Free The Marriage List by Dorothy McFalls Page A

his business. Heaven knows she had been taught to keep quiet about it. Uncle Sires used to threaten to lop off her amber curls and make her go around as bald as a smooth marble if she were ever to even breathe her father’s name in public.
    “You have no right to pry into my private business, my lord,” she bit off the words.
    “Pry?” A wicked smile played at his lips. May could feel her cheeks heat as she remembered how those lips of his had touched hers. “Why no, I suppose I don’t have a right. I just was wondering who in your life would believe it improper for you to sit here . . . beside me . . . unescorted.”
    A hungry gleam darkened his eyes. May took a step back.
    “Perhaps I find it improper, my lord. There are dangers, are there not, in a lady finding herself alone with a gentleman?”
    He didn’t answer right away and when he did, his tone was laced with regret. “Yes, Miss Sheffers, I believe there must be.”

    * * * * *

    Radford had started out at dawn without a destination. The climb to the top of Beechen Cliff had been an arduous one despite the fact that he’d forged a much gentler slope than the ridiculously steep route Miss Sheffers had taken. The effort had been worth the pains pulling through his leg.
    He hadn’t lied when he’d told May that his quest was similar to hers. Up here, with the orderly Georgian city below punctuated with the medieval spires of Bath Abbey at its heart, Radford felt removed . . . free almost.
    His mother had purred her delight over Lady Lillian all during the carriage ride home last night. The marriage was a fait accompli , to hear her speak.
    Instead of relieving his own doubts regarding the decision, her happiness only seemed to shrink the cage he’d been confined to the day his horse had been shot out from under him. He felt trapped—angry. He’d been cursing the birds in the trees when he saw her .
    He shouldn’t have been surprised. Miss Margaret Sheffers, with her unusual wood-sprite features, would naturally be at home up here, under the gently rustling beeches. Without a care for staining her bright yellow and white striped cotton dress she climbed straight up—the most direct route, if not the most difficult.
    And now that he and she were up on the hill together, Radford had to fight to keep his thoughts about her from straying from the respectable path.
    “You were here first. I will leave you to your thoughts, my lord,” she said and turned to make a descent following the same steep path.
    “Wait,” Radford called.
    As much as her company disturbed him and his solitude, he knew her departure would leave him more miserable than before. He struggled to his feet, silently cursing all the while his foolish notion of lounging on the ground like some high-flying Corinthian. Somewhere in the back of his mind, a horridly shameful thought sprang to life. The thought whispered in a singsong voice that if he could find a way to take a tumble in the grass with this fairy creature, his weaknesses and pains would disappear—and become naught but a bad dream brought on by an overindulgence in some rich meal.
    Yes, she’d chase his misery away like the sun would extinguish a nightmare. For where else should such dreaded dreams be vanquished to but to Avalon where this creature with her mysterious birth must call home?
    “In good conscience, Miss Sheffers,” he said, “I simply cannot allow you to continue to traipse through the countryside unescorted. As a gentleman, I’m compelled to protect you from your imprudent actions.”
    The quelling glance she sent his way could have burned the oriental paper off his parlor walls. He was glad they were in a wide-open space.
    “Please, Miss Sheffers,” he said with considerably more tact, “I would suffer terribly were I to hear you’d come to harm on the long hike home. Please allow me to escort you.”
    After an insufferable pause, she gave a short nod. Her lips had thinned to a mere line and resembled