The Emerald Swan by Jane Feather Page A

in the fresh air and he began to feel clean again as the soiled memories retreated.
    Since Charlotte’s death he had satisfied his sexual need with simple, clean, unemotional encounters with willing women who wanted nothing more themselves—unsatisfied wives, lonely widows, the occasional whore. He was resigned to a lifetime of such satisfaction. Mary would be dutiful, of course, but there was no passion there. After Charlotte, he needed as wife a woman who would lie still, be glad when it was over, and grateful for each pregnancy that freed her from her marital duty.
    The reflection brought a cynical twist to his mouth as he entered the inn beneath the lantern that threw his profile into harsh relief. He was unaware of the figure in the bedchamber above the door, kneeling on the window seat looking down at the street.
    Miranda jumped off the window seat and dived under the covers on the truckle bed. She lay looking up into the darkness, listening for his footfall in the corridor outside. How strange he had looked. How cold, his mouth twisted out of shape so that he didn’t look like the man she knew.
    But then of course she didn’t know him. How could she? After a mere two days in his company? He came from a world she knew nothing about, and she had sat up waiting for him because she was not used to sleeping alone and the bedchamber had seemed vast and gloomy and so empty. Even Chip’s familiar company had not been quite enough. But now, as she heard the latch lift, her heart lurched as if the man who entered the chamber was a stranger.
    She closed her eyes tightly, concentrated on breathing deeply, felt him approach the truckle bed, felt his scrutiny as he looked at her in the starlight from the unshuttered window. Only Chip stared back with his bright eyes as he curled in the crook of Miranda’s neck.
    Gareth bent and delicately adjusted the cover, drawing it up to her neck so the draught from the open window wouldn’t chill her. He scratched the monkey’s neck with a fingernail because somehow it seemed impossible to ignore the animal’s presence, and then threw off his clothes, aiming for the chest at the foot of his bed.
    He climbed into bed. A great wash of weariness swamped him, the melancholy fatigue that had doggedhim since the end of his idyll with Charlotte, those few short months of happiness. He knew with familiar dread that in his sleep the dreams would return.
    Miranda listened as the earl’s breathing dipped into the even rhythms of sleep. Only then did she allow herself to sleep. And she awoke at some point in the darkest hour of the night, her heart thudding. She sat bolt upright, aware that Chip had left her and was on the window seat gibbering anxiously to himself.
    The occupant of the big four-poster was thrashing around, the covers had fallen to the floor. His breathing was harsh and ragged, and half-formed words, rushed and nonsensical phrases, escaped from his lips.
    Miranda thrust aside the covers and slid off the truckle bed. She approached the big bed tentatively. The earl’s large frame was twisted among the sheets. But it was his face in the starlight that brought her heart to her throat. His mouth was hard and cruel, with a white shade about the lips, and deep lines scored his face alongside his nose.
    Resolutely, she put her hand on the earl’s shoulder, shaking him as she shook Robbie when the nightmares had him in thrall. She spoke softly, steadily, telling him who he was, where he was, that everything was all right, that he should open his eyes.
    Gareth’s eyes suddenly flew open. He stared unseeing at the small white face above him, dominated by huge blue eyes filled with anxiety. The sweet, melodious voice continued to wash over him and slowly the words penetrated and the horrors of the night receded. Her hand was warm on his shoulder and as the demons left his own eyes she wiped his sweat-soaked brow with a corner of the sheet.
    “Are you awake now, milord?”
    He sat up,