Elizabeth was not sure exactly how the two of them had planned to cause trouble tonight. Probably they had intended very publicly to give her the cut direct and to say something suitably nasty in the hearing of a sufficient number of ball guests that everyone would be sure to hear of it within minutes. It would not have taken much. Her name had already been very thoroughly dragged through the mud. They had surely been hoping to make it impossible for her to continue with the betrothal or even to remain in London. But whatever their intention had been, it was thwarted, partly by Elizabeth’s presence of mind in linking her arm with Blanche’s and walking and conversing with her before Blanche could realize how she had been outmaneuvered, and partly by what followed, courtesy of the Westcotts and Radleys. No sooner had that particular set come to an end than Alvin Cole solicited Blanche’s hand for the next and Cousin Louise and Elizabeth’s mother and Aunt Lilian arrived together to converse with Sir Nelson while Elizabeth danced with Mr. Parmiter and Colin danced with Jessica.
Blanche Elwood did not have the skill of her mother, Elizabeth thought, and her husband seemed to lack sufficient interest to take any initiative. At the end of that set, they left the ball. Elizabeth watched them go from her mother’s side and wondered how their appearance here tonight would be interpreted. As a stamp of approval upon Colin’s marriage, perhaps, acting on behalf of his mother? Quite the opposite of what they had intended, in fact?
“Well,” her mother said, “that was interesting. Did they come to wish you well, Lizzie? But poor Wren.”
Wren had stayed well away from her sister. The appearance of the Elwoods in the ballroom must indeed have been distressing for her. She approached now with Alexander. She was smiling.
“Did they come to make trouble?” she asked. “If they did, you handled the situation superbly, Elizabeth. So did Colin. Let us hope they will cause no further trouble. You two have had enough unpleasantness to last a lifetime. Yet you bear up so well beneath it all.”
“I am quite determined,” Elizabeth assured her, “to have some sort of amicable relationship with your sister, Wren, and with your mother too. I must. For Colin’s sake, since his position as head of the family and owner of the homes where your mother lives compels him to try to make peace with them. But I do understand how disloyal that forces us to be to you. Is there any possible way—”
But she was interrupted by a touch on her shoulder, and she turned to find a gentleman of her acquaintance standing there.
“Lady Overfield,” he said. “Is it too much to hope that you are free to dance the next set with me?”
“Thank you,” she said. “I am, and I would be delighted.”
Colin, she saw, was leading a young lady whose name she could not recall onto the floor.
Could they relax now? Was the worst over?
Would the eveningneverend?
•••
Time must have slowed,Colin thought as the ball proceeded. He had never known such a long evening. It had been worth coming, however. They had used the endless time productively. Elizabeth had employed her poise and charm to show people that the caricature of Lady Overfield with which they had been presented during the past few days was nothing but nonsense. She had walked and danced and conversed and smiled and at no point clung to her family, as she might have been forgiven for doing. And he had been awed at the way she had handled Blanche and averted what might well have spelled disaster for her return to society.
He had spent the evening mingling with as many fellow guests as possible, shamelessly charming the ladies and chatting with the men. When some of his friends expressed amazement over this morning’s announcement, he laughed and told them he had been trying since Christmas to persuade Lady Overfield to marry him and had finally succeeded. It was very nearly the truth. He added that he was the most fortunate of men, and that really was the truth.
Long before a waltz was announced, however, depression threatened to sneak in under his guard. His mother had tried to trap him into a marriage to which he had quite explicitly not consented merely because she had wanted Miss Dunmore as her daughter-in-law and minion. Having failed at that she had sent Blanche and Nelson this evening to destroy the betrothal hehadchosen and publicly announced this morning. It did not matter to her that she could do it only by destroying Elizabeth, who had done nothing to deserve such cruel treatment. His mother would not approve of Elizabeth because she was thirty-five years old and not beautiful in the only sense that was important to her, and because she must sense that she could not dominate Elizabeth as she would have been able to do with Miss Dunmore or most of the young girls who were currently in search of husbands. And Blanche, though for reasons of her own she had defied their mother yesterday, had come to do her bidding tonight.
They werehis motherandhis sister.
He thought about Mrs. Westcott and Alexander—Elizabeth’s mother and sibling. But the comparisons—or, rather, the contrasts—were too painful to dwell upon.
He ought perhaps to have encouraged Elizabeth to withdraw to Riddings, her home in Kent, until the scandal had blown over, as it inevitably would as soon as his mother had believed she had won and did not need to expend any more energy on finding truths and half-truths from her past with which to blacken her name. Perhaps he had done Elizabeth no favor by persuading her to marry him.
Perhaps it had been selfish of him.
One thing he knew for certain. He was going to call upon his mother tomorrow and have a proper confrontation with her. She was difficult, almost impossible to deal with, as everyone who had ever crossed her path had discovered. She always had her own way. But it could be allowed to happen no longer. And merely turning his back upon her and ignoring her existence would no longer serve either. Tomorrow he would assert himself once and for all and…Well, his mind could not quite grasp what might be accomplished.
He was just going to do it. There was no alternative.
He was bowing to Elizabeth then as couples made their way onto the floor. “This is my waltz, I believe, Lady Overfield,” he said.
She smiled at him in that twinkling way that always warmed him from his head to his toes and set her hand on the back of his. “I believe it is, Lord Hodges,” she said.
Even now, of course, they could not relax. For there would surely be scarcely a person in the ballroom who would not be remembering what had happened during the waltz in Netherby’s ballroom less than a week ago. Was it possible that had happened so recently? It felt like forever ago.
They faced each other on the floor, and he took her in his arms when the music was about to begin.
“I really never expected to be notorious again,” she said with a sigh.
Again.That broke his heart.
“This is why we came tonight,” he reminded her. “To face thetonat one of the grand squeezes so that afterward we can put all the nonsense behind us. So thatyoucan. But in order to complete the plan we must waltz.”
So thetoncould see exactly how they had looked just before scandal broke. So they could see how trivial and ridiculous it had all been.
