The Courtship

“There you are!” Lord Tony Windham covered the length of the conservatory in double time. “Miss Himmelfarb, I have need of your company this instant. Sir, you will excuse the lady. She has promised to walk the gardens with me immediately.”

He nodded at Michael, who offered Esther the merest glance to ascertain her consent before stepping back. “Miss Himmelfarb, good day. Lord Anthony.”

“Right, good day, good afternoon, good morning.” Lord Anthony linked his arm through Esther’s and lowered his voice. “Time is of the essence, my lady. You must attend to the flowers in the rose salon immediately.”

This was not the affable, smiling Lord Tony whom Esther had come to know in recent days. This was a fellow with urgent business on his mind.

“I must?”

“Indeed. It is of utmost importance that you do.” He hustled her along, not stopping until they were outside the door of the parlor in question.

The closed door.

“Lord Anthony, what’s afoot here?”

He opened the door and gave Esther a gently muscular shove. “My thanks for your company.”

The tableau that greeted Esther spoke for itself. In a dress far too low cut for daylight hours, Charlotte Pankhurst reclined on a chaise, while Lord Percival stood over her, looking exasperated.

“Miss Himmelfarb.” He bowed to her very low, his expression one of banked relief. “A pleasure to see you. Miss Pankhurst is feeling unwell, and I was just about to—”

The door from the blue salon next door opened abruptly, revealing Lady Morrisette and several of the other older women in attendance.

“I knew I heard voices!” Lady Morrisette’s shrill observation rang out over the room while her cronies crowded in behind her.

“It’s well you’re here, my lady,” Esther said before Charlotte could open her fool mouth. “I came in to check on the flowers and found Miss Pankhurst feeling poorly. Lord Percival stopped by and offered his aid when he perceived the lady was in distress. Perhaps the physician should be summoned?”

The distressed lady—for she clearly was distressed now—bolted to a sitting position. “That will not be necessary.”

Lady Morrisette rose to the challenge after the merest blink of frustrated disbelief. “Perhaps it was the kippers at breakfast, my dear. They don’t always agree with one. How fortunate his lordship and Miss Himmelfarb were here to render you aid.”

Charlotte’s expression turned from mulish to murderous as Lord Tony came sauntering in. “Greetings, all. Percy, the horses are being saddled as we speak, and you’re not yet in riding attire. Miss Himmelfarb, I believe you were to join us?”

This was farce, but from the look in Charlotte’s eyes, deadly farce.

Esther turned a dazzling smile on Lord Tony. “Just let me change into my habit, your lordship. Miss Pankhurst, I wish you a swift recovery.”

She curtsied to all and sundry, spared a dozen wilted bouquets half a thought, and sidled past Lord Tony into the hallway.

“Oh, Miss Himmelfarb!” Lady Morrisette’s voice jerked Esther to a stop as effectively as if Esther were a spaniel upon whose leash the woman had tramped.

“My lady?”

Esther’s hostess approached, glancing to the left and right as she did. “Charlotte is my goddaughter, and one can’t blame her for trying. I’ll understand if you have to depart early.”

What was the woman saying? “Are you asking me to leave?”

“Oh, good Lord, no.” Lady Morrisette’s smile was feral. “What ensues now should be very interesting indeed. I’m simply saying if you do decide your mother has an ague, for example, or your younger sister should come down with lung fever, then I will be happy to make your excuses to the company. I know my goddaughter, and she does not deal well with disappointment.”

A warning, then. “I appreciate your understanding. If you’ll excuse me, I must change into my riding habit.”

Lady Morrisette gave Esther a little salute. “Go down fighting, I always say. Enjoy your ride.”

The innuendo was cheerful, vulgar, and snide. Contemplating that Parthian shot, Esther felt as if she’d been the one to consume a quantity of bad kippers—and in the next two weeks, the feeling could only get worse.

* * *

Percival Windham did not believe in shirking his responsibilities. He boosted Esther Himmelfarb into the saddle, arranged her skirts over her boots, and remained standing by her stirrup.

“I am in your never-ending, eternal, perpetual debt, Miss Himmelfarb. I cannot thank you enough for your timely appearance in that salon. I’d received a note, you see, ostensibly from Lady Morrisette.”

Several yards away, Tony was fussing with his horse’s girth, no doubt sensible that the moment called for groveling.

“You should thank your brother, my lord, though I cannot think why he didn’t simply intervene himself.”

The lady’s words bore a slight chill, something more than politesse but less than indignation. This did not bode well for a fellow who’d reached the inescapable conclusion that he’d met his one true love.

“Had Tony come upon us alone in that room, he would have been honor bound to relate what he saw to our mother, Her Grace, and she would have been delighted to accept Miss Pankhurst as a prospective daughter-in-law. You see before you a man in receipt of nothing less than a divine pardon, Miss Himmelfarb, and you the angel of its deliverance.”

“That’s laying it on a bit thick, your lordship.”

Had her lips quirked? Was humor alight in her lovely green eyes?

“It is the God’s honest truth, madam. You will consider what boon I might grant you in repayment.”

He left her with that offer to consider—a stroke of genius if he did say so himself—and swung up onto his bay gelding. Two grooms mounted up on cobs, while Tony climbed onto a leggy gray.

“Would you like to see Morelands, Miss Himmelfarb? It’s not five miles east cross-country.”

“Lead on, your lordship. Any hour out of doors on such a lovely day is time well spent.”

Esther Himmelfarb rode with the casual grace of one who’d been put in the saddle early and often, and while her habit was several years out of fashion, her sidesaddle was in excellent repair and superbly fitted to her seat.

Five miles passed quickly, with Tony falling behind a dozen yards to confer with the grooms.

“Let’s take the next turning. There’s somebody I’d like you to meet.”

At his suggestion, Miss Himmelfarb nudged her mare to the left, down a bridle path that ran between two high hedges.

They hadn’t gone twenty yards before she drew her horse up. “You wanted me to meet somebody in a graveyard?”

“I did, in fact.” He swung down, handed the horse off to a groom, and assisted the lady to dismount. She put her hands on his shoulders and slid to the ground, the closest they’d stood in days, close enough that his good intentions could be assailed by the scent of lavender and the feel of a slender female waist under his very hands.

“Come.” Percy grasped her gloved fingers in his. “Mrs. Wood bides here. This is the Windham family plot. All the best people are to be found in its confines.”

She gave him a look suggesting he’d gone barmy, but kept pace as he circled the small plot. Tony, may the Almighty bless and keep him, had signaled that he’d assist the grooms to water the horses at a small burn a furlong away on the other side of the hedges.

“When I was a small boy and periodically suffused with indignation, I’d come here to seek consolation. Peter always knew where to find me.”

He led her to a bench under an enormous oak.

“Peter would be the Marquess of Pembroke?”

“Tony still calls him Petey, if you can credit that.” He drew her down to the bench and kept her hand in his.