And she swept away with much more aplomb than a young woman should have.
“What do you see, Miss Woodmore?”
Angelica opened her eyes and attempted to keep her expression bland. “It takes a moment,” she explained to Miss Yarmouth. For the third time. “And great concentration. Even…silence.”
Hoping her inquisitive client would get the hint, Angelica closed her eyes again and fingered Baron Framingham’s glove. She didn’t know how Miss Yarmouth had extracted the item from her possible fiancé, but that wasn’t of any concern.
At last, the familiar prickling sort of buzz descended upon her and Angelica focused on the images evolving. It was rather like that moment between sleep and wakefulness…where onewas fully aware of what images scanned over the insides of one’s eyelids but had no control over their content.
When she was able to summon it, the vision was always a picture, a static image that, while it didn’t change, allowed her the chance to examine all its details. A moment in time, captured, as the last bit of life evaporated.
“He’s much older. Perhaps fifty. Bald atop his head, many wrinkles. Lying in bed. Eyes closed.” She listed off her impressions as she got them. “The window nearby…there’s bright sun and leaves on the tree. Full leaves. Summer, perhaps. Alas, I cannot tell if there is anyone with him.” That was a bit of a lie, for she did see a woman who looked nothing like Miss Yarmouth.
But that could be anyone—a servant, a nurse, a sister—and she never gave any information that could imply or suggest what the woman’s decision could or should be.
“Facial hair?” asked the young woman, her voice hushed. “Is he clean-shaven?”
“No facial hair, nor sideburns. There seems to be no sign of injury, but his face is drawn and gray.” Angelica opened her eyes. “I believe he dies of old age, or some malady. And from his aged appearance and the loss of his hair, I should expect it will be a decade or more from now.” She looked at Miss Yarmouth. “So you must decide if you can bear to be wed to the man for some time.”
The inquisitive, impatient Miss Yarmouth didn’t seem to appreciate Angelica’s advice. “But you have told me very little. How shall I make a decision about that?”
Angelica tucked the second gold crown a bit deeper into her reticule. “You have more information now with which to make a decision than you did earlier this evening. And more information than anyone else would be able to give you.”
With the exception, possibly, of Sonia. But that was unlikely, for Angelica knew that her younger sister had a completely different view of their gift of Sight than she did.
While Angelica had not only learned to live with it, but to embrace it, Sonia considered her version of the Sight a curse, and that was why she’d entered a convent school. She felt she needed protection for—or perhaps from—her gift.
Angelica rose from the little stool in the corner of the ladies’ retiring room—which she had unceremoniously cleared of both maids and ladies upon her arrival—and looked down at the other woman. “The image I receive is only the moment of death. There are times when it’s simple to determine the cause or even the age and time: for instance, if someone is hit by a carriage or is shot or tumbles down a flight of stairs.”
Or falls off a bridge.
Angelica bit her lip. That dream had been so odd, so unexpected. She’d never experienced anything like it before…for it wasn’t like her normal visions. Not only had she dreamed actual events, but the information had come to her unbidden. And the most sobering thing about it was the man had actually appeared tonight. He was a real person. And he’d been dressed exactly as he had in the dream, down to the tie of his neckcloth.
Which meant he would likely die tonight.
Her lip throbbed from where she’d bit down, but Angelica ignored it. What else could she do? She’d warned Lord Brickbank, and suffered through the condescending looks from him and the skeptical one from his handsome companion. Who was he?
Oh, yes. Dewhurst.
He hadn’t seemed any more interested in her pronouncement and warning than Lord Brickbank had, but Angelica had felt a prickling over her skin when he looked at her. As if he was examining her or searching for something.
“I must go,” she told Miss Yarmouth. “I wish you the best regards, and I pray you will make a decision that will make you happy, as well as your father and Baron Framingham.”
She gave a little bow and left the young woman, who now looked utterly miserable and a bit lost, sitting on her stool alone in the room.
Beyond the warm, tea rose, and lily-infused walls of the ladies’ tiring room, Angelica was able to draw in a relatively clean breath. The rooms where the ladies might need to disrobe—to correct frock malfunctions or dragging hems—were kept well heated for obvious reasons and, along with the powder dusting the air, it made for a cloying environment.
“Ah, Miss Woodmore. How serendipitous.”
Angelica turned at the sound of the low, smooth voice and felt her heart give a little lurch. For some absurd reason, her cheeks suddenly felt warm as she met the eyes of none other than Viscount Dewhurst.
“Whatever do you mean, my lord?” she asked.
He seemed to have appeared from nowhere, for the corridor down which she’d been walking had been empty when she came out of the chamber. She hadn’t heard the sound of a door opening, nor of footsteps. Unless he had been waiting for her…
A little prickle of unease, combined with—yes, she must be honest—intrigue, filtered over her shoulders as she glanced past him to gauge how far out of earshot she was from the party. Yet, though her heart was pounding and her palms dampened beneath their gloves, she didn’t feel nervous or threatened.
Just…aware.
