His amused smile softened her heart. If nothing else, she always had her uncle to converse with. To actually carry on a conversation of substance. To challenge her intellect, gain knowledge, and exchange ideas.
Perhaps if she did that enough, she would finally gain some of the real world experience she needed for her writing. But even she didn’t believe that.
***
Under normal circumstances, Jude would have quit the ball directly after his conversation with Bernard. He had received his orders, as strange as they were, and he was free to start them early should he care to set sail tonight.
And he would have done so, had he not overheard the brief exchange between the uncle and his niece.
Those few short phrases tossed between the two had furrowed their way under his skin. Most women at these balls were dressed to impress a duke, snag a husband, and submit themselves to their future marriage. Countless conversations he had undergone over the years still tortured him with their mind-numbing tedium. The exact color of a gown—when he had one time gone out of his way to compliment the lady on her red dress and she had corrected him stating it was crimson. The weather of the summer season; namely, and somehow inexplicably surprising, as if the woman hadn’t observed the pattern of summer weather over the last almost two decades. And of course the gossip. He shuddered, that being his least favorite of all.
If he did, perchance, find a girl willing to chat and she spilled gossip, that was his cue to pass the baton onto someone else. He was just not interested in hearing someone (who he didn’t really know) talk about someone else (who he surely didn’t know) do something to a third party (who he also didn’t know).
He had tried that life and left it behind for privateering. And if some (some being many) mistook him for a pirate, so be it. Either way it meant they would likely not be making attempts to secure his attentions. If his reputation had to suffer in order for him to avoid title-seeking women, he was content to make that sacrifice.
But that one little conversation had nudged something within him that he thought had died. The fact that something within him had budged at all indicated life was still present but perhaps had only fallen asleep. So…acting contrary to his natural inclinations and habits of the past decade (more or less), he followed the niece in hopes (that was exaggerating the feeling) of having a stimulating conversation with her himself. And perhaps he would even ask her to dance. What harm could come from one conversation?
It would be refreshing. And he wanted nothing more than to be refreshed. It sounded like the kind of experience he needed right about now.
Chapter 4
“SO, INTO KANT ARE you?”
Oh no. Dread filled his body, one shovelful of dirt at a time. He could feel the dirt piling up, heavy, grimy, threatening to tumble out of his mouth. Except it already had tumbled out, in the form of that atrociously horrendous, bacon-brained question.
Had it really been that long since he had tried to woo a woman? This couldn’t be considered wooing. This was scaring. Or worse, scarring. The last time he had even attempted to banter with a woman, he was absolutely sure it had been more smooth than this asinine approach. Surely, he had said something more charming about her dress, her eyes, her smile or something. Anything. A large part of him (also known as his dignity) wanted to slap his hand over his eyes and just walk away. At least he could keep his pride intact and recover alone. No one the wiser. She would never even have to know who he was or who had asked the question. The question to beat all ridiculous questions.
What the devil was he thinking? That had to be the worst line he had ever used on a woman. What was he hoping her response wouldbe? There was no great reply to such a dimwitted question. So all things considered, her answer wasn’t terrible.
“Can’t? What can’t I do?” The blank look on her face was nothing like what he had seen when he had observed her speaking with her uncle. Certainly, she hadn’t been sparkling or over emotive with him, but she had borne a sliver of a smile. It was obvious that she was comfortable and content speaking with her uncle, whereas right now, here with him, she was awkward and almost irritable.
He wanted to blame it on his moronic question.
“You read Kantian ethics?”
“No.” And that bland look that was at first forgivable was now vexing.
“You never discuss his categorical imperative?” He was no longer resenting those shovelfuls of dirt, in fact, he was almost welcoming them. Perhaps if he had enough of a pile, he could be completely disguised underneath it, and then he could burrow a tunnel out of this conversation. And why stop there? It only made sense to continue tunneling right out of this damn ballroom.
Her eyes went wide at his question though, and he thought for a split second that just maybe he had caught her in her lie. Though at this point only God knew two things: one, why she was lying, and two, why he even cared to catch her in it. There was only one thing he hated more than lying and that was ignorance. For this woman to be the bearer of both meant that she may as well have been waving two large red flags in front of a raging bull. (He, of course, being the bull about to charge and she the matador, though why he wanted to assign her that much power over him was beyond bewildering.)
This whole encounter was proving to be disastrous, just like every other run in with a woman at a ball. Or soiree. Or musicale. Or anything.
Bah! It was part of the reason he was a privateer in the first place. Part of it.
But then the vexatious double-dealer grabbed his hand and before he could register what she was saying, she was already pulling him onto the dance floor. He was fairly certain now, absolutely positive actually, that she had asked him to dance, but the question made about as much sense as his,Into Kant, are you?question. Ladies didn’t ask men to dance. It was unheard of.
Then again, it was also unheard of for women to be discussing the philosophy of ethics, so really, what did he expect from this woman? What he thought he would get, he didn’t. What he didn’t expect, he got.
At this point, he wasn’t sure he could distinguish left from right, so he went along with the dance. Which was another one of his not-best-ideas because a person really ought to be able to distinguish left from right when embarking on a dance. Even a simple one.
Amidst the befuddlement and therefore extra concentration on his steps, there wasn’t ample opportunity for conversation, but he did find himself nodding or answering yes to a few questions. Though he couldn’t be sure he recalled the questions, so his yesses might have been better answered as nos.
“So, you’re a pirate?”
“Yes.” He checked his feet, darted a look up, grabbed her hands and spun her around.
“That means you have a ship?”
