“Then welcome home, old friend. We’ll have a drink to celebrate you coming to your senses and realizing what the poets already knew—there’s no place like England.”
“We’ll have that drink.” Harrison grabbed his side and grunted one last time. “But not tonight. It might be a few days before I’m up to matching you port for port, winning your blunt, or riding up north with you.”
Bray looked at Harrison’s face and nodded. There was a cut under his eye and at the corner of his lip, which was swelling rapidly. Blood had dripped onto his neckcloth, and his clothing was dirty and rumpled from the fight. Bray couldn’t help but think of Miss Prim calling his club the Heirs’ Club of Scoundrels. Looking at Harrison now, he realized she was right.
Damn, he couldn’t get Miss Prim off his mind, no matter what he was doing or thinking. Every last thought always came back to her.
The hell of it was that it bothered him less and less.
Chapter 11
I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial.
—Othello,act 2, scene 3.
It was the second day in a row for rare bright sunlight and azure blue skies. The heat of the sun felt good to the back of Bray’s neck as he walked up the stone path to Miss Prim’s house. He’d been an inconsiderate blackguard more times than he hadn’t, and it was unusual for his past transgressions to haunt him. In fact, other than Nathan Prim’s death, nothing ever did. But for several days now, he hadn’t been able to stomach the fact that Miss Prim thought he’d been knowingly malicious to her younger sisters.
That rankled.
He didn’t know much about children and nothing about girls. Except now he knew girls could squeal to the high heavens and make one want to put a pillow over one’s ears. They could cry for no reason and touch things they shouldn’t. They could be just as impolite, naughty, and playful as boys, but he would never mistreat them. And he didn’t even want to think about little Miss Missing-Teeth Bonnie hugging him. Most unfortunate of all was that he was their guardian until his runner could find that blasted viscount.
Last night while plowing through a bottle of claret and trying once again, but in vain, to play a game of cards without thinking about Miss Prim, he’d decided he must see her again. He wouldn’t rest until he’d taken her to task about her accusations. He wasn’t going to be able to let this be and get it out of his mind until he was sure Miss Prim and Proper knew he hadn’t kept Saint from them on purpose.
Bray reached to pick up the brass door knocker, but his hand closed around air as the door opened in front of him. Miss Sybil seemed shocked to see him standing there, but he was not surprised to see the little girl. Remembering what she did the last time she’d opened the door for him, he immediately flattened his hand against the wood and stuck his booted foot over the threshold so she couldn’t shut the door in his face again.
Her eyes widened in fear, and she stepped out on the stoop with him. “Are you here to take Saint from us?” she asked in a soft breathy voice.
Her question illustrated how necessary it was to clear things with her older sister once and for all. He leaned down to her and said, “No. He is yours for now and forever. I wouldn’t take him back even if you tried to give him to me.”
A wide smile spread across her face and wrinkled her nose. She whispered, “Thank you, but don’t talk so loud.”
Bray frowned. “Don’t talk so loud?” he repeated her words in a whisper.
Miss Sybil put her forefinger to her lips and said, “Shhh,” and pointed inside the house behind her.
“Why? Is someone sleeping?” he asked.
She shook her head and rose up on her tiptoes to get closer to him even though he was still bent down to her. “We’re playing blindman’s buff and Louisa isit,” she whispered with a mischievous gleam in her big blue eyes. “I’m hiding.”
Bray made a quick assessment of the situation. “Does she allow you to hide outside when you are playing the game?” he asked, following her orders and whispering again.
Miss Sybil’s gaze held as steady on his as if she were playing a hand of cards with him. She remained silent. He knew she was trying to decide if she should tell the truth or not.
“Well, does she?” he asked again.
Finally, she pouted and shook her head again.
“Back inside,” he said softly.
She jerked her hands to her hips, turned around, and stepped back into the vestibule. Bray followed her and quietly closed the door behind them. Miss Sybil pointed to the stairs and gave him a questioning look. Bray could remember playing the game and hiding on different floors when he was a boy. It was never easy for the one wearing the blindfold, but immense fun for others. He could only assume this was not the first time Miss Prim had played the game with her sisters. She probably knew she’d have to search the entire house to find even one of them.
Bray nodded his approval to Miss Sybil and then whispered, “Where is Miss Prim?”
“Book room,” she mouthed to him, and pointed down the corridor. “Everyone else is abovestairs, too. Be quiet and don’t tell her.”
He made the motion as if to put a key to his lips and lock them and then throw the key away. Miss Sybil grinned and headed up the stairs. Bray smiled, too. He hadn’t even thought about the game blindman’s buff in years. And he was amazed at how quickly the childhood gesture of locking his lips with a key had come back to him. Maybe little girls could be enjoyable after all—if they weren’t crying, or screeching, or hugging.
After watching her climb the stairs, he walked down the corridor as quietly as his boots would allow on the squeaky hardwood floors. He paused to peer through each door he passed until he was rewarded at the last room on the left.
