The Incomparable Miss Compton (12 page)

Persy tightened her lips, but the words burst out anyway. “But we must discuss it. I thought he came for me, Sarah, truly I did. I had such hopes.” Her lower lip began to tremble.
If she cries about the fact that the man who couldn’t love me doesn’t love her
, Sarah thought,
I shall be forced to slap her
.

“Hope is for nitwits and innocents,” she said aloud. “Be glad you are the latter and stop acting like the former. You have any number of presentable suitors, all of whom would commit senseless acts of valor for the merest smile from you. Be happy. Now, go change. I believe you are foregoing the pleasure of Almack’s tonight to allow the duke to escort us to Drury Lane to see Keene before he ends his run.”

Persephone lowered her gaze and fiddled with her skirt. “I was. But I dismissed His Grace.”

Sarah closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “May I ask why in the name of heaven you would do that?”

“I thought Lord Breckonridge was offering for me!” she cried. “I thought I no longer needed Reddington’s stuffy attentions. I thought I was all but married.”

“You didn’t think at all that I can tell,” Sarah informed her. “Persy, have you no refinement of spirit? Are all your suitors toys to you? Do none of them move your heart in the slightest?”

To her surprise, the girl colored. “My heart has been moved, but not where it should be. And do not ask me to explain that statement, for I will not.”

Sarah raised an eyebrow. “You should know better than to make a statement you will not explain. Your mother would not allow it.”

“But you will,” Persephone said hopefully. She met Sarah’s stern gaze with an importuning look of her own. “You know you will, Sarah. You know how it feels to love the wrong man.”

“I know how it feels not to be loved,” Sarah corrected her. “That is entirely different. Now, if you‘ve lost your heart at last, you must tell me.”

Persephone hung her head. “I would not say that I’ve lost my heart, precisely. I am merely intrigued. He is very handsome and quite unattainable.”

Sarah could imagine her cousin being infatuated with a man who appeared unattainable. That would have been quite different from her many suitors who were only too happy to lay their hearts at her feet. She sat on the sofa and motioned her cousin to do likewise. Truth be told, she wasn’t sure she was ready to hear of her cousin’s success in love when her own life was proving so very unsuccessful, but she had a duty as chaperone. And she needed to focus on something other than her own pain.

“Tell me more,” she insisted as her cousin joined her.

“I met him at Lady Prestwick’s ball,” she confessed, violet eyes misty. “Lord Yarmouth introduced us. I had only one dance with him, but he watched us the entire time we ate with Lord Breckonridge, and he joined my group for conversation after Lord Breckonridge left.”

“The fellow who looked suspiciously like Lord Byron?” Sarah asked, remembering. She would not have felt comfortable around the brooding fellow, but she supposed Persephone might find him as poetic as the other women had once found Byron.

Persy nodded. “The very one. He barely spoke two sentences to me, but I could tell he was interested in furthering the acquaintance.”

“Indeed,” Sarah replied, hiding a smile. “If he only spoke two sentences I wonder that you were sure he was alive, let alone interested in pursuing you.”

“A lady can always tell when a gentleman is interested,” Persy informed her, nose in the air.

“Really?” Sarah knew her cousin could not be so wise as she had just dismissed a room full of suitors for a man who was plainly disinterested. Yet Sarah had to own she was not so sure of the signs herself. She had begun to believe Malcolm might be interested, with his warm looks and pointed attentions. Obviously, she had been mistaken. Or rather, she had mistaken the type of interest. She had foolishly hoped for love and found only an offer of employment.

“How exactly does a lady know?” she mused aloud.

Persephone leaned forward, obviously willing to share her limited knowledge. “Well, for one thing, he looks at you in the same manner as you might look upon a luscious raspberry trifle.”

Sarah tried to imagine Malcolm looking at her in so hungry a manner and blushed.

“For another thing,“ Persy continued, “he will ask you personal questions. Lord Wells asked me where I was staying and how long we’d be in London. He wouldn’t have asked if he hadn’t wanted to call on me, would he?“

“I would think not,“ Sarah had to agree. Malcolm had asked any number of questions about her, all of which an employer might ask. She could not see that as such as sign of devotion as her cousin did.

“Finally,“ Persy said dramatically, “he will allow nothing to keep him from your side.“

Sarah snorted. “That sounds decidedly inconvenient.“

Persephone smiled. “Not in the slightest. It is delightful beyond words.” She sobered. “Only Lord Wells has yet to call, so I suppose he was not interested after all.”

“It has only been a few days,” Sarah reminded her, although she had felt the same way earlier about Malcolm.

“True,” Persephone allowed with a sigh. “I shall not let his absence drive me into a decline. I still have any number of suitors, and more every day. Still, I would have much preferred to have caught Lord Breckonridge instead. Now, there was an eligible gentleman. He has a much greater fortune than Lord Wells, and he is much more powerful. I would have been the envy of every lady in London.”

Sarah felt a chill at the words. Persy pushed aside the man who intrigued her for another who would make others envy her. She could not imagine a less healthy attitude. But then, she reflected, she had never had a reason to feel that others envied her.

“It is a pity,” Persephone said with another sigh, “that Lord Breckonridge was not brought to heel.”

“You are better off without him,” Sarah tried to assure her, even though a small part of her protested. “He thinks of nothing but himself.”

Persy giggled. “Perhaps that is because he hasn’t found anyone else better. If he approaches me in the future, I will not be shy about letting him see how wrong he is.”

Sarah looked at her with alarm. “I would prefer that you keep away from him. You would do better attempting to mend this riff with the duke.”

“Tish tosh to the duke,” Persy said with a wave of her hand. “He had no more appreciation of me than your Lord Breckonridge. We will both find better gentlemen.”

“You will find someone, I have no doubt,” Sarah replied, unable to frown at her airy tone. “In fact, I would not be surprised if you hadn’t found someone by this time tomorrow. I will simply be glad when this Season ends.”

“Very well, if you insist,” Persy replied. “But I intend to enjoy every moment of my visit to London. What do you say, Sarah, shall we go to the theatre ourselves tonight? I wager if we send Timmons around, he could procure us tickets.”

Sarah made a face. “In truth, I’d rather not go out tonight. I may ask Norrie to come visit. Would you mind staying in?”

It was quite apparent that Persy would mind a great deal, but she gave a tight-lipped smile. “No, certainly, if that is what you wish. Tomorrow will be a better day, Sarah, you wait and see.”

Sarah wanted to believe her. She had certainly expected a brighter future before she met Lord Breckonridge. But his proposal, insulting as it had been, seemed to have changed her view. Just as the luster of Lady Prestwick’s ball had dimmed when he had left it, so her life seemed to have dimmed without the prospect of him in it.

“I don’t understand it,” she complained to Norrie when her friend visited that evening. “I never expected to marry and I certainly don’t want to marry without love, so why am I so blue-deviled?”

Norrie smiled consolingly. “Do you perhaps love him?”

Sarah frowned. “I didn’t think so. Certainly I find him handsome. And I will admit I admired him before he made his proposal. I do not think I know him well enough to love him.”

“Perhaps you are merely disappointed he is not the gentleman you thought him,” Norrie offered. “However, it is nice that he chose you, you must admit.”

“I suppose,” Sarah allowed. “Am I over reacting? Should I have given his suit more consideration?”

“Not in the slightest,” her friend declared. “You have the right to be loved, Sarah. And you said yourself you cannot abide a gift given out of anything less than love. You may be miserable now, but think how miserable you would have been if you had accepted him.”

Sarah did think about it. Indeed, it seemed as if she could think of little else. She thought of it as she wrote her letter to her aunt and uncle because she could not admit that not only had Persy cast off the duke but she had rejected what they would consider an excellent match. She thought about it that night as she brushed out her hair, and her hand grazed the spot he had touched on her cheek. The memory was as warm as her skin. She could not help thinking about it as she was forced to sit the next day and watch Persy flirt with her endless stream of callers. Neither Lord Wells nor the Duke of Reddington appeared. There was also no sign of Malcolm Breckonridge. Sarah was just as glad. She wasn’t sure what to say to him anyway.

It was late in the afternoon when Mr. Timmons drew Sarah aside. “We have a difficulty in the entry hall, Miss Sarah,” he said in his wheezy voice.

Sarah frowned. “Difficulty? What’s the matter?”

“Perhaps you should see for yourself, miss,” he replied.

Catching Persy’s eye to let her know she would be out of the room for a moment, Sarah excused herself and hurried to comply. Once out the door, she immediately saw the problem.

The entry hall was overflowing with flowers. Vase upon vase of roses sat upon the hall table, squatted on the marble-tiled floor, rested against the wood-paneled walls. Red roses brushed the mirror above the hall table; white roses cluttered the entry to the library; and pink roses gathered behind the etched front door. She looked at Timmons in exasperation.

“This is the last straw. We must ask Persy’s admirers to restrain themselves. There cannot be a single rose left in London!”

Persy chose that moment to peer down the stairs. Seeing the flowers, her eyes widened, and she hurried down to caper into what little space was left.

“Oh, roses!” she exclaimed, going first to one bouquet and then another. She touched a petal here, bent to sniff a flower there.

Sarah watched her with a shake of her head. “Really, Persy, this is too much. See who sent these, and ask him to stop at once.”

Persy giggled. “They are ostentatious, aren’t they? Oh, what a dear. Let me find the card.”

“Here, miss,” Timmons offered with a deep sigh, handing her a small card. Persy took it eagerly and read the inscription. Sarah turned to the butler.

“Perhaps if we salted them about the rooms, the smell would not be so overpowering,” she suggested.

“Perhaps we should move them all to Sarah’s room,” Persy said, voice decidedly piqued. Sarah turned to her with a frown, but it was nothing to match the frown on her cousin’s face. Persy thrust the card at her and stalked back to the sitting room. Frown deepening, Sarah looked down at the card.

“Forgive me,” it read. It was signed only, “Breckonridge.”

The card dropped from her lifeless fingers, and she stared around at the dozens of roses. For her? He had sent all these to apologize to her? Did he care about her feelings after all?

The thought was wondrous. She had dreamed years ago that someone might truly love her and care about how she felt. She’d conjured fairy tales with Norrie about the gentlemen they’d meet and the love they’d find. The dreams had sustained her until her Season had proven them a lie. Since then she had been careful to whom she gave her heart.

No doubt that was why the thought that he might care frightened her as well. She had accused him of not loving her, but she had admitted to Norrie that she did not think she was in love with him. Now that she was faced with the possibility that he could love her after all, she wasn’t sure what to do. Perhaps that was why she hadn’t truly believed he would propose in the library that day. Love had seemed a far away ideal, something remembered before the deaths of her parents, something echoed in her friendship with Norrie. She wasn’t entirely sure why no one except Norrie had ever shown her what she believed was love, but she had wondered whether she might somehow have held them off. Now here was Malcolm, refusing to be held off, refusing to go away. She had no idea how to respond.

But one thing she did know.

It would take a great deal more than a surfeit of roses for Malcolm Breckonridge to wedge his way into her heart.

Chapter Eleven

“And then,” Appleby stated with great relish, “Mr. Timmons reports that she took the roses and threw them in the trash.”

Malcolm paused in the act of removing his shoes. It had not been a good day. In the first place, recent events had made the Marquis DeGuis more than cautious in openly endorsing any mention of reform. Respected as he was among the Tories, his support was key to Malcolm’s plans to halt the spread of censure. Only an extended conversation with the fellow, and his astute wife, had brought him into reluctant agreement. In the second place, Viscount Darton was having trouble framing the Widows and Orphans Act in such a way as to please the conservative Tories, and Malcolm had had to spend several hours wrangling over the merits of “child” over “dependent.” Despite his promises to Anne, he had not had a moment to spend in courting and had hoped the roses might carry on in his stead. Obviously, that was not the case.

“You’re certain she saw the card?” he asked his valet.

“Most certain,” Appleby reported giddily. “She ripped it in half and half again.”

“If you tell me she danced among the pieces,” Malcolm growled, “I shall hurl this shoe at you.”

Appleby sobered immediately. “My apologies, my lord,” he murmured with a hurried bow. “I had no idea the subject was so injurious to your sensibilities. You can, of course, count on me to temper my comments in the future.”