Chapter 4
Four
By the time Genny and Harrison returned to Lady Penworth’s drawing room, the atmosphere had shifted in the way fashionable gatherings did on the verge of scandal.
No one had said anything openly. No formal alarm had been raised.
Yet servants moved a little too quickly, voices lowered when doors opened, and everyone they passed looked first at Harrison and then at Genny, as though their faces might confirm disaster or merely foretell it.
The house itself remained lovely, of course.
Lady Penworth had excellent taste, and no amount of social treachery could entirely diminish the polish of marble floors, gilt-framed mirrors, or spring flowers arranged in blue-and-white vases along the corridor tables.
Beneath the elegance, tension pressed against Genny’s skin.
It should have unsettled her more than it did.
Instead, she was too aware of the folded subscription sheet hidden inside Harrison’s coat and of the curious, dangerous steadiness that had taken root between them over the past half hour.
She ought to have been mortified still, or furious, or at the very least more cautious.
Yet a stubborn, excited pulse had begun low in her chest, because for the first time since the morning’s humiliation she no longer felt merely cornered.
She felt engaged in the thing itself.
That, she suspected, was either a most promising sign or a very unfortunate one.
Louisa, Alexandra, Lord Penworth, and Mrs. Wexley were waiting when they reentered.
Niall had made himself comfortable near the mantel as though intrigue throughout the house were among the natural amusements of married life.
Lady Penworth had joined the company as well by then, all pale blue silk and dignified agitation, while beside her stood a woman of indeterminate years with an air of useful reserve whom Genny recognized as Lady Penworth’s companion, Mrs. Fanshawe.
Every head turned toward them.
“Well?” Lord Penworth demanded.
Harrison, who had resumed the precise, composed manner that made other people instinctively look to him whenever matters went awry, gave a concise account of their search.
He did not mention the private conversation in the drawing room.
Nor the laugh she had drawn from him. Nor the strange new warmth that had unsettled her more effectively than his censure had.
For that omission Genny was absurdly grateful.
She would rather have announced her own idiocy than endure Louisa’s knowing silence or Alexandra’s sympathy if either guessed how deeply that brief exchange had affected her.
“We have not yet found the ledger,” Harrison said, “but we did recover a subscription list suggesting that certain names and placements may have been tampered with before this morning. I think it prudent to assume the theft was not an isolated piece of mischief.”
Mrs. Wexley made a distressed sound. “Not isolated?”
“No,” Genny said before Harrison could answer. “Merely ambitious.”
Niall’s mouth twitched.
Lady Penworth pressed her fingertips to her temple. “Do you mean to tell me someone has contrived this deliberately? In my house?”
“I am afraid so,” Harrison said.
“Then who?”
“If we knew that already, Lady Penworth,” Genny said, “the day would be much less inconvenient.”
Louisa shot her a warning look that plainly translated to do try not to antagonize the hostess while we are standing in the midst of disaster.
Genny responded with what she hoped was an expression of innocence.
It must have failed, because Alexandra sighed.
Harrison unfolded the subscription sheet and laid it upon the table. “Lady Castlemain’s name has been marked. That may prove significant.”
At once Mrs. Wexley looked faintly ill.
Lady Penworth lowered herself into a chair. “Good heavens. If Lady Castlemain were publicly slighted, she would never forgive me.”
“She would publish the injury to every drawing room in London before dinner,” Louisa said, practical as ever.
“Precisely,” Harrison replied. “And if Lady Dorring were simultaneously provoked, the resulting scene would serve anyone wishing to throw the entire fête into disorder.”
Genny watched the company absorb that. She could almost see the panic arranging itself in fresh patterns around the room.
A slight to Lady Castlemain. An insult to Lady Dorring.
A vanished ledger. Altered packets. Her own name hovering at the edge of blame like a ribbon waiting to be tied neatly around the whole dreadful parcel.
It would have been impressive, had it not been aimed at her.
Lady Penworth lifted anxious eyes. “Then what are we to do?”
Harrison answered at once. “We proceed as though nothing is amiss while quietly verifying every donor placement, announcement, and assignment connected to the fête.”
“Quietly?” Mrs. Wexley repeated. “How can one do anything quietly with three committees, six tradesmen, and Lady Dorring already in a temper because the floral arch is not symmetrical?”
Genny brightened despite herself. “I do not believe Lady Dorring knows what symmetrical means.”
“Genny,” Alexandra murmured.
“What? It is true. She uses the word as though it denotes moral superiority.”
Niall laughed outright.
Even Lady Penworth looked briefly tempted.
Harrison, damn him, did not laugh. Yet Genny noticed the almost-smile again at one corner of his mouth, and because she noticed it, the room seemed to warm by a degree. It was a ridiculous reaction and one she firmly declined to examine.
Instead she leaned over the subscription list. “If Lady Castlemain is the target, then someone must have reason to believe a public slight would cause sufficient uproar to damage the fête. That suggests a woman with a vicious memory, an injured vanity, or both.”
“Then we are spoiled for choice,” Louisa murmured.
Mrs. Fanshawe, who had been silent until then, spoke in a mild voice that nonetheless carried. “Lady Castlemain has quarreled with Lady Dorring twice in as many months, and Mrs. Vale considers them both vulgar.”
All eyes turned toward her.
She did not appear troubled by the attention. “One hears things in a house,” she added.
Genny was instantly delighted. She liked Mrs. Fanshawe on the spot. There was something deeply reassuring about a quiet woman who had clearly spent years collecting facts while other people mistook silence for passivity.
Harrison said, “You believe the conflict between those ladies is well known?”
Mrs. Fanshawe inclined her head. “Well known enough that a clever person might exploit it.”
There it was again. Clever person.
Not impulsive. Not muddled. Not reckless.
Clever.
The word sent a ridiculous little bloom of satisfaction through Genny, though it had not even been aimed at her.
Perhaps she was growing pathetic. Or perhaps after a lifetime of being treated as if brightness and frivolity were near relations, she had simply reached the age at which one compliment to the intellect outweighed ten to a gown.
Lord Penworth began pacing. “This is intolerable. My house is overrun with scheming women and injured subscribers.”
“My lord,” Louisa said gently, “that describes most of Mayfair in April.”
“That is not a comfort.”
“No,” she agreed. “I suppose not.”
Harrison began assigning tasks with the same maddening efficiency he brought to everything.
Lord Penworth was to quietly retrieve the correspondence concerning Lady Castlemain’s subscription.
Lady Penworth would keep Mrs. Vale and Lady Dorring apart for the remainder of the afternoon if it could be managed by mortal effort.
Mrs. Wexley would verify the flower assignments without mentioning the altered papers.
Mrs. Fanshawe would sit with the announcement cards and determine whether any additional names had been changed.
Then he looked at Genny.
It ought not to have mattered quite so much that he did so last, as though her task were not an afterthought but something he had saved to consider properly.
She hated that it mattered. She hated more that she could not seem to stop waiting for his gaze, as if her body had begun to recognize his attention before her pride had agreed to want it.
“You,” he said, “will assist Lady Louisa and Lady Alexandra in speaking with the ladies expected to attend the fête. Quietly.”
Genny blinked. “Quietly?”
“Yes.”
“That seems a singularly ambitious command.”
“It is the command I am giving nonetheless.”
She folded her arms. “And what, precisely, do you imagine I shall do with Louisa and Alexandra?”
“Listen,” he said.
The simplicity of the answer disarmed her more effectively than an argument would have done.
“Listen?” she repeated.
“You know these women. You know how they speak when pleased, when slighted, and when pretending not to be either. If someone has been laying the groundwork for a quarrel, you are more likely than anyone in this room to hear it.”
The others seemed unsurprised by the instruction. Only Genny stood there for a moment, caught between suspicion and something far more foolish.
He trusted her with that.
Not merely because she was present. Not merely because she had inserted herself and proved impossible to remove.
He had looked at the room, at the problem, at the people in it.
Then he had decided there was something she could do better than the rest. The realization struck with force, and for one instant she could only stand there and absorb it.
Her chest felt too tight, her hands oddly light.
To be seen in a room full of people was one thing; to be understood in it was quite another.
“I can listen,” she said, a touch more softly than she had intended.
His gaze held hers. “I know.”
That could not possibly have been as meaningful as it sounded, and yet it lingered with unreasonable force. Genny turned away first and informed herself sternly that she was being absurd.