The Master of Winterbourne

‘You are mistaken, I am not afraid,’ she managed to say. She despised herself for the sensations he was evoking in her. Surely a well-bred young lady should be more in control?

‘Then what is it? Why have you run away to this parlour to avoid me? That you are not adverse to me I know from your kisses. Is it my political beliefs?’

That was too close to the mark for Henrietta's raw conscience. ‘You know my feelings, Matthew.’ Her voice shook and she got to her feet to put distance between them. ‘Sacrifices such as my family have made cannot lightly be set aside. My father, my brothers…’

‘I am one of your family,’ he reminded her gently.

‘Distantly. And you think that makes your treachery any easier to tolerate?’ she bit out. Her own conscience was hurting badly with the realisation that she had been on the brink of breaking her vow to James by throwing away the responsibility he had laid upon her shoulders.

‘Treachery?’ He was on his feet too, the angry colour high in his cheeks. ‘We stood for King and Parliament until the King betrayed us and our liberties. He would be King now if he had not sought to rule absolutely, as a tyrant without Parliament.’

‘And so you murdered him?’ Henrietta gathered up her skirts and swept out. As she closed the door behind she saw the anger drain from his face, leaving it cold, implacable and unreadable.

*

‘Which nightgown, Mistress?’ Alice fussed around the bedchamber, twitching the hangings, stirring the fragrant pot-pourri.

‘Why, the cambric as usual, what's the matter with you?' An uncomfortable evening of stilted conversation and over-rich food had left Henrietta's already frayed nerves in tatters. After a few minutes Matthew had rejoined her in the long gallery and neither had spoken of her last, unforgivable words. He had not looked at her again, but her eyes had followed him all evening and the scene refused to leave her tired brain.

‘I thought the new French lawn might be more to your

liking this evening.’ Alice shook out the diaphanous garment, a present from Lady Willoughby that Henrietta strongly suspected had been smuggled from France to evade the duty.

‘Why?’ Henrietta was in no mood to acknowledge Alice’s veiled hints. After the way she'd parted from Matthew in the parlour he was the last person she expected to find on her threshold that evening. It was a wonder, she reflected, that he had not repudiated the betrothal.

‘Mistress.’ Alice shook her head. ‘The master will come to you tonight for sure. He's hot for you and after that kiss at your betrothal, how can you doubt it? Don't you want him to come to you?’ Her voice was frankly incredulous now.

‘We are not yet wed.’ Henrietta ignored the flimsy nightgown, pulled the concealing cambric over her head and climbed into bed.

‘But it is the custom. No one would think any the less of you now you are betrothed.’

‘I can assure you, miss, he will not come to my chamber tonight, nor would I admit him if he did.’ Even as the words were spoken there was a light scratching at the door. ‘That will be my aunt, let her in.’

The tall figure in the doorway was unmistakably male. With a triumphant glance over her shoulder Alice slipped past him into the darkness of the corridor.

‘Alice! Come back this minute!’ It was too late. Matthew closed the door behind him, turned the key in the lock and pocketed it.

‘Now, madam, no one will disturb us.’

Henrietta clutched tight the neck of the plain cambric nightdress as he approached the bed. ‘No!’

‘Oh, yes, Henrietta. Oh, yes.’

Chapter Nine

‘I neither know nor care what licentious habits prevail in London, sir, but I told you in the garden this morning – do not presume on our betrothal. You are not my husband yet.’ Despite her fighting words Henrietta was cornered, her back against the bulbous carving of the bedpost. In spite of all Alice's hints she had not truly expected Matthew to come and now he was here she was totally unprepared.

‘On the contrary, far from being licentious, the Puritan influence grows daily in London. The frolics taking place in your kitchen at this moment would not be tolerated there.’ Matthew stopped a few feet from her, the candlelight shining on the whiteness of his shirt sleeves, casting a shadow at his throat where he'd discarded his lace and pulled open the drawstrings. He stood before her in shirt and breeches, disturbingly male, disturbingly close.

‘How dare you come to my chamber uninvited and half-dressed?’ She wondered what would happen if she screamed. ‘And if the servants are misbehaving, why do you not discipline them? They are your household now.’

He quirked a dark brow. ‘You are even more undressed than I, madam. And as for the servants, why should I spoil their fun? I did not say I disapproved. There is no need for the whole household to be miserable because their mistress is out of temper.’

It was he who was out of temper, Henrietta could see plainly. There was colour on his taut cheekbones and no humour in his eyes as he watched her. In the candlelight, his hair disarranged on his shoulders, he seemed saturnine, dangerous. Henrietta remembered his remark about stirring the beehive and knew she had gone too far in provoking him that evening.

‘Indeed, you surprise me.’ Attack seemed the only defence. ‘I would have thought their innocent pleasures would offend your Puritan sensibilities.’ Henrietta scrambled out of bed and edged round the post, realising too late that she'd trapped herself between the four-poster and the wall.

‘I do not think innocent is the word I would apply.’ Matthew sat on the edge of the bed, his back against the carved post and regarded her levelly. 'Tell me, Henrietta, why do you persist in calling me a Puritan?’