‘My apologies. Mademoiselle.’ He offered his arm to the nearest girl. ‘May I have the pleasure?’
His partner giggled, and he winced inwardly, ignoring the surreptitious victory glances she cast towards her friends as he led her on to the dance floor. He made polite conversation, but he kept glancing back at the mysterious woman in the grey gown. She seemed to have completely retreated into the shadows of the balcony.
‘You are here with friends, mademoiselle?’ he asked.
‘Oh yes,’ the girl, whose name he could not recall, responded.
‘And who is the lady in the grey gown, who hides in the shadows?’
‘Oh, her!’ the girl remarked with a dismissive sniff. ‘That’s Lady Maxwell. She’s Sophie Westhall’s chaperone, at least Sophie’s grandfather pays her to act as chaperone. Mama says that she is a person of no consequence.’ She waved at a plain, rather dumpy girl with buck teeth, dancing nearby. ‘That’s Sophie.’
But Fabien had no interest in Sophie Westhall.
Maxwell.
The girl had called the chaperone Lady Maxwell.
Fabien’s breath stopped as the tug of the past pulled him back to the memory of the slight girl struggling in the arms of Sir Simon Maxwell, her chestnut curls in disorder as she pleaded for Fabien’s life.
It was true, the story her mother had told him in her letter… Hannah Linton had become Lady Maxwell.
At the conclusion of the dance, Fabien bowed to his partner and let her return to her mama. He scanned the crowd trying to make out Lady Maxwell among the gathering, but he could see neither her nor her charge.
‘But, Lady Maxwell,’ Sophie wailed, ‘Lord Easterbrook had asked me for the supper dance.’
‘I have a headache,’ Hannah snapped. ‘I could not have borne another moment in that room.’
‘Your headache is not my concern. You are paid to see that I am properly chaperoned. It was humiliating having to leave before supper.’
‘And if I had thrown up, would that not have caused you more embarrassment?’
Hannah leaned back against the coach seat and closed her eyes. She had not lied. The throbbing in her head felt like the pounding of a blacksmith’s hammer.
Sophie snivelled. Hannah opened one eye and regarded her charge with irritation. As unprepossessing as the Honourable Sophie might appear, she would have no difficulty snaring a husband. A comfortable twenty thousand pounds a year would ensure her future with Lord Easterbrook—or someone like him. It didn’t really matter.
Sophie had never known poverty, had never had her home taken from her. Nor would circumstances ever force the Honourable Sophie into a marriage that would be so hateful that she would spend every day in contemplation of taking her life. But then it was doubtful that Sophie would ever know what it was to be truly in love. Maybe that was for the best.
Hannah allowed herself a bitter smile. The memory of that love, fleeting and intense as it had been, had both sustained and tormented her for the five long years of her marriage to Sir Simon Maxwell. Every day had been a torment until the happy day he broke his neck in a hunting accident.
He had left her as penniless as she had been on the day he married her. She had been forced to sell what assets he had not mortgaged and once again found herself in the invidious position of facing a life of genteel poverty.
It left her with little choice but to take on the role of chaperone to girls such as Sophie Westhall, who lacked a female relative to see to their first season. If she failed to see her charge married or at least betrothed by the end of the season, it would be unlikely that any more commissions of this nature would come her way.
Sophie flounced up the stairs to her bedchamber and flung herself full length on her bed. ‘When I marry Lord Easterbrook,’ she announced, ‘I will hold balls every night.’
Hannah, engaged in removing her gloves, looked down at her charge. ‘I think any man you marry had better have deep pockets,’ she remarked.
‘Oh, I've plenty of money,’ Sophie said, ‘and I will marry a rich husband and have diamonds and pearls. Not like you!’ The girl sat up and seized Hannah’s right hand. ‘How pitiful that the only jewellery you wear is that pathetic little ring. Is that the best Sir Simon could afford?’
Hannah snatched her hand away, the threat of tears stinging her eyes. Not trusting herself to speak, she turned and left the room, closing the door behind her.
In her bedchamber, she sat down at the dressing table and stared sightlessly at her reflection in the mirror, while she turned the little ring on her finger, half daring to hope, half hoping she might be wrong.
The door latch clicked, but she didn’t turn her head as her maid, Bet, said, ‘I didn’t expect you back so early?’
‘I have a headache and it was so unbearably hot in that ballroom.’
‘I suppose her nibs wasn’t too pleased to be dragged away. I heard her screaming at poor Ellis.’
