“No indeed, Father. Please. I am well. Truly.” She pulled away from him and tugged the draperies over the window. “I am quite tired.”
“In bed with you then, my dear, and I shall tuck you in as I did when you were a child.”
“Father.”
“Permit an old man his fancy, will you not?” He smiled, setting the candlestick to the stand while she climbed into the four-poster bed.
Then he hovered over her, drawing the counterpane to her neck, with an expression as fond and concerned as if shewerea child. “I think perhaps we shall not yet go to London. You are too pale for the journey, and after your dreadful ordeal in the rain—”
“I am not ill, Father, and am of perfect strength. I should very much like to go to London.” Indeed, shemust.The thought of remaining here, with William outside these walls and the seashore close enough to taunt her—
“I have quite made up my mind. I shall not chance your health.”
“Father—”
“Please, my dear.” His flash of tears startled her. “I did not heed the signs of your mother’s declining strength, and by the time I realized her sickness, it was too late to remedy.”
She knew the tears were not for Mother, though. Why did that bother her?
“At any rate, you must not despair. I shall invite Lord Livingstone to remain here in our company, and I shall also prepare for a ball here at Sharottewood. Colonel Nagel’s regiment is camped outside the village, and with the militia joining us too, I believe we shall have a splendid guest list, despite those who are in London. Does that make you happy?”
No good would come of arguing with him. In matters of health, not even a pout could persuade him. “Yes. That would make me happy indeed.” But her quivering voice belied her words, and the second Father departed her chamber, she turned her face into the pillow and wept.
Leaving William and Sharottewood would have been difficult enough. Remaining was unbearable.
What was she going to do?
“Do you always awake looking so perfect?”
Isabella darted a glance about the breakfast room to make certain the footman, who was lowering a platter of buttered toast to the sideboard, did not hear such a remark. The last thing she wanted to be was the subject of servant gossip. “My lord, you should not say such things.”
“They do not please you?”
“No.” She forked a sausage. “They do not please me.”
“Most surprising, as other ladies find such complimentary comments endearing.”
“Have you such experience?”
“Pardon?”
“With other ladies.” Not that it truly mattered to her. She had seen more than one tribe of conniving mamas and daughters form about him, and it bore no effect on her.
Lord Livingstone smirked as if it did. “You must not be taunted with jealousy, Miss Gresham. My heart, as I have already declared to you, is irrevocably yours.”
“You are in error, my lord, as I was not fraught with jealousy. And I fear you are far too bold in your expression of affection—”
“One day we shall not play these silly games.” He lowered his teacup, pulled out his napkin, his gaze steady on her face. A nerve twitched his eye. “Shall we?”
Relief marched through her when Father entered the breakfast room, brushing at wrinkles in his tailcoat, though there weren’t any. “Ah, I see we are off to a rather early start. What shall the two of you be into today?”
Yesterday it had been battledore and shuttlecock in the yard. The day before, strolls in the garden. The day before that, word games in the drawing room.
“I rather imagined I might take Isabella for a ride.” Lord Livingstone tilted his head, and her heartbeat spiked at his proposal. “Provided she is agreeable to the idea, of course.”
“You need not persuade Isabella for a ride.” Father chuckled as he filled his gold-rimmed plate at the sideboard. “She would rather ride the countryside like a hoyden than remain at home and do her needlework, is that not so?”
“Yes.” She crunched her napkin and stood. “But I fear I am not quite up to the exertion today.”
