Winterset by Candace Camp Page A

from them, doing his best to look interesting. His brown hair was worn a trifle long and shaggy, and his cravat was carelessly tied. The effect he was looking for, Anna thought, was that of an artist or poet—moody and enigmatic, even a little bit dangerous. In truth, he simply looked a trifle unkempt and unsure of himself. He should, in Anna’s opinion, take a look at Reed, for the elegant set of his shoulders and the flash of silver in his eyes was inherently more dangerous to any woman’s heart than all of Miles Bennett’s posturing.
    Anna greeted the squire and Felicity. Squire Bennett was a stolid, quiet man, the opposite of his chatterbox of a wife, and he greeted Anna and her brother, whom Mrs. Bennett had managed to seize and drag along with them, with a brief bow and a few words. Then he fell silent, nodding along as he let his wife and daughter rush forward with the conversation. Mrs. Bennett talked, and Felicity giggled and bridled and flirted with her eyes over her fan at Kit, who remained politely oblivious to her efforts.
    Miles apparently realized after a time that his pose by the mantel, while artistic, kept him apart from the conversation, for after a few minutes he lounged over to join their circle.
    “Miles, there you are!” his mother exclaimed with delight, as if he had appeared from some distance. “I was just telling Sir Christopher and Miss Anna how you have been spending your days writing.” Mrs. Bennett turned toward Anna, saying with a smile, “You should see him. He just scribbles and scribbles away in there, for hours on end. Of course, he won’t let me read a bit of it—young men are so secretive, are they not?”
    She beamed at her son, who was looking acutely embarrassed. Her daughter picked up the conversation, tittering and saying, “That is all he ever does, read and write, write and read. I cannot think what he finds in it.”
    “You wouldn’t,” Miles retorted rudely, shooting his sister a dark look.
    “I love to read, as well,” Anna put in, with a smile toward Miles. He had been rude, of course, but it must be a severe trial to have the mother and sister that he did.
    Miles smiled back at her, and his face was instantly more attractive. He would be better served, Anna thought, to put aside his brooding-writer pose and smile more.
    “I am certain that you understand,” he told Anna warmly, and it occurred to her that perhaps his mother’s words hadn’t sprung entirely from her imagination. It was just possible that Miles was suffering from a mild case of puppy love. She sighed inwardly, knowing that she would have to watch her words and gestures carefully from now on, so that he would not receive any unintended encouragement.
    She was glad when Dr. Felton joined them and asked her if she cared for a stroll around the room. Large and rectangular, it was really more an assembly room than a drawing room, with several straight-backed chairs placed about the walls and a massive teak table in the center. It was perfect for a social affair such as this: large enough to accommodate several areas of conversation, while having plenty of space to stroll about in. Later, if Lady Kyria did indeed allow dancing, the large table could simply be pushed back to create a small ballroom. It was also one of the rooms for which Winterset was justly famous—the barrel-vaulted plasterwork ceiling was covered in representations of animals, both real and fantastical, running the gamut from jumping trout and oddly formed elephants to hippogriffs, chimeras and dragons.
    “Interesting ceiling,” Felton remarked, looking up at it. “I’ve heard about it—my father used to sing the praises of Winterset—but I haven’t ever actually seen it.”
    “Yes, my uncle rarely entertained,” Anna agreed, keeping an eye out for Reed’s whereabouts so that she could avoid running into him.
    “How is your uncle?”
    “Doing well, thank you.”
    They had drawn close to the vicar and his wife, and