'Do you know any poetry, Nell?' he asked.
'Poetry, sir?' she asked, looking across at him wide-eyed.
'Probably not,' he said, answering his own question. 'I must bring some books and read to you. You would like the works of some of the new poets, I believe.'
'Why?' she asked.
'I think some of them share your complete absorption with nature,' he said. 'William Wordsworth, for example. He believes, you know, that there is a spirit behind all of nature. A tree is not just something pretty to look at. It somehow has a spiritual force.' He laughed. 'You probably do not know what I am talking about, do you?'
'Oh yes, I do!' Helen said eagerly. 'Yes, I do, and that is exactly how I feel. Do you too?'
William Mainwaring smiled again into the bright face so close to his. 'I admire his poetry and read it quite frequently,' he said. 'But I must confess that I have not given a great deal of serious thought to his philosophy. But then I have never known the man. I do know you, wood nymph, and I believe your passion might be infectious.'
He had not meant it quite the way it sounded when it came out of his mouth. The girl looked intently at him. Her cheeks flushed and her lips parted, but there was nothing coquettish in her manner. Perhaps it was his realization of that fact that made her so irresistible. Mainwaring leaned forward before he had any conception of what he was about to do and kissed her.
He lifted his head almost immediately. She had offered no resistance. Her lips had been warm and soft beneath his. Those rather dreamy eyes of hers were still looking into his.
'I wanted you to do that,' she said unexpectedly, and she leaned imperceptibly toward him.
This time he put an arm around her shoulders and turned her to him before kissing her. And he could feel the blood pounding against his temples as her breasts came against his coat and her lips parted beneath his. He threaded his free hand through the loose tangles of her hair and tentatively explored her lips with his tongue. The soft warmth drew him in and soon he was reaching into her opened mouth, touching her tongue with his, stroking the roof of her mouth until she shivered against him. He kissed her closed eyes, her chin, her throat, and finally, her mouth again.
A village girl. Just a poor village girl. What was he doing taking advantage of such innocence? He put her head against his shoulder and held it there while he looked up into the branches of the trees, trying to impose sanity on his mind. Had he completely taken leave of his senses? He had never before allowed himself to be carried away by sheer desire. He had never had a woman. He had kissed only one other. He closed his eyes tightly. Elizabeth! How could he sully his love for her with these feelings of mere desire for a young girl with whom he could have nothing in common beyond a fondness for a wood and a stream?
William Mainwaring put the girl gently away from him and smiled at her. 'I should not have done that,' he said. 'I am sorry, Nell. I do not wish to frighten you into believing that you are no longer safe here. I assure you that it will not happen again.'
She gazed seriously back at him. 'I am not sorry,' she said, 'and I am not frightened. Are you going to leave now?'
'Yes,' he said, 'I think I had better go.'
'Will you come again?' she asked. 'Will you read me those poems?'
He had stood up. But he stooped down now and put a strand of hair behind her ear. 'Yes, wood nymph,' he said softly. 'I shall come and read to you. There is a whole world of which you must be unaware that I would wish opened to you.'
He smiled at her and drew his thumb lightly over her lips before straightening up again and turning to stride away through the trees and quickly out of her sight.
Helen did not immediately leave. She noticed, in something of a daze, that one of her feet was still dangling in the water. She pulled it out and tucked both feet under the hem of her dress, not bothering to dry the wet one first. What a coil she was in! In the past half-hour she had broken just about every rule that should guide her actions as a lady. The first meeting with Mr. Mainwaring could be discounted. She had not expected him then. She could not be expected to feel any guilt about talking to him on that occasion. Mere civility had demanded it, even if not the deception. But this time!
She admitted to herself quite freely that the hope of a meeting with him was what had really brought her there. And she had deliberately invited closeness. She could have stayed in the tree and talked to him from that safe distance. But no. She had descended as fast as her legs would carry her as soon as he had suggested it, and she had invited him to come and sit with her on the bank. She had used feminine wiles that she had not known she possessed. It was most improper to sit on the bank of a stream in the midst of a dense wood with a gentleman, unchaperoned.
And that was not all. She had felt the spark of something between them when he had said that he might learn her passion for nature. She had known he was going to kiss her for a full second before she had felt his mouth on hers. And she had done nothing to avert the peril as she could quite easily have done by laughing or breaking eye contact with him or doing any of a hundred and one little things that would have broken the tension of the moment. If she were a lady, she would have done one of those things. And she would have been walking away from there just as fast as her legs would carry her.
Truth was, she had wanted him to kiss her. What a shocking admission! They had not even been formally introduced. And even if she could be excused for that first kiss, about which she had had only a second's warning, there was no excuse at all for the kiss that followed. She even had the uncomfortable feeling that she had invited it. The first one had not been enough, a mere brushing of lips. But the second! She did not know by what instinct she had parted her lips, but she could feel now the intimacy of his open mouth against hers and of his tongue touching her own. She could feel her breasts pressed against the hardness of his chest.
And she had reveled in the feelings. She should have been deeply shocked. She should, in fact, have swooned quite away at having done something she should not even have dreamed of doing outside the marriage bed. But the only fact that made Helen feel guilty was that she did not feel ashamed. The day was brighter for the embrace. She was the happier for it. She lifted her head and gazed at the sky, where the same powerful gale was blowing wisps of white across its surface. She wished she were up there so that she could feel the wind in her hair and on her hot cheeks.
She wondered if she was falling in love. Helen believed very strongly in love. She had always thought it must be the most glorious and sublime feeling of which one could be capable. But she had never expected it to be part of her experience. She had never felt even a mild liking for any of the men she had met since she left the schoolroom. But this could not be love. It had come too suddenly. She hardly knew the man. He I probably be quite different if he knew her real identity. He would then surely be as prosy and as starchy as all the other gentlemen of her acquaintance.
Helen's face suddenly felt hotter than ever. Of course, soon he was bound to find out. There was no way she could escape indefinitely meeting him in public. There was a ball at Lord Graham's house the very next night, and she was bound to meet him there. The ball was being given largely in honor of his arrival in the neighborhood. How would she be able to face him? What would his reaction be when he knew that the girl he had teased and kissed in the woods was really Lady Helen Wade? He would probably feel obliged to do something stupid like offer for her. And how mortifying it would be to receive an offer of marriage for such a reason. Especially when one was beginning to imagine oneself in love with the man.
Helen frowned and rested her chin on her raised knees. Was Mr. Mainwaring a rake? she wondered. Was he out to take her virtue just because he believed her a village wench, someone who did not count? She would hate to think so. Undoubtedly, though, he would not have behaved so had he known that she was a lady. But then, she had behaved so, had she not, knowing that she was a lady? The problem was just too complicated. Anyway, if the man were a rake, he would not have been contented with the kiss they had shared. And he was the one who had ended it. Helen did not like to examine the question of when she would have put an end to the encounter.
Of one thing she was sure. She wanted to see him again before the inevitable exposure of her identity the following evening. She should not, of course. She should not play with fire. But he was going to read her the
