“Adopting you. Claiming you as another sister,” she said as easily as one might offer to loan a spare shawl or hair comb. She patted Ashley on the back. “Eat up! You’ll need your strength for later.”
Ashley choked down a sip of wine. She had longed for siblings, but her mother was lucky to have survived having one babe. The staff and students at the academy were as close as she had come to an extended family, and that had been ripped away from her with Madame Zavrina’s passing and the closing of the school two months ago.
The men did not stay at table for port and cigars after the meal. Everyone trooped in ragtag order down the hall to the music room, which was easily large enough to accommodate a modest ball. The dog Georgia had secretly been feeding was a cream and brown Pekingese, missing its front left leg and left eye. It trotted along in Georgia’s wake, its fluffy tail coiled over its back, wafting from side to side.
The hubbub of conversation died away as soon as they entered the music room so they could listen to the young woman who stood beside the pianoforte, rehearsing a duet with the gentleman playing for her. She twirled one of her braids as she sang. The pianist wore his hair loose and long enough that it caught on his shirt points, obscuring much of his face.
They paused and repeated stanzas several times, seemingly oblivious to the crowd entering and settling on the various sofas, chairs, and ottomans.
The girl’s soprano was tentative but grew more confident with his quiet tenor just beneath, a barely audible support helping her navigate changes in key and pronouncing the Italian lyrics, dropping out when she hit a sustained note.
“My cousin Melissa,” Georgia explained as she tugged Ashley down on a sofa beside her. “She’ll have her come-out in two years. She’s competent with French but finds Italian vexing.”
“She has my respect,” Ashley said. “I have never even attempted that aria.”
Melissa finished the song with a sustained note at the top of her register. Her audience broke into applause. She blushed and glanced around the room as though just now aware they were not alone.
“Missy, I wondered where you had got to,” Georgia’s Aunt Lydia said. “You weren’t hungry?”
“No, Mama. I just wanted a little extra practice.”
Aunt Lydia turned her gaze on the gentleman at the keyboard who was now straightening pages of music. “And you were not hungry either?”
“I arrived late and was drawn in here when I heard Missy.” His smile was charming, his mellow baritone speaking voice much lower than his singing voice. Ashley had thought him older because of the grey in his hair but now saw his face was unlined.
“We’re lucky he’s here at all,” Lady Mansfield said, crossing the room to the pianoforte. “Come here,” she demanded with a grin. He stood and they embraced, and broke apart only when Aunt Lydia tugged on his arm for her hug.
“Let me introduce you,” Georgia said.
Up close, Ashley guessed he was only a few years older than her twenty-three years. Rather than grey hair, he had a single, startling streak of white in his chestnut hair about the width of her pinky, framing the right side of his face.
“Uncle David,” Georgia said, drawing his attention.
“Scamp,” he replied in greeting, a mischievous smile tilting the corners of his mouth. His hairstyle was old-fashioned, the strands nearly long enough to brush his shoulders, but his clothing was very muchau courant, perhaps even forward. He wore trousers and a coat of dark blue superfine, emerald green neckcloth, and his pale green silk waistcoat was embroidered with rich green leaves and vines.
“This is my new friend, Miss Ashley Hamlin. Today I discovered she’s an orphan so I’ve decided to adopt her.” Georgia turned to Ashley. “My uncle David, Earl of Ravencroft.”
Ashley curtsied. “Lord Ravencroft,” she murmured.
“Miss Hamlin.” His long hair fell forward when he bowed, partially obscuring his face again. Likely he tied it back with a ribbon on formal occasions. He lifted her hand to drop a kiss in the air just above her knuckles. “Welcome to the family.”
Something in his rich, deep voice, like rocks tumbling in a river, went straight through her. She suppressed a delicious shiver. “You don’t seem the least bit fazed by Georgia’s outrageous claim.”
“Of adopting you?” He shrugged one shoulder. “Her other adoptees tend to have fur or feathers, but no, I’m not surprised.” He bent down to pet the Pekingese, who was leaning against his shin.
Hearing that many words in a row from him, something stirred at the edge of her memory, but she couldn’t quite grasp it. “Have we perchance met before, my lord?”
He tilted his head to one side as he straightened. “I would hate to think we had and I’d forgotten it.”
“Let’s get started warming up,” Lady Mansfield called. “Children begin, then ladies, then the men.” She pointed a warning finger at the children, who had huddled together, furiously whispering. “If you choose a naughty catch by Henry Purcell again, you will go straight up to the nursery.”
That must have been precisely what they’d been planning, because their faces fell. They quickly grinned and huddled and whispered some more.
A few moments later, the boy who’d earlier been using his spoon as a facial fashion accessory announced their choice, “Three Blind Mice.”
“Should have warned them nothing gory,” Georgia’s Aunt Lydia said in a stage whisper to Lady Mansfield.
“What do you expect when your brother regales them with bedtime tales of ghosts and goblins wanting to cut off their heads?” Lord Mansfield interjected.
