Chapter 7
. . . have never been so bored in all of my life. Colin, you must come home. It is interminably boring without you, and I don’t think I can bear such boredom another moment. Please do return, for I have clearly begun to repeat myself, and nothing could be more of a bore.
—from Eloise Bridgerton to her brother Colin,
during her fifth season as a debutante,
sent (but never received)
while Colin was traveling in Denmark
Eloise spent the entire day in the garden, lounging on an exceedingly comfortable chaise that she was quite convinced had been imported from Italy, since it was her experience that neither the English nor the French had any clue as to how to fashion comfortable furniture.
Not that she normally spent a great deal of time pondering the construction of chairs and sofas, but stuck outside by herself in the Romney Hall garden, it wasn’t as if she had anything else to ponder.
No, not a thing. Not a single thing to think about other than the comfortable chaise beneath her, and maybe the fact that Sir Phillip was an ill-mannered beast for leaving her alone for the entire day after his two little monsters—whose existence, she added into her thoughts with a mental flourish, he had never seen fit to reveal in his correspondence—had given her a blackened eye.
It was a perfect day, with a blue sky and a light breeze, and Eloise didn’t have a single thing in the world to think about.
She had never been so bored in her life.
It wasn’t in her nature to sit still and watch the clouds float by. She would much rather be out doing something—taking a walk, inspecting a hedgerow, anything other than just sitting like a lump on the chaise, staring aimlessly at the horizon.
Or if she had to sit here, at least she could have done so in the company of another person. She supposed the clouds might have been more interesting if she weren’t quite so alone, if someone were here to whom she might say, Goodness, but that one looks rather like a rabbit, don’t you think?
But no, she’d been left quite on her own. Sir Phillip was off in his greenhouse—she could see it from here, even see him moving about from time to time—and while she really wanted to get up and join him, if for no other reason than the fact that his plants had to be more interesting than the blasted clouds, she wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction of seeking him out.
Not after he’d rejected her so abruptly this afternoon. Good heavens, the man had practically fled from her company. It had been the oddest thing. She’d thought they were dealing with each other rather well, and then he’d grown quite abrupt, making up some sort of excuse about how he needed to work and fleeing the room as if she were plagued.
Odious man.
She picked up the book she’d selected from the library and held it resolutely in front of her face. She was going to read the blasted thing this time if it killed her.
Of course, that was what she’d told herself the last four times she’d picked it up. She never managed to get past a single sentence—a paragraph if she was really disciplined—before her mind wandered and the text on the page grew unfocused and, it went without saying, unread.
Served her right, she supposed, for being so irritated with Sir Phillip that she hadn’t paid any attention in the library and she’d snatched up the first book she’d seen.
The Botany of Ferns?What had she been thinking?
Even worse, if he saw her with it, he’d surely think she’d chosen it because she wanted to learn more about his interests.
Eloise blinked with surprise when she realized that she had reached the end of her page. She didn’t recall a single sentence, and in fact wondered if perhaps her eyes had only slid along the words without actually reading the letters.
This was ridiculous. She thrust the book aside and stood up, taking a few steps to test out the tenderness of her hip. Allowing herself a satisfied smile when she realized that the pain wasn’t bad at all, and in fact couldn’t even be called anything beyond mild discomfort, she walked all the way to the riotous mass of rosebushes off to the north, leaning forward to sniff the buds. They were still tightly closed—it was early in the season, after all—but maybe they’d have a scent, and—
“What the devil are you doing?”
Eloise just managed to avoid falling into the rosebush as she turned around. “Sir Phillip,” she said, as if that weren’t completely obvious.
He looked irate. “You’re supposed to be sitting down.”
“I was sitting down.”
“You were supposed to stay sitting down.”
She decided the truth would make an excellent explanation. “I was bored.”
He glanced over at the chaise in the distance. “Didn’t you get a book from the library?”
She shrugged. “I finished it.”
He quirked a brow in patent disbelief.
She returned his expression with an arch look of her own.
“Well, you need to sit down,” he said gruffly.
“I’m perfectly fine.” She patted her hip gently. “It hardly hurts at all now.”
He stared at her for some time, his expression irritable, as if he wanted to say something but didn’t know what. He must have left the greenhouse in a hurry, because he was quite filthy, with dirt along his arms, under every fingernail, and streaked quite liberally on his shirt. He looked a fright, at least by the standards Eloise had grown used to in London, but there was something almost appealing about him, something rather primitive and elemental as he stood there scowling at her.
“I can’t work if I have to worry about you,” he grumbled.
“Then don’t work,” she replied, thinking the solution quite obvious.
“I’m in the middle of something,” he muttered, sounding, in Eloise’s opinion, at least, rather like a sullen child.
“Then I’ll accompany you,” she said, brushing past him on the way to the greenhouse. Really, how did he expect them to decide if they would suit if they didn’t spend any time together?
He reached out to grab her, then remembered that his hand was covered with dirt. “Miss Bridgerton,” he said sharply, “you can’t—”
“Couldn’t you use the help?” she interrupted.
“No,” he said, and in such a tone that she really couldn’t continue the argument along those lines.
“Sir Phillip,” she ground out, completely losing patience with him, “may I ask you a question?”
Visibly startled by her sudden turn of conversation, he just nodded—once, curtly, the way men liked to do when they were annoyed and wanted to pretend they were in charge.
“Are you the same man you were last night?”
He looked at her as if she were a lunatic. “I beg your pardon.”
“The man I spent the evening with last night,” she said, just barely resisting the urge to cross her arms as she spoke, “the one with whom I shared a meal and then toured the house and greenhouse, actually spoke to me, and in fact, seemed to enjoy my company, astonishing as it might seem.”
He did nothing but stare at her for several seconds, then muttered, “I enjoy your company.”
“Then why,” she asked, “have I been sitting alone in the garden for three hours?”
“It hasn’t been three hours.”
“It doesn’t matter how long—”
“It’s been forty-five minutes,” he said.
“Be that as it may—”
“Be that as it is.”
“Well,” she declared, mostly because she suspected he might have been correct, which put her in something of an awkward position, and well, seemed all she could say without embarrassing herself further.
“Miss Bridgerton,” he said, his clipped voice a reminder that just the night before he’d been calling her Eloise.
And kissing her. “As you might have guessed,” he continued sharply, “this morning’s episode with my children has left me in a foul mood. I thought merely to spare you my company, such as it is.”
“I see,” she said, rather impressed with the supercilious edge to her voice.
“Good.”
Except that she was quite certain she did see. That he was lying, to be precise. Oh, his children had put him in a foul mood, that much was true, but there was something else at work as well.
“I will leave you to your work, then,” she said, motioning to the greenhouse with a gesture that was meant to seem as if she were waving him away.
He eyed her suspiciously. “And what do you plan to do?”
“I suppose I shall write some letters and then go for a walk,” she replied.
“You will not go for a walk,” he growled.
Almost, Eloise thought, as if he actually cared about her.
“Sir Phillip,” she replied, “I assure you that I am perfectly fine. I’m quite certain I look a great deal worse than I feel.”
“You had better look worse than you feel,” he muttered.
Eloise scowled at him. It was a blackened eye, after all, and thus only a temporary blight on her appearance, but truly, he didn’t need to remind her that she looked a fright.
“I shall remain out of your way,” she told him, “which is all that really matters, correct?”
A vein began to twitch in his temple. Eloise took great pleasure in that.
“Go,” she said. And when he didn’t, she turned and began to walk through a gate to another segment of the garden.
“Stop this instant,” Sir Phillip ordered, closing the distance between them with a single step. “You may not go for a walk.”
Eloise wanted to ask him if he intended to tie her down, but she held her tongue, fearing that he might actually approve of the suggestion.
“Sir Phillip,” she said, “I fail to see how— Oh!”
Grumbling something about foolish women (and using another adjective which Eloise considered considerably less complimentary), Sir Phillip scooped her into his arms and strode over to the chaise, where he dumped her quite unceremoniously back onto the cushion.
“Stay there,” he ordered.
She sputtered, trying to find her voice after his unbelievable display of arrogance. “You can’t—”
“Good God, woman, you could try the patience of a saint.”
She glared at him.
“What,” he asked with weary impatience, “would it take to keep you from moving from this spot?”
“I can’t think of a thing,” she answered, quite honestly.
“Fine,” he said, his chin jutting out in a furiously stubborn manner. “Hike the entire countryside. Swim to France.”
“From Gloucestershire?” she asked, her lips twitching.
“If anyone could figure out a way to do it,” he said, “it would be you. Good day, Miss Bridgerton.”