ChapterFive
Even though he felt as though he’d lost a few hands in the game he and Miss Narayan were playing, thanks to his mother’s wily teasing, Francis was still confident that he would win in the end. He’d actually enjoyed being the butt of his mother and Miss Narayan’s sharp teasing. It had kept him on his toes and provided further proof that his future life with Miss Narayan as his wife would mean there would never be a dull moment in his world.
But when he’d subtly hinted at his endgame by making his intentions to court her somewhat clear, Miss Narayan had panicked. Actually panicked. It was as far from the reaction Francis had expected as chalk was to cheese. Nearly all of the other women he’d known in his life would have fallen all over themselves with giddiness at the prospect of being courted by an earl, but not Miss Narayan.
To complicate matters even further, the address she gave his driver as the location of her next call was as far from where he would have expected an intelligent young foreign woman to go as could be.
“Are you quite certain you are needed in Poplar?” Francis asked as he climbed into the carriage behind her and sat in the seat facing her.
“Do you doubt my word, my lord?” Miss Narayan asked with a look of incredulity.
There was something feigned about her expression, though. Francis could have sworn she was being contrary as a way of putting him off from making any further inquiries. He wasn’t about to have that.
“Yes,” he said with a shrug of feigned casualness. “I do doubt your word. A lady of good repute has no need to travel in the sort of circles that exist in Poplar.”
Miss Narayan tensed. Francis could practically see the calculations forming in her mind as she hugged herself. She was looking for a way out of the corner she’d painted herself into. Francis rather liked the way she thought things through.
“If you must know,” she said after several long moments of silence, “I have made arrangements to undertake some charity work at one of the orphanages in Poplar. It is…it is a part of my studies.”
She was lying through her teeth, even if she did square her shoulders and tilt her chin up and commit fully to the lie.
Francis grinned at her. The game between them was most definitely still being played. He needed to make another move that would throw Miss Narayan off-balance.
“And what are you studying precisely?” he asked. “To what purpose do you plan to put your newfound education?”
As he asked the question, he stretched his legs just enough to bump one of Miss Narayan’s feet under the hem of her skirt.
Whether she noticed the blatantly flirtatious gesture or not, Miss Narayan did not pull her foot away.
“Not that I have any need to tell you,” she said with the same sort of imperious air his mother put on when she was trying to make a point without truly having the moral ground to stand on, “but I am studying History and Literature with the intent of educating women in my homeland about the scourge of empires.”
Francis had a difficult time hiding his smile. “You are against the British Empire and all that it stands for?”
“I am most certainly,” she said, nodding definitively to prove her point.
“Even though we have brought peace and prosperity to your kingdoms?” he asked. He was poking at a hornet’s nest, he knew, but the thrill of seeing Miss Narayan indignant was too much to resist.
Sure enough, her eyes widened in defensiveness. “Who is to say that the kingdoms of Hindustan would not have advanced on their own, in their own time, without the condescending intervention of an empire that sees us as children to be exploited?”
“The fact that there were no advances when the British arrived there?” Francis argued. “Correct me if I am wrong, but the Indian subcontinent was rife with warfare between small, backward kingdoms before the British conquered you all.” Miss Narayan leaned forward slightly and opened her mouth, but Francis rode over her with, “And I also believe that we have established more than a few schools, hospitals, and other public conveniences that have greatly improved the lives of the people, have we not?”
Miss Narayan snapped her mouth shut and glared at him for a moment. “Social and institutional advances should not come at the expense of discounting the cultural and religious sovereignty of a people,” she said. “As useful as British ingenuity has been for the improvement of conditions in Hindustan, British arrogance and your silly insistence on divine superiority have made more enemies than friends. As I believe you discovered in eighteen fifty-seven.” She arched an eyebrow at the end of her statement.
Francis frowned. The Sepoy Rebellion had happened before he was born, but the memory of that tragedy loomed large in the British consciousness when it came to relations with the colonies. Mistakes had been made, sure enough, but he had never been convinced they were worth the loss of life.
Of course, now, sitting across from Miss Narayan, he was tempted to see things from the other side. How would he have felt if foreigners had invaded his country to exploit the people and resources it possessed?
It was too uncomfortable to think about, so he cleared his throat, shifted on his seat, and asked, “So you plan to return to Koch Bihar to be a teacher?”
For some reason, that question made Miss Narayan blanche and turn to the side to glance out the window. “That will not be possible,” she said, playing with the strings of the reticule hanging out of the pocket of her coat. “Other expectations have already been placed on my shoulders.”
“Then why bother to go through all the trouble of traveling to a foreign land to attend university?” Francis asked. The incessant questions were intended to be a part of his game, but he found himself genuinely interested in the matter.
She glanced back to him with a look of such hopeless longing that Francis’s throat tightened. “I wish to learn, Lord Cathraiche,” she said, her tone implying such things were not possible for her in India. “I wish to understand the world I live in so that I might improve it. But for too many, an educated woman is like an albino peacock—she is an exotic and unusual conversation piece to bring out at parties to impress one’s guests.”
Francis’s heart squeezed. Without ever having met the man, he instantly despised Miss Narayan’s father. If the entire purpose of exposing his daughter to the world was simply to take her back and keep her in a gilded cage to entertain his guests, then he was the worst sort of man imaginable.
“I find your intelligence delightful, Miss Narayan,” he said in a soft voice. “If you belonged to me, I would encourage you to pursue whatever endeavors your education had prepared you for. Such beauty and intelligence should not be confined to a parlor or a ballroom. It should be given free rein to go out into the world and do some real good to change things.”
The look in Miss Narayan’s eyes when she glanced up at him could have broken his heart. More than ever before, Francis could tell that he had pierced her prickly armor and touched her. He could see that she was drawn to him, that the views he’d just expressed appealed to her. But something was holding her back. Whether it was a wall of her own making or some sort of cage her father had put her in, she didn’t believe the divide between them could be crossed.
The carriage drew to a stop before either of them could say anything more. The jolting movement seemed to shake Miss Narayan out of whatever thoughts and feelings she’d fallen into. She glanced out the window at the rough and dirty street, then moved quickly toward the carriage door.
“Thank you, Lord Cathraiche,” she said, opening the door and hopping out of the carriage before Francis could stop her. “I no longer require your assistance.”
“I think you do,” Francis said, scrambling to climb out of the carriage as well.
“I truly do not,” she said, taking a few quick steps away from the carriage.