Chapter Ten #4
Farrah absorbed the full force of her mother’s disapproving scowl as they passed one another.
Holding her head high, she pretended not to notice, preferring not to dwell upon her mother’s double standards.
She had wandered away from the main party and the duke had followed her, not the other way around.
What was she supposed to have done about it?
she wondered, smiling when Lady Charlotte glided up to her side.
‘I am so pleased to have made your acquaintance, Lady Farrah,’ she said with a wide and genuine smile.
‘I hope you plan to stay for the entire summer, when it eventually arrives.’ She glanced out the window at the falling rain.
‘It will be lovely to have someone closer to my own age on the doorstep.’
‘Thank you, but my sister Sophia is the younger of us. I in comparison am positively ancient. Out for an entire season and still not married. How shocking is that?’
‘I dare say that is because you have too much sense to jump into matrimony. I am a very good judge of character and can already tell that you are not a slave to society’s expectations.
’ She clapped a hand over her mouth. ‘I beg your pardon. That sounded rude. Please don’t tell Mama what I said.
She is always berating me for speaking my mind, but I cannot seem to help myself.
I think something and then those thoughts turn into words which spill from my mouth quite without my permission.
I am sure your sister is perfectly delightful, but she seems …
well, distracted. I tried to gain her opinion of Madame Celeste’s identity.
Everyone is wondering, you know, but she didn’t seem that interested. ’
Farrah smiled. She had seen Lady Charlotte attempting to engage Sophia in conversation a little earlier, but it had been obvious to Farrah, even from the opposite side of the room, that Sophia’s attention remained focused on the duke.
She would have been far better advised, Farrah knew, to develop a friendship with the duke’s delightful sister.
That would have given her an ideal excuse to visit Alton Hall frequently, but she had squandered a golden opportunity to show herself to the duke.
Lady Charlotte, though young, was indeed an astute judge of character, Farrah sensed, and Sophia would not get a second opportunity to gain her friendship.
What concerned Farrah more was Lady Charlotte’s assertion that everyone in society was attempting to guess Madame Celeste’s identity.
Her identity. She had not expected her column to become so successful.
What had started off as a favour to a friend who needed contributors to her new publication had rapidly run out of control.
If her identity ever became public knowledge, Mama would be scandalised and Farrah herself looked upon with disapproval at best. Farrah knew that she ought to give it up but couldn’t.
As things stood, it was her family’s only source of income.
‘Your secret is safe with me,’ Farrah said, returning her attention to Lady Charlotte. ‘Not that I can imagine the duchess ever berating anyone. I think your character and hers are very similar.’
Lady Charlotte beamed. ‘Everyone says the same thing, which is lovely of them. I adore my mama as I am sure you do yours.’
Farrah refrained from giving a direct response, preferring not to indulge in an outright lie, yet reluctant to tell the truth. ‘My relationship with my mother is complex,’ she contented herself with saying. ‘She is far closer to Sophia than she is to me.’
‘Oh, I am sorry. There I go again. Have I touched a nerve?’
‘Not at all. I am perfectly content with the situation.’
‘Well anyway, I am absolutely sure that you and I will be the very best of friends. I am never wrong about these things.’
‘I would like that.’ Farrah paused. ‘I believe you have recently been on an educational tour. How did you enjoy it?’
‘Oh, it was the best possible fun. Not the museums necessarily,’ Lady Charlotte said, wrinkling her nose and grinning. ‘I looked upon those as a necessary evil. But everything else was delightful.’
‘I am sure you learned more simply by experiencing new things and meeting different people.’
‘That is precisely what I think. We cannot all be intellectual geniuses, can we?’
The butler announced that dinner was served.
Farrah glanced at the opposite end of the room where she had left the duke trapped by her mother and sister.
He would have no option other than to offer his arm to Sophia, she thought.
That being the case, she was surprised to see her mother and sister standing in front of the portrait that Farrah had admired earlier, completely alone.
Even at a distance, Farrah could detect her mother’s simmering annoyance.
She turned away, wondering whom the duke would favour with his company, only to discover him looming over her. He had moved so silently, and Farrah had been so intent upon her conversation with his sister that she hadn’t noticed his arrival.
‘Lady Farrah,’ he said, proffering his arm. ‘May I have the pleasure?’
When Farrah frowned and hesitated, it was Lady Charlotte who responded.
‘Oh do say yes, dear Lady Farrah!’ she implored with a mischievous smile.
‘To please you, Lady Charlotte – and because I obviously have no choice in the matter,’ Farrah replied, placing her gloved hand on the duke’s sleeve and sending him a condemning look.
She was fully conscious of everyone in the room watching her and probably thinking that the duke had taken leave of his senses as he led the procession into the dining room with Farrah at his side.
‘You were supposed to escort Sophia,’ she hissed.
‘Oh, excuse me, I was not aware that any such arrangement had been made.’
‘Well, of course you are free to please yourself, but I hope you realise that you have made life very difficult for me.’
‘Which was not my intention,’ he said, pulling out the chair to the right of his position at the head of the table and waiting as she seated herself and arranged her skirts to her satisfaction.
Farrah couldn’t help suppressing a giggle when she glanced down the table.
Sophia, looking fit to be tied, had been passed over by Ezra too and taken in by Lord Templeton.
She almost felt sorry for her. She herself had been introduced to Templeton a little earlier and the manner in which he had looked at her person with such a bold, assessing eye had made her skin crawl.
Ezra had settled for one of Templeton’s nieces, and they were already engaged in animated conversation.
There were uneven numbers and Farrah’s mama had been obliged to enter the dining room unaccompanied.
She did not seem best pleased at first, but when the affable gentleman whom she was seated beside politely gave her his attention, Farrah could see that her wounded pride had been at least partially salved.
Crisis averted, she thought, letting out a long breath, aware that her mother’s disappointments would be taken out on her and it would all somehow become her fault.
The excellent meal lasted for over two hours, but the duke’s lively and irreverent conversation made it seem more like ten minutes. Farrah couldn’t recall the last social occasion upon which she had enjoyed herself quite so much ? if ever.
‘We must talk privately,’ the duke said when his mother stood to indicate that the ladies should withdraw. Reuben was on his feet when he spoke, helping Farrah from her chair. ‘But not tonight.’
‘And Mama will likely thrash me if I dare to speak with you again. She has spent the entire meal shooting daggers at me.’
Reuben laughed. ‘Sticks and stones, my lady.’
Farrah gave a mock shudder. ‘Easy for you to say.’
She returned to the drawing room at the back of the party, hoping for a moment’s solitude, but it wasn’t to be. Her mother and sister both bombarded her with angry questions.
‘I cannot think why the duke prefers you to me,’ Sophia complained.
‘It’s simply not good enough,’ her mother hissed. ‘Have you no shame?’
‘I did not put myself forward, Mama – as well you know, because you were watching me like a hawk.’
‘You must have said something,’ Sophia grumbled.
‘Oh, for goodness sake!’
Farrah accepted coffee from the duchess’s hand with a smile of thanks and retreated to a far corner of the room, happy to be excluded from the general conversation.
When the gentlemen rejoined them, the duke was once again the centre of attention. He glanced Farrah’s way and sent her a smile, but she pretended not to notice, thinking that he was likely amusing himself at her expense.
‘Has no one ever told you that it’s impolite to exclude yourself from the group?’
Farrah jumped at the sound of a deep, gravelly voice close to her ear. Too close. She had not seen anyone approaching and had been lost in a reverie.
‘Lord Templeton,’ she said accusingly, glaring up at him. ‘Has no one told you that it is impolite to creep up on people?’
He chuckled, seemingly unoffended by a reprimand that few would probably dare to issue to such a significant person.
‘What is it that young ladies dream about, I wonder?’
‘If you wish to know that,’ Farrah replied, wondering what it was about the man that had caused her to take him in such instant dislike, ‘then you would be well advised to ask your nieces. I am beyond the age of dreams.’
‘Perhaps because your father is missing and you have more immediate problems.’ He spoke as though he relished uttering the words. ‘I understand no one can find him.’
She wanted to ask how he knew that but then recalled the animated nature of his conversation with Sophia over dinner.
Templeton was an attractive man for his age, well-connected and very rich.
Sophia would have been putty in his hands and had undoubtedly revealed all their family secrets the minute Templeton had shown concern.
‘Thank you for taking such an interest in my family’s affairs, sir,’ she said coldly.
‘If you want to know more about your father’s activities, meet me in the village tomorrow.’ He suggested a time and place. ‘And come alone,’ he said, before sauntering away.