Hiding from Love by Barbara Cartland

Author:Barbara Cartland
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-908411-40-2
Publisher: Barbara Cartland.com

CHAPTER SIX

A half hour later Leonora stood staring out over the dark waves. A sea breeze blew and she gave a shiver.

She wished that Finny would hurry with the shawl he had gone to collect from her cabin.

It was Finny who had suggested a stroll on the deck before retiring for the night.

He had found her in dismal spirits in her cabin. She had left the supper table before pudding, unable to bear any longer the sight of Desirée monopolising Mr. Chandos.

Leonora was relieved to see Finny and had agreed with alacrity to a stroll. The sight of the star-laden sky had lifted her spirits, but the night air was so cool.

Placing her hands on the ship’s rail, she gazed out at the horizon, a thread of pale light between sea and sky.

Shivering again, she looked for Finny. There was no sign of him, but her eye was caught by the red glow of a cigar in the shadows.

“Hello?” she called out.

The red glow advanced.

Her heart lurched as she saw that it was held in the left hand of Mr. Chandos. He went to the rail and flicked the cigar overboard, then leaned on his elbows to watch it being swallowed by the deep.

He said not a word and she wondered unhappily if he did not feel inclined to talk to her because it was she and not Desirée.

“It’s a beautifully clear night,” she ventured at last.

He turned his head slightly, but she could not read his expression as the moonlight was behind him.

“It is indeed,” he replied. “Had we been on deck a short while ago we might have seen the Scilly Isles. We should reach the Azores in two days time.”

“You have – made this journey often, then?”

“Not often enough.”

He raised his head to regard the sky and the large white moon riding there.

“An Atlantic moon,” he murmured.

Leonora followed his gaze.

“Is it – so very different – from other moons?”

“Look at it. Is it the same moon you can see from your bedroom window in England?”

“Well – no. At home, at most times, it looks softer as if it’s wrapped in muslin. Only on very frosty nights is it like this – sharp as a blade.”

“Alas! It’s not often enough that I witness a frosty English night.”

“Oh, you don’t live in England?”

“I live in Brazil,” he answered.

“In – Rio?”

“In Rio,” came the firm reply.

Recalling that the Griddles were going on to open a shop in São Paulo, she felt an ungallant surge of triumph.

Her rival Desirée would be leaving the field free!

She studied his profile as he stared out to sea.

That nose really was most aristocratic! Perhaps he was indeed an aristocrat – the younger son of an Earl or a Duke. After all, she really knew very little about him. In fact she really knew too little about him to feel as she did.

With a sudden rush of shame she thought of Isobel and their pact never to succumb to the allure of romance.

What had happened since

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