Her eyes widened and she leaned in, as though ready to impart a grave secret. "In A Patient Heart, the heroine is married to a dark baron, very much against her will. But he isn't really dark at all!" She clasped tiny fingers. "That is simply how the townsfolk have painted him. And, of course, he's been much affected by the loss of his wife owing to a plague. And the loss of his left eye." She sighed, falling back against the squabs. "But after the heroine, Eloisia, catches a fever fleeing from him during a storm, he nurses her back to health and they experience the most profound and perfect joining of souls."
Now she sat forward again, wide blue eyes boring into him, unblinking. "Do you not wish to experience the very same thing, Mister Field?"
"What's that now?" His primary wish most days had been to experience a good bit of flirtation while strolling the Mall, and a sound win against Henry Parsons at cards.
Miss Blake raised her joined hands, raised both index fingers, and pressed them together, eyes half closed. Breathless, she repeated, "A perfect joining of two souls."
"Oh." Patrick removed his hat and briefly massaged a confused tension in his brow. "Naturally."
She leaned in, full lips drawn into a serious frown. "I have very refined sensibilities."
There was no daring a word; ribs creaking, he raised a brow in answer.
"I was educated in France," she remarked offhand, as if there could be no doubt.
"That is…" Irrelevant? Perhaps 'unfortunate'? "Agreeable," he offered instead.
At last, silence filled the small space between them, though by her hmming and sighing, he wagered the change was satisfactory only to one of them. Then she gasped, and Patrick braced. "I have a thought! A scheme that might aid us both."
He doubted any of her schemes were rooted in enough of the here-and-now to be of use to anyone, but amused and fighting boredom, he held his tongue to hear her out.
"It occurs to me, based on my extensive reading, that an unmarried lady really ought not be unescorted in the wild. Highwaymen and overzealous tinkers abound, and her virtue is every moment under assault."
Near as he could see, 'unpredictable' described her to a tee. He began to put some stock into her story about adventuring, and based on her wide-eyed breathlessness over it, began to feel nervous being alone with her.
"And you've mentioned your need for coin," she added frankly.
Very nervous.
"For an hour more on the road, we could reach Gretna Green."
"So we could, though I don't follow." At least, he hoped he didn't follow. The Scottish village, notorious for satisfying elopements, evoked a certain image among British subjects north and south.