The Indian Maiden (2 page)

The horseman sighed. These young persons were the cream of society’s young eligibles, in the pink of health and blush of youth. Yet still, he thought, very much like the three old fates the ancients had said passed one eye around between them, this group would be lucky if they had the equiv
a
lent of one full brain to share among the lot of them.

But then, he shrugged to himself, they weren’t expected to invent new machines, write great works, or compose beautiful music. Their primary task was to attract a mate, and breed in the true line to carry on their noble names. And this, in all fairness, he had to admit, they could do, and were actually now in the process of doing. This little gathering was all in the nature of a rite to advance those worthy purposes, and he should not have expected to hear anything very much more profound than the excited babble and argument that now arose over what noxious dangers America possessed that England did not. Actually, he mused, the fact that the conversation had risen above neckcloths and frock lengths to attain such dizzying heights as the nature of poisonous reptiles was likely entirely to the unknown young American female’s credit. But if she were a guest here, that, he thought sadly, was likely all he could credit her with, no matter how he tried.

She’d spoken in the unmistakeable accents of her native land. That, and her remarkable face, of course, like the original sight of the entire party, had made him wish for more and feel this curious disappointment at finding two illusions unmasked within the same hour. Because if she were not a member of the idle nobility, then having been made welcome here, she was either related to one of them, or was herself extraordinarily wealthy. And that would make her a member of the newest aristocracy. That happy circumstance could buy her all the older class’s rights and privileges, only if, that was to say, she were fortunate enough to attract a true nobleman to help her spend all her money.

Undoubtedly, that was why the earl was here, as close to her as her elbow. It was well known that though his line was as long as his limbs, his fortune was thin as they were as well. And though his intellect ran deep, his pockets were shallow. He doubtless deserved it, but still, the rider thought, it must be a bitter thing to sell oneself to a ninny to save one’s heritage. But the earl was never a fool, and what’s a soul as weighted against a castle, two manor houses, and a hunting box? the observer mused, as he prepared to knee his mount to a walk. Then he had to leave off his reflections as the pitch of the discussion below intruded upon his thoughts.

“Nettles,” young Lord John Percy insisted, his face becoming even redder than his tight high shirt points could account for, “are very nasty. Why, on Oak Day in my home district, the boys fight with them, do you see, and anyone who gets swiped with one ends up with blisters for days.” He crossed his arms and glowered, daring anyone to gainsay him, as though he were feeling the sting of the nettles even now, upon this green and blameless shorn lawn.

“Weeks,” the young woman said flatly, unemotionally. And as young Percy turned to listen, she added, “The ivy has such a volatile poison within that merely breathing in its vicinity causes internal blisters that last for weeks. And it looks exactly like harmless ivy, the sort I see growing everywhere about here. There’s oak, too, that look like these we sit beneath only not quite so tall, that produces even larger lesions
...
that ooze.” She drew out the last word as though it were so delicious she could scarcely bear to let it leave her mouth.

As she prated on, about the snakes that pleased themselves by coiling around those deadly oak limbs, some that rattled a tune you had to dance to before they struck, and others that wrapped themselves around persons and promptly hauled them up, screeching, to the treetops, the group she addressed shrank back from her as though she could produce these horrors from a pocket in her skirts.

The young American gentleman, who stood as if on guard at the Incomparable Lady Mary’s side, bit his lip and gazed up at the trees as though he wished something, serpent or otherwise, would come and haul his compatriot up and away from the enthralled throng. And the earl stood back, eyes shining, and beamed upon the young woman as she happily launched into descriptions of other venomous attractions commonly found in American gardens. It was then that the rider knew that if he was the only one who could stop her narrative, he must, for her own sake.

He leaned far forward in his saddle to verify his impression. Yes. If at first he’d found her lovely, and at second look believed her as unexceptional as the rest of the company, this final close scrutiny confirmed what he’d suspected at last when he’d seen the earl’s reaction. For whatever his multiple sins, the earl was certainly no fool. The girl was in high spirits; she could scarcely conceal her amusement. She was enjoying herself profoundly by pulling the legs of the assorted company so far that in a moment, she’d have them all down flat on their rear ends, howling in distress—and then for her blood. There was the sum of it. And that was the danger in it, for it wouldn’t be mere sport in the end; in this company, as he well knew to his own sorrow, ridicule was a blood sport.

Clearly, she’d been bored with them, their amusements and their conversation. And so here she was entertaining herself by spoofing them. But as a stranger, she did not know, could not know, how they valued their self-esteem more highly than any Oriental potentates might or how very much they’d resent having been gulled, nor the extent and the nature of their revenge when they discovered the deception. Oh Methley knew, doubtless he knew, doubtless, the rider thought as he urged his mount forward, he knew to a fraction how easy it would be to woo even a very wealthy young woman who had no other friends, a young female no one else would deign even to speak to without scorn.

And so as a complex act of charity, with revenge and self-service intermixed with it, the rider on the creamy stallion burst from his place of concealment in the beech avenue and rode down the sloping lawns to spoil sport. Only to all the onlookers who immediately turned from the American storyteller to view the intruder, he looked more like a knight of old come to slay a few dragons in order to rescue the fair maiden than a fellow hell bent on silencing the damsel as soon as he could. But the simple fact of his sudden appearance turned the trick nicely before he even drew his mount to a stand several feet from the young lady. For she left off speaking and stared at him as though he were the most wondrous thing an English forest ever disgorged, nettles, dragons, and unicorns included.

There was nothing odd about her reaction, for after all, American or not, the chit had eyes. So all of the other young females, and quite a few of their seniors as well, responded when they saw him. It was not just the fact of his sudden appearance that thrilled them, it was he, himself. He might well have produced the same excitement in their ranks if rather than flying down the slope on a blooded stallion, he’d come strolling along, negligently, hands in pockets. His was that sort of presence.

He didn’t need the great steed to show off the long muscles in his legs nor close-fitting riding clothes to display the athlete’s torso which grew from trim hips to broader chest to broadest shoulders. Nor did he need his mount’s brushed light coat to point up the light golden tan that gilded his own smooth skin on the sensitive hands that held the reins, or on the strong-featured face which smiled reassurance at his startled hostess. Nor did he even require the steed to nudge the errant memories of some of the gentlemen to make them remember their long neglected, gladly forgotten classics lessons and suddenly think, “Centaur!” when he bowed his tousled, tawny head in greeting.

The hair was overlong and thick, and streaked blond and baize and all the several colors that the sun will turn a thatch the color of taffy to begin with when it is left to have its way by constant exposure. And when the dutifully bent head lifted, it was a pair of long hazel eyes which looked out at his impromptu audience, and beneath the long straight nose the mobile lips parted to show a flash of strong white teeth again before the cool voice said evenly, “My lady, greetings. I was visiting with your father and, having missed seeing you at home, I am, you may imagine, delighted to find you here. I cannot believe my good fortune,” he added, when it seemed that his unknowing hostess could not reply at once.

The Lady Mary might be forgiven for coming to a stand and remaining at one as her company recovered themselves and pressed forward, eager, in some cases avid, for an introduction. Barnabas Stratton, Lord Deal, might be a neighbor, she might have seen him, or more honestly speaking, looked to see him, many a dozen times along the local roads, but he’d never been delighted to see her, nor missed not seeing her, nor considered it good, bad, or even indifferent fortune to see her, so far as she knew. He was, as everyone knew, almost a social recluse. But now he was here, and Lady Mary had had an excellent upbringing, and besides, everyone was staring at her now. So she swallowed down her fear of his mockery and her surprise at his arrival, and doing homage to generations of British governesses, curtsied and then quietly and without one slip introduced him to her party.

“
...
and this,” she concluded, several moments later, having come full circle, “is Miss Faith Hamilton, who is visiting with us from America, and this, as I am sure you know, is Robert Craig, Earl of Methley. Lord Deal,” she breathed at last as she finished up.

“Yes, of course, we’ve known each other forever,” the earl said pleasantly, though his eyes remained cool.

“Servant, Methley,” Lord Deal replied quietly, giving the tall gentleman a level look.

“I could not help but overhear your somewhat spirited debate as I approached,” Lord Deal turned and said at once to the entire company, “and
I
couldn’t fail to be impressed at how all you fellows tried to paint this green and pleasant isle as a jungle, even as Miss Hamilton made surviving in her country for over a day seem an incredible feat.”

The assembled young people began to relax. The gentlemen, seeing the absurdity of their position and moreover feeling fractionally better because the new arrival made the American girl’s boasts seem as foolish as their own so that they knew there could be no winner or loser in the dispute, could now begin to chuckle. The ladies cheered up enormously. Just knowing, one of the Washburn twins whispered to the other contentedly, that there weren’t really such ghastly things afoot in the world was a very great relief. The other young American, whom Lady Mary had introduced as a Mr. Will Rossiter, seemed relieved as well. But the earl wore a thoughtful expression, and a quick glance over to Miss Hamilton made Lord Deal wince. Some of her wilder countrymen, he remembered learning, committed massacres when they looked as she did now.

“I understand,” he said quickly, “that the fact that you were planning to go through the wood to the lake precipitated the discussion. And as I rode over from that direction this morning,” he lied, “I can tell you it’s a very good idea, since there was a cool breeze blowing there that was very refreshing. I tell you what,” he said with great false spontaneity, “since Miss Hamilton, as a newcomer, quite reasonably has some trepidation about our English woods, I’ll take her on my horse, and then we’ll all meet there, that is,” he bowed to the chaperones who stood at the outskirts of the ring around him after they’d come down the hill to be introduced, “if it is quite all right with you ladies.”

It was clear to Miss Hamilton that the chaperones would have considered it quite all right if he’d requested permission to remove her head. And when he put out his hand to her, and Will faithlessly came to her side and cupped his hands to give her a lift up to the saddle, she was very tempted to invent an instant fear of horses. But she did want to ride on this visit, and she didn’t want to give this fellow Lord Deal, who was already wearing an irritatingly challenging smile, any further reason to belittle her. So she turned and gave the earl a helpless lift of her shoulders, and he returned the smallest lilt of his dark brows to show he understood, and she found herself raised up until she sat before the new arrival on his magnificent horse.

It was not until they’d pointed out the path to the others and then paced on ahead down the pine-needle-covered narrow track, that he spoke to her.

“You see,” he breathed, and no matter how she held herself upright there was no getting away from the fact that they were so close she could hear his faintest exhalation and she even fancied she could feel the glow of his body warmth behind her as palpably as a touch, “no snakes twined about the trees, not a bird of prey gorging on unwary travelers. Mind, there’s a man-eating rabbit lurking in the rhododendrons, but don’t stare or he’ll give himself airs.”

“Why,” she asked, still staring straight ahead at the tunnel of pines they were passing through, “are they allowing you to ride off with me, alone? I’d thought that wasn’t done.”

“True, they’d never let me so close to a well-brought-up female unattended if we were on the ground, or on any other piece of furniture for that matter, except a saddle. We’re great equestrians, we English, but there are some things even we don’t do on horseback. Don’t worry,” he said all at once, quite seriously, seeing how stiffly she held her slender back, how high her head,
“
it’s not because they think an American girl isn’t worth protecting. It’s only because a great many things that are unthinkable any other time are quite permissible in summer. It’s such a brief, rare time. We relax then, you see. Why,” he asked calmly in turn when she made no comment, “did you tell them all that nonsense back there?”

“Oh,” she said, beginning to think that the strangest thing about the conversation was not that it was being held with someone behind her back, but that she was losing her anger at his interruption of her fun and chatting with a stranger as though he were a long-time acquaintance, but it was easy, and she saw no harm in it, “I don’t know, they were talking such claptrap. All they were doing was flirting and teasing and maneuvering for attention. The ladies were only interested in fixing the gentlemen’s interest, or posing for them, and all the gentlemen were doing the same. I became bored, I suppose.”

“You’re not interested in finding a husband then?” Lord Deal asked with some amusement, remembering the earl’s long measuring look as he’d watched them out of sight.

“No,” she said at once, turning so that he could at last look directly into her smoldering gray eyes, “for I haven’t lost one, you see.”

Oh lord no, he thought merrily, even as he threw his head back in delighted laughter, he’d been entirely right, the earl certainly was no fool.