The Marriage Wager. Candace Camp

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СКАЧАТЬ it is settled,” Lady Haughston went on. “I shall call on you tomorrow, say around one, and we shall make a day of it.”

      “You are very kind.”

      Again that smile flashed, and Francesca took her leave, pressing Constance’s hand in farewell before she walked away. Constance watched her go, her mind still humming. She could not imagine why Lady Haughston was so interested in her, but she suspected that it would prove entertaining to find out.

      She turned and looked over to where she had been standing with her aunt and uncle. She could not even see them through the crowd of people. It occurred to her that her aunt would not know precisely when she had parted from Lady Haughston. Perhaps she could spend a little more time away without encountering any censure from Aunt Blanche.

      Constance glanced around her and spied a doorway opening into a hall. She slipped through it and made her way around the people who had drifted out of the crowded great hall and stood about in small clumps, talking. No one paid her any mind as she walked along the hallway—an advantage, she supposed, of her plain style.

      Another, smaller corridor took her past a set of double doors that stood partly open. She saw that it was a library. A smile touched her lips, and she stepped inside. It was a grand library, with bookshelves up to the ceiling filling all four walls except for the space occupied by windows. With a sigh of pure pleasure, she gave herself up to looking at the rows and rows of books.

      Her father had been a scholarly man, far more inclined to keep his nose in books of this sort than in the books of accounts for his estate. Their library at home had been crammed full of volumes of every description, but that room had been much smaller than this one and could not have held a third of the books here.

      She strolled over to the shelves on the opposite wall and was reading through the titles when she heard the clatter of hurrying footsteps in the marble-tiled hallway outside. A moment later a man burst into the room, looking harried. He checked for an instant when his eyes fell upon Constance, who was standing watching him in surprise.

      He laid his forefinger against his lips in a gesture of silence, then slipped behind the door, out of sight.

      CHAPTER TWO

      CONSTANCE BLINKED IN surprise, not sure what to make of this peculiar entrance. She hesitated, then started toward the open doorway. There was the sound of short, quick steps in the hallway, and Constance came to a halt as a woman now appeared in the doorway.

      The new visitor was short and square, a startling vision in a puce overdress of sheer voile above a satin rose gown. Neither the material nor the fashionable color suited the woman’s middle-aged body. And the heavy frown she wore did nothing to improve her looks.

      She glared somewhat accusingly at Constance and barked, “Have you seen the Viscount?”

      “Here? In the library?” Constance raised her eyebrows in a skeptical way.

      The other woman looked uncertain. “It does seem unlikely.” She glanced back into the hallway and then into the library. “But I am positive I saw Leighton come this way.”

      “There was a man running down the hall only a moment ago,” Constance lied cheerfully. “He probably turned into the main corridor.”

      The woman’s gaze sharpened. “Headed for the smoking room, I’ll warrant.”

      She turned and bustled away in pursuit of her quarry.

      When the sound of her footsteps had receded, the man emerged from behind the door, pushing it halfway closed, and let out an exaggerated sigh of relief.

      “Dear lady, I am eternally in your debt,” he told her with a charming grin.

      Constance could not keep from smiling back. He was a handsome man, his looks enhanced by his smile and easy manner. He was a little taller than average, topping Constance by several inches, and slender, with a wiry body that hinted at hidden strength. He was dressed well but not meticulously in a formal black suit and white shirt, his ascot tied in a simple but fashionable style, with none of the fusses and frills of a dandy. His eyes were a deep blue, the color of a lake in summer, and his mouth was wide and mobile, accented by a deep dimple on one side. When he smiled, as he did now, his eyes lit up merrily, beckoning everyone around him to join in his good humor. His hair, dark blond sunkissed with lighter streaks, was worn a trifle longer than was fashionable and tousled in a way that owed more to carelessness than to his valet’s art.

      He was, Constance thought, someone whom it was difficult to dislike, and she suspected that he was well aware of his effect, especially upon women. The unaccustomed visceral tug of attraction she felt inside was proof of his power, she thought, and firmly exercised control over the jangling of nerves in her stomach. She had to be immune to flirtatious smiles and handsome men, for she was not, after all, marriage material, and any other option was unthinkable.

      “Viscount Leighton, I presume?” she said lightly.

      “Alas, I am, for my sins,” he responded, and swept her a very creditable bow. “And your name, my lady?”

      “It is merely miss,” she answered. “And it would be highly improper, I think, to give it to a stranger.”

      “Ah, but not as highly improper as being alone with said stranger, as you are now,” he countered. “But once you tell me your name, we will no longer be strangers, and then all is perfectly respectable.”

      She let out a little laugh at his reasoning. “I am Miss Woodley, my lord. Miss Constance Woodley.”

      “Miss Constance Woodley,” he repeated, moving closer and saying confidentially, “now you must offer me your hand.”

      “Indeed? Must I?” Constance’s eyes danced. She could not remember when she had last engaged in light flirtation with any man, and she found it quite invigorating.

      “Oh, yes.” He made a grave face. “For if you do not, how am I to bow over it?”

      “But you have already made a perfectly proper bow,” she pointed out.

      “Yes, but not while I was so lucky as to be in possession of your hand,” he replied.

      Constance extended her hand, saying, “You are a very persistent sort of fellow.”

      He took her hand in his and bowed over it, holding it a bit longer than was proper. When he released it, he smiled at her, and Constance felt the warmth of his smile all the way down to her toes.

      “Now we are friends, so all is proper.”

      “Friends? We are but acquaintances, surely,” Constance replied.

      “Ah, but you have saved me from Lady Taffington. That makes you very much my friend.”

      “Then, as a friend, I feel I am free to inquire as to why you are hiding in the library from Lady Taffington. She did not seem fearsome enough to send a grown man into popping behind doors.”

      “Then you do not know Lady Taffington. She is that most terrifying of all creatures, a marriage-minded mama.”

      “Then you must take care not to run into my aunt,” Constance retorted.

      He СКАЧАТЬ