Page 30 of Oddity of the Ton
“No,” he said, ungraciously. “I won’t.”
“Don’t youwanta wife?”
“At the moment, all I want is solitude.” Ignoring her protests, he strode across the room and headed for the terrace doors. Lady Arabella stepped into his path, her eyes shining with triumph.
Clearly she believed he was in a hurry to partner her, as opposed to being in a hurry to getawayfrom her.
“Oh, Your Grace…” she began.
“Excuse me,” he said, veering to one side.
She scowled, giving him a glimpse of what would be in store for him for the rest of his life were he to shackle himself to her.
Once outside, he closed the terrace doors behind him and drew in a deep breath, cleaning his lungs with the night air. Strains of music filtered through the doors, and he strode across the terrace and leaned on the balustrade, looking out into the garden bathed in moonlight.
Incivility had its benefits, not least the ability to extract oneself from disagreeable company. Doubtless Lady Arabella would describe him asthe very worst of brutesto that sharp-nosed friend of hers.
Let them! They believed him to have a heart of ice—but they were wrong. Ice, like his interest in a woman, melted away with each encounter, until it was no more. His heart was fashioned from granite—a stone that, no matter how belligerently a womantried to erode it, remained as cold and as fixed as it had ever been.
“Oh, Lady Arabella,” he said. “How little you know of my heart!”
A sound—like a small cry—came from the end of the terrace, where the surrounding trees cast deep shadows.
“Who’s there?” he called.
He discerned faint shapes in the darkness—a stoneware urn bearing a plant with thick, sharp-edged leaves, a pair of statues guarding a gap in the balustrade where a staircase descended into the gardens, and a row of bushes lining the far wall.
He took a step forward, then froze. A faint rustling sound carried across the terrace—too deliberate to be attributed to the wind.
Had Mother sent someone to spy on him?
“Show yourself!” he demanded.
One of the bushes seemed to be quivering, though there was no wind. As his eyes grew accustomed to the dark, he thought he could discern a shadow within the bush. Was it a spy—or perhaps another man, seeking respite from the flesh market inside?
“You’re at liberty to tarry here as much as I,” he said. “If you’re here to escape the company inside, then I applaud your good taste.”
His words were met with silence.
“Of course, if you’ve no right to be here, then I’m within my rights to alert the Duke of Westbury to a trespasser. One of my fellow guests is a magistrate, I believe.”
He smiled to himself. The threat of the authorities would flush out any coward.
Then he saw it—at the base of the bush. A shape, moving along the ground, about the size of a man’s hand. A long nose,black eyes gleaming in the moonlight, stubby legs, and a body covered in spikes.
He approached the bush and the creature froze. The nose seemed to withdraw into the body, together with the legs, until all that remained was a ball of spikes.
He burst out laughing. What a fool he was to think someone was there! No wild animal would have ventured so close to the bush if that were true.
“I know how you feel, little fellow,” he said. “My spikes may be invisible, but I wear them as you do, to ward off predators.
He pulled his gloves out of his pocket, slipped them on, then picked up the creature, wincing as one of the spikes penetrated the fabric.
“Let me take you to safety,mon ami.”
He descended the staircase and placed the hedgehog in a sheltered corner of the main garden. When he glanced back toward the terrace, he saw a shadow moving across the balustrade. Then he blinked and it was gone.
Chapter Eleven
