Over his shoulder she could see Jeannie, her face a picture of anxiety and indecision. Stay there, do not try to help. Stay there, she tried to signal.
Then he was jerked away from her. The wooden box fell to the ground and burst open, two duelling pistols fell out on to the grass, exquisite death glinting in the winter sunshine.
‘Take your hands off my wife before I break all your fingers,’ Grant said pleasantly, his own hands fisted in the lapels of Lord Baybrook’s elegant coat. ‘You’ll need them to fire one of those pretty toys you’ve just dropped.’
For a long moment they stared into each other’s eyes, almost nose to nose, two male stags in their prime locking antlers over a female. Then, when Kate thought she would burst with the tension, Jonathan stepped back, hands raised in the fencer’s signal of yielding.
‘Your wife? Allundale, is it not? I am Baybrook. My apologies, I had no idea. In fact, I had misread the situation totally. The lady asked me something and I thought—forgive me, madam—that she was…well, not to beat about the bush, I completely misunderstood her status. I could see no one with her. I was deep in thought and most unfortunately leapt to the conclusion that she was…er…importuning me.’
‘Lady Allundale?’ Grant’s rigid formality failed utterly to veil the fury in his eyes.
He’ll kill him, Kate thought. If he has the slightest idea what is happening… Jeannie, thank heavens, was keeping her distance, had turned away from the three of them so the child in her arms was not visible.
‘It was, as the gentleman says, a misunderstanding. I was cutting across to the path, stumbled and caught at his arm and must have blurted out some words of apology. When he spoke to me I was confused, I did not realise what he thought and then when I did I was agitated, which made things worse… Jeannie had fallen behind, so I appeared to be unescorted.’ She managed a tight social smile for Jonathan. ‘Sir, it was entirely my fault. I am quite unused to London.’
He was a quick thinker, she had to hand it to him. And a brilliant actor. He was all contrition, all elegant apologies, and Grant was left with no option but to accept them. He bowed, the merest inclination of his head, and offered Kate his arm. Jonathan bowed in his turn, picked up the pistols and strode off towards the Queen’s Walk.
‘Did he hurt you?’ Grant demanded the moment they were alone. She shook her head and saw him relax a little. ‘And what the devil was Jeannie playing at? Well?’ he demanded as the maid hurried up to them. ‘When you escort your mistress your duty is to stay with her, not stroll about like a moonling.’
‘Anna has been very fretful,’ Kate said hastily. ‘I expect that is what held you up, Jeannie.’
‘Yes, my lady, and then when I saw the gentleman, I didn’t know what to do. Not when I had Lady Anna, because I thought he would frighten her.’
‘Very well. Where is the carriage?’
‘Waiting near the palace, my lord, at the end of the Queen’s Walk.’ Jeannie gave Kate the tiniest of nods.
‘I’ll go back with you in that case. I was walking back from the Palace of Westminster across the parks. Fortunately.’
‘Yes, wasn’t it.’ Kate clung to his arm and hoped he would attribute her shakiness to the after-effects of the encounter with Jonathan and not shock at his own appearance combined with a hideously guilty conscience. ‘That gentleman was not a friend of yours, then?’
‘The Viscount of Baybrook? No. I’ve hardly ever seen him that close to. The man was a gazetted rake, and a wild one at that, before his marriage. I never ran in those circles, even when I was sowing my own wild oats—the gambling was too deep for me, for one thing, and I dislike being sodden with drink half the time. Now his father-in-law holds the purse strings so tight that Baybrook hardly dares sneeze without permission, by all accounts.’ They walked on in silence until they were almost at the gravelled walk bordering the high walls of the fine houses that overlooked Green Park. Grant’s fingers stroked reassuringly over hers and gradually her breathing calmed.
‘It is strange, though, there was something so familiar about him.’ Grant shrugged. ‘Perhaps I’ve come across one of his relatives. Society is so interbred, I may know a cousin of his and not even realise it. Now, where is the carriage?’
It was waiting at the end of Milkmaid’s Passage, where a footpath led from the park to the front of St James’s Palace. ‘Why did you not take the groom with you?’ Grant demanded as they settled themselves inside.
‘Um…idiocy?’ Kate ventured and was rewarded with a smile.
‘I shouldn’t be cross with you. I forget what an innocent you are in London. This is not the moorlands where you may stretch your legs accosted by nothing worse than a flock of sheep.’
‘No, my lord,’ Kate said meekly and saw, from the smile in Grant’s eyes, that she was forgiven. ‘Sheep can be very dangerous, you know.’ I don’t deserve him. How am I going to get out of this mire without someone getting hurt? ‘How did your meeting go, my lord? It was satisfactory, I hope?’
‘Most. I suspect I have landed myself with a great deal of work, but I am interested in social issues.’
She would get the details out of him when they were alone and, perhaps, convince him that she read the newspapers, too, that she had views on social policy and could discuss the problems he was going to be tackling. If he is still prepared to talk to me.
Kate stared blankly out at the passing clubs and shops as the carriage climbed the slope of St James’s Street. What am I going to do about Jonathan and Henry now?
*
Grant stood in front of his dressing mirror, tying his neckcloth and attempting to pin down the niggling sense of unease at the back of his mind. He had swept Kate upstairs and made love to her so thoroughly that she seemed to be entirely satisfied that he was not blaming her for the Green Park incident. It also served to satisfy his own primitive male feelings of ownership. He grimaced at himself as he acknowledged the response. Still, it could have turned nasty if he had not come across them. The behaviour was typical of Baybrook, by all accounts. The man might no longer be able to carry on his dissolute lifestyle, but he obviously could not resist accosting an attractive woman when one crossed his path.
What was unsettling was that the strange incident had reawakened all his niggling doubts about Kate. He had been trying to suppress them, tell himself that they were simply leftovers from his experiences with Madeleine, and that now he was so happy in his marriage they would vanish. But they had not. Perhap
s the lack was in him and he had lost the ability to trust completely.
‘Move the candles up, would you, Griffin?’ The valet shifted a branch of candles to the left-hand side of Grant to balance those on the right, and he leaned close to the glass to slide in his tiepin. Just so. He met his own gaze in the mirror and grimaced. He was turning into a damn dandy, peacocking about for his Kate.