Chapter 7 #2
Lottie and Eleanora exchanged a glance too quickly for Mya to read. “With pleasure, sir.”
She turned a benevolent smile on the next young man in line. “Mya,” she said, glancing around as she spoke. “This is Mr. Baird. Mr. Baird, Miss Mya Boyle.”
“A pleasure,” Mya said.
Mr. Baird, obviously aware of his newly assigned role in the little tableau Lottie had engineered, bowed. “Miss Boyle, might I have the pleasure of dancing the waltz with you?”
Mya sought Eleanora, who dipped her chin in a nod small enough that others would not notice it. She turned back to the red-haired Mr. Baird with a smile. “Gladly, sir.”
He was not the man she wished to dance with, but he was rather attractive. A dancing round across the ballroom with him would not be a chore. Whether Mr. Baird would come to regret his offer when he learned how rudimentary her dancing skills were, was another matter entirely.
It was not that Mya could not dance at all.
In the week leading up to the ball, Lottie and Eleanora had taught her most of the basic steps, Eleanora leading her through the movements and Lottie calling time and instructions from the side.
But she had only had a little time to practice, and most of the women in the room had been dancing since they were girls.
Her body had not seemed particularly inclined to recall the steps, though Lottie had told her that she must have danced sometime.
If that was so, she had either danced different steps, or not danced well, because there had been no muscle memory of the dances they had taught.
Mr. Baird must not have regretted their dance too terribly; between him and Lottie, Mya was introduced to a number of young men, all of them politely asking for space on her dance card.
By the time the band was striking up the third dance, her card was nearly full.
Only the spots she had deliberately kept open were free.
Lottie was in something of a similar situation, and had already turned away nearly a dozen prospective dance partners, each with a polite apology that she was already engaged.
Eleanora had retired to the edge of the dance floor, where she was seated and talking with one of the other young ladies.
“There will be men over there asking them to dance soon,” Lottie said, leaning in to speak the words softly enough that they would not be overheard.
From a quick glance around the room, it looked as though there were more women than men at the ball, and Mya was not so sure, but when she expressed the reservation, Lottie shook her head.
“One of the party hosts will ask, or send a friend to. They must make sure that every woman in the place dances, or the ball will not be seen as a success.”
“That is rather kind of them,” Mya said.
“Kind?” Lottie laughed. “It is an issue of social standing, for the most part, though there are a few who are genuine.”
As she spoke, the third dance struck up, and their partners appeared to draw them apart and in for the dance.
Mya noted, from the corner of her eye, that Eleanora had risen from her seat with the other young lady, and they were taking their places on the floor, opposite each other.
She hid a smile behind her fan. A shortage of men, it seemed, wouldn't stop the women from getting to enjoy themselves.
Another pair of girls had joined the line at Lottie's end.
The dance was a quick one, though it was not one of the ones Mya had struggled to learn.
The steps were simple, and she enjoyed the energy of it.
Skirts and curls were bouncing with the light motion of the dance, and she heard beneath the music the occasional soft peal of laughter or delighted cry ring out.
She would glance every so often around the room, or toward the entrance and then back to the dance floor.
As she wove in and out of the line of dancers, she caught sight of Lottie, who was swinging a turn on the arm of her partner, dark hair flying and eyes alight.
Eleanora, for the moment in the arms of one of the men, whose partner was temporarily engaged with another before the motion of the dance brought them back together, was laughing along with the rest of them.
When the music slowed at last to a stop, they were standing as they had been at the beginning, facing their partners across the small space that separated the two lines.
Everyone was breathing a little harder, faces flushed with exertion and enjoyment.
Mya, glancing around the room once more, could understand, then, why Lottie was so intent on attending parties.
They were far more pleasant than she had anticipated, given the number of rules that went along with preparing for them.
Lottie slipped the gaze of her escort and laid a hand over Mya's arm, leaning against her shoulder. “Did you enjoy yourself?” she asked as Eleanora came up on her other side, a genuine smile still lighting her face.
“I think that one was my favorite,” Mya said, getting a grin and a nod of agreement.
“I think that is the favorite of most young people,” Eleanora said. “Though some of the older ladies and gentlemen are equally as fond of it.”
“Do you need something to drink?” Lottie asked.
A drink did in fact sound nice, and they were making their way to the refreshment room when the butler called out a new arrival.
“Lord Kayden McGregor!”
Mya turned to look up toward the top of the steps, where Kayden, in a closely tailored charcoal gray suit, was making his way down. She thought the flush in her cheeks might not be entirely from dancing any longer.
That was confirmed when Lottie nudged her side.
“The man you were waiting for?” she teased.
“I was not waiting for anyone,” Mya protested, to no avail.
Her companions were obviously convinced that Mya had been on the lookout for Kayden's arrival.
Which, if she were honest, was not entirely untrue.
Though she had not been pining for him. Only wishing to see if he would show up.
And see what he would look like dressed in fine clothes.
Or if he would wear a kilt, like her dream.
And if he was a fine dancer? And if he would ask her to dance.
No, she had not been pining for him at all.
“As you are already introduced, it will not violate etiquette for him to ask you if you would like a dance. Give it a few moments and we shall see what he does.”
“He will have to dance with the young lady of the household first,” Eleanora said, brushing a loose wisp of hair back from her face. “But I think that will not be a recurring activity.”
Mya, watching as Kayden was presented to the hosts of the ball and a smiling Blanche Auteberry, hoped it would not be. A spike of jealousy flickered through her. Strange, as she had no ties to Lord McGregor. She found him insufferable to say the least.
The next dance was not one on the card, and Mya looked to Eleanora and Lottie to explain. Lottie rolled her eyes.
“It’s not acceptable to cancel on a dance partner who has signed your card,” she said.
“But the unscheduled dances are open to choice. So, they have given Miss Auteberry the opportunity to dance with Lord McGregor by slipping an extra dance in. It’s manipulative, but not considered rude, as there will be a few dances over the course of the night that are not on the card.
They can claim this is merely the moment the band chose to slip one in. ”
Miss Auteberry was, in fact, dancing with Kayden. Mya, rather than take an invitation, begged out on the excuse that she was not used to such exertion after a recent convalescence and retired to a chair along the wall to watch.
He was a beautiful dancer. And not only in the sense that he was a beautiful man.
Watching him was spellbinding, every motion smooth as a hunting cat's stride.
Mya could almost see the way the muscle shifted under the close-fitting cloth of his suit as he led a rather clumsy Miss Auteberry across the floor.
Heat rushed to her face, and Mya lifted her fan, attempting to cool the red blush that must be sitting on her cheeks at the memory of the dream, suddenly vivid in her mind's eye.
“Are you well?” a voice asked beside her. “Do you need air, or perhaps water?”
“Oh,” Mya said, turning to face the young woman who was leaning worriedly over from the next seat. “I am quite well. Thank you. Just a little unused to so much dancing.” She smiled. “Hello. I am Mya Boyle.”