America's First Daughter: A Novel(56)

I swayed on my heeled shoes, quite fearing a swoon. “What is it you wish to declare?”

He looked down, almost shyly. “I’ve so often planned what I’d say in this moment that it should be ready on my tongue. But poetry has suddenly fled from me . . . how can I find the words?”

I stared, expectantly, wondering if he might dare to take my hand and kiss it. If he might scandalously twine his fingers with mine. If he might lean close to whisper in my ear. Instead, he reached into his coat and pulled forth the little piece of folded paper, now worn and creased with time, and unfolded it for me to see my hair still pressed within. “Patsy, this token has never left my possession. It’s been a reminder, every day. What I want to declare—what I want to offer—is quite beyond abiding friendship.”

I gulped, then forgot to breathe. “You kept my hair, all this time?”

“Yes. Near my heart. A year ago, I adored you. But now I adore you even more than before. For you’ve grown into a graceful and beautiful woman.”

How could I believe him? Perhaps I was graceful. Shapely, too, with the added allure of an ample bosom and ginger hair. But even then, in the flower of my youth, I knew that I wasn’t so much beautiful as appealing, my face a delicate rendering of my father’s. Maybe it was the very resemblance to my father that accounted for the beauty Mr. Short saw in me—for I was a feminine reflection of a man he idolized.

But still, I was wary. “There are prettier ladies in Paris.”

“Not in my eyes,” he insisted, emphatically.

Now he did draw my hand up and clasp it against his chest, where I felt his heart throb beneath the buttons of his waistcoat—evidence that he did think me beautiful.

That, in turn, made me feel beautiful. It was a heady, intoxicating feeling. A feeling that could rob a girl of all reason.

“Patsy, will you allow me to take you home?”

In that moment, I’d have gone anywhere with him. It didn’t matter that I’d left my shawl behind. Or even that when I looked up, I realized that the Duke of Dorset was standing at the top of the stairs and had witnessed the entire exchange. That spring in Paris, defiance was the norm. And a wild defiant liberation had taken hold of me, so I didn’t fight it. I simply went with William out into the night, and alighted a carriage back to Paris, quite undone by this turn of fate.

My thoughts were as tumultuous as the jostling ride. I’d built a fortification round my heart, and not only because I’d been hurt. Given my intention to take my vows, I was forced to wonder if Mr. Short was a temptation sent by the devil himself. If so, I was ready to fall into the devil’s arms, but I wasn’t so unprincipled as to deceive him.

When we disembarked on the Champs-élysées beneath lamps hung in the trees, I turned to him. “Mr. Short, I’m very much changed since you left. You don’t realize the full extent of it. When you learn more, I fear—I fear you must reconsider your declaration.”

“That sounds ominously serious. . . .”

“I’m afraid it is.” I told him of my bargain with God. Of my admittedly wavering belief that I’d been called to serve as a Bride of Christ, rather than the bride of any man.

When I was finished, he exhaled. “What a relief. I feared you’d given your heart to Polignac. I’m much happier to have God as a rival. More glory in it for me if I win your love, and less shame should I lose.”

I gasped at his playful remark. “That’s blasphemous.”

He winked. “Probably so. I’m a sinner with more faults than you imagine, Patsy. But you’re the friend to which my soul is unalterably attached, so I’m prepared to make whatever alterations to my character would be conducive to your happiness. Only tell me this. Are my hopes in vain, or can you be induced to love me?”

I loved him already. Had loved him, it seemed, all my life. Loved his loyalty, his ambition, his radical vision for the world. That a man like William Short wanted my love filled me with such joy that I could’ve thrown my arms about his neck, heedless of the eyes upon us, and confessed it on the spot!

But did I not love God just as much?

Even if I hadn’t determined to take the veil, I’d been strictly taught that a girl’s easy confession of love was indecent and would destroy that love. I couldn’t answer him with true candor. Worse, in struggling to think of a reply of sufficient restraint, I uttered words he took for reproach. “Sir, your absence pained me more than I can ever express—”

“You cannot forgive me?” he asked, stiffening.

“I could forgive you anything, but I need time to petition Heaven for guidance.”

“You’re cruel, Miss Jefferson. I’ve already spent a year’s time waiting for you.”

I shook my head. “It’s not cruelty but confusion. For in that year’s time, I feared you despised me. Now in one night, everything I thought I knew is changed.”

“You feel hurried. Yes, I see that now. As do I. For your father tells me he expects permission for his leave of absence in the post any day now, and that you’ll set sail for Virginia. I saw the trunks, already packed.”

The breath went out of me. I hadn’t forgotten my father’s congé. But I hadn’t realized that the need for a decision would steal swiftly upon me. Now, here was Mr. Short, making my choice more complicated. “But I need to understand. If—if I loved you, what then?”