by Balogh, Mary
He had arrived a bit early. She had not been quite ready. But she had hurried, alarmed that he was going to have to face her mother alone in the drawing room. And sure enough, Mama had been looking severe when she arrived there, and he had been looking stern. He had not told her—and she had not asked—what had transpired between them. Merely a stilted, banal conversation about the weather, she hoped.
“Oh,” she said now. “Just look.” They were foolish words, since they were facing the opposite bank of the Thames and he would have to be blind not to see the dozens of colored lanterns strung through the branches of the trees of Vauxhall Gardens, swaying in the breeze, their reflections shivering across the flowing water. “Is it not sheer magic, Charles?”
“It is indeed,” he agreed, but when she turned her head to look at him it was to find that he was looking at her, his eyes shadowed by the near darkness and the brim of his tall hat.
She smiled and turned her face away. He had used to do that all the time. She had questioned him about it once. Why are you always looking at me? she had asked. He had had a ready answer. Because there is nothing and no one in this world I would rather look at. Foolish, flattering words that had warmed her to her toes. She did not ask the same question now. Who knew how he would answer?
“It was very kind of your daughter to invite me to join her birthday celebrations,” she said. “Her card mentioned the fact that it is to be a family party.”
“Immediate family, yes,” he told her. “Barbara and Jane will be there with their husbands. Adrian has invited Lady Estelle Lamarr. And I have invited you. Social events are always better when there is an even number of men and women.”
“Will Estelle indeed be here too?” she asked, pleased. “I had not heard. I like your son, Charles. He is a very pleasant young man.”
“He likes you too,” he told her. “He says you have a permanent twinkle in your eyes.”
“Oh,” she said, “I do not.”
“No, I know,” he said. “But you ought to, Matilda. You were born to arouse happiness in those around you. You used to do it. When I won your affections—for a short while at least—it was against brisk competition.”
“That is so untrue,” she protested.
“You were unaware of your own charms,” he told her. “It was one of the endearing things about you. You were much admired, Matilda, largely because of the sparkle of happiness you exuded.”
He must be wrong. Oh, surely he must. She had had other suitors, of course, a tedious number of them after she had sent him away. But she was Lady Matilda Westcott, eldest daughter of the Earl of Riverdale. She came with a large dowry. She was extremely eligible. The attention she received had not been at all surprising. There had been nothing personal about it. He was quite wrong about that.
“This is a silly conversation,” she said.
He laughed—and her insides turned over. “Then it is a good thing it is at an end for a while,” he said as the boat drew in to the bank and all the magic and pleasures of Vauxhall awaited them, as well as the nervousness of meeting his daughters and their husbands as a member of their family party just as though … Well, just as though Charles were courting her.
She was so unaccustomed to being out alone, Matilda thought. For a moment she longed for the prop of her mother to fuss over. Then she set her hand in Charles’s, got carefully to her feet against the sway of the boat, and stepped out onto the jetty. She rearranged her shawl about her shoulders as an excuse to release her hand from his, straightened her spine, and nodded briskly to indicate that she was ready to proceed. Colored lanterns swayed above their heads. The distant sound of music enticed them to come closer.
“Matilda.” He offered his arm. “I chose you as my companion for this evening because I wanted you here. Everyone will be prepared to like you. You need not look as though you were about to march into battle.”
“Do your daughters know?” she asked as she took his arm. “About Gil, I mean?”
“Yes,” he said.
“And they know he is married to my niece?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said. “And to Lady Estelle Lamarr’s stepsister. They know. They are dealing with the knowledge.”
As was she, Matilda thought. She was still dealing with it, with the knowledge that Charles must have fathered Gil a mere few months after declaring his undying love for and fidelity to her.
They strolled along a wide avenue in the direction of the rotunda, surrounded by other people, their senses assailed by the sounds of music and voices and by the sight of colored lamplight. She was here with a companion who was not her mother. She was here with a man who had deliberately chosen her. She was here with Charles. Whoever could have predicted any of this?
“Do you remember,” he asked her, his voice low, “the last time we were here together, Matilda?”
How could she possibly not remember? The magic, the exhilaration, the pure joy of that evening. The heady feeling of being young and in love. The anticipation of a lifetime of love together. She had never doubted his eligibility, even though she knew he had been embroiled in some pretty wild escapades with Humphrey. He had been heir to a viscount’s title, after all. And that evening had been one of the very few times they had been able to snatch more than just a few short moments alone together. They had wandered along one of the narrower, darker paths among the trees until they had stopped and he had kissed her.
“It was a long time ago,” she said.
He did not answer. They had reached the rotunda with its tiers of open-fronted boxes arranged in a horseshoe shape about the dance floor. The orchestra was positioned in the center.
“It looks as if we are the last to arrive,” he said. “But everyone else was coming via the bridge. My children, it would seem, have no sense of romance.”
“And you do?” The words were out of her mouth before she could rein them in.
He turned his head to smile at her. “And I do,” he said.
Then they were at the family box and Matilda was being presented to Mr. and Mrs. Dewhurst and Lord and Lady Frater, all of whom smiled amiably at her and shook her hand. Mr. Sawyer shook her warmly by the hand too, and Estelle beamed at her and kissed her cheek.
“It was only half an hour ago that I learned you were coming here too with Viscount Dirkson, Aunt Matilda,” she said. “I was so delighted. Is this not the perfect evening for Vauxhall?”
“It is indeed,” Matilda agreed. “And may I wish you a happy birthday, Mrs. Dewhurst?”
She was a pretty young lady and favored her mother in looks, as did her brother. Lady Frater more closely resembled her father.
“Thank you, Lady Matilda,” Mrs. Dewhurst said. “But will you call me Barbara, please? And I am sure my sister would rather be called Jane than Lady Frater.”
“I would indeed,” that young lady said. “Do come and sit down, Lady Matilda. The food will be arriving shortly. Vauxhall always has the best ham. And strawberries.”
“Edward will pour you and Papa some champagne,” Barbara said as her husband got to his feet.
Oh, this, Matilda thought, gazing about her at Charles’s family and beyond the box at the sights and hearing the sounds of Vauxhall, was wonderful. Wonderful. She was going to tuck every single detail away in her memory to hoard for the rest of her life.
Her eyes rested briefly upon Charles’s face and she smiled.
The thing was, Charles thought, that Matilda looked every bit her age. She had attempted nothing to minimize it. And she behaved with a certain primness. At the same time there was something almost youthful about her—a certain innocence and wonder over her surroundings. There was no bright sparkle in her eyes, very little laughter, not a great deal of conversation, very few outright smiles. But … What was it about her? At every moment while they ate supper and listened to the music and watched the dancers and conversed, she looked … happy? Was that a strong enough word? She looked as if she really wanted to be here. She appeared fully present. She
looked upon his children, his sons-in-law, her stepniece, as though she really liked them and was enjoying being with them. She looked very little at him, but when she did it was with almost a questioning expression, as though she did not quite know why she was here with him, but for this evening anyway was contented that it be so.
He suspected there had been very little joy in Matilda’s adult life. And very few outings that did not include her mother or other members of the Westcott family.
He sensed that his daughters liked her, even knowing of her connection to Gil. He knew that Adrian did.
“I want to dance,” Barbara announced after the remains of their supper had been cleared away. “And the next one is to be a waltz. Come, Edward.”
“I believe almost every dance at Vauxhall is a waltz, Barbara,” Wallace said. “Jane?” He held out a hand for his wife’s.
“Have you been approved yet to dance the waltz, Lady Estelle?” Adrian asked. “I know this is your first Season.”
“I have,” she told him.
“I am not sure the rules apply so strictly here at Vauxhall anyway,” Charles said as Lady Estelle got to her feet and set her hand in Adrian’s. He turned his head. “Matilda?”
“Oh,” she said, “I have never waltzed. The dance was not even performed in England until a few years ago.” There was a certain wistfulness in her voice.
“But you know the steps?” he asked her.
“Yes, of course,” she said. “I always think it must be the most romantic dance ever invented. Young people now are very fortunate.”
“I do not believe,” he said, “there is any prohibition upon the not-so-young waltzing too.” He stood and extended a hand for hers.
“I would make a cake of myself,” she protested. “And humiliate you.”
“Matilda.” He leaned a little toward her. “Do you not trust me to hold you and lead you and prevent you from tripping over your own or anyone else’s feet? And do you not trust yourself to perform the steps you have seen and yearned to dance?”
“I have not yearned—”
“Liar,” he said softly, smiling at her. “Your eyes give you away.”
“Oh, they do not,” she protested.
“Waltz with me,” he said.
She raised her hand and placed it in his. She primmed her lips and squared her shoulders and he almost laughed. But it was not the moment for laughter. Only for tenderness. He knew that the bright, youthful star that had been the young Matilda was still locked within her, long repressed. All the warmth and vitality and love he remembered were still there too. He was not imagining it. It was not wishful thinking on his part. His Matilda still existed, but she had grown older, as he had, and he was not sorry for it. He was no longer interested in youthful beauty and allure. A fifty-six-year-old Matilda suited him perfectly. But the real Matilda, not the one shaped by her sense of duty to her mother and the perceptions of her family, who saw her merely as a spinster sister or aunt.
“You will be sorry,” she warned him.
“Only if you are,” he said. “I am wagering on my ability to make sure that you are not.”
He led her onto the floor with a number of other people, including his son and his daughters, and waited for the music to begin. He looked up, beyond the colored lanterns, and saw the moon, almost but not quite full, and stars against a black sky.
“Look,” he said, and she gazed upward with him.
He lowered his eyes to her face and the music began. He placed a hand behind her waist while hers came to rest on his shoulder. He took her other hand in his and held her firmly, close to but not quite touching his chest. And he led her into the steps of the waltz, tentatively at first, avoiding any fancy twirls. She kept her eyes on his, though she was not really seeing him, he knew. She was concentrating upon the steps she had seen performed but had never danced herself. And then she smiled fleetingly and then more brightly, and he knew she was seeing him and beginning to enjoy herself.
He led her into a simple twirl, and she laughed. With pure delight. He smiled back into her eyes. She was warm and vital in his arms, and he was where he wanted to be more than anywhere else on earth—not at Vauxhall specifically but within the loose circle of Matilda’s arms. He was where he had surely always yearned to be, long after he had consciously and then unconsciously let go of the memory of her and his passion for her.
“Neither of us is going to be sorry,” he murmured beneath the sounds of music and voices and laughter.
“No,” she said. And then, with a touching sort of wonder in her voice, “I am waltzing, Charles.”
He felt a curious tickle in his throat as though—alarming thought—he was about to weep.
“We are waltzing,” he said.
And Vauxhall wove its magic around them.
All about them couples old and young, plump and thin, rich and not so rich, were waltzing. And Matilda waltzed with Charles among them.
She would not feel self-conscious because she was a staid spinster who always sat among the chaperons on the rare occasion when she attended a ball with her mother, or because she was past the age of fifty. She was not past the age of wanting to waltz or to indulge in a little romance. She was not too old to enjoy the feel of a man’s hand at the back of her waist, his other hand in hers, the whole of the waltz to be danced face-to-face, almost body to body. She could feel his heat. She could smell his cologne as well as something equally enticing that seemed to be the very scent of him. She was not too old to feel the pull of his physicality. Or to dream.
Or to fall in love.
Though perhaps it was impossible to fall into anything one was already in. To fall in love again, then. Could one fall in love twice, with the same man, when one had not really stopped loving him the first time? Was it possible …
“What is amusing you?” he asked, and Matilda shivered at the low intimacy of his voice against her ear. He knew, as many people did not, that in order to make oneself heard amid music and a babble of voices, one needed to pitch one’s voice beneath the general hubbub rather than try to shout over it.
“I am merely enjoying the waltz and the myriad sensations of being here at Vauxhall on a lovely evening,” she told him.
“No,” he said. “There was amusement in your face, Matilda. Something tickled you.”
“Oh,” she said, “I was wondering if it is possible to have the same feelings twice in a lifetime about the same subject, or whether that would mean that really there had been only one feeling spread over a long period of time, even if perhaps it was dormant for a while, and not two separate feelings at all.”
And if he could interpret that it would be a wonder.
He led her into a series of twirls that had her marveling that this accomplished female dancer, who did not once trip over her own feet or anyone else’s for that matter, was she. Matilda Westcott. Though she knew it was really the accomplished dancing of Charles that made her look good.
“I can see why you were so amused, then,” he said. “Those were enormously amusing wonderings.”
His eyes were laughing. Oh, he had used to do that all the time. And Matilda could not stop her own laughter from bubbling out of her. Then his mouth was smiling too and all sorts of lines showed themselves on his face, mostly at the outer corners of his eyes. Wrinkles in the making. Or, rather, laugh lines. Very attractive ones.
And she had never—oh, surely she had never before in her whole life, even when she was in love at the age of twenty—been happier than she was now, at this precise moment. Waltzing at Vauxhall. With Charles. She wanted to pinch herself. No, she did not. If this was a dream, she did not want to wake up. Ever.
But the waltz came to an end. Life always forged onward whether one wished it to do so or not. Matilda returned on Charles’s arm to the box, only to have her hand solicited for another waltz by his son.
Oh my. She was about to refuse. No one ever danced with Matilda. She never expected it. But now two partners in one evening? She mi
ght never recover from the vanity of it all. Charles, she could see, was extending a hand for his elder daughter’s and leading her out into the dancing area.
“Well, thank you,” she said. “I have just danced my first waltz, you know. I hope I do not make a cake of myself and a spectacle of you during the second.”
He laughed as they took their place on the dance floor. “I am my father’s son in some ways,” he said. “I will see to it that you come to no harm, Lady Matilda.”
“Ah,” she said, “but can you also see to it that you do not?”
He laughed again.
He was as good a dancer as his father, she decided after they had waltzed for a couple of minutes without talking—and without mishap—though he was not Charles, of course. He was not quite as tall and he was fairer of coloring and considerably younger. She doubted he had ever given his mother a moment’s anxiety over wild oats he was sowing. Though he had been a mere boy, of course, when his mother died.
His eyes were upon hers. “You know my half brother, Lady Matilda,” he said. “When you came to our house that day with Bertrand Lamarr, it was to tell my father about the custody hearing, was it not?”
“Yes,” she said. “I thought he might be able to help. It was very much in the balance, you see, whether the judge would order that the little girl remain with her grandparents or be restored to her father.”
“The little girl,” he said. “My niece. My half niece.”
“Katy, yes,” she said.
She guessed that he was still grappling with the knowledge that there was another member of his father’s family he and his sisters had known nothing of until very recently. Just as they, the Westcotts, had had to deal with the appearance of Anna, Humphrey’s only legitimate daughter, in their midst six years ago. It had not been easy. It had been harder for some of them than for others.
“Lady Matilda,” he said, “tell me about your niece.”
She thought for a moment that he was moving on to another subject. “Estelle?” she said. “She is not really my—Oh, you are asking about Abigail, are you?”