CHAPTER ONE
Eleanor Bennett stared at the opulent ballroom, filled with ladies and gentlemen of thetonin various masks and costumes. Behind her, her half-sisters all gathered as Greek muses, giggling amongst themselves. A quartet played a lively Scottish reel, and a set of country dances had formed in the center of the room.
“Do you suppose the Duke of Ravenscroft will be in attendance?” Isabel, her eldest half-sister at twenty, whispered. “Mama said he was certain to be present, but when I spoke with Lady Eliza, she said that although her mother had extended him an invitation, she thought him unlikely to accept.”
Eleanor did her best not to roll her eyes, though it was tempting. The Duke of Ravenscroft had expressed his intention of calling within the next few days, supposedly with the intention of choosing a wife from among the Bennett girls. Of course, although she was the eldest, Eleanor knewshewould not be a part of this ‘honored’ ceremony. Ever since her father had diedwhen she was just seven years old, she had been the bane of her stepmother’s life.
She supposed, in a way, she ought to be thankful that her stepmother had kept her fed and clothed, with a roof over her head. Considering that Mrs. Margaret Bennett had no love for Eleanor’s father, and even less for Eleanor herself, anything more would have been foolish to wish for.
Eleanor had a home, and she had the opportunity to accompany her half-sisters to this ball, which looked as though it would be the largest and most elaborate that Eleanor had ever been to.
Given she had few blessings to count, she made sure to count them all now.
Yes, she did not have a particularly flattering dress—the patterned muslin was from Isabel’s season last year, and it suited Isabel’s blonde curls far more than it did Eleanor’s brown tresses—but she was here.
And yes, perhaps she had little likelihood of dancing, but she had her pet mouse in her pocket—an infraction her stepmother would never forgive if she ever knew about it—and would be sure to have some company that way. Besides, the beauty of the ballroom alone made her feel as though she had stepped into Olympus itself.
“I think he will choose me,” Isabel was saying, fluttering her fan at her flushed cheeks. “After all, I am the eldest.”
“Only by a year,” Annabel, her second half-sister, snapped. “And you can’t be certain he won’t find me far more beautiful.”
“With your dark hair?” Isabel snorted. “I’veheard he prefers blondes.”
“How would you know?” Mirabel, the youngest of them all at seventeen, asked with rounded eyes. Of all her half-sisters, Eleanor found Mirabel’s company the most palatable, and if it had not been for Isabel’s spite, she thought that perhaps the two of them might have been friends. “Have you ever spoken to him?”
“Men do not speak of their conquests to ladies,” Isabel said scornfully. “No, I heard it from Lady Eliza. She told me that a few years ago, when her sister first came out, he courted Lady Lydia.”
Eleanor had heard of Lady Lydia, one of the famed beauties of theton. She had never spoken to the lady, which was hardly surprising; ladies such as Lydia did not spend time with maligned first daughters of a deceased gentleman.
“What happened?”
“Well, I don’t know the details, but he certainly isn’t married now,” Isabel smirked and tossed her hair over her shoulder. “But I would say that it displays his preference for blonde hair, do you not think?”
“Yes, but Lady Lydia is far more beautiful than you,” Annabel murmured, pursing her lips. “She looks like a doll.”
And you do not.
Isabel slapped her fan against Annabel’s arm. “As though he would be tempted to marryyou, with your coarse hair.”
“Now, now, girls,” Margaret, Eleanor’s stepmother, said, coming up behind them like a mother eagle guarding her young. With her hooked nose and sharp eyes, the comparison seemed apt, but where eagles did not have the richest plumage, Margaret wore a gown of rich crimson and a nodding peacock feather in her headpiece. As always when she appeared out, she presented herself at her very best. “That’s no way to treat one another. The Duke shall choose a bride from amongst one of you, and I’m sure it could be any one of you.”
Any one of them, Eleanor thought.
That notion did not sting as much as she had once thought it might. To be sure, she was now three-and-twenty with no prospect of a husband, but she found she had little interest in the Duke. She, too, had heard rumors about the Duke of Ravenscroft—about his rakish ways. It didn’t matter that he was due to pay them a visit to choose a wife from among them. Everyone knew that he only courted a lady for a maximum of seven days before moving on to his next victim. Eleanor hardly knew why Isabel so desperately wanted to be yet another on a long list, or why she thoughtsheshould be any better.
Margaret turned piercing eyes on Eleanor, and her brows pinched in a frown. “Why are you just standing there? Fetch me a drink before I perish from this heat.”
“Yes, and for myself,” Isabel put in. “You know my constitution is so frail.”
In Eleanor’s estimation, Isabel had the constitution of an ox. With a robust figure and cheeks often ruddy from the heat and exertion, she seemed about as far from fainting as it was possible to get.
“Hurry,” Annabel said, glancing around the crowded room. “Before a gentleman asks us to dance.Youdo not need to worry about that.”
“We do not all wish to spend the rest of our lives on the shelf,” Isabel scoffed.
Mirabel sent her a quiet, pitying look, but said nothing in her defense.As is usual. Eleanor knew better than to hope for Mirabel’s defense.
“At least you are wearing a mask so no one can connect you tous,” Isabel smirked. “I do so hate it when people think we are related, and I must explain that you are so much older and yet still unmarried.”
