Chapter 16
Sixteen
After retrieving a glass of Negus for his mother, Lord Finlay, aka Henry Mackenzie, steered her over to a group of her acquaintances and nodded in acknowledgement when she reminded him to be back to escort her to her seat when the time came.
He then rejoined Alec, surprisingly well assembled this evening, who had positioned himself at the back of the room.
While people ebbed and flowed around them, they occupied a tiny pocket of privacy.
Glances occasionally came their way, but everyone was so focused on seeing and being seen, no one would be listening.
They thus had the perfect opportunity to observe the entrance of the Wentworth party.
“She is magnificent,” Alec breathed, as Millicent held her moment at the doorway.
“Wentworth! Oh, Lord!” Finn muttered under his breath, but loud enough for Alec to hear.
“What? What is it?”
Finn turned to look at his cousin with a grimace of dismay.
“Lord Wentworth is terribly to let. He has gambled away the family’s fortune.
They are only able to launch their daughter this Season, I have been told, because they have undertaken to present the daughter of some prince of manufacturing from the Midlands or thereabouts.
Word is, said prince will settle somewhere in the neighborhood of five thousand pounds on the daughter at marriage, but then, she is his sole heir.
So, what will she inherit? Significantly more. ”
Alec lifted an eyebrow. “That is remarkably specific for ‘I have been told,’ and ‘some prince of manufacturing.’”
“Yes, well, very little escapes the mamas who are overseeing the Season. And when you are a Nonpareil,” at this, Finn coughed politely behind his hand, “one’s man is made au courant with the latest gossip.
” He dropped his dandy pose for a moment and looked at Alec ruefully.
“You must scratch the Beauty from your list, Alec. She cannot help you.”
“I refuse to believe such an exquisite creature—”
“Alec,” interrupted his friend.
Alec stopped and glared at Finn. And then he relaxed. “She reminds of Mary, though she’s even more beautiful. What Mary would have looked like if she had come to London for a Season.”
The wistfulness in his cousin’s voice surprised Finn. It was the first time he had said anything that touched upon his feelings about his late wife. “Yes, she does.”
“Then it is the second young woman?”
“Hardcastle, I believe.”
“Ah, Hardcastle. Then it is Miss Hardcastle—of the two—I should fasten my attention on. Unless you can point me toward anyone else? I see I must rely on your guidance. Good God, how mercenary this entire process is.”
“What? Oh, yes,” and Finn struggled to come back to the present from where he had been caught up—a sudden memory of a ride out into the hills, the two of them and Mary, and hearing her laugh at something.
Alec gave him a crooked smile, one that implied he might be reading his mind, and said softly, “Yes, I remember her. And it is all right, Finn—I mean, Henry. I know you loved her, too.”
For the first time in a long while, Lord Mackenzie, Duke of Galloway, completely lost his countenance and blushed to the roots of his hair. “You—you knew?” he managed to stammer.
“I think I’ve always known. We both loved her.
I try to think of those early days, before, before everything changed.
” Keenly watching his cousin, Finn saw Alec’s eyes turn stormy, and a shadow appeared to pass over his face.
If anything, the sudden sternness threw his profile into sharp relief, and several women, young and old, available and officially off the market, gaped at him.
Finn sighed. Though he was the more exquisitely dressed of the two, Alec was able to make him into a nonentity where women were concerned.
As usual, Finn could see the man was completely unaware of his effect on the women around him.
Alec set his shoulders back and spoke again. “So, Miss Hardcastle.”
“Yes. Miss Hardcastle.”
“Unless another worthy prospect…?”
“Unless another worthy prospect. There is a Miss Fortescue I have heard tell of, but her fortune is perhaps an eighth of what Miss Hardcastle would bring to a marriage. From what I have been hearing, if you are looking for a secure sum of money for the future, Miss Wentworth’s companion should be your focus. ”
* * *
Blissfully ignorant of any discussions going on around the room concerning her, Aurora waited patiently for all to be seated and the concert begin. At first, she had been too shy to look at anything other than the floor. Then, gradually, she had taken some wider glances around the room at large.
Missie stood nearby, tall and graceful, her head floating on top of her neck as if she were an empress, coolly surveying the room.
I am such a goose! A complete ninnyhammer!
All right, take a deep breath, square my shoulders, and tear a page from Missie’s book.
There. That wasn’t so bad. No one is staring at me.
I have done nothing dreadful (at least, not yet—oh, shush!).
Take another breath. I am a young lady of wealth and some consequence.
I am beautifully dressed. I am—and here her thoughts broke off in a rapid tumble.
Because there they were, the two gentlemen from the Tower.
Standing on the far side of the room, close to the punch bowl.
The tall, pale one was very elegantly dressed; his neckcloth looked like it had taken hours of work to achieve its complexity.
His hair towered even higher above his head, swept into a sculpture which bested that of any other man in the room.
The other one, with his broad shoulders and dark hair, was more elegantly dressed than the other day.
Of course, you silly! He had not been going to an event then.
He’d been out for the day with his friend and his daughter.
Lord Raeburn. Duke of Selkirk. A Scotchman.
He hadn’t sounded Scotch when he had spoken to Marjorie.
It had been a low voice, low and—musical.
It had a resonance to it, a bass rumble beneath the baritone that had wrapped itself around her, and—Goodness, Aurora!
Do not be so ridiculous. He is a duke. I am simply the daughter of a rich nobody.
That is, of a man who was a simple country doctor who became a businessman with a manufactory; and with a wife who was also far from gentry, but who now had social pretentions.
Oh, but how Papa and Mama would love to be here, she continued to herself, in all this glittering finery.
At least there would have been two people other than herself who felt like such a complete fish out of water.
A lady’s finishing academy was not quite up to the task of making her feel entirely at home in the ballroom of a member of the Ton.
Shakespeare, on the other hand, probably had a quote for a situation like this.
There must be something in the Iliad that said it even better.
Or perhaps Ovid? No, you goose, those are love poems. And I only know about them because I snuck the book out of the locked shelf in the corner of the library that afternoon when Papa fell asleep with the key right next to him.
“Rorie?”
“‘Oh, to be silent upon a peak in Darien!’” came the fervid response. Ah, yes. Keats had come to rescue her. The Greeks were of no assistance. But Keats, yes, Keats.
“What? Rorie, whatever are you talking about? It is time to take our seats.”
And, indeed, the glasses of punch were being collected by the various footmen as they whisked unobtrusively around the room, and the scented company began to chatter and select their seats. In dismay, Aurora saw the two dukes coming closer and grabbed Missie’s arm.
“Ouch!” came the whispered epithet. “Don’t pinch!
” A footman ushered the four members of the Wentworth party to a row and handed each a beautifully calligraphed program.
Smoothing her skirt, Missie turned unseeing eyes at the list of music which would be played.
Letting out a sigh, she continued, “Pray this is over soon.”
“Millicent, dear,” hissed her mother, “A young lady is always appreciative of music. Remember, it shows the proper amount of sensibility and refinement.”
“Yes, Mama.”
Aurora could only stare at the program in delight.
She had longed to play the violin, but that was not considered an instrument for young ladies.
The harp, perhaps, or the pianoforte, both of which she had been able to study at Miss Fielding’s.
And what a selection was on offer tonight!
For whatever Lady Hinsdale’s eccentricities were, they did not extend to what was clearly a superb taste in music, as far as Aurora was concerned.
There was Bach. And Haydn. And then a soprano was to come and sing some Purcell.
Aurora had read about Purcell but had never hoped to hear his music sung.
He was not the latest thing in composers and therefore forgotten by many.
But Bach—the mathematical construction of the music, the parts that so perfectly complemented each other.
Oh, please let it be everything she had always believed Bach could be when played by a master musician.
* * *
From his seat back and across the aisle from the Wentworth party, Alec Raeburn studied both young women.
In spite of himself, he could not stop gazing at Millicent.
Her cropped curls glowed almost white in the profusion of candles.
He wished she would turn so he could see the pulse beat faintly at her throat (ridiculous at this distance, though it might be).
Her gown’s neckline plunged downward, more than hinting at her bosom.
He saw the almost sculptured side of her face, which stared impassively at the musicians as they completed their tuning and began to play.