Chapter 4 #2
Felix saw Miss Cantwell at the opera two days later.
Lady Balfour’s box was well visited during intermission, including stops by Mr. Pitt and Lord Firth, the latter of whom Felix considered his biggest obstacle.
But the tête-à-tête at the Fielding ball had its desired effect: Miss Cantwell was quite cool toward Lord Firth and he did not stay long.
Otherwise she listened, talked, and laughed, her manner all vivacity and animation.
He spied her again at the races and spent more time studying her than he did the horses—even his own. She looked quite fetching, which ensured a steady stream of gentlemen paying their respects.
Such was the fate of a pretty but penniless young lady—gentlemen still liked to look at her and even spend time with her.
But they lacked the courage to marry her, not when a better-dowered wife could put lobsters on the menu and ensure that they need never descend a rung or two from their accustomed place in the world.
Felix was quite confident that Miss Cantwell would prove the rule and not the exception. Still, every time a likely gentleman was introduced to her, he grew uncharacteristically tense. Two men in particular, a Mr. Peterson and a Mr. Featherington, preoccupied him for days.
Mr. Peterson was a scion of industry, with pockets deep enough for a dozen epileptic sisters-in-law. It took Felix the better part of a week to find out that Mr. Peterson must marry the daughter of at least an earl and preferably a duke, or risk having his allowance cut off.
Mr. Featherington, a country squire with an income of eight thousand pounds, caused Felix to lose actual sleep. Until it became apparent that Mr. Featherington was leveraging Miss Cantwell’s warm reception to gain the hand of a different lady.
The almost dizzying relief Felix experienced, as he read of Mr. Featherington’s engagement in the papers, gave him pause. But he dismissed his responses as perfectly natural for a man no longer accustomed to failure, or even the possibility of it.
Of course he would be tense: He had a plan in place and he was invested in the plan’s outcome.
He decided to adjust the plan, which had been made with a specific date in mind—late July, three days before he left London.
But now he was convinced it would not be wise to wait that long.
There was too much uncertainty involved.
And the possibility of a knight in shining armor, however remote, was nowhere near enough to nil for his liking.
The time had come to preempt her decision, if possible.
* * *
For the venue, Felix chose a picnic organized by Lady Tenwhestle, at which Miss Cantwell was certain to be present. The picnic fell on a rare beautiful day, the sky clean and blue after the previous day’s thunderstorm, the clouds as white and fat as newly fluffed pillows.
Clad in a cream muslin dress, Miss Cantwell played a game of croquet with the ladies.
It was clear that she was unfamiliar with the rules of the game and had had very little actual experience with a mallet.
Yet throughout the match, she managed to stand or walk in such a way as to always present her figure to its best advantage.
One truly must admire her discipline and dedication.
He waited, participating in a few overs of cricket, then sitting down on a picnic blanket with several members of his usual coterie. After their stomachs had been filled, the young people present decided on a game of blindman’s buff.
She was not one of the participants—which gave him the opening he was looking for. He encouraged his friends to take part. Once they had departed, he eased into a stroll.
Predictably, though he did not venture near Lady Balfour’s picnic blanket, she beckoned him with her fan. As it would be rude otherwise, he answered her summons.
“Lady Balfour, Miss Cantwell, how do you do?”
Miss Cantwell, her cream lace parasol over her shoulder, reached for a cluster of grapes, all the while looking down at the tartan blanket, presenting the very image of becoming demureness.
He, however, noticed that she swallowed even before she inserted a grape into her mouth.
The distance he had kept from her, it would seem, had not diminished his effect on her. The thrill this produced in him was out of all proportion to the observation’s relative lack of significance. Of course nothing had changed in that regard. He hadn’t even worried about it, had he?
Lady Balfour harrumphed. “We were getting on exceedingly well, until I realized you have not complimented Miss Cantwell on her toilette.”
He was becoming rather fond of the old woman—certainly a ferocious champion for her charge. “How unforgivable of me,” he answered lightly. “Miss Cantwell, may I be so forward as to mention how exquisite you look today?”
She glanced up, a soft blush upon her cheeks, and a bright, bright light in her eyes.
Which he realized the next moment was less arousal than a reflection of the panic simmering inside her. So she did feel it, the prospect of a good marriage slipping farther from her grasp with each passing day.
To his surprise, he experienced a twinge of guilt. Perhaps even a stab of it. But nothing strong enough to lead him to apologize. Or reconsider his plans.
“You are too kind, sir,” she murmured.
“Now, now, Louisa,” Lady Balfour objected. “Don’t be so grateful. Lord Wrenworth has committed not a kindness, but a faux pas. And he must now make up for it by escorting you for a round in the park.”
Had he paid Lady Balfour in advance, she could not have better performed her function.
Miss Cantwell objected modestly. “I’m sure Lord Wrenworth has no such—”
“I am determined to commit a multitude of faux pas in the future, if my penances all prove to be so sweet. Miss Cantwell, may I have the pleasure of your company for a short walk?”
“Yes, you may,” Lady Balfour answered for her. “Now, off you go to speak of what young people speak of these days.”
* * *
“You should not give her such hope,” said Miss Cantwell, as they left Lady Balfour’s earshot.
She really did have a pretty walk, as if she were gliding, with just enough sway to her hips to give interest to her movement.
“I can truthfully avow I have never done anything to give her hope,” Felix answered her charge, a tiniest bit of smugness to his tone.
She heard it. “I have noticed. At the end of the Season, when she looks back and wonders why there is no proposal from you, she will see that every time we have been thrust together, it has been as a favor either to Lady Tenwhestle or herself—and that you have never sought me out on your own.”
“I hope you would approve—that a man in my position does what he can to avoid marrying by accident.”
Her parasol twirled. “I have no doubt you will be ultimately held blameless, but you cannot convince me that you are not aware of the hope you are sowing in Lady Balfour’s heart.”
“I will hold myself forgivable as long as I am not sowing those hopes in your heart,” he answered glibly. And then, in a moment of genuine curiosity, “Am I?”
“I do not pretend to understand what drives your interest in me, save to know that it is not the kind that leads to a church.”
Clever, clever girl. He beamed at her. “Then I need have no fear.”
They passed the cluster of young men and women playing blindman’s buff. Mr. Pitt was among them, standing next to Miss Lovett. He cast a glance of unhappy longing toward Miss Cantwell.
“Any—” Felix began.
“No,” Miss Cantwell said simply.
“A pity. When Parliament repealed the Corn Laws, I’m sure all the eminent gentlemen who voted in favor never thought their decision would have such repercussions on your marital aspirations.”
“You forgot to mention the gentlemen who made rail and steam transportation ever faster and cheaper, as well as those who modernized agricultural machinery,” she replied glumly.
“They, too, were not thinking of the future impoverishment of all the English squires who would have otherwise made wonderful husbands for me.”
“The entire course of recent history seems to have been conspiring against you.”
“At this point, I would not be surprised.” She was silent for a few breaths.
“And why, exactly, are you, sir, interested in my progression—or lack thereof—toward matrimony? You do not wish to marry me yourself, so that cannot be a reason. Despite our unusually frank discussions on the topic, you are no friend of mine, so that also cannot be a reason. Try as I do, I cannot think of anything else.”
At last, an open salvo. They were reaching quite another level of intimacy, he and Miss Cantwell. “Do you spend a great deal of time pondering my motives?”
The handle of her parasol turned faster. “Sometimes. Does that gratify you?”
Yes. And how. “Sometimes.”
“And my misfortunes—my inability to attract a suitable proposal—does that also gratify you?”
She had lobbed similar charges at him before. It tickled him that The Ideal Gentleman was accused of such a rampant case of schadenfreude. “It would make me a terrible sort of man, Miss Cantwell.”
“But I am correct, am I not?” she asked, staring straight ahead. “Does it amuse you to see me founder like this?”
He lifted a low-hanging branch for her to pass. “It does not amuse me, per se. But I cannot deny it opens an opportunity for me to exploit.”
She cast him a wary glance. “I do not see how you can possibly benefit from my inability to marry.”
“I have been doing some calculations concerning your future circumstances, should you return home at the end of the Season without having secured an engagement.”
“And did those calculations arouse compassion on your part, or scorn?”
“I did note that the sums required to keep all your sisters and yourself in a state of reasonable comfort—a state of minor luxury, one might even say—consist of an amount that is negligible to my ledgers.”