Simply Magic

14

The Duchess of Bewcastle had reserved the ballroom as well as the tearoom at the Upper Assembly Rooms in Bath in order to give the children somewhere to run and be noisy while the adults conversed in civilized fashion over tea and listened to a few speeches. But she had engaged the services of an orchestra too, Peter discovered when he arrived early on the appointed afternoon with Lauren and Kit. After all, she explained with a laugh while the duke looked on with a supercilious air and incongruously fond silver eyes resting upon his lady, it would be a tragic thing indeed if the presence of the ballroom aroused in anyone a desire to dance but there was no music to make dancing possible.

“What you mean, Christine,” Bewcastle said, his long fingers curling about the handle of his quizzing glass and raising it halfway to his eye, “is that you are quite determined to dance if only Sydnam and Mrs. Butler can be persuaded to lead the way.”

“You know me all too well, Wulfric,” the duchess said with a laugh.

Peter was looking forward to the social gathering with uncharacteristic unease. He probably ought not to have come. If he suddenly, after several months of inaction, felt it necessary to check on Susanna’s health-marvelous euphemism-then he ought to have done it by writing to her or calling at the school. He ought at the very least to have somehow let her know that he was going to be here today. He was almost certain that she was. Lauren had told him that four teachers were coming from the school as well as the former teacher who was now married to the Earl of Edgecombe.

And yet it struck Peter even as he entertained these troubled thoughts that the chance to meet Susanna again this afternoon ought to have been a cause of pleasure to both of them. They really had been friends-until the very end. How he kicked himself now for not having stayed in the drawing room with her that last afternoon-or for not taking Edgecombe up on his suggestion that he and the countess accompany them on their walk. Then they would have been meeting today with shared pleasure as friends who had not expected to see each other again so soon.

Other guests began to arrive. Peter was introduced to Mrs. Butler’s parents and siblings and their spouses from Gloucestershire and to Lord and Lady Aidan Bedwyn, whom he had not met before. He hailed Lord and Lady Alleyne Bedwyn and a number of Kit and Sydnam’s cousins, whom he had met on various occasions at Alvesley.

Normally he would have been in his element.

But his uneasiness was growing by the minute, and he found himself glancing at the door every few seconds instead of concentrating upon making himself agreeable to those with whom he conversed. A dozen or more times he thought about making his escape before it was too late, but escape might well be impossible, he realized as time went on. Even if he dashed out now, he had a long hall to traverse and a largish courtyard outside to cross before he could hope to slink out of sight of someone who would surely be arriving at any moment.

He wandered in the direction of the ballroom and forgot his woes for a while after Andrew and Sophia, two of Lauren’s children, grabbed a hand each, dragged him triumphantly inside the large room, and demanded that he play with them. A whole host of other children gathered hopefully about him, and he proceeded to play Blind Man’s Buff with them with a great deal of noise and energy and good humor.

It was only when he heard a loud burst of applause and even cheering coming from the tearoom that he realized the guests of honor must have arrived and that therefore all the other guests must now be gathered there too.

Even then he was tempted to slip out and hope no one would notice his absence.

But he would not add arrant cowardice to his other shortcomings, which were legion. He extricated himself from the children’s game and went to stand in the shadowed half of the doorway into the tearoom so that he could peer cautiously about him.

Like a thief in the night, he thought with some disgust.

Sydnam Butler and a lady dressed in rose pink, who was presumably his bride, stood in a pool of red rose petals inside the door at the far side of the room, looking startled and bewildered. The Duchess of Bewcastle was clapping her hands for silence.

“Well, Mr. and Mrs. Butler,” she said, her voice warm and cheerful, “you may have thought yourselves very clever indeed when you married in great secrecy a few weeks ago. But your relatives and friends have caught up with you after all. Welcome to your wedding breakfast.”

The children, without the distraction of an adult to play with them in the ballroom, had left it and were streaming past Peter to see what all the fuss was about. They were soon adding to the cheerful mayhem that ensued for a few minutes while everyone attempted to get close to the bride and groom and pump the hand of the one and kiss the cheek of the other.

But Peter, still and silent in the doorway, took no part in the collective merriment.

He had seen her.

She was dressed neatly in pale blue, her short curls vibrantly auburn in contrast. She was bending down to hug a little boy who, he guessed, must be Mrs. Butler’s son, and then she was reaching for Mrs. Butler herself and holding her in a close embrace for several seconds. She was laughing and tearful and bright-eyed and dazzling.

For several moments he simply gazed at her, his reluctance to see her again vanished without a trace. By Jove, he had missed her. He drank in the sight of her, more lovely and more vibrant than any other lady he had ever met.

She stepped aside so that the ladies with her-the Countess of Edgecombe and a brown-haired, severe-looking though not unhandsome woman who was probably Miss Martin-could take their turns greeting the bride. Susanna was waiting to pay her respects to Butler and was looking around at the other guests as she did so with bright, happy eyes.

And then those same eyes met his across the room-and her smile froze and then died altogether.

Peter was instantly conscious of himself again-and of the dashed uncomfortable fact that he had ruined her, made her a dishonorable offer, and left her without a backward glance, all within the space of one afternoon. And that now he was reappearing in her life without any warning and at just the time when she was celebrating the marriage of her friend.

He really ought not to have come, he thought again.

But dash it all, it was too late now to go away.

He strode purposefully across the room, intending to speak with her. But Lauren, flushed and animated, caught his arm as he approached, linking her own through it, led him up to the newlyweds, and proceeded to introduce him to Mrs. Butler, who was, he discovered, very lovely indeed. He bowed over her hand and raised it to his lips. He shook Sydnam’s left hand with his left and wished him well. Then he shook the boy’s hand-he was David Jewell-and winked and grinned at him.

“If you want to make your escape anytime soon,” he said, “you will doubtless find hordes of other young people in the ballroom-once they have found their way back there.”

The boy smiled back.

“Do come and sit at our table, Peter,” Lauren said as order began to replace the cheerful chaos of the past several minutes and the children made their way back to the ballroom rather than be caught up in the tedium of an adult tea party.

“I will, thank you, Lauren,” he said, “but there is someone to whom I must pay my respects first.”

Before he could delay too long and set up a greater awkwardness than he already felt, he strode over to the table where Susanna sat with Edgecombe and the countess, Lord and Lady Aidan Bedwyn, the unknown severe-looking lady, and the duchess’s sister, Miss Thompson.

“Whitleaf,” Edgecombe said, standing to shake hands with him. “Good to see you again.”

“But of course,” the countess said, smiling at him, “you are related to Lady Ravensberg, are you not? It is a pleasure to see you again, Lord Whitleaf.”

And yet there was a hint of something in her tone that suggested she was not entirely pleased. Or perhaps his conscience was just playing tricks on him.

He bowed to her and to Miss Thompson, who must have arrived with her mother after he went into the ballroom, and turned his eyes on Susanna.

“Miss Osbourne?” he said. “I trust you are well?”

“Yes, thank you,” she said with perfect composure and a polite smile on her face-as if they had never lain together on a secluded hill above the river at Barclay Court. “And you, my lord?”

“Quite well,” he said, “thank you.”

Good Lord, where was his arsenal of small talk when he most needed it? But perhaps it was as well it had deserted him utterly, or he might have found himself saying something totally asinine like great beauty having to be a prerequisite for a teaching position at Miss Martin’s School for Girls. He had the feeling that present company would not be at all amused by such a compliment.

“My lord,” Susanna said before he could make his escape to his own table, “may I present Miss Martin, owner of the school where I teach? This is Viscount Whitleaf, Claudia. He was staying not far from Barclay Court while I was a guest there.”

The severe-looking stranger whose identity he had guessed earlier inclined her head while he bowed and favored her with his most charming smile.

“Ma’am,” he said. “This is a pleasure I have long desired.”

They were only mildly extravagant words, but looking into her unsmiling gray eyes, he felt suddenly stripped naked. Not in any physical way, it was true, but he felt as if every layer of artifice were being stripped away and she was recognizing him for the shallow fribble that he was. He wondered if Susanna had told her anything about him.

“How do you do, Lord Whitleaf,” she said.

He retreated in reasonably good order after that and sat with his back to their table while he took tea and conversed with all around him and listened to the few speeches and toasts that followed it. He would have enjoyed the afternoon, he knew, if there had not been those few minutes of uncharacteristic gaucherie to bother him. And if he could have convinced himself that he had any business being here.

He knew she was not pleased to see him.

“You may all expect,” Sydnam Butler was saying to the whole gathering after commenting on the surprise of finding so many guests awaiting them here, “that Anne and I will put our heads together over the winter when there is nothing else to do and devise a suitable revenge.”

Peter joined in the general laughter.

And then, soon after the speeches and toasts were at an end, his ears sharpened to something Hallmere was saying at the next table.

“It was just here that we waltzed for the first time, Freyja,” he said. “Do you remember?”

Peter had been wondering how Susanna felt to be in the same room with Lady Hallmere, who had once refused to give her employment as her maid and who had perhaps been responsible for sending her to Bath as a charity pupil in Miss Martin’s school. And he had been wondering if Lady Hallmere remembered her.

But the lady was speaking.

“How could I forget?” she said. “It was while we waltzed that you begged me to enter into a fake betrothal with you, and before we knew it we were in a marriage together-but not a fake one at all.”

They both laughed-as did everyone else at their table and a few at Peter’s.

Kit had certainly heard the exchange.

“It would be a shame,” he said, raising his voice and getting to his feet at the same time, “to have an orchestra and the use of one of the most famous ballrooms in the country and not dance. I shall instruct the orchestra to play a waltz. But we must remember that this is a wedding celebration. The bride must dance first. Will you waltz with me, Anne?”

Sydnam stood up too.

“Thank you, Kit,” he said firmly, “but if it is not the custom for the bridegroom to be first to dance with his bride, then it ought to be. Anne, will you waltz with me?”

It was a courageous offer, Peter thought amid the general buzz of excitement as chairs scraped back and guests got to their feet to remove to the ballroom, from which music had been wafting all during tea. How did one waltz when one was missing a right arm-as well as an eye?

“Yes, I will,” Mrs. Butler said-and it struck Peter at that very moment that theirs was a love match.

He watched them waltz alone together a few minutes later, a little awkwardly at first, then more smoothly and confidently. And then Hallmere led the marchioness onto the floor to join them, and Kit and Lauren, Edgecombe and the countess, Bewcastle and the duchess, followed after them. Other gentlemen were taking their partners.

It was a waltz.

Peter never missed an opportunity to dance it at any of the balls he attended. But he was actually remembering the last time he had waltzed. He had enjoyed it enormously even though it had been at a small, unsophisticated country assembly. It had also been a prelude to all his woes, though-well, to the worst of them anyway. Without that waltz, there would probably have not been that kiss. And without that kiss, there probably would not have been…

Well.

Greeting her at the tea table had simply not been enough, had it? That atoned for absolutely nothing. Having made the decision to come, he must now make the further effort to find out what he had come to learn. And what better time than now?

He strode over to where she stood watching the dancers, between Miss Martin and Miss Thompson, who in his fancy resembled two stern avenging angels, except that Miss Martin had tears in her eyes as she watched the bridal couple dance and Miss Thompson looked amused.

He bowed in front of them and donned his most disarming smile.

“Miss Osbourne,” he said, “would you do me the honor of waltzing with me?”

He was aware of the eyes of the headmistress suddenly turned on him, sharp despite her tears though he looked only at Susanna, whose green eyes were fathomless as she gazed back at him.

He thought she was going to refuse him. Dash it, what an unexpected humiliation that would be-but one he doubtless thoroughly deserved.

“Yes,” she said then and licked her lips. “Yes, thank you, my lord.”

He held out his hand, palm-up, and she placed her own on it.

And he was immediately assaulted by familiar words speaking loudly and distinctly in his head-though one word was different from usual.

Here she is,the voice said.

And it was quite indisputable, was it not? Here she was indeed, her hand on his, about to waltz with him.

Susanna had been trying to convince herself for the past two and a half months that she was not nursing a broken heart.

Now, finally, she had succeeded.

Viscount Whitleaf was in no way worthy of the tears she had shed over him, the painful dreams she had woven about him, the guilty memories of him in which she had sometimes indulged.

He ought not to have come without any warning like this. He must have known that she would be here. What interest could he possibly have in Anne? Or in Anne’s husband either, even if Mr. Butler was Viscountess Ravensberg’s brother-in-law?

When she had looked around the tearoom after hugging Anne, feeling completely happy for once because it had been instantly apparent to her that Mr. Butler did indeed care for Anne and that Anne was happy and that even David was happy-when she had looked around and seen Viscount Whitleaf standing in the shadow of the doorway at the far side of the room, she had…

Ah, but it was impossible to put into words what had been a purely physical reaction. Her knees had turned weak, her heart had hammered at her throat and in her ears, her hands had become clammy, her breath had seemed suspended. It had taken her brain a second or so longer to catch up.

And then he had stridden confidently into the room, and he had been smiling, as if he did not have a care in the world-as doubtless he did not. He had approached with his cousin on his arm and turned his smiles on Anne and Mr. Butler. He had even paid attention to David, lest one person in the tearoom not become his adoring admirer. When he had come to speak to her and spend a few brief, polite moments standing by her table, he had turned on the full force of his charm, especially upon Claudia-and had then gone away to sit with his back to them all through tea.

A man without a care in the world, indeed. He probably scarcely remembered her.

Claudia had not been taken in by his charm.

“There is a gentleman who thinks a lot of himself,” she had said as he walked away from the table.

“Ah, but I believe he is genuinely amiable,” the Earl of Edgecombe had said.

“I have always found him unfailingly cheerful and courteous,” Miss Eleanor Thompson, the duchess’s sister, had added.

Susanna had said nothing-though she had been feeling inexplicably grateful to the earl and Miss Thompson.

Neither had Frances.

The whole tea, to which Susanna had looked forward so eagerly for a whole week, had been ruined for her. She had been quite unable to swallow more than a few mouthfuls of food or to relax into the pleasure of being in a room with her three closest friends again, Frances and Claudia at the same table with her, Anne not far away with her new husband, looking flushed and very happy. She had not been able to marvel in peace that she was in the same room and at the same entertainment as the Marchioness of Hallmere, whom she had recognized instantly as that long-ago prospective employer.

It was simply not fair.

And now-ah, now he had asked her to waltz with him and she had said yes.

She had come into the ballroom with Claudia and Miss Thompson, smiling brightly and knowing that she was going to have to stand and watch Anne waltz with Mr. Butler and Frances with the earl. She had been feeling more wretchedly bleak than she had felt since the end of August, especially knowing that he was in the ballroom too and would probably dance with one of the other ladies.

And now?

Now, as she turned to face Lord Whitleaf on the dance floor and fixed her eyes on a level with his chin, a smile on her lips, she felt nothing at all-except happy to know that her heart was not broken after all.

His hand came behind her waist, and she lifted her hand to his shoulder. His other hand clasped hers.

He still wore the same cologne, she noticed.

The waltz was already in progress. They moved into it without further delay.

The memory of that other waltz was still precious to her despite everything. She did not want it to be overlaid with this memory. But now it forever would be, she supposed.

It was not fair. He ought not to have come. And now she would remember him harshly because he had come, without any regard to her feelings-probably not even remembering that there was anything about which she might have feelings.

And yet, she thought, if that last afternoon at Barclay Court had proceeded differently-if Frances and the earl had come with them, if they had kept walking across the bridge and down to the waterfall instead of sitting on the hill, if she had said stop instead of don’t stop -if any of those things had happened, she would have been very happy to see him this afternoon. She would not have blamed him at all for coming. He would have been no more than her dear friend.

She lifted her eyes to his as he twirled her about one corner of the ballroom and found that he was looking back, a smile on his own face too. But how could they not smile? They were surrounded by wedding guests.

“Susanna,” he said softly, “you look as lovely as ever.”

“Is the day warmer and brighter for my presence in it?” she asked him, unable to keep the bitterness out of her voice.

He tipped his head slightly to one side as he gazed back into her eyes.

“You are not happy to see me,” he said.

“Ought I to be?” she asked him.

“I thought perhaps you would not be,” he admitted. “But it was a wedding celebration, you see, and involved a number of people whom I know and like. How could I have resisted coming?”

And that was the trouble with him, she thought. He could not resist being blown along by any wind that happened in his direction. She had once told him that he was a kind man. But was it kind of him to come here today only because there was to be a party and congenial company?

“You knew I would be here, then?” she asked him as they twirled about another corner.

“Yes,” he said. “It is why I came.”

And now he was contradicting himself. Was there any firmness of character in him at all?

“Susanna,” he asked even more softly than before, “are you with child?”

If she had been, the child would surely have turned over in her womb. Every other part of her insides seemed to somersault as she drew breath sharply and stumbled slightly. He drew her closer until she had regained her balance and fitted her steps to his again.

“No,” she said.

His eyes found hers and searched them. His smile had slipped, she noticed. So had hers. She donned it once more.

“I am glad,” he said.

“No doubt.”

She lowered her eyes and tried to recapture some of the magic she had felt the last time they waltzed. She deliberately let her attention move to their fellow dancers and could see Anne and Mr. Butler dancing with surprising grace despite the fact that his right arm was missing. Anne was looking a little less slender than usual, especially below the high waistline of her dress. The duchess was laughing up into the austere face of the duke, whom Claudia detested so fiercely. His pale silver eyes looked back at her with a total absorption that spoke of emotions burning just behind the autocratic façade. Frances twirled in the earl’s arms, and it was obvious that they had eyes for no one but each other.

The world was filled with happy couples, it seemed-and her very lone self.

Ridiculous, self-pitying thought!

“You are bitter,” Viscount Whitleaf said.

Was she? She had no reason to be, had she? He had not seduced her. He had given her the opportunity to stop him. He had asked her afterward to go away with him and had promised that he would look after her even when all was over between them. She had said no. They had parted as friends. Ah, that parting-that memory of him riding away across the terrace and down the lane until he was out of sight. It was a memory that had always gone deeper than pain because she had thought she would never see him again.

Now she was waltzing with him once more in the Upper Assembly Rooms in Bath. The reality of it, she felt, had still not quite hit her.

“Silence is my answer,” he said. “And I cannot blame you. It would be trite of me to say I am sorry. But I do not know what else to say.”

“You need not say anything.” She looked back into his eyes. “And you need not feel sorry-any more than I do. It happened. Our friendship had to end anyway. Why not that way?”

“ Did it end?” he asked her.

She gazed back at him and then nodded. Of course it had ended. How could they even pretend to be friends now?

“Then I really am sorry,” he said. “I liked you, Susanna-I like you. And I thought you had come to like me.”

She swallowed.

“I did.”

“Past tense?” he said, and after a short silence between them, “Ah, yes, past tense.”

They stopped dancing for a few moments while the orchestra ended one waltz tune and prepared to play the next one in the set.

Did she not even like him now, then? Because he had come here today to disturb her peace again? He had come because she was to be here. He had come to ask her if she was with child.

What would he have done if the answer had been yes? Would he have gone away again faster than he had come? She knew he would not have.

She looked up at him again as they resumed their dance.

“I do not dislike you,” she said.

“Do you not?”

He was smiling-no doubt for the benefit of those around them. She smiled too. And then, because they were still looking at each other, both their smiles became more rueful-and then more genuine.

“I have told myself,” he said, “that it would have been far better for me-and considerably better for you-if I had left Hareford House two days after your arrival at Barclay Court, as I had originally planned. I would have remembered you, if at all, as a rather straitlaced, disapproving, humorless schoolteacher.”

“Is that how I appeared to you?” she asked him.

“And as someone who made an already glorious summer day seem warmer and brighter.” He whirled her twice about a corner, startling a laugh out of her. “But then another part of myself answers with the assertion that I would hate never to have got to know you better.”

She looked about with leftover laughter on her face. Mr. Huckerby, she could see, was watching her feet-to see if she remembered the steps correctly, no doubt. She caught Claudia’s eye as she danced past and smiled at her.

“Do you wish,” Lord Whitleaf asked her, “that I had left when I intended to do so?”

Did she? She would have been saved from a great deal of heartache-and from a great deal of vividly happy living.

“No,” she said.

“Why not?” He bent his head a little closer.

“You once told me,” she said, “that in your childhood you were surrounded by women. It is what has happened to me since I was twelve. I have had almost no social contact with men. I have been shy with men, unsure how to talk or behave with them. I was terrified when I first met you because you were handsome and self-assured and titled. And then I learned that you were amiable and kind and really rather easy to talk with. And then I came to genuinely like you and look forward to seeing you each day and spending a short while in conversation with you. Knowing you brightened my life for a time and provided me with memories that will give me pleasure in future years-riding in a curricle with you, racing a boat against you, climbing to the waterfall with you, waltzing with you.”

Kissing you.

Making love with you.

“I am not sorry you stayed,” she said.

“Are we friends again, then?” he asked her.

She smiled back at him and then laughed softly.

“Oh, yes, I suppose so,” she said, “for what remains of this afternoon, anyway.”

Though it struck her that the celebration would probably not go on much longer and that then she would go back to school and he would go away somewhere with the Ravensbergs and that that would be the end of it-the real end this time.

And there would be pain all over again.

But pain was something that life inevitably brought with it. If there was no pain, there was no real living and therefore no possibility of happiness. She had been happy-truly, exhilaratingly happy-on a few occasions in her life, almost all of them with Viscount Whitleaf. She must remember that. She must. There were two particularly perfect incidents that had drawn her so completely into happiness that no un happiness had been able to intrude. One had occurred at the assembly rooms when she had waltzed with him. The other had occurred on the hill above the river and the little bridge when they had made love.

It was so easy to remember that lovemaking as the worst thing that had ever happened to her-because it had brought her a far deeper unhappiness than she would have felt otherwise in saying good-bye to him. But actually it was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened too.

It was. That had been easily the happiest half hour or so of her life.

Now she was waltzing again-with the man who had waltzed with her then, and with the man who had been her lover on that hill. And if she was not perfectly happy now, the reason was that she was allowing past pain and future unhappiness to encroach upon the magic of the moment.

It was magical.

“Let’s just waltz,” she said to him.

The smile deepened in his eyes.

“Yes,” he said. “Let’s.”

And for what remained of the set they did not speak at all but just danced and smiled into each other’s eyes.

She was glad he had come, Susanna thought. Ah, she was glad. There was surely something healing in his being here-he had not just carelessly dismissed both her and their lovemaking from his mind. She thought she would be less unhappy after today. Or perhaps she was just fooling herself. Tomorrow her life would be without him again.

But she would not think of tomorrow.

She danced, aware of their splendid surroundings and of the company and the music, all her senses sharpened. And she was aware too that the man in whose arms she danced was the man who had kissed her and caressed her and been deep inside her body.

She could never ever regret that she had had that experience once in her life.

Once was enough.

It would have to be.

He laughed aloud as he took her into a swooping turn before the orchestra dais, and she laughed back at him.