Nan Ryan - The Countess Misbehaves

Tall, slender, with a natural grace despite her momentary loss of equilibrium, she was a dazzlingly pretty woman and she had effortlessly arrested Armand’s attention. He wondered who she was and where she was going. And how long it would be before she was in his arms?

This late-summer crossing was, Armand decided, going to be far more pleasurable than he had hoped.

Once she was safely inside her elegantly appointed stateroom, Lady Madeleine was careful to maintain her calm composure. She didn’t want her hired attendant to know that she was upset. She hardly knew Lucinda Montgomery, the young woman who had agreed to be her traveling companion in exchange for passage to America.

“Lucinda, will you please have some ice water sent up at once? I’m very thirsty,” the Countess requested in an effort to have a few minutes alone.

“Yes, my Lady,” Lucinda replied and she hurried out of the stateroom to do her mistress’s bidding.

Alone at last, Lady Madeleine sighed with relief, then immediately shivered and hugged herself. The brief encounter on deck with the impertinent stranger had left her breathless, oddly disturbed and anxious. Which was not at all like her.

She had always led a very social life, one in which she mixed often with the great and near great and took their admiration as her due. She was well aware of her beauty and knew that she possessed a natural talent for charming people. From the time she was a young girl she had been completely comfortable in the company of powerful men. And she had learned early on that she need put forth very little effort to have males, be they young or old, handsome or plain, eating out of hand. She was accustomed to being fawned over, flirted with, panted after and she took it all with good grace and a grain of salt.

So what on earth was bothering her now?

Granted, the stranger was so darkly handsome and potently masculine no female could help but notice and be affected. Tall, slim, impeccably dressed, he appeared to be quite the gentleman. Yet his flashing eyes and audacious manner were contradictory. And, no well-bred gentleman would laugh at a lady the way he had laughed at her.

He was, undoubtedly, a reckless rogue whose outrageous behavior some women would find appealing. Not her. She found him coarse. Common. Vulgar. Not worth wasting another minute’s thought on.

Madeleine decisively shook her head, then took off her bonnet and tossed it on a velvet-covered sofa. She crossed to the bed, turned about, and sat down on its edge. She sighed, stretched and slowly sank down onto the brocade-covered bed.

She raised her arms above her head and sighed once more. And she gave silent thanks that the man to whom she was officially engaged, was a kind, cultured nobleman.

Madeleine smiled as she pictured Desmond Chilton, Fourth Earl of Enfield, whom she was to wed next spring. A distant cousin whom she had known since childhood but had rarely seen, Lord Enfield had left their native England more than a decade ago.

The earl had settled in New Orleans where Madeleine’s dear uncle, Colfax Sumner—her deceased mother’s only sibling—had lived for the past forty-five years. The two men had become good friends and when she had visited her uncle during the past summer, the handsome blond earl had spent a great deal of time at Colfax’s French Quarter mansion. A week before she was to return home to England, the earl proposed and she had accepted.

Lord Enfield would, she felt sure, treat her as a wife should be treated. He clearly adored her. And, if she was less than passionately in love, that presented no weighty problem as far as she was concerned. She much preferred being the ‘beloved’ as opposed to the ‘lover.’ Desmond was most definitely the lover. She his beloved. Which was as it should be, as it would remain.

Never again would she risk being humiliated by a mere mortal man.

Armand de Chevalier remained on deck for the next hour, strolling unhurriedly from stern to bow as the huge vessel moved slowly out of the Liverpool harbor and made its way to the open sea.

Excited, well-dressed travelers had lined the ship’s railing, waving to those left behind. Others, like Armand, promenaded around the ship’s polished decks, greeting fellow voyagers, laughing, talking, anticipating an enjoyable adventure.

Many of those happy passengers were, of course, women. Some with husbands or family members. Others traveling together in groups of two or three. Still others were alone, save for a servant or attendant. There were, Armand noted, dozens of unattached, attractive women.

But not one captured his attention as the stunning woman with the red-gold hair. He couldn’t get her out of his mind. He wanted to see her again, and he searched the milling crowds, hoping that perhaps she would take a stroll once they were on the open sea.

She did not.

After a couple of frustrating hours, Armand gave up and made his way to the gentleman’s tavern. There in the darkly paneled club, he stepped up to the long polished bar, ordered a bourbon straight and downed it in one swallow.

As the barkeep poured another, Armand couldn’t help overhearing a conversation taking place between two gentleman standing next to him who were sipping port.

“She’s a British noble lady,” said a short, balding gentleman with muttonchop sideburns. “The only child of the fifth earl of Ballarat and his American-born wife, both of whom are now deceased.”

“Is she now?” replied his drinking companion, a tall, cadaver-thin man in a brown linen suit with a boutonniere in his buttonhole.

Armand knew, instinctively, that they were talking about his red-haired beauty. “Excuse me, gentlemen,” he said and the port-drinking pair turned to look at him. “Does the noblewoman of whom you are speaking happen to have red hair?”

The tall, skinny fellow nodded, and said with a slight touch of wistfulness, “An unusual shade of red-gold that is incredibly striking against her pale-white skin.”

“Who is she?” Armand asked bluntly.

“Why she’s Lady Madeleine Cavendish, the flame-haired Countess,” said the short man with the muttonchop sideburns. “One of the most renowned beauties in all Europe.”

“Undoubtedly,” said Armand before he downed his second whiskey. “Gentlemen,” he said as he nodded good-day then turned and walked out of the tavern.

Armand was unfazed by her lofty status. Un-bothered by the fact that she was a Countess. An inherently confident man, Armand had learned, long ago, that beneath fine satins and laces, often beat the passionate heart of a hot-blooded woman.

He’d bet everything he owned that the lovely Lady Madeleine Cavendish was such a woman.

After a restful afternoon nap followed by a long leisurely bath, Madeleine Cavendish was again feeling like her old self. Relaxed. Self-assured. Looking forward to her first evening at sea.

When the blinding summer sun had finally slipped below the horizon and full darkness had fallen, Madeleine was humming happily as the surprisingly talented Lucinda meticulously dressed her long hair. It took a good half hour, but when Lucinda had finished, Madeleine’s heavy locks were skillfully fashioned into a shiny coronet of thick braids atop her elegant head. The style was quite flattering to Madeleine as it accentuated her graceful, swanlike neck and beautiful throat.

Madeleine had chosen, for the first dinner at sea, a shimmering green silk ball gown with a low-cut bodice, an uncomfortably tight waist, and billowing skirts that spilled attractively over yards and yards of crinoline petticoats.

By ten minutes of nine she was fully dressed and ready for dinner. But she waited another half hour before leaving the stateroom.