“Something I ate didn’t agree with me,” Ashmont said. “Sick all night, or I would have come, dash it.”
“Something you drank, most likely,” Lady Charles said crisply. “A fine start to wedded bliss this is. I had hoped that even you could get married without making a muddle of it. And to such an admirable girl, too.”
“I know she’s admirable,” Ashmont said. “Saw it at once. Wondered why I didn’t see it before. But wasn’t thinking of marrying before, you see.”
“Had you made your feelings clearer to her, she might not have run away,” her ladyship said.
Ashmont frowned. “Yes. Didn’t woo hard enough. So everybody tells me. But I did, you know. Told her all about the library, like Unc—that is, as I knew I ought—and she seemed pleased.”
“We’re not sure she did run, exactly,” Blackwood said. “We suspect it was Ripley’s joke.”
“Do you, indeed?” said Lady Charles. “It puzzles me why a clever girl like Olympia would have gone along with him.”
“That’s what her brother said.”
“Regardless of her motives, your behavior has not been calculated to please,” said her ladyship. “You were too busy fighting and drinking yourself sick to hurry after her and coax her back.”
“Extenuating circumstances,” Blackwood said.
Lady Charles’s expression chilled a degree further. “I shall not attempt to imagine what they were. I shall merely tell you that, in her place, I should have been greatly disappointed in my suitor.” She made a dismissive gesture. “Go to London. But do not be amazed if she tells you to look elsewhere for a duchess. Perhaps that’s for the best.”
“I won’t look elsewhere!” Ashmont said. “Whatever’s wrong, I’ll mend it. I said I’d marry her and I meant it. And I will. And Ripley may kiss my—my aunt.”
He made an angry bow and started away.
But he paused, and must have thought better of his behavior, because he turned back, looking sheepish. “Beg your pardon, Lady Charles. Please forgive me. That was . . . Didn’t mean to . . . Well, you know. Feelings.” He gave her his most angelic smile.
“I recommend you learn how to express your feelings in a more intelligent and agreeable manner,” she said. “Because if you don’t look out, someone who can do that will steal her away. If that happens, you won’t get her back.”
“Yes, Lady Charles. I’ll do better from now on.”
He took a proper leave of her this time, and walked to the door.
Blackwood started to follow, then paused and said, “And Alice, by the way? Is she about?”
“Oh, Ripley, what have you done?”
A brown, hairy face loomed over Ripley’s and a gigantic tongue approached. “Get off!” he pushed the dog away.
Ripley’s ears rang. His foot was demanding to be amputated. Rain dripped from the trees onto his face.
Lady Olympia sank to her knees beside him. Her lips were swollen and her hat and spectacles were crooked.
I hate me, he thought.
“Dash it, Olympia! Don’t kneel in the wet!”
“What about you?” she said. “It’ll be a miracle if you haven’t broken something.”
“Nothing’s broken,” he said. “I’m not made of glass. I’m not delicate, plague take it.” He raised himself onto his elbows. “Stop coddling me. You ought to punch me in the face. Do you see? Do you see what happens? This is why it’s against the rules for unmarried ladies to be alone with men. We can’t be trusted. Most of us, we get near an attractive female, and our minds fall straight into the gutter.”
She sat back on her haunches. She adjusted her spectacles.
“Attractive?” she said. “Are you serious?”
Olympia’s heart, which had not stopped pounding, now beat harder.
She still hadn’t recovered from the kiss. She wasn’t sure she’d ever recover. She didn’t know a kiss could be like that. She wasn’t sure kiss was the correct word.
Then he’d taken a fit. And then . . . Attractive, he’d said. Meaning her.
“I told you last night,” he said. “Pretty and shapely. Did you forget?”
“No.” How could she? “But you’re a rake, and rakes are undiscriminating.”
“When I’m drunk, maybe I’m less discriminating,” he said. “I’m not drunk now, though I wish I were.”
“I’m pedantic and boring,” she said. “And I wear spectacles.”
“Do you think that makes the least difference to a man?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe in a crowded ballroom,” he said. “But when one is alone with a shapely, pretty girl, one doesn’t care about her spectacles—or anything else she’s wearing.” He tried to get up. Wincing, he raised himself to a sitting position. And swore.
She put her hand on his shoulder. “Stay,” she said. “Let me get a servant to help you. It’ll be easier on your foot.”
He looked blank. “Servant,” he said.
“I realize my behavior yesterday might lead a person to believe I’m a henwit,” she said. “However, in the normal course of events, I am practical and sensible to a fault. I did not come to your rescue unaccompanied. I’ve brought the coachman, John, and the footman Tom, and we’ve come in your aunt’s landau.”
“Good of you,” he said. “More comfortable traveling to London in the carriage.”
“I daresay, but not today,” she said.
“Olympia, I have to get to London.”
“So you’ve said, more than once,” she said. “Let’s stop and think, shall we? Let’s look at this in a logical manner.”
He lay back, letting his bare head fall on the wet leaves and moss and whatever insects were making their way through the woodland debris. He gazed up through the trees at the gloomy heavens. Then he turned his green gaze to her. “Yes, let’s,” he said.
“It’s more than twenty miles to London,” she said. “Camberley Place lies scarcely a third of that distance from here. From where you lie, do the skies look promising of anything but more rain? In the circumstances, do you not agree that the practical thing to do is to return to Lady Charles, rest for a day or two, then go to London? In a carriage.”
He closed his eyes for a long moment. Then, “Right.” He sat up. “Mind ran amok for a moment. But of course. Obvious. I can hardly take the carriage and leave you here. Very well. Get Tom.” He grimaced. “You ought to have brought him with you in the first place.”
“I was trying to keep up with Cato,” she said. “I wasn’t thinking about the servants.”
“Not thinking,” he said. “Lot of that going about. Ashmont shouldn’t have let you out of his sight for a moment. Asking for trouble. And surprise, surprise. Here we are.”
“I don’t understand,” she said.
“He’s my friend,” he said.
It dawned on her at last, as it should have done moments ago, that his post-kiss frenzy was all about male honor. A gentleman, even one of Their Dis-Graces, didn’t poach on his friend’s preserve. Women were property, and in the eyes of the world she still belonged to Ashmont.