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Authors: Julia Quinn
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acceptable if I remained here?â Honoria asked quickly. âI rather enjoy arranging flowers.â
Mrs. Royle looked at the flowers, which were already expertly arranged, and then back at Honoria.
âJust to fluff them out,â Honoria explained.
Mrs. Royle waved her hand through the air. âIf you wish. But donât forget to change before the gentlemen return. Nothing blue, though. I want Cecily to stand out.â
âI donât believe I even brought a blue dress,â Honoria said diplomatically.
âWell, that will make it easy,â Mrs. Royle said briskly. âHave fun . . . er . . . fluffing.â
Honoria smiled and waited until her hostess disappeared back into the house. Then she waited a bit more, because there were several maids dashing about, fussing with forks and spoons and the like. Honoria poked at the flowers, gazing this way and that until she saw the flash of something silver over by a rosebush. With a glance to make sure the maids were occupied, she took off across the lawn to investigate.
It was a small spade, apparently forgotten by the gardeners. âThank you,â she mouthed. It wasnât a shovel, but it would do. Besides, she hadnât exactly figured out how one might use the words âshovelâ and âinconspicuousâ in the same sentence.
The spade was still going to take some planning. None of her frocks had pockets, and even if they did, she somehow did not think sheâd be able to conceal a piece of metal half the size of her forearm. But she could stash it somewhere and pick it up later, when the time was right.
In fact, she decided, that was exactly what she would do.
Chapter Four
W hat was she doing ?
Marcus hadnât been trying to keep himself hidden, but when he came across Honoria digging in the dirt, he couldnât help himself. He had to step back and watch.
She was working with a little spade, and whatever type of hole she was digging, it couldnât have been very big, because after barely a minute she stood up, inspected her handiwork first with her eyes, then with her foot, and thenâhere was where Marcus ducked more carefully behind a treeâlooked about until she found a pile of dead leaves under which she could hide her small shovel.
At that point he almost made his presence known. But then she returned to her hole, stared down on it with furrowed brow, and went back to the pile of leaves to retrieve her spade.
Tiny shovel in hand, she squatted down and made adjustments to her handiwork. She was blocking his view, though, so it wasnât until she went back to the dead leaves to dispose of what was clearly now a piece of evidence that he realized that she had piled up loose dirt in a ring around the hole sheâd dug.
Sheâd dug a mole hole.
He wondered if she realized that most mole holes did not exist in isolation. If there was one, there was usually another, quite visibly nearby. But perhaps this didnât matter. Her intentionâjudging by the number of times she tested the hole with her footâwas to feign a fall. Or perhaps to cause someone else to trip and fall. Either way, it was doubtful that anyone would be looking for a companion mole hole in the aftermath of a twisted ankle.
He watched for several minutes. One would have thought it a dull enterprise, staring at a lady who was doing nothing but standing over a homemade mole hole, but he found it surprisingly entertaining. Probably because Honoria was working so hard to keep herself from getting bored. First she appeared to be quietly reciting something, except judging by the scrunch of her nose, she couldnât remember how it ended. Then she danced a little jig. Then she waltzed, arms outstretched for her invisible partner.
She was surprisingly graceful, out there in the woods. She waltzed considerably better without music than she ever had with it. In her pale green dress she looked a bit like a sprite.
Mrs. Royle looked at the flowers, which were already expertly arranged, and then back at Honoria.
âJust to fluff them out,â Honoria explained.
Mrs. Royle waved her hand through the air. âIf you wish. But donât forget to change before the gentlemen return. Nothing blue, though. I want Cecily to stand out.â
âI donât believe I even brought a blue dress,â Honoria said diplomatically.
âWell, that will make it easy,â Mrs. Royle said briskly. âHave fun . . . er . . . fluffing.â
Honoria smiled and waited until her hostess disappeared back into the house. Then she waited a bit more, because there were several maids dashing about, fussing with forks and spoons and the like. Honoria poked at the flowers, gazing this way and that until she saw the flash of something silver over by a rosebush. With a glance to make sure the maids were occupied, she took off across the lawn to investigate.
It was a small spade, apparently forgotten by the gardeners. âThank you,â she mouthed. It wasnât a shovel, but it would do. Besides, she hadnât exactly figured out how one might use the words âshovelâ and âinconspicuousâ in the same sentence.
The spade was still going to take some planning. None of her frocks had pockets, and even if they did, she somehow did not think sheâd be able to conceal a piece of metal half the size of her forearm. But she could stash it somewhere and pick it up later, when the time was right.
In fact, she decided, that was exactly what she would do.
Chapter Four
W hat was she doing ?
Marcus hadnât been trying to keep himself hidden, but when he came across Honoria digging in the dirt, he couldnât help himself. He had to step back and watch.
She was working with a little spade, and whatever type of hole she was digging, it couldnât have been very big, because after barely a minute she stood up, inspected her handiwork first with her eyes, then with her foot, and thenâhere was where Marcus ducked more carefully behind a treeâlooked about until she found a pile of dead leaves under which she could hide her small shovel.
At that point he almost made his presence known. But then she returned to her hole, stared down on it with furrowed brow, and went back to the pile of leaves to retrieve her spade.
Tiny shovel in hand, she squatted down and made adjustments to her handiwork. She was blocking his view, though, so it wasnât until she went back to the dead leaves to dispose of what was clearly now a piece of evidence that he realized that she had piled up loose dirt in a ring around the hole sheâd dug.
Sheâd dug a mole hole.
He wondered if she realized that most mole holes did not exist in isolation. If there was one, there was usually another, quite visibly nearby. But perhaps this didnât matter. Her intentionâjudging by the number of times she tested the hole with her footâwas to feign a fall. Or perhaps to cause someone else to trip and fall. Either way, it was doubtful that anyone would be looking for a companion mole hole in the aftermath of a twisted ankle.
He watched for several minutes. One would have thought it a dull enterprise, staring at a lady who was doing nothing but standing over a homemade mole hole, but he found it surprisingly entertaining. Probably because Honoria was working so hard to keep herself from getting bored. First she appeared to be quietly reciting something, except judging by the scrunch of her nose, she couldnât remember how it ended. Then she danced a little jig. Then she waltzed, arms outstretched for her invisible partner.
She was surprisingly graceful, out there in the woods. She waltzed considerably better without music than she ever had with it. In her pale green dress she looked a bit like a sprite.
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