“That sounds monstrously improper,” Eleanor observed.

“My favorite kind of activity.”

Chapter Eighteen

She should probably stop by her mother’s room and inquire about her toothache. And she ought to write a note of condolence to Gideon. Instead Eleanor called for a bath, added essence of jasmine, and climbed in holding Shakespeare’s Sonnets.

Willa took down her curls and brushed out all the wilting violets. Then she poured a bit more hot water from the jug into the bath.

“Would you mind if I went down to the kitchens to finish ironing your linens, my lady?” she inquired.

“Absolutely not,” Eleanor said. “This bath is deliciously warm. Just leave me a towel and I’ll get out when I wish.”

“It’s right there,” Willa said, “but your wrapper is downstairs to be mended, I’m afraid. Oyster dragged it from the bed and snagged the fabric.”

“Oyster!” Eleanor said. He raised his head groggily and gave her a little woof before subsiding again. “Has he been outside lately?”

Willa frowned. “Perhaps I should take him for a walk as well, my lady.”

“I can put myself to bed, Willa, if you would just bring him up later.”

Willa let herself out and Eleanor returned to Shakespeare’s sonnets, which probably everyone in the world had read except for her. That fact made it all the more disconcerting to discover that she couldn’t make head or tail of most of them.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments, she read. And then read it again. An impediment was an obstacle. It made her feel a little sad, really. She and Gideon had been a marriage of true minds until an impediment came along.

She and Villiers spent their time jousting with each other, whereas she and Gideon had thought as one. They had talked for countless hours and agreed on everything, though all these years later, she couldn’t remember what those discussions were about.

He belived dueling was a terrible sin, she remembered that. Of course she agreed. There was no point to dueling. It was dangerous.

She dragged herself back to the sonnet. Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments. Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds.

This line was even harder. Alteration? Could Shakespeare be talking about getting older? So love is not love if a man stops loving his wife because her hair turns gray. Her love for Gideon would never have faltered if he lost his beauty. Or bends with the remover to remove.

Again, unreasonably difficult, she thought. Just who was the remover?

The thing that made her uneasy, though, was that first line. She kept reading it over and over. Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments. True love doesn’t admit impediments. Gideon’s father’s will had been an impediment. And Gideon obviously admitted the impediment.

Had he not loved her?

The water was growing cold. She climbed out and grabbed the towel Willa had left. Why was she going over all this old ground? But she knew why. She had to put Gideon out of her mind, fold away her memories of feverish love.

Ada was gone. But that didn’t mean Gideon wanted to marry her, that he loved her the way she had loved him.

She couldn’t delude herself any longer. Love was not love when it admitted impediments. When it bent with the remover to remove. Gideon had bent to his father’s will.

It would be far better to marry Villiers. Their relationship was not as heady, not as romantic—but what emotion they had was real.

She and Villiers would never fool themselves into thinking they had a marriage of true minds. It would be a different kind of marriage. That of true bodies.

Willa brought Oyster back; after an energetic tail-wagging wiggle, the better to show how much he missed her, he collapsed back on the floor and Willa left for the night. A moment later Oyster shot up and launched himself at the curtains covering the door leading to the balcony.

Eleanor found herself smiling. Villiers must have returned from dinner. He was likely sitting in one of those armchairs, looking at the stars. She looked down at herself. Her towel didn’t cover much more of her legs than Villiers’s had his.

But then, she liked her legs. They were shapely. And she and Villiers were getting married, after all. She tucked the towel more securely around her breasts, loving the feeling that she was playing with fire, and walked to the door, hushing Oyster.

It was pitch-dark outside. Oyster started barking again, so she scooped him up, almost losing her towel, and stepped outside.

“Is anyone out here?” she called cautiously.

“Ah, my princess!” came a response.

Eleanor fell back a step.

“She appears before me like the shadow of a white rose in a mirror of silver.” Roland’s head came into view at the top of the balcony railing.

Oyster gave an aggressive little woof. Apparently he didn’t care for poetry.

She had to admit that Roland spoke verse beautifully. “Oh, hello,” she said, taking another step backwards toward the door to her room and wishing desperately that she had her wrapper. “Are you quite—”

He interrupted her. “She has the beauty of a virgin! She has never defiled herself. She has never abandoned herself to men, like the other goddesses.”

Oyster barked again, and Eleanor felt like joining him. “That’s—ahem—very kind of you,” she managed. Never mind the fact it wasn’t true. “Are you on a ladder, Sir Roland?”

“Certainly,” Roland said, making no effort to climb onto the balcony. “I am acting out my play for you.”

“Don’t tell me you’re standing on a silk ladder!” she exclaimed. “Please do come onto the balcony, Sir Roland. I’m worried for your safety.”

“It’s made of wood,” he said. “Now if you’ll allow me to gather my thoughts…” There was silence for a moment and then he intoned in such a booming voice that she jumped, “The night is fair in the garden, and my princess has eyes like amber.” He flung out a hand and gestured to the sky. “How strange the moon looks! Like the hand of a dead woman seeking to cover herself with a shroud.”

Eleanor looked up, but the moon looked pretty much the same as usual to her, and it had never included dead women or shrouds. In fact, that comment was in fairly poor taste, given the news about Ada…but then Roland hadn’t been there during dinner. But surely he was told when he arrived for the musicale why she had retired early.

He ascended another rung. Now she could see him from the waist up. His eyes were burning with excitement. Or desire.

That made her feel rather pleased, but unfortunately not at all as if she’d like to pull him to her, the way she felt when Villiers issued one of his sardonic jibes.

And yet Roland really was beautiful. In the light that fell from the windows behind her, he looked like the prince from an old fairy tale, climbing the tower to rescue a princess.

“Thy body is white like the snows that lie on the mountains of Judea, and come down into the valleys,” he said. Eleanor could feel her cheeks getting a little warm. She refused to glance down at her bare legs, but of course her body was white. Why wouldn’t it be?

“The roses in the garden of the Queen of Arabia are not so white as thy body,” Roland said feverishly. “Nor the feet of the dawn when they light on the leaves, nor the breast of the moon when she lies on the breast of the sea…”