The Secrets Of Catie Hazard. Miranda Jarrett

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ before she heard the sweet, empty praise of Anthony Sparhawk, and discovered how much her poor, parched heart ached to hear such words again, sweet words meant for her alone.

      And with no answer she could bring herself to speak, she turned and fled. She ran through the taproom and the kitchen and out the back door to the yard, and she didn’t stop until she reached the well, to lean against the rough bricks.

      She didn’t want to be sober and plain and capable, and she didn’t want to work her life away as Ben Hazard’s wife. She was only seventeen, and she wanted to be pretty and merry and praised by a gentleman with golden hair and red silk flowers on his waistcoat. She wanted—oh, Lord help her, she didn’t know what she wanted, and with a muffled sob she buried her face against her forearm.

      “Did they blame you for that foolish row, pet?” asked Anthony softly. “’Twas hardly your fault that we Sparhawk men regard such scrapes as entertainment.”

      Startled, Catie swiftly raised her head. He was standing there in the shadows on the other side of the well, his jacket and waistcoat gone, one sleeve of his fine linen shirt torn in a strip from the shoulder.

      “Mr. Sparhawk!” Self-consciously she rubbed away her tears with the heel of her hand instead of taking the handkerchief he offered. “Oh, dear Lord, look at you! Are you hurt? I can take you into the kitchen and—”

      “No, lass, I swear I’m none the worse for wear.” He stepped into the moonlight to show he’d no hideous bruises or blackened eyes. “And for the last time, it’s Anthony, not Mr. Sparhawk.”

      “Anthony, then.” She frowned and clucked her tongue with dismay. “But look what’s become of your beautiful clothes!”

      “Ha! Old rags, not to be missed.” Dramatically he held his arms out straight at his sides so that the tattered fabric fluttered in the breeze. “You know, I was afraid you wouldn’t come.”

      She hoped the shadows hid her flush of pleasure. He had come back, no matter what Rebeckah said, and he’d come back to see her. “Why did you take my side against Zeb?”

      “What, because you’re a serving girl in a sailors’ tavern?” He let his arms drop back to his sides and walked around the well to join her. “Ah, that you must blame on my grandfather’s teachings. His own chivalrous inclinations were wonderfully universal, an indubitable doctrine I espouse as my own, as well.”

      To her shame, she hadn’t the faintest idea what he’d just told her. Such grand language the gentry used!

      “But why?” she asked hesitantly, praying another question would not displease him. “Why me?”

      “Because I wished it, pet. Because you’re fresh and pretty, with marvelous, solemn eyes that shine like polished pewter.” He was studying her intently, almost frowning, like an artist composing a painting. “You color most charmingly, too, you know, especially by moonlight.”

      “But I’m not pretty,” she protested. “It’s very gallant of you to say that foolishness about my eyes, but I know they’re just gray, just as I know my face is too round and my hair’s drab and straight. I know I’m plain. Everyone tells me so.”

      “Then everyone may go to the devil.” Gently, easily, he drew her close, guiding her arms around his waist. “Someday you’ll be more beautiful than all of them put together.”

      “But I—”

      “Hush now, and listen to me.” He cradled her face in his hands, stroking her cheeks with his thumbs. “The loveliest flowers are often the ones that take the longest to blossom. I can see the promise of real beauty in this charming little face already, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.”

      For an endless moment, Catie let the sweetness of his words wash over her, before she forced herself to break away. “We can’t stay here. Someone may see us from the tavern.” Someone like Ben Hazard, she added mentally. How she’d hate for him to spoil this moment with his grumpy face! “Come, across here to the stable.”

      Shyly she took his hand. Anthony Sparhawk wasn’t like the other men from the tavern that she’d always avoided. He was a gentleman, and he had defended her against Zeb. How could she not trust him?

      “I was born on a farm,” she explained as she led him across the shadow-filled yard to the stable that shared the well with the Crossed Keys, “and when I cannot bear the city crowds and noises any longer, I come here to be alone with the beasts. Mr. Freeman— he’s the ostler—he understands, and lets me come and go as I please.”

      Carefully she unfastened the latch and slipped inside, pausing for Anthony to follow her up the ladder to the loft. Her feet slipped deep into the mounded hay, the fragrance musty and redolent of summer. She knelt beside the narrow window and looked out at the harbor and the ships at the moorings.

      “When all the sails are furled like that, I think the masts look like trees,” she said dreamily, the breeze from the harbor cool on her cheeks. “A whole magic, silvery forest on the water.”

      She heard the straw rustle as he came to kneel beside her. “How old are you, pet?”

      “Seventeen,” she admitted, hoping he wouldn’t think her a child. “But I’ve been working in Newport on my own since last spring.”

      “That makes seven years between us. Was I ever as young as you, I wonder?”

      She turned and smiled. “Of course you were,” she said. “Seven years ago.”

      “Of course.” Gently he tugged off her white linen cap, letting her fine, pale hair spill over her shoulders. “In the morning I’ll be sailing in one of those ships for England. After years of fighting the French for king and country, my grandfather’s at last seen fit to reward me with a lieutenancy in a real regiment. My commission’s waiting in London.”

      “London?” said Catie unhappily as she shook her hair back from her eyes. He might as well have said the moon. “When will you come back?”

      “Ah, that only God in His mercy can answer. One year or ten, or maybe not at all.” He spoke with such a brave melancholy that it tore at her heart, and impulsively she slipped her arms around him, eager to take the sorrow from his blue eyes.

      “You must not talk that way,” she said fiercely, pressing her cheek against the fine linen of his shirt. “You will come back, I know it.”

      He sighed, letting his hands settle around her waist to hold her against his chest. “A good soldier’s life isn’t his own, pet, and he never knows when it may be forfeit.”

      “But that’s so sad!” cried Catie, pushing herself back so that she could search his face. With all his grim talk of war and soldiering, she had meant to comfort him, but she was the one who felt safe here, his arms around her making a special haven in the warm, fragrant straw. “How can you bear to sail from home, knowing you may not live to return?”

      With infinite care, he slowly traced the bow of her upper lip. “You can help me bear it, sweet,” he said, his voice deep and low. “Give me a memory to take with me.”

      He kissed her then, as lightly at first as his touch had been, brushing his mouth across her lips until they parted willingly for him. If he wished to take the memory of her kiss with him into battle, then she’d give СКАЧАТЬ