“I daresay, have you had the chance to take in some fishing along the river?” Mr. Franklin asked, his eyes suddenly brightening.
“Oh, good heavens, Mr. Franklin,” Sir Byron said. “Fishing again? Is that all you ever speak of?”
“It is an enjoyable pastime, my friend,” Mr. Franklin said with a laugh. “If only you would join me again, and I could show you the excitement that only fishing can truly offer.”
“The last time I went with you, it was dreadfully boring,” Sir Byron said.
Mr. Franklin turned to me. “What of you, Miss Amelia? Have you ever had the pleasure of spending a quiet afternoon waiting for the perfect catch?”
“I never have had the chance, sir, no,” I said. “But my father is quite fond of the sport. When he isn’t too busy with his studies, that is.”
“Your father must be a fine man,” Mr. Franklin said. “I should like to meet him.”
My cheeks colored, knowing that my father was indeed a wonderful man, yet he was likely not the sort of man that Mr. Franklin would socialize with, being of such lower social rank.
“Miss Amelia, there you are.” It was my Uncle Charles, with my Aunt Patience on his arm, coming to see me where I stood with Sir Byron and his Lady. “I do not mean to interrupt you, but there was someone we wished to introduce you to.”
My heart sank. Yet another suitor? I was still not sure I had fully wrapped my mind around Mr. Franklin.
The man that my uncle gestured to was nearly a head shorter than Mr. Franklin, with a rather mousey face and a toothy grin. His face appeared flushed, and he was tugging on the collar of his buttoned shirt.
“Ah, Sir Henry,” said Sir Byron. “I was not aware that you would be attending this evening.”
“Oh, yes, sir,” said Sir Henry in a rather nasally voice. When he smiled, he looked more like a rat than a man. “I would not miss the chance with so many fine young ladies.” He laughed, and it reminded me of a donkey’s bray.
I looked over at my aunt, my eyes widening. Surely… she was not thinking…?
“Sir Henry, this is my niece, Miss Amelia,” Uncle Charles said.
“What an honor it is,” Sir Henry said, reaching across to me and taking my hand in his. His eyes, which were somewhat watery as he gazed at me, blinked slowly. It unsettled me.
“The pleasure is mine,” I said, quickly taking my hand from his.
“Sir Henry, you will have to excuse me, for I came over here to ask Miss Amelia if she would be interested in dancing with me this evening,” Mr. Franklin said, his chin pointed upward, his sharp eyes fixed coolly on Sir Henry.
“Oh,” Sir Henry said, his face falling. “Well, yes, of course. I suppose the night is still young, is it not? Surely she will be able to spare a dance with me as the evening progresses.”
Mr. Franklin looked at me, his smile somewhat amused. “What say you, Miss Amelia? May I have the next dance?”
“Certainly, sir,” I said. “I shall be honored.”
Aunt Patience, who stood behind Uncle Charles, nodded her head firmly. I wondered if introducing me to Sir Henry had been my uncle’s idea. She seemed pleased that I had chosen instead to dance with Mr. Franklin.
Sir Henry turned and walked away, and Uncle Charles simply shrugged his shoulders.
“You did your best, dear,” Aunt Patience said. “It seems that we aren’t the only ones who have Miss Amelia’s best interests at heart this evening.”
“Indeed, I daresay you are right, my darling,” Uncle Charles said. “Come, let us have another dance ourselves. Perhaps another young man will present himself.”
“Mr. Franklin is a fine young man, I daresay,” Aunt Patience said.
“Yes, of course,” Uncle Charles said. “Enjoy your dance, Miss Amelia. I imagine you are in for a rather busy evening.”
I believed he was likely correct.
The song changed just a few moments later, and Mr. Franklin smiled at me. Compared to Sir Henry, he was a much more agreeable choice.
“Shall we dance?” he asked, offering his arm to me.
I took it, feeling the warmth of his nearness. “Indeed,” I said. “I should like to thank you, Mr. Franklin, for asking me to dance.”
“I am quite pleased to do so, Miss Amelia,” he said with a smile. “My dear friend Sir Byron tells me how utterly pleasant you are, and I must admit there are far too many young ladies here that are capable of nothing more than giggles and gossip. It will be refreshing to be able to speak to someone about something other than fashion.”
What he meant when he said he wished to talk about something aside from fashion was more about fishing. It wasn’t as if I found fishing to be a poor topic of conversation, but I wondered if there would ever be time when he would not wish to discuss it. It seemed to permeate his every thought.
Perhaps it was nothing more than nerves. I was nervous myself, having only just met him.
In terms of possible suitors, I knew I certainly had worse options. I caught a glimpse of Sir Henry along the outside of the circle of people watching the dancers and wondered if he was biding his time until I was finished with my dance with Mr. Franklin to ask me to dance once again.
I hoped that Mr. Franklin would ask me again, just so that I might have the chance to speak with him more and keep my distance from Sir Henry.
Mr. Franklin was a kindhearted man, and I was well aware that marriages did not always begin with love.
Was Mr. Franklin the sort of man that I could see myself marrying? Why was I agonizing over this so much in my heart?
I knew the truth. It was because I had already given my heart to someone else… someone that I realized I would likely never be able to have.
So I tried as best as I could to content myself with a dance with Mr. Franklin, wondering if I would end up leaving Bath with a marriage proposal after all.
11
“Miss Amelia, I feel I must apologize,” Mr. Franklin said. “I have been the one speaking for most of our dance. How very thoughtless of me.”
The dance had been rather pleasant, with the music being quite upbeat, and all the couples enjoying the merriment of the evening.
Mr. Franklin was an agreeable companion and seemed decent enough at dancing. I thought he was rather plain in conversation, and I had not listened to quite everything he had said. He quite enjoyed talking about his fishing trips.
“No, that is quite all right,” I said. “You have great enthusiasm, and I have rather enjoyed your stories.”
“Really?” he asked. “I must say, I am quite amazed. Most young ladies seem to have very little interest in my stories. I know that I often talk a great deal more than I should, but—”
The movement of our dance pulled us away from one another, the other couples around us clapping along with the music. I felt quite ashamed that I was relieved to have some distance between the two of us, knowing that for a moment, I could just enjoy the splendor of the dance around me.
We spun with the others, and I found myself looking longingly at the other couples, all of whom seemed quite happy to be dancing with one another. Their conversations must have been deeper, holding more meaning.
I kept asking myself if I could marry a man that I was having a difficult time spending time with currently. His conversations were simply so dry, so repetitive. I longed for more.
That was it. I wanted more. And I was not certain that Mr. Franklin could provide that.
But I was being rather unfair to the poor man, wasn’t I? I had barely given him a chance.
I wished I could speak with my sisters, ask their opinions. I wished I had Juliana’s sense and Isabella’s romanticism. Instead, I found myself worrying over every small thing, second guessing myself, and feeling as if I could not make any qualified decision for myself.
I was just resolving to try and give Mr. Franklin some more of my attention when I spun with the rest of the group around me, expecting my hands to meet Mr. Franklin’s and instead finding a pair of unfamiliar hands.
<
br /> I looked up… and saw Colonel Strickland.
My heart skipped, stuttering as if I tripped down a flight of stairs.
“Good evening, Miss Amelia,” he said, a smile growing on his face. His handsome, handsome face.
Oh, how I had longed to see it. How I had hoped I could hear his voice once more, saying my name!
“Colonel Strickland…” I said, almost breathless. “What are you—”
“I came to see you, of course,” he said, his smile wide and warm. “I thought you might be here.”
Came… to see me?
Was this a dream? I couldn’t possibly be awake right now. One moment, I was dancing with the sort of man that I was not sure I could marry. The next, I was in the arms of Colonel Strickland, the one whom my heart had been longing to see once again, the one I had utterly convinced myself I would never again be able to.
I could not lie to myself any longer. I did not care what Lady Byron or Mrs. Lowell had said. I could not believe their words. There was too much goodness in his eyes, too much of a smile on his face to be haunted by such a dark past.
They had to be wrong. They just had to be.
“You look rather surprised, Miss Amelia,” he said with a small chuckle as we were enveloped by the crowd of dancers, lost in our own world.
“I am quite surprised, sir,” I said. I was very aware of the feeling of my hand in his, as well as the pressure of his other hand against the small of my back. “I was told you were still in Bristol.”
“I returned just this afternoon,” he said. “I remembered the upper assembly ball would be this evening, and I certainly could not have just any young man dance with such a beautiful young woman such as yourself.”
His words, so honeyed and exactly what I had hoped to hear from him, deep down in my heart, so deep that I had not even admitted it to myself, rung in my mind.
“I am certainly glad I got here when I did. Mr. Franklin seems to have already found a way to convince you to dance. To be quite honest, I’m rather surprised he was able to utter an invitation when he seems far more interested in talking about his latest fishing conquests,” he said.
I laughed. He knew Mr. Franklin well enough, it seemed, to know the precise way that my evening had gone so far. “He is a very nice man,” I said.
“Indeed,” the Colonel said. “Very agreeable. However, not the most interesting companion, is he?”
His eyes swept over the top of the crowd, which was rather easy for him, given his height. They widened slightly. “Ah, yes… I can see he is rather displeased that I stepped in to take his partner from him. Such a shame.”
I glanced over my shoulder and saw Mr. Franklin indeed standing along the edge of the crowd, his sharp eyes narrowed as he glared at Colonel Strickland.
“Oh, my,” I said.
“I must admit, I certainly have stepped in and perhaps committed quite the faux paus, but surely he must know that you and I had a prior engagement,” the Colonel said.
“We did?” I asked.
“Certainly,” the Colonel said, a playful smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “Remember when we sat in the garden along the river together? I told you that I would very much like to spend more time with you, didn’t I? If I am not mistaken, dancing quite counts as spending time together.”
I smiled, nearly faint with the excitement I was feeling.
“I suppose we should apologize to him, shouldn’t we?” the Colonel said. “He doesn’t know that he was just saving my spot for me so that I could dance with you.”
“I am very glad that you came,” I said, looking up at him. “I thought for certain that I wouldn’t see you again before I left.”
“Why would you say that?” he asked, a long look appearing on his face. “I told you I would be back to Bath soon enough.”
“Your aunt read your letter this morning at the breakfast table,” I said. “She seemed convinced that you wished to stay in Bristol, and she hoped that—”
“She hoped what?” he asked, more seriously.
“She hoped that you would have found a nice young woman to bring home to introduce to her,” I said. I was aghast with myself for even admitting it. Was I no better than some of the other gossiping hens around?
The song ended, and we stepped apart, clapping along with the other couples.
“Did she now?” the colonel said, turning and looking around the room.
“Miss Amelia, I was wondering when you would be finally free.”
It was Sir Henry, and he was upon me as if he had been following me the whole night. Fear gripped me as I turned and stared at him, wide eyed.
“Ah, good evening, Sir Henry,” Colonel Strickland said, taking a step closer to me, taking my hand in his and laying it in the crook of his arm. The motion alone was enough to pull color into my cheeks once again, and I stared up at him, mystified. “I see you have met my lovely companion.”
Sir Henry appeared to be like a rooster whose roost had been disturbed. His chest swelled, and though he stood almost a head shorter than the colonel, he seemed to regard him as an equal, if not actually below him. “Colonel Strickland. I will have you know that I have asked Miss Amelia to dance even before you arrived here.”
“Did you?” the Colonel asked, turning to look at me. “Well, Miss Amelia, what say you?”
Sir Henry looked at me hopefully, his sternness vanishing as he looked at me like a child expecting approval from his mother.
“I’m sorry, sir,” I said. “But I do not recall you asking for a dance.”
He looked as if I had struck him. “But I do recall,” he said. “I said that surely you would be able to spare a dance with me as the night progressed.”
“Ah, but that is not a direct invitation, is it, Sir Henry?” Colonel Strickland said. “That was you expressing your hopes of dancing with her. Well, I regret to inform you that the lady has already promised me the last few dances of the night.”
Relief washed through me. “I have, Sir Henry. I’m terribly sorry.”
Sir Henry shook his head, sighing rather heavily. “Well… I suppose it cannot be helped. Are you certain you would not spare a dance with me?” he asked.
I did not have to think long. I realized I could be insulting a great many people by refusing, but I could not imagine wasting a chance to be with the colonel to dance someone like Sir Henry, whom I was certain would be even less tolerable than Mr. Franklin was.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I have already promised the colonel.”
“Very well,” Sir Henry said. “I suppose I have no choice. Good evening then, to both of you.” He bowed quickly and hurried away.
“I imagine my uncle will not be pleased I turned him down,” I said, watching him go. “He was the one who introduced us, after all.”
“That was likely before he knew I had returned, yes?” The Colonel smiled. “Shall we dance once more?”
“I would like that, yes,” I said.
As we made our way back to the crowd of couples that were preparing to dance once more, I felt the eyes of quite a few people watching us as we went. I imagined it was Lady Byron and Mrs. Lowell, who I had seen arrive earlier in the evening.
But it wasn’t either of them.
It was Lady Voss.
For a moment, she and I stared at one another. It was clear I was with her nephew, my hand in the crook of his elbow.
Her gaze was as hard as glass, and she looked as if she was ready to come over herself and give me a sound thrashing.
My face paled, and I turned away. I should have expected her to know that the colonel had returned. She had been so pleased with the idea of him staying in Bristol that I was now certain that she had sent him away so that he would not be near me.
What a terrible thing to do.
“You look rather distressed, Miss Amelia,” he said. “Whatever for?”
“It’s nothing,” I said as we took our place in the circle of couples.
That didn’t matte
r for now. I was with the colonel, which was something I had been hoping for since I had seen him at the gardens along the river. And he seemed just as thrilled to be with me, too.
I looked up at him, my heart beating rapidly, like the wings of a butterfly.
I was elated. I could only smile.
12
“You know…” the colonel said as the dance wrapped up. His face was as flushed as mine was, and yet his smile was wide and genuine. “Perhaps we should move away to a quieter place. Away from all this noise.”
My heart skipped. I was already quite faint from the heat of the dancing, and the idea of moving away sounded like a wonderful idea.
However…
“Would that be wise?” I asked. “Surely someone would notice.”
“Well, certainly,” he said. “But that is quite all right. I know for certain that we would not be the only couple to take a stroll in the gardens in the moonlight.”
A walk in the moonlight… It all sounded terribly romantic.
“Come along,” he said, holding his hand out to me. “Shall we?”
I looked around the room. All those who had been peering at us with curious stares seemed to have moved on. In that moment, I believed that it would be wisest for us to go if we intended to. “Yes,” I said, deciding to put my own happiness above those of the others in the room, and knowing that being separated from their scrutinizing glances would be good for my nerves.
“Perhaps the fresh air is just what we need,” he said as I lay my hand in his. It was as if we had practiced the action for years, my arm tucked into the hollow of his arm, and together we strolled from the assembly room.
The upper landing was far less busy than it had been earlier, and no one paid us any mind as we began to descend the stairwell together.
“You are a marvelous dancer, Miss Amelia,” he said with a wide smile. “I should not have believed my eyes.”
“You were wonderful as well, sir,” I said. “Where did you learn to dance so gracefully? Surely in the military?”
He threw back his head and laughed rather jovially. “I should think not. The men in my platoon were nothing more than lumbering fools when it came to dancing around camp in the evenings. Certainly, dancing was a great source of entertainment for us, but without a beautiful woman to dance with, it was rather lackluster and would quickly descend into anarchy at the slightest mention of a proper ball, as they all wished they could attend one in earnest.”
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