Page 9 of How to Cross a Marquess (The Way to a Lord's Heart 3)

He hadn’t been pleased, Fenella remembered. And he’d made no effort to hide his reluctance. But the others twitted him as a coward, or a bumpkin ignorant of the steps of the waltz. And so he had grabbed her, his arm tight around her waist, and spun her dizzily down the room. Fenella had found the dance intoxicating. She’d yielded to his masterful lead, senses swimming, until Lady Prouse returned and put a stop to their scandalous performance. “I wonder how Prudence is,” said Fenella.

Roger looked startled, as well he might. She’d been silent through much of the reel, and now she’d come out with this. He laughed. “No one ever had a more inapt name. She’s the least prudent creature I can imagine.”

Before he could think of that long-ago waltz, Fenella rushed on. “She married a man from Hertfordshire. The Prouses usually go to visit her down there.”

Roger nodded. “Do you remember those tableaus she organized one Christmas? Weren’t you in one?”

Fenella fought the blush, but it won out. Prudence had given her the part of winged Victory, to her utter delight. Even though she knew it was because she was the slightest girl and willing to perch on a tall plinth. But the diaphanous toga sort of thing she’d been draped in had turned out to be quite transparent when the banks of candles were lit for the tableaus. She’d been virtually naked, four feet above people’s heads. Her father had roared with fury.

“Oh yes,” said Roger. A spark lit his blue eyes.

He’d remembered. Of course he had. How could he not? “That incident gave me an enduring hatred of sarsenet,” Fenella said dryly. “I’ve never worn it since.”

He burst out laughing, which had been her aim. The music ended. Fenella stepped away, more breathless than a bit of dancing could explain. Roger left her with a smiling bow, shifting to another partner for the next dance.

“You and Chatton move well together,” said Lady Prouse at Fenella’s shoulder.

Fenella turned to find a speculative gleam in her hostess’s eye. She resisted pressing her hands to her flushed cheeks. Or saying anything that might encourage matchmaking. “Have you seen my nephew?”

“He asked about our library,” replied Lady Prouse, looking mildly disappointed at this response.

Fenella found John among the books. He was reading one about India, and he looked tired. She gathered him up to take him home to bed—and probably face the wrath of Wrayle, but she cared very little about that.

* * *

The local church service on Sunday held a good deal of interest for the Chatton Castle neighborhood, which seldom received strangers. Additions to society were always welcome in this isolated corner of the country.

The castle party itself included a distinguished older gentleman. Whispers soon identified him as an earl, and he was seen to be quite friendly with Lady Chatton, rousing a buzz of curiosity. There was also an unknown youngster at the far end of the castle pew, homely but amiable-looking. His status couldn’t be agreed upon within the limited opportunities for gossip inside the church. He did not appear the least cowed by noble company.

The group from Clough House also brought a new member, a slender boy soon identified as the old gentleman’s grandson. Parishioners murmured that this visit must be pleasant for the old man in his sickness. He hadn’t been seen in church, or anywhere else, since being felled by the apoplexy.

The vicar’s sermon that day added to the excitement of the occasion. Rather than his usual homily on responsibility or compassion, he stated that his subject would be Cuthbert, the area’s patron saint and, he declared, the savior of England. “For after this holy man’s death and the many miracles due to his intercession, Cuthbert came in a dream to Alfred, known as the Great, King of Wessex. Alfred was then engaged in a mighty struggle against the Danes, invaders from over the sea.”

The vicar paused and raked the congregation with his gaze. Roger, directly under his eye in the front, was taken aback. Reverend Cheeve was usually the mildest of men, but today his green eyes burned with fervor.

The man shook back the wide sleeves of his surplice, put a hand on either side of the pulpit, leaned forward, and continued. “Calling himself a soldier of Christ in this dream, Cuthbert told the king what he needed to do. Alfred must arise at dawn and sound his horn three times. Cuthbert promised that by the ninth hour, the king would have assembled five hundred men. And within seven days Alfred would have gathered, through God’s gift and Cuthbert’s aid, an army to fight at his side and vanquish the Danes. And so it happened. The battle was won. And England wasnotconquered.”

Roger stifled an impulse to applaud. Cheeve might have been rousing a fighting troop rather than preaching. Far more entertaining than his customary platitudes. The vicar did circle back after this to relate his story to his listeners, urging them to put their trust in the lord. But the jolt of energy he’d provided remained in the air. Roger put a bit extra in the collection plate to show his appreciation. He also congratulated Cheeve on a fine sermon as he passed through the church door after the service.

Outside, Roger came face-to-face with Fenella Fairclough, for the first time since their invigorating reel at the Prouses’. And he couldn’t help thinking that she looked particularly pretty this morning, curvaceous and assured in a deep-blue gown that echoed the hue of her eyes, with a shawl falling artistically over her shoulders. Her face, half-shaded by a chip straw bonnet, reminded Roger of an antique cameo. If such a piece of jewelry could shift expressions like wind passing over water, he amended.

The press of people leaving the church urged him on, and they moved away together. “This is my nephew John Symmes,” she said, indicating a dark-haired boy at her side. “Greta’s son. John, this is Lord Chatton, a neighbor of ours.”

“You live in the castle,” said the boy.

“I do.”

“John is spending his holiday with us,” Fenella added.

“Ah.” Seeing his mother and houseguest ahead, Roger moved toward them. “We have a visitor as well. Up from London. Lord Macklin, may I present Miss Fairclough and…” But young Symmes had faded into the small crowd between one step and the next. He appeared to be gone.

Roger’s mother offered happy greetings, and Macklin acknowledged the introduction with his habitual composure. Roger was about to suggest that they depart when Harold Benson edged around Macklin, plump and furtive to the earl’s tall and distinguished. Indeed, the self-appointed historian was half crouching, so that his rotund figure looked even more squat. “I’m avoiding Cheeve,” he informed them. “He thinks I can guarantee him the part of St. Cuthbert in the pageant, but I can’t. That decision is not up to me. He’s wasted his oratory.”

Benson moved so that Roger was between him and the church door, where the vicar still lingered. “But I have been asked to speak to you again, Lord Chatton. And also to Miss Fairclough. I’m happy to find you together. There’s a scene in the pageant that is part of a Viking raid on the Lindisfarne manor, and the committee wondered, hoped, that you two might enact it. As a gesture of support for the enterprise. To help make the venture a success, you know. And reflect well on the neighborhood.”

Despite this blatant hint, Roger started to refuse, but Fenella spoke first. “What sort of scene?”

“A Saxon noblewoman repels the Viking attacker with a broom.”

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