person was not left out, it also meant that no one else could be absent, including Huntsford himself. Barely a day had passed before Blake's pastime created the first crisis for the other guests.

"Where is Clair?" Alistair wondered as he, Huntsford, and Lucy assembled after supper at the card table in the drawing room.

Fresh candles had been lit and positioned in the round corners, the cards were prepared for whist, goblets of claret were poured, and the gentle lapping of the flames in the fireplace helped relieve the evening's damp. The only flaw in the scene was the empty fourth chair.

"I think Clair ate something that didn't agree with her," Lucy murmured, coloring. The two men fixed her with suspicious eyes. "Well, it might have been the champagne at luncheon...."

"I saw her drink three glasses of her own, then two of mine!" Alistair, a romantically thin and pale young man, sighed and shook his head. "We can't play whist without a fourth. Might not Blake join us this once?"

Hearing his own name, Blake glanced up in surprise. He was sitting nearby, absorbed in his work on a sketch of Lucy's dog, Peter. "What, me? I'd really rather not."

"Confound it, old man!" Huntsford pounded on the table and all their glasses jumped so that claret sloshed right to the rims before subsiding. "There—see what you nearly caused? Why must you behave so selfishly? Why can you not think of others rather than your own desires, night and day, day and night—"

"I say, leave off, will you?" Sir Blake eyed the claret decanter, wondering how much his friend had already imbibed that evening. "I hardly think that I am the villain in this piece. When you invited me here, you didn't mention
conditions,
such as doing your bidding for the duration of our stay!"

Oblivious, Lucy said, "I should like Blake to continue drawing my dear little Peter. That would mean much more to me than a common game of whist."

"Aren't we prosy! Have you forgotten who is the host here?" Enraged, Huntsford stood up and prepared to issue an ultimatum to Blake, when a cloud passed from his beautiful face. "I have the perfect solution. There is someone in the house who can take Clair's place in our little game."

He motioned to the page boy, who waited to obey any order Lord Harms might issue. "Do you know Miss Beauvisage, her ladyship's companion? Of course you do. Go to her room, or wherever she passes her dull little evenings, and tell her that Lord Harms and his guests desire her company in the drawing room. Immediately."

* * *

"May I confide in the two of you?" Lady Thomasina asked suddenly. She looked first at Nathan, then at Adrienne, then down at her cherry profiterole. "I hope that by unburdening myself, I may recover my appetite. I do love this dessert, you know. I'm particularly fond of Kentish cherries."

"Haven't I proven yet that I deserve your trust, my lady?" Nathan wore a compelling expression that he knew to be particularly effective when combined with his spectacles.

Adrienne nodded agreement.

Sipping a generous glassful of port, Lady Thomasina grew teary. "Would you think me a very ridiculous old woman if I were to tell you that I am sometimes small-minded in my hopes for Hunty's future? That I occasionally worry that he might be ungenerous himself in his dealings toward me, his mother?"

"We would not think you ridiculous in the least," Nathan said carefully, "but I am not certain, exactly, what you mean, my lady."

Adrienne chimed in then. "Does this have anything to do with Angus and the blue glove?"

The terrier lay under her ladyship's voluminous skirts, with only his head exposed to the air. In his mouth he now carried, at all times, Huntsford Harms's ruined blue glove. Lady Thomasina bent to pat his little head before replying, "No, I've tried to put Hunty and Angus's quarrel from my mind."

"Excuse me," Nathan interjected, "but am I to understand that your son and your dog have been
quarreling?"

"Angus was merely teasing him, and Hunty wasn't very sporting about it."

"I see." He cocked a dark brow. "I think."

"Don't let him distract you," Adrienne said to the old woman. "You'll forget what it was you wanted to share with us."

"Thank you, Miss Beau. I find that I am growing fond of you!" Lady Thomasina's plump, painted face looked both wistful and garish in the leaping candlelight as she paused, considering her next words. "You see, my friends, I find that I don't want Hunty to truly grow up and be a man. I'm afraid that, if he marries, I'll be cast away—"

The door to her sitting room opened then, throwing a beam of light across the small table where the trio sat. One of Huntsford Harms's page boys marched to Adrienne's side.

"I've come to fetch Miss Beauvisage. His lordship says you must come straightaway, miss. Lady Clair is—uh, ill, and they need a fourth for whist."

"How very peculiar!" Adrienne cried.

"That's putting it kindly," Nathan muttered.

"I couldn't be more pleased!" Lady Thomasina clapped her pudgy hands with delight. She told the page boy to wait in the corridor for Miss Beauvisage, and when he had gone, she leaned forward and explained, "It's just as I hoped. You see, that Clair person has her cap set for Hunty. Mothers know these things. I do not like her, even one whit. She is forever half in her cups, and that is a very bad omen. Now that she's ill from too much champagne, you can come to my rescue, Miss Beau! Hunty will find you far more entertaining, and soon he'll have forgotten about her entirely."

"And what if he transfers his attentions to Miss Beau?" Nathan demanded.

"Don't be silly, dear boy! Miss Beau is a servant, after all. Nothing to worry about, for any of us. And if Hunty should indulge in a mild flirtation, I daresay that Miss Beau would enjoy herself immensely!"

* * *

Sitting at the desk in his bedchamber, Nathan Raveneau lit a fresh candle with the nub of the old one and pushed it into the brass holder.