Chapter Five
The snow continuedto fall that evening as the Welcome Ball got underway. Wreaths of fir and holly adorned the walls of the ballroom, faux snow bedecked corners of the floor, and an enormous Christmas tree towered over the procession in glittering majesty. The effect of it all, coupled with the perfectly groomed and coifed lords and ladies spinning about the polished parquet floor, would have taken the breath of most observers.
But Alexandra was not just any observer, and quadrilles did not interest her, nor did flirtations or furtive searches of the sea of faces for Lord Harry Marlow—who had yet to appear. She most certainly wasnotlooking for him but her empirical examination had nevertheless noted his absence.
Julian would not have beaten him to a pulp, would he? What if he and Lord Harry had pummeled one another into oblivion? When her brother and his wife had quietly escorted Alexandra and Josephine to the ball earlier, she had not detected any injuries upon his person. But now, her imagination ran wild. She imagined Lord Harry sporting a broken nose and a blackened eye and shuddered.
Heaving another displeased sigh, Alexandra shifted in the corner she presently occupied amidst a grouping of potted holly bushes. Her right foot tapped. Then her left.
Balls were so deadly boring. Such a monumental waste of one’s time and attentions. Why, she could be outside taking hourly measurements and temperature readings and recording the results in her journal. It seemed horridly unfair that she should be denied the opportunity to further her studies for her prediction map.
She had observed the weather all afternoon from the window of her chamber, where she had been promptly banished following her ruination. Forced to relinquish her boots, trousers, shirt, and overcoat, she had remained at the window like a morose sentinel, inwardly bemoaning her fate. But at least she had been able to watch and take notes, to add to her prognostic.
Trapped in the ballroom, she was yet another awkward miss, too tall for fashion, hair an unsightly shade of red, who had somehow been compromised by the Duke of Bainbridge’s brother. Oh yes, she had felt the stares.
The gathering was small and select enough that she could flit about with the revelers prior to her comeout, but not everyone here was her friend.
Indeed, most were not. She was aware that she was gauche and odd. That she said and did the wrong things at the wrong times, that she often acted without regard for consequence, and that she was hopelessly inept at behaving as a genteel lady ought.
“Why are you not dancing?”
The voice, butter-rich and deep and so near to her ear that gooseflesh pebbled on her arms, had her jumping and spinning to face its source in a swirl of emerald skirts. There he stood, a few inches taller than she, his golden hair tousled in waves, his green eyes vivid and knowing upon her.
Oh.Thank heavens, he did not appear harmed. He was as handsome as any man she had ever seen. And even more handsome now than he had been earlier in the carriage and snow, resplendent in his formal evening wear. He almost stole all the breath from her lungs.
“Lord Harry,” she said, wishing his name did not emerge as a gasp. “I do not dance.”
Heavens, put her in a dress, and all the ease with which she had interacted before suddenly dissipated like the clouds after a thunderstorm.
Lord Harry offered her an elegant bow, a boyish smile on his lips. “Danvers. I must admit that the sight of you in a gown is as surprising as it is lovely. Why do you not dance?”
She pursed her lips and studied him, trying to discern if he was teasing her or if he was serious. Perhaps a combination of the two, she decided. “Because I am an abysmal dancer. Monsieur Bouchard, my instructor, despaired of my ineptitude. I drove the poor fellow to tears.”
His smile widened, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “Tears, you say? I cannot countenance it.”
Alexandra found herself smiling back at him. “The tears may have been because I stomped on his instep after he suggested that I should compensate for the dreadful color of my hair by dancing with the grace of a swan.”
Lord Harry’s smile fled. “Your hair is glorious. You should have stomped on both his insteps for such an affront.”
“One was enough,” she assured him, recalling the moment her odious dance instructor had retreated, never to return. “It was a very thorough stomp, and I am no sparrow.”
“No indeed,” he said somberly, his gaze roaming her face. “If I were to compare you to a bird, it would never be something as boring as a sparrow.”
“I would never wish to be a bird,” she said with a shudder, “forever winging my way from tree to tree, prey to creatures five times my size. Consuming all my sustenance with a beak. Only think of how tiring it is to be avian. Isn’t it odd that birds are hatched from eggs? Why, they’re almost reptilian in nature, and no one likes snakes.”
Oh dear, there she went. Rambling again. Her face went hot. Would she never learn her lesson? She bit her lip to stay additional words that threatened to spill forth like water over a dam. Julian had issued his sentence to her like a jailer. She was to marry Lord Harry Marlow to atone for her sins. However, there had been nary a word of such a thing. During her hours alone in her chamber, she had fretted that a betrothal announcement would occur that very evening at the ball.
And yet, only her sister-in-law Clara had visited her, with a pitying smile, a commiserating embrace, and instructions that she should heed Julian’s wishes. Josephine had been kept from her tainted presence altogether until this evening. And Julian had never reappeared until she had been marched in deafening, disappointed silence to the ball.
He had growled a single sentence at her before allowing her to abscond to the fringes of thefêteas was always her wont.Do not do anything foolish this evening, Alexandra.
And truly. Did he expect her to honor that or any other command?
“Would flying to one’s destination be such a chore?” Lord Harry asked then, intruding upon her jumbled musings. “Just think of how lovely it would be to soar through the sky.”
“Think of how awful it would be to plummet to the earth,” she countered, unable to help herself. It was the nature of her brain.
He took a step closer. “Alexandra.”
