The Bluestocking's Dilemma Read online

  Caro nodded. Privately, she could not imagine the viscount liking anyone that his sister chose. But if it would keep Lavinia from finding partners for Caro, then it was worth it.

  Chapter 6

  In fact, the Countess of Welham was the only one in several households looking forward to the Countess of Mortmain’s rout with any sort of pleasurable anticipation. Tony, Caro, and Helena, resigned to attending, were all searching for some way to extract even the slightest amount of amusement from an evening that promised to be nothing so much as a crush of people jealously observing one another and stepping on each other’s toes in a stuffy ballroom. The music would be audible only to those directly in front of the players and refreshments would be impossible to obtain without fighting one’s way through the mass of guests. Yet, they all derived some solace from the thought that they could rely on each other for conversation on some topic other than the latest on-dits. Tony knew that he could count on Caro to acknowledge a promised dance when his sister became importunate in her demands that he partner Lord So-and-So’s whey-faced daughter or some gawky heiress that Lavinia favored.

  Meanwhile, in an equally imposing residence in Berkeley Square, another prospective guest was deciding that, unwilling though he might be, he too could not avoid attendance at the opening event of the Season. Frowning at the gilt-edged invitation on the mantelpiece, Nicholas turned to address the two ladies sipping tea in front of the drawing room fire.

  “I should be more than happy to escort both of you to the Countess of Mortmain’s, Mama, though it is like to be a sad crush. I collect that Clary is still adamant in her refusal to have a Season?” He cocked an eyebrow at one of the room’s occupants, a slight girl with her brother’s dark hair and blue eyes. She looked to be no more than eighteen except for the fine lines around the eyes which were those of someone much older and more accustomed to life’s painful experiences.

  Lady Clarissa Daventry, last of the children born to a mature woman, had appeared in the world after much travail on her mother’s part and, as a result of this difficult labor, had a twisted spine. This deformity, though not immediately visible when the young lady was seated, caused her to walk with a decided limp and had kept her from being involved in any physical activities. Consequently, she had thrown her energies into painting and the pianoforte and was an accomplished artist in both these areas. Though blessed with a pleasing face and a quick mind, she had early on recognized that most other children were inclined to look askance at one who enjoyed such quiet pursuits as she did, and thus Clary had led a contented but solitary existence at Everleigh with her governess and her music master.

  Of late, her ailment had become painful as well as inconvenient and at long last she had allowed her adored brother to convince her to come to London to seek advice from the finest medical men the country had to offer.

  Personally, Clary did not hold out much hope for such a cure, but Nicholas had been so optimistic that she could not find it in her heart to resist in the face of such concern. Furthermore, she could see that the Marchioness of Everleigh would never again move amongst her friends in the ton unless her daughter were to accompany her to the metropolis. So, after some demur. Clary had allowed herself to be persuaded. However, she had been adamant in her continued refusal to have a Season or attend any of the countless fashionable affairs to which they had been invited.

  Nicholas had scoffed at the notion that she would appear nothing but a poor awkward cripple to the members of the ton. Though she loved her brother for his belief that her sweetness and charm, coupled with her considerable talents, would make those around her forget her deformity, Clary could not help thinking that in this instance Nicholas was wrong. Wishing to avoid hurting the brother who had been her idol for so many years, she had not flatly refused to appear in society, but thus far she had successfully escaped all contact with the outside world.

  For his part, Nicholas had been remarkably circumspect in promoting his plans, of which the medical consultation formed only the smallest part. He was determined to enlarge his sister’s circle of friends and help her grow accustomed to moving about more in society. He did not expect to overcome her resistance with ease, but there was no harm in trying. In time. Clary might become so accustomed to being invited to join him that she might actually do so. Thus he was not at all put out when she said, “Thank you, Nicky. I would infinitely prefer to stay here, but Mama must go.”

  The marquess merely smiled and shook his head at her before turning to his mother. “You will attend with me, will you not, Mama?”

  The dowager hesitated. She hated leaving her daughter home alone, but it had been so long since she had been a participant in a world where she had once been one of the brightest stars. Her husband’s death, followed by her eldest son’s unexpected and tragic hunting accident had kept her immured in the countryside and it was not until Nicky, home at long last from the wars, had taken charge and offered his escort that she had gotten out at all. The dowager’s conflicting thoughts, writ large on her countenance, were immediately visible to her two children who made light of her reservations.

  “Don’t be a nodcock. Mama. You know you are longing to go, if only to see if Lady Blandford’s daughter is the incomparable she claims her to be. Letters are one thing when you have very little expectation that the recipient will find out for herself. But if Araminta were as her mother insists she is, Nicky would surely know of her and he did not so much as blink when you read the letter to us.” Clarissa threw a challenging look at her brother.

  Nicky grinned, “Now, Clary, how can you say such things when I have been leading a most circumscribed and respectable existence as responsible landlord, attentive son, and, I might add, devoted brother to a sister who refuses to go out and observe for herself.”

  Clary’s eyes danced with amusement. “Don’t fly up into the boughs, brother dear. I may have been playing the pianoforte the evening Sir William and his family came to dine, but I saw how both Susannah and Jane were casting sheep’s eyes at you. Though I do not move in society, I am neither blind nor stupid. Besides, when Colonel Mclntyre came to tell us how you were going on after returning to the Continent, he was full of stories about Spanish beauties and Belgian ladies who fairly swooned over the handsome Captain Daventry.”

  “Oh, Neill. You cannot believe a word that man utters. He is full of Banbury tales,” her brother scoffed.

  Clary looked smug. “That’s as it may be, but I know what I know.” Then, changing the subject, “Do go, Mama. I shall be most content here by myself. I had rather be alone this evening because I wish to try some of the new music we procured from Chappell the other day. Besides, now that Nicky is the head of the family, every matchmaking mama will be forcing her daughter on him. You must not leave him unprotected.”

  Nicholas grimaced. “She’s in the right of it, Mama. My life is no longer my own. I cannot look at a woman but I see myself reflected in her eyes as the husband of her dreams.”

  “Poor Nicky,” Clary teased, but her mother, smiling at her son with maternal pride, merely replied, “Well, you are.”

  “What? Nicky? Why they’d be bored within a fortnight. He would bury himself in Blackwood’s and The Edinburgh Review, go off to attend his political meetings without a thought for them, or bury himself at Everleigh and spend his time riding about the countryside at breakneck speed. No, I suspect Nicky would make a far better flirt than a husband.”

  “Clarissa! How can you say such things about your brother?” The countess was shocked. “Especially when he has been all that is kind and attentive to us.”

  “I was only funning, Mama. You know I consider him the best of brothers, spending far too much time at Everleigh with only us for companionship.” Clary’s eyes were lit with a special warmth as she regarded her brother’s handsome profile and she sighed inwardly. She truly did wish he could find someone to love, but after Lavinia Mandeville there had never appeared to be anyone.

  Of course, he had not co
nfided in his sister, but close as she was to her favorite, Clary could guess. She had seen the light in his eyes and heard the reverence in his voice whenever he spoke of Lavinia. And then, after the Christmas ball at Mandeville Park, he had never mentioned her again. There had been a certain grimness about his mouth and an unhappiness in his expression for weeks afterward, and he began to chafe to get back to his regiment. Clarissa barely knew Lavinia, but she had conceived a fierce dislike for the woman who had spurned someone as magnificent and true as her brother, Nicholas. Giving herself a mental shake, Clary turned her thoughts to the issue at hand. “Truly, you must go, Mama. You know how much you will enjoy it.”

  “Very well, then, if you are certain you will be comfortable here alone.”

  “I shall be more than comfortable. I shall look forward to an uninterrupted evening at the pianoforte. So you see, I should be very poor company indeed, even if you were here,” the marchioness’s daughter assured her.

  Thus, not many hours later, the Marquess of Everleigh escorted his mother up the broad marble staircase of the countess’s impressive mansion in Park Lane. True to prediction, it was dreadfully crowded and they were forced to wait for an age as the press of guests moved slowly up the stairs to be greeted by their hostess, resplendent in a diamond parure and a turban of truly terrifying proportions.

  At long last they entered the ballroom, ablaze with light and already stiflingly hot from the number of guests. The dowager looked eagerly around for old acquaintances, her eyes bright with excitement at being back among the ton, while her son, steering her to the relative calm of a marble pillar, sighed. It was like so many other affairs with women, beautifully attired in gowns and jewels of all descriptions and hues, scrutinizing each other, comparing, and commenting to their friends, all the while casting not entirely covert glances at the male members of the assemblage. The men, less conspicuously than the women, were doing precisely the same thing. Nicholas could picture the on-dits being passed along as he intercepted the exchanges of a sly glance here, a raised eyebrow there. He almost wished himself back on the Peninsula, for after all this was no less a battlefield, but the enemy remained hidden and one could never confront it.

  A silvery voice at his side broke into the marquess’s reverie. “Why Nicholas, how charming to see you.”

  He turned to see Lavinia smiling up at him. Like Caro, he too could not help thinking how much more beautiful she had grown. The Lavinia Mandeville who had spurned him so completely had been a mere girl while this was a woman, secure in herself and her charms. The flirtatious look had gone, to be replaced by a smile that was a thousand times more seductive.

  As he bent over the dainty hand, he observed that the figure underneath the blue satin slip had also matured into voluptuousness. The corsage, which was cut very low, revealed enticingly rounded shoulders and bosom, while the magnificent sapphire necklace called attention to the creamy softness of her skin. “Lavinia.” He tore his eyes away from this distracting vision to find her looking up at him, a tiny smile of amusement curving her delicate lips and a knowing sparkle in the blue eyes.

  Her voice, however, when she finally spoke, was plaintive. “I am delighted to be recognized. After all this time in seclusion, I began to fear that no one would know me. Widowhood is a most lonely state, I assure you,” she sighed.

  Nicholas raised a dark eyebrow. Even for Lavinia, this was doing it much too brown. “I hardly think so. Society does not forget an incomparable so quickly.”

  “Why thank you, Nicky.” Her voice still held a wistful note. “But I know how fickle it can be. And there is always a new crop of hopeful young beauties to catch the interest of the ton. I vow I have been away from it all so long I have even forgot how to dance.” She dimpled up at him.

  As the musicians had just struck up and sets were forming for the quadrille, his mother urged him, “Do go on, Nicholas, I see Amanda St. Clair heading this way and I have not seen her for ten years at least.’’ There was nothing for it but to offer Lavinia his arm and beg her to do the honor of accompanying him, but all through the dance his thoughts were in a turmoil.

  Here was the woman he had dreamed of for so long, someone who had chosen a brilliant marriage over love, or whatever it was that she had felt for him. Nicholas had tried to hate her, or at least her misplaced values, but he had not been able to stop himself over the years from picturing her as he had last seen her at the Christmas ball so long ago.

  As time had passed, the image had faded from his mind and he had relegated Lavinia Mandeville to the ranks of those members of the ton for whom position was everything. Nicholas regretted that she was that way, but he had accepted it and gone on to other, more important things. Now, here he was, the Marquess of Everleigh, wealthy in his own right and head of the family as well, and it seemed that Lavinia was more than ready to recapture their former intimacy.

  He should have scorned her for a heartless beauty. But somehow he could not help being intrigued—as much by her unabashed pursuit of him as by her loveliness. Nicholas couldn’t understand himself. Half of him was enjoying being with her and the other half was saying, Nicholas, you fool. To her you are merely the most eligible bachelor in the room. Unbidden, another face from the past stole into his consciousness and he wondered what the Christmas Waif would say now. She had offered him words of wisdom then. Undoubtedly she would shrug her shoulders, curl a scornful lip, and dismiss him as an idiot beneath her consideration, as someone who had learned nothing from the lessons of time.

  Chapter 7

  In point of fact, Caro was doing very nearly that, though her disgust was directed more at her cousin and her predatory ways than at any folly on Nicholas’s part. Watching them perform the graceful figures of the quadrille, she was forced to admit that they did make a handsome couple. The black coat so beautifully molded to his broad shoulders and the snowy cravat merely emphasized the marquess’s dark good looks, while his powerful frame, nearly a head taller than any other man in the room, made Lavinia appear even more delicate and ethereal.

  Caroline snorted to herself. The fragility was the merest illusion, for no one of Caro’s acquaintance could be more single-minded than her cousin. No sooner had Nicholas appeared in the ballroom than Lavvy had decided to make him hers. Caro had seen her cousin stiffen the moment her eyes caught sight of his commanding figure, but she had continued a running commentary on the room’s occupants before adding in an offhand manner, “Why, there is Nicholas Daventry. He is come into the title now. Such a tragic set of coincidences, both his father and his brother. They say he made a tremendous fortune in his own right—something to do with the consols and Waterloo. Until now he’s kept himself buried at Everleigh. I must go and talk with him and his mother. Mama would be most annoyed with me if I were to ignore one of our neighbors.” And with that she was off, her eyes fastened tenaciously on the marquess and his mother as they made their way through the crowd.

  Caro turned to see Helena’s hazel eyes twinkling at her obvious disgust. “That man has no more chance than a trout on a line and Lavinia will be the new Countess of Everleigh before the year is out,” Caro muttered darkly.

  Her companion laughed. “You are quite in the right of it, but most men would be pleased at the prospect. After all, Lavinia was born to the part and would fill the role most gracefully.’’

  “Yes,” Caro was forced into unwilling admission. “But she doesn’t care for him in the least, you know. I don’t believe that she cares for anyone but herself.”

  “Very likely true, but that does not mean she would not make him a good wife. After all, very few marriages in the ton are based on more than the barest civility,” Helena replied. “Besides, she shall have some competition for the marquess’s attention for I see Sally Jersey has just joined them.’’

  Caro glanced over but remained lost in thought. Annoyed though she had been by his arrogant ways, somehow she did not wish for the marquess to fall into her cousin’s clutches. She could not help reme
mbering the companionable way he had sat down on the cold stairs at Mandeville Park so many Christmases ago and conversed with her so intelligently, as though she were of an equal age and experience. Even though marriage to her cousin was precisely what that young soldier had once aspired to, Caro felt now, as she had then, that he deserved something more than Lavinia with her unceasing appetite for attention and admiration and her demanding ways.

  She sighed and gazed around the ballroom. Caro had guessed how it would be—hot, crowded, and dull—but she had promised Susan that she would take careful note of what everyone was wearing and how their hair was arranged in order to report back to that aspiring young person. In fact, with the exception of Lavinia, the little maid was the only one in the Grosvenor Square household who had looked forward to the event. Even Helena, loyal though she was, had demurred. The Countess of Welham obviously did not expect a mere companion to accompany them, but Caro had been adamant that her companion lend her moral support. Susan had been in her element, selecting Caro’s dress of Uriing’s net over a white satin slip. Though her mistress insisted that she was not a young miss making a come out and could therefore dispense with the obligatory white muslin, the maid had been equally obstinate that she at least wear white.

  “But, Susan, I am not making any appearance in society nor am I here to find a husband, and furthermore, I do not wish to be confused with anyone who is,” Caro protested.

  “That’s as may be, my lady,” the maid responded firmly, “but you don’t wish to be thought of as an ape-leader either. There.” She finished placing a rose in her mistress’s glossy dark hair and stood back to survey the effect.