Lady Midnight (39 page)

Michael laughed. "Not since
you
chose to stay in Italy half the year!"

"Ah, well, it's the climate, you know. One of our daughters has terrible trouble with her breathing in the winter. The Italian sun is so much better for her. And better for
my
disposition! I do hate the cold."

"You have daughters now?"

"Oh, come now, I am sure I wrote to you about it. Twin girls—Georgina and Isobel. They are growing like little weeds and are absolute terrors." Her oval Madonna face glowed with enviable maternal pride. "Thank heaven they are visiting my brother and his wife this month, or I would fear for my sanity! But we must find Nick. He went off to fetch some champagne, but I'm sure he must be quite lost in this crush. He will be in alt to see you again!"

"Of course, Lizzie. First, though, there is someone I would like you to meet."

"Meet?" Elizabeth's smile turned teasing. "Michael! Never say you have wed again?"

"Ah, no. I fear I have not been able to persuade the lady yet." Michael turned, and his brow arched to find her hiding by the wall. But he merely held out his hand and drew her forward, giving her no choice but to step into the light. "Elizabeth Hollingsworth, may I present Mrs. Kate Brown?"

"Mrs. Brown, I am so very—" Elizabeth's smile froze, and it was as if all the color was pulled from her face, leaving her as pale as a marble statue. "But you're dead!"

Kate tossed a frantic glance at Michael, who watched Elizabeth with a puzzled frown. She wanted so much to run away, to leave the past behind her, as she had thought she had. Yet she could not. She was frozen to the spot, unable to run ever again.

"I went to the sale," Elizabeth murmured, almost to herself. She stepped closer to Kate, her gaze darting over Kate's face.

"I—fear I do not know what you mean, Lady Hollingsworth," Kate managed to murmur. "I am quite alive."

"Yes. I see. Yes." Elizabeth gave a nervous little laugh and pressed her gloved hand to her brow. "You are too young to be her, of course. I'm sorry, Mrs.—Brown, is it? You just look very much like someone I knew in Italy. Someone who died."

"I am very sorry," Kate answered. "I
am
from Italy, but—"

"Very much alive. Of course. Forgive me, Mrs. Brown. I am not usually so fanciful! Am I, Michael?" But she still looked shaken, puzzled.

Michael glanced from Elizabeth to Kate and back again, his blue eyes narrowed. "Not at all."

"Now, we must find Nick, before the interval is over! He will be so happy to see you. And you both must come to my salon. Your sister-in-law has already accepted her invitation, and I won't take no for an answer. It will be very informal, just friends, no high sticklers allowed. Except for your mother, of course, Michael!" Elizabeth was chattering merrily again, the color slowly reappearing in her cheeks. But there was still something uneasy in her eyes. "There will be many of my Italian landscape paintings on display, Mrs. Brown, and I would so like to hear your opinion of them. I'd also like to hear how you came to be in England, and to meet Michael. Ah, there is my husband now! Come, let us greet him."

Kate and Michael followed in her wake as she hurried through the crowd. "Did you know her in Venice?" Michael whispered in Kate's ear.

Kate shook her head. "She knew my mother. She once painted her portrait."

"Then Elizabeth obviously thought you were your mother."

"Yes. Quite." And Michael drew Kate protectively close to his side.

* * *

Christina glanced around the crowded refreshment area, clutching a glass of warm lemonade as her gaze searched the faces around her. The people were a blur of bright silks and muslins, flashing jewels, bobbing feathers, stark white cravats, and fanciful waistcoats. There were handsome men and plain men, short, tall, stout, muscular. Even one or two who gave
her
admiring glances.

But there were no black-haired gentlemen, or claret-colored coats. The man from the box had vanished.

She finally retreated behind a potted palm, to sip at her lemonade and ponder this odd new sense of—disappointment.

Chapter 22

What a remarkably fine evening,
Kate thought, with a ridiculous smile, as she stood at her chamber window and watched the street below transform in the twilight. The violet blue light suited the city scene, making the neat, pale houses seem aquatic and mysterious. The great exodus of the houses' occupants to their nightly amusements had not yet begun, though carriages were beginning to draw up to front doors. They waited patiently to convey well-dressed ladies and gentlemen to the theater, to ballrooms, to card parties, even to a secret assignation or two. The street was quiet, but seemed to hum with a barely hushed anticipation.

Just as Kate did herself. She had not yet changed out of her muslin day dress into the blue silk, and had just let her hair down to re-dress it into something a bit more elaborate for the Hollingsworths' salon. As she brushed out the long waves, she hummed a soft Italian tune.

Her ebullient mood was really quite unexplainable. At the theater, when they first encountered Elizabeth Hollingsworth and Kate was paralyzed by fear, she would have said she would
not
feel this way in London. Not with a dark cloud of discovery and humiliation looming overhead. Surely she should be on a knife-edge of anxiety! Yet the last couple of days had dispelled much of that fear. For whatever reason, Elizabeth Hollingsworth allowed Kate to keep her secrets, and Kate was very grateful to her for that.

They had been marvelous days indeed. Yesterday, while Christina went to a lecture at the Royal Botanic Society with Michael, Kate and Amelia strolled in Hyde Park. They walked by the Serpentine, watching boys sail their tiny boats on the water and observing artists capturing the sunny scene in watercolors and oils. They ate warm gingerbread bought from a peddler's cart, and Kate even persuaded an uncertain Amelia to try playing with a hoop—which promptly crashed into a tree, narrowly missing an elderly gentleman, two children, and four pug dogs. Kate still glowed with a warm pride when she recalled how a lady had complimented her on her "exquisite child, obviously so well-bred."

For one glorious moment, she could pretend that she was Amelia's mother, that she would be taking her to the park for years to come, would watch her grow into the beautiful young lady she promised to be. Kate had fantasies of beaming proudly as Amelia danced the opening minuet at her come-out ball, partnered by her equally proud father.

And today had been even finer! She took Amelia and Christina to the British Museum, where they observed the Elgin Marbles in all their glory, and shivered with Gothic delight at the Egyptian mummies. Afterward, Michael met them at Gunter's for tea and ices. While Christina regaled them with the details of the lecture she had attended, Kate surreptitiously observed the people around them. She fancied they watched her with envy, and again she was taken with the fantasy that this was
her
family, her handsome husband and lovely daughters. They were hers, and she was safe forever.

Kate laughed now at her silly daydreams; they were so contrary to what was real and true. But still her fear was gone. She felt only contentment and a new excitement at the prospect of the coming evening. It had been a very long time since she had attended a real party. Not including the ill-fated yachting outing, almost two years. She and her friend Bianca Maroni, the daughter of a friend of her mother's, had crept out to attend a masked ball during carnival. It had not ended well—Kate insisted on going home when she glimpsed Julian Kirkwood in the crowd. Yet she loved the music and the colors, the laughter, the sheer
life
of it all. She did not expect an intimate salon to be like a raucous masked ball, but there would be people there, conversation, art.

There was still a tiny twinge at the back of her thoughts, a fear of being discovered. Elizabeth Hollings-worth could very well recall that Lucrezia Bruni had a daughter, could quiz her more closely about her origins and realize the truth. Elizabeth had said nothing else at the theater, had simply chatted lightly about her children and Italy. Kate thought perhaps the glances from those sharp artist's eyes were too searching, but that was all. She did not betray Kate.

Kate felt she had passed some sort of test, some rite of passage, and she was safe. For now. Until she discovered what Elizabeth Hollingsworth was about.

Tonight, she would simply stay as far from the Hollingsworths as possible, would avoid any hint of personal conversation. She would talk of art with the other guests, and then perhaps find a quiet corner where she could observe and enjoy.

If only she had something besides her dull blue silk to wear! Something more like Elizabeth's gold-and-cream creation. Something that would make Michael's eyes darken with desire when he saw her.

There was a knock at the door, leaving Kate no more time for fruitless clothes envy. She pushed her hair back over her shoulder and called, "Come in!"

It was Christina, already dressed for the evening in a new muslin gown, of white flowers embroidered on white muslin. The white could have been insipid on her, Kate thought, but it actually looked quite striking next to Christina's sun-golden skin and green eyes. Her hair was tamed into smooth ringlets, brushed back and confined in a white ribbon and pearl bandeau. She held a long, pale pink box in her arms.

Kate gave her a smile. "You look very pretty, Christina."

"And
you
aren't dressed yet, Mrs. Brown!" Christina answered pertly, putting the box down across the foot of the bed.

"I was just about to see to my toilette," Kate said, and gestured with her hairbrush toward the dark blue silk gown hanging on the wardrobe door. She eyed the pink box, contemplating whether it contained some strange plant sample Christina was "experimenting" with. "I was just caught up in the view. Even London is beautiful at this time of day. The twilight transforms everything."

Christina joined her at the window, gazing down at the street scene. It was busier now than it had been even moments before, with more carriages arriving at front doors, more lights appearing in windows. In only seconds it would be full dark, and the night would begin in earnest, full of merriment and heartache for the people preparing to leave their homes for all manner of amusements and assignations.

What could the night hold for
her?
Her earlier glow of optimism still remained, a tiny glow at the bottom of her heart, along with a flutter of anticipation and uncertainty.

"It
does
have its interests," Christina agreed. "Yet I prefer trees and fields to stone and pavement. Nature, though certainly changeable, can be studied and understood. People never can."

Kate gave the girl a puzzled glance. "Has something happened, Christina?"

"Happened?"

"Here in London. You sound rather—sad."

Christina laughed. "Oh, no, Mrs. Brown! I am just a bit homesick, perhaps, but not
sad.
How could I be, when Mother has another headache tonight and thus
you
will be my only chaperone? And you will not be melancholy, either, when you see what I have for you. A surprise!"

"A surprise?" Kate asked, pleased, rather like a child on Christmas morning. She liked surprises—
some
surprises, anyway.

"Yes, in that box over there." Christina took Kate by the hand and tugged her toward the bed. "Now close your eyes. And no peeking!"

Kate obeyed, squeezing her eyes shut. She listened to the rattle of cardboard, the rustle of tissue. A faint hint of roses drifted into the air around her.

"All right, you can look now!" Christina said, an unmistakable note of glee in her voice.

Kate's eyes flew open—and she gasped in astonishment and disbelief. There, spread out across her bed, was the most exquisite gown she had ever seen. It was fashioned of the most lustrous dark rose satin, with short sleeves puffed and slashed to reveal pearl-embroidered white silk. More pearls edged the low vee of the neckline and encrusted the hem, scattered among tiny, twinkling pink crystals. In the box could be glimpsed a matching reticule and slippers.

It was a fantasy gown, attire fit for a duchess to wear to Court. It was perfect in every detail.

Kate pressed her hand to her mouth, unable to utter even a word. Surely she was imagining that gown. It could not be meant for her—she was all gray and dark blue now. This pink was the color of sunsets and rainbows and dreams.