With perfect propriety, Nat Meade returned Lily to her side after the first dance, although she was almost immediately snatched up again by another young man.Tabitha took her place among the dowagers and chaperones, although a court did develop around her.She still managed to keep her eye on Lily, however, and this time the girl didn’t come immediately back to her side.Instead, she let her partner give her a glass of lemonade and strolled with him until the next dance started up, and Barty claimed her.
Tabitha relaxed and rejoined her court, which did not, she was glad to notice, include Carily, who hadn’t bothered her at all since the night he had almost dragged her into his bedchamber.A few asked her to dance, but she insisted she was merely chaperoning.The duke, who had wandered over during the third dance, overheard her and did not ask.Keeping determinedly to her own rules, she offered him no encouragement, no opportunity for a private word.
Barty brought Lily back to her side, where the girl happily consumed the rest of her lemonade, her eyes sparkling, her manner animated and happy.Tabitha ached for her innocence and wished it could last forever.
“May I ask Miss Lily to dance?”Durward asked Tabitha, so she knew he would behave.
As they went off, Barty slid into Lily’s vacant seat.Glancing at him, it came to her that he looked happier than he had for a couple of days.
“You’re looking rather pleased with yourself,” she said lightly.
He grinned.“Actually, I am.I enjoy a good caper.Besides, I’ve just had a talk with Carily.”
“Oh.”
“He’s not such a bad fellow, you know.He beat me soundly at cards the other night and I’m afraid I ended up owing him rather more than I can comfortably pay.I went to pay what I could and grovel for permission to pay the rest next quarter day.And do you know what he did?He tore up my other vowel and said I’d written out a duplicate by mistake and my debt was paid.I argued, of course, but he was adamant.Unexpectedly handsome of him, don’t you think?”
“Yes,” Tabitha said slowly, for Carily never did anything without a reason.Angry with her, he had clearly fleeced her little brother.Why would he forego that money?He had given few hints of a conscience until now.
Barty lowered his voice.“He also said he’d had a talk with the duke and decided he wasn’t a bad fellow after all.Made him think, he said.And said the duke deserved you where he didn’t.I thought that was pretty handsome, too.”
Perhaps it was.Perhaps all he had ever needed was a jolt.Mostly, she wondered what on earth Jack had said to him.It had certainly worked wonders.
As the dance came to a close, Lily stopped to talk to someone—Lord Hazlett, Tabitha saw with some surprise.Surreptitiously, she looked around for Ralph, and to her annoyance saw him stalking toward her.
She turned aside to accept a glass of champagne from one of her admirers, and hoped Ralph would take the hint.He didn’t, merely stood beside her until she was forced to notice him.
“Cousin,” she said civilly.“It is an excellent party, is it not?”
“Clearly,” he snapped.“A word in private if you please.”
Unhurriedly, she set her glass on the table and rose to her feet.“Let us walk, then.”She lowered her voice.“But if you make a scene, Ralph, I shall walk away.”
“Please don’t adopt that self-righteous tone with me.You are supposed to be chaperoning Lily, and she is running wild, dancing with rakehells and nobodies while you flirt with all and sundry.It won’t do, Tabitha.It won’t do at all.”
“It wouldn’t if it were remotely true.She has danced only with young men who are known to me and who asked me for permission first.Lily is a sensible and well-behaved girl who would never leave my sight let alone give me cause—”
“Then where is she?” Ralph interrupted with sudden intensity.
Tabitha glanced to where she had last seen her stepdaughter.“She was speaking to Lord Hazlett...”But she was not there now, nor could Tabitha see her in the throngs circulating before the next dance.
Ridiculous panic surged, no doubt fed by the seriousness of Ralph’s tone.The truth, of course, might lie in the fact that neither was there any sign of Nathaniel Meade.
“I’ll look for her on the terrace,” she said abruptly.“She probably needs cool air after all that dancing.In case she isn’t there, you should inquire—discreetly—of Lord Hazlett, which direction she took.”
Without a further glance at him, she strolled casually to the French windows and out onto the terrace.She was so sure that she would find Lily there with Meade and have to haul the pair of them back into the respectability of the ballroom, that when she found the terrace completely empty, she felt curiously forlorn.
Surely they would not have been foolish enough to go alone into the gardens?The terrace was lit up, but the gardens were not, being rather too secluded for this kind of event.As Tabitha well knew, having walked and kissed with Jack there...
Quickly, she ran down the steps from the terrace and across the wet grass.Lily would owe her a new pair of dancing slippers after this...
Something bumped, like a loose door, away to the left where there was a little summer house and a gardener’s shed.Surely Meade would not have taken her there!
And yet, as she knew from experience, a summer house was an excellent place for an assignation.She turned in that direction, peering into the darkness.A pale light shone, and she quickened her steps.
She reached the summer house door, which was closed.But the light flickered to the left and further back.Something—someone—moved.She was sure she heard breathing.Were they avoiding her by hiding in the gardener’s shed?
This is ridiculous!She marched toward it and found the door wide open.
