‘Perhaps.’
He did not expand on his answer, leaving a small but awkward gap in the conversation.
‘I heard that you are about to travel to France, Miss Montague?’ Willa asked the question to fill the silence.
‘Indeed, I am. Mr Fitzgibbon is to accompany our party. It seems he has a great affection for the region and is in dire need of cheering up.’
The last words were said in an accusing tone but Willa ignored them altogether. She could not be responsible for George’s melancholy, and the three letters he had sent her in the last week had been full of the emotion.
Lionel had needed constant propping up, too, and she had sworn never to do that again in any relationship.
‘Well, I hope the weather is warm and the skies are sunny in the south, Miss Montague. At this time of the year I hear they generally are.’
An innocuous reply but she had found talk of the weather always invoked a kind of natural end to conversations and indeed it was only a moment or two before Arabella and her group swanned off again.
‘Well done, Mrs St Claire.’
His words were filled with humour.
‘I rather think she hoped she might have had you to herself, my lord.’
‘It has been centuries since I felt that young and untroubled.’
‘Difficulties in life mark one, I expect, which is why these masked balls hold so much attraction.’
He laughed out loud and she liked the sound. She might never know his trials, and he might never learn of hers, but for now as the music began again she walked into his arms for the next dance.
It was improper, she knew. One ought not to allow more than a few dances to one partner and certainly not two in a row, but ifpeople were noticing she chose not to look. Phillip Moreland felt warm and safe and large, a man who could beat the memory of everything away at least for an evening.
He had lifted his mask upwards now so that the arch of it sat at his forehead, allowing her to see his eyes. He watched the crowd around them, never fully at ease, and she wondered what had made him so guarded.
There were so many parts to one’s life that could scar a person.
He still wore his wedding ring. There was a long white mark on his neck beneath his ear on the left side. He favoured his left leg in the dance as well, for she could feel the slight shift of weight as he moved into particular steps. And the tremor she felt in his hand was there each time they touched.
That was the only thing he did not hide. Perhaps it was so much a part of him he had forgotten about it, an affliction normalised by the length of its existence.
‘You are quiet.’ His eyebrows were raised.
‘I was trying to decide who you are, my lord, underneath the disguise.’
‘Do people have to be something different, Mrs St Claire?’
‘To my knowledge they almost always are. Take Miss Annabelle, for instance. She is beautiful and clever but she is also frightened. Of time perhaps and its passing.’
‘And what of you? What is it that you conceal?’
‘Oh, a thousand things like everybody else probably. My disappointments are no surprise as I have already told you some of those.’
‘Your husband?’
Willa hated the anger that she felt at his question. He could not know just what she had lost. No one ever would.
But a public ball was no place for such private anguish and so with intent she looked about her, finding something else entirely different to say.
‘I had imagined your brother and his wife would have been here tonight celebrating with Esther’s aunt and uncle.’
‘Their eldest son broke his arm and has been sick with an infection, so they have remained at Nettleford Park. He is regaining his health, though, from the latest reports.’
