Fifteen

George dressed slowly, letting his valet fuss over the minor details. He used that time to strengthen his resolve and drink another cup of black coffee. Until the first fingers of dawn, he had tossed and turned in his bed. Several women in his past had stripped him of his clothes and made love to his naked body, but Lilith stripped him bare in a way no other woman had. She ripped his skin off, exposing his beating heart, and released a host of demons. Long-forgotten memories came howling back to George in the darkness. His fingers itched with restlessness to do something, anything to get out the emotion that was burning inside him. When merciful sleep finally came Lilith returned to him in his dreams, whispering and giving him soft kisses on his mouth and other parts of his body. Suffice to say, a man over thirty shouldn’t wake up alone in a bed with sticky sheets.

As he strolled down to breakfast, he was like Admiral Nelson sailing into the Battle of Trafalgar, refusing to go below deck even as the bullets were flying around him.

The dining room was humming with guests. He located the women in his life: his mother beaming majestically over her steaming tea, Penelope appearing pale and traumatized over her uneaten toast, and Beatrice discreetly removing an insect from the flower bouquet. But Lilith was missing.

He had a twinge of dread mixed with sadness at her absence. After he made the obligatory greetings to guests—“Jolly good morning,” “I hope you slept well,” “I assure you that we do not have mites in our sheets, Lord Harrowsby”—he turned to Beatrice and made a show of asking her a question. “My lovely Miss Maryle, what lively entertainment do we have for our lady guests this morning?”

Beatrice didn’t hear, but was entranced by the green metallic bug circling her palm.

His mother cleared her throat. “Beatrice, my darling.”

She jumped. “Yes! What can I do?”

George politely repeated himself.

“Oh!” Beatrice cried. She yanked out her tiny notebook and began to hurriedly read what sounded like a dictation from his mother: “In the morning, the young ladies can tromp down to the ruins, and once they tire of those dull, soggy things, they can see if there is anything tolerable in the village shops. Meanwhile, the matrons can lounge about eyeballing each other’s fashion choices and gossiping in the morning parlor, while the gentlemen smoke, play billiards, and try to get those appalling Whigs to see the light of reason.”

George locked his face in its polite expression.

Lady Marylewick forced a laugh. “How funny, you are so perfectly, darlingly droll, my little Beatrice.”

Beatrice flushed bright red, suddenly realizing what she had read.

“By Jove, why, I can’t think of a morning better spent than trying to see the light of reason,” quipped Lord Charles. “I certainly hope Lord Marylewick can succeed where all those dons with their talk of Aristotle and Descartes failed.”

“Miss Maryle inflates my ambitions,” said George through his clenched jaws. “I thought a simple game of billiards would be enjoyable.”

Before Lord Charles could make another clever rejoinder, Lilith burst into the room, clad in vivid blue and white stripes and hoisting a great roll of papers. Her vibrant beauty obliterated his train of thought.

“Isn’t the morning glorious?” she cried. “I feel inspired. Look at the light. It’s as if God is calling out, ‘What a lovely day it is to sketch the ruins.’” She whirled on her toes, holding her roll like a dancing partner. Why did she whirl every morning? “I have brought enough paper and pencils for everyone.”

He was ready to throttle her after he recovered from the quaver caused by the mischievous glance she flashed him. Her ruse was as thin as gossamer. Now she was on a campaign to make him draw.

“I’m afraid only the ladies will be joining you,” he said in dampening tones.

“What?” Lilith was visibly crestfallen. “Mr. Fitzgerald, Lord Charles, you are not going? But what will happen if we are attacked by rabid sheep or…or a band of marauding art thieves?”

“My footmen have been specially trained for dealing with rabid sheep and art thieves,” replied George.

“Deuce take it, Lord Marylewick,” said Charles. “I couldn’t let one of your footmen be the hero of the day. You know this county is teeming with art thieves and vicious sheep. Ladies, I shall be your protector. What do you say, Mr. Fitzgerald, care to be chivalrous this morning?”

“I do indeed,” he replied.

Several of the other young gentlemen echoed this sentiment, as did Lord Fenmore.

The duke decided the matter. “Let the feeble old men play billiards. A fine day should be enjoyed by the young. Run along, Lord Marylewick.”

George chafed at being told he should run along. Nonetheless, an hour later, he was running along the path to the ruins with his cane spiking the ground. Lady Cornelia and Miss Pomfret hovered around him, while Beatrice dawdled behind, lost in her own world. A retinue of servants carrying paper, easels, pencils, and jars of lemonade marched after the group of guests.

Lilith ambled gaily beside Lord Charles.

“Isn’t it a lovely day?” she said, looking quite stunning amid the lush grass and pale sky. “I feel as though I’ve walked into a Claude Monet or Pierre-Auguste Renoir.”

“Who is she talking about?” whispered Lady Cornelia.

“Inmates at Bedlam,” he quipped, and then quickly amended, because Cornelia was an innocent civilian in his fight with Lilith, “I believe some people consider them to be artists.”

“To capture such radiance!” Lilith carried on.

“My soul is enraptured,” bellowed Lord Charles, matching Lilith’s jubilance.

“As is mine,” she cried.

“Mine’s feeling right jolly,” added Fenmore.

Lilith tossed her head, her curls flapping under the brim of her floppy straw bonnet. “What about you, Lord Marylewick? Is your soul not enraptured, enchanted, or in Lord Fenmore’s poetic description, ‘right jolly’?”

“Do you even have a soul, old boy?” queried Charles.

“But everyone has a soul,” Lady Cornelia pointed out with puppylike eyes. Clearly she had never experienced a dark night in hers. No battles raged in its shallow depths.

“My soul is rather stoic,” replied George. “It never does anything as vulgar as become enraptured.”

It disturbed George how much Lilith’s honest giggle lifted his spirits. Turn back again, fair lady, let me see that wide grin below the brim of your bonnet. Can you make that errant curl lift in the wind again and blow under your eye?

“Well, my soul is quite vulgar,” Lilith said. “It positively dances in delight. Like a whirling dervish.” Of course she had to whirl to illustrate. Every gentleman turned to witness the spectacle, each receiving a good eyeful of her trim ankles and shapely calves.

Lady Cornelia’s shriek halted the dance. “Get it off me!” she screamed. “Get it off!” She hopped about, brushing at her shoulder.

“No!” cried Beatrice. “It’s a marsh grasshopper. It won’t hurt you.”

Something large and green and red leapt into the air, only to be swatted by Cornelia’s flailing arm. The great insect fell to the ground.

Beatrice gasped and hurried to the massive grasshopper bumping about the ground. “No, its leg is injured.” Beatrice’s chin trembled. She resembled the small child George had held after her father died. “Why did you hurt it?” she demanded of Cornelia. “It had done nothing to you. Now it might die.”

“It’s ugly!” Cornelia cried.

Lilith knelt beside Beatrice. She removed her bonnet and gently picked up the struggling grasshopper. She nestled it inside the bonnet, closed the brim around it, and tied it shut. “Perhaps you can help it,” Lilith said, handing Beatrice the bonnet. “You are so smart about everything.”

George watched Beatrice looking at Lilith, but he couldn’t tell what Beatrice was thinking. He doubted anyone was capable of knowing her brilliant thoughts, but he believed he discerned a bit of awe.

“Thank you,” Beatrice told her sister quietly, gathering up the bonnet. “Thank you.”

* * *

The guests sat in clusters on a small hill rising before the cathedral ruins. Lilith struggled to keep up her cheery facade as she found herself having to share a blanket and canvas with Lord Charles and Lord Fenmore, who sat so close her legs and shoulders touched theirs. Her eyes continually strayed to George.

He stood beside Lady Cornelia, studying her adequate composition, and paying trite, polite compliments, which caused the young lady to blush.

Lilith viscerally hated the kind Cornelia. Oh, jealousy was a vile beast.

Would Cornelia be a complacent wife in bed? Would she tempt George? Would she drive him to wild passion? Would she hold him as tenderly as Lilith had? Would she even care to discover the true man beneath the title?

Pick up the pencil, George, Lilith thought, as if by sheer force of her mental powers she could influence his actions. Draw. Free the winged Fancy.

“I adore your addition of the rainbow,” said Charles of their mutual sketch, breaking Lilith’s concentration. “It really draws the eye.”

She turned to her sad rendering. She was a good deal better at drawing than singing, but by no means a great talent. She was proficient enough to appreciate the brilliance of other natural artists like George.

“That’s not a rainbow,” she said. “That’s the arch of the nave. Or rather it’s my impression of the arch as it gleams in the sunlight. To the untrained eye it is a mere rainbow.”

“You are a radical. Let me add some symbolism to our masterpiece.” In a wild stroke, Charles made what appeared to be a bird atop her rainbow arch. “This dove is me, singing of the lovely, angelic Lilith.”

George glanced over with an arched, disapproving brow. Lilith’s heart lifted just from receiving his attention, even if it was in censure.

“This fuzzy blob down here will be me,” Lilith said, milking that attention. “It’s a chicken pecking about the ground.” She had hoped to make George chuckle or even smirk. When he didn’t, she asked, “What about you, Lord Marylewick, perhaps you could add your symbolism to our sketch or Lady Cornelia’s.”

“Please do,” gushed Cornelia. “I will always treasure it then.”

“A miniature copy of your bill in the sketch, perhaps?” Charles suggested. “I might be keener on it if it were presented artistically. You know, touched my aesthetic sensibilities.”

“Because heaven forbid you should use your reason or intellect!” George snapped.

Even over the breeze, Lilith could hear the swish of collars and hats as heads turned toward George. The edges of his eyes tensed, a wince of sorts. She could tell he regretted his hasty words—a tiny chink in the self-control he prided himself on.

George muttered something about seeing to the servants and strode away.

“Did I do something wrong?” Lady Cornelia cried to Lilith and Charles. “Did I upset him?”

“No, I ruffled the old boy again,” said Lord Charles. “Nothing to worry about. ’Twas a daily occurrence at Eton. He never could take a joke, but he’ll be back in spirit soon enough.”

Lilith wanted to run after George and embrace him behind some concealing bush. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t allow herself to get any more attached.

“Go to him, Lady Cornelia,” Lilith advised. Her heart hurt as she watched the other woman hurry off to comfort the man Lilith wanted to hold so desperately.

“I say, Lord Fenmore,” Lord Charles said. “Why do those ladies near Beatrice keep eying you? They’ve been doing it since we’ve been sitting here. Do you think they want something?”

Fenmore glanced over at the attractive women. “By Jove, I should ask.”

“Yes, do be their humble servant and what,” said Charles. He waited until the man had sauntered away and then turned to Lilith. “Fenmore and Marylewick gone. I say, fine work on my part. Now we may enjoy ourselves properly.”

She leaned closer to Charles as if to speak in confidence. “You know Lord Marylewick drives me to distraction. Tell me how you teased him at school. In detail. Please.” Lilith wanted to hear the damage done to George from Lord Charles’s own mouth.

A slow smiled snaked over his lips and then he gazed off, as if remembering some dear nostalgic memory. “It was a game of how far we could push him. But we had to be careful, because he was a marquess’s son.”

Charles told of the cruel pranks he and his friends played upon George, who desperately had wanted friends and to fit in with his classmates. She listened with a rigid smile pinned on her face as her stomach turned. She had experienced the viciousness of other children in her boarding school years, but none to the degree that it had been perpetrated upon George. Charles had made the sensitive boy’s daily existence a hell. Charles chuckled as he spoke, as if the horror he had inflicted was innocent play, no more than a skinned knee.

“For all our efforts, starchy George hasn’t change a bit,” Charles continued. “No one is a better Tory than Lord Marylewick. A true believer in the cause. He’ll do anything Disraeli asks no matter how he is treated. It’s the subject of every other Punch caricature, yet flustering, blustering George still can’t see the joke.”

Though the smile remained on her face, at that moment Lilith loathed Lord Charles. For all his fair looks and pretty words, he was a monster, like George’s father and his mother. So many tormentors of her beautiful George.

“Now, darling, you owe me for this little titillating game of truths,” he said. “There is much I want to say to you. Escape your many admirers and meet me in the gardens after tea.”

All she wanted to do was run as far away from him as she could. And the fastest way to escape was to consent. “Yes,” she said. “Of course. Now I must find my sister.”

Her legs shook as she stumbled toward Beatrice. Where was George? As much as she was jealous of Cornelia, Lilith hoped the lovely young lady was holding him, saying kind things.

Beatrice sat just outside the cluster of ladies whom Fenmore was pestering with his boorish flirtations. She was engaged in creating a detailed rendering of the marsh grasshopper.

“Ew! She’s sketching that horrid injured insect!” cried Miss Pomfret. “With its broken leg and ooze.”

“Beatrice, that’s unnatural,” Fenmore said. “Why don’t you want to sketch something pretty like the other ladies?”

Lilith couldn’t control her temper any longer. “She can sketch whatever she blooming pleases!” she cried and stomped away.

* * *

An hour later, Lilith waited beside Beatrice on the bench outside the village church as the guests ventured into the shops. Lilith had declined to join them. She was content to watch the crows hop along the old tombstones and not engage in another emotionally trying conversation.

“Am I really unnatural?” Beatrice suddenly piped up.

So much for a brief respite from emotionally trying conversations.

“Of course not. Don’t let an arrogant ignoramus like Lord Fenmore make you feel less about yourself. There are many wiser grasshoppers in the world than he.”

Lilith’s words didn’t seem to help Beatrice. Little lines formed between her sister’s brows. “I don’t find pretty what other ladies think is pretty. I try very hard to like what I’m supposed to. Lady Marylewick probably thinks I’m hopeless.”

“Well, you fascinate me. I think you are brilliant.”

“I’m not. Don’t say things like that.”

“Are you insinuating that I’m a liar? Or that I’m not intelligent enough to recognize when someone is brilliant? I certainly hope not.”

“No! I…I…don’t know how to answer you now.”

Lilith patted her sister’s arm. “It’s best to agree with me. I’m always right in these matters. It’s one of my better traits.”

Beatrice peered at the grasshopper through the pressed sides of Lilith’s bonnet. “It’s so amazing. A perfect life composed of thousands of tiny living miracles. I don’t understand how a dress or bonnet could be as beautiful.” She shook her head. “Sometimes I wish I had been born a man. It would be much easier for me.”

“You’re absolutely perfect as you are.” Lilith hugged Beatrice. “Don’t let anyone tell you differently or try to change you. Keep studying this magnificent world and its inhabitants. Don’t ever—bloody hell!” She saw Lord Charles emerging from the tobacconist’s shop. She only had a brief window of time to escape before he tried to make eye contact and then demand her company. “I must go. I’m going to get some…some…toffee. Yes, toffee! It makes everything better.”

She fled in the direction of the confectioner’s around a corner. When she was safely out of Charles’s view, she stopped, pressed her hand to her heart, and took several calming breaths before proceeding to the confectioner’s.

Inside the squat shop were tiny mounds of toffee, meringues, and nougats behind glass. The scents of sugar, butter, and vanilla had the magic effect of easing her tense muscles and momentarily chasing away her anxious thoughts.

She opened her reticule and drew out some of the monies McAllister had given her. Penelope could use some toffee and Beatrice might enjoy the vanilla meringue. Lilith kept adding to her order, trying to linger a little longer in this sugary haven. She knew George wanted to marry her off to a respectable, genteel man, and she wondered how he would take the news when she ran away with a confectioner and lived happily ever after in his shop.

She took her candies, paper-wrapped, and stepped out. She still wasn’t ready to face Charles, Fenmore, George, Lady Cornelia, and all the problems they represented. Nor could she leave Beatrice alone with wolves. She decided to take the long way back to the village church, giving herself ample time to eat enough toffee to fortify her defenses.

She was passing by an alley when a motion caught her eye. She turned, thinking a cat had sprinted by, but instead saw two men conversing deep in the shadows. George and Fenmore.

She concealed herself behind the brick front and peered inside the alley.

* * *

George hadn’t visited a boxing parlor since leaving London. The tension in his mind and muscles roiled like a stoked-up engine. Last night Lilith had pleasured his cock, and this morning she sat shoulder-to-shoulder with Charles, smiling as the man taunted George. And those damned pictures she had shown him still circled in his brain, refusing to leave. Then, atop it all, to have Fenmore dallying about…

“It’s one week,” George growled at Fenmore and spiked his cane in the ground. “Can you show some semblance of proper manners toward my family for one bloody week?”

“Good God, man.” Fenmore raised his palms. “I just accompanied the ladies to the ruins. Penelope didn’t want to go. What? Did you think I would ravish a lady behind a bush? I wouldn’t put it past that saucy ward of yours. She’s always eyeing me like she wants something.”

George dropped the cane and slammed the man against the wall, pressing his knuckles against his throat.

Fenmore gurgled for breath.

“When you are in my county,” George said in a slow growl, “staying as a guest in my house, you will show bloody respect for my sister and my family. That includes Miss Dahlgren.”

“Maybe your sister should show some respect to me,” Fenmore choked. “Maybe she needs to learn how to be a proper wife.”

He lifted Fenmore by his collar until the man’s toes grazed the pavers and then slammed him against the bricks again. Air roared through George’s nostrils. It would be so easy to punch the straying rogue. Again and again, with his bare knuckles, breaking apart that vacant, arrogant expression the man always wore.

Fenmore, realizing his peril, kept his stupid mouth shut, but he emitted humming, frightened whimpers.

George kept Fenmore suspended as he reined in his rage. His love for his sister was the only thing sparing Fenmore injury at the moment. He didn’t want to further humiliate her with the talk that would arise if George beat her husband to a pulp.

“One week.” George shoved Fenmore again, releasing his grip.

The man, dazed, slumped against the wall.

George turned on his heel, retrieved his cane, and walked away, fury still trapped in his veins and no relief in sight.