Reforming Lord Ragsdale (Carla Kelly’s Regency Romances)

Chapter 11

T here is no logical explanation for my desire to visit the art gallery with Emma , Lord Ragsdale thought as the carriage began to move. I am either a bigger bully than I thought, or I love art beyond my previous recollection. The initial ride had begun with an ardent desire on his part to get the banking business done and then return Emma to the book room. He never considered himself a man susceptible to female tears, but there was something so oddly touching about Emma’s obvious remorse at her mistreatment of him. He hoped she would not mind a visit to the gallery, but he was beginning to find her interesting.

And, he reasoned, there was at least some truth in what he had said to her about wanting to look over the place. He knew he needed to do as his mother and Emma had mandated and find himself a wife. A gallery would be a good place for a quiet tête-à-tête; he would test his theory on Emma. If it proved to be a good place to spark a lady (or at least, in Emma’s case, discussion), he would store the knowledge for future reference.

Emma was still struggling with her emotions, so he did not overburden her with conversation. He was content to gaze out the window at the Inns of Court, where several wigged barristers were getting themselves into a carriage for the short ride to the courts of justice. English law , he thought, a noble thing. He glanced at Emma. She was watching the barristers too, but her expression was a set, hard one, as though she looked upon something distasteful.

“English law,” he said out loud, and it sounded inane the moment he uttered it.

“Don’t remind me, my lord,” she murmured and directed her gaze out the opposite window.

How singular , he thought. We see the same thing, and yet our estimations are completely different. I wonder if this is because she is a woman or because she is Irish. I suspect it is both , he concluded.

~

So much silence , he thought as they rode along. He was not a man accustomed to silence. I have spent too much time in drawing rooms, card rooms, and taverns, where conversation seems obliged. It was different with Emma, he reasoned. Despite her remorse, she still did not wish to speak to him. Or could it be that she is shy , he wondered. I see Emma as a budding good secretary, but perhaps ours is an odd association. After all, she is female. Indeed she is , he thought for no good reason, and smiled to himself.

He wanted to ask a penny for her thoughts, and the realization gave him a start. He had never cared what any woman thought before. During his affair with Fae Moullé, never had it entered his head to inquire what was on her mind, because he suspected that nothing was. My word, how strange this is , he considered as he settled back in the carriage. I want to know what this woman is thinking.

He stared out the window, not seeing anything on the crowded road. If she is thinking of me, it will not be charitable. He glanced her way and rubbed his forehead, wondering why it mattered all of a sudden that she change her opinion of him. She sees me as a dilettante, a drunkard, a rogue, and a wastrel , he thought, and she is right. And I am British. He grinned at his reflection in the glass. That I cannot change, and it may be the only thing that she cares about the most. I wish I understood Emma Costello.

The gallery was bare of sightseers. There was only a cleaning woman, who wasn’t dressed much better than Emma. The charwoman looked up from her brush and pail as they skirted around the area she was scrubbing. Lord Ragsdale could tell she was surprised to see someone so obviously a man of consequence with a woman in broken shoes and a plain cloak.

To his chagrin, Emma noticed the look too. “I really don’t belong here, my lord,” she whispered to him, her face red. “Oh, please ... I can wait outside.”

Serenity, John, serenity , he told himself as he touched her elbow lightly and steered her into his favorite room of the gallery. “Nonsense, Emma. This is a public place, and we are the public. Remember now: I want to bring a young lady here, and you are my trial effort.”

That sounds pretty artificial , he thought as he sat her down on a bench; I wonder if she will buy it. He glanced at her then, gauging her response, and was relieved to see a brief look of approbation cross her expressive face.

“Oh, excellent, my lord! The sooner you are reformed and at least soundly engaged, the sooner you will be rid of me.”

He laughed in spite of his own nervousness. “Emma! Am I that much of a trial? Come now, be fair.”

To his relief, she smiled. I wish you would laugh too , he thought as he watched her. Your laughter is almost a balm. Ah, well, not this time. Perhaps another day. He put his hands behind his back and sauntered over to inspect a painting—it must be a Vermeer—he had not remembered from his last visit several years ago.

All was silence in the gallery; he found himself relaxing in the quiet. This would be a good place to bring someone special , he decided as he moved from picture to picture. The devil of it is, I cannot imagine any eligible lady of my acquaintance remaining quiet long enough to absorb what is here .

He glanced back at Emma, who remained where she was on the bench, as if afraid to move from where he had put her. He turned to watch her then, folding his arms across his chest and leaning against the wall.

As usual, she paid him no attention. She sat stiff at first, her feet in her poor shoes tucked up under her so they would not show. ( I must see to a cobbler, and when are those promised dresses coming? ) As she stared at the painting opposite her, her shoulders lost their tenseness and her face seemed to soften. She sighed once, and he could hear it across the gallery. Her eyes grew dreamy, and for the first time in their brief acquaintance, the wariness left her expression.

Emma was looking at one of Raphael’s numerous madonnas, mellowed, as all his works, by a caressing brush and sweetness of expression on the face of Mary. She smiled at the painting of mother and child, and as he watched, she got up from the bench and stood directly in front of the work. There was no barrier in front of the painting, and she reached out her hand, outlining the child.

So you like children, Emma? he thought, wondering at the same time if he was going to have to spend the rest of their association guessing about her past. Presumably one didn’t ask servants their business. We have already established that you do not like me , he thought. I wonder if there is someone you do like. Or someone you love.

He felt a moment’s irrational jealousy, which made him laugh out loud and broke whatever spell Raphael was weaving on Emma Costello. She jumped away from the painting and put her hands behind her back, retreating to the bench, where she sat down again. Serenity , he told himself again as he nodded to her and continued his stately pace about the gallery, hoping she would relax enough again to explore the place herself.

She did not. After a half hour, in which he felt his own frustration growing, he returned to the bench and sat down beside her. She edged away from him slightly and moved forward on the bench, ready to bolt as soon as he said the word. He said nothing, wondering if she would speak first. Finally, she cleared her throat.

“You know, my lord, I could be finishing my perusal of your old correspondence right now and starting on that letter to Sir Augustus Barney in Norfolk,” she reminded him.

“You could,” he agreed. “But isn’t it nice just to sit here?”

She did not answer, and he sighed and stood up. She was on her feet in an instant too, but he took her arm before she could move and held her firmly.

‘‘Tell me, Emma. Is this really a good place to squire a young lady?”

He looked into her eyes, and her expression made him drop her arm and step back. He had never seen such terror before, terror that he was responsible for because he had taken her arm. He looked away and gave her time to collect herself, thinking, So, Emma, you do not care to be grabbed, do you?

His own mind in turmoil, he merely nodded to her and started to leave the gallery at a slow pace. In a moment, she was walking at his side and slightly behind him. “I didn’t mean to startle you, Emma,” he said. “Seriously, what do you think? Should I take a young lady here?”

“No, my lord,” she replied, and her voice was smooth and in control. “She will want to chatter, and you will want to admire, and it will not speed any wooing you might attempt.”

“How well you know your own sex,” he murmured as he climbed into his carriage and made no move to help her. “But, Emma, you were silent as the grave in the gallery,” he insisted. “How can it be that any young lady I would bring there would be a gabble box?”

She pulled her cloak tighter about her. “My lord, if it were someone who returned your regard, she would want to talk with you, wouldn’t she? I mean, I would.”

And so you were silent. Touché, Emma , he thought. He let it go at that, leaned back in the carriage, and closed his eyes .

He did not expect another word from her and was even dozing off when Emma spoke.

“Begging your pardon, my lord, but could I ask you something?” she was saying. “It is a favor, in fact.”

“Only if you promise that it will not cause me any exertion,” he teased.

“Oh, it will not,” she assured him seriously, and again he was verbally flogged by her reply.

You think I am in earnest , he wondered. “Say on, Emma,” he stated finally when she hesitated.

He thought for a moment she would not speak, after all.

“Well?” he prompted. “Come, come, Emma, you make me fear that it is an outrageous request.”

“Oh, no, my lord,” she assured him, her expression worried now. “Nothing of the sort. I was merely wondering if you would permit me a day off once a week.”

Is that all? he asked himself, but he did not respond.

“I have some business in London,” she said quickly when he did not speak. “Please, my lord. It is only once a week. I can see that everything is left in order before I leave.” She was pleading now, and he wanted to know what it was she had to do in London.

He almost asked her.

“A half day then, sir? Oh, please,” she was asking now, her eyes on his face.

He felt shame then. I am a churl to make you grovel , he thought as he sat up straight.

“A day, Emma,” he said firmly. “Mr. Breedlow had a day, and it is only fair.” He leaned forward. “And when would you like this day?”

“Tomorrow, my lord, if you please,” she responded, a little breathless.

“You’ll have that letter to Sir Augustus ready?” he temporized. “And another which I shall dictate tonight to my bailiff in Norfolk? I mean to leave in two days.”

“Anything, my lord,” she said .

“Tomorrow it is,” he said, adding, “although I cannot imagine what it is that you would have to do in London.”

It was only the tiniest opening, but she did not take it. Of course she did not , he told himself, feeling the fool, and a bully in the bargain. John, you maggot, did you ever quiz David Breedlow about his day off? God knows you should have, in his case, but here is Emma Costello, and she is powerless, harmless, and poor. London is safe from whatever she could possibly be planning.

“Thank you, my lord,” she said, and her gratitude made him wince.

“You’re welcome,” he grumbled, “although I wonder what evil plans you have afoot.” Ah, there. He was rewarded with a smile.

“If you’re worried, Lord Ragsdale, you’d better lock up the silverware before I leave your house,” she replied, with just the hint of a twinkle in her eye.

“Oh, I do not think it will come to that, Emma,” he said as the carriage pulled up in front of the house. He sighed, considering the evening ahead. “Now I must gird my loins for an evening of fine dining and dancing.” He helped her from the carriage, careful not to hold her elbow a moment longer than she needed. “I would almost rather stay in the book room with you and consider ledgers and double entries.”

“And we all know what a fiction that is,” Emma murmured as they walked up the front steps.

He smiled. “It’s less of a stretch than you would suppose,” he said as he nodded to Lasker, who must have been watching for them out of the peephole in the door. “Emma, it is somewhat daunting to converse with lovely young things on the right and on the left, and across the table, and try not to be too obvious staring at whatever charms they possess. Thank you, Lasker,” he said as he relinquished his overcoat. “And then, in turn, I must suffer their sidelong glances as they try to discover if there is any substance beneath my shallow facade. ”

Emma laughed, and it was the glorious, heartfelt sound he realized he had been craving all day. “Are you saying, my lord, that there is rather less to you than meets the eye?”

He wanted to laugh out loud at the strangling sounds coming from his unflappable butler, who had turned away and with a shaking hand was rearranging a bouquet of flowers. “Well, as to that, I wonder, Emma. I think you are improving me already,” he said as they continued down the hall toward the book room. “I have not been near my club, the wine cellar is locked, and Mama is looking on me with less chagrin than normal.” He chuckled. “Now if only the young ladies will follow her lead. . .”

“They will, my lord,” Emma assured him as she removed her cloak and sat down at the desk. “You need merely to decide what it is you are looking for in a wife, and follow through.”

Follow through, is it? he thought as he watched her rummage for pencil and paper. You are asking that of the man who could not save his own father from a rabble crowd? I wonder if I know how to see anything through to its completion. I was well on the way to my own ruin, but it seems I cannot accomplish even that.

“My lord?” Emma was asking. “You wanted to dictate a letter to your bailiff in Norfolk?”

“Oh! Yes, yes, I did,” he said as he clasped his hands behind his back and strolled to the window. “And you’ll have the other one for Sir Augustus ready by the time I return this evening?”

“Of course, my lord.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to ask her to call him John, but reason prevailed, and he did not. The letter was too soon dictated, then he had no more excuse to linger in the book room, and must face, instead, the prospect of shaving again, and dressing, and staring in the mirror and wondering what on earth he was doing. It is not that I dislike women , he considered as he suffered Hanley to arrange his neckcloth. Quite the contrary. It’s just that I begrudge the exertion I must expend to find a wife. Too bad they do not grow on trees, there for the plucking. Or something like that , he concluded, grinning to himself.

Sally Claridge looked especially fetching in a pale blue muslin, her blonde hair swept up on her head in a style that earned a second look. He watched her descend the stairs, admired, from his viewpoint, her trim ankles, and idly considered the prospect of an alliance with his Virginia cousin. The quick glance of terror she turned his way before her more well-bred demeanor masked it convinced him that she would not be much fun to sport with. And even if she were, he thought as he helped his mother with her evening cape, sooner or later she would open her mouth and bore him into drunkenness or opium use, whichever came first.

His mother also watched with approval as Sally completed her descent of the stairs. “My dear, how lovely you look tonight!” she exclaimed, kissing her niece on the cheek. “John, only consider how well your guineas look upon Sally’s back.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “Only think how well we are spending my money.” That ill-advised remark earned him another look of terror from Sally and a cluck of his mother’s tongue. “Glad to do it for relatives, glad to do it,” he amended, hoping that his evening was not ruined before it started.

Mama was eager to be pleased (perhaps considering her own incursions into his fortune). “Quite right, John. Sally, do you have on your dancing shoes? I hear Lord Renwick has engaged a particularly fine orchestra for tonight.”

Shoes. Shoes. That was it. “Excuse me, Mama, Sally. I forgot something in the book room,” he said as he hurried down the hall.

Emma Costello looked up in surprise when he opened the book-room door without knocking. “Now, my lord, you are not getting cold feet. . .,” she began, putting down the quill pen .

“No, but you are, Emma,” he said. “I need two pieces of paper and a pencil.” He snapped his fingers and held out his hand for the items, which Emma brought to him. He put the papers on the floor in front of her. “Take off your shoes, Emma.”

She hesitated. “Hurry up, now,” he admonished, taking the pencil from her. “I don’t want to miss a minute of what promises to be an evening of astonishing boredom.”

“You are too negative, my lord,” she grumbled as she removed her shoes—poor, cast-off things that should have been in an ash can years ago.

“Raise your skirt,” he ordered as he knelt on the floor beside her and grasped her ankle.

She gave a noticeable start when he touched her stockinged ankle, then rested her hand lightly on his shoulder to steady herself while he outlined her foot with the pencil.

“Other foot.”

She leaned the other way as he held that ankle. Such a shapely foot , he thought as he carefully traced it. Not small, he considered, half-enjoying the weight of her against his shoulder. He looked at the papers. “Well, what color do you want?”

“Black or brown; something sensible. And if you please, stockings to match, my lord,” she said. She sounded embarrassed at the intimacy of their association, so he did not look at her while she stepped into her shoes again.

“I’m surprised your Virginia indenture holders didn’t see that you were better shod,” he said as he took the papers and stood up. He looked at her then, and her cheeks were still pink.

“My lord, I think you will understand the matter more completely when you consider that Robert Claridge’s bills generally outran the family’s entire quarterly allowance,” was her quiet reply as she took her seat at the desk again.

He strolled over to sit on the desk, ignoring his mother’s voice calling to him from the front entrance. “So you were the afterthought. ”

“I and the other servants, sir,” she said, dipping the quill tip into the ink bottle again. She looked at him in that calculated way of hers, as though gauging his response. “And I have to tell you that I like going barefoot in the summer, so please don’t feel sorry for me, Lord Ragsdale.”

She turned again to the letter in front of her, effectively dismissing him from his own book room. He grinned at her impertinence and left the room.

Lasker hovered outside the door, obviously sent by Lady Ragsdale to tell him to hurry up but also obviously reluctant to tell him anything. “It’s all right, Lasker, I’ll go peacefully,” he said, pleased with himself to earn one of the butler’s rare smiles. “And you take these to wherever it is Lady Ragsdale gets her shoes made. I want one pair of sturdy brown shoes.” He started down the hall, then turned back, grinning broadly. “And another pair of red Morocco dancing slippers. Good night, Lasker. You needn’t wait up,” he added, knowing that the butler would be sitting ramrod straight in one of the entryway chairs until the last titled member of the household was indoors and abed. It was their little fiction.

~

Truly enough, there was Lasker waiting for them when they returned in that late hour just before the dark yielded to the blandishments of another day, careering in from the east. He handed his mother and cousin their candles, wished them both good night, and went to the book room, hoping that Emma might still be up. He wanted to tell her about the diamond of the first water—a daughter of Sir Edmund Partridge—who had flirted with him mildly, and who appeared, when he worked up the nerve to converse with her, to have at least some wit. He wanted to tell Emma that he and Clarissa Partridge were destined to witness a balloon ascension—he whipped out his pocket watch—in eight hours.

But the book room was dark. He held his own candle over the desk, where Emma had arranged the letter she had composed for him to Sir Augustus Barney, and the other to his bailiff. He picked up the letter to his bailiff and read it, noting that she had changed some of his dictated wording and added other passages. He read it again and had to admit that her changes were salutary. “Really, Emma,” he said out loud as he left the room, “you were supposed to be here so I could tell you about Clarissa Partridge. Do I have to do everything in this courting venture?”

Well, it would keep for the morning, he decided as he mounted the stairs. He stopped halfway up. Emma was taking her day off tomorrow, and he would not see her until the evening. Perhaps I was a little hasty with this day off , he thought. He continued up the stairs, putting Emma from his mind and wondering what one wore to a balloon ascension.

~

While the day could not have been deemed an unqualified success, at least Emma Costello ought to have the decency to hurry back from her day off so he could tell her about it, Lord Ragsdale decided the following evening as he paced back and forth in front of the sitting room window.

He had decided that he would begin by painting a word picture of Miss Partridge for Emma, describing her delicate features, her big brown eyes that reminded him of a favorite spaniel, long dead but still remembered, and her little trill of a laugh. Of course, by the time the balloonists had taken themselves up into the atmosphere, he did have the smallest headache, but he couldn’t attribute that to Clarissa’s endless stream of questions. He just wasn’t accustomed to having someone so small and lovely who smelled of rosewater hanging on his every word and looking at him with those spaniel eyes.

“Emma, you are certainly taking your time with this day off,” he muttered under his breath. He was beginning to feel that when Emma finally opened the door, a scold was in order. He would remind her that London was far from safe after dark and that nasty customers liked to prey on unescorted women, especially if they were pretty.

There wasn’t anything else he could scold her about. When he had wakened in the morning, his correspondence was ready for his attention on the smaller table in his bedroom. He had signed the letters, initialed the morning’s bills, and noted with approval a newspaper article about Norfolk that she had circled to catch his attention. A man never had a better secretary than Emma Costello.

But where the deuce was she now? He clapped his hands together in frustration, imagining her conked on the head and being delivered unconscious to a white slaving ship anchored at Deptford Hard, even as he wore a path from window to window. One would think she would have more consideration for his feelings. That was the trouble with the Irish.

And then he saw her coming up the street, moving slowly, as though she dreaded the house and its occupants. As he watched, she stopped several times, as though steeling herself for the ordeal of entering into one of London’s finest establishments.

“The nerve of you,” he grumbled from his view by the partially screening curtain. “When I think of the legions of servants who would love to have half so fine a household as this one. . .”

Perhaps I am being unfair , he thought as he kept his eyes on her slow progress. She trudged as though filled with a great exhaustion, discouragement evident in the way she held herself. He thought she dabbed at her eyes several times, but he could not be sure. He waited for her knock, which did not come. You idiot , he realized finally, she has gone around to the alley and come in from the belowstairs entrance. He rang for Lasker.

“Tell Emma Costello that I would like a word with her,” he told the butler.

1

“I was not aware that a day off meant a night off too,” he found himself telling Emma several minutes later when she knocked on the sitting-room door, and he opened it.

She mumbled something about being sorry, and it was a longer walk from the city than she realized.

She looked so discouraged from her day off that he felt like a heel for chiding her. Her eyes were filled with pain that shocked him. He wondered briefly if her feet in those dreadful shoes were hurting her, and then he understood that the look in her eyes was another matter. He stood in front of her, hand behind his back, rocking back and forth on his heels, feeling like a gouty old boyar chastising his serfs.

“I trust this won’t happen on your next day off,” he ventured, wishing suddenly with all his heart that she would tell him what was the matter.

If he was expecting a soft agreement from her, he was doomed to disappointment. At his sniping words, Emma seemed to visibly gather herself together, digging deep into some well of resource and strength that he knew he did not possess.

“It will probably happen again and again, my lord,” she replied, each word distinct, her brogue more pronounced than usual. “Unlike some of us in this room, I do not succumb easily to misfortune.”

“Emma Costello, you are impertinent!” he shouted, wondering even as his voice carried throughout the room why he was yelling at someone who did his work so well and who looked so defeated. Miserable and furious in turns, he waited for her to speak.

She took her time, and it occurred to him that she was as surprised as he was by his outburst. The wariness returned to her eyes, and he knew that he had erased whatever meager credit he had accrued in the last day or two. I am British and you are Irish, and that is it , he thought as he stared at her .

When she spoke, her voice was soft, and he felt even worse. “I am sorry for any inconvenience I have caused you, my lord.”

He could think of none, other than the fact that she had not been there to hear his account of his day with Clarissa Partridge. Had he been a small boy, he would have squirmed.

“Is that all, my lord?” she asked.

Unable to think of anything, he nodded, and she went to the door. She stood there a moment, clutching the handle. “If I were not impertinent, Lord Ragsdale, I would have died five years ago. Good night, sir.”

She was gone, the door closed quietly behind her. Filled with that familiar self-loathing that he had hoped was behind him, Lord Ragsdale resumed his pacing at the window. I have heard this conversation before , he thought, summoning up images of standing before his father when he returned late and endured the familiar scold that his mama assured him only meant that his father cared enough to worry about him.

He stopped walking and looked at the door again, wishing that Emma would walk back into the room so he could apologize. Someday when I have sons and daughters, pray God I will remember how I feel right now , he thought as he leaned against the window frame. Somehow he must make amends to his servant, even though he knew there was nothing he could do.

I would like to help you, Emma , he thought. How can I convince you that I mean it? He shook his head and smiled ruefully. This whole thing begins to smack of profound exertion. I think I am going to be wonderfully ill-used during your tenure here, Emma Costello, drat your Irish hide. I had better find a wife quickly so I can release you from your indenture and be miserable in private.

He went to the window again, wishing that spring would come. I need a change right now , he thought, something that will sweeten my life. He considered Clarissa again and smiled into his reflection in the windowpane. “Madam, you are a peach,” he said out loud, rejoicing in the fact that he had only yawned a few times during their hours together at the balloon ascension. Tonight he was escorting his mother and cousin to Covent Garden Theatre. With scarcely any effort at all, he could train his glasses on the Partridge box and watch her from a distance.

He resolved to make the Norfolk stay a short one. The place only held ghosts and leaky crofters’ cottages anyway. He would point his secretary toward his bailiff and let them do the wrangling. He would pay a brief visit to Sir Augustus Barney, then prop his feet up in front of a comfortable fire and think about Clarissa Partridge. That ought to make everybody happy , he thought. Even Emma will approve , he told himself, provided she is speaking to me. I may even be forced to apologize. How unlike me.