Page 95 of A Foolish Flirtation

The next morning the first of the designers arrived, a Mr. Penrose along with his team of three workmen, and that same afternoon, an architect called Mr. Wimble. Mrs. Cheviot discussed with Emmie the plans for putting them up. This consisted of providing guest rooms for Mr. Penrose and Mr. Wimble in the east wing and finding lodgings in various cottages on the grounds for their workmen.

Emmie assured their housekeeper that this all sounded highly suitable and agreed with her suggestion that formal dining should be reinstated to accommodate these new members of the household. She felt a little sad to lose the intimacy of their private dining room, but after all, one had to accommodate one’s houseguests, and it might be easier considering how things had taken a decidedly awkward turn of late between herself and her husband.

As a consequence, breakfast, luncheon, and dinner were now formal affairs and felt decidedly stuffy after their family supper and the picnic lunch on the beach. She fancied Pinky, who had been slowly opening up to Jeremy’s presence, shrank from two new gentlemen on the premises and retreated once more into her shell.

Teddy took a lively interest in Mr. Wimble, who was a shy and retiring young man, and ignored the somewhat pompous Mr. Penrose, who he had met before and was somewhat contemptuous of.

“He decorated Mama’s rooms before. My other mama, I mean,” Teddy elucidated. “He’s very fussy,” he added in a whisper. “But apparently, quite famous in London.”

Emmie had to admit she did not care much for Mr. Penrose herself, for the man clearly had a high opinion of his own taste, and she had not enjoyed the brief consultation they had shared thus far about the decoration of her rooms. Neither of the two sketches he had produced had appealed to her in the slightest.

As for Mr. Wimble, she was not entirely sure what the architect’s role was. When she asked him three nights later at dinner, he had paled, then flushed bright red and started stammering. Jeremy had interrupted at this point to explain he wanted to add a new annex to the folly.

“Oh, is it the amphitheater you always wanted as a child?” Emmie guessed.

Teddy’s ears had pricked up. “Really, Papa?” he asked excitedly. “Are we to have an amphitheater?”

Jeremy had looked a little embarrassed. “No,” he said heavily, shooting this down at once. “Decidedly not. I was thinking of adding a new ‘ruined’ section to the side of it, with fallen columns and skeletal arches, to appear as though the folly were once part of something far larger. We could have roses planted, climbing ones which would be trained to grow over the ‘ruins’ and form a pergola of sorts. Don’t you think that sounds picturesque?”

Emmie tried to imagine it but failed. It sounded more gothic than classical to her but what did she know? “I look forward to seeing the sketches,” she said encouragingly, and could not help but notice Mr. Wimble looked even more alarmed by the idea, casting a look of mute appeal at his employer.

When she mentioned his reaction to Jeremy later as they climbed the stairs together, he shrugged it off. “Wimble does not like to show anyone his sketches until he is entirely satisfied with them,” he explained.

They reached her rooms first and Emmie hesitated at the door, unsure if Jeremy would accompany her inside. He had not approached her quarters in the past three days, not since their falling out. She was not even sure if he had checked the door to find she had unlocked it.

Of course, that might not have anything to do with their row. It might be because she was on her monthly right now and he had no interest in spending evenings with her while that was the case. She placed her hand on the door handle, and he cleared his throat. She turned to him at once, eagerly.

“Would you mind if I join you this evening?” he asked with scrupulous politeness. “Only if it is agreeable to you, of course. I do not mean to intrude.”

“No, I would like you to,” she assured him with a smile. She felt hugely relieved all of a sudden. The past few days of distance had rather chilled her. She hesitated. “Is the bedroom convenient, or would you rather we went into my sitting room?”

She thought he looked a little aback. “I only ask,” she said in a hurry, “because I am not altogether sure when I am supposed to use it. I’ve barely spent any time in there thus far.”

“I would rather sit on your bed and watch you at your toilette,” he admitted frankly. “But if that would make you uncomfortable then, of course, I am happy to settle for whatever intimacy you will afford me.”

Emmie blinked. “I am happy for you to sit on my bed,” she said quickly, suddenly afraid he would retreat altogether. Now it was his turn to look relieved.

He smiled at her and made as though to follow her into her room, but she forestalled him with a hand on his arm. Jeremy halted at once. “Won’t you—won’t you go and put on your dressing robe, my lord?” she asked hesitantly. “Lottie will be waiting to ready me for bed. Once we have washed and undressed, then we can be at our leisure together and take our ease.”

He relaxed visibly. “You would like that?” he asked, looking hopeful.

“Yes, of course.”

“Then”—he paused—“will you wait for me to…to put on your face cream and brush your hair?” He spoke the words lightly but the way he avoided her eyes and colored faintly clued her in to the fact he was earnest in his request.

“Yes, of course, if you wish it,” she answered with surprise.

He nodded and looked down to where her hand still rested on his arm. Quickly, Emmie released him and hurried inside to greet Lottie, who had her washing things and her nightclothes ready. Half an hour later, a knock on the door announced Jeremy’s arrival.

He did not come via the connecting door between their rooms but used the door from the corridor. Emmie saw Lottie’s raised eyebrows and hoped it would not lead to too much speculation in the servants’ hall.

“I’ll leave you now, milady, if that’s everything?” Lottie asked.

“Yes, that is all. Good night, Lottie, thank you.”

Emmie lingered at her dressing table as Jeremy flopped down onto her bed, dressed in his gaudy black and gold robe. He was watching her in the mirror, she noticed, as she picked up a jar of “otto of roses” and started dabbing it onto her face and neck. He seemed wholly riveted by the proceedings and Emmie reflected on the odd thing he had said about “settling for whatever intimacy she would afford him.”

Was this one such intimacy? she wondered, rubbing in the lotion in sweeping circular motions. She had noticed from the first that Jeremy liked to watch her performing such attentions. It was so strange how entranced he was by it all.