The afternoon sped by much too fast for Adam’s preference. His hands were full with encouraging the snow-sculptors and finding people on his forfeits list to inform them of their fates. Since he knew few of the villagers by name, he had to keep asking those he spoke with to point out the others he sought. He had only finished assigning tasks to about half of those on his lists, but he had two more days.
“We will finish Silly Hat Day tomorrow with an assembly in the late afternoon,” he began telling people. He wanted the children to be able to attend. The Twelfth Night assembly would be much more elaborate, including food and presumably, plenty of drinking. But there were already too many forfeits to be performed in just one night.
His duties kept him from keeping track of Miss Tamworth and also the Hammons, with whom he wished to speak quite urgently. But not too long before the 4 o’clock deadline for the snow sculptures, he wandered down along the pond banks to see what progress had been made on the competing candidates located there. Despite the quickening of his pulse when he saw Miss Tamworth with hers about halfway along the bank, he took his time, trying to devote equal time observing each sculpture and conversing with the creators, as he had already done on the village green and along the street in front of the inn. The variety of efforts astounded him: snowmen, snow women, snow dogs and cats, faces, a snow snake, a fish, a turtle, a chair, birds and many more objects and animals. Judging would be difficult.
Miss Tamworth’s attempt was not impressive. She was already so angry with him, he tried very hard not to laugh when he came to hers. “I’m truly sorry, Miss Tamworth. What is it supposed to be?”
She folded her arms in obvious annoyance. Looking away from him, she said, “I know it is terrible. I could not get the snow to stick. It is a rabbit. The ears are folded back. It is resting.” At least she could not avoid speaking with him.
He looked closely, finding her attempt at least more successful than the snow-horse at the livery stable. He nodded slowly. “I dare say I can see it, Miss Tamworth. A worthy attempt. Although I would not recommend you take up sculpture as a pastime.”
He waited until his silence finally forced her to turn and look at him. Then he smiled, raised an eyebrow at her, and tipping his hat in salute, moved on. This was hard, this trying to win a way back into her good graces. He couldn’t swear he had ever made it as far as her heart the first time, but she had agreed to a courtship. That had to mean something. And now that he finally knew his own heart, there was so much more at stake.
At four o’clock he announced the contest winners from the steps of the inn to all the gathered participants. He had devised categories to suit the offerings he had seen. “Most original” he awarded to a couple who had built a pair of snow-people seated with a table between them, apparently having snowball tea. “Best imagination” went to a young farm worker who had built a fearsome winged snake with huge snowball eyes. “Most ambitious” he gave to the men from the livery stable, for he thought truly, no one would have been able to make a competent snow-horse with this snow, but at least they had tried.
Just after he finished, he received a note from Lady Anne, delivered to him by one of the servants from Highfield. He scanned it while the man stood in the cold waiting for his reply. She and the squire requested his presence at dinner.
The invitation was worded more like a summons. Perhaps they sought an explanation for what had happened at the ball? He had found no opportunity to speak with them, and he was more than ready to give them the details. Winning their support for his pursuit of Miss Tamworth might make all the difference in his ability to earn another chance with her. If he gained that chance and still failed to win her trust and heart–well, that did not bear thinking on.
“Please tell Lady Anne and Squire that I am honored to join them,” he told the messenger.
Adam arrived at Highfield promptly at half past the hour of five, as requested. After depositing his hat, scarf and coat with the footman who admitted him, he was shown into the first drawing room. Lady Anne and Squire Hammon rose from the green striped sofa to greet him as he came in. Instead of smiles, he saw lines of concern on their faces.
“Thank you for inviting me, Lady Anne and Squire. I have been hoping for a chance to speak with you, especially given the way things ended the night of the ball.”
“Please, Lord Forthhurst, do sit,” Lady Anne said, pointing to a curved-back armchair upholstered in pale green that matched the walls. She continued once they were all seated. “We want to apologize for the precipitous way we left, without thanking you or your parents for the hospitality, and without any notice to you when you had been expecting to travel with us. It was unthinkably rude.”
He shook his head. “Please have no concern over it. I spoke with Mr. Haslitt, so I know that Miss Tamworth was overset. I’m certain she left you with no choice.”
He looked intently into their faces. Could he make them understand what had really happened? “I have been trying to convince Miss Tamworth to speak with me. What she apparently heard at the supper has led to a grave misunderstanding.”
He couldn’t sit still while he tried to unravel this. He got up and began to pace in front of his chair, his footsteps softened by the fine Wilton carpet. “Would you share with me what she said? I’ll have more hope of sorting this out if I know more than my own assumptions and what Mr. Haslitt told me.”
He stopped and looked at them again, wondering if they could see his misery was genuine. “I made a right mess of this. I need a chance to try again.”
“I see no harm in telling you,” Lady Anne said.
Adam listened as she and Squire related their ride home from Blakehill with a distraught Miss Tamworth. At the end of their account, Squire lumbered to his feet and approached Adam, laying a fatherly hand on his shoulder. “You should have told her about the scandal, lad, before you asked to court her.”
His sympathetic tone gave Adam hope. “Yes, I should have. I did everything wrong. And then it was all compounded by foolish gossip and speculation. If she is going to hate me, I think it should at least be for the truth, and not some slanted supposition.”
Squire patted Adam’s shoulder. “Sit, my boy. Talk to us. We will listen.”
Encouraged by their kindness, Adam sat down again and related his version of what had occurred, omitting only a few details. He couldn’t tell them about kissing Miss Tamworth. “We–we have a connection. Er, attraction. I think I erred by using that, as well as failing to tell her about the scandal.” He glanced at the squire, wondering if the other man could interpret what Adam had left unsaid. He didn’t know the man well enough to be able to tell.
Continuing, he explained the error about Mrs. Darlington, and then offered them the truth about his broken engagement.
Lady Anne was beaming at him. “So, in fact, you never did betray anyone, did you, Lord Forthhurst? “I did not believe it could be true.”
“My parents would make a strong case that I betrayed them, and I did–I had to make a choice. And whether or not I was justified, I did cause a huge scandal. Miss Tamworth has every right not to wish to be involved or even associated with me.” He folded his hands and looked down at his fingers, trying to stay controlled and reasonable.
“You must understand that her father’s bitterness predisposes her to believe what she heard rather than to trust you.”
He opened up his hands in a gesture of helplessness and lifted his head. “I truly did want to find someone better to marry her. But in the end I could not bear the idea of giving her up.”
Squire and Lady Anne exchanged looks, and then she spoke again. “I had every confidence that there was more to this story, Lord Forthhurst! I knew if the Lady brought you to our village, there was a right reason for it. And for your selection as our Lord of Misrule! Do you say you are in love with Miss Tamworth?”
“Yes. Enough to give her up if that is what she truly wants. I don’t want to marry her to smooth over my scandal. I would like to marry her in spite of it, if she were willing, because I love her and need her in my life. But I don’t know how to earn back her trust.”
Lady Anne clasped her hands together and raised them to her chin, casting what he thought appeared to be a benevolent gaze over him. “How can we sit by and do nothing to help the cause of true love?”
She paused for a moment. “It seems fortunate that I had the foresight to invite her to join us for dinner. I may have omitted the fact that you would be here. However, I did tell her to come at six o’clock. It is very nearly that hour now.”
Cassie could hear the clock inside Highfield Manor chiming six as she shifted the basket on her arm and lifted the door knocker. The footman who ushered her inside took her basket as she unfastened her pelisse and bonnet.
“Thank you.” Taking the basket back, she inclined her head. “They are in the first drawing room?”
“Yes, Miss. Please go ahead in. Lady Anne said to treat you as family.”
That comment made her smile as she approached the door, which stood open. “Hello. I have brought the Twelfth Night capes with me,” she said as she stepped into the room. “I thought Squire could–” The sight of Lord Forthhurst sitting there with Lady Anne and Squire stopped her short.
Her first instinct was to simply turn around and march back out. She had thought Highfield would be a safe haven, a place where she needn’t worry about running into him. She looked at Lady Anne and Squire, feeling betrayed. “Why is he here?”
They and Lord Forthhurst had risen at her entrance. “Now, my dear, don’t do or say anything hasty. Allow me to explain,” Lady Anne said. “Please, come in and sit down with us.”
She sat and waited until Cassie and the gentlemen were also seated before speaking again. Cassie chose a chair as far away from Lord Forthhurst as possible.
“Cassie, do you not think it a remarkable string of circumstances that led to your meeting Lord Forthhurst on Christmas Eve?” Lady Anne asked. “You may believe it was all happenstance, but I assure you that I do not. And because of that belief, or faith if you prefer, I also could not believe of him all the things you told us you heard at the ball supper. Gossip and rumors! Did not your father teach you to put no trust or value in such things? Did not Squire and I teach the same thing? You were too upset to listen Saturday night, or even yesterday when we came home, but I think you should allow the man a chance to speak with you.”
Cassie closed her eyes. Well and good for Lady Anne to say. Lady Anne had not heard Lord Forthhurst repeatedly claiming he was a devil and not to be trusted, warning Cassie away from him even though her heart had refused to obey. Why shouldn’t she believe what she had heard? Did the words not merely confirm a portrait of him that he himself had painted? She was only trying now to protect that fragile and very foolish heart. Even as angry as she was, looking at him still triggered the now-familiar pull of attraction she was fighting so hard to resist.
“I hardly know what I believe now, Lady Anne,” she said, close to tears. Was this misery what came of making wishes? Of wanting change?
“Miss Tamworth. Please. There is a great deal misunderstood between us,” Lord Forthhurst said. “At least allow me to set those things straight, so your judgment can be based on truth.”
Whose truth? His? How would she know if she could trust that?
“All I am asking is for you to listen.”
Before she could answer, a footman appeared in the doorway. “Sir, my lady, dinner is served.”
Lady Anne rose. “I prefer warm food to cold. Let us go in. Cassie can consider her answer while we dine. The conversation you need to have should be private, but there is time enough after dinner. Cassie, I don’t see what harm there can be in a simple conversation.”
The harm was that it wouldn’t be simple, Cassie thought. She left her basket with the capes in it sitting on the floor in the drawing room. Lady Anne took her arm and the two women went ahead of the men into the dining room. Behind them Cassie heard the murmur of Squire’s voice speaking to Lord Forthhurst.
The harm might be that whether or not Lord Forthhurst made sense and showed things to be different than she understood them, she would still succumb to his charm and her attraction to him, just as she had done at the ball. The harm could be that he might still break her heart no matter what he said.
The long dining table had been turned sideways and pushed to one end of the room, making space for a smaller table with four chairs to be set under the chandelier in the center. Far less awkward than trying to arrange four people at one end of the long table, but also, Cassie noted, more intimate. Clearly Lady Anne had put thought into this.
Lady Anne and Squire took seats opposite each other, ensuring that Cassie and Lord Forthhurst had to do the same. Cassie darted a glance at the viscount after they were all seated. The spark she was used to seeing in his eyes was gone, as was any trace of a smile. Weariness had deepened the lines near his eyes. Was this her fault?
Lady Anne began a perfectly unobjectionable conversation about the food on the table, something about getting pike at this season and the recipe for stewed venison. Cassie hardly noticed when Squire put a generous portion of roasted pork on her plate.
Where is your backbone, Cassie? Was she truly afraid to have a mere conversation? She would never approve of such faintheartedness in her students if they faced a problem. She would listen to Lord Forthhurst after dinner, and she would keep herself in hand.
She picked up her knife and fork, and as she ate, began to participate in the flow of discussion. She could not avoid looking at the viscount, but she made certain her glances did not linger. She was very well aware that his did.
“Cassie, I am eager to see the Twelfth Night capes after dinner,” Lady Anne said, starting a new topic. “You said you had brought them?”
“Yes, I did. I wanted to see how the man’s cape would fit on someone large like Squire. There’s no guarantee that whoever will wear it will be of a slight build like my father.”
“What is the purpose of the capes?” Lord Forthhurst asked. “Is it yet another custom with which I am unfamiliar?”
“The King and Queen of Fools wear them,” Lady Anne said, sparing Cassie from having to answer.
Squire cleared his throat. “The man that finds the bean is crowned King of Fools for the evening. The woman who finds the pea becomes his queen. ’Tis an ancient custom, but we still follow it here.”
“What do they do?”
“They preside over the banquet, and forfeits may be performed in front of them, or if you desire it, may be presented to them. As Lord of Misrule, you will be the Master of Ceremonies.”
“The capes are simply costumes, but they have been part of our tradition here for endless generations,” Cassie said, finally joining in. “The ones we had were so old they were falling apart. I have made new ones.”
“Of course you did.” Lord Forthhurst rested his gaze on her very deliberately.
That’s all it took, one long, lingering scrutiny. The flames inside Cassie lit up instantly. She could no more stop her reactions to him than she could stop her heart from beating. How would she be able to listen objectively to his story?
Dinner ended with mince pie. Lady Anne expressed her belief that even if they didn’t eat it every day during Christmastide, it would still bring good luck. Cassie was far less certain about that idea–hadn’t mince pie been the start of all the trouble with Lord Forthhurst?
Before they adjourned from the meal, Lady Anne asked one of the footmen to bring Cassie’s basket with the capes into the dining room.
With the basket at her feet, she took up the folds of one cape and beamed as she shook it out. “Oh, Cassie. This is exquisite. See how it catches the light.” She ran her fingers across several of the patches. “I recognize these bits. You have blended the old and the new quite perfectly.”
She lifted out the second cape and held it up as well. “Which is the man’s, and which the woman’s?”
Cassie got up and came over to where Lady Anne sat with the basket. “The only difference really is that the queen’s cape is smaller.” She compared the two capes and then slipped one around Lady Anne’s shoulders. “There, let us see how you look! You never know, perhaps you will end up as the Queen of Fools.”
Cassie turned towards Squire with the other cape. “May I try this one on you, Squire? If it needs adjustments, I have only tomorrow left to do the work.”
With a grunt of assent, the squire leveraged himself out of his chair. He stood patiently while Cassie tried to fit the garment around his shoulders, but she had difficulty because he was tall as well as wide.
Lord Forthhurst rose and came to assist her. “Here, allow me.” As he reached for a section of the cape to pull it straight, his fingers grazed hers. Instant fire. They both snatched their hands away.
Squire reached up to straighten the cape himself. Wriggling his shoulders, he grinned. “’Tis a fine thing, Cassie dear. Shall I be the King of Fools?”
He allowed Cassie to examine how the cape hung on him, but then he started to remove it. “I’m already an old fool anyway. Here, put it on Forthhurst. Might as well see how it looks on a fine strapping handsome fellow instead.”
How she could refuse without seeming awkward and insulting? Reluctantly she took the cape from Squire and turned to Lord Forthhurst. The gleam was back in his eye.
“May I?” he asked. “Will it shatter any magic if the Lord of Misrule assumes the mantle of the King of Fools? I imagine it is the only chance I shall have to wear it, since I already have a job for Twelfth Night.”
She handed it to him. Placing it around his shoulders would have brought her far too close to him. Just the thought triggered the memory of when he had stood in the vicarage entryway, frozen like a block of ice, and she had helped him with his outerwear. He would have to don the cape himself.
Unfortunately, he seemed incapable of accomplishing such a simple task. After he tossed it around his shoulders with a flourish, the cape was sideways and one side was completely tucked up underneath. He turned to her with a helpless look she doubted was genuine. Devil. And yet he made her want to laugh.
He raised one eyebrow at her. Lady Anne and Squire both looked on expectantly. With a sigh of resignation, she stepped closer to him and reached up to adjust the cape. Mercy! The heat between them in that brief moment felt as if it should melt her.
Thankfully he made no movement–to touch her, or do anything else. He just stood absolutely still. She did not think he so much as twitched a finger. When she stepped away, she let out breath she did not realize she had been holding.
“Oh, there now!” Lady Anne exclaimed, her enthusiasm overwhelming her sense of decorum, as so often happened. “What a fine, handsome lord, indeed. Does it not look splendid on him?”
Cassie had to admit that it did. The cape’s blue, green, burgundy and gold colors made his eyes seem greener than ever and accentuated the magnificent broadness of his shoulders. Seeing him in it was doing something to her–more than igniting fires, it felt as though her heart might be melting, her anger evaporating. “The children are convinced that the capes are magic,” she said, reaching for something, anything, to say. “It is silly, is it not?”
Lord Forthhurst was looking at her so intently, and she could not look away. “Is it?” he asked.
She could not find her voice.
“Squire and I shall retire to the drawing room,” Lady Anne said quietly as she rose from her chair. She had removed the queen’s cape and placed it neatly folded in the basket once again. “Come and join us when you two are finished talking.”
“But I did not…” Cassie let the protest die in her throat. With trepidation she watched the older couple leave the dining room. They left the door open.
“You did not say you had decided to hear me out,” Lord Forthhurst finished for her, smiling. He was still wearing the king’s cape. “Lady Anne presumes, but she does know you well.”
He took a step closer to her as he spoke, feeling a little less anxious. The woman he knew–the woman he loved–had too much sense and compassion to refuse his request. But Miss Tamworth put both of her hands up, as if she would fend off something evil. He stopped instantly.
“I will listen to what you want to say, my lord, but there are conditions.”
It chilled him that she was back to calling him “my lord”. He thought they had moved far beyond that, even to the point of using given names with each other. But that was before the ball supper. “Whatever you require, Miss Tamworth.”
“You are not to touch me or even come near to me,” she stated earnestly. “You will sit in that chair,” she added, pointing to the seat he had occupied at dinner, the one that put the width of a table safely between them.
He nodded meekly and moved to stand by the chair. Squire’s words to him as they had headed in to dinner rang in his mind. “The physicality between you is a blessing, my boy, make no mistake. But women need to know there’s more. They want to know what’s in your heart, and you can’t assume your actions tell them.”
That had never been an issue in his love affairs before now, but admittedly this was different, Miss Tamworth was different, and this time, his heart and his future were at stake. All he needed to do was make her understand, and win her back. Just a simple task.
She sat down in the chair opposite him, so he also sat. She hadn’t said he couldn’t look at her, so he did. “If I don’t address some concern you have, please ask. I may not be aware of every aspect of our misunderstanding.”
Sitting there felt awkward. He clasped his hands together. He might as well begin with the biggest issue. “I should have told you about the scandal I caused in London before I ever asked to court you. I apologize. In truth, I enjoyed being here in Little Macclow where no one knew of it. There was no reason you should ever need to know, when we were merely acquaintances. I never expected–damn, I cannot do this sitting!”
He sprang up from his chair, almost knocking it over, and with his arms straight as ramrods set his hands on the table in front of him. He stared at her as if his eyes could bore into her soul. “I promise not to come near you, but I must be allowed to move about.”
When she gave a single, almost imperceptible nod, he let out a rush of breath and turned to pace in the space behind his chair. “I never expected to develop feelings of such intensity for you.”
He turned back, pinning her with his gaze again. “I need you to understand that I did not ask to court you or want to wed you as an answer to my scandal. That was the last thing I wanted. So that is the first item of misunderstanding.
“The second item is related: the scandal itself was based on a lie, although it was a lie created for good reason.” He resumed pacing. “The number of people who know this can be counted on one hand, and I am sharing this in confidence.”
He proceeded to explain the story of his engagement to Louisa Bettencourt, the couple’s frustration with their parents’ plans, and Louisa’s love for someone else. He hoped Miss Tamworth–Cassie–would believe him when he outlined the solution they had devised. When he finished, he stopped and looked to see if she had any reaction.
“So there never was a second woman?” He could not read the expression in her eyes.
“That is correct. The scandal was one Louisa and I purposely created. But now you know the truth behind it.”
He laughed, unable to avoid an edge of bitterness in it. “My mother was very concerned that the mysterious other woman I have never identified would rise up and try to come between you and me.”
“Your mother approved of our courtship? I must say I found her intimidating. She is a very imposing woman.”
That made him smile, and not just because she was becoming more engaged in the conversation. “She would be no match for you. She plots and schemes, and assumes others are doing the same thing, but you are far too intelligent not to see right through her if you came to know her.”
“At least she did not think that I am that other woman. It shocked me to discover that some people at the ball decided that I must be her, since they had no other idea of who I might be or why I was there.”
“Idiots. Idiots and idiotic gossip. I am truly sorry you were subjected to hearing them. And that is all part of the problem of creating a scandal in the first place–it encourages rumors and gossip. I had planned simply to weather it until attention turned to some new scandal, as it usually does in time. My reputation is hardly spotless, although there had been nothing as bad as this. They tell me it will only end once I marry….” He trailed off, realizing he had reached treacherous ground.
“Why did you change your mind about waiting for it to pass?”
He rubbed a hand over his face. “I never thought it would reflect on my sister. Poor Emma is hoping to attend the next season in London, but right now her reputation is stained by her kinship to me.”
“So it is true that you are under some pressure to marry, and quickly.”
“Yes, I cannot deny that.”
She tilted her head, her expression thoughtful. That was certainly an improvement over the hard and angry looks of earlier in the day. Dare he to hope he was making some headway?
“That brings us to the matter of Mrs. Darlington,” he said.
“Yes. Mr. Haslitt’s opinion was that you might very well marry her.”
“Which no doubt put a final nail in the coffin of your opinion of me, since I had asked to court you. Bleeding blazes! I apologize, but the speed and ease with which everything between us unraveled still astounds me.”
He opened his hands and held them out instinctively. He had nothing to hide, everything to plead, and yes, he felt helpless. The gesture could be taken in any of those ways.
“I have known Mrs. Darlington for years. She was not happily married, but becoming a wealthy widow has still been a difficult adjustment for her. We are friends, but I assure you, nothing more. She turns to me for advice–more as a sister than in any other role. She is not inclined to remarry, at least for now. Those are reasons enough why I would not marry her, even though it could be expedient. But there is another reason as well, one Mr. Haslitt was not aware of when you spoke.”
“What reason is that?”
He locked his gaze on her, hoping his heart might shine through his eyes. “I wish it were obvious to you. You are the one I care for.”