Page 9 of A Duchess for his Family

Sophia made the mistake of looking interested, which encouraged the man considerably.

“A poor turnip,” he continued, “reveals poor soil, poor management and very likely, poor morals somewhere among the tenants.”

“Poor morals?” She lifted an eyebrow.

“In agriculture, everything is connected.”

Sophia’s lips trembled. She lowered her gaze at once, for laughter would have been unking, and Mr. Wilcox was not unkind himself. He was merely devoted to turnips with a tenderness most gentlemen reserved for horses, politics or the memory of their first love.

Lady Briarwood’s ballroom glittered around them with determined magnificence. As always, her sisters drew attention enough for the family. Emma, serene and lovely in soft blue, spoke with a gentleness that made everyone near her wish to be gentler too. Frances, in rose silk despite Andrew’s earlier diplomatic error, had already made three gentlemen laugh, and one dowager look scandalized. Their husbands stood nearby with the easy consequence of men quite accustomed to being noticed.

After dancing with Mr. Wilcox, Sophia retreated. She had just begun to hope she might pass a quarter hour in peace when three young ladies drifted toward her with the graceful inevitability of swans approaching bread.

“Why, Miss Norton,” Miss Clarissa Vane, the boldest and prettiest of them, greeted her with a smile as polished as glass. “How unexpected to find you without a book in your hand.”

Sophia’s fingers tightened upon her fan. “Good evening, Miss Vane.”

Miss Eliza Hartwell gave a soft laugh. “Perhaps she has concealed one in her reticule. One must always be prepared for emergency reading.”

“How clever,” the third mused, a young lady by the name of Miss Penrose, who was not clever herself but admired the quality when it could be used unkindly.

Sophia smiled because propriety demanded a lady do something with her mouth even when silence would have served better. “I left my book at home.”

“How brave of you,” Miss Vane replied. “I should have thought a ballroom rather alarming without one.”

The words were light. Pleasant, even, to any ear not trained by years of being gently reduced. Sophia heard such tones often enough. They never sounded cruel from a distance. That was their art.

“I manage tolerably,” she told them.

“Do you?” Miss Hartwell glanced toward the dancers. “You are very quiet this evening.”

“She is always quiet,” Miss Penrose observed.

“Yes, but at a ball, quietness is almost a declaration,” Miss Vane pointed out. “One might think Miss Norton disapproved of merriment.”

“I do not disapprove of it,” Sophia replied. “I merely prefer not to compete with it.”

Miss Vane’s brows lifted, and Sophia knew at once that she ought not to have spoken so nearly like herself.

“How droll,” Miss Hartwell grinned. “You see, Clarissa? Books do make one witty, though perhaps not very sociable.”

Heat rose in Sophia’s cheeks. She looked beyond them, across the shifting colors of the ballroom, and saw Frances standing near the refreshment table. Her sister’s head was turned toward Andrew, but Sophia knew Frances too well to trust in her distraction. Frances could detect an insult from three rooms away if it approached someone she loved.

Please do not look this way, Sophia thought.

If Frances noticed, there would be no quiet escape. There would be defense, sharpness, attention. And attention, even kindly meant, was the very thing Sophia most wished to avoid.

Miss Vane leaned a little closer. “I suppose it must be peaceful, being so devoted to novels. One need not be disappointed by real gentlemen if one has invented ones.”

“My dear Clarissa,” Miss Hartwell added, “that is perhaps why Miss Norton remains unmarried. No ordinary man can compare with a hero in a book.”

The three laughed softly. Sophia’s fan opened and closed once in her hand. She could not think of any answer that would not expose the hurt beneath it. It was not merely that they had spoken of books. She loved books and would not be ashamed of them. It was the other part, the unmarried part, the overlooked part, the part already whispered by anxious relations and well-meaning matrons until it had become a small stone she carried inside her.

“There are many worse fates than remaining unmarried,” Sophia told them.

“Oh, indeed,” Miss Vane replied. “But one hopes not to prove it by experiment.”

Miss Penrose hid her smile behind her fan. Sophia shifted as if to move away, but Miss Hartwell stepped delicately into the path she might have taken.