The Dollar Prince's Wife by Paula Marshall Read Free Book Online Page A

Jacobus—Cobie— Grant from New York. Lord and Lady Kenilworth have kindly invited me to Moorings. We meet unconventionally, but I hope that you won’t hold that against me.’
    So this was her Yankee rescuer whom she had supposed to be middle-aged and odd!
    So strongly did his mere presence affect her that Dinah felt as though she were under a spell, or had been hypnotised. She suddenly knew why the servants had spoken of him as they did. He was an enigma…yes, that was it. An enigma—and Violet’s latest lover: she was sure of that, too.
    She almost croaked at him. ‘Indeed, I don’t, seeing that you did me the kindness of making sure that the dog-cart was sent to rescue me at Moorings Halt. Besides, I don’t mind unconventionality, and oh, how beautifully you play!’
    Unable to stop herself, she added, ‘But why in the library, Mr Grant?’
    Her reply amused Cobie. She was so unlike Violet, so unlike anything which he had expected after listening to Violet’s cruel descriptions of her. She reminded him of the young Susanna. There was the same quality of vulnerability about her, something in the defensive way in which she held herself. But Susanna had always known that she was valued—and this girl knew that she wasn’t.
    Besides, Susanna had always been beautiful, and Dinah plainly thought that she wasn’t. She was still unformed, half a child, but Cobie judged that the promise of beauty was there.
    He answered her gravely in order that she might think that what she had just said was important enough to deserve a reasoned reply. ‘It seemed a convenient place, Lady Dinah. Few appear to use it—or so the butler told me—which meant that I was unlikely to be disturbed.’
    â€˜You were playing Vivaldi, weren’t you? I like Vivaldi. I always think…’
    Dinah hesitated, not sure whether to continue. He might laugh at her behind her back: she knew that Violet often did when she was foolish enough to reveal her inward thoughts to her…but…but…she decided to go on…
    â€˜His music always reminds me of a fountain playing. The water is rising and falling, spreading and narrowing, until finally, just before it ceases altogether, there comes a great burst when the last drops fall into the basin… Only…only…those last notes still remain with you—unlike the water drops.’
    She must have been mad to offer her secret imaginings to a Yankee barbarian—which was what her brother Rainey always called them—and one of Violet’s confidants intothe bargain. Only he had played the Vivaldi concerto so beautifully that he must have had some real feeling for it.
    If Cobie was surprised by what she had just said to him, he didn’t allow it to show. Instead he picked up the guitar—it was Violet’s—and still standing, holding it high and upright against his left shoulder, he began to play the concerto’s coda again.
    This time with even more feeling so that the last few notes seemed to hang in the air even longer—like the drops of water of which she had spoken, slowly falling into the basin of which she had spoken.
    He said nothing, simply raised his beautiful eyebrows questioningly.
    Dinah shivered.
    â€˜Yes, like that,’ she finally achieved. ‘I wish that Faa could hear you play.’
    Cobie inclined his head. He didn’t ask who Faa was, but he could guess. Violet had told him her half-sister’s sorry story earlier that day as though it were something of a joke. He was more than ever relieved that he had discovered Violet’s careless treatment of the poor child. She had allowed her half-sister to be abandoned at Moorings railway station as though she were an unconsidered package.
    Well, be damned to that. He had not gone to rescue her himself, but had caused her to be rescued by others because Violet had always spoken of her so dismissively that he had