Red Rose (6 page)

By the end of the evening, Raymore was still feeling satisfied with himself and his wards. He should be able to get them off his hands by the end of the Season. Even Miss Dacey need not be a hopeless case if she could find a way of hiding her deformity and if she would keep her caustic tongue still.

He lingered with his party until most of the audience had left the theater. He let Sir Henry lead Sylvia out and then offered his arm to Rosalind. He drew her arm through his and held it firmly against his side as he led her down the stairs and out to the pavement, where his carriage had now found an empty spot in which to wait.

Rosalind fumed and shrank away from the hard masculine body against which she was being pulled. “My walk may not be elegant, my lord,” she said quietly, for his ears only, “but I am capable of moving unassisted from place to place.”

He looked sidelong at her, his eyes glacial as usual. “I hoped to save you from embarrassment,” he said.

“You could do that very effectively,” she retorted, “by allowing me to return home.”

“Touché,”
he answered. “You do enjoy having the last word, Miss Dacey, do you not?”

He handed her into the carriage and jumped in after her. Sir Henry excused himself as soon as they arrived back in Grosvenor Square. He did assure Rosalind, though, that his wife would invite her to visit whenever she felt well enough. The earl, too, left the house again to visit one of his clubs, having seen his wards safely into the care of Cousin Hetty and the dogs.

***

Rosalind and Sylvia spent a fairly quiet time for the five days that remained before the ball. They went shopping with Cousin Hetty a few times and helped her walk the dogs in the park during the mornings. But they could neither receive nor accept any invitations until they had made their official come-out.

Sylvia was impatient, but happy. The shopping expeditions and the arrival of the bulk of their new wardrobes filled her with excited anticipation. And the visit to the theater had whetted her appetite for more meetings with society.

“Did you not think Mr. Hammond exceedingly charming, Ros?” she asked one afternoon when Rosalind sat on her bed while Sylvia held her new clothes against herself one at a time and surveyed the effect in a long mirror.

“I certainly noticed that he was handsome,” Rosalind replied with a smile. “Do you like him?”

“Do you suppose he has been invited to Cousin Edward’s ball?” Sylvia wondered, answering the question indirectly.

“He must be acquainted with our guardian or he would not have come to his box at the theater,” Rosalind said. “It is likely that he will have received an invitation.”

“Oh, I do hope so,” Sylvia said.

Rosalind tried as far as possible to forget about the coming ball. She was pleased two days after the theater visit to receive a note from Lady Elise Martel, inviting both Sylvia and herself to call on her during the afternoon. Sylvia declined, as she had already agreed to go with Cousin Hetty to a milliner’s for the purchase of several new bonnets. Rosalind was glad of the excuse to avoid having to go with her, and she genuinely looked forward to meeting Lady Martel. She had liked her husband very much.

The Earl of Raymore’s carriage delivered her to Sir Henry’s home. A butler took her bonnet and gloves and showed her into a light and airy sitting room. Lady Martel rose to greet her. She was a smiling, auburn haired lady, very pretty, Rosalind decided, despite her large bulk.

“Miss Dacey?” she said, coming forward, right hand extended. “This is a most unorthodox way to meet, but I am so obliged to you for coming. Henry was very taken with you the other evening and mentioned that you hoped to meet me. I hope you have not come merely out of the kindness to a poor pregnant lady who is confined to the house.”

“Indeed I have not, ma’am,” Rosalind assured her. “I do not like to be seen in public, either. I would rather be here with you than on Bond Street with my cousin Sylvia and Mrs. Laker.”

Lady Martel smiled and motioned Rosalind to a chair. “Is it because of your limp?” she asked candidly.

Rosalind was surprised at her own lack of embarrassment. “Yes,” she admitted. “I hate to be noticed by everyone, especially for such an ugly defect.”

“I can see that it would limit your activities,” Lady Martel agreed. “You would not want to walk too much in the park, I imagine, and I suppose you cannot dance. But I would advise you not to be overly conscious of the fact that you limp. When people have once noticed, they will disregard it, you may be sure. And you have other assets.”

Rosalind shrugged in a resigned manner. “I know that I am ugly,” she said, “but I have learned to accept the fact. All I ask is to be allowed to live my own sort of life.”

Lady Martel chuckled. “And Edward will not allow you to do so. Henry said that he thought you and your guardian do not see eye to eye. I can imagine how trying it must be for you. He hates women, you know. But, my dear Miss Dacey—may I call you Rosalind?—why do you call yourself ugly? You are no such thing. It is true that you do not have the peaches-and-cream look of the typical English debutante. You must have foreign blood, do you? French?”

“Italian.”

Lady Martel nodded. “You are not pretty,” she said frankly. “Your hair is too dark and your features too strong. But you could be quite extraordinarily handsome if you chose. You should wear your hair high on your head and hold your shoulders back more and your chin high. And your clothes should be more carefully made to your figure.” She frowned and unexpectedly wagged a finger at her guest. “I would wager that you are deliberately hiding a good figure. Am I right?”

Rosalind did not know how to reply. She was saved from her embarrassment when Lady Martel laughed suddenly. “My manners have certainly gone begging,” she said. “Goodness, we have just met. It is most impertinent of me to pick you apart the way I just did. Please forgive me. Put it down to my condition. I am living in a rather unreal world at the moment, where the usual rules do not apply.”

Rosalind immediately relaxed. The conversation switched to a discussion of the coming event and Elise’s fervent hope that she would bear a boy. She assured Rosalind, though, that Henry would not be at all disappointed with a girl. The visit lasted for more than an hour. Rosalind felt as if she had known her new friend for years. She promised to return the following week, after the ball, if the new arrival had still not put in an appearance.

The visit to Lady Martel occupied only a single afternoon. Rosalind helped keep her mind off the ball for much of the rest of the time by busying herself with music and reading. She paid a few visits to the library at times when she knew that the earl was not at home. She discovered a volume of Mr. Pope’s poems and carried it off to her room, where she spent many hours reading his poems carefully. She thoroughly enjoyed “The Rape of the Lock” and read it many times. But on the whole she found his tone unnecessarily caustic. Much of what he wrote was the product of a bitter mind. And he had had some deformity, she had read somewhere. She shuddered. She hoped she would never allow her physical condition to warp her mind or her attitude to life.

And she spent many hours in the music room. She was fascinated by the harpsichord and played it often. It was especially suited to the music of Bach, she found. But it was the pianoforte that became her particular love. She played Haydn, Mozart, all the music she had ever learned, in fact. And she sang to her own accompaniment. She sang old ballads and newer love songs.

In the music room she could completely forget herself. It was a large room at the far end of a wing of the house that contained none of the apartments that were in daily use. The instruments stood in the middle of the room, far from windows and doors. Here she could play and sing undisturbed and undetected. Here she could be happy and forget such things as balls and society and stubborn, arrogant guardians.

She would not have felt so contented had she known that on an afternoon three days before the ball the Earl of Raymore, on his way to his room to change from his riding clothes into an outfit more suited for dining out, heard the distant sound of music. He stopped in his tracks and listened. His jaw set in annoyance when he realized that the sounds were coming from the music room. Only carefully selected guests, including the professional performers that he invited to play at his annual concerts, were allowed to touch the instruments there. One of his wards must be tinkling away in her best schoolroom manner. What sacrilege!

He changed direction grimly and strode toward the door of the music room. It was probably Rosalind Dacey. She was the one who fancied herself as an accomplished musician, he seemed to remember. He would make it perfectly clear to her that she was welcome to practice in the drawing room when he was not there, but that the music room was very definitely out of bounds.

He stopped just outside the door, his hand stretched toward the handle but not quite touching it. She was singing. He did not recognize either the words or the melody, but the song was so simple and so haunting that it halted his progress completely:

My Luve is like a red, red rose That’s newly sprung in June

Raymore felt a momentary sharp pang whose source and meaning he could not identify. She should always sing. She had a contralto voice that was soft and throbbing with feeling. It was sheer beauty.

And I will come again, my Luve, Tho’ ‘twere ten thousand mile!

The song was finished. The earl’s hand had fallen to his side, but he still stood and listened as she continued to play the melody. After a while she began to hum again.

When she started to play Beethoven, the Earl of Raymore moved away from the room without opening the door. She was good, he was forced to admit. He would leave her alone with her music. She could probably do no harm to his prize possessions, after all.

He did not intend to, he did not particularly want to, but he found his feet taking him toward the door of the music room for the following two afternoons. The first time she was playing the harpischord. He did not hear it very often. Most of his guests avoided it as an outdated instrument inferior in versatility to the pianoforte. But she made Bach sound brilliant, as if the harpsichord were the only instrument that would bring his music to full life. The second time she was singing again, an old ballad of valor and love and death. She made him feel all the grandeur and all the pathos of the old story. That must be how the ballads had been sung all those years ago, when song had been the chief method of communicating news as well of entertaining.

Raymore retreated abruptly when the music stopped and did not immediately resume. He had no wish to be caught spying or, indeed, to come face to face with his ward. Rosalind Dacey, musician, he had been forced to recognize and respect in the last few days. Rosalind Dacey, the woman, was a different matter altogether. He could live quite happily if he never encountered her again.

Rosalind had much the same thoughts in reverse during those few days. She saw very little of the earl. But she still seethed with resentment over his refusal to allow her to return home and over his insistence that she attend the ball. She did not intend to submit meekly to her fate, though. She smiled several times to herself, thinking of the plan she had made to make the Earl of Raymore see things her way.

Chapter 4

The servants and extra hired workmen bustled around all the day of the ball, preparing for the three hundred guests who were expected in the evening. The hallways and grand staircase were scrubbed and polished and decorated with lavish floral displays. The ballroom underwent similar treatment. By late afternoon the whole house smelled of roses and carnations.

Sylvia and Rosalind had been sent to bed by a firm Cousin Hetty after lunch. They were to rest, she insisted, even if they were too excited to sleep. A hair stylist was to come later to dress their hair and then it would be time for an early dinner and all the bustle of getting ready before joining the earl at the receiving line.

Surprisingly, Sylvia was ready first. Flushed and excited, she tapped on Rosalind’s door and let herself into the room without waiting for an answer. Rosalind swiveled around on her stool, disregarding the dresser whom Cousin Hetty had insisted she allow to help her to dress. The woman was attempting to fasten a string of pearls around her neck.

“Oh, you do look lovely, Sylvie,” Rosalind exclaimed. “Just as a young girl should look at her come-out, I believe.”

“Starry-eyed and heart aflutter?” her cousin asked, laughing. “It is absurd to be in such high spirits, is it not, Ros, but I cannot help myself. Will I do?” She held the sides of her lace overdress and twirled for Rosalind’s inspection.

The green underdress had been an inspired choice, Rosalind thought. Sylvia looked as fresh and innocent as spring. The lace was delicate and made the girl look ethereal. Her silver-blond hair, combed into soft, shining waves, was threaded with a green ribbon. Her cheeks glowed with natural color. There was just enough bosom displayed above the scalloped neckline of her. dress to indicate that she was a woman and no longer a schoolgirl, yet not enough to draw undue comment.

“Indeed you will outshine everyone, Sylvie,” she said with sincerity.

“Oh, but I shall not outdo you,” her cousin answered loyally. “There will probably be a score of girls to resemble me, Ros, but no one could compare with you.”

Rosalind grimaced, unable to see that comment as a compliment. She turned back to face the mirror and allowed the dresser to attach her pearl earrings to her ears. She was not displeased with her appearance, but she would need all the confidence she could muster to see her through the ordeal of the hours ahead.

Conceding the fact that she could not change the color of her hair, she had to admit that the style was good. Lady Martel had been right. It did suit her to have it piled into complicated swirls and twists on the crown and back of her head. But the hairdresser had allowed enough loose ends to curl around her face and along her neck to give her a softly feminine look. The dresser had insisted on a little rouge to relieve the paleness of her skin. And it was so artfully applied, blended so carefully along the line of her cheekbone, that it looked natural.