Miss Fellingham's Rebellion (19 page)

“Ah, so this is your first time here,” observed Clarise. “What do you think so far?”

Catherine looked around the crowded assembly rooms at the overheated guests and thought of the routs she had been to, the ones where everyone smelled foul. “I am reserving judgment for the moment.”

“Good for you,” cheered her new friend, “but just between the two of us, this is as good as it gets. Wait another hour and it will get even more crowded. I am only here because I am bringing out my younger sister this year. As much as I detest making the social rounds, I know I have to do it for her.” Seeing Catherine’s look, she said, “Now I’ve shocked you, I suppose. Is it really so awful for someone to hate endless silly chatter and bad lemonade?”

Catherine considered her answer carefully. “No, of course not. I myself find it a little trying but that’s because I’m…well, not suited for it. But I would think that an Incomparable like you could not
not
enjoy it.”

“I think the enjoyment of social events is more a matter of temperament than appearance, don’t you?” she asked, her clear blue eyes beguilingly honest.

“Yes,” agreed Catherine, “I suppose it is.” She had never thought about it quite that way before.

“My sister loves it. I hope she will make a match of it soon so that I may retreat into my quiet routine again. I haven’t the heart to deny her anything. My parents died when Cecy was tragically young, and all she has is me and dear Aunt Loll, who barely knows her head from her heart.” Leaning in closely, she whispered in Catherine’s ear. “Dear Aunt Loll is more than a little senile, but we need some sort of chaperone to keep up the appearance of propriety. Cecilia and I have set up our own establishment rather than live with our awful cousin.” She leaned back and considered Catherine carefully. “Have I shocked you again?”

“Not at all,” Catherine assured her. “I am full of admiration. I would set up an establishment of my own if I could figure out a way to do it. I am a quiet person and much prefer solitude to a full house.”

“Indeed!” cried her new friend in perfect sympathy.

After a while, their conversation turned to books and poetry. Just as Catherine was describing her favorite scene in
Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage
, Clarise said, “Catherine, is there something you wish to tell me about Lord Deverill?”

Startled, Catherine looked at her oddly. “Uh, no. Why? Do you know him?”

“Not yet. But of course I know who he is, as does everyone,” she said, looking over Catherine’s shoulder. “I was just wondering, you see, what he had to do with you since he is coming just this way and I know it isn’t because of the dowagers.”

Catherine had known this moment would come. Still, now that it had arrived, she was ill prepared to deal with it. She turned slowly in her chair and instantly made eye contact with him. He was wearing a simple cutaway waistcoat in Devonshire brown that showed off his shoulders to perfection, making him look splendid. She also observed—and envied—his elaborate cravat, flawlessly tied. Catherine smiled weakly, and he grinned widely in return. Damn him, she thought, why did he have to be so blasted confident?

“Miss Fellingham,” he said, reaching for her hand, which she had not thought to offer, and grazing her knuckles gently with his lips. “May I say you look delightful this evening.”

Catherine, of course, wanted to tell him that he could not say anything of the sort, but she didn’t want to appear rude in front of her new friend. To that end, she introduced them and watched Deverill carefully to see his reaction to the ravishing Miss Menton, who was much more to his speed than she. But he greeted her politely and with no more interest than one would expect. Indeed, he turned immediately back to Catherine and winked. “Ready for that dance now?” he asked, holding out his arm. Catherine took it. “Miss Menton, if you’ll excuse us, we have an engagement.”

Much to her disgust, Catherine’s heart was beating wildly and she damned him for being able to affect her like this and herself for being susceptible. Why couldn’t she be stronger?

No answer was forthcoming, and before she knew it she was back in Deverill’s arms, gliding on air as the orchestra played the waltz. She kept her gaze fixed on his cravat, much as she had the last time they had danced. But she had barely known him them. Had that really only been two weeks ago? It seemed so much longer.

“Catherine, I do wish you would look at me,” he said gently. “How can I admire your beautiful eyes if they are staring at my cravat. My valet tells me this style is called the Mathematical. Please note how the top layer curls underneath the bottom layer. Something to remember should you try wearing one again.”

This reference to their recent conversation in the carriage had a terrible effect on Catherine, for at once she felt warm at the reminder of the shared history that a longstanding joke implied and cold at the reminder of the way he’d kissed her with ruthless disregard of her feelings.

For a long moment, she was incapable of speech, then she composed herself and looked up. “I am not sure a gentleman of my stamp would be seen sporting such a frilly confection. It’s good enough for you, of course,” she conceded graciously.

“That’s much better,” Deverill said, pulling her almost imperceptibly closer. “Do you know your eyes twinkle when you—”

“Don’t, please,” she said, a mask falling over her features. It was the satisfaction in his tone—the way he made it sound as if drawing a smile from her was his most-cherished goal—that made her realize she couldn’t go on with this charade. She was already in too deep, for if she’d learned anything from his kiss it was that she never wanted it to end. But end it must. She was nothing to him but a project to alleviate his boredom.

“Don’t what? Compliment you? I assure you, my dear Catherine, I can no more cease admiring you than I can halt my next breath,” he said in a low voice that caused Catherine’s heart to shudder and break. He had a way with words that left her helpless. “How such a prime specimen as you could have reached the advanced age of four-and-twenty without securing a husband, I will never understand.”

At these words, Catherine missed a step and her heart leaped into her throat. Only a moment ago, she’d thought the charade had to end, and now, here, suddenly, was the end. For weeks she had known the moment was coming, but she had never imagined it would happen in the middle of the dance floor at Almack’s, and yet it had.

So be it.

Ignoring the pain that had started in her heart and was now spreading through her body, she said with admirable calm, “I assure you, my lord, it takes a special talent to be an ape leader and the veriest quiz.”

Deverill stiffened for a moment, then relaxed. “Come, now, Catherine, you know I am just teasing.”

But Catherine, insecure and vulnerable, knew nothing of the sort. “Are you sure, my lord? Or is your little game starting to bore you?”

“Game?” he asked, his voice not quite as soft as it had been, nor the light in his eyes quite as bright. “What game?”

Admiring the skill with which he performed his part, Catherine said with scathing admiration, “Yes, you play a very good game indeed, my lord, but enough is enough. I am tired of being a project.”

“Excuse me?” he asked.

“I said I am tired of being Lady Courtland and your project. Not that I am completely unsympathetic to the honor you have done me by condescending, against your inclination, to spend time with an ape leader like myself.” As she heard herself speak, she was amazed how apathetic she sounded. She didn’t feel apathetic. Her heart was about to pound out of her chest, and tears were starting to form in the back of her throat. She had to get out of there before she humiliated herself completely. “I trust your consequence hasn’t suffered too much. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

But Catherine had forgotten that she was on the dance floor in Deverill’s arms and not in a drawing room, and as she tried to turn and walk away, she found herself clasped tightly in his grip. Deverill was pale now, and his eyes seemed to shine unnaturally bright, his earlier amiability nowhere in evidence. “Despite what you think of me,” he said through clenched teeth, “I will not let you turn yourself—and me—into a spectacle. We will finish this dance, I will return you to your mother, and we will say good night like civilized people.”

Catherine nodded, consenting to the scheme because she realized he spoke the truth. She didn’t need to be at the center of a scandal, not now while her feelings were in such turmoil.

“And then tomorrow, I will call on you and we will talk about this,” he added quietly, having regained some of his composure, though she could tell from the way his fingers grasped her arms that he was not entirely calm.

Catherine stiffened and missed a step.

“Keep dancing,” he growled into her ear. “And we
will
talk about this tomorrow.”

We’ll just see about that, she thought, knowing that she would not consent to see him tomorrow. She would tell Caruthers to deny him entrance, or, even better, she would be away from home when he called. She would go out shopping or walking or something completely distracting. Maybe she’d take a trip to the lending library and get that book by Francis Burney that Clarise had so highly recommended.

The rest of the dance was intolerable to Catherine, and several times she had to fight the urge to simply walk away and leave him alone then and there on the dance floor. But she was sensible to the kind of scandal it would create and wasn’t brave enough to weather either it or her mother’s wrath. There was nothing for it but to continue twirling around the floor in his arms.

Then, after what seemed like an eternity to Catherine, the music stopped and Deverill returned her to her mother. He greeted Lady Fellingham with a polite bow and some meaningless chatter before turning to Catherine to make his goodbye. “I will call tomorrow afternoon, Miss Fellingham, and we will talk then,” he said forcefully.

Catherine, aware of her mother’s keen interest in the conversation, bit back the rude reply that jumped to her lips. “I shall look forward to it, my lord,” she assured him, with not an insignificant amount of irony that her mother, oblivious to undercurrents, didn’t notice.

If the marquess detected it, he gave no indication. “Until tomorrow then,” he said with a bow and disappeared into the crowd.

Whatever relief Catherine felt at seeing him leave was short-lived, for as soon as he was out of hearing, her mother cried out joyfully. “An interview with you, my dear, tomorrow! And he so serious! Why, that can only mean one thing.” She took her handkerchief and wiped her forehead with it, as if overcome from the excitement, but Catherine knew it was merely the heat of the assembly rooms. “He’s going to declare his intentions! How thrilling. To think, just a month ago we had no hope for you at all, and now the most sought-after peer in all of London wants to take you to wife. I must make sure that Sir Vincent is at home tomorrow so that Deverill can ask for your hand. Your prospective husband is a very proper sort of gentleman and knows how these things are done. I’m surprised that he hasn’t asked to speak to Sir Vincent first. But then again, he’s very modern in some of his ways. Take his interest in the marbles, for example.”

Catherine knew that she should interrupt her mother. The longer the woman went on about Deverill’s proposal, the more disappointed she would be when none was forthcoming. But she was too exhausted from her ordeal on the dance floor to try to talk sense into her mother, and besides, she thought with just a little bit of spite, it would be a much-needed lesson on counting one’s chickens before they hatched.

She let her mother cherish her high hopes for several minutes and interrupted only when it become clear that listening to those lovely fantasies was more painful than telling her the truth.

“Mama, Lord Deverill has no intention of declaring himself. He is coming over tomorrow to show me…and Melissa…his”—she thought quickly—“sketches of the marbles.”

Lady Fellingham, in the act of dabbing her brow, abruptly froze. The look of stark disappointment that was so plainly etched in her face might have been comedic if it hadn’t been so tragic. “Melissa, you say? He wants to see you and Melissa?” She spoke slowly and carefully and seemed a little bit unsure that her brain was working properly. “Both you
and
Melissa?”

“Yes, he told us about the drawings en route to the museum, and Melissa well-nigh begged him to show them to her,” Catherine explained. There, she thought, that should put an end to her ridiculous fancy.

But Eliza Fellingham, just now recovering from the shock her daughter’s intelligence caused, was even more inured to reality than her daughter supposed. “I understand, of course, but surely these drawings are merely a ruse. I’ve no doubt that after a few minutes of showing his interesting sketches to Melissa, he’ll ask for a moment alone with you. It wouldn’t do to leave you unchaperoned, of course. But if he did ask your father first, it would be quite proper to give you a few moments alone.”

“Actually, I think it might very well be the other way around. Deverill will have a short coze with me for propriety’s sake, then closet himself away with Melissa,” she said crushingly. “You should have seen them, Mama, talking at length about the marbles as thick as thieves. He was quite fascinated by Melissa’s ideas.”

“Interfering child,” her mother murmured.

“I think Deverill is a little shy about the quality of the craftsmanship,” she continued, prevaricating as she went along, “and Melissa had to go to great lengths to convince him of her interest in the drawings over the skill of the artist.”