“Pooh,'' the boy said. "I don't want to sit for my picture.'' But he did squirm to be set down so that he could walk around to the side of the artist and watch the progress of the portrait.
Judith wandered to a book stall a few feet away after a couple of minutes. But she was not to be allowed to browse in peace. A man with one arm outstretched and draped from shoulder to wrist in necklaces of varying degrees of gaudiness accosted her and tried to interest her in his wares. Another man came up on her other side with a tray of bangles.
The marquess watched her laugh and shake her head, looking from one to the other. They moved in closer on either side of her, pressing their wares on her. Her reticule dangled from her right arm.
He walked toward her and set one hand lightly against the back of her neck. "You are not considering buying more baubles, are you, my love?" he asked, at the same time picking up her reticule and tucking it into the crook of her arm.
She looked around at him, her eyes wide and startled.
"These pearls for the lidy, guv?" the necklace seller asked. "Real pearls wiv a real diamond clasp? A bargain they are today, guv."
"I am sure they are," the marquess said. "Unfortunately the lady already has three different strings of pearls." He held up a staying hand. "And all the other jewels she could possibly wear in a lifetime."
The bangle seller had already faded away.
"You're missin' the bargain of a lifetime, guv," the hawker said, and he turned and made his way to a group of three ladies who had stopped nearby.
The marquess removed his hand from Judith's neck.
"That was one reason why you needed a male escort," he said.
"They were harmlessly trying to sell their wares," she said stiffly. "I did not need your interference, my lord."
"You would have been easy prey," he said. "They would not even have had to draw attention to themselves by racing off with your reticule. The bangle seller was lifting it so skillfully off your arm that you probably would not even have missed it until they had disappeared among the crowds."
She looked down at the reticule she now held against her side. "That is ridiculous," she said. "They were merely selling their wares."
"They were merely thieving," he said. "However, since no harm has been done, I suppose it does not matter if you do not believe me. But do be careful. This type of scene is a pickpocket's heaven."
"He was really about to steal my reticule?" she asked, frowning.
“As surely as the clasp on that pearl necklace was glass,'' he said.
She was looking directly into his eyes. He had never quite been able to put a name to the color of her eyes. They were notexacdy green, not exactly gray. They were certainly not blue-not altogether so, anyway. But they were bright and beautiful eyes, the colored circle outlined by a dark line, almost as if it had been drawn in with a fine pen. He had once fancied it possible to drown in her eyes.
"Thank you," she said. She did not smile. He knew that it had taken her a great effort to acknowledge her gratitude. She turned abruptly to the portrait painter's booth.
The portrait was finished and Kate was holding it in her hands and gazing at it wide-eyed. Her aunt was exclaiming in delight over it while Rupert regarded it critically, head to one side.
“Look, Mama.'' Kate held out the portrait for her mother's inspection. Judith took it and the marquess looked at it over her shoulder. A little girl sat stiffly on a chair, her feet dangling in space, her hands in her lap. Two large dark eyes
peeped from beneath the poke of a bonnet. It could have been any child anywhere.
"Oh, lovely," Judith said. "I will have to find a frame for it at home and hang it in my bedchamber. How clever of you to sit still all that time, Kate."
The marquess paid the assistant one shilling and sixpence. Kate was pulling on the tassel of one of his Hessian boots as he put his purse away in a safe inside pocket.
"Yes, ma'am?" he said, looking down at her.
She pointed upward and smiled at him. He stooped down closer to her.
"Ride up there," she said.
She weighed no more than a feather. He swung her up onto one shoulder and wrapper* an arm firmly about her. She put one arm about his head beneath his beaver hat and spread her palm over his ear. And she sat very still and quiet.
It was his one regret. No, perhaps not the Only one. But it was one regret of his life that he had not had children of his own. He had dreamed of it once, of course. When he was twenty-six years old he had been very eager to marry and begin his family. He had hoped that Judith would want several children. He had suffered too much loneliness himself from being an only child.
He should, he supposed, have shaken off his disappointment and his heartache more firmly and chosen again. He might still have found contentment with another woman and he might certainly have had his family.
But it seemed too late now at the age of thirty-four to begin the process of finding a woman with whom he might be compatible. He had loved once, and the experience seemed to have sapped all his desire to search for love again.
Rupert was holding his free hand, he realized suddenly, and telling him in his piping voice how he would skate like the wind if he only had skates with him. Faster than the wind. He would skate so fast that no one would even see him.
Judith walked to his side, her eyes on her children, almost as if she believed that he would disappear with them if she relaxed her vigil for one moment. Amy walked at his other side, still gazing about her with bright interest.
"I'm cold," Kate announced suddenly.
They were strolling back toward the bridge where the carriage was to meet them, and the slight movement of air was against their faces.
"It is chilly," Amy agreed, "though you were quite right in what you said earlier, my lord. The excitement of the occasion makes one almost forget that it is a cold winter's day."
"We will warm ourselves at the roasting fire," the marquess said, leading the way there.
And indeed the heat from the flames was very welcome. While Rupert dashed forward, his hands outheld, Lord Denbigh lifted Kate down carefully from his shoulder, stooped down behind her and unbuttoned his greatcoat to wrap about her, and held her little hands up to the blaze.
"Better?" he asked.
She nodded. He took her hands and rubbed them firmly together and then held them to the blaze again. He looked up at Amy.
"It feels good, does it not?" he said.
"Wonderful," she agreed.
He looked up at Judith. "Warm again?" he asked.
"Yes, thank you," she said.
"Only those wot's buyin' meat is welcome to warm their 'ands, guv," the man who was tending the cooking said, and he stretched out a hand to catch the shilling that the marquess tossed to him.
"Is that better?" the marquess asked Kate after a couple of minutes, rubbing her hands together again.
She nodded once more to him, turned, and raised her arms to him. He wrapped his coat more firmly about her and lifted her.
"I think the carriage will be waiting by the time we have strolled back to the bridge," he said. "Has everyone seen enough?"
"Oh, yes, indeed," Amy said. "This has been very wonderful, my lord."
"This has been the best day of my life," Rupert said.
"May I take Kate, my lord?" Judith asked. "She must be getting heavy."
"As light as a feather," he said, glancing down and realizing that the child had fallen asleep against his chest.
He had a strange feeling, almost as if butterflies were fluttering through his stomach. She was warm and relaxed inside his coat. He could hear her deep breathing when he bent his head closer. No, it was more than butterflies. He felt almost like crying.