Jonathon was unperturbed by his host’s cold reception. He met the Duke’s unblinking gaze squarely and with a smile.
“Is that so, Duke?” he said casually, and took a step to the left so that Antonia was again in his line of sight. He was delighted to discover that her slightly oblique eyes were the color of brilliantly cut emeralds. That she was even more exquisitely beautiful at close quarters strengthened his resolve to have her dance with him. “Why don’t you let your mother tell me that herself?” he said with a blunt, friendly familiarity that had the Duke been struck across the face he would not have been more shocked.
Those in the crowd close enough to hear this crude declaration were so taken aback to have a pre-eminent member of their order addressed in such a shockingly informal manner, and by one regarded as a parvenu (an East India merchant at that!), that there was a loud hiss of horrified disbelief as everyone collectively drew in breath.
The collective breath held awaiting the Duke’s reply.
“Perhaps you did not hear me,” Roxton enunciated frigidly, unused to being so rudely addressed that his close-shaven cheeks diffused a dull brick red, as if he had indeed received a reproachful slap. “The Duchess does not dance. She is returning home immediately. Now you will excuse her.”
Neither man gave way. They stared at one another in silence, eye to eye. The crowd breathed and again held its breath. Good manners and societal convention demanded that the guest submit to his host’s polite demand. But Jonathon was not a man who gave in easily, not without good reason. He certainly wasn’t going to concede just because some unwritten collective tenet demanded it. There was no reason for him to back down unless she wished it.
Thus he did not do as Society expected. He did not apologize. He was not penitent. He did not bow and scrape and back away to be swallowed up by the crowd. Instead, he committed an unforgiveable social sin; one Society matrons agreed he would never make a recover. He might as well pack his portmanteaux and leave in the middle of the night to return to whatever social backwater from wither he had materialized.
Jonathon ignored the Duke.
He stepped forward, brushing past the Duke’s shoulder, as if his illustrious host was a menial not worthy of his notice and addressed Antonia directly.
“Would your Grace do me the honor of taking a turn about the ballroom with a man who has two left feet and as much elegance as a stick insect treading water?”
Everyone awaited the Duchess’s response to this little drama being played out above her head between two large handsome men who were at opposite ends of their social order. Everyone expected her to decline. There was the affront done her son, besides which no one had seen her upon a dance floor since the old Duke of Roxton had fallen ill with the complaint of the lung that had eventually taken his life.
Antonia’s impulse was to decline, to give a lame excuse about having a megrim, and quickly depart to save any further embarrassment to her son. But she had never given a lame excuse in her life, nor did she suffer from megrims. And she certainly did not want to see this gentleman, who smiled down at her with all the confidence of receiving an acceptance, humiliated by her refusal. He had already incurred the silent wrath of her son whom she knew had a dread of public scenes. He would punish this stranger for his bad manners by undoubtedly snubbing him at every social gathering thereafter. Just as with a flock of sheep, the rest of society would follow the Duke’s lead and the stranger would find himself socially ostracized.
She would not be responsible for this gentleman’s social exile.
She met the handsome stranger’s smile openly and despite the deep lines that radiated from his dark brown eyes and etched his cheeks, and the fact he possessed a swarthy complexion, no doubt the result of years sailing on the high seas or living in sun-drenched colonial climes, she estimated he could not be more than half a dozen years older than her son. What harm could there be then in having one dance with him if it meant he would not be henceforth cast out by her peers?
Mind made up, she stepped past the Duke and held out her small hand in greeting.
“If you can bear with my lack of practice, M’sieur, I will bear with your two left feet.”
Jonathon’s white smile broadened, but it was not, as the onlookers supposed, in triumph because Antonia had accepted his audacious invitation in the face of the Duke’s opposition. He was pleasantly surprised that she had replied in softly spoken French without regard to the possibility that he himself might not be articulate in the French tongue. That he had a good linguistic ear and spoke several languages fluently could wait for another day. For now, he was just delighted to have her on his arm.
Without a second glance at the Duke, he led her into the middle of the ballroom under the full blaze of three chandeliers with all the confidence of her acceptance being a commonplace thing.
There was universal indecision as to whether other couples should join them to make up the required number for a cotillion, but then Deborah Roxton swept up to her husband and said loudly that he had promised her this dance. The Duke made no objection, though he looked askance at his wife, and several other couples were quick to form and follow their hosts’ lead. Within minutes, word swept through to the refreshment room and the gaming tables and these were all but deserted in favor of watching Antonia, Duchess of Roxton dance for the first time in seven years.
Lord Cavendish watched from the sidelines, all admiration for Jonathon’s impudence. And by the looks of longing cast at Strang by at least half-a-dozen eligible beauties as he led Antonia in a cotillion, it was his lordship’s considered opinion that far from tarnishing his suitability as a prospective mate, this episode had increased his straight-talking brother-in-law’s prospects of bagging a titled heiress tenfold. His lordship couldn’t wait to confer with his wife.
Jonathon kept up a banter of inconsequential conversation all to distract Antonia from the fact they were being watched by every guest invited to attend the Roxton April Ball. Later he tried to recall what he had blathered on about, but had no idea as to the precise nature of his ramblings, only that he was acutely conscious of wanting to make her feel at ease.
That he was in fact a very good dancer became apparent the moment the music struck up and he guided Antonia through the steps of the cotillion with all the mastery of a dancing instructor. When she looked up at him with a suspicious questioning frown he winked and smiled down at her in a conspiratorial fashion. It caused her to quickly look away. Inexplicably, her throat was hot. When they touched hands again she was once more herself, that is until he had the boldness to squeeze her fingers and say with a sad shake of his head,
“I really wish you would concentrate, Mme la duchesse. It is difficult enough keeping my two left feet pointing in the same direction without my dance partner’s thoughts drifting off from the matter in hand.”
Antonia gaped at him. “I beg your pardon, M’sieur—”
“It’s Strang. Jonathon Strang.”
“I beg your pardon, M’sieur Strang—”
“But when we get to know one another better you will call me Strang.”
Antonia drew herself up to all of her five feet two inches in height. “M’sieur Strang, I do not believe—”
The sentence was left to hang as he followed the gentlemen into the center before returning to stand beside her again. He leaned his head down, close to her ear, and said conspiratorially, “But I live for the day you call me Jonathon.”
Now Antonia was not only annoyed she was affronted. “M’sieur! I find you infinitely en gras and never will I call you anything but M’sieur Strang.”
He laughed, flashing a white smile. “Very well, that’s a start,” he said good-naturedly.
For the remainder of the dance he kept silent, much to Antonia’s relief, though his gaze was very much trained on her, which was disconcerting. She was not a vain woman but neither was she witless. She was well aware men admired her beauty, but it was always from a respectful distance, never at
such close quarters and never so openly as to put her to the blush. Again, she wondered if this stranger was drunk, but when he had stooped to talk in her ear she had not been overpowered by the smell of spirits. So perhaps he suffered from a nervous disorder that made him appear excessively friendly?
Whatever his affliction, she just wished the dance over with. She disliked the attention dancing with this stranger was creating, and that her partner was enjoying his newfound notoriety. Yet, when she chanced to glance up at him, again he winked at her, not in a lewd manner, but in a way that suggested he was very much in control of his faculties. In fact, she received the impression from the intense look in his brown eyes and the set to his mouth when he was not smiling, that underneath his friendly demeanor there was a steely determination, that once he put his mind to a purpose he had the capacity to go doggedly after it until he had gained his object, and count no cost.
Her suspicions were confirmed when, at the cessation of the music and the dancers began to disperse, he did not return her to where her ladies-in-waiting dutifully stood. He wrapped her arm firmly about his velvet sleeve and whisked her off to the refreshment room. Before Antonia could say two words in protest, he pressed a glass of champagne in her hand and maneuvered her to a quiet corner by a long window with its view over the lantern-lit Ornamental Gardens. With his broad back to the gathering crowd, he positioned his tall frame between a marble pillar and the window, effectively shielding Antonia from curious onlookers.
He drank his champagne with relish.
“Don’t it amaze you how famously we’re getting along, Mme la duchesse? You speaking Louis’ French and me replying in the King’s English. Well, I can say that now because this George does speak English. The previous two German Georges weren’t very good at it, were they? They had to converse with their English Ministers in French because their mastery, or should I say lack of the English tongue was appalling.” He smiled down at her. “Those two Georges could have prattled on to you very well. I dare say the second George liked nothing better than to converse with you in French?”
“Yes. Yes, His Majesty he was a great prattler, M’sieur,” she answered, distractedly, trying to look past him into the crowd surging towards the tables laden with food and wine for any sign of her son, but her dance partner blocked her line of sight so effectively that the only possible place for her to look without being impolite was up into his face. “Monseigneur he says it is just as well the German Georges spoke a civilized tongue and not their native guttural utterances or he would have been forced to throw his support behind the Young Pretender’s claim to the throne.”
“Is that so?” Jonathon replied with interest. “I’ll wager Bonnie Prince Charlie also conversed in French better than he did English.”
“That is very true,” Antonia agreed and suddenly dimpled at a memory. She sipped unconsciously at the champagne in her glass. “Monseigneur approved of Charles Stuart’s impeccable manners and the fact he could tie a cravat to perfection, but his politics he could not tolerate.”
“Monseigneur has his priorities right, that’s certain,” Jonathon said as casually as he could manage, for that dimple had quickened his pulse. He had made her smile, smile at a memory of her precious Monseigneur, but smile nonetheless. Determined to make the most of that small dimple, he stumbled on, surprising and embarrassing himself as to how well he was able to spout drivel like a gauche youth. “A gentleman’s appearance says a great deal about him and what he thinks of the world. There’s a vast difference between the nonchalantly dressed man and the man who dresses nonchalantly. I would hazard a guess that Monseigneur would caution that no amount of good tailoring can compensate for poor manners.”
Antonia’s green eyes lit up. “That is also very true, M’sieur,” she answered with approval. “Monseigneur will forgive a nobleman a tattered flounce but there is no excuse for a lack of civility, hein?”
“Precisely! A gentleman may have fallen on hard times and not have the means to afford the services of a tailor, but if he has a wealth of good manners he is welcome everywhere.”
“Exactement,” Antonia agreed. “It is preferable is it not, M’sieur, to entertain the village vicar in his battered tricorne who does not snort his snuff all over his lapels than the cardinal in his new cloak who has the manners of a pig and spits in the communal pot de chambre. You laugh, but I tell you, M’sieur, Monseigneur he cannot abide cardinals.”
“Well I’m pleased Monseigneur and I are in accord,” he replied with satisfaction, taking her empty glass without removing his gaze from her upturned face and setting it on the tray held by a hovering footman. “I can’t abide nose-in-the-air preachers either, particularly the spitting variety. I’ve no doubts that there are any number of subjects Monseigneur and I agree upon. What a pity I’ll never have the opportunity to meet the great man…”
But as soon as he uttered these words he knew he had made a tactical error. He could have kicked himself for being so unthinking. His innocuous comment wiped the smile from her beautiful mouth and dropped the lashes over her green eyes, fingers convulsing about the stem of her feathered fan.
He should have been more careful. He should have picked up on the fact that M’sieur le Duc de Roxton, her Monseigneur, remained very much alive to her. She continually referred to her dearly departed duke in the first person. But he had been so caught up in his triumph at making this beautiful, refreshingly candid woman smile that a momentary lapse in concentration had made him speak without thinking. And who could blame him for that?
Being in such close proximity confirmed everything about her that he had first admired from a distance, and more. She certainly didn’t appear old enough to be Roxton’s mother. But she was definitely the most beautiful creature he had ever laid eyes on. From her glowing skin to the deep cleavage of her white breasts, to her pleasing subtle perfume, and her softly spoken French, every inch of the Dowager Duchess of Roxton was delightfully and enticingly feminine.
God, he was an unthinking ass. He had allowed hubris to override judgment. After all, her dimpled smile had not been for him, it had been for Monseigneur.
“You need another drink,” he stated.
Neither of them moved.
Antonia stared vacantly at his flowered waistcoat with its covered buttons. It was an exquisite piece of finery, delicately embroidered with the exotic flowers and fruit vines of the Indian subcontinent upon a background of sapphire blue satin of such intense richness that she was sure there was many a lady who had been unable to resist smoothing a hand over its surface to satisfy a curiosity that it was as silky to the touch as it was to the eye. She wondered if he possessed other just as exquisite waistcoats and how many. Perhaps he had one for every day of the week? The natives of the Indian subcontinent were such excellent weavers and their intricate embroidery was masterful. She had at least two-dozen petticoats of fine Indian cotton in her clothes press. She wondered where they were, if Michelle was taking good care of the gowns and bodices she had worn before…
It was her way of coping, of shutting out the world of the here and now, to focus on something, anything, that would take her mind off the unbearable hollowness in her heart. She must not fall all to pieces in public. Julian would be mortified. He would never forgive her if she caused a scene here, in his own home surrounded by his peers. He frowned on public displays of emotion. But he was not a cold-hearted man. In truth, he was painfully shy. She had made this surprising discovery about her eldest son only upon his marriage to Deborah. Why had she not known this about him before?
She had always been openly demonstrative with his father.
Strange…
Thank God Julian had Deborah: beautiful, good, sensible and loving. That was her daughter-in-law. She made a fine Duchess of Roxton and was just the sort of wife and mother to his children Julian needed. They were the perfect couple and so happy…
Why had she attended tonight’s ball? Why had she not stayed at home with her memories, surround
ed by their books and their belongings, so necessary and comforting to her sanity? She prayed her son would come now and escort her to her carriage for the drive that skirted the lake to the sanctuary of her dower house.
Where were her two watchdogs?
She needed to go home, now.
With supreme effort of will she brought her concentration back to the present and forced herself to once again focus on her dance partner’s intricate waistcoat. The sapphire blue satin was really quite calming. A sea of sapphire… It was enough of a distraction that after only a few moments she was able to breath deeply, knowing she would not fall all to pieces, not here, not openly, not tonight.
“Indian needlepoint,” Jonathon stated quietly and smiled to himself when she was startled into blinking up at him. But her green eyes were bright, as if glazed with tears, and her cheeks delicately tinged with color, so that his smile dropped into a look of concern. Still, he couldn’t help a cheeky comment he hoped would snap her out of her sad abstraction. “You are welcome to touch, should you feel so inclined,” he offered with a lop-sided grin.
“M’sieur, you are absurd!” Antonia said dismissively, but his mischievous comment had its desired effect. She was instantly annoyed and picked up a handful of her petticoats, a sign that he should step aside to allow her to pass. Yet, when he just stood there, blocking her way, she hesitated to know what to do, after all, etiquette dictated he give way, when he did not, she scowled up at him, at a loss to know his motives.
He enlightened her.
“I am fully sensible to the fact it would be bad-mannered of me to call upon you at Crecy Hall uninvited,” he remarked casually. “But it would be equally bad-mannered for you to refuse me once I am at your door. I intend to come uninvited tomorrow for afternoon tea, so if you do not wish to be bad mannered I suggest you physically not be at home. I won’t accept one of those “Mme la duchesse is not at home to anyone” brush offs from your nose-in-the-air butler.” He stepped back a pace to allow her to pass and bowed. “Until tomorrow.”
Autumn Duchess: A Georgian Historical Romance (Roxton Series) Page 3