Chapter 11
Seating herself in the carriage, Christina set her hands in her lap and looked at her brother, who was shifting about impatiently. “Is there something about Lord Wishaw’s ball that concerns you, brother?” she asked, as he frowned. “You look impatient.”
“That is only because we are tardy,” he responded, tightly. “I do not like to be so.”
“And yet, that is what is expected,” their mother smiled, as she knocked on the roof, the carriage immediately shifting forward. “You know as well as I, my son, that there is no expectation that we arrive at the very hour the ball begins.”
Lord Bedford shifted in his seat, looking out of the window, and Christina’s lips tugged gently, a notion catching her thoughts. “It could not be that there is a certain person that you are eager to see this evening?”
His brother’s eyes shot to hers, and he quickly cleared his throat. “No, not at all. Why would you say such a thing? There is no suggestion that I have anyone of interest in my view. Goodness, Christina, do you not think – ”
“You do protest a good deal, Bedford.” Their mother, seeming to enjoy the light-hearted teasing, laughed softly as Lord Bedford scowled at them both. “If there is a young lady of interest to you, then pray, do speak of her to us. I would personally be very interested to hear who this might be.”
“There is no one, I can assure you,” he said, with a shake of his head. “Besides, we are meant to be considering Christina’s prospects, are we not? I am of no importance.”
Seeing her opportunity, Christina ignored the kick of nervousness in her stomach and forced a smile. “Speaking of prospects, I have had my own interest caught by a particular fellow.”
Her mother quickly drew in a breath, her eyes rounding. “Is it Lord Granton? I did think that he might be interested in pursuing you. There is also Lord Pennington and Lord Newfield, of course. They have danced with you very often and – ”
“None of them have drawn me towards them, unfortunately.” Christina smiled at her mother’s eagerness. “They are all very suitable, I understand that, but they have sparked no warmth in my heart.”
“Then who is it?” Lady Bedford asked. “And does he know of your interest?”
A flush crept into Christina’s cheeks, and she was glad of the darkness of the carriage, which hid most of her expression from her mother and brother. “As yet, there is only an acquaintance between us.”
“Who is it?” Lord Bedford leaned forward in his seat. “Is he suitable?”
“Yes, I think so.” Christina smiled at him. “Viscount Coventry has no whisper against him; he has fortune and wealth, and his estate is well situated.”
“Oh, my dear!” Lady Bedford grasped Christina’s hand. “How wonderful. Do you think that he might return your interest?”
“He has asked to call upon me soon,” Christina returned, as her mother’s fingers pressed hers. “I am sure that he shall, should he be welcome.” Her eyes slid towards her brother, looking at him.
Lord Bedford shrugged, showing no enthusiasm but no hesitation either.
“I have nothing against him coming to call. I will, of course, make certain that his reputation is as pristine as you believe it to be, should anything more come of this. No one is aware of the fortune you are to receive from your grandfather upon your marriage, I presume? I should not like that to be a motivation.”
“No, he is unaware of it,” Christina reassured him. “Just as Lord Wickton was when it came to Sophie’s marriage.”
Lady Bedford nodded slowly, but her expression had grown thoughtful — a particular quality of attention that Christina recognized from childhood.
It was the look her mother wore when she was about to say something that had been sitting in her mind for some time, waiting for the right moment to emerge.
“There is something I should tell you, Christina.” Lady Bedford folded her hands in her lap with deliberate care. “It may be nothing — indeed, I hope it is nothing — but it has troubled me.”
Christina exchanged a glance with Bedford, who raised an eyebrow but said nothing.
“Lord Pennington called upon me two weeks ago,” her mother continued.
“He was very civil — exceedingly so, in fact, which ought to have been my first signal that something was amiss. He asked after you, Christina, but not in the way a cousin might. His questions were... particular.” She hesitated, choosing her words.
“He wanted to know about your father’s will.
He asked — in the most roundabout way, you understand — whether there were any provisions made for you beyond your father’s estate.
He couched it all in concern, of course.
Said he wanted to be sure that his cousin’s daughter was properly settled. ”
The carriage seemed suddenly cold. Christina’s fingers went still in her lap.
“What did you tell him?” Bedford asked, his voice sharper now.
“Very little.” Lady Bedford’s chin lifted with a quiet dignity.
“I told him that our family’s financial arrangements were our own and that he need not concern himself.
He was... displeased, though he hid it well enough.
” She paused. “But I have thought about it since. It was not a casual question, Christina. He was seeking specific information. And I recall now that his letters in the country — those many, many letters — asked after such things almost as often as they inquired after our health. I attributed it to the awkward kindness of a man who does not quite know how to write to bereaved relations. I am less certain of that reading now.”
Christina felt the blood drain from her cheeks. Lord Pennington, asking after her inheritance, pointed, specific questions wrapped in the trappings of familial concern. It was another thread in a pattern she was only beginning to see.
“I never liked his persistent attention to you,” Bedford added, his voice dropping.
“Even before father passed, there was something... watchful about the man. As if he were calculating something. And during these last two years, while you and Mama were in the country, he sought me out more than once here in town. Always with some errand or other — a club introduction, a question about an investment, the loan of a pamphlet he swore I must read. I took it for the usual efforts of a distant cousin attempting to be useful. But looking back, each visit ended with a question about you — how you were, when you might return to London, whether there was any gentleman in the country whose attentions you received. I thought him tedious. I did not think him deliberate.”
A silence held the carriage. Bedford’s words — I did not think him deliberate — settled over them with a weight none of them wished to carry across the threshold of a ball.
“Then we must be deliberate ourselves,” Bedford said at last, his voice low.
“I will make quiet inquiries tomorrow. I know one or two gentlemen at White’s who will speak plainly about Pennington’s affairs if they are pressed.
In the meantime — Mama, Christina — I would ask that neither of you give him any opening.
Dance with him if you must, be civil if he calls, but volunteer nothing.
Let him work for what he wishes to know. ”
“Nothing shall pass my lips,” Lady Bedford said, with feeling.
Christina nodded, though she scarcely trusted her voice.
She had set out this evening to think only of Coventry — of the possibility of him, of what might be said before the night was through — and now the whole shape of the Season seemed to have shifted beneath her.
She drew a breath and made herself speak.
“Let us not bring Lord Pennington into the ballroom with us tonight,” she said. “We shall be watchful, as Bedford says. But I should like — for a little while — to think of other things.”
Lady Bedford reached for her hand and pressed it, her eyes soft in the carriage lamplight. “Of course, my dear. And Lord Coventry — let us hope that he is there this evening.”
Christina smiled, and this time it came more easily. Both her mother and her brother seemed genuinely contented with Lord Coventry’s consideration of her, and for that, at least, she was grateful.
“It brings my heart joy to dance with you, Christina.”
The music swirled around them both like a warm summer breeze, the sweet music lifting the air and Christina’s heart with it.
Lord Coventry had not made an immediate step towards her as she had come into the room, but instead, had taken some time back from her so he would not appear too eager.
When he had asked for her dance card, she had not expected him to take the waltz, given that it was such an obvious consideration, but, upon returning it, his steady gaze had locked with hers in silent reassurance and obvious determination.
He was not about to be set apart from her again.
“I did not think that we would ever dance like this again,” she responded, her body flooding with heat as his hand clasped her a little more tightly about the waist. Gazing up at him, her eyes searched the deep pools of grey and blue, seeing the softness that was so familiar to her.
His face had not altered greatly in their years apart but there were whispered lines of tension across his forehead and a hint of sorrow in the tug of his lips.
Would that she could smooth one hand across his skin and feather away those lines!
But their fragile hope remained just that: brittle and unsteady.
“I did not mean to injure you, Christina. I know that I must have broken your heart and then caused you more pain with my coldness and disinclination.” His voice was low, words hidden almost completely by the music from the orchestra.
“I wish that there was more I could do than apologize, but I have only words to offer you.”