The Courtship by Catherine Coulter Read Free Book Online Page B

excellent hearing. One must always think before speaking if he is anywhere in the vicinity. Hearing even a whisper isn’t beyond him.”
    â€œI will be more careful in the future.” Future? It was possible he would not see her again after tonight, but he wanted to. He wanted to bed her, nothing more to it than that. Sweet, simple lust, a fine thing, something a man could see to without much difficulty, and then it was over and done with and a man could go about his business again, unburdened for a goodly number of hours.
    â€œDinner is served, Miss Helen.”
    When Flock opened the dining room door, frowning because it was closed in the first place, he stared in perfect horror.
    The small dining room was fast filling with smoke.
    â€œOh, dear,” said Flock. “Oh, dear.”
    Lord Beecham quickly moved Flock to one side.
    â€œIt’s the buttock of beef that’s burning,” Lord Beecham said. He picked up a bottle of wine and poured it over the roast. He then removed a silver dome from another platter and set it over the meat. There was a hissing sound. More smoke gushed out from beneath the dome, then it stopped.
    â€œOpen the windows,” Lord Prith said to Flock. “How did this happen?”
    â€œIt is the hotel, my lord,” Flock said as he pulled the draperies back and shoved up the three side-by-side windows. “The chef is extremely voluble and quite French. His name is Monsieur Jerome. He saw Miss Helen when we arrived, lost his head, and has begged me to allow him to cook for her. This is his latest attempt to impress her. He called this his feu du monde .”
    â€œWorld fire?” Lord Beecham said and coughed. He picked up a napkin and began flapping it against the smoke. “I don’t suppose the chef is short?”
    â€œYes, my lord. Jerome doesn’t even come to Miss Helen’s chin. I do, however, pass her chin on most occasions.”
    â€œEh? What does that mean, Flock?”
    Flock said as he rubbed the burned spots on the lovely white linen tablecloth, “It means, my lord, that Miss Helen is safe from me. I define a short man as not coming to Miss Helen’s nose. I am there, my lord. Nearly.”
    Helen was batting at the smoke as well. “I thought you told him that I was married, Flock, and thus his ardor was sufficiently cooled.”
    â€œHe informed me that if you weren’t married to a Frenchman, you had no idea what l’amour could possibly be like.”
    Lord Beecham laughed and lifted the dome from the blackened buttock of beef. More smoke wafted out. “Miss Mayberry, regard a Frenchman’s masterpiece. World fire—it is too much.”
    â€œI don’t think I will ever look at a buttock of beef again the same way,” Helen said.
    There was a stain of ashes on her nose, a small streak down her cheek. Lord Beecham lightly rubbed it off with his fingertip.
    He said close to her hair, which smelled a bit like smoke, “Not only am I to your nose, I can even see the ribbons you’ve threaded through your hair.”
    Flock cleared his throat. “I believe, Miss Helen, that you should repair once again to the drawing room. I will bring what food is edible and you will dine there. However, I must first go outside, where Monsieur Jerome is very probably pacing nervously, the poor Frog, to tell him that his feu du monde was an unexpected surprise.”
    â€œBring more champagne,” said Lord Prith. “It is one of those dark moments.”

5

    L ORD BEECHAM STRETCHED out in his bed, his head pillowed on his arms, and watched the thin, lazy light from the one candle beside him curl upward to form vague outlines of exotic shapes above his head.
    It was the strangest thing. Tucked in among those weaving, ever-changing shapes above him he again saw Helen Mayberry with her father’s bright-red wool scarf tied around her neck, the knot right in the middle of her breasts. He had