by Mary Balogh
And yet when Claire obliged and seated herself at the pianoforte, no one paid either her or her music the slightest heed until she finished her piece and rose to her feet. Then the ladies interrupted their gossiping about the fire.
“That was quite divine, Miss Ward,” Miss Garnett said.
“Oh, do play on, Miss Ward,” Lady Florence urged her. “You have a quite superior touch.”
Claire played on, smiling inwardly as the ladies resumed ‘heir conversation. She did not mind playing or being ignored. Indeed, she felt far more comfortable where she was, especially after the gentlemen came in from the dining room. And safer. She was a little overawed by the presence of so many strangers and despised herself for being so. One of the gentlemen was even a duke—the Duke of Langford.
Why she should feel suddenly fearful of playing a wrong note just because she had remembered that there was a duke present in the room she did not know. He was no more human than she, she told herself firmly. Besides, no one was listening to her music and so there was no reason for nervousness.
And yet when she glanced up and across the room to assure herself that in truth she was being ignored, it was to find herself looking straight across into the dark, hooded eyes of his grace. Claire looked down hastily and indeed played a wrong note. She grimaced and played on.
She rather thought that the man might make her nervous even without the exalted title. But then perhaps it was the title that gave him his remote, haughty air. His dark good looks merely enhanced it—though the silver hair at his temples proclaimed him to be a man well past the first flush of youth. He regarded the world from lazy dark eyes and occasionally from a quizzing glass. Claire suddenly had a panicked feeling and looked up to find the quizzing glass trained on her. She played on, unaware of whether her fingers had faltered again or not.
He had not spoken a great deal either at tea or at dinner. And yet he was clearly a favorite with all the ladies. And they made no secret of the fact, something that had rather shocked Claire. She had lived such a sheltered life, she realized. She knew nothing about the manners of polite society.
“Miss Ward.” Lady Florence’s voice stopped Claire’s hands on the keyboard. “Of course you must join us before I tell everyone what is planned for this Valentine’s party. I was so enjoying your music that I almost forgot to call you over until Gerard reminded me.”
Claire was not sure which of the gentlemen was Gerard. But she felt instant regret after all that she had been persuaded to play the pianoforte’. All eyes watched her as she rose from the stool and crossed the room to take an empty chair close to the fire. She felt like a gauche girl, she thought in some annoyance, her movements jerky and self-conscious.
Lady Florence stood before the fire, looking as if she was thoroughly enjoying herself. Her red silk evening gown complemented the color in her cheeks. Claire looked at the latter in some fascination. Was the color natural?
“Tomorrow morning,” their hostess said, “we are going to observe the custom of the gentlemen drawing lots for valentines.”
“Two days early, Florence?” Lord Mingay asked.
“Why wait?” she said. “I have six identical valentines ready. Tomorrow each lady will write her name on the front of one and place it facedown on a table. Each gentleman will pick one, add his name to the lady’s, pin it to her bosom, and take her for his valentine for what remains of the party.”
Claire’s cheeks felt as if they were on fire. She must be sitting too close to the heat.
“I say,” Mr. Tucker said, looking about him. “A random choice, Florence? The whole thing is to be left to chance? No cheating?”
“Now, why do you ask, Rufus?” Lady Pollard asked, rapping him sharply on the knuckles with her fan. “Are there any of us ladies whom you would hope to avoid?”
“Or anyone you particularly favor, Rufus?” Miss Garnett asked.
Rufus Tucker looked about slowly at the ladies. “Not I,” he said. “No to both questions. So after tomorrow morning, Florence, we are to be in couples?”
“What a splendid idea, Florence,” Mrs. Tate said. “For three whole days we will each have the undivided attention of a gentleman? What a treat that will be.”
“I have plenty of activities planned to keep everyone entertained for three days,” Lady Florence said.
“Oh, bother,” Lucy Sterns said with a laugh.
Lady Florence held up one hand. “With plenty of opportunity for private tête-à-têtes,” she added.
“Ah, this is better,” Lucy Sterns said.
Sir Charles Horsefield seated himself on the arm of Lady Pollard’s chair. “Your servants are like to benefit too, Florence,” he said. “Six fewer beds to make up each morning after tonight.”
“Charles, you naughty man,” Lady Pollard said, slapping him on the knee while there was general laughter from the rest of the company. “You are quite putting me to the blush.”
“Then I am doing something no one else has accomplished these ten years past, Mildred,” he said, and there was another general burst of laughter while she shrieked again.
In addition to being too close to the heat, Claire thought, she was too far away from the door. Too far away from air. She was having difficulty breathing. Could she possibly be misunderstanding what she was hearing? But of course she must be. Everyone was laughing and in the best of good humor. They were joking. The jokes were in the poorest of taste by her standards, but she knew nothing of London standards. The truth was that Lady Florence had tried to organize a party that would be romantic in the true spirit of St. Valentine’s Day, and her friends were making lighthearted fun of her plans.
And yet, Claire thought, it would be unutterably embarrassing. Tomorrow morning she would be chosen to be one of these gentlemen’s valentine for three whole days. One of the gentlemen was going to find himself with a dreadfully dull companion. She was quite out of her depth in this company. She did not know how to laugh and talk wittily as these people did. Which gentleman would it be? she wondered. Her heart was racing and she felt more breathless than ever. And she did not know if the cause was panic or excitement.
She glanced up at the Duke of Langford, who was still standing and lounging against one corner of the mantel. He was looking back at her from those heavy-lidded eyes and idly swinging his quizzing glass on its ribbon. Claire licked her lips and looked back down again.
“But how annoying of you to make us wait until tomorrow morning, Florence,” Mrs. Tate was saying. “How are we to sleep tonight? This is almost like being a child at Christmastime again.”
“Ah, but, Frances,” Mr. Shrimpton said, winking, “Florence is kindly giving us the chance to have one last good night’s sleep.”
There was that general laughter again, but Claire found herself as unable to join in as she had before. There could be no mistaking Mr. Shrimpton’s meaning. But surely he must be merely joking. Oh, surely. Lady Florence Carver had a reputation for fastness. Claire knew that. But surely being fast did not mean being quite so unprincipled. Surely it meant just this—talking in rather a vulgar and suggestive manner.
Claire wondered as everyone stirred when the door opened to admit two servants with the tea tray whether it would be possible to return home the following morning. It would mean sending for Roderick’s carriage, which was not supposed to come for her until the fifteenth. It would not arrive until the afternoon even if she sent early.
But she would not go, she knew. She would not be able to bear having Roderick and Myrtle—and doubtless the Reverend Clarkwell too—tell her that they had told her so. Besides, she was curious. More curious now than she had been before she came. Curious about this totally different world that she seemed to have landed in at the grand age of twenty-eight. And a little excited too. Yes, she had to admit it, however reluctantly.
She had never been anyone’s valentine. Certainly not for three whole days.
———
The Duke of Langford had had the advantage of the
other guests, if advantage it were. Lady Florence had divulged a part of her plan to him on his arrival. He had known that on the morrow she and her guests were to be paired. It would be interesting, he had thought at the time. A companion and a bed partner for a few days without any effort on his part either to entice or to hold at bay. February was a dull month of the year—not quite winter, not quite spring, Christmas festivities well in the past, the Season still in the future. Valentine’s Day had been a brilliant invention of someone who had known something about boredom.
He had spent the latter part of the afternoon and dinner surveying the possibilities—not that the choice would be his. It was to be by lottery. He was not actually averse to any of the ladies except Miss Claire Ward, of course. She was the country mouse Florence had led him to expect. Florence herself would be a voluptuous armful and had much experience with the art of love, if gossip had the right of it. Mildred, Lady Pollard, had an earthy sort of humor and a certain beauty of her own. Lucy Sterns was on the loose after a stint as Lord Hendrickson’s mistress. Olga Garnett was without a doubt the most beautiful of the ladies with her blond tresses and creamy complexion. Frances Tate—well, he hoped he would not pick up her valentine. He had always avoided bedding other men’s wives, however desirable they might be.
The duke found himself mildly interested in the possibilities of the following days without in any way being excited by them. The trouble with any of the four unattached ladies, he could almost predict, was that they would assume that a short liaison in the country would blossom into a longer liaison in town. It would mean his having to be absent from London just at a time when events were leading up to the Season.
Perhaps, he thought idly during dinner, there would after all be more to look forward to if he were landed with Hetty’s substitute. It might be amusing—it would certainly be a new experience—to try seducing a country mouse. And for the first time he really looked at Miss Claire Ward.
Slim, straight-backed—her spine did not once touch the back of her chair—disciplined: she was the picture of an aging spinster. Which she was except that she must be seven or eight years younger than his own thirty-four years and except that she would be pretty if she once relaxed and smiled and if she wore her hair in a less severe style.
She scarcely spoke except when spoken to. He did not once hear her voice. And yet she appeared calm and unflustered. His look became especially keen when twice he thought he detected a gleam of amusement in her eyes as someone made particularly spiteful remarks about “friends.” Miss Ward might be a prude, he thought—indeed, he did not doubt that she was—but he suspected that she might be an intelligent one.
He watched her again in the drawing room after dinner, at first sitting apart playing the pianoforte, which she had been asked to do, according to Florence, though no one was listening to her. She looked unabashed by the fact. She actually looked as if she was enjoying herself—and she played extremely well—until she looked up and caught his eye and looked down in confusion.
A virgin if ever he had seen one, he thought. And he watched her a little later contain her shock and dismay as Florence explained her plan for their Valentine’s entertainment and everyone added comments, several of them risqué. It was all enough to give a virgin spinster a fit of the vapors severe enough to last a month, he thought. And yet Miss Ward sat straight-backed and silent and calm—and scarlet-cheeked. Even without the relaxation and the smile and the more becoming style of hair she looked pretty.
The Duke of Langford swung his quizzing glass pendulum-fashion from its ribbon and declined tea. He had an idea, one that might bring more amusement than any of the five experienced flirts and respectable courtesans would bring.
He walked upstairs later with Lady Florence. It was not difficult to arrange since both of them seemed intent on maneuvering it. “Er,” he said, “your lottery is to be a random thing tomorrow, Florence? And yet you are to arrange it that Mullins gets Miss Ward?”
She flashed him a brilliant smile. “It is fitting, don’t you think, Gerard?” she asked. “He is dreadfully dull. I should hate to feel that he might draw my valentine. And she, of course, is impossible. I would not have dreamed of inviting her if the alternative had not been having uneven numbers.”
“Then it is wise to pair them together,” he said. “But how, pray, is it to be done if there is to be no cheating?”
Her smile deepened. “Perhaps just a little manipulation, Gerard,” she said. “I shall see to it that Miss Ward’s valentine is at the bottom left of the table—as far from mine as it can possibly be, in fact. And I shall warn each of the gentlemen except Percy that that is where it will be.”
“I see,” he said. “And I take it that Mullins is to be the last to choose?”
“But of course,” she said, widening her eyes at him. “And you are to be first, a tribute to your—superior rank.”
“Ah,” he said.
She smiled. They had passed his room and had come to a stop outside hers. “Three days and three nights,” she said. “Of course, for one couple it could be three days and four nights.”
“Ah,” he said again, “but that would be unfair to the other participants in this party, Florence. Don’t you agree?” He took her hand in his and raised it to his lips.
She pulled a face. “What does fairness have to say to anything?” she asked him.
“Everything.” He bowed over her hand before releasing it. “To a man of honor, that is.”
She smiled as he turned away. He heard her bedchamber door open and close again before he reached his own room.
———
The valentines were red silk hearts trimmed with a double layer of white lace. They were exquisite, all the ladies agreed. There was a heightened air of excitement in the morning room as each in turn wrote her name carefully on one heart, leaving room below for a gentleman’s name. The gentlemen were still in the breakfast room.
Claire wished more than ever that she had sent for the carriage. A night of restless tossing and turning and bizarre dreams had not convinced her that innocent romance was the object of Lady Florence’s party. And think as she would of the six gentlemen, any one of whom might be her valentine, she could not imagine one with whom she might be comfortable—or one who would be pleased to draw her name.
Lady Florence gathered up the six hearts when they had all finished and the ink had dried. “Now, over to the fire all of you,” she said, laughing, “and no peeping. I shall arrange the hearts on the table so that none of you will know which is your own. That way there can be no cheating, no secret signals to a favored gentleman.”
The ladies laughed merrily and moved obediently to the fireplace.
“But indeed,” Mrs. Tate confided to Claire, “I have no favorite. Well, perhaps one, but then who would not favor him in any company? But Florence has chosen her gentlemen guests well, would you not agree, Miss Ward? They are all personable.”
“Yes,” Claire said.
“One can only hope,” Miss Garnett said with a titter, “that the gentlemen feel the same way about us, Frances.”
“I have no doubt of it,” Mrs. Tate said, looking about at the group. “I do believe Florence has chosen us carefully too, if I may be pardoned for the vanity.”
“Poor Hetty,” Lady Pollard said. “It is a shame she had to cry off at the last moment. She would have enjoyed nothing better than Florence’s little entertainment.” Then she glanced at Claire and looked uncomfortable. She spread her heavily ringed hands to the blaze. “There is nothing as cozy as a large fire in a morning room, is there?”
Claire smiled to herself. So she was poor Hetty’s substitute, was she? Well, she had known it, or all but the name of the absent guest anyway. But Lady Florence had sent a servant to summon the gentlemen. There was no time to dwell on the fact. Claire’s heart began to thump, just as if she were fresh out of the schoolroom and meeting gentlemen for the first time in her life, she thought in disgust.
“You
are each in turn to choose a valentine from the table,” Lady Florence told the gentlemen after they had arrived. Her cheeks were glowing and she had her hands clasped to her bosom. She was thoroughly enjoying herself. “You must not turn it over until everyone has chosen. Then you will all turn over the valentines together, add your own name beneath the lady’s, and pin the valentine to her bosom, as I explained last night. There are pins on the table. Are there any questions?”
There were not. Claire seated herself on the chair just vacated by Lady Pollard. She wished heartily that she could fade out of sight altogether.
“Very well, then,” Lady Florence said. “Gerard, will—you make the first choice?”
“Me first?” he said in the rather bored drawl Claire had noticed the night before during the few occasions when he had spoken. “Ah, the choice is overwhelming, Florence. And all quite identical?”
“But not the ladies whose names are written beneath, Gerard,” Lady Pollard said.
He stood at one corner of the table for a long time—all the gentlemen did when their turn came except Mr. Mullins, who was last and had no choice at all—before finally picking up the heart closest to him. It must have taken ten minutes for all the hearts to be chosen, though why it took so long Claire did not know. Since the hearts were identical and there was no knowing which belonged to whom, there seemed little point in pondering the choice. She could only conclude that the gentlemen were enjoying and savoring the game as the ladies clearly were. Her own heart was beating in her chest like a hammer.
“Now,” Lady Florence said, her voice so bereft of the gay excitement with which she had set the game in motion ten minutes before that Claire looked at her in some surprise, “you may turn your hearts over, gentlemen, and discover the identity of your valentine. Add your own names, please.”
Not one of the gentlemen as he read the name of his valentine either looked at her or spoke her name. Another five minutes passed—or it seemed like five to Claire, though perhaps it was not quite so long—before Percival Mullins, the first to use the pen, picked up a pin and crossed the room to Lady Florence.