The Mercenary Major Read Free Page B

most famous elephant—and Astley’s Amphitheatre, and I particularly do not want you to miss the balloon ascension on Friday. Now, confess,” she said, “you do find me eccentric.”
    “Not at all,” he said, laughing, “I’d say you know just how to show a fellow the town.”
    “Of course, now that I see you, now that I can let go of the picture I’ve had in my head these fourteen years, I am willing to consider more grown-up entertainments as well—the theatre and the opera, and dinner with friends.” She saw the guardedness return to his expression.
    “I think I had best stay away from dinner parties . . . Lady Letitia. I have only my uniforms, and they are sadly in need of attention.” Jack held out a well-mended sleeve.
    “I am sure there can be no lack of dignity in wearing a uniform that proclaims such service to England, Jack.”
    “But soon I would be seen as the eccentric one, if I appeared on all occasions dressed for the parade ground.”
    “Then we must add a trip to the tailor to your London itinerary. You can be dressed a la mode inside of a week.” The silence that greeted this suggestion left Letty feeling she had blundered irretrievably. Of course, she meant to outfit him as befitted his station, but she had not meant to make the suggestion so openly or so soon.
    Again Jack heard the familiar warning voice. He shook his head. It was as if an invisible battle line were being drawn, but how could he think of Lady Letitia as an opponent when every impulse of hers seemed to be generous? She was watching him with an expression of restrained hope.
    “Well,” he said carefully, “we need not take time out from menageries and adventures. I can get by with my uniforms for a while, and I’ll be on my way soon enough.”
    “But Jack, you must stay through Christmas,” she cried, and her hands flew up like startled birds, then clenched abruptly as if she were holding something back.
    A single coarse Spanish word came to Jack’s mind. He was a fool, he realized, to think he could come even for a few days to the world of the ton without the necessary silver in his pocket. He had banked most of the money Lady Letitia had sent him over the years, and he meant to return it to her, not to draw on her for more. One trip to a tailor would end that resolve. “I have no funds,” he confessed.
    “Of course you don’t,” she said, as if relieved to hear his objection. “Nor should you be expected to spend your own blunt to please me. If I require you to attend some dinner, it is only right that I provide such monies as will outfit you in style, just as . . . just as the army provided you with a rifle.”
    He had to laugh at her reasoning. “But ma’am,” he argued, pushed to admit a still greater obstacle to her plans for him, “even if I allow you to dress me up as a gentleman, I am not sure I know how to be one. My manners are likely to cause you some embarrassment.”
    “Never think so,” she admonished him. “You shall merely be thought to have a romantic background, and soon all the proper young ladies of London will be sighing over you as they did over Lord Byron before his troubles.”
    Jack stiffened. Improper young ladies might sigh over him, but proper young misses would be advised by their mamas to shun him.
    “I would not want to mislead any romantic miss, ma’am, for I won’t marry until I make my way in the world, in America, I think.”
    This was terrible, Letty thought. He was not going to give her a chance to make a home for him. She had so much more to do than she had dreamed if she wished him to take his rightful place among the Favertons and the ton . And she would restore Helen’s son to the world from which Helen had been banished so many years before.
    “A noble sentiment, Jack,” she said, “but you may make the acquaintance of any of my friends and speak to all the shocking flirts in London without feeling obliged to offer marriage.”
    He laughed. He couldn’t