cruel practice,’ she said. ‘I know chimneys have to be cleaned, but surely there must be a more humane way? I hear there are devices that can produce results that are almost as good.’
‘Devices,’ he said, turning to her with a curious expression.
‘For cleaning chimneys.’
‘Really? I had no idea.’
‘Oh? But then why did you ask me about them?’
His brows drew down irritably.
‘I beg your pardon,’ she said hastily, hanging her head meekly. Whatever had possessed her to question him? How could she have forgotten the way her father had reacted should her mother have ever dared to question his motive for saying anything, no matter how absurd?
There was a moment’s awkward pause. She darted him a wary glance to find he’d folded his arms across his chest and was glaring at his plate as though he was contemplating sweeping it, and its contents, from the table before storming off.
A kind of dim terror crept over her. A mist rising up from her past. Her own appetite fled. She pleated her napkin between nervous fingers, fighting to stay calm. He couldn’t very well backhand her out of the chair, she reminded herself. Not even her father had taken such drastic action, when she’d angered him, not in public, at any rate.
No—Lord Havelock was more likely to return her to her chaperon in frosty silence and vow never to have anything to do with her again.
She felt him shift in his seat, next to her. ‘Entirely my fault,’ he growled between clenched teeth. ‘No business bringing such a topic up at a dinner table. Cannot think what came over me.’
The mist shredded, blasted apart by the shock wave of his apology. She turned and stared at him.
‘I dare say you can tell that I’m just not used to conversing with...ladies.’
Good grief. Not only had he apologised, but he, a man, had admitted to having a fault.
‘I...I’m not very good at it myself. Not conversing with ladies, obviously, I can do that. I meant, conversing with members of the opposite...’ She floundered on the precipice of uttering a word that would be an even worse faux pas than mentioning the grim reality of chimney sweeps.
And then he smiled.
A rather devilish smile that told her he knew exactly which word she’d almost said.
With an unholy light in his eyes that sent awareness of her own sex flooding from the pit of her stomach to the tips of her toes.
‘So you found your mouse,’ remarked Morgan, as they strode out into the night.
‘I’ve found a young lady who appears to meet many of my requirements,’ Havelock testily corrected him. He hadn’t been able to believe his luck when the bashful creature he’d had to coax out from behind her potted plant had admitted to being an orphan.
‘The only problem is,’ he said with a scowl, ‘the very things I like most about her make it devilish difficult to find out what her character is really like.’
‘How so?’
‘Well, it was damn near impossible to pry more than a couple of words out of her at a time.’ To think he’d congratulated himself on so deftly separating her from her more exuberant cousins, only to come unstuck at the dinner table.
‘I made a complete cake of myself.’ He sighed. She wasn’t like the girls he was used to sitting with at such events. Girls who either flirted, or threw out conversational gambits intended to impress and charm. She’d left all the work to him. And he discovered he was a very poor hand at it. In his determination to delve to the heart of her, he’d asked the kind of questions that had both puzzled and alarmed her.
Climbing boys, for God’s sake! Who in their right minds asked a gently reared girl about such a deplorable topic? Over a supper table?
Though in fairness to Miss Carpenter, she’d swiftly rallied and given an answer of which he could heartily approve. And shown her head wasn’t stuffed with goose down. Devices for sweeping chimneys, eh? Where could she have heard about them? If they even existed.
‘You know,’ said Morgan as they turned in the direction of their club, ‘either of her cousins would be only too glad to get an offer from you. Wouldn’t be so much work, either. That’s why I made them known to you. Family not that well off, eager to climb the social ladder. Have known them some time, so I can vouch for them both being good girls, at heart.’
‘No, thank you,’ said Havelock firmly, recalling the way they’d fluttered and preened the moment they heard he had a title. ‘Miss Carpenter is the one for me.’
‘Very well,’ said Morgan with a shrug. ‘Perhaps you will get a chance to discover more about her when we go and visit her tomorrow.’
‘Perhaps,’ he said gloomily. He wished now that he had been more in the petticoat line. Had more experience with plumbing the depths of women’s natures. He’d plumbed other depths, naturally, to the satisfaction of both parties involved, but had always avoided anything that smacked of emotion. The moment a woman started to seem as though she wanted to get ‘close’, he’d dropped her like a hot potato.
He’d thought it was safer.
And it had been. Not one of them had ever managed to get under his skin. The trouble was, keeping himself heart whole had left him woefully unprepared for the most important task of his life.
* * *
‘Good morning, my lord,’ gushed Mrs Pargetter.
Havelock favoured her with his most courtly bow. If he was going to be frequenting these premises, he needed to be on good terms with the hostess.
Miss Carpenter’s cousins, whose names escaped him for the moment, fluttered at him from their strategic locations on two separate sofas, indicating their willingness to have him join them. Or Morgan. The hussies didn’t appear to mind which.
Miss Carpenter, on the other hand, was sitting on a straight-backed chair by the window, looking very much as though she would like to disappear behind the curtains.
Morgan made straight for the younger chit, so he went and sat beside the elder. He’d paid this kind of duty visit to dance partners, the day after a ball, before. But he’d never realised how frustrating they could be if a fellow was serious about pursuing a female. You couldn’t engage in meaningful conversation with teacups and macaroons being thrust under your nose every five minutes. Not that he’d had much success in the field of conversation when he had got her to himself.
‘We hope you will permit us to take your lovely daughters out tomorrow,’ Morgan was saying. Havelock scowled. He didn’t want to take either of them anywhere.
The girls looked at each other. Then their heads swivelled towards the window where Mary was sitting.
‘And you, too, Miss Carpenter, of course,’ said Havelock, taking his cue from them. Morgan had been right. Man-hungry they might be, but they weren’t totally ruthless in their pursuit of prey. They were willing to offer Miss Carpenter a share in their spoils.
‘Oh, no,’ said Miss Carpenter, blushing. ‘Really, I don’t think...’
‘Nonsense, Mary,’ said her aunt briskly. ‘It will do you the world of good to get out in the fresh air.’
Her brows rose in disbelief. Since rain was lashing at the windowpane, he could hardly blame her.
‘It isn’t really the season for driving in the park, now, is it,’ said Morgan with just a hint of a smile. ‘I was thinking more in the lines of visiting somewhere like Westminster Abbey.’
Westminster Abbey? Was the fellow mad?