Free Improper Advances by Margaret Evans Porter

said, “After this long rest, I don’t mind walking.”
    “I can’t let you stifle one of my rare chivalrous impulses.”
    Dare brought the horse over to her and lifted her onto his saddle. He shortened the left stirrup strap for her and was rewarded with a tantalizing glimpse of her foot when she placed it in the iron.
    “Does he go fast?” she asked, threading the reins through her fingers.
    “Very. But you can’t try his paces till I’ve found a lady’s saddle for you.”
    He released the bridle and away she rode. He followed behind, down the lane, across the stream, and through the gateposts of the property he had reluctantly rented to the fair rider.
    With more politeness than enthusiasm, she invited him to come inside. “Ned wants cheering, and you’re quite a hero to him.”
    But not to you , he thought regretfully.
    “If you care to dine here,” she added, “I’ll tell Mrs. Stowell to lay another place at the table.”
    Dare cringed as the long-necked gray fowl hurled herself at them. “Might I suggest roast goose?”

Chapter 6
    “Booa”
    “Cow,” Oriana translated.
    “Kiark,” said Ned.
    “Hen.”
    “Goayr.”
    “She-goat.” It was the easiest to remember.
    From the front garden rose a loud honking. Grinning, her instructor said, “Guy.”
    “Goose.” Moving to the window, she discovered the cause of the latest disturbance—her landlord in his pony-drawn gig. “One day, Sir Dare will ride right over that creature.”
    He visited daily, pausing on his way to his hilltop house or his lead mine, stopping again on his way back to Ramsey. Usually he lingered, waiting until she offered him a cup of tea and Mrs. Stowell’s gingerbread. He never turned down an invitation to dine.
    Turning back to the bed, she asked Ned, “When will you teach me to speak full sentences?”
    Mrs. Stowell applied her dusting cloth to the blanket chest. “Yiow moyrn lhieggey —pride will have a fall. A short and simple proverb, but none more true.”
    Oriana repeated the phrase. “Give me another, please.”
    “Cha vow laue ny haaue veg.”
    “What does that mean?”
    “The idle hand gets nothing. As I told the master many a time, when he was a lad. And this one: Ta caueeght jannoo deiney ny share. Religion makes men better.” With a final swipe of her cloth, the housekeeper left the room.
    Said Ned, “She’s Methodist, very prayerful. Always worrying ‘bout people’s souls and salvation.”
    After a thoughtful moment he said, ” Ta leoaie lheeah. Lead is gray.”
    “I’m not likely to need that remark in the course of daily conversation.”
    She was still laughing when Dare entered the room. Warmth crept into her cheeks, for his intimate and admiring smile caressed her vanity.
    “Is the lad setting up as a wit? What has he said to amuse you?”
    “She’s learning Gailck,” Ned reported. “She can call her animals now and knows two of Mrs.
    Stowell’s proverbs. And I’ve taught her three new ballads.”
    “I’m eager to hear them, Mrs. Julian.”
    Oriana’s merriment was stifled by a frisson of alarm. Surely he’d recognize that her voice was highly trained-and that could lead to complications. They had been getting on so well lately, she hated to refuse, though.
    “Perhaps another day,” she said. “Ned is eager for news of his friends at the mine.”
    She darted out of the room, feeling that she’d escaped a lion eager to rip out her heart and feed upon it.
    Absurd, she scolded herself. He wasn’t the villain of an opera, nor was she a trembling ingénue. She must continue to behave like a sensible woman. Just as she’d forgotten—almost—the way her limbs had melted when he’d held her against his chest and kissed her, she must rid herself of this ridiculous desire to sing for him.

    Did he like music?
    Thomas Teversal had seldom attended her performances. He’d preferred to meet her afterward and whisk her from the opera house or concert hall to a rented room for an hour of