Kathleen McGurl - The Emerald Comb

Bartholomew jumped to his feet. ‘I shall find your uncle for you. Though I could fetch you a cab myself.’ And accompany you home in it, he hoped, though it would not be the normal course of behaviour.

‘My uncle is my guardian,’ she said. ‘I live with him. So I must at least inform him that I wish to leave.’ She scanned the room.

‘Ah, there he is.’ She indicated the portly man in a captain’s uniform with whom he’d first seen her dancing.

So that was the person he needed to impress. From the way she’d held herself when dancing with him, it seemed there was no love lost between them, on her side at least. Interesting. Bartholomew took her arm, and led her through the crowds towards the captain, who was talking with a group of people in a corner of the room. She seemed tiny at his side – her slightness contrasting with his fine, strongly-built figure.

‘Uncle, this is Mr St Clair. He has very kindly been looking after me, when I felt a little unwell after our last dance.’

Bartholomew bowed, and shook the captain’s plump, sweaty hand. ‘Pleased to meet you, sir.’

‘Charles Holland. Obliged to you for taking care of the girl.’

‘Excuse me, sir,’ said Bartholomew. He took a step forward and spoke quietly. ‘Your niece wishes to return home. With your permission, I shall call a cab for her.’

Holland turned to regard him carefully. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘You wish to continue taking care of my niece. You may do so. She has money, as you are no doubt already aware.’

‘Sir, I assure you, your niece’s fortune is not of interest…’

Holland waved his hand dismissively. ‘Of course it is, man. It’s time she married and became someone else’s responsibility. You look as likely a suitor as anyone else, and perhaps a better match than some of the young pups who’ve been sniffing around. You may take her home.’ He nodded curtly and turned back to his companions.

Bartholomew opened his mouth to say something more, but thought better of it. What rudeness! But if Charles Holland didn’t much care who courted his niece or how, at least it made things easier. He glanced at her. She was standing, hands clasped and eyes down, a few feet away. Probably too far to have heard the exchange between himself and her uncle. He took her arm and led her towards the cloakroom and the exit.

Outside, a thin covering of an inch or two of snow lay on everything, muting sound and reflecting the hazy moonlight so that the world appeared shimmering and silver. Georgia shivered and pulled her cloak more tightly around her.

‘Come, there should be a cab stand along Ship Street,’ Bartholomew said, steadying her as she descended the steps to the street. He grimaced as he noticed her shoes – fine silk dancing slippers, no use at all for walking in the snow.

‘It’s a beautiful night,’ she said. ‘I should like to see the beach, covered in snow. It always seems so wrong, somehow, to have the sea lapping at snow. Can we walk a little, just as far as the promenade, perhaps?’

‘But your shoes! You will get a chill in your feet, I fear.’

‘Nonsense. They will get a little cold but the snow is not deep. And the night air has quite revived me. I feel alive, Mr St Clair! Out of that stuffy ballroom, I feel I want to run and skip and – oh!’

He clutched her arm as she slipped in the snow. ‘Be careful! Hold on to me, or you will do yourself more damage than cold feet.’

She tucked her arm through his and held on. Bartholomew enjoyed the warmth of her hand on his arm, the closeness of her hip to his. Her breath made delicate patterns in the cold night air, and he imagined the feel of it against his face, his lips… Yes, she would do nicely. He smiled, and led her across King’s Road onto the promenade. It was deserted, and the snow lay pristine – white and untouched, apart from a single line of dog paw prints. On the beach, the partially covered pebbles looked like piles of frosted almonds.

Georgia sighed. ‘So pretty.’

‘Indeed,’ said Bartholomew, watching her as she made neat footprints in the snow, then lifted her foot to see the effect. She had tiny, narrow feet, and the slippers had a small triangular-shaped heel.

‘See my footprints? We could walk a little way, and then you could pick me up and carry me, so when others come this way it will look as though I had simply vanished.’ She giggled, and pushed back the hood of her cloak to gaze up at him.

Her eyes glinted mischievously, and even in the subdued moonlight he could see they were a rich green. He was seized by the urge to take her in his arms and kiss her.

‘Let’s do it!’ he said, taking her hand to walk a dozen more steps along the prom. Then he scooped her up, his pulse racing at the feel of her arms about his neck, her slight figure resting easily in his arms. Her hood fell back and tendrils of her golden hair fell across his shoulder. For a moment he stood there, holding her, gazing into her eyes and wondering whether she would respond to a kiss.

‘Well, come on then, Mr St Clair – you must walk now, and make your footprints look no different to before. You must not stagger under my weight, or it will be obvious what has happened. Gee up, Mr St Clair!’ She gently kicked her legs, as though she was riding him side-saddle.

‘Yes, ma’am!’ he laughed, and walked on along the prom. After a little way she twisted to try to see the footprints he’d left, and he, feeling he was losing his grip on her, put her down. She instantly walked on a few more steps and turned back to see the effect.

‘Look, I appeared from nowhere!’

‘Like an angel from heaven,’ he said. ‘Come, I must escort you home. It is late, and the snow is beginning to fall again.’

Georgia tilted her head back and let a few large flakes land on her face. ‘It’s so refreshing. Thank you, Mr St Clair. Since meeting you I have had a lovely evening. We can walk to my uncle’s house, if you like – he lives in Brunswick Terrace.’

Bartholomew noted she had not said ‘we live’ – clearly she did not feel as though her uncle’s house was her home.

‘On a fine evening, Miss Holland, I could think of nothing better than to take your arm and stroll along the promenade as far as Brunswick. But I shall have to postpone that pleasure for another day. Your feet will freeze, even more than they already have. Look, we are in luck, here is an empty cab.’

He waved at the cabman who brought his horse to a skidding stop beside them. They climbed aboard and Georgia gave the address. She shivered and pressed her arm tightly against his. Minutes later the cab halted outside the grand terrace, its whitewashed walls gleaming in the wintry moonlight.

Bartholomew paid the cabman and asked him to wait. He helped Georgia down from the cab and led her up the entrance steps of her uncle’s house. The door opened as they approached, and a maid ushered them inside, into a grand hallway where the remains of a fire smouldered in the grate.

‘Oh, Miss Georgia, I am so glad you are back. Mr Holland were back a half hour ago and he said you had left the ball before him. I were fretting about you.’ She bustled around, taking Georgia’s cloak and exclaiming over the state of her shoes.

‘Agnes, I am perfectly all right. Kind Mr St Clair has been looking after me. We decided to walk part of the way home.’

The maid glanced accusingly at Bartholomew. She was a striking-looking woman, blonde like her mistress but with more mature features, as though she had grown into her looks. She was an inch or two taller, and looked, he thought, as Georgia might in a few years’ time, when she’d outgrown her childish playfulness. Beautiful, rather than pretty.

‘Sir, forgive me for speaking out of turn but my mistress were not wearing the right sort of shoe for a walk in the snow. See, the silk is ruined and her poor feet are froze. Sit you down here, Miss Georgia, and I will fetch a bowl of warm water to wash them.’ With another stern look at Bartholomew, she hurried along the hallway towards the kitchen stairs.