Chapter Nine #2
Hawthorn pushed the decanters around the table. “Drink up, gentlemen, and we’ll rejoin the ladies.”
“What is our entertainment this evening?” Barty Yeo, Tabitha’s brother, asked.
“Your choice of cards or moonlight dancing on the terrace,” Hawthorn replied. “If the rain stays off and if there is a moon!”
“Do you dance, Duke?” Carily asked, as though determined to find a tear to worry at.
“Up to a point,” Jack said.
“What point?” Durward asked, apparently entertained.
“Gun point,” suggested someone sotto voce.
“The point of foolhardiness,” Jack said lightly, “on the part of the lady concerned.”
“I expect you’re a positive card sharp, then,” Carily mocked.
“No,” Jack said, bored. “This is excellent port, Hawthorn. Which merchant do you use?”
***
TABITHA HAD RARELY been so relieved to escape to the company of her own sex. She was annoyed with Louisa for placing her beside Carily again, for the man was growing increasingly impossible, as though he sensed something in Jack’s arrival that was against him.
Unfortunately, it was inspiring him to show-off his closeness to her, as though she had granted him the right to touch her hand, lean too near, even stroke her leg beneath the table.
He couldn’t have known just how close to screaming that brought her.
But she had every intention of avoiding him for the rest of the evening—for the rest of the week, in fact.
In the drawing room, she flopped onto a chair whose arms were too narrow for anyone else to perch on and thought with peculiar intensity of Jack.
He had looked quietly stunning in dark evening dress, dignified without being haughty, handsome in a way that appeared tasteful and good-mannered rather than overly frail.
All the same, she could see him unwittingly setting a fashion trend for that refined look and knew it would amuse him.
Not that she had watched him except from the corner of her eye occasionally, to be sure he was not struggling.
He wasn’t. He appeared to make Louisa laugh and even entertain the exacting Lady Kenwood without obvious effort.
She wished he was beside her now, his company soothing, unthreatening, expecting nothing and yet. ..
He moved her. There was something about him that both aroused and melted her. He always made her think in different directions. And laugh. A mass of contradictions that inspired the same in her. He made her feel alive in a good way, and not a desperate, brittle sort of good either.
He would make someone the most perfect husband. How sad that it would not be her...
As though her thoughts had conjured him, he strolled into the room with Sir Peter, saying something over his shoulder to Durward that brought forth the latter’s distinctive crack of laughter.
Towards the back of the group, Carily entered, deep in conversation with Barty.
That made her uneasy, too. But at least it kept him away from her.
“Is it dark enough yet for the moonlight dance?” Amelia Kenwood asked eagerly, causing a general ripple of excited laughter.
Tabitha went out of the French windows with Louisa to gauge the weather.
Footmen were summoned to light lanterns and torches and one of the dowagers, who had been a fine musician in her youth, took her place at the pianoforte, sorting through music.
Tabitha supervised the placement of chairs and extra shawls, to make sure there were always two chaperones outside with the young people.
“How ridiculous that you and I should be chaperones,” Louisa whispered with a gurgle of laughter. “I feel no older than these children!”
I do, Tabitha thought. A lifetime older.
.. She ached for the growing up many of them would face.
At least she would have some control over Lily’s.
Though when the first dancers spilled outside for the country dance set, she was not best pleased to discover Lily’s first partner was Carily.
He even threw Tabitha a look of triumph, as though he expected to have made her jealous.
The idea would have been laughable except she would not have him using Lily in such a way. The music began, drifting out of the drawing room windows quite clearly enough for the dancers. Although it was still only twilight, the sight of the graceful figures was both pretty and romantic.
Someone dropped into the chair beside hers, on the edge of the terrace.
“Wouldn’t you rather be dancing?” asked the Duke of Isbourne.
“No. Wouldn’t you?”
“Perhaps later. I wondered if I might ask Lily.”
“You must ask whomever you like.”
“I thought you would turn me down.”
“I would when I am on chaperone duty. At least the young bucks appear to be sober.”
“Hawthorn did swipe the port and brandy away rather sharply and marched us to the drawing room.”
“A good effort, but they all know where it’s kept. Is no one playing cards?”
“A few of the older fellows. Are you quite well, Tabitha?”
She blinked at him. “Of course I am. Are you? Or wishing you were back at Isley Place? Or carefree on the road?”
“Neither. I am perfectly content where I am.”
The dance came to a graceful end amid much applause and happy laughter. Lily flitted over. “Oh, Tab, it’s such fun to dance outside! You should try it! So should your grace,” she added politely.
“I would love to.” His grace had already risen. “Perhaps you would be my guide—I am not used to dancing.”
Lily smiled at him and curtseyed before laying her hand happily on his arm. He bowed gravely to Tabitha and led his prize into the new set. Tabitha was feeling quite benign —until Carily slipped into the vacant chair.
It crossed her mind that he had engineered this, that he had sent Lily straight to her in the hope the duke would dance with her and leave the chair free. But perhaps she was being overly suspicious.
“Come for a walk with me,” he said softly.
“I am on chaperone duty.”
“Lily is perfectly safe with the Duke of Deathly Dull. Though she might need to bathe her poor feet afterward.”
“Such a spiteful cat, aren’t you, Carily? He dances as well as you.” He did, too, and with no obvious guidance from Lily.
Carily watched them broodingly for a few minutes. “Aiming a bit high, aren’t you? Considering the state of the Sark estate. Her dowry is barely respectable.”
Tabitha sighed and pretended to smother a yawn.
“Oh, drat you, Tabbie, come for a walk,” he exclaimed. He even took her hand as he jumped to his feet, aiming to pull her with him.
“I am about,” she said between her teeth, “to make an utter fool of you.”
He released her at once, though his expression turned ugly. “How long do you imagine you can keep me at arms’ length?” he demanded.
“For ever. Go away, Carily, you’ve turned into a crashing bore.” She waved him aside as though merely trying to see the dancers better.
He turned on his heel and stalked off into the drawing room.
***
JACK FOUND LILY’S ATTITUDE refreshing. She neither flirted nor gazed at him in awe as though he were some god come down to earth, which were the main responses of the other unmarried young ladies he had spoken to.
He had already taken a moment earlier in the evening to apologize for his less than honest introduction at the Headless Horseman, and now she seemed happy enough to carry on that discussion when the movements of the dance allowed.
“I don’t in the least blame you,” she said cheerfully. “It must be horrible to be constantly toadied and fawned over and cheated by innkeepers who imagine they can overcharge you.”
“It has not happened to me much,” he said cautiously. “In fact, I was merely playing truant and not ready to give up.”
“What changed your mind? Tabitha?”
He smiled. “Yes. Is it so obvious?”
“Men do fall in love with her very easily,” she said, a shade wistfully.
“And who is she in love with?”
She gave him a rather adult look, as she spun away from him. When next they came together, she said, “You will have to ask her that. Is that why you asked me to dance?”
“Actually, no. I believe you are aware that your papa and mine have placed us in an awkward situation.”
“Oh, that. Tabitha says we need not regard it.”
“And what do you say?”
There was an annoyingly long gap as they danced with different people, before they again stood close enough to converse.
“You mean, do I want to be a duchess?” she said bluntly. “I’m sure it would have its advantages, and I do rather like you. But I have no intention of marrying anyone who is in love with someone else. Whether at eighteen or at eight-and-twenty.”
He smiled, not even embarrassed by her insight, and for some reason her breath caught. “What a very sensible person you are.”
“So are you,” she said generously. “And you dance well.”
They parted from each other in perfect harmony, and Jack, flooded with relief, looked about for Tabitha. Mrs. Saunders had replaced her in the chaperone’s chair, so he strolled back into the house.