Taming Beauty by Lynne Barron

buzzing, insects of some sort presumably, perhaps even grasshoppers. Wind ruffling the grass and blowing through the leaves on the trees. Was that the sea splashing against the cliffs in the distance?
    She scrambled from bed and hastened across the room to the window. Pushing the curtains aside, she looked out over a vista of rolling green hills marked here and there by low hedgerows planted in tidy square formations. The sun was just peeking over the horizon, a blaze of orange beneath a cloudless blue sky.
    Geography had never been her forte, but even she knew the ocean—the Celtic Sea if she remembered correctly—was to the west.
    Perhaps this afternoon, between visiting the village Dunaway had assured her lay somewhere nearby and offering up further glimpses of soiled linen over dinner, she would take a walk along the cliffs. She’d never seen the ocean, and it seemed she ought to take advantage of the opportunity, for she couldn’t imagine when she might willingly travel beyond the environs of London again.
    With her day planned out in her mind, Lilith drew on the silk kimono she’d purchased on the London docks, part of a bounty pilfered from some merchant ship waylaid in the channel by privateers, no doubt. Tying the belt loosely, she hurried out onto the balcony and down to her maid’s bedchamber. She pushed open the door and Tula looked up from the ironing board wedged into one corner of the room no bigger than her dressing room at home.
    “Oy, you gave me a fright,” Tula said by way of greeting, her brown eyes going wide beneath a frizz of pale curls tumbling from a white mobcap. “I’d a’ been in with your Turkish coffee some ten minutes past only the cook ain’t never brewed up anything more ‘an weak tea. And seeing as she don’t allow anyone to muck about in her kitchen, I ‘ad to give her a quick lesson on how to grind the beans and add the milk just so. Not what I’m makin’ any promises on whether t’will be to your liking.”
    “Never mind, I suppose one can’t expect perfect coffee, or anything else, in the country,” Lilith replied, eyeing the yellow gown the girl was ironing. “I thought I’d wear the lilac and the turquoise shawl with the matching fringe. And a pair of sturdy walking boots.”
    “You don’t own anything sturdier ‘an the gray ‘alf-boots you wore fer travelin’ and thems fair coated in mud.”
    “The white kid-skin then. Oh, and when you fetch my coffee, ask Reggie to bring around the carriage.”
    “You goin’ somewheres?”
    “To the village, and the sooner the better as I’ve a letter to post before the mail coach arrives.” Lilith turned back the way she’d come, scurrying over the warped boards of the balcony.
    A movement flashed in her peripheral and she halted before her open door. Turning, she swept her gaze over the tangle of rosebushes, weeds and wildflowers between the bachelors’ quarters and the house proper.
    Two heads sporting bright orange curls poked up from behind a crumbling fountain, matching blue eyes fixed on Lilith. The boys were the oldest of Susan Rossiter’s brood of little people, if she didn’t miss her guess.
    Lilith dropped into a curtsy, her robe parting to expose one leg from mid-thigh to bare foot before she quickly pulled the silk closed and rose to stand once more.
    The little persons erupted into giggles as they ducked down beneath the fountain.
    Smiling, she looked toward the main house only to find Baron Malleville standing on the threshold of one of the open glass-paned doors. He was dressed simply in a white linen shirt open at the neck and black trousers tucked into tall boots. With his arms crossed over his chest, his muscled legs braced apart and his too long hair falling to frame his square jaw shadowed by night whiskers, he was the very picture of the Beast of Breckenridge.
    He watched her, silent and perfectly still but for a lock of mahogany hair lifting on the breeze before settling across his brow.
    A