Redeeming the Reclusive Earl - Virginia Heath Page 0,18
France to accommodate two of every species which walked the Earth now!
The congregation hadn’t appreciated her comment, either, and she’d been treated as more of a pariah than usual in the four weeks since which had made her feel significantly lonelier than she usually did.
A moment before Smithson opened the door and exposed her to the caller, she darted into the drawing room, too. Yet another thing which seemed to surprise Lord Rivenhall, who had taken himself to the French doors to stare out at the garden.
‘Do you mind if I hide in here with you for a minute or two?’
He looked decidedly uncomfortable with the request. ‘Do I have a choice?’
‘Not really. At least not till they’ve gone.’ She smiled to soften the blow. ‘Besides, it probably will not do your standing any favours to be seen consorting with me, so it’s for the best.’
‘Why should I not be seen consorting with you?’
‘Because—and I doubt this will come as a piece of mind-shattering news, Lord Rivenhall—I am a trifle odd.’
‘A little eccentric, perhaps...’
It was very decent of him to try to defend her and she found herself smiling at him and meaning it completely. ‘Eccentric is wearing breeches and digging holes in the ground, Lord Rivenhall. Odd is when you have a brain which retains every piece of information it happens to come across.’
‘Every piece?’ He wasn’t convinced, although to be fair to him, why should he be? Effie had never even read about another person like her. ‘It is impossible to remember everything Miss Nithercott.’
‘What proof would you like?’ It was probably for the best she get it over and done with. ‘Should I recite every monarch from Alfred the Great to King George? I could do it forward and backwards and give you the dates of their reigns. Or Ge Hong’s exact and original ingredients for gunpowder from fourth-century China? It’s sulphur, charcoal and saltpetre, in case you were wondering. Although rather interestingly, they tended to retrieve the saltpetre from decayed manure rather than mine it back in those days. I’ve always pondered how he discovered that. What exactly was Ge Hong doing with dung that made him wonder if it might explode? Unless it was a complete accident as so often scientific discovery is?’ His square jaw was hanging slack. ‘Which neatly leads me to the real crux of my oddness, in that my mind constantly asks questions or speculates and at such speed they often fly out of my mouth before I’ve given any thought at all as to whether or not it is appropriate to say them. Which inevitably means I either inadvertently offend people or terrify them. And as much as I don’t mean to alienate them, I completely understand why I do. It is hardly normal for a person to know all of the bizarre and convoluted things that I do.’
‘But not particularly unusual when the person’s father is a don at Cambridge who specialises in translating Anglo-Saxon texts.’ He had remembered and appeared charmingly smug that he did. ‘Hardly a surprise, then, that you have an extensive grasp of history, Miss Nithercott.’
‘Was a don. He died four years ago.’
‘Oh...’ She could see that brought him up short. ‘I am sorry.’ He stared down at his feet awkwardly for a moment and she felt bad for directing their conversation on to a morbid path when she had been rather enjoying it.
‘I am afraid my oddity is not confined to just history. I remember everything. Test me. If I’ve read it, it’s in here.’ She tapped her forehead.
‘Shakespeare’s sonnet number one hundred and sixteen.’
‘“Let me not to the marriage of true minds / Admit impediments. Love is not love / Which alters when it alteration finds...” I’ve always had a soft spot for that one.’ The single dark eyebrow she could clearly see raised, impressed. ‘Is it your favourite?’
‘It used to be. How many miles is it to cross the Channel?’
‘At its narrowest point, just twenty-one. But if one is travelling the normal route between Dover and Calais and in need of a harbour it’s twenty-eight. Although that is as the crow flies. If I were