Simply Magic (18 page)

“Ah,” Claudia said with a sigh, “it is my thought too. Let us hope we are right and not just a couple of hopeless romantics. Ah, Anne! I suppose we will not see her again for a long time. I
do
object to losing my friends, not to mention my teachers. I will have to look about for her replacement, though Lila is coming along quite nicely, would you not agree?”

Lila Walton was a junior teacher, promoted at the end of the summer term from the ranks of the senior girls. Like Susanna before her, she had been a charity girl.

“She shows great promise, as I knew she would,” Susanna agreed as Claudia linked an arm through hers and they stepped back inside the school.

But they were to see Anne again far sooner than Claudia had expected. She and Mr. Butler did not go directly home to Wales, as it turned out, but instead went first to Alvesley Park in Wiltshire, family home of Mr. Butler, and then to Gloucestershire to visit Anne's estranged family. The day after a letter arrived at the school from Anne at her father's home, another letter came from Viscountess Ravensberg at Alvesley Park. Claudia held it open in one hand when Susanna answered a summons to her study at the end of a composition class—a subject she had taken over from Frances two years before.

“There is to be a surprise wedding breakfast for Anne and Mr. Butler at the Upper Assembly Rooms next week,” Claudia said. “The Viscountess Ravensberg and the Duchess of Bewcastle have arranged it and have devised some sort of devious plot for luring the couple back here. We are invited, as well as Mr. Huckerby and Mr. Upton.”

They stared at each other. The strange coincidence of Mr. Butler's being a brother-in-law of Viscountess Ravensberg, cousin to Viscount Whitleaf, had not escaped Susanna's notice at the time of Anne's wedding. Now she would have an unexpected opportunity to meet the lady—the very cousin, she believed, who had the same color eyes as he.

Certain wounds, healed over nicely but still tender to the touch, were going to be in danger of being ripped open again, she thought. She would just have to make very certain they were not.

Claudia was tight-lipped.

“You know what this means, Susanna, do you not?” she said, folding the letter and tapping it against her leg. “If the Duchess of Bewcastle has had a hand in organizing this breakfast, then undoubtedly the
duke
will be in attendance. And since Lady Potford on Great Pulteney Street is a friend of Anne's and grandmother to the Marquess of Hallmere, it is altogether possible that the marquess and
that woman
will come to Bath and be there too. I would rather have every fingernail on both my hands pulled out than be in company with those two people. But some things cannot be avoided. This is for
Anne
. I will go. You will come too?”

She stood ramrod straight and spoke as if she were inviting Susanna to accompany her to a funeral.

“I will come and hold your hand,” Susanna promised.

Claudia snorted and then laughed.

“I do not suppose,” she said, “that either one of them will even recognize me or care if they
do
. Though Lady Hallmere did come here a few years ago to look down her nose at me
and
my school and ask if there was anything I needed. The nerve of the woman! But, Susanna, we will see our beloved Anne again after all—and our dear David. I miss them both very much indeed.”

“Yes.” Susanna smiled. “We will see them again.”

And Viscountess Ravensberg.

How absurd to think that seeing her would somehow bring Viscount Whitleaf closer. Or that it would be a desirable thing even if it did.

Yes, that healed wound was
very
tender to the touch.

14

The Duchess of Bewcastle had reserved the ballroom as well as the
tearoom at the Upper Assembly Rooms in Bath in order to give the children somewhere to run and be noisy while the adults conversed in civilized fashion over tea and listened to a few speeches. But she had engaged the services of an orchestra too, Peter discovered when he arrived early on the appointed afternoon with Lauren and Kit. After all, she explained with a laugh while the duke looked on with a supercilious air and incongruously fond silver eyes resting upon his lady, it would be a tragic thing indeed if the presence of the ballroom aroused in anyone a desire to dance but there was no music to make dancing possible.

“What you mean, Christine,” Bewcastle said, his long fingers curling about the handle of his quizzing glass and raising it halfway to his eye, “is that you are quite determined to dance if only Sydnam and Mrs. Butler can be persuaded to lead the way.”

“You know me all too well, Wulfric,” the duchess said with a laugh.

Peter was looking forward to the social gathering with uncharacteristic unease. He probably ought not to have come. If he suddenly, after several months of inaction, felt it necessary to check on Susanna's health—marvelous euphemism—then he ought to have done it by writing to her or calling at the school. He ought at the very least to have somehow let her know that he was going to be here today. He was almost certain that she
was
. Lauren had told him that four teachers were coming from the school as well as the former teacher who was now married to the Earl of Edgecombe.

And yet it struck Peter even as he entertained these troubled thoughts that the chance to meet Susanna again this afternoon
ought
to have been a cause of pleasure to both of them. They really had been friends—until the very end. How he kicked himself now for not having stayed in the drawing room with her that last afternoon—or for not taking Edgecombe up on his suggestion that he and the countess accompany them on their walk. Then they would have been meeting today with shared pleasure as friends who had not expected to see each other again so soon.

Other guests began to arrive. Peter was introduced to Mrs. Butler's parents and siblings and their spouses from Gloucestershire and to Lord and Lady Aidan Bedwyn, whom he had not met before. He hailed Lord and Lady Alleyne Bedwyn and a number of Kit and Sydnam's cousins, whom he had met on various occasions at Alvesley.

Normally he would have been in his element.

But his uneasiness was growing by the minute, and he found himself glancing at the door every few seconds instead of concentrating upon making himself agreeable to those with whom he conversed. A dozen or more times he thought about making his escape before it was too late, but escape might well be impossible, he realized as time went on. Even if he dashed out
now,
he had a long hall to traverse and a largish courtyard outside to cross before he could hope to slink out of sight of someone who would surely be arriving at any moment.

He wandered in the direction of the ballroom and forgot his woes for a while after Andrew and Sophia, two of Lauren's children, grabbed a hand each, dragged him triumphantly inside the large room, and demanded that he play with them. A whole host of other children gathered hopefully about him, and he proceeded to play Blind Man's Buff with them with a great deal of noise and energy and good humor.

It was only when he heard a loud burst of applause and even cheering coming from the tearoom that he realized the guests of honor must have arrived and that therefore all the other guests must now be gathered there too.

Even then he was tempted to slip out and hope no one would notice his absence.

But he would not add arrant cowardice to his other shortcomings, which were legion. He extricated himself from the children's game and went to stand in the shadowed half of the doorway into the tearoom so that he could peer cautiously about him.

Like a thief in the night, he thought with some disgust.

Sydnam Butler and a lady dressed in rose pink, who was presumably his bride, stood in a pool of red rose petals inside the door at the far side of the room, looking startled and bewildered. The Duchess of Bewcastle was clapping her hands for silence.

“Well, Mr. and Mrs. Butler,” she said, her voice warm and cheerful, “you may have thought yourselves very clever indeed when you married in great secrecy a few weeks ago. But your relatives and friends have caught up with you after all. Welcome to your wedding breakfast.”

The children, without the distraction of an adult to play with them in the ballroom, had left it and were streaming past Peter to see what all the fuss was about. They were soon adding to the cheerful mayhem that ensued for a few minutes while everyone attempted to get close to the bride and groom and pump the hand of the one and kiss the cheek of the other.

But Peter, still and silent in the doorway, took no part in the collective merriment.

He had seen her.

She was dressed neatly in pale blue, her short curls vibrantly auburn in contrast. She was bending down to hug a little boy who, he guessed, must be Mrs. Butler's son, and then she was reaching for Mrs. Butler herself and holding her in a close embrace for several seconds. She was laughing and tearful and bright-eyed and dazzling.

For several moments he simply gazed at her, his reluctance to see her again vanished without a trace. By Jove, he
had
missed her. He drank in the sight of her, more lovely and more vibrant than any other lady he had ever met.

She stepped aside so that the ladies with her—the Countess of Edgecombe and a brown-haired, severe-looking though not unhandsome woman who was probably Miss Martin—could take their turns greeting the bride. Susanna was waiting to pay her respects to Butler and was looking around at the other guests as she did so with bright, happy eyes.

And then those same eyes met his across the room—and her smile froze and then died altogether.

Peter was instantly conscious of himself again—and of the dashed uncomfortable fact that he had ruined her, made her a dishonorable offer, and left her without a backward glance, all within the space of one afternoon. And that now he was reappearing in her life without any warning and at just the time when she was celebrating the marriage of her friend.

He
really
ought not to have come, he thought again.

But dash it all, it was too late now to go away.

He strode purposefully across the room, intending to speak with her. But Lauren, flushed and animated, caught his arm as he approached, linking her own through it, led him up to the newlyweds, and proceeded to introduce him to Mrs. Butler, who was, he discovered, very lovely indeed. He bowed over her hand and raised it to his lips. He shook Sydnam's left hand with his left and wished him well. Then he shook the boy's hand—he was David Jewell—and winked and grinned at him.

“If you want to make your escape anytime soon,” he said, “you will doubtless find hordes of other young people in the ballroom—once they have found their way back there.”

The boy smiled back.

“Do come and sit at our table, Peter,” Lauren said as order began to replace the cheerful chaos of the past several minutes and the children made their way back to the ballroom rather than be caught up in the tedium of an adult tea party.

“I will, thank you, Lauren,” he said, “but there is someone to whom I must pay my respects first.”

Before he could delay too long and set up a greater awkwardness than he already felt, he strode over to the table where Susanna sat with Edgecombe and the countess, Lord and Lady Aidan Bedwyn, the unknown severe-looking lady, and the duchess's sister, Miss Thompson.

“Whitleaf,” Edgecombe said, standing to shake hands with him. “Good to see you again.”

“But of course,” the countess said, smiling at him, “you are related to Lady Ravensberg, are you not? It is a pleasure to see you again, Lord Whitleaf.”

And yet there was a hint of something in her tone that suggested she was not entirely pleased. Or perhaps his conscience was just playing tricks on him.

He bowed to her and to Miss Thompson, who must have arrived with her mother after he went into the ballroom, and turned his eyes on Susanna.

“Miss Osbourne?” he said. “I trust you are well?”

“Yes, thank you,” she said with perfect composure and a polite smile on her face—as if they had never lain together on a secluded hill above the river at Barclay Court. “And you, my lord?”

“Quite well,” he said, “thank you.”

Good Lord, where was his arsenal of small talk when he most needed it? But perhaps it was as well it had deserted him utterly, or he might have found himself saying something totally asinine like great beauty having to be a prerequisite for a teaching position at Miss Martin's School for Girls. He had the feeling that present company would not be at all amused by such a compliment.

“My lord,” Susanna said before he could make his escape to his own table, “may I present Miss Martin, owner of the school where I teach? This is Viscount Whitleaf, Claudia. He was staying not far from Barclay Court while I was a guest there.”

The severe-looking stranger whose identity he had guessed earlier inclined her head while he bowed and favored her with his most charming smile.

“Ma'am,” he said. “This is a pleasure I have long desired.”

They were only mildly extravagant words, but looking into her unsmiling gray eyes, he felt suddenly stripped naked. Not in any physical way, it was true, but he felt as if every layer of artifice were being stripped away and she was recognizing him for the shallow fribble that he was. He wondered if Susanna had told her anything about him.

“How do you do, Lord Whitleaf,” she said.

He retreated in reasonably good order after that and sat with his back to their table while he took tea and conversed with all around him and listened to the few speeches and toasts that followed it. He would have enjoyed the afternoon, he knew, if there had not been those few minutes of uncharacteristic gaucherie to bother him. And if he could have convinced himself that he had any business being here.

He
knew
she was not pleased to see him.

“You may all expect,” Sydnam Butler was saying to the whole gathering after commenting on the surprise of finding so many guests awaiting them here, “that Anne and I will put our heads together over the winter when there is nothing else to do and devise a suitable revenge.”

Peter joined in the general laughter.

And then, soon after the speeches and toasts were at an end, his ears sharpened to something Hallmere was saying at the next table.

“It was just here that we waltzed for the first time, Freyja,” he said. “Do you remember?”

Peter had been wondering how Susanna felt to be in the same room with Lady Hallmere, who had once refused to give her employment as her maid and who had perhaps been responsible for sending her to Bath as a charity pupil in Miss Martin's school. And he had been wondering if Lady Hallmere remembered her.

But the lady was speaking.

“How could I forget?” she said. “It was while we waltzed that you begged me to enter into a fake betrothal with you, and before we knew it we were in a marriage together—but not a fake one at all.”

They both laughed—as did everyone else at their table and a few at Peter's.

Kit had certainly heard the exchange.

“It would be a shame,” he said, raising his voice and getting to his feet at the same time, “to have an orchestra and the use of one of the most famous ballrooms in the country and not dance. I shall instruct the orchestra to play a waltz. But we must remember that this is a wedding celebration. The bride must dance first. Will you waltz with me, Anne?”

Sydnam stood up too.

“Thank you, Kit,” he said firmly, “but if it is not the custom for the bridegroom to be first to dance with his bride, then it ought to be. Anne, will you waltz with me?”

It was a courageous offer, Peter thought amid the general buzz of excitement as chairs scraped back and guests got to their feet to remove to the ballroom, from which music had been wafting all during tea. How did one waltz when one was missing a right arm—as well as an eye?

“Yes, I will,” Mrs. Butler said—and it struck Peter at that very moment that theirs was a love match.

He watched them waltz alone together a few minutes later, a little awkwardly at first, then more smoothly and confidently. And then Hallmere led the marchioness onto the floor to join them, and Kit and Lauren, Edgecombe and the countess, Bewcastle and the duchess, followed after them. Other gentlemen were taking their partners.

It was a
waltz
.

Peter never missed an opportunity to dance it at any of the balls he attended. But he was actually remembering the last time he had waltzed. He had enjoyed it enormously even though it had been at a small, unsophisticated country assembly. It had also been a prelude to all his woes, though—well, to the worst of them anyway. Without that waltz, there would probably have not been that kiss. And without that kiss, there probably would not have been…

Well.

Greeting her at the tea table had simply not been enough, had it? That atoned for absolutely nothing. Having made the decision to come, he must now make the further effort to find out what he had come to learn. And what better time than now?

He strode over to where she stood watching the dancers, between Miss Martin and Miss Thompson, who in his fancy resembled two stern avenging angels, except that Miss Martin had tears in her eyes as she watched the bridal couple dance and Miss Thompson looked amused.

He bowed in front of them and donned his most disarming smile.

“Miss Osbourne,” he said, “would you do me the honor of waltzing with me?”

He was aware of the eyes of the headmistress suddenly turned on him, sharp despite her tears though he looked only at Susanna, whose green eyes were fathomless as she gazed back at him.