‘Good morning, Miss Wickford,’ he said softly, making the officer start and spill what remained of the tea that had gathered in his saucer down his scarlet jacket. ‘Won’t you introduce me to your new friend?’
Georgiana’s lips compressed in annoyance. As though to say the man wasn’t her friend at all. However, manners obliged her to provide the information he’d requested.
‘Lord Ashenden, this is Major Gowan.’
Major Gowan looked torn between reaching for a napkin to mop up the tea trickling down the front of his jacket and sticking out his hand to shake. Edmund solved his dilemma by whisking a handkerchief from his own pocket and extending it to the Major. The action also solved his own dilemma, borne of his extreme reluctance to extend his hand to this man in friendship. Or even common politeness.
‘Thank you, my lord,’ said the Major, dabbing at the damp blotch. It would probably leave a stain. And tea stains were notoriously difficult to remove, he reflected with satisfaction. ‘Dashed awkward, handling such tiny cups, with hands my size.’
‘Indeed,’ he said coolly, eyeing the man’s sausage-like fingers.
‘Don’t know why women must insist on serving such pap anyway. Would all do much better for a decent glass of brandy.’
‘Ale, surely, at this time of the day?’ Edmund glanced at Georgiana, who was, at least, shooting her silent daggers at the Major now, rather than at him.
‘Ale?’ The Major looked outraged. But then he darted a look round the drawing room and pulled a face. ‘Oh! Yes, of course. Need to keep one’s wits about one when dealing with the fair sex.’
‘Only when dealing with the fair sex? Dear me,’ he said softly. And had the pleasure of seeing Georgiana bite her lower lip, while her eyes lit with amusement. ‘Of course, you hold a commission in a cavalry regiment, don’t you?’
‘Yes, that’s right,’ said the Major, impervious to the slight he’d made by drawing the inference between belonging to a cavalry regiment and his reluctance to use his wits. ‘Was just telling Miss Wickford here about my absolute passion for horseflesh. Something we share, by all accounts, eh, what?’
He’d turned to Georgiana as he made the remark, but since he didn’t raise his gaze to the level of her face when he made it, he completely missed the way she rolled her eyes.
‘Do you have something in your eye?’ Edmund enquired politely.
She glared at him. But only briefly, for the Major ceased his keen observation of her cleavage for a second, to look up in bewilderment.
‘In her eye? What? Eh?’
‘A mote of dust, perchance?’
‘No, it isn’t dust,’ she snapped. ‘That is,’ she added more politely, after glancing in her stepmother’s direction, ‘I have nothing in my eye.’
‘Then why were you squinting?’ He removed his spectacle case from his pocket, took out his spectacles, hooked the wires over his ears, and leaned closer as though inspecting her eyes. He came close enough to smell her perfume. It was predominantly something herbal. It made him wonder if she’d rinsed her hair with a decoction of rosemary. It was certainly glossy. Like silk.
Just as he was wondering whether her hair would feel as silky as it looked, he noted an increased tension about her shoulders, as though she was flexing one of the muscles in her arm. Or clenching her fist. Or at least thinking about clenching it.
‘Your pupils are constricted,’ he said. ‘As though the light is bothering you.’
‘The light?’ Major Gowan looked up at the cloudy sky through the window, in disbelief.
‘Of course, the light on a day like this would not bother most men,’ he said, turning his attention to the Major, ‘since we spend a great deal of time out of doors. But the fairer sex, you know, are confined within doors for such long periods that at this time of the year, when the days begin to grow longer, it can be quite painful for them to expose the delicate membranes of the optical orb to sunlight. Particularly the sort which comes through west-facing windows.’
‘Is that so?’ Major Gowan regarded him with astonishment.
‘Oh, absolutely,’ he said with a completely straight face. ‘I recommend removal from the area at once, Miss Wickford. Before permanent damage is done. We do not wish the squint to become permanent, do we?’
‘Squint?’ the Major echoed, looking at Georgiana’s beautiful brown eyes in alarm. ‘No, certainly don’t wish you to acquire a squint.’
‘In that case, Miss Wickford, I must insist that you move away from the window at once.’
When she opened her mouth to utter what would probably have been a pithy account of her estimation of the nonsense he’d been spouting, he adopted his most severe expression.
‘Allow me,’ he said, ‘the privilege of a long-standing acquaintance to escort you to another part of the room. A safer environment.’ He crooked his arm. She took a deep breath. And narrowed her eyes. It was touch and go, for a moment, whether she would take it or not. He could see part of her still wishing to hit him, or shout at him, or simply flounce away. Any of which would prove fatal to her social standing.
Fortunately, another part of her was looking for an excuse to escape the Major. And it was that part of her that accepted his offer. That placed her hand on his arm and allowed him to steer her to the one remaining sofa without occupants, with meekly downbent head.
The moment she sat down, however, she shot him a challenging look from beneath her lush dark lashes.
‘You really are the most complete...’
‘I know,’ he replied calmly, sitting down beside her. ‘But the Major believed every word, which was the main thing.’
‘I know, I cannot believe he swallowed such a...plumper!’
‘My dear, have you not heard the opinion the infantry hold of the cavalry?’ My dear? He’d called her my dear? He would just have to hope she didn’t make an issue of it, but just assumed it was the kind of thing he said to every female he chatted with during at-homes. From now on, it might be a good idea to do just that. ‘That all the brains in those regiments reside in the four-legged troopers?’
‘No. I have not yet held a conversation with anyone from the infantry.’
‘I doubt very much that you have held one with a cavalry officer, either,’ he said dryly. ‘Though really, you could do with learning something about tactics.’
‘Tactics?’ Her eyes narrowed with suspicion.
‘Yes. For example, when choosing one’s ground, one should always have a means of...ah, swift retreat. Have you not heard of the expression, fighting with one’s back to the wall?’
‘I certainly know what it feels like,’ she said with feeling.
‘Then next time, I trust that you will not retreat into a corner before you have even engaged with the enemy.’
She nodded. ‘I shall certainly regard these at-homes more in the light of skirmishes, from now on.’
‘And employ a suitably defensive strategy? I may not always be around to come to your rescue.’
‘I—’ She swallowed back what looked like an indignant retort with a great effort. ‘I suppose you wish me to thank you,’ she said through gritted teeth.
‘No thanks necessary,’ he said with a languid wave of his hand. ‘I am sure you would have come up with some means of escaping that booby, eventually.’
She darted him a look of surprise.
‘You