Chapter Twelve
The dance had been pleasant enough, Kate supposed. A reel did not leave much opportunity for conversation during the dance itself, but it was spritely and invigorating nonetheless, and she had enjoyed herself for the duration.
Before and after, however, had been something less than pleasant. In those few minutes, as Lord Shaw had led her to and from the floor, she had learned that he was the elder brother of Miss Applegate, and had felt it his brotherly duty to extoll his sister’s many virtues for Kate’s consideration.
The words of a loving brother, which she had felt obliged to commit to memory so that she might jot them down within her notebook later, but which had made her heart burn in her chest with some raw bit of anger that Kate had found exceptionally confusing.
The worst of it was that Kate could not bring herself to dislike Miss Applegate, whom she had found to be an amiable lady.
No, that wasn’t quite true; the worst of it was that she had wanted to dislike Miss Applegate, though the woman had done nothing to merit it.
It made her feel small and petty and cruel.
Still, she had done her damnedest to enjoy the dance—right up until the moment she had encountered Miss Applegate in the midst of the weaving rhythm of the dance, and nearly lost her step entirely.
As she had suggested, Elliot had partnered Miss Applegate for the dance, and the two of them had looked... just lovely together.
The perfect couple. Elliot so tall and fair; Miss Applegate slender and delicate, with her stunning chestnut curls.
She was not quite serious, as Elliot had requested of the woman who would be his wife, but she was sensible, clever, kind, and just a bit sly.
She loved the countryside, read a great deal, and could sit a horse capably.
She liked children, and had a dog of her own—a little spaniel she had named Captain, and of whom she had spoken with much enthusiasm and fondness.
Miss Applegate embodied nearly everything Elliot wanted in his future wife, and she exceeded Kate’s own conditions besides. She was worthy of every bit of praise which Lord Shaw had conveyed to Kate’s ears, though she hadn’t required them to have reached a similar conclusion herself.
Miss Applegate was horribly, dreadfully, completely perfect.
She would make any gentleman a wonderful wife, but Elliot especially.
And still, beneath the thin fabric of her evening gloves, Kate’s fingers itched to fish in her reticule for her pencil and scratch the woman’s name straight out of her notebook.
It wasn’t fair of her, she supposed, but if Elliot had not already settled upon Miss Applegate, then there was the possibility that he would—as he had in regard to Lady Harriet—defer to Kate’s better judgment.
But was her judgment better? With just a scratch of her pencil, with just a few careful words, she could erase Miss Applegate from the competition...
and possibly Elliot’s chances of the love match he wanted.
And really, he could do so much worse. He’d asked for her help in this, had prevailed upon their longstanding friendship to help him where it most mattered.
What sort of friend would she truly be if she were to strike out a woman who might well turn out to be the love of his life?
Kate drew in a lungful of cool night air, relishing the relief it provided from the sweltering heat of the ballroom.
Lord Shaw had returned her promptly to Rebecca’s side, as was only proper.
But Elliot had chosen a more circuitous path to return Miss Applegate to her own family, and between the relentless heat and the outrageous and baffling spark of anger that had flared in her chest at seeing their heads bent together, Kate had found herself in desperate need of a reprieve.
Luckily there had been a convenient exterior door which led out to the garden.
Full of blooming roses and tall, neatly-pruned hedgerows, it had offered a welcome respite.
From the heat; from the worst of the noise.
But not, notably, from the irritating tangle of her thoughts.
Those seemed to have redoubled in the quiet of the night, knotting themselves tighter and staunchly resisting further examination.
At least there was a breeze, and even if the stars were not so bright here in London as they were in the countryside, the sweet scent of roses was a lovely alternative to the heavy stench of coal smoke and refuse that seemed to permeate the city streets.
“What are you doing out here?”
Kate startled to the unexpected intrusion, swinging around abruptly. Her reticule, propelled by the swift, alarmed motion, connected solidly with the interloper; a faceless shadow in the darkness of the night.
There was a soft grunt of pain, and then a grumbled, “Ouch,” rendered in a familiar voice as the man pulled back a step into the faint light pouring through the nearest window. Elliot scowled as he rubbed at the shoulder she had accidentally struck with the full weight of her reticule. “Rude.”
“You startled me,” Kate accused, blowing out a breath of relief.
Elliot issued a soft snort. “Better me than anyone else. Katie, you can’t go wandering off from a ball.”
“I didn’t go wandering off,” Kate protested. “I stepped outside for a bit of air. The heat in the ballroom is—”
“Immaterial,” Elliot pronounced, in a voice which had taken on an uncharacteristically stern cadence. “You told Rebecca you were for the retiring room.”
“I was. But after, I just needed a moment of privacy.” Away from the people. Away from the heat. Away from Elliot’s damned dimple and that smile he had bestowed upon the bashfully blushing Miss Applegate.
“Kate,” Elliot said, his shoulders shaking with a low, rueful chuckle, “for an unmarried lady, there is no such thing as a moment of privacy at an event such as this.”
“Pardon me, then, for not knowing. In the countryside—”
“This isn’t the countryside. This is London.
It’s practically a different world.” His head turned back toward the house at the sudden advent of voices in the hallway through the window.
“Christ,” he said, and charged from the light into the shelter of the shadows with her.
“Were you seen? By anyone other than me?”
“I don’t think so.” She hadn’t been paying much attention, but she also hadn’t been seeking it from anyone else. Away from the window in the shadows of the house had seemed a safe place to snatch a bit of room to breathe and a moment to herself.
Elliot muttered an oath beneath his breath. In the darkness, his hand groped for hers. “Come with me,” he said. “We’re too damned close to the windows.” And the moment he had judged it safe enough, he plunged out of the shadows and into the garden, pulling her along in his wake.
Rose bushes flew by, silky crimson petals blurring into brief flashes of color across Kate’s field of vision as she stumbled along behind Elliot.
Past the hedgerows, deeper into the garden than she would have ventured on her own.
“Elliot,” she said, clutching at his hand as his grip threatened to pull her glove straight off of her fingers. “Where are we going?”
“Away from windows.” The response was terse, swift, and decisive.
“I thought I wasn’t meant to be out here alone.”
“You aren’t. You can’t be seen unchaperoned, and we can’t be seen alone together, and that’s the damned trouble. You’ve been lucky so far, but there’s no guarantee that luck will hold out, and I have got to find a safe place to put you until I can send Rebecca to retrieve you.”
“Oh, of course,” Kate said through the grit of her teeth, wincing as she nearly rolled her ankle about an especially tight turn. “Rebecca may go about as she pleases!”
“Yes,” Elliot said, his voice gone low and faintly guttural, “because she’s a married woman and a suitable chaperone for an unmarried one besides—and would you keep your voice down? I have got a care for your reputation, you know.”
“What reputation?” Kate asked, with an odd little laugh.
She would be in London for a few weeks more and then—then she would return to the countryside, with her sheep and her rolling hills and her solitude.
And Elliot would be married, his visits necessarily less frequent.
Possibly she would never again see Rebecca or Richard.
What was a few weeks in London? Practically nothing.
Soon enough, no one would even recall her.
“Elliot, I haven’t got any sort of reputation to speak of. ”
“You will if you are observed, and it will not be a good one.” Another turn, and they breezed past still more hedgerows, so tall they rose even above Elliot’s head.
“Your mother will not be well-pleased to hear your name bandied about in gossip, Rebecca will be devastated to have allowed an incident to have occurred when she was meant to be your chaperone, and I will hold myself responsible for having dragged you to London in the first place.”
“It’s—it’s not so dire as all that, is it?” Her voice wobbled uncertainly, and Kate realized she’d begun to grip his hand so tightly that her nails must have dug into his skin even through their gloves.
Elliot drew to a halt so abruptly that Kate almost slammed into his back, the soles of her dancing slippers sliding upon the grass. “I’m not going to let it be,” he said, and he loosed his hold on her hand at last.
Kate cast her gaze around, but saw only dark walls formed of thick hedges, the moon and stars high overhead. “Where are we?”
“Near the center of the hedge maze,” he said. “It’s not a particularly large one, if memory serves. But it is at least enough to keep us out of view. And mostly out of hearing.”
“And you can find your way back?” Kate asked as she brushed the flat of her hand against the nearest hedge wall and felt the prickly leaves stick in the fabric of her glove. “You’ll be able to direct Rebecca?”