The Hermit's Daughter (16 page)

Monstuart greeted the group but soon turned his attention to Sally. “How did you enjoy the play?”
he asked.

She gave him a flirtatious glance and replied, “My heart was not in the mood for tragedy. I kept thinking of this lovely ball I was missing, and my only mood was impatience.”

“Then we shared an emotion, even if we were not together.”

This came dangerously close to sentiment. She knew Monstuart was about as sentimental as a dagger, and decided to goad him to further excesses of folly. “How could you be impatient for the ball? You were already here, Lord Monstuart.”

“But
you
weren’t.”
He tucked her hand under his arm and led her off. “It was you I was waiting for. Now you have heard what you wished to. I promise I shan’t bethump with you any more maudlin compliments. Shall we dance?”

Sets were forming for a cotillion. “Let us wait for a waltz,”
she suggested. “It is so much more ... personal, and once we have stood up together, we have nothing further to look forward to for the evening.”

“I think we might have two dances together without raising any eyebrows.”

She gave him a flirtatious smile. “You think wrong, Lord Monstuart. Every quiz in the room would whisper that you were showing a great deal of attention to Miss Hermitage.”

His dark gaze lingered on her, and his lips lifted
a fraction in an incipient smile. “Worse, they would
say you had caught me.”

She decided to take offense. “You aren’t the one who will look a fool when it all comes to nothing. We ladies have our pride to consider, you know.”

Monstuart gazed at her long-lashed eyes and the beautiful contrast of ebony hair against that ivory skin. His reply was delayed a moment. “You have decided it will come to nothing, have you?”

She peered coquettishly from the corner of her eyes. Her heart pounded in excitement and anger. “You must know a lady never reveals her feelings till she is certain they are reciprocated. Now that I am in London, I must leave off country manners.”

Monstuart inclined his head close to hers. His voice was softly intimate. “I think I preferred us in Ashford. Will it offend you if I choose your next partner?”

She followed the line of his eyes to see a middle-aged gentleman looking in their direction. “It will if old Gouty Sudderland is the gent you have in mind.”

“I don’t want to give myself too much competition.”

Her lashes flickered shamelessly. “You are too modest, Monstuart. You know there isn’t a gentleman in the room who provides real competition for you.”

A bark of laughter cracked out. “This sentiment is contagious. We must take care, or we’ll be out picking flowers in sun-dappled pastures. Very well, tell me who it is you have in your eye.”

She chose Lord Alton, one of Monstuart’s set, a handsome, wealthy nobleman. “You realize there is a price for the introduction,”
he warned.

“I have already promised you the first set of waltzes, Lord Monstuart.”

“That has already been established. The bonus I refer to is that you stop calling me Lord Monstuart as though we were mere acquaintances. My friends call me Monty.”

“Very well, Monty.”

“And I shall ask your sister to stand up with me. She no longer hates me, I think. I have been at some pains to bring her around. You are observing, I trust, how far my guileless mind is from providing
you
any competition.”

“This seems an auspicious moment for you to assure me I am above competition.”

“Since you already know it, you save me the trouble.”

Lord Alton proved a charming partner. Sally was sure that if her mind had been on romance, she might have made some headway with him, for he was admiring. Her second partner, another of Monstuart’s friends, was equally suitable. But her mind was not on romance. Anger seethed in her breast at Monstuart’s duplicity. How he must be anticipating her disgrace! Why was he pretending to like her? The answer came slowly, but at length she had figured it out. He was only making up to her to ensure that she didn’t form any other attachment! It was exactly the sort of underhanded stunt she expected from him. When bellowing her lack of dowry didn’t turn the trick, he pretended he loved her.

With so much on her mind, Sally didn’t notice that Derwent was missing for a set. Mrs. Hermitage, occupied with Sir Darrow in the card parlor, didn’t notice it either. Derwent told his bride he was stepping out to blow a cloud but would be back presently. She was not such a sleuth that she noticed the lack of tobacco reek when he returned from his rendezvous with Peacock half an hour later.

When the set of waltzes began, Monstuart appeared at Sally’s elbow. “At last,”
he said, and drew her into his arms. His words called to mind Peacock, who had said the same thing. It seemed her fate to be surrounded by faithless scoundrels.

They floated around the room as lightly as feathers. Monstuart thought the febrile glitter in her eyes and her air of breathless excitement was due to pleasure. He felt unusually animated himself. The step he was anticipating was one he had avoided for years. Marriage was a large, irrevocable step, but one he must take eventually.

Sally Hermitage made the step not only possible but enjoyable. She was a woman whose charms would not pall after the first month. A gentleman must marry an innocent bride, but that was no reason she must be a Bath Miss. Sally was conversable, she was intelligent, and she was beautiful. In short, she represented the best of all possible brides: virtue robed in the alluring guise of a mistress.

He was done fighting the inevitable. She had bested him in rushing Derwent’s marriage forward. He had made some rallying and halfhearted efforts at repaying her, but the thing was done. It would be petty and fruitless to fight it further. Sally would have no trouble finding a husband, and to risk losing her was unthinkable. He must give Derwent at least some of his money. But they would speak of that later. For now he would let his body and head reel through this delicious waltz.

When it was over, he said, “If we go to the refreshment parlor, we can prolong this meeting.”

“And you can avoid the strenuous exertion of the country dance,”
she riposted. “I have noticed you always avoid them, Monty. Don’t bother letting on that staying in my company has anything to do with it.”

He smiled, unfazed at her charge of selfishness. “Wouldn’t you like to hear the cool trickle of the punch fountain?”
he tempted.

“Not in the least, but I wouldn’t mind slaking my thirst on a glass of champagne.”

They sat in a private corner, half-hidden by a spreading palm, and talked the greatest nonsense. “Is London living up to your expectations?”
Monstuart asked.

“Now that you have permitted the eligible bachelors to recognize me, it surpasses them.”

“Would it assuage your vanity if I admitted what a hard time I have had holding them back?”

“You surely don’t expect to trap me into admitting vanity by that loaded question?”

“Vanity was the wrong word. I should have said pride. That is a good Anglo-Saxon virtue. I am virtuous myself, in that one respect.”

“And no other?”
she asked, batting her eyes in mock horror.

“I lay claim to all the gentleman’s virtues. I never seduce innocent ladies or fail to pay my gambling debts or vote Conservative,”
he joked.

Sally observed the cynical nature of his answer but failed to notice his joking mood. “Papa always voted Conservative.”

“He got a deal of business from them.”

She felt the prickle of anger that could no longer be controlled. “And what do you get from the Whigs, Monstuart?”

“Peace of conscience. I don’t parade my philanthropy, but any man with a heart has to support the reforms of the Whigs. Have I surprised you? You thought because you only see me in society that I have no other interests? What you imagined to be an orgy at Lady Dennison’s was, in fact, a meeting of Whigs planning to wrest power and reform the electoral ridings. We deem it unfair that Lord Suddaby’s barn has a vote in parliament, whereas many towns of ten or twelve thousand have not.”

It was the first time she had heard Monstuart speak of such serious things, and she looked alarmed. That he should come out on the side of the underprivileged was as surprising as the rest.

“I hope I have impressed you,”
he admitted. “I wouldn’t want you to think I was only a fashionable fribble or that my wife would have no more strenuous duties than being popular.”

Wife! She was ambushed by the word and all it implied. An air of constraint came over her. She looked uncertainly at him and felt terribly ill at ease.

“I’ve chosen a poor moment to speak of politics,”
he said at once. “Blame it on my lust for your approval. And now, if you’ve had all the champagne you can hold, I’ll take you back to the ballroom. You haven’t stood up with Derwent yet,”
he said laughing. “Fair is fair. I hauled Mellie around the floor. You must submit to Derwent’s two left feet.”

Derwent was found and agreed sulkily to stand up with Sally. “I have a ripping headache, if you want the truth,”
he complained. “Mellie don’t like London above half, and I come to think I don’t either.”
Gravenhurst would be a much cheaper place to rusticate. The difficulty was Mrs. Hermitage and Sally.

“The Season only lasts six weeks. There is plenty of time for Gravenhurst.”

“The Season is more than half over. I don’t see why we can’t leave at once.”

“And cheat Melanie of her ball? Derwent, don’t be so selfish. It is all arranged.”

“The cards ain’t out yet.”
And more important, none of the expensive orders had arrived. No reason it couldn’t all be canceled and save a thousand pounds. “It’s dashed expensive, entertaining half of London.”

“Half of London has entertained us. Social obligations must be repaid.”

“Oh, absolutely.”

“And what of the expensive house in Cavendish Square?”

“I know a chap who’d sublet and pay nearly the whole price we paid for the entire Season, for as time goes on, places are impossible to hire.”

Sally fell into alarm to learn he was actively working to leave London. “Don’t be ridiculous!”
she scoffed. “We’re not that poor. We still have six thousand pounds—haven’t we?”

Derwent scowled and stumbled on to the next step of the dance. You could have bowled him over with a zephyr when Tinny Hendry was standing there with Peacock, also with his fist full of I.O.U.s. Another thousand pounds. It came as close to wiping him out as made no difference. And how was he to tell the ladies? Lord Derwent felt like Atlas, trying to plod up a hill with a great weight on his back.

If it were only he and Mellie, there would be nothing to it. It seemed hard that a man had to deal with his bride’s whole family, and Monstuart thrown into the bargain, making him buy that ugly tiara that Mellie hated. Maybe he could sell it. When the steps of the dance brought Sally back to him, she repeated, “Haven’t we got six thousand left, Derwent?”

“Of course we have.”
He scowled. There was something in her green stare that unmanned him.

As soon as the dance was over, Derwent took Melanie home. “You tell Mama we decided to leave,”
Melanie said to her sister.

Sally was concerned and spoke to her mother as soon as she left the card table. Her mother brushed it aside. “It is only natural they should want their house to themselves from time to time,”
she said archly. “Newlyweds—and to have the pair of us forever hanging over their shoulders like vultures.”

“They have plenty of time to themselves. The house is huge. They need only see us at meals if they want to.”

Mrs. Hermitage sighed. “It’s different when you’re in love, Sal. You never were sensitive to the finer emotions.”

“I don’t like it,”
Sally insisted. “He even spoke of returning to Gravenhurst—immediately, before the ball. What has he got in his head?”

Mrs. Hermitage looked interested at this news. If Derwent took Mellie off to Gravenhurst, there would be nothing to delay her own match with Darrow. Sally would no longer have the prestige of being under Lord Derwent’s roof, so she couldn’t object to removing to Darrow’s apartment. Except that it really was too small for the three of them.

“You don’t mean it,”
she said pensively. “What would he do with Cavendish Square?”

“He mentioned subletting it. Did you ever hear of anything so foolish?”

“Subletting, you say?”
It flashed into her mind in an instant that Darrow could sublet, and they wouldn’t even have the bother of moving. He could just move in with them till the lease was up.

“More to the point, what are
we
to do? We’ll have to go home. It will be pretty tight, living in Ashford when we’ve spent so much of our money.”

“Ashford? I don’t intend to return there, Sal. It is like a stagnant pond, after the pleasure of London.”

London had given Sally about as much pleasure as a bad tooth. “Perhaps one of us will have Heppleworth after all,”
she said wearily.

“Surely not! You can do better than that, Sal.”

“Actually, Mama, it was you I had in mind. I only said it to frighten you into talking some sense into Mellie, in the hope that she will persuade Derwent out of this freakish idea.”

Mrs. Hermitage patted her curls and said, “Darrow might have something to say to my marrying Heppleworth.”

It took a moment for her meaning to sink in. “You don’t mean he has offered!”

“Several times, and I haven’t said no.”

“Oh, Mama! How lovely for you.”

“For us all, Sal. We will want you to live with us. We’ll have a good cose when we get home.”
Then she strode out of the room, leaving Sally behind with a musing smile on her face. Mama and Sir Darrow—what a boon that would be! It seemed all the family was having success except her. It never occurred to her that her mother would marry immediately, which still left her with the problem of Derwent’s wanting to leave London.

Monstuart rushed forward as soon as he saw Sally alone. “I hadn’t the foresight to ask you to join me for supper,”
he said. “I hope I am not too late.”

“I’m promised to Sir Darrow Willowby’s table, Monstuart.”