He accepted the abrupt change of subject without comment. “The portrait gallery,” he said.
“It must be a very large collection,” she said, “if it stretches the whole length of the wing.”
“The room was designed as a long promenade for the family during inclement weather,” he told her. “And as a place to take guests too fearsome of slopes and steps and what the outdoors might do to their hair or their complexions. As a play area for children to roar along. As a retreat for anyone wishing for some quiet exercise and solitude. And, incidentally, as a family portrait gallery. I will not show it today. People who visit the state apartments have their heads stuffed with what they have seen and heard by the time they reach the last room. I believe all my guests are very ready for tea in the grand reception hall. I will show you the gallery another day.”
Youas in her, Estelle? Or a collectiveyouas in all his guests? He did not say and she did not ask.
“Shall we?” He gestured with one hand toward the dining room, and she walked there beside him. He did not offer his arm.
It was a long room, quite breathtaking in its size and splendor, as were all the apartments. The sound of voices now came from the room beyond it. There was no one else left here. They walked slowly but did not stop, and he did not point out any features of the room. Estelle was sure she had never seen such a large table. It looked as if it wouldaccommodate at least fifty diners without any clashing of elbows.
The rest of the party was in the ladies’ withdrawing room beyond the dining room, some sitting, some standing. They looked expectantly at the earl when he appeared in the doorway.
“What does itfeellike to be the owner of all this, Lord Brandon?” Gillian Dickson asked. “I cannot evenimagineit.”
“Oh, I can, Gill,” her brother, Wallace, said. “I would feel like aprince.”
“When one inherits something like this,” the earl said, “one realizes that one has done nothing to earn it, that one owes it all to an accident of birth. It is an enormous privilege and a weighty responsibility. Is anyone ready for tea?”
Everyone was, it seemed. Energy was instantly restored and they were all on their feet in moments.
The earl crossed the room to a closed door and spoke to the footman who was standing beside it, waiting to open it. The young man hurried away, back through the state apartments, and the earl opened the door himself and stood back to let them through.
And so they entered the room with the dome, which Estelle had been longing to see since her arrival yesterday. It was a vast round hall with a tiled mosaic floor and a high balcony that ran all about the circumference and that was held up by marble pillars and made safe by a marble balustrade, which must be at least waist-high. The great glass dome above it filled the room with light. Even as Estelle looked up, clouds must have moved off the sun and a shaft of sunlight beamed downward, to be fractured into all the colors of the rainbow as it caught walls and balcony and pillars and floor.
“Nowthat,” the earl said to the whole group, “was perfect timing. This is sometimes a grand reception hall, occasionally a ballroom. Today it will be a tearoom.”
“A ballroom,” Estelle said, looking up and about her at the fractured light. She spread her arms wide and turned once about. “It would surely be the most wonderful place in the whole world in which to dance.”
Maria laughed. “Oh,” she said, her voice filled with delight. “I had a birthday party here once. It was my eighth birthday. How could I have forgotten until now?”
Perhaps, Estelle thought, because not long after there had been a great upset in the house and her brother had vanished. She wondered what it had been like here then, after he had gone. How upset by it all had Maria’s father been? And her mother? And Maria herself? It must have been a life-changing event for all of them.
“I remember it well,” the earl said, looking at his sister with what was surely fondness. “The room was filled with squealing little girls, and I had been put in charge of organizing games and entertainment for you all.”
“I can just picture it,” Mrs.Sharpe said, clapping her hands once before clasping them to her bosom and beaming at her nephew. “I suppose you performed your magician’s act, Justin? You were always so good at it. I never knew how you could produce an endless stream of ribbons from an empty hat or gold coins from behind people’s ears.”
“It was pure magic, of course,” the earl told her. “Maria, this is your tea, I believe? You are the hostess.”
The center of the room had been set up with several square tables covered with crisp white cloths and laid with gleaming china and crystal and silverware. Maria moved toward them.
“Ah, and here comes Lady Maple,” the earl said.
She was being ushered into the room from the entrance hall by the young footman the earl had sent upon an errand a short while ago. The Ormsbury uncles and aunts came in behind them.
“A private showing of the summerhouse this morning, complete with a marriage proposal,” Bertrand murmured, coming up behind Estelle and setting his hands upon her shoulders. “A private moment in one of the sitting rooms this afternoon while everyone else moved on. Do I smell a romance after all, Stell?”
“If you do,” she said, “there is something drastically wrong with your nose. But, Bert, have you ever in your life seen anything more splendid than all this?”
“Yes,” he said, grinning at her. “Elm Court.”
She laughed.“Splendid?”
“It is a sizable manor house,” he said. “More important, it is home. This is a magnificent showpiece, though. I was particularly impressed with the half-square rooms with their perfect mirror imaging. Twin rooms.”
“We are an imperfect example of the type, alas,” she said. “We are not quite mirror images of each other.”
“Sometimes,” he said, squeezing her shoulders, “imperfection can be more interesting than perfection, Stell. It is something you may wish to keep in mind, actually, when you continue your search for your Mr.Perfect.”
