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“Piqued, repiqued and capotted!” Lord Humphrey said, grinning. “Very well played, Miss Whittleton.” And to her surprise, he pulled out a roll of notes and deposited it in her hand.
“Oh no, I was only joking—”
Connie chuckled. “Nonsense! You deserve it, dear, and Humphrey can afford it. He is as rich as a nabob, you know. Come, let us make our farewells and escape while we still may, before Lord Pinner blocks the doors and calls for pistols. Or rapiers. Which is the most fashionable these days, Humphrey?”
“Rapiers are more stylish, but few people have the skill to duel with them. I prefer a more basic approach myself.” And he grinned, bunching his hands into fists.
Connie shuddered. “How abominable you are, Humphrey! You should not speak of such things before ladies. Come now, let us go. Where to next — the rout or the card party?”
“No more cards,” Lady Humphrey said firmly. “Humphrey has caused enough trouble as it is. Besides, I like the Dunmortons. The duchess’s parties are always amusing. One never knows what she will be up to next.”
“The rout it is, then,” Connie said with satisfaction.
~~~~~
Will watched the Marfords’ party leave, but Miss Whittleton did not look his way. The interest had largely gone out of the evening now that she was no longer there to watch him being gentlemanlike. He could skulk in the card room if he wanted, or simply walk around ignoring all the hopeful young ladies who sat despondently beside their mamas. And yet… if he were to meet Miss Whittleton tomorrow and she were to ask him how he spent the rest of the ball, he wanted to be able to say he had done his duty by the ladies, and stood up for every dance. It had become a matter of pride, although he was beginning to realize there was no purpose to it. Miss Whittleton would never accept him as a gentleman. She despised him so thoroughly that nothing he did could ever dislodge her opinion of him.
At least Rosie was a success. Whatever the intention had been, her minuet with the Pinners’ son had established her firmly as the star of the evening, and she was besieged on all sides by hopeful young men vying for her hand, and since those rejected consoled themselves by dancing with Angie, both sisters were happy, and Stepmother was in heaven.
Will found himself approached by the elderly man who had cheered Rosie the loudest. “How d’e do, Fletcher,” he said, a little breathlessly, for he had had the exertion of walking halfway around the room. “Crutchley. Came to see your sister dance. Could watch her for hours. Lovely creature! Look at her now, so graceful. And the minuet — count myself privileged to have seen that. Yours too, naturally. Very prettily done. I was just such a one as you when I was your age. Very light on my feet, as Her Majesty was so gracious as to say once.” He chuckled, a wheezy rumble. “Envy you young ones. My dancing days are over, heh heh heh…” Here he patted his vast stomach. “Still, if I were thirty years younger, or even twenty, I should cut out some of these young sprigs, see if I shouldn’t.”
In this jumble of words, Will picked at the one sentence that jumped out at him. “You came here with the intention of watching Rosie dance? But how did you know she would be here?”
Another wheezy rumble. “Lord, Fletcher, half the young hopefuls in town are paying your footmen for word of the lady’s movements. Must have the richest footmen in Mayfair. They are all here — Somerwell, you see? Very keen, he is. Young Iverson, leading her into the dance now. The Irish fellow, Earl of Kilrannan’s son — Tranter, that is it. He is with the younger sister. And Albury is here, too. Never seen so many people at one of Lady Pinner’s entertainments, for she is not well regarded, in the general way of things. Paltry affairs. No style at all. No, they are all here for Miss Fletcher, bless her. Or her fifty thousand pounds. One or the other. Or both.” He sighed. “Such a lovely face, and as delicate as a dainty little flower. And so modest. That way she has of lowering her eyes, and looking down when a fellow addresses her. Such a shy little creature. Reminds me of my wife. Ah, poor Araminta! Dead these twenty years, poor lady, and not a child in fifteen years of marriage. I have been quite alone all these years, Fletcher, but I still have an eye for a beauty like your sister.”
Will rapidly tired of this never-ending encomium. He had been the recipient of such enthusiasms from the time Rosie had reached the age of fourteen, and much as he understood it, the ramblings grew tedious in short order. But the list of suitors, now that was interesting. And which of them were interested in Rosie herself, and which in her dowry?
Somerwell he knew about, for the man had been so besotted that he had chased all over town to find some way to meet Rosie, before he even knew her name. Iverson was young and gauche and seemed to be in the throes of his first love. Those two he could acquit of fortune hunting. But Tranter… the Irish earls were notoriously impoverished, if rumour was to be believed, so a son might well set himself to win a pretty little creature with fifty thousand pounds. He had not noticed him before, but he would observe him carefully from now on.
As for Albury, was he a suitor? That seemed unlikely, somehow. He had called on Will only because of his connection to Johnny, and had not mentioned Rosie at all. Perhaps before this evening he had not even known of her existence. He had arrived with one of his sisters and another man, presumably the lady’s husband, and was now joining the set presently forming up with an excitable girl with bright red curls.
Will supposed he ought to find a partner, too, but although there were unclaimed young ladies aplenty, and some rather pretty, he knew none of them. As he was looking about him for someone who might introduce him to a partner, his eye was caught by a striking young woman with black hair smiling and waving at him from the other side of the ballroom. This was all the more surprising because he was sure he had never seen her before. As he watched, puzzled, she laughed and gestured to him to come nearer.
A pretty woman wanting his company? How could he resist! He strolled across the room, weaving through the dancers lining up, until he faced her.
With a flourishing bow, he said, “You summoned me, madam?”
She laughed merrily. “Are you looking for a partner, sir? If so, look no further.”
“I am very willing, but we have not been introduced.”
“Fie on you, sir! Must we be bound by such tawdry and spiritless conventions? Let us pretend that we are at a masquerade ball. I am Good Queen Bess and you are…?”
“Henry of Monmouth,” he said, plucking a random king from his memory.
“Ah, Agincourt.‘God for Harry, England and St George.’And for a pair of country dances, if you will, my Liege Lord?”
“With pleasure, Majesty.”
She was pretty, with laughing eyes and very desirable red lips, and although her figure was not so well formed as Miss Whittleton’s, she was dressed to enhance her charms. He bowed and willingly led her into the set, now so long that it would be some time before they would be called upon to join the dance. Time for a little amusement.
“So how goes it with Good Queen Bess?” he said. “Are the Spanish giving you much trouble, Majesty?”
“Not since I sent good Sir Francis Drake to send them to the rightabout,” she said. “He scattered their Armada like leaves in the wind. No, it is Mary of Scotland who gives me the most grief. Ah, my dear cousin, and my greatest enemy!”
“Was Mary not beheaded before the Armada?” Will said, dredging up faint traces of his tutor’s lessons on history.
“Pooh! An inconsequential matter. Let us not allow facts to detain us, Sire, for are we not monarchs of England, and therefore above such trifles? If I say the Armada happened first, then so it was, for a Queen cannot be wrong.”
