of Eden fumbling with the nut like any schoolboy. ‘And don’t tell me you aren’t one,’ she added as he opened his mouth. ‘But I am definitely a lady, so I think you deserve the first fruit of your labours.’
‘Thank you.’ He popped it into his mouth, then mumbled, ‘I’dths too hot!’
‘I know,’ she said, laughing. ‘Why do you think I let you have the first one?’
He grinned back at her teasing and began to extract another. ‘Here, open your mouth, it will mark your gloves otherwise.’
Eating in the street, let alone having a man popping food into her mouth, was thoroughly unladylike behaviour, Maude knew, lifting the edge of her veil just enough for Eden to deliver the chestnut between her parted lips. But as they walked down Cranburn Street into Leicester Square the people they were passing weren’t ladies and gentlemen, but people with far fewer inhibitions about enjoying themselves, and their chestnuts were not the only things being consumed. Regaining proper speech again, Eden tossed the rest of the parcel to an urchin. ‘Here, catch.’
‘Oh, look, Stagg and Mantle’s are still open,’ Maude said, veering sharply off to the left as soon as they got into the square, only to be brought up short by Eden digging in his heels.
‘Over my dead body are you dragging me into a linen draper’s,’ he stated, with more firmness than gallantry. ‘And,’ he added as Maude studied his face for any signs of yielding, ‘if you so much as flutter an eyelash at me, I will call a cab and that’s the end of our walk.’
‘All right.’ She tucked her hand more firmly into the crook of his elbow. ‘It is your turn anyway.’
‘For what? Mind that coal cart!’
‘For a treat.’ Maude looked up at his austere face. ‘I had the chestnuts, now it is your turn.’
‘I wasn’t aware that walks involved treats.’ Eden sounded amused—or was he simply bemused?
‘My governess started it, and then my girlfriends picked it up and it has become a tradition. So—your turn to choose.’
‘I can’t think of anything I want. Nothing, that is, that it is reasonable to want on a crowded street,’ he added as they walked down Coventry Street towards the bustle of Piccadilly.
‘Hatchard’s?’ Maude enquired hopefully. Once she had lured him into a bookshop, there was the prospect of browsing together companionably, finding out what kind of books he liked, edging him towards the poetry…
‘I have far too much reading waiting for me, without adding any more. Aren’t you tired yet?’
‘Certainly not, this is a mere stroll. At home in Hampshire I walk miles. Oh my, look at that quiz of a hat.’
‘It probably cost twenty guineas. The family estate in Hampshire, no doubt?’
‘Yes, Knight’s Fee. I love it. So does Papa—bone deep. You know, this afternoon, when I saw you looking out from the stage at the theatre, you had just the sort of expression he does when he looks out at the land.’
‘Bone-deep love? Yes, I suppose that is what it is. The first time I stepped into a theatre I was fourteen years old and the magic got hold of me and has never let me go. I had never possessed anything before that was my own creation. The theatre let me create and then I was able to buy one, and another, to put on plays. But none of them were right—but I knew I would know when I found it. And in the Unicorn, I have.’
She held her breath, willing him to go on, to let her see more, to understand more. But he had caught himself up, she could sense it.
‘And you, Maude—you couldn’t live without your country estate and your town house, your balls and your charities, could you?’
‘I could if I still had my friends and I could still visit Knight’s Fee. Women have to get used to the knowledge they must leave their childhood home, at least, unless we give up all idea of marriage.’ It made her slightly breathless, actually speaking of marriage to Eden.
‘And you haven’t given up, despite your advanced years?’ He sounded serious, despite his joke about her age.
‘No, of course not. I have always said that there was the right man out there for me and I would know him when I saw him. Just like you and your theatre. I will remain a spinster all my life, rather than compromise on that. That’s what gave me the strength to stand up to Papa when he wanted me to marry Gareth.’
‘Standon?’ He sounded surprised. ‘So that is who you were telling me about. But you are good friends, are you not?’
‘Excellent friends and we have been for years. It would have been like marrying my brother. Oh, look—’ Maude pointed up Dover Street ‘—that’s where we first met.’ Oh, Lord! I blurted that out without thinking…
‘What, you and Standon?’
‘No.’ Nothing for it. ‘You and I. In Todmorton’s perfumery shop. I was with Jessica—Lady Standon—you had come in to collect something.’
Eden stopped, ignoring the pedestrians who bumped against him, then began to flow round them as though they were a rock in a river. ‘I knew I had seen you before.’ He frowned in concentration. ‘Sponges. Why do I think of sponges?’
‘Because Jessica and I were tossing little ones to and fro and you walked in and had to catch them. We were being foolish and you were looking exceptionally severe.’
Eden ignored that. ‘You were wearing green. Moss green and a bonnet with a big satin ribbon and ruching all under the brim.’
He remembered her! And Jessica had said he hadn’t noticed them at all. ‘That’s right,’ Maude confirmed happily until she realised with a jolt that she should have pretended not to recall any detail at all. ‘It was brand-new. I remember Jessica commenting on it as we went into the shop.’
‘And there I was, thinking every detail of the day was burned on your memory because that was the day we met,’ Eden said, creating an inner turmoil that made her feel light-headed. If he only knew!
‘Well, it was not burned on yours,’ she retorted as her scrambled wits reasserted themselves. ‘I had to remind you.’
‘I could hardly stare at a beautiful young woman, chance met in a shop, now could I?’ he asked reasonably, beginning to walk again. ‘I saw the gown, the bonnet, a glimpse of your face. I knew you were familiar when I saw you at the theatre.’
Maude could have told him every detail about what he had been wearing: the highly polished Hessians, the buff pantaloons, the dark blue coat, the cane with the silver head, the high-crowned hat in his gloved hands. She could have described in minute detail how his hair had curled over his collar, his words to the shop assistant, the almost physical blow to her senses that seeing him had been.
‘Nearly there now.’ They were turning into Berkeley Street, up the side of Devonshire House. ‘It seems we were fated to meet again,’ he added, almost to himself.
‘Yes,’ Maude agreed, striving for a tone of bright amusement at the coincidence.
‘One could almost say that
