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“Oh,” I said. “But—”
The count raised his hand. “Don’t be anxious, child. The traitor has no idea that Rakoczy and his men are keeping watch on everything you do. Alastair sees himself committing the perfect murder: the corpses will dissolve into thin air the next moment. Very useful.” He laughed. “With me, of course, that would not work, so he destines me for a different kind of death.”
Well, great.
Before I could digest the news that we were fair game to be thrown to the wolves, which changed my attitude to balls in general and this one in particular, the garishly dressed First Secretary—I’d forgotten his name again—returned with two glasses of white wine. In his wake came another old acquaintance, fat Lord Brompton. He was delighted to see us and kissed my hand more often than I thought quite proper.
“The evening is saved!” he cried. “I’m so glad you are here. Lady Brompton and Lady Lavinia saw you as well, but they were held up on the dance floor.” He laughed so much that his fat paunch wobbled. “I’m told to take you both over to join the dancing.”
“A good idea,” said the count. “Young people should dance! I never missed an opportunity to do so in my own youth.”
So here we went. Now everyone was going to see that I had two left feet and wasn’t very good at turning right, a problem that Giordano had described as “a striking lack of any sense of direction.” I was about to drain my glass of white wine, but Gideon took it away from me and handed it to the First Secretary.
On the dance floor, they were getting into position for the next minuet. Lady Brompton waved to us enthusiastically, Lord Brompton disappeared into the crowd, and just before the music began, Gideon stationed me in the row of ladies. To be precise, I was in between a pale gold dress and a green embroidered one. The green dress, a sideways glance told me, belonged to Lady Lavinia. She was just as beautiful as I remembered her, and even for the fashions of this period, her décolletage was generous, giving anyone who wanted a good look. In her place, I wouldn’t have ventured to bend over. But Lady Lavinia didn’t seem bothered.
“How wonderful to see you again!” She cast a radiant smile all around, but directed it mainly at Gideon, and then sank into the opening curtsey. I imitated her. In sudden panic, I found that I couldn’t feel my feet.
A number of instructions were buzzing around in my head, and I almost muttered out loud, “Left is the side where your thumb is on the right!” but then Gideon stepped past me, performing the tour de main, and oddly enough, my legs seemed to find the right rhythm of their own accord.
The cheerful sound of the orchestra filled every corner of the ballroom, and the conversations around us died down.
Gideon put his left hand on his hip and gave me his right hand. “Wonderful music, these Haydn minuets,” he said in a conversational tone. “Did you know that the composer almost joined the Guardians? In about ten years from now, on one of his visits to England. He was thinking of settling permanently here in London at the time.”
“You don’t say.” I danced past him, tilting my head slightly to one side so as not to lose sight of him. “All I knew about Haydn until now was that he liked torturing children.” At least, he’d tortured me as a child when Charlotte used to practice her piano sonatas with the same grim determination that she was now putting into searching for the chronograph.
But I couldn’t explain that to Gideon further, because by now we had danced out of a figure of four into a large circle, and I had to concentrate on going around to the right.
Just how it happened I didn’t know, but all of a sudden, I was really enjoying myself. The candles cast a beautiful light on the magnificent ball dresses, the music no longer sounded boring and dry as dust but exactly right, and the dancers in front of me, behind me, and beside me were laughing happily. Even the wigs didn’t look quite so silly, and for a moment, I felt light as air and free. When the circle broke up, I danced toward Gideon as if I’d never done anything else in my life, and he was looking at me as if we were suddenly alone in the ballroom.
In my curious mood of elation I couldn’t help smiling at him radiantly, never mind Giordano’s stern warning never to show my teeth in the eighteenth century. For some reason or other, my smile seemed to be making Gideon struggle to stay calm and composed. He took my outstretched hand, but instead of just placing his fingers lightly under mine, he took them and held them hard.
“Gwyneth, I’m not going to let anyone—”
But I never found out what he wasn’t going to let anyone do, because at that moment Lady Lavinia reached for his hand, placing mine in the hand of her own dancing partner, and saying with a smile, “Let’s change partners for a little while, all right?”
No, it was not all right from my point of view, and Gideon, too, hesitated briefly. But then he bowed to Lady Lavinia and abandoned me like the unimportant little sister I was supposed to be. My cheerful mood disappeared as quickly as it had come.
“I have been admiring you from afar,” said my new partner, as I came up out of my curtsey and offered him my hand. I’d have liked to wrench it right away again, because his fingers were damp and sticky. “My friend Mr. Merchant has already had the pleasure of meeting you at Lady Brompton’s soirée. He wanted to introduce us, but now I can introduce myself. I am Lord Fleet. The Lord Fleet.”
I smiled politely. A friend of Mr. Merchant the bosom groper, was he? As the next sequence of dance steps took us away from each other, and I was hoping that the Lord Fleet would take the chance to wipe his damp hands on his evening breeches, I glanced at Gideon for help. But he seemed to be deep in contemplation of Lady Lavinia. The man beside him, too, seemed to have eyes for nothing but her, or rather her plunging neckline, while he studiously ignored the lady he was supposed to be dancing with. And the man beside him—oh, my God! It was James! My James. I’d found him at last! He was dancing with a girl in a dress the color of plum jam, and he looked as alive as anyone can if he’s wearing a white wig and has white powder on his face.
Instead of giving my hand back to Lord Fleet, I danced past Lady Lavinia and Gideon in the direction of James, saying as nicely as I could, “Please would you all move one place up?” and taking no notice of the protests. Two more changeover steps, and I was facing James.
“Excuse me, please move one place up.” I gave the plum-jam girl a little nudge that sent her straight into the arms of the man opposite her, and then I offered the astonished James my hand and tried, breathlessly, to fall back into the rhythm of the dance. A glance to the left showed me that the other dancers were also rearranging their positions, and then dancing on as if nothing had happened. I didn’t look at Gideon, for safety’s sake, but stared at James. It was hard to believe that I could hold his hand and the hand felt warm and alive!
“You have upset the whole set,” he said reproachfully, examining me from head to toe. “And you pushed Miss Amelia away from me in an extremely uncivil manner.”
Oh, yes, this was James! The same supercilious tone of voice that I knew so well. I beamed at him. “I’m really sorry, James, but I just have to talk to you about something very important.”
“As far as I am aware, we have not been introduced,” said James, nose in the air, while he stepped gracefully from foot to foot.
“I’m Penelope Gray from … from the country. But that doesn’t matter. I have some information that will be very, very important for you, so you must meet me somewhere—it’s urgent. If you value your life,” I added for extra dramatic effect.
“What in the world are you thinking of?” James looked at me, baffled. “Whether you are from the country or not, your behavior is most improper.”
“Yes, I know.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that the line of dancers was being disturbed again, this time on the men’s side. Something sea green was approaching, keeping in time with the dance steps. “But all the same, it’s important for you to listen to me. This is a matter of life and … I mean, it’s about … about your horse. Hector, the gray. You absolutely must meet me in Hyde Park tomorrow morning at eleven. On the bridge over the lake.” I could only hope that the lake and the bridge were both there in the eighteenth century.
“You want me to meet you? In Hyde Park? Because of Hector?” James’s raised eyebrows almost touched his hairline.
