The housekeeper led her back to the start of the West Wing, across the entire gallery to the East Wing and through a large and rather formal saloon with gilded chairs and sofas set against the walls to a parlour with a much less formal feel. Chairs and a sofa were grouped about the fire. A couple of bureaux, a table and a pianoforte hugged the walls and a card-table with straight chairs around it occupied the open area opposite the fireplace. Standing before the mantel and leaning one arm along it stood Raoul, looking very much the marquis in a mulberry coat over a cream waistcoat, immaculate buckskin breeches and a fresh and intricately tied neck-cloth.
He smiled as she spotted him, flicking a glance down her gown and back up to her face. “Come in and sit down, ma’am.”
Ma’am? Felicity’s stomach dropped. He looked very much less approachable than he had throughout their unconventional journey, and she was attacked with both shyness and a flutter of butterflies in the stomach.
“I have put Miss Temple in the Blue bedchamber, my lord. If you will ring when the lady wishes to go there, I will send up one of the maids to conduct her.”
Raoul nodded. “Very proper.”
Felicity, her voice jumping, chimed in. “I think Mrs Astwick has realised I won’t be able to find my way by myself.”
He glanced from her to his housekeeper’s carefully neutral expression. “I am sure Miss Temple will very soon learn her way about. Or her ladyship may show her. That will be all, Mrs Astwick.”
The excessive formality was quite as oppressive as Felicity had feared, and she watched the housekeeper’s retreat with the oddest sensation of apprehension. Was she afraid to be alone with Raoul?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Felicity rushed into speech as she moved to take a chair as removed from where Raoul was standing as possible. “When may I meet your sister?”
“Presently.” He waited for her to be seated and dropped into the nearest chair, crossing his legs and leaning back, very much at his ease. “Lucille is at her lessons, I believe. I’ve sent a message up, so I daresay she will cajole Miss Wimbush into letting her curtail them directly.”
Felicity wanted to say she could wish Lady Lucille to arrive at once, but it would scarcely be polite. Her mind balked. Since when did she consider politeness when talking with Raoul? Only he looked so much a stranger in this environment, she hardly knew how to talk to him at all.
He was eyeing her with his enigmatic expression. “I am glad to see I will not be wasting my money.” Bewildered, Felicity blinked at him. He gestured towards her person. “The gown. It becomes you. I will say for Angelica that she has excellent taste.”
“In fact, I chose it,” snapped Felicity, unaccountably goaded.
His lips twisted in amusement. “Then I applaud your taste, ma’am.”
She flung up exasperated hands. “For heaven’s sake! I wish you won’t call me ma’am in that horrid way. It is bad enough without that.”
He raised an eyebrow. “What is bad enough?”
“All this!” She described an arc with her hand. “This grandeur!” She saw his brows draw together and leaned a little forward. “I don’t mean to disparage it, Raoul, but I can’t — I am not — It’s all so —”
“So grand? So formal?”
“Yes! I feel utterly unlike myself. And you are like a stranger! I’ve never been so uncomfortable in my life.”
He did not speak for a moment. His measured regard seemed to weigh her. He uncrossed his legs and sat up, leaning his arms along his knees, a frown creasing his brow. “Do you think you might perhaps be able to grow accustomed?” He threw up a hand as she opened her mouth to speak. “I do understand it is not what you are used to. But any new experience is bound to be difficult at first. Will you not give it a little time?”
“Time? But we only came here for a day or two.”
“To give you an opportunity to decide what you wish to do, exactly so. Well, there is no rush, is there? Allow me to spoil you a little, Felicity. You have not been well used and you deserve a trifle of consideration. Or don’t you think so?”
His tone was perfectly matter-of-fact, but Felicity could not listen to the words unmoved. Indeed, her eyes pricked and she was hard put to it not to burst into tears. Her voice was husky. “How is it you manage to be so kind, a man as provoking as you are?”
A smile twisted his lips. “Now you begin to sound more like yourself. Come, relax! I will engage to provoke you at every opportunity and you will very soon find the alien environment becoming all too familiar.”
She had to laugh, a little of her oppression dissipating. She did not answer him directly, instead fixing upon the portrait above the fireplace. “Is that your mother?”
He nodded and his face softened. “It is indeed. My father commissioned her portrait as soon as she was installed in the house. It is a Lynchmere tradition. She will give place to the next marchioness.”
His wife? The oddest stab afflicted Felicity’s bosom. A snatch of memory presented her with the animadversions of Silve and Hetty upon the prospect of either becoming Raoul’s wife, despite his undoubted eligibility. He was the bar. But they did not know him, not as she had come to know him.
She caught herself up. Where were her thoughts tending? He was speaking again and she snapped her attention in.
“There are later portraits in the gallery, along with past Lynchmeres and Ruscoes. I will show them to you.”
