“It was kind of you,” Louise, Dowager Duchess of Netherby, told him, “to invite Matilda.”
“Kindness had nothing to do with it, ma’am,” he said. “Or if it did, it was on Lady Matilda’s part. She was kind enough to accept my daughter’s invitation to be one of the party.”
“Oh,” Lady Molenor, Matilda’s youngest sister, said. “The invitation came from your daughter, did it?”
“It did,” he said. “At my suggestion.”
“Estelle’s invitation came from Mrs. Dewhurst too,” the marchioness said. “At the suggestion of Mr. Adrian Sawyer, I believe. She had a splendid time.”
“Do have a seat, Lord Dirkson,” the dowager said, indicating an empty chair.
“I do not intend to stay, ma’am,” he said. “I came to pay my respects and to ask Lady Matilda if she will drive with me in my curricle in the park later.”
“Oh,” the Dowager Duchess of Netherby said, “my sister has never ridden in a curricle. She would be terrified.”
“I have, Louise,” Matilda said. “I rode up with Bertrand one afternoon several weeks ago, and far from being terrified, I found it to be one of the most exhilarating experiences of my life.”
“Matilda?” Lady Molenor said. “Impossible.”
“With Bertrand?” the marchioness said. “Well, the rogue. He said nothing to us.”
“Bravo, Aunt Matilda.” The young Duchess of Netherby laughed. “How splendid of you.”
“Indeed,” Lady Jessica Archer agreed. “How did he persuade you to do something so daring, Aunt Matilda?”
“Exactly when was this?” the dowager countess asked eagerly.
Matilda was stretching her fingers in her lap and then curling them into her palms again. “Thank you,” she said, looking at Charles and ignoring the questions her family had for her. “That would be delightful.”
“Matilda—”
“Oh good, Aunt Matilda.”
“Are you sure, Matilda—”
She continued to ignore them all. She licked her lips, her eyes still upon Charles, though it was clear she was addressing everyone when she spoke. “Last evening Viscount Dirkson asked me to marry him and I said yes.”
Well, that silenced them—for a few moments anyway.
Charles smiled slowly at Matilda, and she frowned back at him.
Part of his attention was caught by the sound of the dowager countess, her mother, drawing breath. He waited for the tirade that was sure to come.
“Well, thank God for that,” was what she actually said.
* * *
Matilda thought her fingernails might well be drawing blood from her palms, but she could not seem to relax her hands. She thought her heart might beat a path through her chest cavity and ribs. She held her mouth in a firm line so that she would not … what? Laugh? Why would she feel an irresistible urge to laugh when she was so tense that her jaw felt locked in place?
She gazed upon Charles and could hardly believe he was the same man as the one with whom she had danced and laughed last evening. And kissed. The one with whom she had stood beyond the rotunda to watch the fireworks while exclaiming all the while in childish superlatives at the splendor of it all. The one who had stood behind her at last and encircled her waist with his arms so that she could rest the back of her head against his shoulder and not grow dizzy as she gazed upward—despite the fact that they might have been observed by half theton, or even three-quarters.
Today he was an immaculately clad gentleman, handsome, solid of build, somehow remote from her. Except that … He had named her alone when he had entered the room and greeted everyone. He hadsmiledat her. He had come to make sure she had taken no harm last evening, though from what she might have taken harm she did not know. He had neatly turned the idea thathehad been kind to inviteherto Vauxhall into one in whichshehad been kind tohimby accepting Barbara’s invitation. And he had come—he had said it in front of her mother and sisters and sister-in-law and nieces—to invite her to drive in his curricle with him in Hyde Park. It must be thirty years or more since any gentleman had invited her to do that.
She was fairly bursting with her love for him. All last night’s and this morning’s anxieties had fallen away.He had come.And he had smiled and called her by name. He wanted her to go out with him. He still loved her.
Tomorrow had not come after all. It was still today. Eternally today in which to be with Charles, to enjoy his love, to return it in full measure, to …
“Thank God, Mama?” Mildred said.
