The Wooing of Miss Masters

  And Raeburn? Would he forget? Likely he was quite vexed with her for running off with no explanation. At this thought, Audra nearly laughed aloud despite her melancholy humor. In view of Raeburn's temper, which rivaled her own, saying that the man would be vexed was rather like calling the conflagration that burned down the house a trifle warm.

  But no matter how furious he was, he would get over it. No man could tolerate as many snubs as she had dealt him. He would curse her, but then he would direct his attention elsewhere, back to his task of finding a bride, filling the castle nursery with heirs.

  As for herself, she needed only to put the events of last night from her mind. The infamous ball was finally over. She could go back to her own quiet existence.

  But that was the very deuce of it. She was not sure that she could, whether she was destined to be haunted forever by the feeling she might have let something infinitely precious slip away from her.

  Her one true friend.

  Wondering why she should even be thinking such depressing thoughts, Audra leaned back her head, closing her eyes. She was weary enough that she might have dozed off for a few moments, but Mrs. McGuiness stepped into the parlor to announce she had a caller.

  "Tell, whoever it is that I am not at home," Audra said.

  "But it is your uncle, the Reverend Mr. Masters."

  Audra's eyes flew open. What had brought him out to Meadow Lane so early in the day? Perhaps the old man justifiably had a few questions regarding what had happened at the ball last night. She had never thought the time would come when she would be so reluctant to see her favorite relative, but she wished Uncle Matthew would have given her a few days to recuperate before facing him.

  She was not even given a few seconds, for he found his own way into the parlor. Somberly attired in black, somehow even his clerical collar failed to dispel his air of roguishness. The white waves of his hair were as ever neatly bound into a queue, the nip of autumn reddening his plump cheeks and nose. The familiar spring to his step caused Audra to eye him with some resentment.

  No man of his years should be looking so bustling after having lingered into the wee hours at a ball, especially not when she was feeling so dragged out herself. She roused herself enough to stand and greet him with a kiss.

  "Good morrow, Uncle Matt."

  "So the gel remembers who I am," the old man said. "I was beginning to wonder after being abandoned at the castle like a forgotten parasol or some other frippery to be fetched later."

  "I am sorry, sir. Did not Jack Coachman explain how Cecily had been taken ill? I instructed him to do so."

  "Humph!" He eyed Audra in a penetrating manner she found most uncomfortable.

  "Truly, sir, she was. I have been up half the night with her. I don't know what could have come over her so suddenly. A touch of influenza perhaps."

  "More like a touch too much of champagne," Uncle Matthew said as he made himself at home, settling into Audra's armchair.

  "Champagne!" Audra exclaimed. "Muffin was drinking champagne? She has never taken anything stronger than lemonade."

  "A girl must have her first sips sometime. Everyone must eventually learn to deal with the fruit of the vine." Uncle Matthew raised his eyes piously. "I, myself, have devoted half my life to the study of the brew."

  But Audra only shook her head, this new information lashing her with remorse, adding to her burden of guilt. "I should have watched Cecily more closely last night. I should have taken better care of her."

  "Nonsense. The girl had plenty of care. That Coleby woman was there, wasn't she? And Lady Augusta was most gracious and attentive to the child, introducing her to eligible partners."

  "Did she do so? I fear I didn't notice." No, Audra scolded herself, because you were far too taken up with noticing the lady's brother.

  "For my part," Uncle Matt said, pausing to help himself to a pinch of snuff, "I was glad to see you less absorbed in hovering over your sister and more bent on enjoying yourself. You did enjoy the ball, did you not?"

  "It was tolerable." She hated the shrewd look the rector gave her.

  He heaved a deep sigh. "I wish I could say I thought that the duke found it so. But he looked quite glum, poor fellow. Especially at the supper hour."

  "Oh, no! Did he?" Audra cried. Feeling a self-conscious blush about to steal into her cheeks, she turned abruptly to face the window. "I mean, I am sure that is a deal too bad."

  "I never saw any man appear so pulled down," her uncle continued mournfully. "However his spirits seemed somewhat improved when he called upon me this morning."

  "He what?"Audra whipped about, gaping at her great-uncle. Her uncle took an unmercifully long time about responding, being more absorbed in his snuff.

  "The duke visited you?" she prompted. "Why?"

  "Why not, my dear? Though the Raeburn family never attended my church, I've known His Grace since the days he was in short coats, although it has been many years since I had set eyes upon him." Uncle Matthew chuckled. "I believe he was agreeably surprised last evening to discover me still alive."

  "That does not explain what His Grace wanted of you this morning."

  "Merely to talk."

  "Talk? Talk about what?"

  "Many things. The scriptures, moral tracts. His Grace is a most learned man."

  "And I don't doubt that he's every bit as pious as you are. Don't tease, Uncle. What did that man really want? Did it have anything to do with—"

  She never had the opportunity to complete the question for at that moment the housekeeper bustled into the parlor, to announce that another carriage had arrived.

  "Tell whoever it is that I am not at home," Audra said tersely.

  "But this time, it is your aunt, miss."

  Audra felt as though she were already up to her eyebrows with vexing relatives. "That's impossible," she snapped. "I haven't got an aunt within a hundred miles of here."

  "Well, there's one whose maid is piling up bandboxes in the front hall this very moment, miss." Mrs. McGuiness said dourly. "Come all the way from London, so she says. But if you think the woman is an imposter—" The housekeeper shrugged, preparing to retreat.

  "Wait!" Audra cried. "From London? Not Aunt Saunders?"

  "The very same, miss." Mrs. McGuiness smirked. Audra sometimes wondered if her housekeeper would announce even the beginning of Armageddon with such grim satisfaction.

  Audra braced herself against Uncle Matt's chair for support. She could not have been more astounded and dismayed than if a bolt of lightning had rent her house asunder. Mrs. Prudence Saunders, here at Meadow Lane? Audra had little time to collect herself, only exchange a startled glance with Uncle Matthew before the lady was ushered into the room.

  It had been many years since Audra's disastrous Season in London when she had parted from her aunt upon such bad terms. But her mother's elder sister still appeared as spare and austere as Audra remembered her, a veritable icicle of a woman, her fine-boned frame garbed in silvery gray.

  Audra often thought nature had divided her gifts most unfairly between Lady Arabella and Mrs. Saunders. While Mama had got all the dimpled prettiness and too much of a zest for life, Aunt Prudence received more than her share of common sense and rigid propriety. So much so that it rendered the woman rather joyless.

  Her eyes were so pale a blue as to be almost mild, insignificant. Aunt Saunders remedied this defect by frequent use of a lorgnette, which device she now trained upon Audra, subjecting her to a critical inspection.

  Audra suddenly felt all of nineteen again, gawky and hopelessly inadequate. She tugged nervously at her lace spinster's cap, smoothing back a stray curl.

  "Well, miss," Mrs. Saunders rapped out. "I have had a long and disagreeable journey from London. Do you mean to stand there forever gaping at me?"

  "N-no, Aunt I . . ." Audra managed to sink into an awkward curtsy. "It is only what a shock . . . I mean, what a surprise to see you here."

  Embracing Aunt Saunders was out of the question, b
ut the woman did deign to offer Audra two fingers to clasp.

  "Did you not send me a letter full of the most extraordinary supplication on your sister's behalf?" her aunt asked.

  "Well, yes, I did." Audra refrained from saying that she had thought it likely her aunt had consigned her appeal to the fireplace grate. Certainly she had never expected Aunt Saunders to come swooping all the way down from London like one of the Furies of legend.

  All the way from London? Of a sudden, the full import of her aunt's visit dawned upon Audra, what Mrs. Saunders's purpose must be. A wild hope stirred within her.

  "Oh, aunt, you have decided to bring Cecily out this Season. You have come to fetch her to London. I shall go tell my sister at once. She will be overjoyed."

  "Not so fast, miss," Aunt Saunders said before Audra could dash from the room. "I have not entirely forgotten certain past disasters. Although I fully appreciate my duty toward my nieces, I am much more careful these days who I take on as a protégé. I shall have to inspect the girl first."

  Audra wanted to retort that Cecily was not a horse, but she managed to curb her tongue. She took a deep breath, reminding herself that Mrs. Saunders was Cecily's best, perhaps her only chance of a Season in London.

  "Of course, Aunt," she agreed. "But I am sure you will find my sister quite charming. Not in the least like me."

  "I hope so," Mrs. Saunders said frostily. She then leveled her lorgnette at the parlor, subjecting the comfortable room to her disapproving gaze. She drew up short, nearly dropping her glass when she came to the old gentleman ensconced by the hearth.

  Audra had all but forgotten Uncle Matthew's presence herself. Usually so quick to greet any feminine company, sweeping his most courtly bow, the Reverend Mr. Masters had not stirred at the sight of Mrs. Saunders. Now he rose stiffly to his feet, made the barest nod instead of his usual magnificent leg.

  "Aunt Saunders," Audra began. "This is my—"

  "I know who it is." Mrs. Saunders gave a shudder of distaste. "We met before, at the time of your sister's christening,"

  "Indeed," Audra murmured nervously. She had heard some tale passed through the family of some unpleasantness between Mrs. Saunders and the Reverend Mr. Masters, but she had never credited it. Surely not even such an old rogue as her uncle would ever have been tempted to pinch Aunt Saunders.

  "Madam," he said. "I would like to say I am pleased to make your acquaintance again."

  But I am not. Her uncle might as well have added the words. His manner proclaimed it. After clasping Mrs. Saunders hand, he actually returned to the fire, holding out his fingers to the blaze as if he had been nipped by frostbite.

  Aunt Saunders turned away from him with a scornful sniff. "And where is Cecily? I should like to see the child at once."

  "Oh, no!" Audra protested, her mind filling with a vision of Cecily with her bloodshot eyes, recovering from a bout of too much champagne. "That is, I fear my sister is still abed."

  "At this hour! I hope she is not of a frail nature. I despise sickly people."

  "No, truly, Cecily blooms with good health. She is . . . merely being fashionable. She has heard that in London all proper young ladies spend their morning abed, and Cecily always tries to be proper."

  "That sounds promising. Very well. Then show me to your guest room so that I may rid myself of the dust of the road. I shall expect the child to put in her appearance by teatime.

  "Certainly, Aunt."

  Audra held open the door herself, eager to escape from the room especially as she could tell that Uncle Matthew was seething with indignation, ready to burst from the desire to vent his opinion of Mrs. Saunders's introduction into the household.

  As soon as she saw her aunt settled into the cottage's one spare bedchamber, Audra instructed Mrs. McGuiness to fetch her uncle some port, hoping that it would put the old gentleman in a mellow frame of mind so that he would do or say nothing to affront Mrs. Saunders.

  Feeling rather harried, Audra rushed to Cecily's bedchamber. Flinging back her curtains to let in the light, Audra called out, "Hurry, Muffin, you must get up."

  The only response was a moan. Cecily's muffled voice came from beneath the lacy white counter-pane. "Please don't shout, Audra. I am dying."

  Audra darted over to Cecily's wardrobe, rapidly inspecting her array of dresses. "Now what must you wear?" she muttered. "Something demure, but quite elegant, I think."

  "All I need is a winding sheet," Cecily said. "You may have my best brooch, Audra. And give Uncle Matthew my miniature to remember me by."

  Audra paused, long enough to give the mound upon the bed an impatient glance. "You must rouse yourself, Cecily. Aunt Saunders has arrived from London to see you."

  "Upon my death bed?"

  "No, you goose. To see if you are in fit state to be conveyed to London and got ready for your coming out."

  "What!" Cecily emerged from beneath the bedclothes, sitting bolt upright.

  "I suppose I must tell Aunt Saunders she has arrived too late, only in time to witness your demise—"

  But with a tiny shriek, her sister bolted off the bed. "Oh, Audra, you must send Heloise to me at once with the curling iron. I've got to do something with my hair, and where are my sandals?"

  As Cecily darted frantically about the room, Audra retreated with a wry smile. Never had a dying woman made so miraculous a recovery.

  The wine Mrs. McGuiness served the Reverend Mr. Masters must have been soured, for the first thing the old man did when Audra returned to the drawing room was to demand when she intended to send that woman packing.

  "Mrs. McGuiness?" Audra said lightly. "Well, I grant she is not always the most cheerful creature but—"

  "You know who I mean, miss. That winged harpy from London. That Medusa who must have you already turned to stone. Meekly accepting all her insults, behaving like some milk and water miss!"

  "But you must see what an opportunity this is for Cecily, Uncle. You yourself said this reclusive life-style was bad for the child. If my aunt takes her to London, Cecily's future will be assured."

  "And yours?"

  "Then I will not be obliged to attend balls anymore. I may actually find time to read again."

  "That was not what I had in mind!" Quivering with indignation, her uncle strode to the bellpull and rang for the housekeeper to demand his hat and cloak.

  "You won't be staying for tea, Uncle?" Audra asked, ashamed for feeling slightly relieved.

  "In the company of that woman? No, thank you. I prefer my afternoon tea a little on the sweet side and not with curdled milk."

  Barely pausing to shrug into his cloak, Uncle Matthew jammed his tricorne upon his head and exited from the lodge in a state of high dudgeon.

  Audra sighed, regret at seeing her favorite uncle driven from her door mingling with a foreboding of the hours that stretched ahead of her.

  But somehow she managed to scrape through the rest of the afternoon. Aunt Saunders, unaccustomed to country hours, was not pleased to hear how early they supped at Meadow Lane.

  "And you employ a female to cook for you, Audra?" she complained. "I would have thought the time you spent with me in London would have given you some better notion of how to conduct a household. But there—" Aunt Saunders gave a shrug of resignation, that martyred expression Audra remembered too well.

  Cecily had retired to change again for dinner. As Audra and her aunt waited for the girl in the parlor, watching the sun set over the garden, neither woman had much to say, which Audra feared was just as well.

  She was relieved when Cecily finally did join them. The girl was looking particularly sweet with a ribbon catching back her blond curls, her dainty form garbed in tawny-pink taffeta. She had even tied an absurd little bow onto Frou-frou's collar.

  The vision of such a perfect young lady should have pleased Aunt Saunders, but she merely pursed her lips, staring through her lorgnette.

  "I have never approved of a dog being brought into the parlor, Cecily."

 
"It's not a dog, Aunt," Audra said, "It's a pug."

  Although Cecily looked a little crestfallen at her aunt's disapproval, she hastened to say, "Frou-frou is very well behaved, Aunt Saunders, but I shall make sure you won't be bothered. I will make her stay over here in her basket quite out of the way."

  Muffin was trying so hard to please. It would not have hurt that poker-faced old witch to offer her one encouraging smile.

  It was worse somehow watching Cecily pinned beneath her aunt's critical eye than any agonies Audra had ever endured when herself a victim of that infernal lorgnette. But she struggled to curb her resentment.

  Her aunt summoned Cecily to sit beside her on the settee. "So, child," Mrs. Saunders said. "You have grown a great deal since I last saw you, but happily not so tall as your sister. You have been living mostly with Audra then? A rather odd arrangement, I must say, but then I understand your late father was singularly without relatives and as for your mama . . . Well!" Aunt Saunders gave an expressive shrug. "So I suppose Audra has had a great deal of influence over your education?"

  "Oh, yes, aunt," Cecily began, innocently unaware of the danger lurking beneath the question. "Audra always made sure that I could ride well and—"

  "But for the last two years," Audra hastily interposed, "Cecily has been attending Miss Hudson's Academy."

  "Indeed? I am relieved to hear it. And what accomplishments have you acquired, child?"

  While poor Cecily stammered on through this inquisition, Audra was virtually ignored. She drifted toward the window to peer out at the garden. Not even the moon was out tonight, leaving the landscape beyond a black rustling void. It was the sort of chilly evening best spent alone, curled before the fire with a good book. Or if not alone, at least with someone more congenial than Aunt Saunders, someone not given to the fidgets like Muffin. A someone also disposed to read, or to talk about something besides ladies' hats, to jest a little or merely to sit and watch the fire crackle in companionable silence.

  A someone Audra had never been able to imagine clearly until now. But the night itself seemed alive with raven-black hair and dark eyes, a heavy scowl that when it did lighten to a smile, was capable of warming nights far colder than this one.