Mistress Below Deck

‘He is quite handsome, I do agree, and he seems much taken with you, Jane.’

‘I do hope so. Who’s that with him?’

Rowena’s eyes were drawn to the tall, indolent figure standing beside Edward. He met her gaze with the cool expression gentlemen always seemed to assume when presented with an attractive woman, but there was a leap of pleasure in his eyes behind his silver mask, which she knew was answered in hers. His identity was a mystery to her, but his manner bespoke the privileged class, of generations of men of superiority and honour. Averting her gaze, she turned to her sister.

‘I’m going outside. If you must know, this wretched wig is making my head hot and unbearable. I have to take it off, else I swear I shall scream.’

‘Then go to the ladies’ retiring room. I’ll come with you if you like. Mrs Crossland was most insistent that we were not to leave the house.’

‘I really do need to go outside for a bit. I’ll be back before Mrs Crossland notices I’ve gone.’

Jane watched her go. No one, except perhaps their father, had ever defied Rowena’s dangerous spirit, nor had the courage to try to curb it. Through a succession of governesses had been employed to educate her, not one had had the resolution that was needed to discipline Rowena Golding.

She had a hot temper, had Rowena, which could flare in a second from mere annoyance to a rage from which one would flee in alarm. Without a mother and their father a cripple, Rowena had taken on the mantle of responsibility for her family, which gave her a degree of freedom not experienced by many of her peers. In her spare moments her laugh rang frequently across the hills around Falmouth, where she had grown up as free and wild as an unbroken pony.

Rowena ventured deeper into the gardens, smiling with amusement on hearing whispers and giggles and the odd shriek of laughter coming from the undergrowth—the gardens were full of dark places and dark deeds. Eventually she found herself in an enclosed, secluded arbour, where she tore off her mask and wig and shook her thick, dark brown tresses free.

A moment later she heard a sound. She looked towards it, her senses suddenly alert. Something or someone was watching her. Her heart began to race, urging her to turn and run back the way she had come. But then a man, tall, long-limbed, dark and mysterious in the shifting shadows, stepped into the arbour. It was the man she had seen with Edward Tennant.

She let out her breath, unaware until that moment that she had been holding it. ‘You startled me.’

‘Do not be alarmed. I mean you no harm.’

His voice was unusually deep and rich in timbre. She could not make out his face, which was hidden by a silver mask and the shadow of a wide-brimmed hat on which a black plume curled with a flourish.

He drew close, his eyes gleaming through the slits in his mask, and as she was about to step back, murmured, ‘Dear God! Never have I seen the like!’ Lifting his gaze from the gentle curve of her slender hips encased in the gold girdle, he stared into the vibrant beauty of her face. How did she get away with it?

On his arrival he had been a figure passing among the throng, a mysteriously ominous keen-eyed observer of the masquerade. This young lady had not escaped his notice—in fact, she had stood out like a black sheep in a field of white. He had watched her, with a toss of her head and a wide smile on her carmine lips, almost with wild abandon dance first with one gentleman and then another, just two who vied with many for her attention and to make her laugh—too loud at times, causing heads to turn to see what Matthew Golding’s undisciplined daughter was up to now.

Like everyone else he had been unable to tear his eyes from her, and he had observed the leap of interest in her own when she had met his gaze. He had thought her outrageous, a young woman who evidently believed she was above every consideration, every rule, every discipline that life and society dictated. He had been amused and strangely stirred by her appearance, as any man with a drop of red blood in his veins would be.

Recovering quickly from her initial discomfort, Rowena stiffened, clutching her mask and wig in both hands at her waist. ‘What are you staring at?’ she retorted rudely, her eyes dark and dangerous.

‘At you, lady,’ he answered softly. Deliberately his gaze raked over her from top to toe. ‘Did no one think to tell you that your costume is outrageous for a young marriageable lady, who with behaviour such as this will never attract the attention of a husband?’

‘And how do you know I don’t already have a husband?’

‘Had you a husband, I doubt he would allow his wife so much freedom and abandon with every one of your partners.’

She scowled, feeling a certain amount of discomfort at the way he was looking at her. ‘Would you please stop looking at me like that? I find it most annoying.’

‘If you don’t want to be looked at then you shouldn’t make a spectacle of what no sane man can resist. You can’t expect men to be unaffected by the sights you display so audaciously.’ Again he let his gaze wander speculatively over her.

Rowena was angry now without really knowing why. Perhaps it was because his words had a ring of truth to them. She had started to regret her choice of costume the moment she had stepped on to the dance floor and every face she saw was secretly smiling, covertly sneering. Suddenly she had felt stark naked. What she had done was childishly defiant and she wished she had chosen something more demure to wear.

‘What right have you to lecture me on what I should wear? It is nobody’s business and certainly none of yours, whoever you are.’ The hot flash of temper exploded quite visibly. Her nostrils flared and her soft pink mouth had thinned into a hard line, straining to find the words to punish him.

‘Then if anything should happen to you, you will have no one to blame but yourself.’

‘Why, you rude, insolent…’ Her mouth gaped in amazement and the scathing words with which she intended to berate him stuck in her throat. It wasn’t often she was lost for words, as she was now as she confronted this presumptuous stranger.

Her eyes blazed into his while her mind struggled to find something to say to reduce him to his rightful place, but even while she did so, something in the core of her sensibility, independent and wilful, dwelt on his hard, lean body and the pleasing shape of his mouth, and the dark depths of his eyes glinting at her from behind his mask. He was a head taller than she was, with wide shoulders, yet his waist and hips were slim. He stood indolently in front of her, his manner telling her plainly that it was of no particular interest to him whether he offended her or not.

‘What a capricious and flighty manner you have, along with courting danger, young lady, being out here alone in the dark.’

‘And what kind of danger could there possibly be, surrounded as I am by so many revellers?’

‘Precisely—with the majority of the gentlemen so drunk out of their minds they would not give a jot for your reputation.’ He let his amused eyes drift to her flushed face and his smile was mocking. ‘You should know better—unless, of course, you have arranged a tryst with one of the young men you danced with.’

‘Of course I haven’t,’ she snapped, her cheeks flushing an indignant red. ‘What are you doing here? Did you follow me?’

‘No, I did not, but I did see you leave.’

Rowena studied him thoughtfully. ‘You are unfamiliar to me, and I know most people hereabouts.’

His lips, well cut and firm, lifted at the corners with a hint of humour. ‘That’s because I’m not from—hereabouts. My home is in Bristol.’

‘Then that explains why I’ve never see you before. I trust you were invited to Lord Tennant’s ball?’

‘Actually I wasn’t. I am in the area for a short time and thought to sample some of the town’s novelties. When I was told about the masquerade ball, I thought, why, what a pleasant way to pass an evening. Behind a mask one loses one’s identity, so who would know I was not invited? The amusement would help me spend my time until I have to leave.’

‘And you are amused?’

He chuckled low in his throat. ‘I have heard Lord Tennant’s masquerade balls are informal, but this is informality with a vengeance. I also heard that his parties are famous for their diversions—which appears to be correct, for it seems that the accepted way of sitting out a dance is to crawl into the undergrowth with one’s partner to indulge in pleasures other than dancing. Like you, after partaking of the revelries I sought a solitary place, wishing to take respite.’

‘Then I would be obliged if you would seek another arbour in which to be solitary and leave me to mine.’ She frowned at his attire. This man intrigued her. He interested her, and so she satisfied that interest in the only way she knew how—by asking questions. ‘Forgive me, but who or what are you supposed to be? It’s bad manners not to come in fancy dress to the masquerade.’

His smile deepened into an amiable grin, showing strong white teeth. ‘My face is covered, but I am not given to dressing myself up and looking like a complete idiot. I have my reputation and my dignity to uphold.’

‘But if no one knows who you are, it doesn’t really matter, does it?’

‘Not to you, perhaps, but it does to me.’

Rowena regarded him with interest, responding to his completely easy and natural manner. His eyes twinkled wickedly through the slits in his mask, making her wish she could see the man and his expression behind it, suspecting he was grinning wolfishly. ‘But if your costume was clever and original, you wouldn’t look like a total idiot.’

He laughed, then said, ‘You look extremely elegant—and exceedingly provocative. It is clear you have put much thought into your costume—and succeeded in not looking like an idiot.’

‘You know who I am supposed to be?’

‘How could I not? You have enough kohl painted around your eyes to supply half the ladies in Egypt. Cleopatra would be envious. But I am curious as to the identity of the real you.’

‘It is no secret. Even though I wear a mask, everyone knows who I am. My name is Rowena Golding—and there isn’t a man or woman in Devon or Cornwall who doesn’t know my father, Sir Matthew Golding.’

He stared at her quite openly, behind his mask his eyes narrowing. ‘Miss Rowena Golding?’ He should have known, of course, for who else could it be? This was the girl whom the whole of Falmouth gossiped about, the whispers rustling like wind through the bracken on the land, whispers of how Matthew Golding’s daughter rode her fleet-heeled mare with all the wildness that was in her, and by God, he could see why. She was undeniably magnificent.

The gentle curves of her body all rippled beneath the fine material of her gown. Any female dressed in such revealing garments was bound to attract attention, but it was not just her lack of clothing that drew every male eye at the ball to her—it was her defiant, direct stare, the way she tossed her imperious head, the challenging set to her shoulders, and the way she moved with a sensual arrogance. But the most interesting—and more than a little surprising—thing of all was that she was Matthew Golding’s daughter.

Becoming thoughtful, he considered her apace, then, recollecting himself, took a step back and said abruptly, ‘Don’t you think you should return to your chaperon, Miss Golding, before she comes looking for you?’