Lucy paced across the room, to the door. “I knew he meant some sort of insult about the scandalous gowns Mama used to wear to parties, but I didn’t push him into the punch bowl.”
Bess’s mouth was dry. “What did you say to him?”
“I smiled back and thanked him.” Lucy glanced over her shoulder at Bess, her hand on the doorknob. “I smoothed it over, the way you would have done.”
“I never meant for you to stand quietly by and let yourself be insulted!”
“But that’s the way the world works,” Lucy pointed out. “Men like Thornecliff and Finch and my brother have all the power and can say and do whatever they like. Women have to put on a smile and bear it.”
Bess felt ill. “Lucy, no, that’s not?—”
“I’m tired, Bess.” And she sounded it, weary beyond her years and dull like Lucy Lively should never, ever be. “I think I’ll take a short nap.”
Bess stood, bumping against the dainty tea table and nearly knocking over the teapot. Swearing, she sopped up the spilled tea with a scallop-edged napkin and when she looked up, Lucy was gone.
Her stomach was in knots. Was this what she’d taught Lucy? By example, if not in so many words.
I smoothed it over.
Damn it all. Bess’s mind was suddenly full of Nathaniel’s low, gravelly voice telling her she didn’t need to make everything nice all the time. That she didn’t need to smooth everything over to make other people comfortable.
That he’d want her, even if it was a little messy. If she was a mess.
Bess shook herself free of her thoughts. She had to talk to Lucy. Leaving the soggy remains of their tea where it sat, Bess hurried to the door only to collide with the footman who was about to enter.
The footman, eyes wide, fumbled his silver salver and the folded, sealed letter atop it while Bess apologized for her clumsiness.
“Not at all, Mrs. Pickford,” the footman intoned, recovering his equanimity much more quickly than Bess. “There is a letter for you.”
Thanking him, Bess took the letter and darted into the hall, but Lucy was long gone. Bess bit her lip, debating whether to interrupt her nap with a difficult conversation she wasn’t sure how to approach in the first place.
It was difficult to teach what you didn’t know, after all.
Nathaniel’s soft, incisive words the other night had peeled back a protective layer of Bess’s psyche that had long kept her from examining her own tendency to put the comfort of others before her own.
And why was that such a bad thing, she’d argued with herself for the past three days. Wasn’t it supposed to be a good thing to take other people’s feelings into account?
Life generally ran smoother when there was someone smoothing things over, Bess had always found.
This, she saw now. This was why it was a bad thing. She could see it with Lucy in a way she couldn’t for herself.
No woman should have to put up with a man’s insulting, insinuating comments merely to keep the peace. Certainly not Lucy, as vibrant and unspoiled a creature as any ever created. It shouldn’t be Lucy’s responsibility to take everything she was feeling and thinking and stuff it down deep for the sake of getting along in a society that would ask that of her.
Maybe it was the practical choice. The sensible choice. But Bess could no longer see it as the right choice for Lucy.
Later, she promised herself. She would let Lucy rest for now, and later, Bess would talk to her. Tell her—there was more to life than being sensible. That she didn’t have to hide who she was in order to be happy.
That if Lucy wanted to go home to Little Kissington at once, Bess would take her.
Heart cracking and mind racing, Bess absently broke open the seal on the letter she still held and smoothed out the thick, creamy paper.
It wasn’t a letter, but an invitation.
The honor of your company is cordially requested at the Midsummer Masquerade…
Bess’s heart leapt. Her palms went damp as she read the invitation through again, and then again to be sure.
An invitation to a masked ball. That very night.
