She had not wanted the roses.
“Flowers become you, my lady,” Lord Allenbright whispered teasingly.
With a forced smile, Lillian looked up, a polite answer hovering on her lips, when she detected the mischievous twinkle in his eyes. She found it utterly enchanting. “You are incorrigible, my lord,” she whispered back, and tried to suppress the twitching of her lips. “I do not think it is quite fitting to tease a lady like this.”
“Ahh, well…” He cleared his throat and made a sweeping gesture with his hand. “Have you noticed the Arazzi along the walls? They are superb,” he said more loudly. “There’s Vulcan presenting Jupiter with the thunderbolts, Apollo with the Muses, and over there Bacchus and the Bacchantes. Now,
that
is something I consider naughty!”
Lillian laughed, yet the tapestries against the silk and velvet brocade of the walls were indeed beautiful, with gay colors and frolicking figures.
“Should you wish to admire all of Lord Holland’s treasures, my dear, it would take you the better part of a month.” Ravenhurst reached for her hand and placed it on his forearm. Even through the material of his clothes she could feel the hard muscle beneath. His flesh was unyielding, and its heat drifted up to warm her fingers. “Shall we? We don’t want to keep everybody waiting.”
“Of course.” Lillian lowered her eyes. Even though she realized he was only playing the considerate husband for society’s sake, she felt his touch to the marrow. Tingles shot up her arm, and her fingers almost twitched with the urge to explore the strength of his arms. Yet her hand remained stiff, for she felt the tension coiled within his big body. She risked a quick glance at him from the corner of her eyes. The sternness had returned to his face, the lines etched into his skin deeper than ever.
Inwardly, she sighed.
A thick, red carpet swallowed the sound of their steps as a footman guided them through a silk-hung doorway on their right to a large staircase and up to the first floor. Here they stepped through a door into a wainscoted chamber, large enough to count as a ballroom. Arrangements of upholstered chairs and delicate-looking settees were grouped around two fireplaces. Tall, graceful figures looked down from the paintings above each chimneypiece, and beneath, some lightly clad nymphs danced on a ground of gold.
“Most decidedly naughty,” came Lord Allenbright’s dramatic murmur from behind, and Lillian had to bite her lip in order to suppress another giggle.
“Through here, my lady, my lords, sir.” The footman bowed and showed them into an adjoining room where sounds of conversation and laughter resonated. A company of maybe twelve people stood around in small groups, talking and gesticulating, all apparently in high spirits. Against the crimson walls they looked like an artfully arranged
tableau
, a study in polite parlor conversation. A middle-aged, ample-bosomed woman broke off from one of the groups and approached, her tight brown curls bouncing up and down with each step.
“Lord Ravenhurst!” she exclaimed. “Good evening, good evening. And this delightful creature must be Lady Ravenhurst.” She took Lillian’s hands. “Delighted, my dear, delighted.” Her gaze honed in on Lillian’s hairdo, and immediately the smile vanished from her face to be replaced by a frown. “But what have we here? Five roses?
Five?
Decidedly
beaucoup trop
, my dear. Five roses! Heavens!” She reached out and plucked two flowers from Lillian’s hair. “Much better, this. Don’t you think so, too, Lord Ravenhurst? Mr. Allen? Mr. Allen! Do get rid of these roses, will you?” She thrust the offending blossoms at a tall, pale man with graying hair and enormous spectacles balancing on his nose.
“Shall I proceed to eat them, my lady?” he asked courteously, a Scottish accent lengthening his vowels.
“Oh, don’t be silly, Mr. Allen.” She rapped his arm with her fan. However, her attention was immediately drawn to something else. “My dear Lord Allenbright!” she exclaimed, all smiles again. Enthusiastically she reached out as if to clasp him in a hearty embrace. “What a pleasure to have you here. And Mr. de la Mere, too.”
Mr. Allen issued a polite snort. “Ye are so seldom in London that yer stay caused quite a sensation. Of course, Lady Holland
must b
e one of the first to have ye for dinner. Isn’t that so, my lady?” For that, he felt the rapping of her fan a second time.
“The roses, Mr. Allen, the roses.” She threw him a pointed look before she turned back to Allenbright and de la Mere. “Quite the inseparables you two are. Like the Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux, twinkling among the field of stars.” She blinked. “Doesn’t Lady Nicolai have some parrots that are inseparable, too? General Luttrell?” Her fan hit the arm of the man who was just trying to squeeze past them. “You are late, Luttrell.”
“My lady, I am devastated.” Grinning, he bowed, hand on his heart.
“Yes, yes.” Lady Holland poked her fan into his chest. “Lady Nicolai?” she prompted.
“No. Not any longer. One of the parrots died while trying to lay an egg.”
Lady Holland lifted her eyebrows. “How perfectly shocking. Whatever is she going to do now?”
“I am sure Lord Nicolai is already on his way to Africa in order to catch a new parrot for her,” the man said with a perfectly straight face. Half turning, he spotted Mr. Allen. “Allen! What are you doing with the roses?”
The other cleared his throat, lifting his hand as if to point, then scratched the side of his face. Surprised, Luttrell looked back, then coughed politely as he noticed Lillian. “Your locks are slightly askew, my lady.”
“Oh.” Lillian’s hands flew up to her hair.
“Hmph.” Lady Holland thrust her chin forward. “It looks much better than before.
Five
roses!
Beaucoup trop!
” She glared at Luttrell, daring him to contradict her.
Lillian lowered her hands to her sides. “You are quite right, my lady,” she agreed softly. She was a bit overwhelmed by the woman’s vivacity.
Lady Holland’s face lit up. Cheerfully, she patted Lillian’s cheek. “And you are a perfect dear, Lady Ravenhurst. Now run along and have some fun.” She turned to continue poking her fan into Mr. Allen. “You are still here? Tsh, tsh, go!”
Luttrell lifted an eyebrow. “Dearie me, you got promoted to pet chicken, Allen. What a lucky devil you are!” He slung a friendly arm around the other man’s shoulder, and together they marched off, Lady Holland and her fan in tow.
Behind her, Lillian heard Lord Allenbright’s light chuckle. “Poor Allen,” he murmured.
“Lady Holland’s very own Nubian slave,” de la Mere added in an amused drawl. “I suggest that we make the rounds before the procession begins. Shall we?”
“By all means.” In a show of apparent solicitousness, Ravenhurst once more reached out to place Lillian’s hand in the crook of his elbow, putting his large fingers over her much smaller ones.
Perhaps he is afraid I will run away…
In silent reassurance, Lillian curled her fingers over his arm and gently squeezed the hard muscles. Whatever charade he intended to play for their hosts, they were in this together. So she lifted her chin a notch and let him guide her around the room to do the introductions.
She soon found that many different sets of people made up the Hollands’ dinner party. Beside the titled, she also met writers and actors, the famous John Kemble even, whom she had seen doing Shakespeare in Covent Garden. She was introduced to high-ranking people of the middle-class as well as commoners from abroad, like the short Italian, Mr. Foscolo, whose English was almost unintelligible, but who made up for it by talking with his hands and feet instead. At one time, lost in a convoluted narrative of his adventures in St. Omer, he almost knocked off Mr. Allen’s silver eyeglasses.
The tall, bespectacled Scot happily took on the obligation to introduce them to the people Ravenhurst did not know, like Mr. Prestwood Smith, Esquire, a lawyer whose waistcoat stretched so tight over his enormous belly that Lillian feared the buttons might pop off at any moment.
The man eyed Lillian speculatively before he turned to Ravenhurst with a sly smile on his face. “I am surprised you have brought your wife here, my lord.”
Ravenhurst lifted his brows. “Whyever should I not?”
“Well, you know how it is…” The lawyer, all fake innocence, lifted his shoulders. “Mrs. Prestwood Smith would rather drop dead than cross the threshold of Holland House.”
Angry color rose in Mr. Allen’s face, but before he could say anything, Lord Allenbright beat him to it. “I fail to see why.” His voice oozed icy disdain.
Mr. Prestwood Smith failed to read the warning signs, for he continued blithely. “Why? Because of Lady Holland’s rather—how shall I put it—dubious past, of course!” Because of the fact that Lady Holland had divorced her first husband in order to be with Lord Holland, that their first son had been born out of wedlock.
Aunt Louisa, of course, had known all about it and about the terrible scandal that followed. But how heavy weighed that old scandal against the friendliness Lady Holland had shown Lillian? Though Lillian thought she understood why a man like Mr. Prestwood Smith would slight a higher-born woman in her own home.
From under lowered lashes Lillian watched the men around her. Mr. Allen looked ready to explode. Allenbright’s and de la Mere’s faces mirrored their open contempt, while Ravenhurst’s expression had frozen to stone.
Mr. Prestwood Smith’s dart had hit true.
Lillian frowned.
Prestwood Smith.
The name seemed to tickle a memory, one of Aunt Louisa’s anecdotes of Seasons past, of—
“Mr. Prestwood Smith,” she said softly.
“Yes, my lady?” Smirking, the lawyer turned to her.
Lillian cocked her head to the side. “Are you the same Prestwood Smith who in the winter of 1810 fell into the Thames while in pursuit of—how shall I put this—a bit of muslin?” She smiled politely, as if the question were the most natural in the world. Next to her, Allenbright broke into guffaws of laughter.
Very slowly, a mottled color covered Mr. Prestwood Smith’s face. “Well… I say!” He huffed and puffed. “This is—”
“The ice broke, did it not?” Lillian went on sympathetically. “Oh dear, that must have been
quelque peu déplaisant
for you,
non
?”
“A little bit unpleasant?” Mr. de la Mere echoed, then erupted into a coughing fit.
She would not have been surprised to see foam emit from Mr. Prestwood Smith’s mouth. Clenching his fists until the knuckles showed white, he threw his head back and marched off, an image of injured dignity.
"Oh dear.” Mr. Allen allowed himself a small chortle before he became serious again. “My dear Lady Ravenhurst, you are a true Penelope.” Obviously deeply moved, he bowed low over her hand.
Feeling that he was paying her a compliment, Lillian gave him a shy smile. “Think nothing of it, Mr. Allen,” she said softly. When she risked a quick glance at her husband, she saw that he was looking at her with a most peculiar expression on his face. Quickly Lillian averted her eyes.
Some short time later Lady Holland clapped her hands, and Mr. Allen immediately hastened to arrange the assembled guests in rows of two, according to their rank and importance. Then they all marched into the adjoining dining room in a festive procession. The room blazed with lights, which were reflected in the great glass above the chimney-piece and lent a luxurious sparkle to the crimson damask walls. Golden-framed portraits looked down on the party as the guests tried to find their places according to Lady Holland’s wishes.
“Ibby? Ibby, do change your seat with Lord Allenbright. We do not want to separate the inseparables, do we?”
Obligingly Miss Fox, a small, middle-aged woman with a shy smile, stood.
“Mr. White, do not make such a horrid face.” Lady Holland rapped her fan against the table. “Lest anybody think we give you poison to drink.”
“The champagne is enough to poison any man’s soul,” the so-chided White muttered rebelliously, if a bit quietly. He raised soulful eyes to look at Lillian. “I am a practicer of asceticism,” he explained with great dignity.
“Stuff and nonsense, asceticism,” Lady Holland cut in, omniscient of all that went on at her table. “Holland House is not a monastery, Mr. White. Make sure that you do not stuff poor Henry’s head with such rubbish. Lord Ravenhurst, I see with pleasure that you have found a seat next to your wife. We would not want to separate newlyweds any more than the Dioscuri.”
“Especially when they are so
happily
wed,” murmured Mr. Prestwood Smith. Those sitting nearest him tittered and threw arched looks at Lillian and her husband.
Beside her, she could feel Ravenhurst growing tense, yet before his fury could erupt, his friend leaned back in his chair, apparently all ease and polite boredom. “My dear… Smith, is it?” Justin de la Mere drawled. “If you had seen the paradisical environs of Bair Hall, where Lord and Lady Ravenhurst spent their honeymoon—a fair Garden Eden it is, with them as Adam and Eve in all their beauty and innocence…” He threw Ravenhurst a look.
Lillian felt color rise in her cheeks. Surely he must be thinking of their encounter in the garden when she had run around bedecked with flowers.
Strangely, though, her blush seemed to help to defuse the situation, for Miss Fox sighed and said, “Ahh,” and Lady Holland looked much touched.
"Indeed.” Ravenhurst’s voice betrayed none of the agitation Lillian still felt in his tightly coiled muscles. With apparent ease and familiarity he took one of her gloved hands to lift it to his lips. At the last moment, he turned her hand around and placed a slow, lingering kiss on her palm. Even through the material of her glove his hot breath warmed Lillian’s skin, and a tingle of awareness raced up her arm.
“We are the most happily wedded couple you can imagine,” he said. The lie fell lightly from his lips, but when he raised his head to meet Lillian’s gaze, she saw that his eyes were curiously flat and dead.
Icy apprehension replaced the pleasant tingle of before. In an unconscious move, Lillian turned her hand and curled her fingers around his.
The corners of his mouth lifted into a sarcastic smile, and with great care, he put Lillian’s hand back on the table before he faced the potbellied lawyer. “You see, Mr. Prestwood Smith,” he said, his voice deadly soft, “there is no need for concern. Absolutely none.”