Chapter 3 #2
Silver was clearly Lady Frances’s latest theme.
The footman’s livery was new—silver froggings on pale blue, his powdered wig with a slivery-gleam.
And Sebastian spied two men hard at work in Lady Frances’s morning room as they passed, papering the walls with blue-and-silver paper.
So he wasn’t surprised when the footman led him to the Blue Gallery and announced him with a bow.
“The Viscount Cotereigh for The Lady Frances Elston.”
The Blue Gallery, unlike the West, was floored in pale marble and held many marble plinths, on which stood marble statues.
The long drapes were pale blue, brocaded with silver, and the three great mirrors which broke up the artwork on the walls were bordered in silver too.
Where else would Lady Frances be found when her heart was set on silver and blue?
She was seated in a window seat, halfway down the long room.
In a nod to propriety, her mother sat distantly on a small sofa—blue, of course—that had been arranged in the farthest corner.
Sebastian could hardly have been certain without field glasses, but the marchioness was probably occupied with some sewing, no doubt blue and silver.
If they happened to shout, she might even have been able to hear them.
He approached Lady Frances where she awaited him, smiling.
Her slim figure was swathed in a generous column of silver satin, very wide at the hem, which was ornamented with many blue ribbons and another blue ribbon around the high waist. A cluster of silver stones twinkled from its centre, just beneath a bosom seemingly dusted with silver.
In her fair hair more diamonds twinkled, and a blue ribbon bound behind her ringlets.
The blue suited her colouring. The silver only just. Her golden hair needed to be paler for that.
“Hints of Marie Antoinette,” he said, pressing her extended fingers with a smile. “Is it due a comeback, do you think? Those old French Court fashions? Please don’t make buckled shoes the thing. I don’t think I could stand it.”
“For gentlemen? No! But can a lady have too many jewels?”
“Absolutely. This amount”—he nodded to her as he sat on the padded window seat—“is at the limit of good taste. And I suspect you’re one of the few women who could pull off the look in daylight.
But if it were a ball, the room dim and candlelit…
” He reached out and touched her earlobe, taking it gently between his finger and thumb.
“Diamonds here.” He trailed a finger down her chest. “And here.”
He touched her, he knew, to stake a claim. But also perhaps in the way one examines a horse: running one’s hands down its legs, picking up its hooves. Checking not only for imperfections, but for temperament—how it responded to being handled.
Lady Frances didn’t blush. It would take far more than that.
She never made much response to him at all other than to smile, the glint in her eye knowing, not maidenish.
She took lovers, he knew. But she was discreet.
She’d know enough to ensure his sons were his.
There’d be no need for distasteful discussions. Such things were understood.
As for his own response… He desired her about as much as he desired any beautiful woman—enough for what was necessary in a man who needed an heir.
He took his hand away, silver on his fingertip. Mrs Ardingly would have left ink.
“Oh dear, Lord Cotereigh,” said Lady Frances. “Have you come here just to scowl at me?”
He cleared his brow with a smile.
“Not at all. I came to ask if you’re still planning that picnic at Richmond next week?”
“Yes,” replied Lady Frances. “And every day looking at the weather and praying it will hold.”
“How many are coming?”
“Two dozen at the last count.”
“Might you be prepared to invite one more?”
She tilted her head, a pretty, curious bird. “Who is it?”
“Ah.” He smiled. “You’re wise to make it conditional. You won’t like my answer.”
She furrowed her brow, her curiosity genuine now. “Whoever can it be?”
“A Mrs Ardingly. Lady Pemberthy’s niece.”
Lady Frances frowned, searching her memory, then pulling a face. “No!” she breathed, astonished. “Whatever can you mean? Not that stout, puffing preacher in her moth-eaten velvets?”
“Her niece, yes.”
Now Lady Frances’s eyebrows shot up. “The Pretty Pariah! My goodness, no! What are you playing at? You’re not the pranking type.”
“Nor the gambling kind, or so I thought. But…you see…I somehow seem to have entered into a wager, and Pemberthy and her niece are at the heart of it.”
Lady Frances gave him a frowning smile. “Sir Nathan Handley, was it? Go on. Explain yourself.”
“Handley, yes. And a wager to do the impossible. What else could I do but be prepared to meet it? I am tasked with getting them ten upstanding members of our set for their committee. And, not only that, but with making sure their fundraising ball is a triumph.”
She started laughing. “My goodness. The thought of you turned charity maker…”
“You haven’t heard the worst of it.”
“No?”
“Their cause is hopeless.”
He told her what it was and she laughed—of course—her fingers over her mouth. “Oh no. But that is madness. They can’t really think it’s possible?”
“They certainly seem committed.” He had a memory of Mrs Ardingly’s face and that damned ink splotch, her lips parted in indignation, heat flushing her cheeks as she met his common sense with her stupid, self-immolating fire.
He shifted his position, uncrossing his legs and studying his boot as he flexed his calf. The papers in his pocket crackled.
“I find them rather…pathetic,” he said. “Have you ever watched the runt of a litter, some weak, struggling pup?”
This was the method he’d determined upon to prove his heart to Lady Frances. She’d never believe he’d committed to this ridiculous cause in earnest. But that he might pity the hopeless people attached to it… Might that be believable?
Probably not.
Not to anyone who truly knew him.
“Haven’t you ever been tempted to reach out and pick up that pup and set it at its mother’s side to suckle? Even though you know the kindest thing would be to kill it. Something inside you stirs…”
He glanced up and found Lady Frances staring at him in much the same way his uncle looked at Beckford.
She gave a laugh. “Oh, cut these waterworks, I beg you! If you want my help to win your stupid wager, I’ll give it. Though you know it’s impossible. You’re going to make us both look absurd in the process.”
“Never!” He flashed her a smile. “Our standing is good enough to weather any storm. And this wager will prove it.”
And there, really, was the rub.
His uncle wanted him to fail.
Sebastian refused.