Thea's Marquis (15 page)

“You mean we shall be expected to gamble?” cried Meg. “Oh, Penny, I had much rather not waste my pin-money when there are so many more interesting ways to spend it.”

“I shall see that you have enough to play a few hands at silver loo. We need not stay long.”

“Penny, are you well enough to attend all those parties?” Thea asked anxiously.

“I usually feel quite well in the evenings and...and perhaps Jason will go with us. Sometimes, at least. If I am not well, I shall send my excuses. I daresay I should not dance.”

“Dance!” said Meg in a hollow voice. “I have just realized, Thea and I don’t know how
to dance. That is
much
worse than not playing cards.”

“And as easily remedied,” Penny said, “though I hope you will both learn quickly, since Lady Turner’s hop is next week already. I shall hire a dancing master at once. I cannot promise to turn you into performers upon the harp or pianoforte before Lady Lewin’s musicale, however!”

“No, Thea and I never learned, having no instrument, but if we are asked, we could sing one of our duets,” Meg proposed.

“In public?” The very thought made Thea shudder. “Not I. Nor is there any need for me to learn to dance. This is Meg’s come-out, not mine.”

“Will you not?” said Penny, disappointed. “I did so want you as well as Meg to have fun in London, Thea.”

“Of course you must,” Meg insisted. “Pretty and elegant as you are, gentlemen are bound to ask you to dance. You cannot be forever telling them that you are too old, as if you were in your dotage.”

Giving in, Thea agreed to join the lessons. In truth, she would be sorry to have to tell Lord Hazlewood she did not dance—if he should happen to ask her to stand up with him. Satisfied, Penny went off to rest before dinner, and Meg to look through her wardrobe and decide what to wear for the coming parties

The dowager sighed. “It is very kind in Penny to give Meg her Season, and naturally it is what one must desire for a daughter, but I wish I did not have to attend soirées and balls. When I made my own debut, I disliked mingling with crowds of strangers. Indeed, I was glad to marry your father, Thea, just to escape. I hoped that at my age I should not mind any longer, but I still shrink from facing all those people.”

Though Thea was disconcerted to find herself her mother’s confidante as well as Penny’s, she understood all too well the dread of entering a crowded room. It wasn’t fair that after the long, patient years of bringing up her daughters without help. Mama should have to suffer more for their sakes.

“Need you, Mama? I can very well take Meg to parties. You know I do not care to dance.”

“My love, as an unmarried lady you are by no means old enough to chaperon Meg to parties, even if you return to your caps.” The dowager had never quite approved when Penny persuaded Thea to give up that badge of the old maid.

“Penny is married,” Thea pointed out.

“But Penny is only twenty-one.”

“Between the two of us we combine matrimony and sufficient years. You need only go when Penny does not.”

Her mother’s relief was so gratifying that for a moment Thea almost forgot her own qualms.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“I told you so,” Meg hissed as she and Thea waited behind Jason and Penny to reach their hostess. “Lady Turner is only calling it an informal hop because Maria has not been presented yet. It is a proper ball. Are you not glad you are wearing your best gown?” She glanced down complacently at her own dress, of white lace opening over a white sarcenet slip garnished with pink silk roses to match the rosebuds in her hair.

Thea had let Penny persuade her to make a change from her favourite blue. Her gown was yellow, a soft shade deeper than jonquil, less bright than canary. She knew it suited her, but dismay at the crush in the confined entrance hall overwhelmed her pleasure. Bejewelled matrons bemoaned the horrid squeeze; girls in white or pastels whispered and giggled; soberly clad gentlemen begged each other’s pardon as they tried to protect their ladies’ gowns from the crowd.

Fixing her gaze on Penny’s moss green satin, Thea managed another step forward. “Half the ton must be here,” she murmured.

Meg shook her head. “Heavens, no. It is quite a small house, hired for the Season. They have no garden at all. The ballroom is as large as the rest of the house put together, but I cannot imagine where they will put everyone. Maria said they invited two hundred people.”

Two hundred! How was Lord Hazlewood ever to find her among so many? Though he had already requested a dance, she would never be bold enough to seek him out. However, tall as he was, he would be easily found by those hopeful ladies daring enough to pursue him. In fact, she saw him now, as they turned a corner and reached the open doors of the ballroom. He was standing just beyond the group clustered about the receiving line, his fair head bent to listen to his companion.

The crowd parted for a moment and Thea recognized the beautiful Lady Daphne, her hand on the marquis’s arm. Shaken by an emotion she refused to acknowledge, Thea turned her head away. She had no right to be jealous.

Had jealousy been possible, she would have found much cause for suffering it that evening. Lord Hazlewood was too great a matrimonial prize for his long and resolute bachelorhood to deter the ambitious. No sooner had he left one young lady with her chaperon after a dance than he was besieged by prospective partners.

Lady Daphne stood up with him, and Maria Turner, the latter with the advantage of being both his hostess’s daughter and his cousin’s friend’s sister. He waltzed with Mrs. Wilmington, the dashing, voluptuous widow he had snubbed in the Park—how had she coerced him into it? Thea wondered. She did not recognize two other damsels he led onto the floor.

Somehow he found Meg, surrounded by her own admirers, when the time came for the country dance she had promised him. He flashed Thea a smile as he neatly abstracted her sister from the group. She stopped worrying that he would forget her or search for her in vain, and started worrying that she would make a muddle of the newly learned waltz.

In the meantime, she danced a quadrille with Lord Stewart, grateful for his discreet reminders of the complicated figures. Will DeVine, resplendent in crimson velvet, requested a country dance. So did Sir Gideon Turner
,
who confided that he was desperately in love with Miss Megan.

“Ready to blow my brains out,” he assured her solemnly.

“Don’t do that!” she said in alarm, then recalled that his sister had told Meg he was given to impassioned attachments. “Meg may not favour you at present, but I doubt she will be ready to make up her mind before she has enjoyed the splendours of her Season in the spring. Though I am sure nothing could be finer than this ball,” she added hastily.

“Promised Maria I’d do it up well. My only sister, you know, and she’s not a bad chit. For a sister.”

Thea was glad Meg did not favour him. He seemed a singularly brainless young man.

When Thea was not dancing, she stayed with Penny. Jason made a point of introducing his many friends and acquaintances to them. Thea was impressed by Penny’s ability to converse with all and sundry despite never having met them before. She listened carefully, hoping to learn the knack, but decided the first requisite was a self-confidence she did not possess.

She did not understand how Penny could meet strangers with such tranquillity, yet be so unsure of herself when it came to her relationship with Jason. If love was to blame for so much unhappiness, Thea reflected, perhaps she was a widgeon to yearn for love.

“You are thoughtful, Miss Kilmore.”

With a startled gasp she looked up at Roderick. He smiled at her and her heart quivered. Widgeon or no, she wanted more from the marquis than his friendship, precious as that was. Yet he must never guess, for if he came to consider her just another of the females who pursued him, her misery would equal Penny’s.

He held out his hand to her. “It is time for our waltz, ma’am.” As she rose and went with him to take their places, he said softly, “You are a trifle down pin, I think. Is this evening a great trial to you, Thea?”

“I find large numbers of people bewildering,” she admitted.

“Nothing could be more natural after the solitude of the moors.”

But how could she remain down pin or bewildered when his hand was at her waist, her hand in his firm clasp? She gave him a joyful smile as the music started and he guided her into the dance.

“Actually, so large a crowd is easier than a lesser company,” she said to explain her sudden change of spirits, “since no one notices if I am tongue-tied.”

“True. There is scarce space for the ladies to observe each other’s gowns. The Turners’ ball will certainly win the accolade of being described as a shocking squeeze.”

“Accolade? How odd. The other advantage of a ball, I have discovered, is that during a country dance one spends little time with one’s partner. It is only the waltz that is troublesome, for one is expected to do two difficult things at once—converse and mind one’s steps.”

“You seem to be managing remarkably well with both.”

She realized that, swept along by his strong arm, she was indeed whirling about the floor without sparing a thought for her feet. He was a superb dancer, confident and graceful, as she had noticed when watching him earlier. However, his earlier partners had all been too short for him, forcing him to conform to their shorter steps, to bow his head to speak to them. For the first time in her life, Thea felt her height gave her a worthwhile advantage. If only they could waltz forever.

Roderick’s blue eyes lit with rueful amusement. “I should not have spoken, since my words appear to have silenced you.”

“Oh no, I was silently congratulating myself, since to do so aloud would be odiously conceited.”

He laughed. “If there is one adjective I should never think to apply to you, it is
conceited.
Since you are in a mood to be pleased with yourself, let me say that yellow becomes you to admiration.”

“You said that of my lavender dress.”

“Are you accusing me of repeating myself? No punishment can be too dire for a gentleman so unoriginal as to offer the same compliment twice to a lady. The only possible explanation is that the admiration is owed to the wearer, who would grace any colour she chose.”

Pink-cheeked, she retorted, “I see you are determined to
make
me conceited, sir. Pray let us talk of something sensible.”

“By all means. What do you reckon are my chances of winning a wager that Princess Charlotte will be brought to bed of a girl?”

“Precisely one in two. But I said sensible! Have you really made so idiotic a wager?”

“No, but I wager half the gentlemen in this room have. At the clubs, it is quite the thing to bet on flies crawling on the wall, or raindrops running down the window-pane, or whether the next member to enter will wear a blue coat or a brown.”

“And gentlemen are supposed to be the more-intelligent sex! Even Meg is wiser. At the Duchess of Trent’s card party, she refused to play for more than penny points, though Penny was staking her. She said she kept thinking of all the ribbons and romantic novels she might buy with those shillings.”

“Penny points at the Trents’?” The marquis grinned. “I wish I had seen it. And what did you do?”

“I sat and watched the whist players, pretending I wished to learn. Jason warned us that there is often deep play at the Trents’.”

“Your brother was never a gamester, for all his other misdemeanours. Oh Lord, I beg your pardon—I ought not to have said that.”

“I’m glad you did. I had not considered the possibility, but how shocking if he were to gamble away Penny’s fortune.”

“If he had been frequenting the gambling tables, I should have heard of it, no doubt. There is one less thing for you to tease yourself about.”

Thea looked at him uncertainly. He had sounded almost irritated. “You must think me a peagoose to worry so much about my family.”

“Not at all. I only wish...”

But what Lord Hazlewood wished was never voiced, as the music ended and they found themselves beside his cousin and Meg.

“Shall we go in to supper together, coz?” Mr. DeVine suggested. “If you have no objection, Miss Kilmore. I can count on Rod to keep the hordes at bay, you see. I cannot think what possessed me to present my friends to Miss Megan.”

Meg giggled.

“Is it time for supper?” Thea asked. “I should like to go with you, but perhaps Lord Hazlewood has arranged to take someone else in.”

“That waltz was the supper dance, Thea,” said her knowledgeable sister. “You go with your partner to supper.”

So, as usual, Roderick had arranged matters for her comfort. She had felt the tiniest bit hurt that he had not danced with her earlier, but it was so that she would not have to sit through supper with an uncongenial partner, or none. Though she had to be grateful for his chivalrous forethought, she wished wistfully that he did not regard her merely as an object for his compassion.

She took his arm and all four proceeded to the supper-room.

The Turners’ drawing-room and dining-room had been thrown into one for supper. Will had bribed a footman to reserve one of the tables set up in the drawing-room, a tiny table in a corner, barely large enough for four. He ushered Meg to the chair in the corner, telling her laughingly, “So that none of my rivals can approach you.”

Before sitting down, Thea scanned the room. “I want to be sure that Penny has found a place,” she explained to the marquis. “I cannot see her. Can you, sir?”

He turned from holding her chair and glanced around. “No. Would you like me to...Ah, there she is. With Kilmore and the Montmorencys.”

“Thank you.” She smiled at him as she took her seat. She could not regret his compassionate chivalry since it embraced Penny, too, who had real need of it.

There was no room for a buffet, so footmen with trays darted between the tables. Meg exclaimed in delight over lobster patties, truffled chicken
timbales,
chocolate wafers and raspberry ices. Her small appetite was soon satisfied, though, despite her exertions on the dance floor. While the others ate, she studied their fellow guests with a lively interest, commenting on a charming headdress here, an intricately tied cravat there.