Cecily sat still.
Ellen tucked in the last pin. “There,” she announced, with the satisfaction of a completed task. “You look very well, Your Grace.”
Cecily looked at her reflection. The ring on her left hand caught the morning light, the small stone the color of his eyes. She had noticed that on the first day she put it on. She was still noticing it.
You are in a great deal of trouble,she told her reflection silently.
She went down for breakfast, only to find he was not there. His chair was empty. His cup was not on the table. No letter beside his place, no coat on the back of the door, nothing to suggest he had been down at all.
She firmly told herself to stop feeling let down.
Letitia was there, eating toast with the comprehensive attention she gave to all activities. Isadora sat beside her, reading something she had tucked beside her plate in the way she always did, the book angled so it appeared she was simply looking at the table if anyone glanced over.
“You’re not reading at the table,” Cecily said, sitting.
“I am aware of the rule,” Isadora replied, without looking up.
“The rule still applies when you’re aware of it.” Cecily smiled sweetly.
Isadora closed the book with the sigh of a principled person making a concession, then looked up. “You look well.” Then, she leaned closer with interest. “You look like you slept well.”
“I slept adequately.”
“You’re smiling,” Letitia noted.
“I’m not smiling.”
“You were when you came in. Before you noticed William wasn’t here.” Letitia looked at her. “Was the ball very good? I heard the carriage at half past twelve, and I thought you had stayed until the end, which means either the company was excellent or something happened.”
“The company was excellent,” Cecily replied.
Letitia nodded her head once. “I knew it. Was Lady Pemberton kind? She looks kind in portraits, but portraits are unreliable. People say so.”
“She was very kind.”
“And Lady Ashford?” Isadora probed.
“Also kind,” Cecily replied. “In the end.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“And something happened,” Letitia said. “Obviously.”
“Nothing happened,” Cecily said, and reached for the toast. She did not look at any of them.
“Mrs. Hatch says Lady Pemberton’s balls are always the best of the Season,” Letitia continued, undeterred, piling marmalade. “She went once, years ago, as a young woman, before she became Mrs. Hatch. She said the supper was extraordinary. Was the supper extraordinary?”
“I barely touched the supper,” Cecily said.
“Because you were dancing?”
“Among other things.”
“Who did you dance with?”
“Several people.”
