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All around came the steady drone of voices. The room continued to fill with entering guests, the black or dark-blue coats of the gentlemen relieved by the brightly colored gowns of the ladies. She and Megan seemed to be the only ones in pale-colored gowns as befitted unmarried young ladies.

Everyone around them seemed to know one another in contrast to her and Megan, who stood huddled beside Lady Bess as chicks under a hen.

Mr. Marfleet appeared at her elbow. “Thank you for coming. I hope it doesn’t prove frightfully boring for you. They’re mainly my father’s guests, fellow MPs, you know.” He seemed ill at ease, and again she remembered their last conversation, this
time remembering his words “ugly younger son of Sir Geoffrey Marfleet.”

Did he feel like an ugly duckling among his handsome parents and brother? Even his sister had a striking look about her, though she hid it behind an unfashionable coiffure and gown.

“My dear boy, we are tickled that you had your mother include us in your party,” Lady Bess told him. She had no qualms about lifting her quizzing glass to her eye and subjecting him to the same scrutiny his mother had given Jessamine and Megan.

His sister stood at his side, looking at Megan and Jessamine with frank curiosity.

Lady Bess’s quizzing glass focused on something beyond Mr. Marfleet’s shoulder. “Isn’t that Lady Gouldsborough? I haven’t seen her in an age. Not since she remarried.”

Mr. Marfleet turned a fraction. “Yes, it is she with Henry Dalton. She is Mrs. Dalton now.”

“I must say hello, if the two of you will keep the young ladies company for a moment?”

“With pleasure,” he murmured.

Lady Bess was off in a flurry of lace.

Megan giggled. “You mustn’t feel compelled to stay with us. We are quite accustomed by now to standing about not knowing a soul, are we not, Jessamine?”

Jessamine smiled with effort. She did wish at times that Megan weren’t quite so forthcoming about their lack of social standing. “Indeed.”

“Then you are in good company,” he returned with an easy smile that included them both. “Since my return to London, I scarcely know anyone.”

“And is not particularly desirous of remedying the situation,” his sister added.

He looked abashed. “Not particularly. You heard the despair in my brother’s tone, and now my sister betrays me.”

Megan looked around her. “Where is he, by the way?”

“Harold isn’t here. He rarely attends my mother’s dinner parties. He has his own town house—he and his wife.”

“I see. Is she in town?”

“No,” Miss Marfleet answered. “Lady Rosamunde Marfleet is at their country place in Hampshire. She prefers it to London.”

Megan nodded.

“If you think I am unwilling to go into society, my sister here is worse. The only reason she condescended to come to dinner this evening was that it is under her own roof and she must eat.”

“My brother exaggerates. He has the luxury of running off to places like India where he can escape British society, and then has the temerity to come back and criticize me.”

Jessamine blinked at the raillery between brother and sister.

Mr. Marfleet gave his sister a lopsided grin. “And yet the moment I return and am well enough to be on my feet, I obey the pater and accept invitations high and low.” He addressed Megan and Jessamine. “My sister stays ensconced in our solarium and paints. She is an accomplished watercolorist.”

Jessamine eyed her with new curiosity. Miss Marfleet shrugged off her brother’s words. “I am passable. But at the moment he flatters me, since he needs me to illustrate the dozens of plant specimens he brought back from India.”

Mr. Marfleet took no offense at her words, merely smiled indulgently and said, “She is very gifted in her abilities.”

Miss Marfleet raised her eyebrows with an expression of “you see?”

Jessamine said, “My father would love to see your paintings, I’m sure. He is . . . somewhat of an amateur botanist, though he does not travel. But he frequently experiments with new varieties of flowers in our small glasshouse at the vicarage.”

“I should like to see his collection,” Mr. Marfleet said at once.

“I’m sure it is nothing like what you have brought back with you.”

“If my brother has his way, he shall publish his findings in a folio,” Miss Marfleet said. “That is why I am doing my best to illustrate them for him.”

“How fascinating,” Megan said. “I look forward to seeing it. I can’t paint worth a straw, although it is an accomplishment all young ladies are supposed to have.”

“Since it is my only accomplishment, I do not feel any overweening pride in it.”

“You look very pretty this evening,” Mr. Marfleet said in the pause that followed, his glance encompassing both Megan and Jessamine.

Megan executed a curtsy. “Thank you, sir, but we feel quite dowdy ever since arriving in London.”

Jessamine envied her friend her easy manner.

“You wouldn’t feel so in India,” he said, “unless you felt overshadowed by the brightly-colored cloth some of the women attire themselves in. They can be quite pretty.”

“It must be terribly exotic,” Megan said.

“Even the colors of the land are intense. It’s such a vast area that the regions vary enormously.”

“I’ve heard it is very hot,” Jessamine said, just to contribute something.

“Except for the mountains to the north, yes, it is,” Mr. Marfleet replied. “That is why Europeans quickly succumb to the various diseases that are so prevalent. Our constitutions don’t seem able to withstand the oppressive heat.”

Before she could ask him anything about his health, his mother requested that they find their partners for dinner.

“I’m to escort you,” he told her, “and my friend Donald Emery”—he indicated another young gentleman who approached them—“is to escort you, Miss Phillips.”

The brown-haired gentleman bowed to Megan. “At your service, miss.”

“Thank you.” She returned his smile and placed her hand on his proffered arm.

Jessamine felt a pang. All Megan had to do was smile. It lit up her face and looked so genuinely warm that both men and women were won over. Jessamine knew the smile was sincere. By contrast her own smile felt as stiff as the plaster molding the ceiling.

“Shall we?”

“Oh—yes, thank you.”

Mr. Marfleet stood waiting, his bent arm held out. She placed her gloved hand atop it. He was dressed in a black coat and pantaloons, looking, except for his cravat, every inch a vicar. She should have spotted it immediately, she who’d grown up in a parsonage and had been around vicars all her life.

“You are very quiet this evening. I hope this company doesn’t intimidate you.”

She started at his words. He would think she was addlepated if she didn’t start paying attention to what was going on around her. “Not at all,” she answered tartly.

“Is it because you can’t see them?”

“What!” Her gaze flew up to his. He was wearing his spectacles, but they did not hide the amusement in his eyes.

She had a good mind to whip hers out of her reticule and put them on to show him she didn’t care a fig what she looked like. What a pair they’d make! But she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

She looked straight ahead of her as they walked to the dining room. “I told you, I am not so shortsighted, as you perhaps”—she glanced sidelong at him—“and only wear my spectacles when I need to focus on some minute object in the distance.”

Before he could reply, she continued. “I didn’t wear them tonight since I didn’t expect to address those sitting across the dinner table, but then again, a gentleman who speaks to a lady he has not been introduced to perhaps expects his guests to do the same.”

She had the satisfaction of seeing his cheeks turn a ruddy hue.

“I have already asked your pardon about that,” he said in formal tones, all amusement erased from his eyes. “I don’t know why I did it. I can assure you I am not in the habit of addressing young ladies I have no acquaintance with.”

They arrived in the dining room, and Mr. Marfleet showed her to her seat. As she had expected, both she and Megan were seated near the foot of the table as their lack of rank demanded. She was surprised when Mr. Marfleet took his place beside her. She thought as son, he would be seated closer to the head of the table.

As if reading her mind, he cocked an eyebrow. “Did you not expect me to sit beside you when you are my guest?”

She felt her cheeks warm. “I didn’t know what to expect, to be perfectly frank.” She sought Megan, who was sitting directly across the table from Mr. Marfleet. Mr. Emery sat beside her across from Jessamine. She smiled in their general direction before looking around for Lady Bess.

She made out her peacock-blue gown and fan farther down the table; Lady Bess was already feeling at home among her dinner companions from the sound of her voice. “Thank you for including Lady Bess in the invitation,” Jessamine said in a low tone to Mr. Marfleet.

“It was nothing. Besides, I could not very well invite you and Miss Phillips without a chaperon, could I? I am not so far gone from propriety, no matter how long I’ve been in India.” The wry humor had returned to his tone.

She fixed her attention on the table instead of replying to him. She did not wish to appear too friendly to him. It would do no good to encourage him. Her supposition that his interest lay in Megan must have been wrong, yet she did not want him to think she was available.

Everything on the table was exquisite from the white damask linen to the gilt-edged plates, heavy silverware, and fragile crystal goblets atop it. The center of the long table held crystal vases filled
with arrangements of flowers cascading over their sides and ivy trailing along the tablecloth.

The footmen began serving the first remove, a creamy soup. There were many other dishes on the table, and Mr. Marfleet did his duty offering her a selection.

Accustomed around her father’s table to say grace before meals, she discreetly bowed her head and uttered a short prayer.

When she took up her fork, Mr. Marfleet said quietly at her left, “Amen. I’m sorry my parents do not generally say a blessing over the meal—especially not at a dinner party.”

“There is no need to apologize. I didn’t expect it of them.”

He swallowed a spoonful of soup and then said, “Your father is a vicar as well as an amateur botanist?”

“Yes,” she replied after taking a spoonful.

“That is perhaps why he named you as he did?”

She nodded cautiously, surprised that he had made the association.

“Jessamine. Yellow jasmine.
Gelsemium sempervirens.
”

“Or plain wild woodbine, not nearly so exotic.”

“But just as beautiful.”

She dabbed at her lips with a napkin, feeling uncomfortable with his notice. “My father’s passion—besides that for the Lord—is flowers. He loves the beauty of them. He has developed a couple of new varieties of roses and a peony.”

“I shall have to look up his name.”

“He hasn’t any renown. He hasn’t sought publication, and if I didn’t keep his notes straight, he’d probably have forgotten half of what he’s done.”

“He is a devout man? Forgive my asking,” he added quickly, “but being a member of the clergy does not guarantee devotion. I have found sometimes quite the reverse.”

“No, indeed,” she was quick to agree. “My father, however, is devout. That is perhaps why he has remained a lowly vicar in a
small village when he could have moved to a bigger parish when the opportunity presented itself. But he knew his flock would be neglected . . . under the present rector.”

Mr. Marfleet nodded, as if understanding perfectly what she said without having to hear more. She knew her father would not want her to malign his overseer.

When she had eaten more of her soup, she ventured to ask, “Are you a member of the Clapham Sect?”

He set his spoon down, cocking an eyebrow at her. “Where did you hear that?”

She made a vague motion with her hand. “Lady Bess heard it somewhere and concluded it had something to with your having become a missionary.”

He toyed with the handle of his spoon before replying. “She was not far from wrong. I have been influenced by them, certainly, but am not myself a member. My greatest mentor, as I told you, Reverend Simeon, however, is a member of the Clapham Sect.”

As the first remove was cleared and a Dover sole served, Jessamine sat back. “How long were you in India?” she asked, telling herself that if she had to sit beside him through dinner, she might as well get to know him. He did appear to have led an interesting life.

“A little over two years. Not nearly enough to do anything that would seem on the surface to amount to much, in terms of souls won—especially when I was sick half the time,” he added with a grimace. “I can only trust that the Lord used me to plant seeds that may someday bear fruit.”

“It must have been very difficult, with India being so different from England.”

“Imagine if you can a land completely alien to our Christian world—not only in religious traditions but in every tradition we hold dear. A land where people have none of the modern advances we begin to take for granted. Everything is primitive, barbaric to the European eye—and yet, as a person representing the gospel, one
is called to view the natives through the loving eyes of the Savior, who wants their salvation as much as our own.”

The more Mr. Marfleet spoke, the more he reminded her of her father, whose gentle character cared deeply about souls. Jessamine sighed. After her heartbreak over Rees, she did not want to wed a man who preached patience, resignation, and submission to God’s will above all else. All those virtues had brought her nothing but pain and a sense of wasted years.

It was clear her virtue was not enough to incite a man’s love. No, a woman of beauty and charm and other worldly allurements was what won a man’s heart.

A footman hovered between them, holding out a platter of thinly sliced roast beef, which Mr. Marfleet served her before serving himself. “I worked alongside some fine men who have sacrificed much to bring the gospel to the native population, among them Henry Martyn. He was a chaplain with the East India Company. Have you heard of him?”