“Somehow it will all come right,” she’d reassured Lucy, which was the kind thing to say. She almost even believed it. “But the onus shouldn’t be on you to make introductions, and I do not hold it against you one bit.”
“Good evening, ladies. You both look lovely this evening.”
Lucy and Catherine turned toward Miss Seaver, who also seemed to begin her evenings next to the ratafia. Her chaperone—her mother—was clustered with other matrons on the opposite side of the room.
Instead of Mr. Hargrove, this time she had brought with her the pretty young Lady Hackworth, whose husband was a viscount. Introductions and curtsies were exchanged.
Catherine wistfully eyed the tiara perched on Lady Hackworth’s complicated yellow-gold coiffure. Her own wavy hair was pinned up rather simply, and strands of it spiraled at her cheekbones.
“There are to be two waltzes this evening!” Miss Seaver announced. “And I’m dancing the firstwiiiith...”
She widened her eyes playfully.
The dramatic pause was clearly designed to torture poor Lucy, who had not yet been asked to dancetonight by Mr. Hargrove. Catherine was tempted to accidentally-on-purpose trod hard on Miss Seaver’s instep.
“...Mr. Richards,” Miss Seaver finally said brightly.
Both Lucy and Catherine disguised exhales.
“I’m looking forward to the first quadrille,” Catherine contributed.
Thanks to Lucy, Catherine had, indeed, met a few young men in the past thirty minutes. They had drifted oh so casually over to greet Lucy and had seemed quite pleased to meet her appealing new friend. Two of those young men had been anyone’s definition of very attractive and the third—well, he seemed cheerful enough. Her dance card now sportedthreeentire names. None of them were waltzes. Perhaps her season would improve just like this, in increments, the way Lord Kirke had said laws protecting children would be made.
She hadn’t seen him at all today at The Grand Palace on the Thames—he was such an early riser!—but he’d been a low hum in her thoughts for much of the day. WhileThe Arabian Nights’ Entertainmentshad gotten off to a stirring start in the sitting room last night—Mrs. Pariseau even did the voices when she read, which was quite entertaining—it was Lord Kirke’s earlier, bold, inspiring words that ran like a river through her mind as she drifted off to sleep. The soft rumble with which he’d delivered the word “vulnerable,” the crisp metallic precision of the word “pique”—the choices he made about cadences and emphases reminded her of an orchestra conductor, except his instruments were words. It was impossible not to get swept up in the flow of them, the way one might be helpless not to tap a foot while listening to a waltz. It was the first timeshe’d understood how speaking could indeed be a gift, and how easily he could hold the House of Commons in thrall.
But he’d also said “arse” in the sitting room, and this delighted her almost more than his little speech.
Suddenly, as if she’d conjured him, through the milling ballroom crowd the man himself appeared.
The four of them stopped talking at once.
He deftly maneuvered through a clot of matrons blocking his path, then vanished again into another room.
His expression was remote and abstracted. He didn’t look their way at all.
Catherine slowly released her breath.
They all spent a moment of silent, almost reverent appreciation in the aftermath, as though they’d spotted a mythical beast.
Lady Hackworth leaned toward the other young ladies confidingly. “I heard Lady Clayton say that she wanted toclimbKirke.”
Catherine nearly reared back. Lady Hackworth’s nose was turned up at the tip, which made her look as though she was literally sniffing out gossip. Her eyes were a startling shade of near turquoise.
She didn’t know what “climbing him” meant, precisely, but it sounded as though it had something to do with sex and her cheeks went hot.
She was hardly completely naive about those matters. She knew which body parts were inserted where during sexual congress when it came down to it. But she was indignant on Lord Kirke’s behalf. It was the first time anyone she’d known personally had been so shockingly, cavalierly discussed and she was surprised at her impulse to throw herself, metaphorically, bodily in front of him. Especially since she barely knew him, and she was absolutely certain the man had no trouble protecting himself. Furthermore, he’d outright told her he was scandalous.
“She wants to climb him because he’s tall, like a tree?” she said, furrowing her brow. She wanted to see how far Lady Hackworth would go to explain herself.
Lady Hackworth laughed merrily. “Oh, my dear! You are too, too much.”
“Perhaps you shouldn’t repeat that sort of thing,” Lucy bravely suggested, confirming to Catherine that she, too, thought it was about sex. They exchanged a swift glance of solidarity.
“Oh, my little gooses,” Lady Hackworth, who wasn’t much older than the two of them, soothed, sounding genuinely contrite. “I didn’t mean to upset the two of you. It’s just something silly I heard and I was making conversation. And it’s a compliment to the man, truly.Oneday, if you’re lucky—as lucky as I am—you’ll understand.”
There was little Catherine loathed more than this sort of condescension.
“He hasn’t danced at a ball in a decade. What I wouldn’t give to waltz with him! But it’s probably also a mercy. I think a girl might crumble into ash.” Lady Hackworth gave a theatrical little shiver. “When he looks at you, it’s hard to know whether to cross yourself or lie back and hike your skirts. Perhaps both,” she mused. “I’ve heard he’sverygood.”