“What would you do?” Rose whispered. “In his position, I mean to say.”
“I would have my house locked up tighter than the Bank of England,” Grace said. “Likely have the house watched by hired men to ensure that no one unknown to me made it anywhere near, and keep the evidence near to my person at all times. Either directly on my person, or within a strongbox, since I would already be aware that a locked drawer in my desk has proved insufficient protection against theft. So you see, all of my skills, such as they are, would avail me nothing. I would never make it anywhere near the house without being caught.” Grace sighed. “He would be a fool not to have fortified his defenses—and whatever else he is, Mr. Marsden is not a fool.”
“No,” Rose sighed. “Just a cad.”
Grace squeezed her hand. “You can do better than that,” she said. “I’ll teach you some proper foul words.”
Rose startled. “Will I need them, do you think?”
For her upcoming life as a ruined and scandalous former countess, Grace supposed she meant to say. “No—but they are quite fun to use in the right company.” She patted Rose’s hand gently. “As it happens, I quite agree with you about Alicia. She is a lovely woman, and so very fond of you all.” She paused, took Rose’s hands in hers. “Don’t give up hope just yet,” she said. “Itis true that Ihave reached the limits of what I can do, myself. But there is still Alicia.”
And Alicia, she expected, would prove invaluable.
∞∞∞
“Mow.”
Grace pressed her fingertips to the bridge of her nose and sighed at the plaintive, warbling moan. In the drawing room window, Tansy had thrown herself onto her back, flopping about dramatically like an actor in the midst of a death scene gone farcical.
“Good lord,” Mercy said, blinking. “Whatever is the matter with her?”
“Same as always. She wants to visit Lord Lockhart’s garden,” Grace sighed. “I’m afraid she’s grown rather accustomed to having her own way.”
“And whose fault is that?” Felicity asked, with an elegant arch of one brow.
Grace grappled for one of the small, embroidered pillows that sat at either end of the couch and cast it across the room at Felicity’s head. “As though you weren’t just as bad,” she said with a laugh as Felicity ducked and the pillow sailed straight through the air to pop against the far wall. “I’ve lost count of how many times I caught you attempting to bribe her to like you with bits of roast chicken.”
“For all the good it has ever done me,” Felicity muttered over her cup of tea.
“Mooooow.”
“Tansy, for God’s sake!” Grace grumbled. “You’re confined tothe house, notdying.”
“She’s giving a rather passable impression of it,” Charity said dryly. “The poor thing seems just devastated. Do you suppose we ought to plant some catmint of our own?”
“It’d take months to grow to size,” Grace said. And she wasn’t entirely convinced it was only the catmint which Tansy missed so desperately. Somehow, Tansy had developed a fondness for Henry. And she thought he had done the same.
“Mow,” Tansy said mournfully, rather like Grace imagined a recently-bereaved widow might do. She cast a sorrowful glance at Grace as she resigned herself to confinement, laying her chin upon her paws with a morose sigh far too large for a creature of her size. Even if that size happened to be rather substantial, for a cat.
“Do you suppose we ought to leave her to her sulking?” Mercy asked.
“I can’t imagine it would do much good,” Grace said. “Tansy prefers an audience for her theatrics. She’d pick one of us to follow—me, most likely—and make an utter nuisance of herself. She’s done it before.”
Tansy gave a magnificently waspish swish of her great tail as if to say,And I’ll do it again.
“Well, the old girl will find her audience substantially reduced in a few hours,” Felicity said. “We have got the St. John ball tonight.”
A queer silence descended over the room, as if Felicity had blundered onto a topic that they had all tacitly agreed not to discuss. Because there was the possibility that Henry would be present, Grace supposed.
“You don’t have to come,” Mercy blurted out. “If you’re not up for it, that is to say. If—if it is too—”
Charity cleared her throat. “If you’d rather not attend this evening, we’ll make your excuses for you,” she said. “And if youdo choose to attend, we’re happy to make certain that Lockhart keeps his distance, should he happen to be present.”
“I’ll come,” Grace said. “I’m no coward.” She would have to face him sometime. Some things could be avoided only so long. And the longer she waited, the worse it would be. He’d danced so much attendance upon her just lately that the lack of it recently would no doubt invite speculation. Best to give a good show of it, present herself as every bit as sociable and heart-whole as she had always been, lest theTonbegin assuming Henry had broken her heart.
Which he had. But she’d rather that not become public knowledge. A mutual break with no hard feelings left between them—that would be for the best all around.
She ought to have expected that the façade of a courtship would come back round to bite her on the arse eventually.
