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“No. But Sir William Fairchild is coming this way, and he expects you to look pleased.”

He was steering toward them with purpose. Tristan bowed and asked whether he had found the supper room. By the time he had answered a question about the wine, his mother had gone. The business of giving a ball absorbed him: a partner found for a woman abandoned beside the doors, a shortage of glasses settled. An elderly friend placed the first Ashcombe ball several years before the house was built, and Tristan let him. Every discomfort in the room could be repaired except the one he had made himself.

For fifteen minutes, he managed not to look for Lydia. Then he heard laughter near the sofa and turned before he could stop himself. She was still with the young woman. Henry stood over them holding a plate apparently subject to dispute. Lydia accepted a small cake, her brother bowed as if she had conferred a title, and the laugh she gave him reached Tristan even through the music. He wished, rather foolishly, that he had been the one to draw it from her.

Tristan looked away. He had interrupted her dance and then expected her to understand that his intentions remained unchanged. Put plainly, it was desire without the honesty to own it. Glances had followed them when she left the floor. In a room trained to turn gestures into intentions, his interruption had been louder than any declaration he had refused to make. He had protected himself from courtship by behaving exactly like a jealous suitor. The realization left an unpleasant tightness in his chest.

“Your Grace.”

Pembroke stood at the entrance to the passage, his expression composed. “May I have a word?”

Tristan set his untouched glass on a passing tray. “Of course.”

They moved far enough from the ballroom that they no longer had to raise their voices. Pembroke stopped beneath a portrait and waited until a servant carrying fresh candles had passed. “What happened between you and my daughter?”

“We disagreed.”

“About?”

Tristan glanced toward the open doors. “There is no understanding between us, if that is your concern. I have made no offer.”

“I am aware of that.”

“I do not intend to pursue a marriage I cannot honestly offer her.”

Pembroke regarded him steadily. “You seem to believe I have come to demand one.”

“Have you not?”

“No.”

The answer was so plain that Tristan felt the discourtesy of his own question. Pembroke continued before he could correct it. “If you do not wish to marry Lydia, that is your decision. I would rather know it now than learn it after she has become attached to you.”

Pembroke went on. “But you cannot single her out before a roomful of people and expect them to understand whatever private distinctions you have made.”

“I asked her to dance.”

“You interrupted another gentleman to do it.”

“Yes.”

“And she left you before the dance ended. I have already been asked whether she is unwell.”

The ballroom doors stood open behind him. Tristan had considered the attention of their mothers. It had been convenient not to imagine everyone else watching too. “She is not.”

“Then I should like her to have no further need of that explanation.”

“I understand.” He did not trust himself to say more.

“I hope so. My daughter came here believing that your family was considering a match in earnest. I allowed her to come on that understanding. Whether your mother exceeded her authority is a matter for the two of you.”

“She did.”

“Then speak to her about it. Lydia cannot settle your disagreement for you.”

A burst of applause came through the doors as the music ended. Pembroke waited for it to subside. “She has other prospects, Your Grace. I will not see them damaged because you find it inconvenient to let her pursue them.”

Pembroke’s reproach reached him where his mother’s had not. His mother could call his loneliness concern; Lydia’s father spoke only of consequence. Rank would protect Tristan from gossip. It would not protect her from being defined by his attention. And he had done precisely what he had promised himself he would never do: made an innocent woman suffer for his own selfishness.