Free Joan Wolf by The Scottish Lord Page A

been named Helen, after Frances’s mother, with them.
       The Earl of Aysgarth had a house in Berkeley Square, which he had opened and staffed for the use of his son and daughter-in-law. They planned to stay for at least a month. It was not London that Robert had been avoiding for all these months but the Macdonalds, specifically Douglas and Charlie. He did not care to have Frances reminded of Ian. However, it was inevitable that they meet at some time, he realized, and so he was the one who proposed the longer visit.
    They had been in town for two days when Frances wrote to tell Douglas they had arrived. He came immediately. She heard his voice as she was coming down the main stairs, and went herself into the front hall to welcome him.
    “Douglas! How marvelous to see you. We’re so excited about your exhibition. Come into the drawing room and tell me about it.” She drew his arm through hers and began to walk him down the hall. Over her shoulder she said to the butler, “Bring some sherry, Matthews.”
    Douglas was regarding her with an expression that Frances barely noticed, she was so accustomed to seeing it in the eyes of men when they looked at her. She smiled warmly and sat down. “Tell me all about it,” she repeated. “I made Robert bring me to London as soon as I heard. Imagine. The Royal Academy!”
    Douglas blinked and abruptly sat down. After a moment’s silence he began to do as she requested. When he had finished the tale and had promised to escort them himself to see the paintings he asked courteously, “But how is the baby, Frances? She must be walking by now.”
    Frances grinned. “She’s been walking for eight months, Douglas! And she’s fine. You can see for yourself. We brought her with us.” She rang the bell.
    Douglas smiled a little painfully. “Oh, good.”
    The butler came in. “Matthews, will you ask Nurse to bring Miss Helen down to the drawing room, please?”
    “Yes, my lady.” The butler nodded magisterially and withdrew. In ten minutes a stout middle-aged woman appeared holding a little girl by the hand.
    “Thank you. Nurse,” Frances said. “I’ll bring her back to the nursery later.’’ The little girl ran to Frances and immediately climbed up into her lap, staring with huge gray eyes at the strange man sitting in her mother’s drawing room.
    “This is Mr. Macdonald, Nell,” Frances said. “He is a good friend of Mama’s. Will you say hello?”
    “Hello,” the little girl said gravely, staring at Douglas with the relentless gaze of childhood. She was a beautiful child. She had hair of dark gold and eyes the deep gray of a northern loch.
    “Hello, Nell,” Douglas replied equally solemnly. “I am very glad to meet you.”
    Nell considered this in silence for a few minutes, then got off Frances’s lap and went over to him. “What that?”
    Douglas looked ruefully at his finger. “A paint stain,” he admitted. “I like to paint, Nell.” Nell looked incredulous and he smiled. “I know it isn’t a very grown-up thing to do but I like it.”
    The child’s eye was caught by an ornament on a table over on the far side of the room and she toddled toward it determinedly. “She looks like your father, Frances,” he said.
    “Yes,” she agreed. “So everyone says.” Nell had reached the ornament. She picked it up.
    “Mama!” she said excitedly. “A horsie!”
       “Yes, love, I see. Bring it here carefully and we’ll look at it.” Frances smiled at the child who grinned back, her small face lighting up in a way that made her suddenly resemble unmistakably the man who was her father.
    Douglas’s breath rasped in his throat. Frances was still smiling lovingly at Nell, who was coming toward her carefully holding the horse. She turned briefly to say something to Douglas and when she saw the appalled recognition in his eyes her own face sobered. “Is it as obvious as that?” she asked out of a constricted throat.
    He looked from the child to her.