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‘Thank you, Miss Tatton.’
A carriage rolled slowly past, setting Dog to barking. ‘That is smart for this street,’ Rose observed. ‘I wonder where they are going.’
‘Shortcut to the Botanical Gardens, perhaps. Although considering that was a wagon park while we were mustering, it is probably still more of a ploughed field than a garden.’ Adam got Dog to heel and offered Rose his arm. ‘Tell me who I am likely to meet this evening.’
*
‘I warned Adam that Mrs Grace numbers the worst gossips in Brussels amongst her friends,’ Rose remarked as she sat on the chaise in her mother’s bedroom and watched her maid fasten a dashing little spray of plumes in her hair. ‘I told him he must flirt and charm them all, even the worst dragon, and he gave me that look that Papa gives you when he doesn’t want to make afternoon calls.’
‘A trifle to the left, Annette. Yes, it cannot be anything but an ordeal for a man under the eye of that collection of harpies, I am certain. But the two of you have behaved perfectly at church and at last night’s soirée and I have been dropping hints about how charmed I am by the major. He only has to hold his nerve and he’ll brush through in style.’
‘I expect he would prefer to be facing a French cavalry charge, Mama. There’s the knocker. I’ll go down and see if I can soothe both our menfolk.’
Adam had the look of a wolf that had been forced to wear a jewelled collar and pretend to be a lapdog. The French cavalry would be shaking in their boots if he looked at them like that, Rose thought as she joined the men in the drawing room.
‘You both look very handsome,’ she said as Adam snapped to attention and bowed. ‘Don’t worry, it will all be over by midnight.’
‘They said that about Quatre Bras,’ he rejoined gloomily.
‘Have a brandy, Flint.’ The earl produced the decanter. ‘You’ll need it.’
*
It was every bit as bad as Rose expected. Since the soirée the gossip mills had been turning, grinding out their speculation and half-truths. Their hostess inspected Adam with blatant curiosity. ‘You’re related to Colonel Lord Randall?’
‘My half-brother, ma’am.’
‘He recognises you, does he?’
‘We recognise each other, ma’am. Fortunately we resemble each other closely, so we rarely get confused and recognise someone else by mistake.’ Adam said it so earnestly that for a moment Rose was persuaded he really had misunderstood Mrs Grace’s question.
‘They are a devoted family,’ she interjected, administering a sharp kick to his ankle. ‘And there is Lady Sarah Latymor as well. Major Flint is so very fond of his sister. We were all together in church on Sunday.’
‘That flighty little miss,’ Mrs Grace began.
‘Ma’am?’ Adam, without moving a muscle, had that wolf look on his face again.
Mrs Grace took a step back. ‘Mr Grace, won’t you take our guests through to the drawing room?’
Her husband, an anxious host at the best of times, ushered them through while making disjointed small talk. ‘Such lovely weather… Our gallant troops… News from the Duke at Peronne… My wife is most put out at not being able to procure a good turtle for soup, but of course, with the late trouble…’
There were already about half of the party of twenty assembled. Rose was conscious of sharp, assessing looks behind the smiles of welcome. One palely elegant lady, a few years Rose’s senior, drifted across. ‘My dear Miss Tatton, such a surprise to see you!’
‘Indeed, Lady Fitzhugh? Why is that?’
‘After you vanished at the Duchess’s ball, one did wonder…’ Her voice trailed off suggestively.
‘If I was indisposed?’ Rose smiled back with great warmth. ‘Yes, a touch of the influenza. How kind of you to be concerned.’ Out of the corner of her eyes she could see Adam looking vaguely bored.
‘Oh, was that all it was? I thought you must have run off with a gallant solider,’ Lady Fitzhugh rejoined with a trill of laughter. ‘You were so close to the unfortunate Lieutenant Haslam, were you not?’
‘Would have been very bad tactics on his part,’ Adam remarked so unexpectedly that both women started. ‘Eloping into a battle, that is. No soldier is going to do that. You need a clear field before taking off, no pursuing fathers and certainly no charging cavalry. Ladies expect a certain romance about the thing, wouldn’t you say?’ He raised an eyebrow at Lady Fitzhugh, smiled his wicked, slow smile. ‘A certain…finesse.’ The drawl and the innuendo brought the hairs up on the back of Rose’s neck and, from the other woman’s widened eyes and fluttering fan, they had their effect on her also.
‘My goodness, Major. Do you have much experience…of that sort of thing?’
‘Elopements? None at all, ma’am. But my strategy is excellent.’
‘I should have introduced you at once, do forgive me,’ Rose said in haste before Lady Fitzhugh’s smouldering gaze ignited Adam’s hair. ‘Lady Fitzhugh, may I present Major Flint of the artillery?’
