He was.White faced and tight-lipped with fury, he could only watch from the corner as everyone surged toward the new claimant.It was rampant curiosity, of course, the scent of scandal and gossip in their nostrils, but to Ralph it must have looked like support for his enemy.
“I am almost sorry for him,” Tabitha murmured.
“So would I be if I wasn’t so sure he had tried to kill Hunter already...”
Hunter was graciously accepting introductions and shaking hands, but through a sudden space in the crowd around him, he suddenly saw Jack.His whole expression changed from calm civility to sparkling pleasure.He advanced through the crowd that parted for him, his hand outstretched.“Your grace, my dear fellow!What a delightful surprise!”
Tabitha took Lily by the elbow and drew her back a step—she did not want Lily associated with either side of the quarrel.
Hunter, however, had concentrated all his attention on Jack, shaking his hand with genuine warmth.
“This man saved my life—literally!”he declaimed to his hosts and the vicar and anyone else within earshot.“If it had not been for his hurrying me away, actually placing himself between me and a bullet, I should have been shot through the heart.”
“That’s not quite how it happened,” Jack protested.
Hunter waved that away.“If I had not recognized you, I wouldn’t have moved to shake your hand.”
“Then it was your own action, sir, not mine, that saved you.”
Of course, Jack’s disclaimer only led people to think all the more of him for his modesty, and he actually flushed under all the admiring gazes, looking more uncomfortable than Tabitha had ever seen him.
Hunter grinned and clapped him on the back in a friendly way, while he repeated the story of his attempted “assassination” to all and sundry.
“I suppose they have not found the shooter?”Jack asked.
“Not yet.I took the advice of the authorities in London and decided to come down to the country to look up my old friend Teague, whom I knew in Canada when he was engaged upon missionary work there...”
“Well,” Lord Durward murmured in Tabitha’s ear, “this should prove a more interesting evening than anyone imagined!A man of parts, our modest little duke.”
“I don’t find him little,” Tabitha said defensively.It should have pleased her, not hurt her.
“Neither do I,” Durward said.“Rejoice, Tabbie, I’m to partner you to dinner.”
As Jack turned to find them again, Tabitha took Durward’s arm, leaving Lily to the duke.Oddly, she caught Lord Hazlett’s disapproving eye, and she was sure his lip curled.
***
DINNER FELT LIKE SOMETHINGof an ordeal.Although Durward was much his usual, entertaining self and, on Tabitha’s other side, Mr.Saunders, the father of Lily’s friend, was an amiable gentleman with twinkling eyes, she felt ridiculously tense, almost brittle.She knew she talked too much and laughed just a little too loudly, as though she was trying to rush through the whole event.
And the ball was still to come.
Tabitha loved to dance, so she had been looking forward to the occasion since leaving Brighton, all the more since Jack had joined the party.Now she had a headache behind her eyes and wanted only to be somewhere else.
Had Lily not been present, she would probably have made her excuses and taken to bed.But she could not spoil her stepdaughter’s first formal ball.Nor admit that she was not a suitable and dutiful chaperone.
And so, after dinner, she helped dress Lily for the ball and was so pleased with the result of her appearance—an angelic beauty in white muslin and net trimmed with rosebuds—that she almost stopped worrying.Quite what her anxiety was—apart from foolish jealousy and indecision over Jack—she did not know.The evening just felt suddenly...ominous.
She hoped Ralph was not about to take another pot shot at Hunter.
The duke, as the highest-ranking guest, opened the ball by dancing with Louisa.And since Lily had promised the first dance to Lieutenant Meade, Tabitha, as the lady of highest rank, was happy to dance with Sir Peter.
They were comfortable enough in each other’s presence for him to mutter, “Such a nightmare!What the devil are we supposed to do about the two Lord Sarks?”
“Avoid introducing either of them to anyone,” Tabitha advised.Ralph, talking to Lord Hazlett, found the time to glare at her in disapproval.Hunter seemed to be making more friends, the centre of a laughing group.“Fortunately for Louisa, neither are at an age where she should feel obliged to find them dancing partners!But I am sorry, sir.I wouldn’t have had this happen for the world.”
“Then you didn’t know he was coming here?”
“Lord, no, and neither did his grace.When we ran into him—at an inn when I was on my way here—he did not call himself Lisle let alone Sark.He had just entered the country, I believe.”They parted in the dance, met again, and turned together.“Don’t look so worried.Louisa’s party will be talked about for years, whoever turns out to be the true Sark!”
