Black Sheep by Georgette Heyer Page B

very earnestly: “Promise me one thing at least, sir! Even though you won’t intervene in this miserable affair, promise me that you won’t promote it!”
    “Oh, readily! I am a mere spectator.”
    She was obliged to be satisfied, but said in somewhat minatory accents: “I trust your word, sir.”
    “You may safely do so. I shan’t feel any temptation to break it,” he replied cheerfully.
    Feeling that this remark showed him to be quite irreclaimable, Abby walked on in silence, trying to discover why she allowed herself to talk to him at all, far less to accept his escort. No satisfactory answer presented itself, for although he seemed to be impervious to snubs she knew that she could have snubbed his advances if she had made any real effort to do so. After a half-hearted attempt to convince herself that she endured his escort and his conversation with the sole object of winning his support in her crusade against his nephew she found herself to be under the shameful necessity of admitting that she enjoyed both, and—far worse!—would have suffered considerable .disappointment had he announced his intention of leaving Bath within the immediate future. She could only suppose that it was his unlikeness to the other gentlemen of her acquaintance which appealed to her sense of humour, and made it possible for her to tolerate him, for there was really nothing else to render him acceptable: he was neither handsome nor elegant; his manners were careless; and his morals non-existent. He was, in fact, precisely the sort of ramshackle person to whom no lady of birth, breeding, and propriety would extend the smallest encouragement. He had nothing to recommend him but his smile, and she was surely too old, and had too much commonsense, to be beguiled by a smile, however attractive it might be. But just as she reached this decision he spoke, and she glanced up at him, and realized that she had overestimated both her age and her commonsense. He was smiling down at her, and, try as she would, she was incapable of resisting the impulse to smile back at him. It was almost as if a bond existed between them, which was tightened by his smile. In repose his face was harsh, but the smile transformed it. His eyes lost their cold, rather cynical expression, warming to laughter, and holding, besides amusement, an indefinable look of understanding. He might mock, but not unkindly; and when he discomfited her his smiling eyes conveyed sympathy as well as amusement, and clearly invited her to share his amusement. And, thought Abby, the dreadful thing was that she did share it. He seemed to think that they were kindred spirits, and the shocking suspicion that he was right made her look resolutely ahead, saying: “Yes, sir? What did you say?”
    Quick to hear the repressive note in her voice, he replied meekly: “Nothing, I assure you, to which you could take the least exception! In fact, no more than: I wish you will tell me .Upon which you turned your head, and looked up at me so charmingly that the rest went out of my mind! How the devil have you contrived to escape matrimony in all the unnumbered years of your life?”
    An unruly dimple peeped, but she answered primly: “I am very well content to remain single, sir.” It then occurred to her that this might lead him to suppose that her hand had never been sought in matrimony, which, for some reason unknown to herself, was an intolerable misapprehension, and she destroyed whatever quelling effect her dignified reply might have had upon him, by adding: “Though you needn’t suppose that I have not received several eligible offers!”
    He chuckled. “I don’t!”
    Blushing rosily, she said, trying to recover her lost dignity: “And if that is what you wished me to tell you—”
    “Oh, no!” he interrupted. “Until you smiled so enchantingly I thought I knew. But you aren’t old cattish—not in the least!”
    “ Oh! ”gasped Abby. “Old cattish? Oh, you—you—I am nothing of