The Peculiar Pink Toes of Lady Flora Page 4

  "The next time you seek a wife, your grace, I suggest you do not batter her over the head with your disdain and arrogance. I would particularly advise against having her list of calamitous faults read aloud by your solicitor. With meat in his hair."

  "Meat?"

  "I suppose, working for you, he's a nervous eater. And a drinker. The poor man is much put-upon and probably as terrified of you as everybody else in this place. But who am I to judge, being so wretched a creature myself, and one whose only redeeming feature are her bubbies?"

  "You were not supposed to see that list yourself."

  "Did you think it less insulting if it be read to me?"

  He brushed one stiff hand across his mouth impatiently, turned his back to the library, and then, in a low voice, trembling with restrained anger, replied, "You, madam, are the first to assure the world of each and every one of your defiant, rebellious and havoc-causing antics — polishing and showing them off like trophies. Your reputation preceded you—" He pressed his lips shut in a hard line and glowered down at her, both hands behind his back again. Finally, his breath regained, he added in a calmer tone, "And now I shall give you counsel. Might I suggest that in future you restrain the urge to insult a man when he not only feels capable of tolerating your mistakes, but has the patience to let you live in great comfort under his roof and his protection, while you grow out of this childish phase. You are in the right, madam, for you are too young for me. Completely lacking in sense and good judgment."

  "Goodness, imagine me being in the right about anything."

  "Even a stopped clock is right twice a day."

  Oh, now she was annoyed again and she had almost started to like him. "You can stand before me like bull beef, scowling with all your might, Malgrave, you don't frighten me. Nor do I find you the least little bit inscrutable and enigmatic with your brooding stares and reluctance to say anything nice. Since we're being honest, you, sir, are an unmitigated bore, so stuffed full of your own importance I shall be surprised if you don't burst into a thousand little pieces one day. Well, not all over me you won't."

  "You have said sufficient, madam. I understand you find me a wretched fellow. As you remarked yourself— no need to batter me over the head with it."

  "I didn't say you were wretched." Now she felt flustered. With his guard down in anger he showed an unexpected vulnerability. She wished she hadn't noticed, but there it was.

  The sudden deepening intensity of balsam scent told her that his temperature was up too, even if he controlled his tone and did not get all red-faced and ugly, as she undoubtedly had.

  "It is possible to like a person, despite their faults," she said. "None of us can rightfully claim perfection. Those that do, tend to be the biggest scoundrels and mountebanks, sir."

  "Is that so?" he muttered tightly.

  "You and I might have been friends, in fact, but I daresay your pride won't allow that now. Pity, since I would have been a better friend than any of those pick-thanks and lick-spittles in there—" she pointed over his shoulder, "—who will never show you their true feelings, nor challenge you with an honest opinion."

  Great Aunt Bridget's shrill voice could suddenly be heard calling for her with an eagerness that bordered on desperation. The ancient floorboards rattled against their joists as that lady's rapid footsteps marched steadily closer, just short of breaking into a canter.

  "Oh! She must have found Plumm in his deflated state and immediately assumed that I am responsible in some way for bursting him." She sincerely hoped the solicitor, in a weak moment, had not given her aunt any hint of his master's intention.

  "Aren't you responsible?" the duke replied, looking, for the first time, somewhat amused. "Aren't you always to blame?"

  "Excuse me, your grace. Although I would like to debate the matter of your unjust accusations further, circumstances impel me to cut short our discussion and make a hasty exit. Perhaps another time."

  His lips twitched and his eyes warmed just a little. "Yes. Another time." Then he gave a quick, stiff bow, as if jerked into it by somebody tugging on his strings to remind him. "I shall forward the bill for all the things you've broken over the past day and a half, madam. Including my solicitor."

  "Please do." She bit her lip. "Although I haven't any money of my own and shall have to beg for it."

  "Should have thought of that before you went about the place, wrecking things." His gaze fixed upon some point at the side of her neck, but a quick check with her fingers discovered only a curl — fortunately not a scrap of ham. "And moving the fourth duke's porcelain figurines into compromising positions," he added gruffly, "which cause us to wonder where the virtuous young Lady Flora gets her ideas."

  What could she say to that? She had no inkling where her thoughts came from either. It was, however, necessary to defend herself. "You say the word virtuous as if you have cause to doubt it, your grace. Greater cause than a few re-arranged china people. It is not polite to listen to rumors about a lady, you know. Didn't they teach you that in all your ducal training?"

  "There are, it would seem, many things I was not taught." His words came out under duress between his teeth, like puffs of steam escaping a spout. "There was, in fact, nothing about you in my education. Clearly an oversight."

  She shrugged. "I suppose you were kept apart from common folk and your lessons were very drear, all theory. But why take your instruction solely from books? A person should find a path on their own, live life for themselves. Get a little dirty."

  "Dirty?" One hand paused in the gesture of patting down his neatly combed hair as he glanced back over his shoulder. Perhaps he'd never heard the word before.

  "One ought to wander off the path and experience new things. How can you enjoy a full life if you have felt only one emotion, tasted only one wine, worn only one style of waistcoat? If you have always been saved from mistakes," she added with dramatic fervor, "and never run barefoot through damp grass, you cannot know the true joys of living, for there cannot be mountains without shade; ups without downs; achievements without failures. You should not have to sail a course already chartered. Where is the thrilling adventure in that?"

  He remained unmoved. "Without following a map one increases the probability of error. You can afford to do that, madam. I cannot."

  "Really? But you were willing to take a chance on me. That was surely a greater dare than most men would venture." She laughed softly. "I do not believe I am charted on any map drawn by your forebears."

  His eyes narrowed as he looked down at her, brow vexed. "But you are drawn there now, Lady Flora, on my map," he said, his voice deep and low, striking a sudden, unexpected blow to her heart. "It seems I put you there and have, alas, only myself to blame."

  Oh, why did he have to say that, and in such a strange, sad tone?

  What would it be like to marry such a man? The thought fluttered through her mind. Many would envy her. As the Duchess of Malgrave she would never be short of coin and pretty things.

  But no, it would not be fair to him, for he believed her to be something that she was not and, despite his awkwardness and an abrupt manner, he was not a bad person. Just a very dull one with a superior opinion of himself. He ought to learn how to love, and be loved in return, by somebody better suited to his world.

  The Duke of Malgrave was far too grand and pompous for Rosie Jackanapes. He wanted to marry her despite his admitted disapproval of almost everything about her, but how long would that last before he grew weary of the challenge he'd set for himself?

  Besides, she valued her liberty beyond riches and, as she had said to him, she was too young, not ready for marriage.

  He still stared at her and now his lips parted slowly as if they had something very awful to say, the words heavy, causing him pain. And she had better not let him say it, or her resolve just might waver irretrievably. Very slightly he bent toward her and she felt a startled sigh lifting her reluctantly on tip toe. His eyes had darkened again, the grey and green shades deepeni
ng like the early descent of dusk creeping through a forest, and although his eyelids had lowered, she knew his gaze had fallen to her lips. She felt it there, like the pressure before a storm.

  At such a moment any masquerading villainess worth her salt knew the best reaction was a corked tongue and a swift exit.

  In a manner later described by witnesses as "graceless hoofing", she lifted her skirt and ran for the glass-paneled doors at the far end of the hall, to freedom and fresh air for as long as it might be enjoyed.

  He never did send her a bill, which was just as well as it would simply have been added to the stack that Great Aunt Bridget artfully ignored as she scrabbled and connived her way through a life she could no longer afford.

  * * * *

  "Of course, he approaches marriage as a duty to be dispensed," Flora wrote in her diary the following evening, practicing her handwriting as instructed. "It does not matter how little he feels for his bride, how little he admires in her, as long as she can provide the requisite, healthy heir. For a man like Malgrave, the marriage bed is a business arrangement— cold, comfortable only for brief visits, and not meant to be fun, but convenient, necessary and, if well maintained, functional. Like the nearest outside privy in a drafty winter.

  Lady Flora, on the other hand, longs for passion with generous helpings of stolen kisses, palpitations and perspiration; a desperate, dangerous love affair that thrills her as much as balancing barefoot along the parapet of a bridge; the sort of love that cannot be negotiated and bound by contracts."

  The stern Duke of Malgrave, she knew the moment they met, could not give Lady Flora that. They were entirely wrong for each other.

  She knew it with all the experience and romantic, fervent enthusiasm of her seventeen mighty and fearless years.

  Although she frequently felt considerably older. And for that she had no explanation either.

  "Yes. Another time," he'd said, having no idea what would come to pass, or what already had. Up until then, of course, his life was linear and well regulated. Unlike hers.

  Chapter Five

  Twelve weeks before. Or something like.

  "Make haste, Rosie Jackanapes. Come inside directly and tidy yourself, for we have guests."

  Our heroine, at that time having no suspicion of her importance in anybody's story— not even her own— had been wandering through the garden, humming softly to herself and so far away in her thoughts that she had not noticed the fog descending on what was previously a crisp, clear winter morning. Suddenly she could barely see her hands in front of her face and had to be guided through the thick cloud by the sound of that voice calling her name.

  For just a moment she felt panic. Unable to recall what she was doing out there in the garden, she stared into the greyish vapor and struggled to breathe. An odd clamminess sank into her skin, she felt light-headed and her pulse thumped a faster, more erratic rhythm. She'd never experienced such a deep fog. Now she must rely on senses other than sight to find her way back.

  Her bare feet tripped uncertainly along the path, and she reached forward with both arms like a blind man, feeling for signs of other life.

  At last.

  An elderly lady in a lace cap opened the door to her frantic knock."There you are! Where have you been?"

  "Out walking."

  "In this fog?"

  "It was pleasant weather when I left. I think." Reassured by the other woman's warm, soft hands squeezing gently around her fingers, tugging her over the threshold, she offered a breathless explanation. "For a moment I...couldn't find my way. I thought everything in the world had disappeared. It gave me quite a fright to find myself lost, even on a familiar walk."

  "But Rosie, look at your feet! Barefoot in winter? What could you be thinking?"

  She looked down at her toes, pink with cold and damp from the wet grass. Where were her shoes and stockings?

  The other woman closed the front door, shutting out those curls of menacing fog before they could follow the wanderer inside. "For pity's sake! Run into the scullery and dry your feet. There are some clean stockings hanging by the kitchen fire. Take off your apron, tidy your hair and put on some shoes before you meet our guests."

  This list of instructions was as comforting as the old lady's hands. It brought direction to her mind and purpose to what had begun to feel like chaos.

  The phrase "Dragged through a hedge backwards" came to her thoughts. Yes, she must look a sight after what she'd just been through. Whatever it was.

  In the kitchen she quickly checked her distorted reflection in the tea kettle— yes, it was her uninteresting face, although why she expected another was a mystery— and tied her hair with a velvet ribbon she found in her apron pocket.

  "Bring with you a bottle of my raspberry and dandelion wine, Rosie dear."

  The pantry was a long, narrow, dark, windowless room. She took a candle to find her way down the step and illuminate the two dozen or so bottles of homemade wine, all neatly marked with labels, lined up along the shelf. Goody Applegate's Gooseberry and Plum; Goody Applegate's Best Parsnip and Peapod; Goody Applegate's Cowslip and Comfrey. Each label was decorated with a tiny watercolor painting of whatever taste the title promised. Each one unique.

  She sorted through them to find the required bottle, her fingers caressing the labels, lovingly revisiting each illustration, over which great time and care had once been devoted. Just to make the bottle pretty. Not many folk bothered any more with the little details, she mused sadly. No machine, however advanced, could replicate something so personal and meaningful. Something made with love from the heart.

  But as soon as she had the thought it was gone. Vanished like smoke from a chimney.

  Now she was peaceful again, her pulse steady.

  Rosie loved the tranquility of the dark pantry. Standing here, all was silent and still, her soft breath the only draft to tickle the candle's flame. Here she felt not only calm, but rejuvenated. Slowly she counted the bottles. There were fewer than she remembered. They must make more in the summer.

  The wine was made from fruit, flowers and herbs, all grown in the south facing garden behind the house. Currently, of course, the plants hibernated, preparing for the first break of bud in spring, the first cluster of blossom. But that change would come; transformation was the essence of life.

  Oh, that was a profound thought for a— she glanced at the almanac left open on the kitchen table— Tuesday. Was it Tuesday? She'd thought it was Friday. Dunderhead!

  When she finally stepped into the parlor some minutes later, balancing the wine on a tray with some glasses, a very grand couple sat waiting impatiently for her. They both wore cascades of thickly perfumed, frilly silk and impractical, embroidered shoes with gleaming brass buckles. The towering grey wigs they carried atop their proud heads made them seem like giants in a strange fairytale, or characters in an opera— too outrageous to be real. Rosie had never seen anything quite like it. At least, she didn't think she had. At present she suffered the most dreadful sore head that made her confused, unsteady. Perhaps she had caught a chill from being outdoors barefoot.

  The guests were politely offered glasses of Goody Applegate's Raspberry and Dandelion Delight, but that treat, regarded warily, was left untouched.

  "So this is she," said the stiffly-posed, highly-decorated woman. "The girl has a remarkable Chelmsworth resemblance, especially with all that red hair. Don't stare with your mouth agape, girl. In polite society one breathes through one's nose, not one's mouth. That is the purpose of nostrils."

  Rosie quickly shut her lips.

  "At least she is obedient. Thank heaven." The first of that lady's many, optimistic misconceptions. "She is seventeen, is she not?"

  "Thereabouts, your ladyship."

  "Yes, I believe she will do very well." The woman nudged her companion, and he made an attempt to sit up, but even his eyelids appeared exhausted by the slightest effort.

  Underneath all the frills and bows, he was a wizened, hunched gentleman
with yellow eyes, blue-veined cheeks and a mottled nose that was neither improved nor disguised by a layer of thick powder and a scattering of "beauty" spots. Although complaining of a fierce draft upon his neck, this gentleman also found the heat of the fire too much against his face. He whined of a dry throat, but refused the offer of refreshment. Even when given the best chair in the room, he found it "damnably uncomfortable" and then, with his tall, careless shoe heel, tore a hole in the tapestry cover of Goody Applegate's favorite foot stool. And made no apology.

  In this way he had quickly proven himself to be what Rosie called a "Smelfungus", one who could find nothing that pleased and imagined himself a witty critic. He apparently knew more and could do better than anybody, although there was no evidence to prove him capable of doing anything except lift his limp eyelids and move his lips very slightly. His lady companion was, by turns, wearily tolerant and uncomfortably embarrassed by his comments. She was certainly not so amused by him as he was by himself, but he was apparently an irritant that must be borne.

  Now, having cast his sour gaze around the room and muttered about "provincial coarseness" he finally turned his appraisal to Rosie.

  "Is there something wrong with her?" he grumbled. "Are her wits intact? She looks as if she's wandered on stage for the second act of a play and has yet to learn her lines."

  "Her guardian assures us the girl is in good health," the woman muttered, directing a hard glare at her companion without moving her proud, and probably heavy head. "We have no cause to distrust her assessment."

  "As long as the wench is not addled. She is, of course, a country yokel. No fashion. No delicacy or prettiness. We have our work cut out for us. Where does one find such an appalling garment? Dredged up from the local duck pond, perchance?"