“Well, that’s just it, Sophie; it turns out that Mama and Lord Exton were friends back before her marriage — but he was notLord Exton then, nor expected to be, so of course she did not recognise the name.”
“How marvellous for you, aunt! Now there will be someone else to talk with at parties, and if you’ve already found one old friend in town, there are most likely others who will remember you too. I thought Lord Exton was a most amiable gentleman, did not you, Laura?”
Laura agreed wholeheartedly, happy to see that Sophia’s pleasure in her aunt’s good fortune was quite sincere and not merely uttered from a general desire to please.
Mrs. Marsh remarked cheerfully that the unanimity of this sentiment was a source of delight to her, and glided from the room with that innate grace her daughter still hoped to emulate in time.
Despite her pious resolve to respect her mother’s privacy with regard to the fateful meeting with her erstwhile sweetheart, Laura’s veiled glance followed her every movement that day, searching in vain for some sign — an inner radiance or, contrarily, a lowering of her mother’s spirits that might denote disappointment. Annabelle, however, went about her daily activities with her customary tranquility and that air of affectionate interest in the girls’ concerns that characterised her demeanour.
If anyone’s state of mind could be described as heightened or altered, that person was Laura, whose frustrated curiosity finally triumphed over good intentions when she went to her mother’s room to say goodnight.
“Mama, did you … did you find Lord Exton much changed?” she blurted.
Her eyes never blinked, but the hand holding the hairbrush stilled momentarily as Mrs. Marsh considered the question. “No,” she said after the briefest of pauses. “Allowing for the natural effects of the passage of time, I found him very …familiar. The only thing that seemed … odd,” she added, resuming the slow brush strokes and speaking as if more to herself than Laura, “was to see him as a parent. That aspect was entirely new.”
“Lord Exton seemed like a wonderful father to me.”
Mrs. Marsh smiled at her daughter’s eager assertion. “An affectionate one certainly, and small wonder, for Henry is a very appealing child, but one feels for their situation.”
“Yes. Henry has lost his mother and Lord Exton feels helpless to ease his grieving, which makes him perhaps more to be pitied than the child.”
“Your tender heart does you credit, my love.” Mrs. Marsh put down her brush and took up the nightcap lying on the table top. “As in all things, time will work its healing magic. And, speaking of time, it is more than time we were in our beds, for we have an especially full day tomorrow.” As she spoke, Mrs. Marsh tied the strings of her nightcap and rose from the dressing table.
Laura received her dismissal with assumed grace, wishing her parent a smiling goodnight. She returned to her bedchamber but not immediately to sleep. Her over-active brain persisted in reprocessing all her impressions of Lord Exton’s call and the recent exchange with her mother. She kept her journal entry brief and factual but was incapable of editing her thoughts — or perhaps her imagination, she admitted in some exasperation as she neared the threshold of sleep.
On the positive side, the event she’d been anticipating had passed off smoothly and, yes, happily. She could predict with some confidence that Lord Exton would become an integral part of their circle this spring and hoped that a renewed attachment would flourish between her mother and the man she had loved as a girl. Nothing she’d seen or heard from her parent thus far was of a nature to provide active nourishment for this little mustard seed of hope, but she did not yet despair that it hadfallen on barren ground. Her constitution was too impatient, that was the whole problem.
“And you call yourself a farmer,” she muttered, turning her pillow over in search of a cooler spot for her heated cheek. As a farmer, she knew that time was every bit as vital as water and sunshine in predicting a good crop; one simply could not rush nature. Her intellect accepted this maxim, but she drifted off to sleep devising improbable schemes that would throw her mother and Lord Exton together under circumstances guaranteed to nurture any latent romantic feelings they might secretly harbour.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
On the evening of Lady Bentley’s card party the Mount Street ladies presented a uniform picture of pulchritude and poise to the casual observer. The beauty was authentic, but in one member of the triumvirate a keener eye would discover that the poise was suspect. Laura’s expression of cool civility was a mask imposed to conceal a newly born and swift-growing apprehension that she would say or do something gauchethat would brand her a country bumpkin and embarrass her mother. She did not normally suffer from shyness, but even limited exposure to town manners and conversation had shown her that her interests did not closely march with those of the women she’d met thus far.
She had deplored her father’s reclusive habits in Hertfordshire, but here in London Laura was forced to entertain a lowering suspicion that her own nature might be similarly retiring.
Of course, she could always pretend an interest she did not share, nod and agree with whatever was said. This might keep her safe from egregious errors, but the idea of figuring as a ninny, a nonentity with nothing to say for herself, was scarcely appealing. Common sense told her that this was the lesser evil, however, so she gave herself a final critique in the mirror, satisfied that her appearance at least would conform with the unwritten requirement for modesty in one’s first season, and sailed down the stairs with head held high in unconscious preparation for social battle.
Laura’s dithering having retarded her progress, she was the last to appear in the saloon. Her eyes winged to her parent, who was standing near one of the sofas chatting with her brother while Sophia tinkled idly on the pianoforte. “Mama, you lookso beautiful,” she exclaimed impulsively, the apology for her tardiness vanishing in a rush of emotion. “I’ve never seen you wear that lovely peachy rose colour before. It is vastly becoming, do you not agree, uncle?”
“Your mother looks very well,” Sir Oswald said in his ponderous manner, “although if my opinion had been sought, I would have recommended a less frivolous colour, one more in keeping with her role as duenna.”
“You will have to wear a sign proclaiming yourself a chaperone when we go to Almack’s, Aunt Annabelle, or you will steal all the girls’ dancing partners,” Sophia declared gaily, quitting her post at the pianoforte.
Her cousin’s timely intervention, bolstered by a warning glance from her mother, enabled Laura to master the resentment her uncle’s criticism of his sister’s judgment had aroused in her breast as she responded politely to his measured approval of her own appearance. She grinned at Sophia, who sauntered over to give her cousin an all-over feminine appraisal before declaring, “That willow green shade suits your colouring, and I like the matching ribbon threaded through your hair.”
“May I return the compliment? Yellow is very becoming to you, especially that rich jonquil shade.”
“Yes, you both look lovely, girls, and together you are the very breath of spring, do you not agree, Oswald?”
Sophia overbore her father’s civil assent to implore, “I do understand that you could not renege on a previous engagement to accompany us tonight, Papa, but you won’t forget that you promised to escort us to Almack’s next week?”
Sir Oswald was reassuring her on this point when Jimson announced that the carriage had arrived to transport the ladies to their party.
The short drive to the Bentley residence was enlivened by Sophia’s joking speculations on the likely age of their fellowguests at the card party. Her improbably high estimates were received with smiling indulgence by her aunt and increasing dismay by her cousin. Correctly interpreting the alarm on her daughter’s face, Mrs. Marsh said cheerfully, “My dear Sophie, Helena Bentley is near my own age and I assure you, though she may indeed number some valetudinarians amongst her acquaintance, she is more likely to invite those friends from our youth, many of whom will have sons and daughters whom you will meet during the season.”
Happily, Mrs. Marsh proved correct in her supposition.
Their host, whom they had not previously met, was a tall, heavy-set man with a pleasant face surmounted by an untidy wealth of grizzled ginger curls. He beamed a smile at all three women, told Mrs. Marsh that he’d eagerly anticipated making the acquaintance of one long held in deep affection by his dear wife, and enthusiastically predicted that two such beautiful young ladies were bound to become the toasts of the town. Within the hour Laura and Sophia had been presented to two young men and three girls near their age, including one who was also to make her initial appearance at Almack’s in the next week. Laura had the pleasure of seeing her parent warmly remembered by the mothers of two of the young ladies. Observing that Annabelle was caught up in a spate of happy reminiscences, she allowed herself to be included in a group being propelled by Lady Bentley toward a large round table. The young people were still getting settled, arguing the merits of speculation versus silver loo when Lord Bentley appeared at Laura’s elbow, declaring jovially, “Here are two more dedicated gamesters eager to join the fray, my dear. May I present Lord Hastings and Mr. Castle?”
