Free Lady Incognita by Nina Coombs Pykare Page B

as he drew on his gloves and clapped the beaver on his dark head. “I much enjoy our conversations about literature. And, of course, I have to check on Apricot’s growth.”
    “Of course,” murmured Louisa, scarcely knowing what she was saying.
    His lordship escorted his sister down the steps to the carriage and handed her in. Then he climbed in beside her, said a word to the coachman, and sat back as the carriage drove off.
    Louisa stood in the doorway staring after the departing carriage until a discreet cough from Drimble recalled her to the present. With a start she withdrew so that the grave butler could close the door. “Thank you, Drimble. I fear I am getting absentminded these days.”
    “Yes, miss,” replied Drimble gravely and Louisa, already turned away and mounting the stairs, did not notice the merest of smiles that crossed that worthy retainer’s face. Absentmindedness, he was telling himself, was not precisely the matter that ailed his young mistress. No, it was something far more common than that. And about time, too.
     

Chapter Six
     
    The next several days passed slowly. Louisa spent a great deal of time “at her accounts.” The family was all so used to her spending hours closeted in her room that they gave it little thought. But for Louisa the writing of the romance became more and more arduous. It seemed that nothing she could do would keep Reginald from looking and behaving like Atherton.
    Her rest at night was disturbed by visions of the Viscount performing all the manly feats that the plot had decreed for Reginald. Even more disturbing was the fact that in those dreams Bernice’s features and form were those of Louisa herself.
    This simply must stop, she told herself as she lay early one morning watching the sun send golden glimmers over the faded yellow curtains of the old oak bed. She had to finish this book. And she had to sell it. There was no other way to keep the family going. And most especially now that Lady Constance had become her friend. For that lady’s grand designs would demand some new gowns for Louisa, of that she was quite sure.
    Thank goodness that Aunt Caroline had some skill with the needle. Between them they should be able to alter a few gowns, maybe even just one new one, to make them serve for many. They would simply have to, Louisa told herself firmly. For she would not eat away the small reserves that she had so carefully built up against Betsy’s coming out.
    She sighed. But there still remained the question of what to do about Love in the Ruins. How could she take the book to Mr. Grimstead when the hero was so blatantly a copy of Philip, Viscount Atherton? She could not, she told herself, her fingers picking restlessly at the covers. If all the ton were engaged in trying to discover the identity of Lady Incognita, it would never do to so involve Atherton.
    She sighed again. Before this last visit it had seemed all right. Who would imagine that a man of Atherton’s stature would stoop to reading romances? But even if he did not read this one - and after their last conversation Louisa much doubted that - someone in the ton would. And the Viscount would become the object of notoriety.
    Louisa shifted anxiously. She could not allow that. But neither could she tell Mr. Grimstead that there was no romance. If only there were some way...
    Suddenly Louisa sat bolt upright in the old bed, the covers falling from her shoulders. There was a way! It was a daring one, certainly. For all Lady Incognita’s heroes to this day were dark brooding men. But if she made Reginald blond? Gave him piercing blue eyes instead of black ones? Then perhaps Atherton’s mannerisms could be retained. Surely many men moved with lazy catlike grace and many beaux surveyed the world from heavily lidded eyes.
    Yes! That was it. Louisa threw back the covers  with determination and went straightway to her task. It was not easy changing the forceful dark Reginald to a forceful fair one. For