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“Why of course! You know I do not take such things too seriously. The more there are, the more jolly a crowd.” Amiable as always, the woman curtsied. “You are most welcome.”
“’Tis an honor, Mrs. Pitman.” Philo flowed with charm.
Hannah fought the urge to laugh openly at his charade and nearly choked when he pinned his eyes on her. “Hannah, how lovely you are. ’Tis a joy to see you, my dear.”
Like a bird in a trap, there was nothing she could do but offer the kind of grace that was expected of a woman in such a place at such a time. “You are too kind.” Surely he caught the hurt that flung out with her words.
Philo straightened and twisted toward the dance floor. “Stockton was good enough to invite me, and I must say I was eager to attend. I see my daughter but little these days, and I crave any chance to be with her.”
Lies. Hannah shielded herself against their penetrating hurt, but the girlish yearning for fatherly love leapt out, as always. And as always, the barbs of truth cut. He didn’t care for her, no matter how she craved it.
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“Think nothing of it.” Dottie moved forward, stopping just beside him. “I adore your daughter and see why you would wish to be near her. Now if you will excuse me, I should like to see about the musicians. They should have begun to play by now.”
“I shall go with you.” Hannah hurried forward, unwittingly brushing shoulders with her father as she passed him. Though she didn’t look, she could feel his stare and wished she could shove it away with a glare of her own, but she resisted. Taking the woman’s arm, Hannah exuded more geniality than she felt. “I should be most pleased if you would introduce me to the players.”
The comment widened the woman’s eyes, and she seemed almost exuberant at the simple request. “Certainly, my dear. You know, I first heard these musicians while I was…”
Dottie kept on, but Hannah’s hearing faded to low throbbing sounds. The clomp of her shoes on the floor seemed almost louder than the din of voices clamoring through the room. Her father? Here?
It could not be borne.
Why had he come? Why had Stockton invited him? She thinned her lips to keep from scowling. There was more than simple fatherly sentiment that lurked in his self-serving will. This had to do with Eaton Hill, no doubt. And his hatred of Joseph. A revolt began in her belly, and she grit her teeth to keep the sensation at bay.
Dottie looked her way with peaked brows, obviously having asked a question Hannah hadn’t heard. She nodded, hoping the response was requisite, and when it seemed so, she braved a glance behind her. The three men conversed, her father with his back to her.
If she could avoid him all evening, and by some divine intervention Stockton as well, she could perhaps endure the night and make it to the heartache that awaited her at Eaton Hill.
* * *
Philo watched her go, fleeing from him as if he were a leviathan and she an innocent seraph. Of course she would see him thus, and it stabbed in a way that a cold blade could not. Despite what she believed, the deepest yearning of his spirit was not so self-seeking. Not entirely.
Ever since seeing Hannah those few days past, a ticking had begun within him, the slightest shift he could feel but not distinguish. If only she knew how truly he cared. She had grown—changed so much. Though in other ways she’d not changed at all. Even ten years later she was still willing to succumb to a man such as Joseph Wythe.
Staring across the ballroom floor, the hatred he’d nurtured for the man who’d ruined his daughter, the devil who’d cheated her life away from her, loomed like a haunting apparition. Joseph and Ensign had prepared this scheme together for some time, that was clear. Hannah didn’t know herself—she couldn’t make decisions for her future. Joseph didn’t deserve Eaton Hill, and he didn’t deserve Hannah.
Philo alone must own the land that was meant for him from the beginning. Ensign’s pretended benevolence be hanged.
“Reverend Young, allow me to offer my condolences.”
Philo twisted back, questioning the tall soldier in front of him. “I’m sorry?”
“Forgive me. I am Captain Higley.” He nodded forward. “I refer to your brother. I grieve for your loss.”
Who was this man, and how did he know of Ensign’s supposed death? As if a stranger would care. For all he knew this was the very man who’d tried to kill Ensign. Philo lifted his chin to tip away the sarcastic thread. “I thank you for your kindness. He shall be most sincerely missed.”
Ensign had been so close to heaven’s gate last evening. Was he already there? Perhaps he had been denied entrance for his treatment of Philo these past years. Such wouldn’t surprise him.
Though the moment the thought found the center of his mind, a niggling discomfited his belly. If anyone was to get to heaven, ’twould be Ensign. Somehow he could hear his brother’s voice behind him, reprimanding Philo’s stiff-necked ways. He should tell Hannah that Ensign had been living…in fact, that he might in this moment still be breathing. Philo shook his head. Surely he wasn’t. If he was, Philo’s purpose would be thwarted, and he’d come too far to turn back now.
He glanced over his shoulder, spying Hannah as she kept her back to him, speaking with a gathering of musicians and several other women keen on garnering attention with their flapping fans.
If nothing else, this evening he would harness the future for himself and his daughter, as he should have done long ago. She would not be pleased with the outcome. But ’twas for the best. And that was all that mattered.
Chapter Thirty-One
Joseph tugged on his waistcoat and then his jacket and bound up the front steps, his nerves tumbling like a rowdy bunch of schoolboys. The agony in waiting until dinner had long past made him almost writhe, but he’d endured, and at last he could make his appearance.
