A Scandalous Proposal

This did not please Baron Townsend. Levelheaded Baron Townsend. Wasn’t his world topsy-turvy enough, without adding unexpected attraction to his budget of woes?

Still, he watched, fascinated, as those eyes, like a mirror into her soul, told him her every thought, each rapidly transitioning emotion. Wide-eyed shock. Embarrassed innocence. Questioning. Recognition. Amusement, almost as if she was laughing at their situation, perhaps even at him. No, that couldn’t be possible.

“I didn’t mean that quite so literally, but how very convenient,” she said as if to herself, and her smile almost physically set him back on his heels. Damn, it had been amusement he’d seen, and it definitely was at his expense.

Wonderful. It wasn’t enough that they chased him. Did this one have to find the pursuit so amusing?

“Are you all right, miss?” he asked tightly, still lightly holding her upper arms, because that seemed to be his required opening line in these tiring encounters. “Perhaps you’ve twisted your ankle and require my assistance?”

“I seem to have tripped over an uneven brick. How careless of me, not to watch where I’m stepping. No, I don’t think I’m injured,” she said, and her voice, rather low and husky for such a small thing, surprised and further intrigued him, much against his will. “Not precisely at any rate. But if you’d be so kind as to support me over to that bench?”

Those eyes, that voice, the unique color of the little bit of her hair he could see, the alabaster skin set against those eyes and a fetchingly curved pink mouth. So much danger in such a small package.

You said hello, Coop, he reminded himself. Now say goodbye.

“I don’t think so. Why don’t you hop?” he heard himself say, and let her go.

And damn if she didn’t immediately being listing to one side, so that he was forced to swoop her up into his arms before she could collapse on the flagway.

“Why didn’t you tell me you hurt your ankle?” he demanded as he carried her over to the bench outside a milliner’s shop, her companion right behind him asking, “Dany, are you all right?”

“I told you I wasn’t injured, not precisely. I asked for your assistance, remember? I seem to have lost the heel to my shoe, see?” The beauty incongruously named Dany raised her right leg to display the damaged shoe (and give him a brief but delightful sight of her shapely ankle). She looked up at him, understanding rising in her eyes even as the sun rises at dawn. “You didn’t believe me. Are you often accosted in the street by admiring and hopeful females, my lord Townsend?”

Coop straightened. “So you do know who I am?”

“And you said it wasn’t a good likeness,” Darby said, holding out a copy of the damned Volume One. “This fell out of the young lady’s hand as you performed your less than impressive imitation of Sir Galahad to the rescue.”

“Give that back,” Dany demanded, holding out her hand. “I’ve yet to read it.”

“And that’s how it will remain, unread,” Coop said. “Put that in your pocket, if you please.”

“Excuse me,” the older of the two women said imperiously, inserting her body between that of Coop and Dany. “I don’t know who you gentlemen are, but you would both please me very much by taking yourselves off now so that I may attend to my sister.”

“You hear that?” Darby clapped Coop on his back. “The hero of Quatre Bras and all points west has just been dismissed. How lowering.”

Coop took a step back and bowed. “A thousand pardons, ladies. We’ll be on our way. But first, if I may be so bold as to ask we exchange introductions? I believe you might be Oliver’s countess. My friend here is the viscount Nailbourne, and I am...”

“He’s Baron Cooper McGinley Townsend, Mari, hero, as if you didn’t know, or would if you’d lower your chin enough to be able to look at him. Just the man we were talking about before I so providentially tripped and landed in his arms. Twice.”

“Dany!”

The countess sat down beside her sister all at once, rather as if someone had pushed her onto the bench.

Dany looked up at Coop, those huge eyes of hers filled with amusement and obvious mischief. “While my sister plots ways to gag me and have me sent back to the country, please allow me to introduce myself. I am Daniella Foster, here in London, according to my fond papa, to obtain a little town polish before I’m officially sicced on Society in the spring. And sadly failing to acquire any, if my sister’s forlorn sighs mean anything. I’ve been looking for you, Your Lordship. It would appear my sister needs a hero.”

“I’m not looking for...” the countess began, but then subsided.

Dany got to her feet, Darby stepping forward to assist her, moving faster than Coop, who was still repeating her outlandish words in his head. This left him to hold out his arm to the countess, who ignored the gesture, instead grabbing on to her maid in a near-death grip.

When he did open his mouth, it was to hear himself solemnly pronounce as he bowed to the countess, “My lady, I am of course your servant,” as if he was penning his own silly chapter in Volume Three. Apparently he’d lost half his mind in the past few minutes. And here he’d always thought it was only other men who made cakes out of themselves at the bat of an eyelash.

Just then a town coach bearing the Cockermouth crest on its door pulled to the curb. A liveried groom hopped down from the bench to open said door and let down the stairs.

And none too soon, Coop realized as the maid assisted the countess to the equipage, before I shove my other foot in my mouth and volunteer Darby’s assistance, as well.

But it was already too late.

“Miss Foster, although there have been no written reports of my derring-do, I should be honored to likewise offer my assistance,” Darby said, smiling at his friend. “Isn’t that right, Baron? Two heads always being better than one when it comes to this heroing business.”

“Why, thank you, my lord,” she responded even as she half hopped toward the coach with his support. “Number Eleven Portman Square in an hour? Although I doubt the countess will join us. She’s found herself in a rather delicate situation.”

The countess’s voice rang out from the coach. “I am not in a delicate...! Daniella, get in this coach. At once!”

The two gentlemen watched as the coachman drove off.

“Our Miss Foster is going to get an earful all the way back to Portman Square,” Darby said once they turned to continue their walk. “And it won’t be her first, I’d imagine. What an odd little creature. Not a drop of guile anywhere—honest, forthright and apparently amused even as she clearly wants to help the countess. Society will have her for lunch, you know, even here, in the Little Season.”

“Or she’ll have all of Society at her feet,” Coop countered, realizing he was none too happy with his conclusion. “The ton has often embraced the eccentric, and she certainly at least qualifies as an Original.”

“Oh, she’s more than that, old friend. I’ve just realized she managed to remove the chapbook from my pocket.”

“She what?” Coop turned to look at the flagway, hoping the chapbook had simply fallen to the ground once more. It wasn’t there, just the broken heel of Dany’s right shoe, which he quickly retrieved. “My God. Forward, cheeky and a pickpocket. What do you think we’ve gotten ourselves into, Darby? I won’t help with an elopement, and neither will you, if that’s what this is about. Oliver’s a friend.”

“And as our friend, we have offered our services to his wife, or at least to find out what’s going on so that we might warn him. It’s probably all a tempest in a teapot, anyway, knowing women, and easily put to rights, whatever her problem. If nothing else, it should serve to take your mind off your blackmailer for a few hours.”

Coop frowned. “Nothing will take my mind off the bastard,” he said, but as they wisely hailed a hackney to take them back to the Pulteney for what Darby had called “a wash and a brush-up,” it was thoughts of Daniella Foster that most occupied his mind.

He had originally come back to London to find himself a wife, there was that.

But surely not someone like Daniella Foster; he was too levelheaded to go that particular route, no matter how great the initial attraction. Wasn’t it enough his mother was also more than an Original?

CHAPTER FOUR

IT WAS QUIET in the Portman Square drawing room now that the countess had retired to her bedchamber, led there by the promise of tea and freshly baked lemon cakes. She’d run out of complaints and threats, anyway, emptied her budget of Things Ladies of Good Breeding Do Not Say or Do and thrown up her hands in defeat when her sister grinned and asked, “So, are you breeding, Mari? You’ve been rather overset lately. Perhaps you haven’t been counting?”

Having successfully routed her sister at last, Dany looked across the room, to where her maid, Emmaline, had been told to take up residence on a chair positioned close by a front-facing window. There were two reasons for that. One, Emmaline would be able to watch out the window to alert her mistress when one of the carriages stopped in front of Number Eleven, and two, the carriage traffic would help muffle voices while Dany and the gentlemen spoke.

Oh, and a third: young unmarried ladies needs must be chaperoned at all times or else the entire world just might disintegrate into cinders, or some such calamity. Of course, were that true, Dany would have destroyed the world at least six times over by now. And that was just this year.

In any event, Emmaline was discreet. She’d kept many a secret for Dany over the years, either out of affection or because she’d be sacked on the spot for having allowed any of her mistress’s daring exploits, many of which had necessarily included her cooperation. Dany preferred to believe it was affection.

She glanced at the mantel clock, mentally calculating the time between their departure from Bond Street and now, and pulled the chapbook from her pocket. The thing was thin of pages, no more than thirty at the most, quite shopworn, and with luck she could finish it before the hero and his viscount friend arrived.

But first she’d look at the cover again. The baron truly owned one of the most pleasing collections of features she’d ever seen gathered together all in one place. Hair so thick and blond that it would have to be the envy of all the many women who both dyed their locks and supplemented them with itchy bunches of wool to help conceal the thin patches.

Not that Dany had that problem. When it came to her own hair, the true bane of her existence was its color. Not red, not chestnut, not even orange, thank God and all the little fishies. Her mother (believing herself to be out of her younger daughter’s hearing), had once described the curious mix of red and gold as trashy, the sort of hair that couldn’t possibly come from nature, and was favored by loose women who flaunt their bosoms and kick up their skirts to expose their ankles in the chorus in order to delight the randy young gentlemen in the pit at Covent Garden.

Although sometimes Dany thought that might not exactly be considered a bane on her existence, as at least the kicking up of her heels sounded rather fun. To date, the only thing growing up had proved to Dany was that the mere passing of years could turn a female’s life into one long, boring existence, with nothing to look forward to but purple turbans.

She’d marry somewhere in between some sort of hopeful kicking up of her heels and the turbans, she supposed, although she was in no hurry to please her parents by accepting the first gentleman willing to take her off their hands. She hoped for at least two Seasons before anyone was that brave, anyway.

But on to the baron’s eyes. The engraver had been a tad too generous with the green, but by and large, they were the most compelling eyes Dany had seen outside of her childhood pet beagle, which somehow had managed one blue and one brown eye. And they were sweet, and sympathetic, just like her puppy’s eyes when he wanted to convince her he deserved a treat. Winsome, yet wise, and not a stranger to humor.

Yes, she really did admire the baron’s eyes. They were nearly as fascinating as her own, she thought immodestly—she would have said truthfully—which seemed to change color with her mood or what she wore. Not that she was in any great hurry to be limited to dowager purple.

His nose definitely surpassed hers. She liked the small bump in it just below the bridge, which kept him from being too pretty. Hers was straight, perhaps a bit pert. In short, it was simply a nose. It served its purpose but would never garner any accolades.

And then there was his mouth. Oh, my, yes, his mouth. Her father had no upper lip, none at all, as if he’d been hiding behind a door when they were handed out. The baron’s upper lip was generously formed, and nicely peaked into the bargain, and his bottom lip full, just pronounced enough that there was a hint of shadow beneath it.

He didn’t favor side-whiskers, for which she was grateful, seeing that her brother, Dexter, he of the madly curling black hair, had taken to wearing his long enough to clump around the bottom of his ears, making him look rather like a poodle.

And he was tall—the baron, that is—so that the top of her head didn’t quite reach his shoulders. Ordinarily that would annoy her. She’d always thought she would be attracted to shorter men, so that she didn’t feel overpowered. But she didn’t feel small or powerless beside the baron. She felt...protected. Most especially when he had caught her as she fell and lifted her high in his arms. It had been quite the extraordinary experience.

“I suppose I can’t trip again, because that would be too obvious. Pity,” she said to herself, opening the chapbook. It was time to stop thinking and start reading. Time to see just what sort of hero the baron was, if he was a hero at all. She hoped at least part of the story would turn out to be real.

She had only two pages to go when the mantel clock struck the hour of one, but she pressed on, determined to finish.

The April day was made for Pic-a-nicks beneath the Budding trees, a day for Good Food, Fine Wine and Lovers. Instead, it was a Day for Killing and Dying, and by evening the green field would Run Red with blood and gore. The English soldiers looked out across the field, wondering if they would by lying there within the next few hours, Broken in body and Food only for the worms. This was not their Choice—it was their Duty—and they would Fight to the Death for both King and Country, for the Little Corporal had broken free of his prison and had marched nearly into Brussels, threatening the Entire World once again with his Insane Ambition.

The troops had hoped to reach the High Ground above them, and from there Defend their Position if an attack should come. But they’d been Too Late, and when a scout reported seeing French troops Advancing Toward Them, there’d been no choice but to take refuge in the trees at the Bottom of the hill, hoping the French would not Detect them until they’d come too far down the hill to Retreat without Tripping over one another.

But something was wrong. The Fates had placed a low Stone Wall and the Ruins of an old Kiln halfway up to the top of the hill. Several Small Figures huddled there inside the Kiln, at least a half dozen Children and a heavily veiled Lady who could be their nurse or their mother. Whether they hid from the English or the French could not be known. Either way, they were about to be Caught smack in the middle of a Battle.

It was the Worst of all possible Nightmares. How could the English fire, knowing the Children and a Frail Female were between them and the French? No man of merit would Dare such a thing. Even the officers had sent Whispered Commands down the line. Keep your positions! Hold your fire!

But one Brave Man broke ranks, tossing away his rifle and uniform cap, crouching nearly in half as he ran Up the Hill without regard to his own safety. Every last man held his breath as Captain Cooper McGinley Townsend seemed to be Arguing with the woman, convincing her to Leave her ill-chosen safe harbor.

And still the Enemy advanced. It was now possible to see the distinctive Brass Eagle topping a tall staff, and the French Colors flapping in the breeze. Their Full Force would crest the hill in Mere Seconds, hopefully stop to assay the land below. Could they See beyond the wall? Would the sunlit blaze of the captain’s Distinctive Blond Mane catch the sunlight and give away his Position?

With one breath, one silent collective thought, the troops prayed: Run! Run now, before it’s Disaster for all of us!

And run he did. Gathering the youngest against his chest even as he Threw the protesting woman over his shoulder, he motioned for the other children to Run on Ahead as he Raced across the field, out from behind the Fragile Safety of the Broken stone wall, and toward the trees, Throwing Himself and His Precious Burdens into concealment mere seconds before the first horse and rider could be seen Cresting the Hilltop.

The English General dismounted and began walking the Line. “Now that’s how to disobey orders, hmm? Bloody well done, Townsend. Today, gentlemen, we have witnessed the birth of a Hero. Now, what say we rid the World of a few of these hopping frogs, hmm? They’ll send Infantry first. Ah, and here they come a-marching, all smug and unsuspecting. Steady, men. Hold...hold...hold. First rank, Forward if you please. Kneel. Raise your weapons. Hold. Hold. Fire!”

Just as it was Coming on to Dusk, our Hero strode into the camp, bloodied but not bowed, the rescued Innocents, orphans all, skipping merrily behind him, a sweet, towheaded cherub no more than three perched on his Strong Shoulders, waving his small cap in Victory, but with the heavily veiled Lady Curiously Absent.

Huzzah! the assembled soldiers cried out, raising their rifles in Salute after Salute, for they had lost many Brave Men that day and the sight of the Children once again firmed their resolve to Fight On. Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!

The women of the camp Raced forward, gathering the Children against their skirts and hustling them off to the cook tents to be fed, and our brave Captain was swiftly surrounded by his soldiers in arms, All of Them wishing to pat his back, shake his hand.

Huzzah! Huzzah! May the whole world Rejoice in such Modest Bravery!

...and thus, Dear Readers, is how the Baron Cooper McGinley Townsend, Hero, came to be.

There is just a bit More before we term this story Told, although it will not, alas, Satisfy the Curious among Us.

A bold Question from one of his acquaintance about the Scratches on his cheek, followed by the Assumption as to how they’d gotten there, elicited a Warning Green Flash from Townsend’s narrowed eyes before he smiled and Explained that a Holy Nun had been taking the Children to her convent for Safekeeping, but had gladly turned them over since food at the convent was limited.

A search of the area days after Bonaparte’s final defeat elicited No Nunnery in the area. There was, however, Dear Readers, a lovely Country Cottage, clearly quite hastily Abandoned, and a single remaining caretaker who Confirmed that a young woman, always Heavily Veiled, had been in Residence for some Weeks before rushing off, leaving behind nothing more than a Curious Signet Ring as payment, a ring now in the Possession of one whose Discretion can always be Trusted.

But not to fret, Loyal Readers, for our hero’s Daring Adventures do not end with this Single tale of bravery. Upon his return to our faire isle, now Baron Cooper McGinley Townsend, at the Behest of the Crown, has continued his Deeds of Bravery and Rescue, personally preserving the Honor of several damsels in Mortal Danger of their Virtue even while the Mystery persists—who is the Veiled Lady?

Dany let out a breath, not realizing she’d been holding it, and closed the chapbook. “A veiled lady? What a hum,” she said, for her interest lay more in the feat of derring-do than in anything so obviously fictitious as a veiled lady. And a signet ring, no less, also thrown into the mix, a perfect clue for someone with the interest to pursue its origin. But she supposed every story must have a lady in it somewhere, preferably veiled or beautiful or both, or else the gentlemen wouldn’t bother racking their brains and running their fingers beneath line after line to keep their place in order to not miss a word. Men were such children. And women, sadly, were possibly even worse, seeing themselves in the role of the rescued.

“Curricle, Miss Dany.”

With one last quick look at the cover of the chapbook—had she considered his wonderfully high, strong cheekbones in her initial inventory?—Dany quickly slipped it down behind the cushions of the overstuffed couch and ran her hands over her hair, bodice and skirts, just to be sure everything was still where it had been when she’d first arranged herself so carefully in anticipation of her guests.

She pressed a hand to her bosom once more, clearing her throat as daintily as possible, hoping the action might help regulate the rather rapid beating of her heart, and then lifted her chin, directing her gaze toward the doorway.

But no! She couldn’t look as if she’d been just sitting here, waiting on the man. Certainly a hero was already full enough of himself without thinking she’d been counting the minutes until his arrival. She shot to her feet as she heard Timmerly greet the visitors and direct them toward the stairs, looking about frantically for something she could be doing when the butler announced him.

Propping herself against the mantel was ludicrous, and reserved for gentlemen at any rate, not to mention the fact that she’d practically have to raise her bent arm above her head in order to rest her elbow on the thing. She spied her sister’s knitting basket and dismissed it in the same heartbeat. She’d rather be boiled in oil than found knitting, for goodness’ sake.

What to do, what to—wait, the flowers! There must be five huge bouquets scattered about the room, each more lovely the other. How impressed the gentleman would be when he saw her handiwork. She raced to a round table holding a perfectly arranged bouquet and yanked four of the blooms from the porcelain vase. In an instant, three of them were on the tabletop, dripping water onto her skirt, and one was in her hand as she posed in the motion of sliding it in with its fellow blooms.

“Ah, gentlemen,” she cooed, turning her head ever so slightly as Timmerly announced them, inwardly cursing the viscount for keeping good his promise to lend his help. She’d really rather he’d taken himself off somewhere, to amuse himself at somebody else’s expense. “How good of you to come. Timmerly, refreshments if you please.”

“Yes, Miss Dany,” the butler scolded, bowing. “But if you were to leave off playing with the posies, the countess would be that pleased. It took her ladyship and Mrs. Timmerly a good hour to arrange them this morning.”

The viscount’s bark of laughter accompanied the high-nosed butler’s exit from the drawing room, leaving Dany with nothing to do but pick up the other blooms and jam them back into the vase. Butlers could be such prunes.

“I suppose I’m caught out,” she recovered swiftly, wiping her damp hands against each other as she returned to the couch. “I was hoping to look accomplished, but the truth is, I have very few skills welcomed in polite company. Please, gentlemen, be seated.”

And the maddening viscount was at it again: “Such as picking pockets?”

She turned to the baron, who was looking, or so she hoped, at least slightly amused. Therefore, she would be amused. “Yes, my lords, although I’d rather call it retrieving what’s mine. I’ve now read it cover to cover, of course. How much is truth, sir, and how much could be termed a bag of moonshine? As for the signet ring, the tantalizing clue that just happened to be left behind to be found by your anonymous biographer? I would think both it and the veiled lady were only mentioned to encourage purchase of Volume Two. Do you by chance have a copy in your possession, or know where I might purchase one?”