Part 13 (2/2)

'Distasteful, is how I would describe them,' Phyllida said.

'Then Ashe should just have had a bonfire and not made you look at them!'

'Unfortunately some of them are valuable and there were all sorts of things mixed up together, so I had to sort them out. This is a lovely room, Lady Eldonstone. The silks are exquisite.'

'Thank you. I seem to spend all my time throwing things away but gradually a rather fine house is emerging. The silks are one of the things I managed to pack and bring with us in quant.i.ty. Which reminds me, Nicholas, we have been invited to a fancy-dress ball the day after tomorrow. We must all go in Indian dress. I am sure we can find something that will suit Miss Hurst.'

'But I have no invitation-it is Lady Auderley's masquerade ball, I a.s.sume?'

'And you are not invited? I shall tell her we have a house guest and that you will accompany us.'

'But she... Lady Auderley is one of the hostesses who has never received me,' Phyllida said, wis.h.i.+ng the exquisite silk carpet would envelop her.

'Because of your birth,' Lady Eldonstone stated bluntly. 'Well, if she does not receive you, she must have the same objection to me. When I consider some of the rakes and loose screws I have been introduced to in the n.o.blest of houses here, that is completely hypocritical.' Her chin was up, her eyes were sparking like flint struck against iron and she looked ready to pick up a rapier and run Lady Auderley through on the spot.

'I really do not wish to cause you any embarra.s.sment-'

'I will not have anyone in this family-' the marquess cleared his throat and his wife changed tack neatly '-or who is a guest of the family treated like that.'

'You outrank her, Mata,' Sara said with a giggle. 'And she is in love with Papa, so you could arrive on an elephant, let alone with a charming guest such as Phyllida, and she will not object.' She turned to Phyllida, who was torn between the desire to sink gently into oblivion and fascination with the marchioness. 'All the ladies are in love with Papa,' Sara explained.

'Not with Lord Clere?' Phyllida ventured.

'Papa is safely married. They can flutter their eyelashes all they like, whereas with Ashe their husbands would become agitated and lock them up.'

'I do not think you have quite grasped how things work in English marriages,' Ashe drawled. 'The wives do as they like and the men have duels about it afterwards. Is that not so, Miss Hurst?'

'As an unmarried lady I could not possibly comment,' she said demurely.

'Of course. You will have been living a life of blameless, chaperoned respectability,' he murmured as he pa.s.sed her a plate of biscuits.

'Naturally, Lord Clere.'

'We must see what we can do about that,' he replied, making her choke on a biscuit crumb. 'We are decided, then?' he said to the family. 'Miss Hurst will join us at the masquerade to give us a tally of three Indian beauties.'

'Shall we find clothes for Phyllida now, Mata?' Sara said. 'She would look lovely in jade green.'

'I think I should start to prepare those items for the sale room,' Phyllida interjected. 'The specialist sale I told you about, Lord Clere, is in two weeks' time and, if we delay much longer, we will miss the catalogue.'

'Very true. If you have finished your tea, I will come and a.s.sist you, Miss Hurst.'

She could hardly protest that the last thing she wanted was to be in one room alone with Ashe Herriard and a quant.i.ty of erotic art, not in front of his mother and sister. 'Thank you,' she said politely and smiled despite the urge to wipe the satisfied expression from his face.

He showed her into an empty room at the back of the house where the crates had been stacked on arrival from Eldonstone. 'The ones of, shall we say, esoteric content are in the boxes marked with an X, according to Perrott, who added a note to say that he did not know what we were paying you, but that it was not enough.'

'When one does this sort of thing for a living one cannot afford to be too nice about it,' Phyllida said prosaically. 'We must list each item and it had better be in my hand as the auctioneer is expecting them to come from Madame Deaucourt and he knows my writing.'

'I will unpack them, call out a description and you can list it.' Ashe set paper and ink in front of her at a desk and went to the first crate. 'Small bronze of a group of satyrs, signed Hilaire.'

They began to work steadily, although Phyllida did wonder what on earth any society lady with her ear to the keyhole would make of it.

'... six naturalistic carvings in ivory of phalli, possibly French. Size, improbable.' Startled, she glanced up to find Ashe eyeing one of the objects with scepticism. 'Well, I ask you! Have you ever seen...? No, of course not.' He slammed the lid down on another completed crate. 'This stuff is about as erotic as a plate of boiled cabbage.'

'If you say so.' Phyllida drew a neat line and wrote a new heading for the next box.

Finally Ashe hammered a crate closed. 'That, thankfully, is the lot. I just hope it was worth the work.'

'It will make a thousand, possibly,' Phyllida said, running her pen down the list.

'Pounds?'

'Guineas. Gentlemen will pay high figures for erotica.'

'They'd do better to spend it on flesh-and-blood women.' He sat on the edge of the desk next to her, one booted foot swinging, took the pen and put it firmly back in the standish.

'You do not enjoy looking at it?' she asked boldly, thinking of the tales of Indian love texts.

'Nothing is as arousing as being close to a lovely woman, touching her skin.' His fingers ran slowly over the back of her hand. 'Watching her pupils dilate.' He held her eyes with his. 'Seeing the colour come up under her skin as though an artist has brushed it with the palest wash of rose.' His other hand lifted to caress her cheek. 'That stuff in the boxes is for men who don't have a woman or who are incapable of making love to one if they have.'

'I thought India was famous for its erotic texts.'

'Those are for a man and a woman to use together. In the Far East they call them pillow books. You will enjoy them.'

It was a promise that had the fine hairs standing up all over her body. Phyllida s.h.i.+vered. 'When we are married.'

'Why wait that long?' His fingers slid up into her hair, capturing her, holding her for his kiss.

'Not here,' Phyllida said against his lips. 'We cannot-'

'No,' Ashe agreed. 'Not here.' His tongue, firm and insistent, caressed along the seam of her lips, wanting entrance.

'I mean, not at all. Not until we are married.' It had to be said, but it was a mistake to open her mouth at that moment. The words were swallowed by his kiss and she let herself go with them, unable to resist the urgings of her own feelings, needing to touch him, hold him.

He broke the kiss, not she. And it should have been her, she knew it and could not find it in herself to feel guilty. He's mesmerised me, she thought, her hands still fastened on his lapels, her back arched against the chair rail. But, no, she could not blame him. Persuade, not seduce, Ashe had said. He was showing her what she wanted, needed as much as he did. It was up to her to resist.

Chapter Sixteen.

'Are you frightened of consequences, of becoming pregnant?' Ashe asked with the directness she was coming to expect from him. 'It is such a short time until we will be married that it need not worry you.'

I cannot because I am not a virgin and there is no way I can explain to you why that is so. How would he react when he realised? With revulsion? Would he blame her, think her wanton? It would be hypocritical of him, of course, but men held women to different standards than they applied to themselves.

Might she deceive him into thinking her a virgin? She had no idea how to go about that. Besides, she shrank from the deceit. I cannot because if I do lie with you now and you believe me a virgin, then nothing is going to persuade you that we must not wed.

Phyllida rested her forehead against Ashe's s.h.i.+rtfront and tried to find some composure, some strength of will. It occurred to her that, of all the reasons she had for not making love with him, the fact that society would say it was immoral mattered not at all.

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