“Look at Grandmama! She’s enjoying herself,” Maud observed, gesturing to a line of dancers. Sure enough, the queen was beaming. “It’s almost as if she recently got some good news.”
Alix colored at that, but all she said was, “I do love seeing Grandmama dance. She never does so at home.”
Because it would be vastly inappropriate for the queen to toss aside her cane and dance a quadrille in a London drawing room!To May’s utter shock, Victoria—wearing her tartan sash over her usual black gown—had joined in tonight’s jigs and reels, clapping vigorously to the music of the piper. Her limp seemed to have temporarily vanished, and there were spots of color on her cheeks, as if she’d shed decades along with her dignity.
“I’m sure it’s easier here,” Alix added, almost to herself. “So many of the Scottish dances are done in a group, rather than requiring a partner—which probably makes her think of Grandpapa, and how much she misses him.”
Alix, always the sappy romantic. “You’re right,” May agreed.
As one song ended and the lines of dancers bowed to each other, Prince Eddy started toward them. He glanced back over his shoulder at his grandmother, as if checking to make sure she was watching, then beelined for Alix.
See,his actions seemed to say,I’m doing as I was bidden, are you happy?
“Would you join me, Alix?” he asked, holding out a hand.
“Of course.” Alix paused as the opening bars of the next song filled the room. “But it’s the Dashing White Sergeant! Maud, come with us?”
“I was just about to get some air,” Maud demurred, retreating a step.
“May?” Alix prompted.
May stared at her blankly, and Alix repeated, “It’s the Dashing White Sergeant! Dance with us, please?”
“It’s a dance of three, typically performed with two women and one man,” Eddy clarified. “Alix is right; we need a third.”
Two women and one man—how utterly Scottish. If someone tried to introduce this dance in London, the society matrons might die of shock.
“I would love to, though I don’t know the steps.” May hated that she was once again drawing attention to her outsider status, to the fact that they all knew these Balmoral quirks and traditions, while she was behind a veil of ignorance.
“The steps are easy!” Alix exclaimed, with evident relief. It was so strange how she didn’t seem to want to be alonewith Eddy. “First you make a circle in one direction, then you spin with your right-hand partner…” Alix kept going, rapidly listing a series of dance steps, though May had given up listening.
She would learn the movements on the fly; she was good enough at following someone else’s lead. God knows she’d been doing it with her father for years now.
Everyone raised their hands to clap over their shoulders as the music sped up. Eddy and Alix each reached for one of May’s hands, and the three of them began spinning: first one direction and then, as May began to feel dizzy, the opposite way. After a few bars of music, their circle merged with another circle—composed of George, Louise, and Hélène d’Orléans—and the six of them began wheeling ever faster.
May was half a step behind the others, always struggling to catch up to what they had just done, but it didn’t seem to matter. She felt buoyant, seized by an unexpected and utterly childlike joy. It was all so silly, as if she and her cousins had gone back in time and were playing ring-around-the-rosy on the lawn. Eddy was just as lanky and laughing as he’d been at age ten; across the circle, George furrowed his brow, focusing intently on the steps. The sight struck May as endearing.
She met Alix’s gaze and ventured a smile as the other threesome broke apart, then began a funny little jig in their direction, all of them prancing and pointing their toes.
And then May saw it. A single yellow blossom was tucked behind Hélène’s ear.
It had been discreetly done; May would never have noticed if the heated dancing hadn’t slipped Hélène’s hair from its pins. But it was there, as unmistakably gold as when Eddy had plucked it from the gardens this morning.
Logically, of course, May knew this could be some other flower. There were certainly thousands on the grounds of Balmoral. But some primal feminine instinct made her feel certain that it was not.
Eddy had picked this flower specifically, and secretly, for Hélène.
It all fell into place, stray questions resolving themselves in May’s mind. Eddy had been distracted at Balmoral, but as she’d suspected, it wasn’t because he loved Alix—it was because his grandmother wanted him to marry Alix while he had feelings forHélène.Who was at best an erstwhile princess: a royal without a throne, without a country. It also explained the puzzling fact of Hélène’s presence at Mar Lodge, which May had been curious about, since Louise and Hélène weren’t exactly friends.
Of course, Hélène could never be considered as a bride for Eddy. Aside from her family’s exile, there was the insurmountable issue of religion. A Catholic queen? No, May assured herself. Hélène would never get Queen Victoria’s stamp of approval.
Still, she was a complication.
It had been hard enough when May thought she was up against Alix, the queen’s clear favorite. Now she hadanotherprincess to contend with? Hélène might be unsuitable as wife material, but Eddy clearly cared for her—which was far more than he’d ever felt about May. And if Hélène was wearing his secret love flowers, then his sentiments were returned.
Stomp, stomp, spin, spin: the dance kept whirling about her, breathless and relentless. May stumbled, the pin of her brooch digging into her skin, her good mood viciously deflated. She’d been smooth enough when her mind was focusedon following the others, but now she’d lost her rhythm and couldn’t get it back. She kept tripping over Eddy or turning the wrong direction. Shame clouded her vision, and bitter tears stung her eyes. Stupid of her to think that she might have ever had a chance at Eddy—atfreedom.May would be stuck with the Tecks for the rest of her life, forever relegatedto the fringes of the royal world, a poor relation only invited to events out of pity or obligation.
If she didn’t feel so miserable, she might have laughed at the circumstances of this dance, which placed Eddy between two women as if he were the prize they were fighting over.
