Free Elisabeth Fairchild by Captian Cupid Page B

stilled.
    “My aunt took in an orphaned girl.” Alexander said. “A huge responsibility such an undertaking, for a single, young woman, no children of her own. No husband to help her.”
    The weather worn face proved a closed book, no emotion to be read there, only a bright watchfulness in the faded blue eyes. “But a joy. We love the lass,” he said.
    “As my Aunt does her dear Mary.  She is a sweet, taking thing.”
    His gaze strayed to the dance floor, to the sweet taking thing this man’s daughter was.
    Mr. Foster eyed him steadily,  as if to divine his purpose.
    Alexander smiled, well pleased with their brief exchange.
    As for the old men, and those who stood listening, they  watched Penny dance, and Alexander, watching them watch her, liked to think they began to see her a little differently.
    Oscar numbered was among those who overheard this exchange. He made a point of joining Alexander at the cider cask where he asked quietly, “Is the child not hers then?”
    Alexander shrugged. “I’ve no idea. Nor would I care to speculate, but I wonder if you would be so  good as to ask Miss Foster to dance?”
    Oscar watched Penny stepping lightly in the dance,  cheeks pink with pleasure. He smiled. “Small hardship. She is a pretty wench, and I hear . . .”
    Alexander grabbed his friend in what appeared to be a companionable manner, and squeezing Oscar’s elbow, bent his head close to say, “Best behavior, if you please. Most polite.”
    Oscar’s brows rose. He wrenched his elbow from Alexander’s grip and grinned as he gave it a rub. “Like her, do you?”
    “I would put her out of her misery.”
    Oscar frowned at this, puzzled, but he did not beg explanation, merely  set off to do the honors as the music wound to a close.
    Alexander watched Penny join the dance surreptitiously as he made his way around the room endearing himself to the locals. The evening beganlook like a success.
    Val spoiled it.
    He drank too much from the silver whiskey flask he kept always about his person, liberally spiking the already spirited cider, and when he was no longer in full possession of wit, or good sense, he swaggered across the dance floor to confront Penny Foster.
    Alexander was too distant to hear what it was he asked of her, but the negative shake of her head was as unmistakable as Val’s reaction. His faintly inebriated voice carried above the screech of the fiddle, above the enthusiastic thump of the dancer’s feet.
    “Too much, Touch-me-not? Nonsense, I have not yet had enough. Besides, my dear, I thought you liked me best when my head was turned.”
    His voice turned heads.
    One of the fiddlers missed a note.
    The dancers slowed. The moment sped by too fast, like ball and powder once firing mechanism was pulled. No stopping it.
    Oh, Lord, Alexander thought. Not again. Oscar got to Val first, but not soon enough.
    “Is she mine?” Val swayed on his feet, gestures expansive.
    Oscar linked arms with him, said something in his ear.
    “Don’t shush me, Oscar,” Val tried to throw him off. “This is none of your affair. I would know. Is she mine?”
    Coming up behind his inebriated companion, Alexander could see pain writ plain on Penny Foster’s lips, in the downward cast of her eyes.
    Alexander braced Val’s free arm, leaning into the fog of apple-scented whiskey fumes, “This is neither the time, nor the . . .”
    “Time?” Val jerked away, face livid, chin belligerent, his equilibrium affected by the whirl of nearby dancers. “Six years!” he shouted.
    The fiddlers squealed to a halt. The piper trailed away. The dancers fell still.
    “Six years gone. Never . . . never knew she existed.”
    His words echoed in the  dreadful quiet.
    Penny’s low voice broke the stillness. “And if you had?” She advanced on them, regal as any queen. “If you had known of her existence? Would you have publicly claimed a child conceived out of wedlock, Valentine Wharton? Would you have resigned your commission?