Without waiting for any answer, he rolled on, “The setting is rather unusual, as I’m sure you’re aware—the woods all around lend the house a subtle, almost-fairy-tale quality, and the lines of the building are classic, of course, which only adds to the unexpectedness of seeing it in what otherwise appears to be wild and untamed surrounds.” He focused on her eyes. “Please say you’ll consider allowing me to do at least a few more sketches. The house has fired my imagination, so to speak.”
He was clever enough to stop talking at that point and simply sit staring at her in obvious and expectant hope.
Felicia set down her empty cup and returned his steady regard while her mind raced. He might be an agent acting for some other inventor with the intent to sabotage the engine. Against that notion, he wasn’t asking to sketch inside the house. Seeking to confirm that, she said, “Different views of the house from different spots outside?”
He nodded. “Yes. Exactly.”
How could he possibly threaten the engine? He’d be a hundred or more yards from the house at all times.
She still wasn’t sure—and wasn’t sure why that was so. At no time had Mayhew, by word or deed, given her cause to suspect him.
The timing—the coincidences surrounding his initial appearance in the village—had sparked both her and Rand’s suspicions, and his reappearance at such a critical juncture would only further feed their wariness. And although there was nothing more substantial than coincidence to support their suspicions, at least in her case, despite Mayhew’s charm and all the evidence of his undeniable talent, her suspicions showed no signs of abating.
Yet if he was a sneaky gentleman intent on harming the invention, she would really rather keep him in view—stuck behind his easel on the lawn.
She stirred. “Perhaps if you come to tea this afternoon and discuss your request with Mrs. Makepeace and me, we might see our way to granting it.” She smiled to soften her refusal to immediately agree; she wanted a few hours to think—and to consult Rand.
She pushed back from the table, and Mayhew hurriedly got to his feet and assisted her to hers. She smiled easily in thanks. “If you will call at three o’clock?”
“I’ll be there.” His charming smile was very much in evidence as he picked up her basket and insisted on escorting her back to the street.
On the corner, she claimed her basket and was firm in declining his escort along the lane and down the woodland path. “It’s not far, and I know these woods like the back of my hand.”
With a last nod from her and a half bow from him, they parted—both still smiling.
As she walked down the lane to where the path from the house joined it, Felicia had to wonder if Mayhew’s smile was as much a façade as hers.
* * *
Rand had been loitering in the doorway of the forge, waiting for Ferguson to refine the curve on a brace that would anchor the engine into the carriage and, meanwhile, idly scanning the village street, when he saw Felicia exit the inn on the artist’s arm.
“Damn it—he’s back.” Eyes narrowing, Rand had pushed away from the archway against which he’d been leaning. His hands gripping his hips, he’d watched as, at the far end of the street, Felicia had firmly dismissed Mayhew and, parting from him, had continued on alone, walking with her usual free stride along the lane in the direction of the Hall.
She hadn’t seemed distressed in any way. As for Mayhew, he seemed pleased. Rubbing his hands together, the artist was smiling as he turned toward the inn.
Rand watched Mayhew walk back to the inn and disappear inside.
A litany of possible actions—reactions—scrolled through Rand’s mind. In the end, the considerations that stopped him from marching down the street, into the inn, and making it indisputably clear to Mayhew that Felicia Throgmorton was spoken for were twofold.
The first—and most telling with respect to protecting the invention—was that as Rand had led Mayhew to believe he was a family friend passing through, Mayhew would not be expecting Rand to still be at Throgmorton Hall. Mayhew, Rand judged, came from a circle only slightly below his own; he knew how Mayhew would have interpreted his words—he would have assumed that, seven days on, Rand would be gone by now.
That raised the interesting question of whether Mayhew had retreated for a week, waiting until he assumed Rand would have left in order to ensure a clear run at the Hall. Simply by asking around in the village, Mayhew could have learned that, other than the absentminded brother who toiled away in the workshop every day, occasionally blowing things up, there was no true male protector residing at the house.
The more Rand thought of it, the more he felt that it would be wise to allow Mayhew to remain unaware of Rand’s continuing presence. Unless Mayhew thought to ask Ferguson, he was unlikely to learn that Rand was still about.
The second consideration that held him back from confronting Mayhew was more personal. Felicia herself might not—yet—understand where she stood vis-à-vis Rand. They hadn’t yet progressed to the point of a declaration.
To his mind, the kiss they’d shared last night had certainly raised the prospect, but he hadn’t spoken.
Once again, he debated that decision, but waiting until after the exhibition, when there would be no urgent business-related pressure hanging over their heads—no possible consideration that might impinge on her decision to accept him, or that she might imagine had influenced his decision to ask for her hand—still seemed the best way forward.
Waiting to speak remained the better option.
The niggling understanding that he was uncertain enough of her—of his appeal to her—to want more time to convince her to be his, he pushed to the back of his mind.
“M’lord.”
Rand lowered his arms and turned as Ferguson came walking out from the depths of the forge, waving the re-formed brace.