by Maya Rodale
Chapter Twenty-one
No one has ever spent more money on an evening’s entertainment than Mrs. Carlyle has done for her masquerade ball. Thousands of flowers have been shipped from the southern states and it is rumored that thousands of bottles of champagne have been ordered. The theme is Versailles, which should tell you all you need to know.
—The New York World
The Masquerade Ball
Brandon Alexander Fiennes, the Duke of Kingston, Marquis of Westlake, Earl of Eastland, Viscount Blackwood, etc., etc., was nervous. He was nervous because he was about to introduce his mother to the woman to whom he intended to propose marriage.
And the whole damned thing had to be done in costume. He had dressed simply in his evening clothes and a mask. If anyone asked what his costume was, he would reply, Englishman too embarrassed to dress up.
On the other hand, his mother fully embraced the opportunity to appear in costume. She arrived at the masquerade dressed as a bird, head to toe, feathers and all. Or all of the feathers. In shades of deep purple, blue, and green, and accents of white, they covered her gown, her cape, and her mask. Inexplicably, she also wore a diamond tiara.
The dress had been created at the last minute—and at great expense—by a dressmaker who was not Adeline. Kingston had learned of her refusal to dress his mother—the duchess was outraged—but he understood the message. She did not want him indebted anymore, and not to her. She was trying to set him free and it only made him want her more.
The diamond tiara the duchess wore had traveled over in Her Grace’s luggage.
Kingston had to introduce this woman to his fiancée, a devoted member of the Audubon Society, whose one and only passion was preserving and protecting the lives of birds.
This would not go well.
He ought to have seen this coming.
Nevertheless, Kingston performed the introductions.
Woman dressed as royal peacock, may I please present Little Bo Peep.
Miss Van Allen was dressed as Little Bo Peep. It was not a dress born in the House of Adeline.
She wore some frilly concoction of lace upon lace upon ruffles. Ye gods, the ruffles. Between the frills and the feathers, he was in some circle of fashion hell, where too much feminine adornment threatened to suffocate him.
“Your Grace, your costume is quite stunning.”
“Isn’t it? I have come as a bird. I don’t know which one, of course. Something fabulous, though.”
Mrs. Van Allen murmured her agreement because they were words from the mouth of a duchess and so one must agree with them.
Her daughter, however, turned red. Her eyes flashed. For the first time since he’d known her, Miss Van Allen displayed a temper.
“Those are feathers from a variety of birds, including peacocks and great blue herons and snowy egret,” she said. “Some of these species have been hunted nearly to extinction only for the purpose of decorating women’s hats and dresses.”
“Extinct! Well, that should make it all the more valuable then, hmm?”
Kingston winced.
“There are campaigns underway to discourage ladies from wearing feathers. It is an important cause among many of the fine ladies in society and one that is dear to my heart.”
“They’re just birds, dear.” Kingston’s mother flashed him the I am getting bored look.
“Oh, but they aren’t just birds!” Miss Van Allen said passionately, her voice rising to champion her cause. “They are majestic creatures who make significant contributions to nature. They are beautiful creatures—God’s creatures. Why, just imagine if there were no birdsong on our walks through the park.”
“There was no shortage of pigeons during our walk in Central Park today,” the duchess replied. “Nasty little creatures. If they were prettier, I’d wear them.”
Miss Van Allen made a garbled sound of rage.
One did not expect Little Bo Peep to make garbled sounds of rage.
It’s just fashion, he had once said to Adeline. But now his future was about to be derailed by warring factions of the feathers-as-fashion debate. This collision of gowns was a collision of values and passions, just as Adeline had said.
It was a clash of identities.
It was not just a dress.
Miss Van Allen was possibly the most serene and obliging female he’d ever met, including all the demure English girls on the marriage mart. More than once, he’d had the distinct impression that she would wed whomever her parents chose, just to please them.
But birds were the hill that she would die on.
The minute she put two and two together—that her dowry would be used to pay for the duchess’s collection of endangered species-themed dresses and millinery—was the minute this betrothal was over.
Miss Van Allen looked pleadingly at her mother.
Frankly, Kingston did as well.
“Now, now dear, we don’t want to upset the duchess.”
“On that we can all agree,” he replied, trying and failing to sound jovial.
“Hear, hear,” Her Grace harrumphed.
Mrs. Van Allen changed the subject. “Your Grace, isn’t it wonderful that our children have taken a liking to each other. I couldn’t imagine anything more wonderful.”
“A prince, perhaps,” his mother quipped. “But a duke will do.”
And there it was: the great Aristocratic snobbery. And the great elephant in the ballroom. One might as well have asked, how much for that duke in the window?
Mrs. Van Allen had the decency to blush.
Kingston looked around for a passing waiter. He desperately needed a drink.
But his attention was caught by a most curious and arresting vision of six women arriving together. They appeared to be dressed as Amazons, the powerful and mythical lady warriors of Ancient Greece. They all wore matching dresses—white, silky creations that draped from their shoulders and brushed the floor. Upon first glance, they all appeared the same. But when one looked more closely—indeed, these women together were so captivating that one could not look away—it became clear that each gown was customized to its wearer, and subtly unique.
Despite the white masks covering their eyes, Kingston recognized Adeline in a heartbeat. He’d know her mouth anywhere. He recognized the curve of her shoulder, the sassy sway of her hips. He knew her handiwork, too. These dresses were Adeline creations.
She was here.
He fleetingly questioned the how and why and what for of her presence tonight. He decided he didn’t care. His best-laid plans were blowing up all around him and she was here. He didn’t believe in signs, but if he did, his heart leapt at the message this one was sending him.
Adeline is the one.
“What do you think, Duke?”
“Hmm?” He had been addressed by his mother. Who was not asking about Adeline, the recent arrival of a phalanx of ancient lady warriors, or his daring thought to cast aside his intended plans and take the risk of a lifetime.
Little Bo Peep and her mother looked up at him expectantly.
“We were just discussing a house party at Lyon House. Or perhaps Parkland,” she said, mentioning their hunting box near the Scottish border. “You and your gentlemen friends could go hunt while I introduce these ladies to an exclusive mix of London society. A nice intimate launch to the haute ton, if you will.”
Miss Van Allen, weary but nevertheless polite, turned to Kingston and asked: “And what do you hunt?”
Kingston hesitated. There was the right answer and then there was the truth. He could tell her what she wanted to hear, and then be the sort of man who lies to get a woman in his marital bed. Or he could tell the truth and damn himself to debtor’s prison.
He tried to appear apologetic—which he was—as he answered.
“Pigeons. Grouse.”
“You shoot birds? For sport?” Her voice was a strangled whisper of despair. Crushing disappointment. Heartache. And oh, the betrayal.
“By the sackful,” the d
uchess said, utterly oblivious to Miss Van Allen’s distress. “And then Cook roasts them for supper. They are delicious in a Béarnaise sauce.”
And that was too much for Miss Van Allen.
She turned and fled, an angry Little Bo Peep storming off through the crowd.
Her mother patted his arm consolingly. “Don’t worry, Your Grace. I’ll speak to her. She’ll come around.”
Was it wrong that he didn’t want her to?
In the crowd of guests at Mrs. Carlyle’s ballroom, there were numerous Marie Antoinettes, Little Bo Peeps, and Catherine the Greats. And now, there were six women dressed as Amazons in white silk gowns, each with a unique styling to fit its wearer—a cap sleeve here, a fuller skirt there, or a more daringly cut bodice. It was Miss Harriet Burnett’s idea, and she enlisted her society friends and Ladies of Liberty club members to join her in making an impression upon society. She wanted to project a different vision of womanhood than usually done, and this was an image attesting to the strength, honor, and power of women.
She thought to ask Adeline to join them, given that she was making the dresses. Adeline accepted the chance to attend such a glamorous soiree with her new friends—who wouldn’t? The masquerade was the talk of the town before it even happened.
The girls at the shop were so eager for her to attend as well; they wanted stories, gossip, all the details that the newspapers would leave out. When Adeline was dressed in her costume, she slipped her hands in her pockets and laughed at what she found: some money for a hack home, a rubber shield, and even a little tin of lip paint. Little things that made her beholden to no one.
“You are all incorrigible.”
“We want you to have a night to remember.”
“And then tell us all about it in the morning.”
Adeline was no fool—she knew that there was a chance she would see Kingston. At this, she felt a shiver of anticipation. As Harriet’s guest at the ball, she wouldn’t be beholden to him, as she’d been on the other occasions when they ventured out together. Tonight they might meet as something like equals. At this, she felt another shiver of anticipation.
But anticipation warred with dread. Because Adeline had fallen for the duke. She didn’t know how or when or what little thing had pushed her off the fence and firmly onto the side of I might love you but here she was, and wearing a white dress, too.
Yet as far as she knew he had already proposed or was certainly about to.
It was a different Englishman who found her first.
Lord Hewitt. He of the unpaid bills and whose busy hands always found some uncomfortably intimate spot upon her person to rest for just a second too long.
“If it isn’t Miss Black, dressmaker to the Four Hundred and enchanter of visiting dukes.”
“Good evening, Lord Hewitt. It’s Mrs. Black, remember? What are you dressed as?”
“A rogue.”
“You’re supposed to come in costume, not as yourself,” she said, and he laughed, thinking it was a joke.
“Will you dance with me, Mrs. Black?”
“I’m afraid that I don’t know how.”
“Just hold on tight and I’ll guide you through the moves,” he said, and she smiled weakly. He closed the distance between them and murmured in her ear. “How could I mind an innocent young miss, deferring to my wisdom and experience?”
He might not mind but she did.
They danced. Or rather, he danced and she managed. She only stumbled when she caught a glimpse of her duke. Correction: Miss Van Allen’s duke.
He was in conversation with her and their mothers.
He did not look happy.
She knew what he looked like when he was happy: the way his blue eyes sparkled and crinkled at the corners as his lips turned up into a smile that he couldn’t help. It was the way he looked at her when he realized she was teasing him about something or other.
Freddie caught her looking.
“They make an excellent-looking couple, don’t they?”
“My thoughts exactly.”
And they did. He was tall, dark haired, strong. She was similarly tall, willowy, and fair. He was dark, she was light. They were beautiful and rich and proper and perfect for each other. That costume, though, did Miss Van Allen no favors.
“And now he’s staring at you.”
“I know.” She felt his gaze before she saw it, and then the intensity of it took her breath away. His jaw tightened. He was definitely not happy now.
“We’re making him jealous,” Lord Hewitt said.
“There’s no need for that.”
“But there is,” he said urgently. “It might save him from making a big mistake.”
And this surprised her, coming from a man who couldn’t seem to keep his hands in the proper place or his attentions exclusively upon his wife. It was no secret that Lord Hewitt had married his wife for her money; perhaps he spoke from his own experience.
“Miss Van Allen couldn’t possibly be a mistake,” Adeline said. The costume she wore? Unequivocally yes. The woman who wore it, no.
“Oh, she’s loveliness personified. She even charmed me into donating to her ornithological society.” Adeline filed that information away—he did still owe her an enormous sum for his wife’s dress order. “But she is all wrong for him. They’ll make each other miserable before long.”
“That is for them to decide, is it not? Not you. Certainly not me.”
“He will marry her for the wrong reasons,” Lord Hewitt continued. “He will grow bored and restless. His eye will wander. He is a man. He will stray. Like his father before him, or like me. But Kingston has a shred of decency and sense of honor, so the guilt will eat him alive.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“She will sense that his attentions have wandered.”
“No, they won’t.”
“She will go to outrageous lengths to attract his attention. Run up massive dressmaker tabs.”
“About that—” Adeline began.
Lord Hewitt’s grip tightened on her and he pulled her closer.
“I know, Miss Black, I know.”
“A gentleman settles his accounts with dressmakers,” she said. “In cash,” she added, in case there was any question.
“What if Kingston makes you his duchess?”
“He will not. And you will still need to pay for your wife’s dresses.”
“What you two share is the stuff love stories are made of. I might even be jealous.”
“Be still my beating heart,” she said sarcastically.
“No romance for you?”
“Wedding the duke would mean giving up the dream I have worked so hard for. I’m not ready to trade the title of dressmaker for duchess. One I’ve aspired to my whole life, the other I never even considered. I am halfway in love with him,” she said pointedly to this man who held her too closely. “But I prize my independence and will not let it be compromised by any man.”
There was one woman Kingston pursued in the ballroom that evening and she was not dressed as Little Bo Peep. He found her dancing with Freddie—Freddie!—and was nearly choking on his jealousy when he interrupted.
There was no world in which he did not interrupt them.
“May I cut in.”
It was not a question. It was a statement. Which is how dukes asked for things.
“We were quite finished,” Adeline said.
“For tonight,” Freddie said, then in a low murmur to Adeline he said something that sounded like, “I shall return tomorrow with the payment.”
Violent. He felt violent toward his best friend because of a woman. This meant something, surely. Naturally, he assumed the worst, as his brain flashed back to all the times he’d seen Freddie and Adeline talking and laughing. He wondered if he was the mysterious benefactor who had helped her establish her shop. Marian certainly wore enough of her designs. He wondered if there was more than money exchanged. He wondered again, why not me?
Kingston f
elt his throat constrict as he thought of these things. It was best that he choked on the words rather than say them aloud.
His temper was soothed, slightly, when she slipped her hands into his. Just this simple touch was enough to have a measurable effect upon him.
“I should warn you. I’m a terrible dancer.”
“I don’t care.”
Kingston just needed to hold her, and a dance was a socially acceptable, convenient excuse. It also gave him something to do with his hands, other than, say, start a fight or cause a scene. His cousin. Her. Payment. How could they? He shoved it to the back of his mind.
“Rough night, Duke?”
“I introduced Miss Van Allen to my mother,” he said, thinking of the other horrible event of this evening.
“And how was that?”
“A disaster.”
Adeline gave him a sympathetic smile. His grasp on her tightened. He did not want her sympathy. He wanted her to be happy, overjoyed, and delighted that his carefully laid plans were probably ruined. He wanted her to be eager to seize the opportunity that was presenting itself.
Because the strange thing was that he was on the verge of being happy, overjoyed, and delighted his carefully laid plans had imploded and collapsed around him.
“You were right,” he said, which brought a curious smile to her lips.
“Oh?”
“It’s not just a dress. It’s never just a dress. If I had cared to pay more attention, I would have seen what these women—my mother, my maybe future duchess—were trying to tell me. You opened my eyes, Adeline. You have changed the way I see the world and . . .”
He was rambling and running out of words to say that he needed her. Thanks to her, he saw and understood things he hadn’t before. He knew that now. He needed her kiss, her wit, her perspective more than he needed money or a new roof or modern conveniences in any of his houses, plural. He needed her like he needed air moving in and out of his lungs.
“I have not proposed yet.”