Amelia Fairchild lifted her eyes to look at Talbot for what he was only now realising was the first time since they’d started dancing. They were a striking pale blue, almost grey, and they were accusing.
“Thoughtless, uncaring people hurt people.”
Talbot was taken aback by the turn this conversation had taken.
I believe I preferred her when she was timid,he concluded.
Between his dances with Lady Helena, they visited the refreshments again, and there they came face to face with the Corporal and Miss Hawkins, who had also just finished waltzing.
“Your Grace,” Miss Hawkins said, slightly surprised.
“Duke Talbot,” Harding said. “Lady Grey.”
“Corporal,” both Talbot and Helena said in unison.
“Miss Hawkins,” Talbot said in a hoarse voice as Helena merely inclined her head in acknowledgement.
Elizabeth nodded back.
“Will I see you atGentleman Jackson’sthis week?” The swain asked in that friendly way he had.
Talbot imagined landing a facer on him and thereby causing one of Harding’s eyes to swell shut, and said, “Absolutely, I’m looking forward to it.”
Elizabeth said nothing. She was holding her usual lemonade, and the liquid in the glass was trembling. Her eyes were fixed on something in the distance.
She can’t bear to look at me.Talbot thought.
His ribs were aching during the second waltz.Perhaps the boxing saloon is a bad idea, he thought.I clearly haven’t recovered from my last visit.
Stone had managed to hit his unprotected side twice last week. Talbot tried to take a deep breath, but it was difficult.
“Looks like we’re not the only pair who decided to dance two consecutive dances with each other tonight,” Lady Helena remarked with the satisfaction of a woman who had won the better man.
Talbot didn’t want to look.
“They are well-suited to each other, don’t you think?” She continued.
Talbot looked into Lady Helena’s sharp eyes, and it was apparent to him that, on some level, she must have always intuited who her biggest adversary was.
“I don’t concern myself with matches between impoverished soldiers and illegitimate daughters,” he scolded, but Lady Helena’s face glowed like she’d just been given the most wonderful present.
Talbot felt disgusted with himself, but at the same time, itched to make himself feel even worse. It was like picking at a wound and being unable to stop.
*
A week later, he was sitting in his Opera box with Pratt and the two ladies (he was, very impolitely, still unclear on Lady Helena’s friend’s name) and was trying to use his telescoping opera glass to examine the audience, but Lady Helena would not stop trying to include him in the inane conversation she was having with the others.
It is astounding that Lady Helena manages to keep her entire body so still, even when she talks about things that excite her,Talbot thought, impressed, right when he noticed movement in Hawkins’s box.
“He doesn’t even have his own box,” he heard Lady Helena’s friend whisper to her, and he realised they were all watching the same couple.
Talbot wondered whether the fortune hunter was touching Miss Hawkins’s hand while sitting next to her.
What does her skin feel like under her gloves? Are her hands calloused from working as a seamstress and the years of gloveless living? Or have they softened by now?
Colin was suddenly struck by an image of Elizabeth working at the modiste’s, sitting by a window, the sun beating down on her as she squinted at the fabric in her hands. He jerked upright, confused.
“Shall we go to Vauxhall after this?” he leaned to whisper into Lady Helena’s ear.
