‘Ah.’ The doctor fumbled in his pocket, brought out a snuffbox and offered it to Alistair. He didn’t use the stuff himself, but he recognised the friendly overture and took a pinch. ‘Difficult thing, love,’ Melchett mused.
‘What?’ A minute elephant went skidding out of his hand and across the table.
The doctor picked it up and peered at it. ‘Love. Old friends, aren’t you?’
‘Yes. Not lovers.’ He examined the last half-hour in painful detail and shrugged. ‘We were friends, as children, as much as one can be with a six-year age gap. We have apparently grown out of it.’
‘Love, lovers, in love, loving. So many shades of meaning to that word.’ Melchett sighed. ‘You were fond of her as a boy?’
‘She was a burr under my saddle,’ Alistair said evenly as he slid the box lid closed. ‘A pestilential little sister.’ He grinned reluctantly, remembering. ‘I suppose I was fond of her, yes.’
‘And you still want to protect her.’
No, he did not want to protect her—he wanted to make love to her for the rest of the voyage. ‘Lady Perdita requires protecting from herself, mainly,’ Alistair said as he put the box in his pocket. ‘But of course I keep an eye on her; she is the daughter of neighbours, after all.’
Melchett got to his feet. ‘That’s the ticket: neighbourliness. Now you know what it is, you won’t fret over it so much.’ He chuckled. ‘Nothing like a proper diagnosis for making one feel better. Don’t let me disturb you,’ he added as Alistair stood. ‘Have a pleasant birthday, my lord.’
What the devil was that about? Neighbourliness? Diagnosis indeed! He didn’t need medical assistance to know that he was suffering from a mixture of exasperation and frustration. And just a tinge of guilt.
He wanted Dita: wanted her in bed, under him, around him. He wanted her screaming his name, wanted her begging him to make love to her again, and again. Alistair took a deep breath and t
hought longingly of cold rivers.
He also wanted to box her ears half the time. That was nothing new—he had spent most of his boyhood in that frame of mind, when she wasn’t making him laugh. Not that he had ever given in to the temptation: one did not strike a girl under any circumstances, however provoking she was.
Unfair that, he thought with a slight smile. Spanking, now. The word brought a vision of Dita’s small, pert backside delightfully to mind.
Which brought him neatly back to the guilt. It was not an emotion he was much prone to. He certainly hadn’t felt guilt over leaving home. Since then he had done few things that caused him regret; all experience had some value. The problem was, he saw with a flash of clarity, he was not feeling guilty over wanting to make love to Dita, he was feeling guilty because he couldn’t be sorry about it.
Damn it. It would be a good thing when she was home safely, despite her best efforts otherwise, and when she was home he hoped she would do her utmost to find a decent husband, although her list of requirements from this paragon probably meant the man did not exist. He could watch this while he searched for a wife—who should be easy to identify when he met her. She would be precisely the opposite of Lady Perdita Brooke in every particular.
‘If I never see St Helena again it will be too soon,’ Mrs Bastable remarked as the island vanished over the horizon. ‘A more disagreeable place I cannot imagine, and the food was dreadful.’
‘There’s Ascension next; we can pick up some turtles and have splendid soup,’ Alistair remarked from his position on the rail, surrounded by a group of ladies, amongst whom the elder Miss Whyton was prominent. ‘And from there, if we have good fortune, perhaps only another ten weeks sailing.’
‘The Equator soon,’ Callum Chatterton added. ‘But no sport to be had there—we got everyone who had never crossed before on the way out from Madras.’
Alistair ducked under the sailcloth and sat down on one of the chairs under the awning that sheltered Dita, Averil and Mrs Bastable. He chose one opposite her and not the vacant one by her side, much to her relief. Then she realised that from where he was sitting he could meet her eyes. He seemed intent on doing just that. She held the amber gaze and her breath hitched, shortened, as his lids drooped sensually and the colour seemed to darken.
‘How are you entertaining yourselves?’ he asked, his tone at variance with the messages his eyes were sending. ‘I find I am growing blasé about flying fish and whales.’
‘I still have needlework,’ Averil said. ‘There is all the table linen for my trousseau. The light on deck is so good it makes doing white-work monograms very easy.’
‘I intend to carry on reading,’ Dita said. ‘Novels,’ she added, daring him to comment.
‘Sensation novels?’ Alistair enquired, ignoring her challenging look.
‘Of course. I packed the most lurid novels I could find and I am devouring them shamelessly. I have an ambition to write one and I am reviewing plots to see what has not been covered. Perhaps I shall become an eccentric spinster novelist.’
‘How about a story set on a pirate ship?’ Alistair suggested, his expression so bland she could not tell if he was teasing her or not.
‘Oh, yes, what a wonderful idea, and quite fresh, I think.’ Dita cast round their little group for inspiration. ‘My heroine—who will look just like Miss Heydon—has been carried on board by the villain—a tall, dark, dastardly character with a scar on his cheek—’ Alistair raised one eyebrow, which she ignored ‘—who has chained the hero in the foul bilges.’
‘How is she going to escape his evil intent?’ Averil asked, missing this byplay.
‘The hero escapes, but, single-handed, even he cannot overpower the villain,’ Dita said, improvising wildly. ‘So he must haunt the ship, stepping in only to save her at critical moments.
‘There will be storms, sea monsters, desert islands, the villain’s lascivious attempts upon the fair heroine’s virtue.’