Chapter Nineteen

 

His reflections were many and complicated. Foremost, however, was his appreciation for her quick-wittedness, her ability to grasp the problem at hand and get right to a solution. Alistair could hardly call to mind any man who did this well, much less a woman. Why, for a moment, even he, who was usually ahead of his fellows, had felt a little slow, but he had not minded too much. In fact, he had experienced a curious sort of pride in her continuing to fulfill his initial belief in her capabilities. Yet for all her intelligence and her mental sophistication, there was a naiveté about Sarah that Alistair found enchanting. On one hand, she could render material assistance without the blink of an eye to a wounded man who appeared on her doorstep in the middle of the night under most suspicious circumstances; yet on the other, the merest mention of men and women and love overset her completely in spite of her insistence that she had no interest in such things whatsoever.

For a moment the earl toyed with the idea of making her fall in love with him. As far back as he could remember, he had never failed to win over even the most resistant of females. Lady Sarah would present a challenge of the highest order, to be sure, and there was nothing that stimulated Lord Farringdon more than a challenge. But somehow he could not do it. Another part of him, the stronger part, wanted to protect her from men who were just like him. He wanted to defend such innocence—no, it was not innocence precisely, because she was well aware of such things—call it purity, against someone who wished to threaten that purity simply for the sport of it.

To be perfectly honest, this hitherto unsuspected chivalrous aspect of his character was, for the first time in his life, making the earl suffer just the slightest twinge of remorse for his previous predatory attitude where the fair sex was concerned.

But had he truly been predatory? No, now that he considered it, he felt compelled to say in his own defense that all the women he had made love to had been more than willing in the end. Any resistance they had shown had been merely for the sake of propriety, to force him into a declaration he did not wish to make, or to make him part with some very expensive proofs of his interest. More often than not, it was he who had had to do the resisting. And it seemed as though he was going to be called upon to do some more resisting at this very moment, for Alistair had just caught sight of the Marchioness of Cranleigh picking her way daintily through the roses in his direction.

“Good day, my lord. I had not thought to see you involved in such tame sport.” Rosalind greeted him with a most enchanting smile that gave him ample opportunity to admire the delicious dimples and perfect teeth.

“Why, may not anyone appreciate the beauties of nature, my lady?” The earl responded with a smile equally as intimate and suggestive as that of the marchioness.

“Of course they may, foolish man.” She rapped his knuckles playfully with the ivory handle of the delicate lace parasol that was shading her lovely face. “But they are not generally men like you.”

“Oho, this is dangerous ground. And what sort of man am I, pray tell?” The gray eyes glinted with amusement, and something else that was far more unsettling.

Observing the earl closely from under long, dark lashes, Rosalind was hard put to identify that something. Being Rosalind, she naturally assumed it to be a passionate attraction to her person; however, there remained just the slightest bit of doubt. The Earl of Burnleigh was in general a rather disconcerting person to know. He never behaved as other members of the ton did, and he certainly never behaved as he ought, which was precisely why she had broken off their affair, Rosalind told herself smugly, forgetting entirely that it was Lord Farringdon’s gentle but firm refusal to invite her to become Countess of Burnleigh that had been the true cause of the rupture.

The earl’s question still hung between them, and with a coquettish smile, Rosalind opened her eyes wide. “What sort of man are you? Surely so many other women have told you that my reading of your character is quite unnecessary and is likely to make you even more top-lofty than you already are.”

“I? Top-lofty? Surely, I have never been anything but your admiring slave, my fair one. You must elaborate; you cannot leave me in such an agony of suspense, you know.” Alistair persisted in the hope that something she said would leave him an opening to ask the questions he wished to pursue.

“Oh.” Rosalind fluttered her eyelashes. “I do not know. However, I do know that you are more an adventurer than an observer. You are far more likely to wrestle with nature than admire it.”

“A cantankerous sort, in fact.” Lord Farringdon chuckled.

“Not cantankerous, precisely, but...” She struggled to find just the right words. “Adventurous, bold. One might almost say that you seek out trouble and excitement.” Rosalind bit her full lower lip enticingly. La, she had forgotten just how attractive such characteristics could be, especially when they were embodied in such a handsome figure of a man as the Earl of Burnleigh was. And how very dull her husband and his cronies were.

Admiring the speculatively seductive expression on the marchioness’s face, Alistair grinned. Trust Rosalind to turn even the discussion of a man’s character into an opportunity to exploit her charms. But he was tired of flirtatious banter, and he was also well enough acquainted with her to know that no matter how long they remained in the garden, tossing provocative remarks back and forth to one another, that is all that would happen. Rosalind enjoyed being a coquette. She was extraordinarily skillful at it, but she did not possess the inclinations to follow such dalliance to its natural conclusion. For her, flirtation was all about power, her power to attract and to influence men. It was not about passion or even about romance, and certainly it was not about love. Alistair had discovered this the moment he had held her in his arms. The marchioness had been about as responsive as the parasol she was now twirling gently on her shoulder.

Lord Farringdon had had enough. There were things he needed to discover, decisions and communications that had to be made. “So I seek danger and excitement, do I? Well then, I shall not disappoint you by running true to form and asking you if the Chevalier d’Evron is importuning you in any way.” His bluntness had the desired effect. Alistair saw the brown eyes widen a moment and the delicate nostrils flare before his companion reassumed her flirtatious air.

Rosalind allowed a silvery laugh to bubble up from her slender white throat, giving herself a moment to recover from the shock of such a direct attack. It was just as well she had not married the earl. Really, the man had no manners whatsoever, asking questions like that and staring at her in that intense way. “Whyever should you think such a thing, my lord?” One delicate hand fluttered to her breast.

The earl, however, was not about to be distracted by an enticingly rounded bosom; he was far too experienced to fall for a trick as simple-minded as that. “Cut line, Rosalind,” he responded curtly. “I have seen you and the chevalier in deep conversation more than once, and you have looked none too happy about it. Unless I miss my bet, it was not Spanish coin he was offering you, no sweet words of love he was whispering in your ear. You looked far too uncomfortable for that to be the case. Furthermore, you have been doing your best, unsuccessfully, I might add, to evade him. Now the Chevalier d’Evron is an attractive and much sought-after gentleman. It is not like you to avoid someone such as that—quite the opposite in fact.” Alistair raised one skeptical dark brow.

Rosalind’s mind raced. Really, the man was far too observant for his own good. He could do himself and her a great deal of mischief, pursuing such a line of reasoning. “La.” She shrugged in what she hoped was a careless fashion. “He is not so irresistible as he seems to think. Why, the man appears to believe that all he has to do is smile at a woman to make her heart flutter.”

As if you do not subscribe to the same notion yourself, Alistair muttered to himself. “Yet, you do not seem to have convinced him of your lack of interest. Now why is that ?”

The gray eyes looking down at the marchioness were as cold and gray as a winter sea and they seemed to bore into the very recesses of her mind. There was no putting off the earl when he was determined; Rosalind knew that well enough. After all, she had never planned to allow him to kiss her at all until she had done him the honor of accepting his proposal to make her Countess of Burnleigh. Yet, she had found herself one warm summer evening some years ago, crushed in his fervent embrace before she had been aware of what was happening. No, it would do no good to deny him; it was time for another tactic.

Rosalind allowed one perfect tear to roll down her cheek as she caught her breath in a sob. “You are right. Of course you are right,” she whispered so softly that he had to bend close enough to catch a whiff of her perfume in order to hear her. “I do not know what to do, I vow I am driven quite distracted by it all.” She squeezed a tear out of the other eye.

“By what all?” Alistair was entirely unmoved by the glistening drop that clung to her lashes.

“Oh, you know, he is so French and he thinks that... that, I might be able to help him.”

“That you might spy for him, you mean,” Lord Farringdon interpolated bluntly.

“Oh heavens, what you must think of me even to say such a thing!” Rosalind was breathing heavily now, her bosom heaving under a thin silk shawl that was carelessly thrown over the low neck of her walking dress. This was not all an act. She truly had been upset by the demands the chevalier was making of her, and she did not know whether to be relieved or distressed at Lord Farringdon’s discovery of it all.

“I think you are in a desperate situation,” Alistair replied calmly, “and I think you are being forced to supply the chevalier information in order to protect someone, probably Richard,” he concluded in a tone as conversational as though he were discussing the weather.

Lord Farringdon’s lack of reaction had a steadying effect on the marchioness. Her breathing slowed, and she stopped twisting her parasol so desperately. However, Alistair had not missed the slight widening of her eyes at the mention of her brother. He decided to press on. “What price did the chevalier exact for saving Richard, who, I might add, is going to ruin himself, despite anything you might do to save him.”

“Oh, nothing much.” Rosalind began twisting the parasol again. “He just wished me to report to him anything I might overhear of Harold’s conversations—that sort of thing. As if Harold ever has anything of import to say.”

Hearing the scorn in her voice, Alistair almost had it in his heart to feel sorry for the hapless Harold. After all, the poor fellow could not help that he was as stupid as a sheep, nor that he was pompous and self-important. He had been bred that way. Unbidden, the image of Sarah’s bright intelligent face rose before him, and for a brief moment, before he returned to the question at hand, he considered how unfair life had been to her in making Harold instead of Sarah a member of Parliament and master of Cranleigh. A smile quirked the edge of the earl’s mouth. “I am sure that you, irresistible as you are, were able to extract all sorts of valuable information from the Marquess of Cranleigh.”

Rosalind hesitated, unsure of how to read her interlocutor. The voice was pleasant enough, but those penetrating gray eyes under the straight black brows missed nothing. While there was warm admiration in his expression, there was also something else—a steely determination that brooked no denial. Lord, the man was handsome, she thought irrelevantly. Then, sighing gently, she replied slowly. “Very well. You are in the right of it. Harold did let on that more troops had been sent to the Peninsula.”

“Which troops?”

“La, how should I—”

“Which troops?”

Rosalind hunched a defensive shoulder. “Well, the Thirteenth Light Dragoons, a battalion of the First Foot... er, a battalion of the Coldstreams, I think.

Something in her expression warned the earl that she had not divulged it all. “Come now, I already know enough to ruin you. If I am to help you, I must know everything.”

The word help exerted a magical effect on the marchioness. For a moment the earl had looked so stern and uncompromising she had begun to wonder if she might wake up to find herself in the Tower. For all his wild propensities and his life of wine, women, and song, Lord Farringdon had a stern, almost uncomfortable moral streak. Rosalind knew that from experience. He had a very strict code of honor, which included a strong dislike for lying and deception of any sort.

“Well,” she continued, “he also thought that a battalion each had been sent from the Third Foot, the Royal Scots, and the First Staffordshire, but he appeared less certain of that.”

“Thank you,” Alistair replied quietly. “Now I can do something to repair what damage may have been done.” The dark eyes were fixed anxiously on him, and he could not help laying a reassuring hand on the marchioness’s shoulder. “Never fear, I shall not involve you in the least The lads at Whitehall are quite accustomed to my uncovering stray bits of useful information in the oddest of places.”

This time the sigh that escaped Rosalind was one of pure relief. How strange and forbidding the earl looked with that firm jaw, the high cheekbones, and the determined set to the broad shoulders. Here was a man one could trust in and rely on. If only...

She gave herself a mental shake. There was no good repining over what might have been. That only led to regrets and did nothing to sort out one’s future. And thinking about the future, she realized that in spite of her confiding them to the earl, her problems were still staring her in the face. “But what am I to do now?” she wailed. “Once he has discovered me to be a reliable source of information, he will never let me go,”

Lord Farringdon nodded thoughtfully. There was no doubt that Rosalind was perceptive enough when her own welfare was at stake. “I am coming to that. We ... er, I shall have to make up some false intelligence for you to pass along to the chevalier. After all, misinformation can be more damaging than no information at all. In a way, this could prove a fortunate circumstance now that you have established yourself as a credible source. You could be extremely useful to us.”

“Oh, you are clever.” Rosalind breathed.

The earl smiled, secretly acknowledging his debt to Sarah. As a man of honor, he felt compelled to admit that he was not the inspiration behind this particular idea, but as a man of the world, he knew it to be far more effective to have the marchioness think that such a suggestion had originated with him rather than with the sister-in-law she disdained. “Now you go and attend to your guests while I take care of the matter at hand.” Alistair smiled encouragingly, and with a much lighter heart than she had felt in days, Rosalind headed toward the house.