Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
“The food is definitely all ordered, isn’t it?
” Rose asked Mrs. Jennings as they walked through the Ravenhill House ballroom where maids with feather dusters or polishing cloths were working assiduously to shine the long-covered chandeliers, door fittings and window glass. “Including the salmon we discussed?”
“Everything is in hand,” the housekeeper assured her.
“The salmon will be arriving on ice the day before the ball and will stay perfectly fresh in the present weather. You may view the order and delivery book in my room any time you wish to reassure yourself of what is still to come… Agnes, you have missed a spot on that window!”
“And the champagne?” added Rose, drawing the sharp-eyed housekeeper back again from her inspection of the maids’ work. “Did we need to order more or not?”
“No, Mr. Smithers checked the cellars and there was certainly enough for a winter ball of this size,” reported Mrs. Jennings, mixing efficiency and respect admirably in her words and tone.
“The previous Duke of Ravenhill, God rest his soul, laid in a good supply when he first inherited the estate. Then, the poor man was dead within the month before he could give any hospitality.”
“Very sad,” murmured Rose, who had not known the man and understood that Dorian himself had barely known his cousin either.
“Well, it is of excellent quality and will not be wasted in any case,” remarked the practical housekeeper. “Did you require my help in writing the last set of invitations? I believe we have replies now from all the earlier invitees.”
Rose shook her head.
“They are all done, including those for neighboring estates whom we’ve already talked to about the ball. I will need your help with some last addresses however, and it would be good to know which neighbors might expect a personal delivery.”
“Why, none of them, I shouldn’t think, although most of them would be honored. Until you and His Grace went about at Christmas, none of the neighborhood had met any of the Dukes of Ravenhill for years. It is for you and His Grace to decide how well you wish to be known in the neighborhood.”
Turning away to hide her expression, Rose repressed a sigh.
“Thank you, Mrs. Jennings. I will think it over. That will be all for now. You may return to your work.”
“Very good, Your Grace,” responded the busy little woman, giving a brief curtsy and then a bright smile.
“This won’t just be your first ball as hostess.
It will be the first at Ravenhill House in over fifty years!
The whole household is excited and I dare say the county and the ton will be equally so. ”
Rose smiled back and watched Mrs. Jennings withdraw to the ballroom windows, presumably to check that Agnes was now giving proper attention to the glasswork.
Alone again, Rose bit her lip and thought about the question of calling on neighbors with invitations to their ball.
A week ago, she would have simply found Dorian and asked him for his thoughts.
Since Christmas, however, his mood had been strange.
He seemed cooler, almost as avoidant as when she first arrived, often skipping meals or going for long, solitary rides.
Nor had her husband once come to her bed. He had not even laid a finger upon her arm, or a kiss upon her lips in the five days since Christmas. As they had not argued, Rose was baffled and hurt by this withdrawal of physical affection.
Was it something she had said or done? Was it something to do with that conversation about Dorian’s unhappy early life? Perhaps he was sorry to have revealed so much. But Rose was his wife. Whom else could he talk to if not her? And why should he regret it? She was not unkind or indiscreet.
Maybe it was only, as Dorian claimed himself, that Rose was very busy in organizing this first ball and he did not wish to distract her from so challenging a task.
What strange ideas he had! However busy she was, Rose would have far preferred to fall asleep in Dorian’s arms even if he woke her early with his kisses and impetuously lusting morning manhood.
Still, the Duchess of Ravenhill could hardly call on neighbors like the unmarried Admiral Turnbull alone, could she? This nettle must be grasped.
Resolutely, Rose made her way to the Duke of Ravenhill’s study. He was often lurking in there recently, almost as though avoiding rooms like the library or the drawing room, where he might encounter Rose.
She knocked and went inside, to find Dorian with pen in hand, poring over a letter at his desk. When his dark eyes first looked up at Rose they were full of the warmth and life that made her heart sing, but then the light in them died and he put down his pen on its tray.
“Rose, how are you?” he said very formally. “I hear from Mrs. Jennings that you are managing splendidly with the ball preparations.”
While it was good to know that she had earned the housekeeper’s respect, this distant praise was not what Rose wanted to hear from her husband’s lips.
“Yes, I believe it will be a great success. Apparently, it will be a major event in the neighborhood as the Dukes of Ravenhill have not given a ball for over fifty years.”
“I suppose not,” Dorian mused, seeming unsurprised. “I am still a newcomer, my cousin’s time was so brief, and his father so long widowed and ailing.”
“I was thinking that we should deliver some of the neighborhood invitations by hand. We already invited neighbors verbally at Christmas, but left their cards until last.”
“Do go ahead,” agreed Dorian equably, the evenness of his tone and his lack of understanding infuriating her. “As you know, the carriage is always at your disposal.”
“I cannot call alone on an unmarried naval officer in his forties,” Rose pointed out impatiently, something that should be blatantly obvious. “You must come with me in several cases, unless you wish me the talk of the county.”
“Then I shall do so,” he answered, remaining calm. “Only let me know what time you plan to make these calls and I shall be at the carriage.”
“Very well,” Rose said, turning on her heel and going to the door. “I shall do that.”
She did not know whether she turned away to hide the tears in her eyes or to avoid seeing the facile, charming smile she expected to see on his face.
Rose knew Dorian too well now to not to see when his smile was real, and when it was part of his act. Oh yes, with his handsome face and easy manner, little Dorian had learned all too well how to play to the gallery!
It would have been better if he were angry or upset, as he had been when Rose revealed her short-lived and largely imaginary interest in Lord Gillingham. That mood was something she could understand and respond to.
Dorian’s present behavior seemed both dishonest and impossible to address. Only the first gleam of pleasure in his eyes when she entered the study had seemed real in their latest conversation, and that might have related to his letter as easily as to Rose.
As she closed the study door with this thought, a horrible suspicion reared in Rose’s breast. To whom had her husband been writing?
Candle in hand, Rose made her way to the gallery.
It was finally the night of the Ravenhill House ball and there was only an hour now until guests arrived.
Furniture, flowers and candles were arranged, the first lot of food was laid out in the refreshment room and champagne stood in ice buckets at serving tables in the ballroom.
Once satisfied with the house, and sure that Mrs. Jennings could deal with any practical problems that arose, Rose turned to her own outfitting.
Mabel had helped her to dress in one of the new ball gowns from her trousseau, in white muslin trimmed with tiny roses.
She wore her grandmother’s pearls at her throat and her hair was pinned with matching pearl pins.
The red-haired young maid had seemed slightly subdued while dressing Rose tonight, although she might only have been mirroring her mistress’s own mood.
Likely both of them had expected more of this ball when its planning first began.
Did Mabel and the rest of the staff know that the Duke and Duchess of Ravenhill were sleeping apart again?
Rose supposed that their bedlinen told its own story.
“You look very pretty, Your Grace,” Mabel had told her dutifully and Rose had thanked her for her efforts.
Rose knew that her dress was neither as beautiful nor as sophisticated as the blue gown Dorian had bought for her for the Carforth ball, nor was her jewelry as rich.
Still, they fitted her well and suited her coloring.
If Lady Lepford, or some other lover of Dorian’s, was here tonight, Rose did not feel she could compete.
She would not humiliate herself by trying.
Her husband had told her more than once that she was the loveliest woman he had ever met but perhaps he said that to every woman who passed through his bed.
Perhaps nothing Dorian had said or done had been sincere or meaningful to him at all.
He might really be the handsome, charming rogue that his “Wolf of West London” nickname implied.
That thought only made Rose want to lock herself in her room and weep.
Tonight that was impossible, however. Rose was the Duchess of Ravenhill and hostess of the first ball at Ravenhill House for several generations.
She must smile as she welcomed their guests, make polite conversation for hours, and likely even dance with at least a few high ranking guests, with all eyes upon her.
Yet tonight, Rose had never felt more alone and more like the helpless wallflower that many people had believed her to be before her marriage.
Entering the gallery, she approached the portrait of Duchess Juliana with brimming eyes and a trembling lower lip.
How elegant, sure and capable that woman looked to Rose’s eyes!
“How will I manage? I am not like you, Juliana. You were strong enough to manage your home and your husband and bring five children into the world. I am afraid of everything.”
Of course, a picture could not answer her, but Rose still imagined she saw a kindness and compassion in that confident blue gaze. Duchess Juliana must have given many balls, but one must have been her first, and she must have been nervous too.
Rose visualized her predecessor preparing the house and then herself, just as Rose had done.
She saw Juliana readying herself to go downstairs in her old-fashioned blue silk gown.
Then, in her daydream, she saw a man in antique breeches and waistcoat step out and offer his arm with a smile of love and reassurance and her heart fell even further.
Yes, Duchess Juliana’s husband had presumably been by her side to support her and give her strength.
Rose, meanwhile, must do everything alone.
Even if Dorian deigned to appear at her side downstairs, he would not be fully present, only turning on his charm to fool their guests, and remaining at some impossible distance from Rose in reality.
“I cannot bear it!” she sobbed to the painting. “How can I bear it?”
“Rose?” called out a deep voice full of concern, and she spun around to see Dorian walking quickly towards her, already in evening dress, with neatly brushed hair.
Rose’s heart pounded and raced as her handsome husband unexpectedly pulled her into his arms and hugged her close to him, kissing her hair and murmuring her name.
“What are you doing here?” she asked through her tears. “I was looking for you all day.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing…but I heard your voice in here and I cannot bear to see you unhappy,” Dorian blurted out and when Rose looked up, his face seemed entirely, bewilderingly, sincere.
Part of Rose wanted to rail against her husband, to demand to know whether he had brought a lover there to this ball tonight, or even to slap his face.
Another part of her wanted to nestle in his arms, kiss his lips and do everything that might induce him to take her here on the floor of the gallery.
Neither course of action was possible tonight. The Duke and Duchess of Ravenhill had a ball to host and all personal resolution must be postponed until it was over.
“I need you beside me tonight, Dorian,” Rose told him, her voice sounding surer than she had expected it to come out. “I can’t do this by myself.”
“I won’t leave you,” he promised her, again with that puzzling sincerity that she wanted to believe in but could not, after his recent behavior. “You will be marvelous. You already are.”
As Dorian wiped away her tears, he looked to be in pain himself but nothing of this made sense. Glancing back to Duchess Juliana once more, Rose imagined seeing benediction in the woman’s expression. God knew she needed such blessing right now.
With a deep breath, she took Dorian’s arm and stood up straight. She could do this. She must. Rose was the Duchess of Ravenhill now and it was her duty.
“I am ready,” Rose said. “We should go downstairs.”