The Gallant Guardian by Evelyn Richardson Page B

appear.
    Word of the marquess’s arrival had spread like wildfire, from the gardeners trimming the bushes along the drive to the stable-boys. Throughout the servants’ quarters it had been passed along that he was top-of-the-trees, a true Corinthian, and furthermore, it was widely known that he had given the odious Sir Cecil and his shrewish wife a stunning set-down. Everyone, from the butler to the scullery maid, rejoiced that at last someone had come to put the Wadleighs in their place and restore smiles to the faces of Lady Charlotte and Master William.
     

Chapter Seven
     
    In fact, the guardian himself was thinking along much the same lines as Harcourt’s devoted retainers. As he washed off the dust of his journey, Lydon marveled at the change in Charlotte’s appearance when she smiled. In an instant she was transformed from an intense, almost dowdy little creature into an intriguing and attractive young woman. The change had taken him quite by surprise. It had been so brief, so transitory, that he was not even sure he had seen a woman underneath. However, the marquess was nothing if not the man for a challenge, and he resolved to try to bring that brilliant smile back to her face as often as he could.
    Obviously, the best way to accomplish this was through William. It took no great powers of observation to see that Charlotte doted on the lad, lived for his happiness, and trembled lest he be made to suffer the unkindness of an unsympathetic world. The marquess had seen the way her eyes lighted up when he had called him a nice lad. He had felt her eagerness for him to understand and accept her brother when she had spoken of William’s affinity for animals. The boy was everything to her, and no wonder, neglected as she had been by her father, left alone with no family to offer her support or sympathy of any kind. Her love for William and his for her must have been the only love that Lady Charlotte Winterbourne had ever known. How well he understood what that was like.
    Being ignored by the two selfish, unapproachable people who had been his parents. Lord Lydon had suffered a childhood not so different from Charlotte’s. Maximilian only hoped that she had been fortunate enough to have some adult—a nurse or a governess, perhaps—who had given to her all that Felbridge had given to him. Her fierce devotion to her brother was certainly a natural outcome of such an upbringing, and it was through this devotion that Max planned to win her trust and friendship.
    The marquess paused in the middle of drying his face. Win her trust? What had come over him? He had left London that morning resenting the unexpected responsibilities that had been thrust upon him, intent on completing a burdensome task as quickly as possible and with as little cost to himself as he could manage. Now, in the space of little over an hour he was thinking about making Charlotte happy. How had this come about?
    In part, this transformation was owing to William. There was something in the boy’s open countenance and confiding expression that appealed to the marquess in a way that he had never before experienced. And this was further enhanced by his own reaction to Sir Cecil Wadleigh, a creature whose type Lord Lydon had encountered far too many times in his life: self-important, self-serving, and certainly not to be trusted. Seeing the two together, Charlotte and Cecil, innocence, and deviousness, the marquess had experienced a flicker of anger that made him sympathize heartily with Charlotte’s passionate indignation at their situation and made him wish to remedy it as quickly and as effectively as possible.
    The marquess finished his ablutions and, refreshed and ready to tackle both the Wadleighs, strolled to the door of his bedchamber. He paused to glance in the looking glass and give a final twitch to his cravat before stepping into the hallway. As he opened the door he caught sight of the shaft of sunlight pouring through one of the tall