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He turned to her at once. She didn’t look at him but at Octavia.

“Lady Luxborough encourages me to accompany your sister to Lady Hardwicke’s ball. She has a low opinion of Lady Hardwicke, and a high opinion of you, and believes I should strive to assist you and Octavia in any way I can.”

“Thank you,” he said, careful not to smile at his triumph. “I am in Lady Luxborough’s debt.”

“You are,” she agreed, still not meeting his gaze.

“By the way, I mean to win your game.”

“You aren’t playing,” she protested, turning to him with a flash of those eyes that made him catch his breath.

“I’ll make my guess to you and not spoil it for the others,” he told her.

“If you dare. You could get it wrong, you know.”

“Dare? You think I’ll get it wrong?” He looked astonished at the idea and leaned closer, lowering his voice for her alone. “Try me. Your specter’s a traveler whose favorite chair is that Egyptian monstrosity in the corner, which perhaps reminds him of his dry tomb above the Nile.”

Her eyes widened, but she gave no other sign that he’d hit the mark. “Until tomorrow night,” he said, and went to collect his sister.

* * * *

At midnight in the crowded supper room of another great house, Charles spotted the marchioness seated at a small table, surrounded by her growing court of interested gentlemen, none of them in peony stripes.

As he approached, Perry made his way through the crowd bearing a plate of little iced cakes in one hand and a glass of champagne in the other. With his gaze fixed in earnest concentration on the items he held, Perry looked much as he had at school, slight of build and youthful in face. In a word, vulnerable. Years on the town had not hardened him.

Charles could not catch his friend’s eye, as Perry patiently begged pardon of those in his path, taking care not to let the shifting bodies knock the plate or the glass.

Charles stopped when he realized that Perry’s goal was the marchioness.

Perry stepped into the circle around her, a slight furrow knitting his smooth brow.

“Oh dear, Mr. Pilkington,” she said with a laugh. “You must forgive me for sending you off on a foolish errand. You see that am perfectly provided for at the moment, thanks to these gentlemen.” She raised a glass of champagne to her lips.

Perry, with his hands full, looked at the gentlemen around her and at the table covered with plates. Charles stiffened with long forgotten outrage. In the group around the marchioness were some of their old schoolmates who had once delighted in mocking Perry.

“Another time, marchioness,” Perry said with a bow. He tried to back away but remained neatly trapped in place by her admirers.

“Drink up, Pilkington,” said Sedley next to Perry, giving him a clap on the back that sent champagne sloshing over his hand. No one laughed, but no one offered to help.

Perry blinked slightly, awareness of the trick dawning in his eyes. Then he simply leaned over the table and poured the rest of the champagne into a dish of macaroons. While the others stared at the floating macaroons, he slipped from the circle.

Charles waited a moment to recover a little of his temper. He did not like to see his friend mocked, but a ballroom was not a boys school, and he could not use a left hook against a woman. He had to wonder why Perry had been made to look foolish. When only two gentlemen remained in the marchioness’s circle, he approached and made his bow.

“You’ve recovered from your indisposition,” he said.

“Thank you, I have, though I regret we missed our outing. Is your sister well?” One could almost mistake her smile for warmth except for the measuring coolness in her dark eyes.

“She is and anticipates seeing you at Lady Hardwicke’s ball.”

“I am delighted. I will call for her in my carriage,” she said.

“No need. I must claim a brother’s privilege to show her off in her new finery.”

There was nothing in these polite opening maneuvers to alarm either party, he supposed, yet he sensed the marchioness’s alertness to their surroundings. It was a good quality in a spy, that ability to notice a great deal without appearing to attend specifically to any person or object. With smiles and a wave of a black lace fan, she dismissed the two gentlemen who had lingered by her side.

“What did you find to do with yourself without me, I wonder?” she asked.

“Nothing.” He sat in a gilt chair deserted by one of her earlier companions. “I am a dull fellow, I fear. I attended to estate matters, did a little sparring”—he flexed his uninjured right hand—“and kept Octavia occupied. I had not realized the work it is to chaperone a very young lady about London.”