“Put it in your mouth, love, but have a care not to swallow it.” Harriet nodded her head in encouragement when Nicholas swung his wide-eyed gaze between them, full of doubt.
“My brother was rejected at first for classes at the King’s Inns in Dublin because of his speech problem. But he refused to give up, choosing instead to practice speaking skills under the hardest circumstances he could invent.” Richard shifted uncomfortably on the rocky beach with the scree biting into the bottoms of his boots.
Nicholas bounced with excitement, apparently oblivious to the shore stones’ discomfort on the soles of his sturdy half-boots. “What did he do?”
“Every day he’d go down to the loch near our cottage and pick up a large stone to put in his mouth. He’d walk along the shore and recite poetry, or sing, around the obstruction. It made him slow down to think and be deliberate about what he said. He learned to speak with confidence. He applied again a year later and was accepted. He continued his studies and now is a barrister in the Dublin courts.”
Nicholas gave them a dubious look. “But…I don’t know what to say.”
“Surely you’ve memorized a line of poetry or two.” Richard cocked his head and motioned for the boy to continue.
Nicholas shook his head in a stubborn, swiveling motion.
“Nicholas, Lord Blandford, that is a monstrous lie.” Lady Blandford chucked her son beneath his chin, forcing him to look into her eyes. “You help Nana practice her lines all the time, and I know she’s made you learn a sonnet or two.”
He hung his head for a moment and then faced Richard defiantly. “Shw…shall I coompare thwee…thee do, er twu…to a…” His facial expression froze.
Richard knew of course the next word in the Bard’s eighteenth sonnet -summer’s -presented a steep challenge for the boy. He and Lady Blandford sat on a nearby boulder and leaned back to wait. He forced a look of patience onto his face but couldn’t help tightening his grip on the rock face behind him.
“Ah…shwummer…ssssummer’s day.”
His mother clapped soundly and Richard stood to squeeze him on the shoulder. “Well done, Lord Blandford. Now, let’s hear it again.”
5
Harriet curled up on the window seat cushion, pushing into the softness with her stockinged feet. She sipped at a steaming cup of tea and stared out at the meadow behind the lodge where her archery targets threatened to lift off and fly out toward the stables. The October winds had blown so fiercely since early that morning, that she’d considered warning Nicholas and Lieutenant Bourne to stay away from the rocky shore below.
However, she knew she might as well save her strength for more profitable endeavors. The dogs and the two stubborn males would not be thwarted from their daily oratory practice. Even Fleur and Max now followed them as they walked and practiced lines from Shakespeare. Nana had threatened to join them, but Harriet had put her foot down at that cork-brained scheme.
Instead, she’d suggested perhaps her grandmother could provide Nicholas with small scenes he could memorize and practice along the shore with Lieutenant Bourne. Invoking even the thought of the dratted man’s name made her touch her fingers to her lips. They still burned from the unwise kisses they’d shared. All the good sense she’d gained through great suffering seemed to have flown off with the Cornish winds.
She had to keep bringing herself back to reality. Lieutenant Bourne was a maddeningly attractive naval officer who had traveled the world and probably had silly women pining for him in every port he’d ever visited. She harbored no illusions about her own ability, or even capacity to make him stay, or return to her. She shook her head hard. What a bunch of girlish daydreams after only a few, fleeting kisses. Kisses that probably meant little or nothing to him.
Richard, his name was Richard. She refused to let herself call him that, or even think of him as such. He had to leave before her cousin returned…before her silly heart began to believe he might stay.
She turned at a tap on the door. “Come.”
Carrick, the butler, deposited a letter with the duke’s seal on a tray on the table. “This came by special messenger just now, milady.” He paused as if awaiting further orders.
“Thank you. I’ll let you know if they’re on their way.”
He nodded and bowed low before leaving her in peace. She broke the seal to see how much time she had left before her cousin arrived, with his usual booming personality and over-weaning need to control her life. She knew he meant well, but she resented his clumsy attempts at matchmaking. Why couldn’t she live the rest of her life on her own, at peace?
When she ripped open the message, her fears were confirmed. The Duke of Sidmouth was already enroute from London. According to his message, he planned to return to Bocollyn House before proceeding on to the hunting lodge to discuss the progress of Harriet’s engagement with his neighbor, Viscount Grantham.
She calculated how long the letter had taken to arrive from London and realized her cousin had probably already arrived at Bocollyn House, just a few hours away by horseback on the estate. She had two to three days at most to clear the duke’s bedchambers of the inconvenient marine. Clearing the marine out of her heart and mind was not going to be so easy. And now Nicholas had turned into a devotee of the indispensable Lieutenant Bourne.
Steady on, she thought. There had to be a way to continue to have the lieutenant nearby to help Nicholas with his speech. She pushed away the small, nagging voice that accused: You meanyouwant him nearby. Those few kisses had not been enough.
Harriet crossed the room to a writing desk. She sat and selected a fresh nib, pulled the sand pot close, and pulled out a few fresh sheets of paper. First, she’d beg her neighbor, Captain Thorne, for a favor. Then she’d have to craft a more delicate missive for her cousin. One of the servants could deliver it within a day. He’d want to know why she hadn’t followed through with the proposal of marriage he’d arranged with Grantham. Better to get it over with before her interfering cousin arrived. She could not imagine why he’d cut short his wedding tour of the continent. She hoped the poor woman wasn’t increasing already.
Richard wasgrateful for the long overcoat Captain Bellingham had brought him, along with his meager uniform stash from the ship. The wind off the Channel was bitterly unforgiving. He’d wisely left his hat back at the lodge. The tall, stove-pipe-like admiralty issue would have sailed halfway back to London by now.
“I…if mwusic b…be the food of love, pway on.” Nicholas stumbled a bit in the push of the winds, and both dogs dashed to his side. Fleur gave him an anxious look and slathered the back of his hand with her huge tongue.
Richard scooped the boy up in his arms and tilted his head close so he could make himself heard. “Let’s call today a success and climb back up to the lodge.” When Nicholas made a low whining noise, Richard gave his best imitation of one of the stern looks his father had given him when he was a boy and held out his hand for the pebbles from young Lord Blandford’s mouth. Nicholas spit them out, one by one, while the dogs bayed in unison, obviously as eager as Richard to regain the warmth of the lodge.
At times like this, Richard found himself missing his father again. After all the times they’d butted heads in arguments and disagreements over the years, he was sure the elder Bourne would have a good laugh at the predicament Richard found himself in now. He’d come to care for Nicholas as if he were one of his younger brothers, but there were occasions when he knew the boy needed a stern taskmaster. He was terrified at the thought that he was the one responsible for helping Harriet’s son build confidence in his speech. He’d shepherded many young men in the ways of marine combat over the years, and most had survived battles on sea and land.
