"What are you going to do for the concert, my lord?" she asked, her head bent to the task of making the daisy chain.
"Oh, Lord," he said. "Play the violin, I suppose. Mama might as well turn the cats loose for ten minutes and save me the embarrassment."
She looked up at him and laughed merrily. "Surely you are not that bad," she said. "Shall I dance to your music?"
Lord Crensford gaped. "Dance?" he said."To my music?Without a partner?"
"Yes," she said. "I love to dance, to just feel the music in my body and move to it. There is nothing in this world more exhilarating. If I had not been born a lady, I would have danced on the stage for a living. At the opera I would have had all the gentlemen vying for my favors." Her eyes were dreamily looking into a world that could not be.
"Oh, I say." Ernest gulped. She was not even blushing. Did she have no idea what particular favors from dancers gentlemen vied for?Clearly not.She was a child.A dangerous child.It was to be hoped that if Wickenham ever took her to London, he would keep her on a tight rein. There was no telling what scrapes she might get into.
"Is it settled, then?" she asked. "I will dance and you will play?"
"We will have to try it first," he said guardedly, frowning into her eager little face. But his attention was suddenly diverted to his nephew. "If you are going to throw the ball to me, scamp, could you aim for the chest, do you think, instead of the nose? My nose is big enough without being pounded by a ball."
His nephew giggled and threw the ball at his nose again.
"I wonder how well Mrs. Ingrain and Lord Kenwood will do with their duet," Angela said.
"Diana?" Lord Crensford said, the ball falling still in his hands."And Jack?Duet?"
"Your mama arranged it all," she said. "They are practicing now. I cannot imagine the marquess singing, can you?"
"Now?"Lord Crensford allowed his nephew to prise the ball from his fingers and got precipitately to
his feet."Where?"
"In the music room, I suppose," she said.
"I'll call him out." He clenched his fists at his sides."The cunning scoundrel.He was going to read a book. I thought Diana was going to rest in her room for an hour, like the other ladies. I'll put a bullet between his eyes for this."
Angela was on her feet too, brushing at the daisy heads that had been strewn over her lap. "Is something wrong?" she asked. "Are you jealous, my lord? Is that it? Do you admire Mrs. Ingram?"
"He can choose his weapons," Lord Crensford was muttering, gathering his protesting nephew into one arm and the ball in the other, "and name his seconds. I have had enough of this."
"Wait for us," Angela called, scooping up her niece and throwing the daisy chain over the baby's head.
"Oh, dear, I had no idea you would be so angry when I mentioned the duet. I thought you must have known. Did you want to sing with Mrs. Ingram yourself?"
''I'll run him through with a sword if he chooses that for weapon," Lord Crensford muttered. "Or I'll pound him to a pulp with my fists."
"Oh, please don't do anything rash," Angela pleaded, trotting along to keep up with his angry strides. "I am sure the Marquess of Kenwood is a perfect gentleman."
He threw her a scornful glance. "Whoever decided that you were ready to leave the schoolroom?" he said.
Angela looked down at her niece and laid a cheek against the soft down on the baby's head.
Lord Crensford halted abruptly when they were inside the house. He set his nephew's feet on the tiled floor of the great hall and put the ball in his arms.
"Upstairs you go with your aunt, scamp," he said.
"Are you going to kill him?" Angela asked, gazing up at him in some dismay.
"Probably not," he admitted, striding away from her toward the closed doors of the music room. "But I might have a good go at it."
* * *
When the doors crashed open behind him, the Marquess of Kenwood had an elbow on the top of the pianoforte and was picking out a slow tune on the keyboard with one finger of the other hand. He did not look up from his absorbing task as the doors rather anticlimactically closed quietly.
