The gulf between his diplomatic life and her knowledge and experience widened by the minute. His future as a country squire seemed inevitable.
Aunt Maude must never find out how socially inexperienced Maddy was.
“Very well then,” he said. “We’ll commence dancing lessons this afternoon. Three o’clock in the green saloon.” At his words, the little girls squealed with excitement, and he kicked himself for mentioning it in front of them. “Oh, but—” he began, but then it occurred to him it was as good an excuse as any. If Aunt Maude enquired, he and Maddy were teaching the children how to dance.
Maddy’s eyes shone. “I look forward to it,” she said quietly. “I’ve heard the waltz is a very romantic dance.”
Nash nodded brusquely. It was a romantic dance, but not when his whole future was riding on it.
Twenty-two
Maddy was running late for her waltzing lesson. The modiste from London had arrived at noon, and most of the afternoon had been taken up with fittings and adjustments.
To Maddy’s relief, the modiste was not the famous Giselle, but her assistant, Claudine, another Frenchwoman, and though Claudine initially eyed Maddy’s shabby clothing with ill-disguised distaste, from the moment Maddy addressed her in French, Claudine softened.
Maddy wasn’t able to get away until well after three, but she left Claudine and her two assistants enthusiastically planning a range of stunning dresses for her.
Maddy hurried down the stairs and along the corridor. The green saloon was in the far wing of the building. She slowed to walk more softly past the pink drawing room. Lady Gosforth had established it as her own special territory, and Maddy had no desire to attract the woman’s attention.
The door was ajar. As Maddy tiptoed past, a voice floated out. “That chit has caught him in her toils somehow.”
Maddy froze. It was Lady Gosforth, Nash’s aunt.
Lady Gosforth continued, “I wouldn’t have thought it of your brother to be caught by a brazen little fortune hunter with big brown eyes. Of all you boys, I always thought Nash the most level headed.”
They were discussing her. She ought to do the polite thing and tiptoe away. Outraged curiosity glued her to the spot. Brazen little fortune hunter indeed!
“To be fair, Nash was seriously injured. His brains were quite addled,” said Maddy’s future brother-in-law, the earl. “She took advantage of that to entrap him.”
Entrap?Maddy bristled. How dare he suggest such a thing! Nash wasn’t addled in the least when he asked her. And she’d done everything she couldnotto entrap him—and at considerable risk to her own reputation. If anything, he had entrapped her!
“You know the gel better than I, Marcus. What do you make of her?”
“She’s interesting,” Marcus began.
His aunt cut him off. “I meant, can you suggest a way out of this pickle?”
Maddy clenched her fists. Her marriage to Nash might not be what his family expected, but it wasnota pickle.
“She’s as poor as a church mouse, so I doubt it.” The earl snorted. “There’s no shifting Nash when he’s in one of his gallant moods—you know how stubborn he can be.”
“Pish, tush! All you Renfrew men are as stubborn as blocks,” his aunt said caustically. “That simply means we can’t expect him to act on his own advantage. Doesn’t mean we can’t act for him. Good God, boy, have I searched the length and breadth of the kingdom for the finest available brides, only to have him trapped into marriage by some scheming little nobody who for all I know caused the accident deliberately?”
“How dare you!” Maddy stepped into the room. She was shaking with anger. “I didnotcause Nash’s accident. All I did was to try to save a stranger’s life, and if you must know, it put me to a great deal of trouble and inconvenience!”
Lady Gosforth peered disdainfully at Maddy through her lorgnette, then sniffed, and turned her attention back to her knitting.
Maddy’s temper rose. “Don’t sniff at me, you obnoxious old woman! I would scorn to entrap any man. You may call me a nobody, and it’s true that my father’s family was undistinguished, though it was genteel, but my mother’s family was noble and well connected—”
Lady Gosforth’s finely plucked eyebrows rose.
“—even though most of them died during the Terror—”
“Oh, French,” the old woman said with a dismissive wave.
“Yes, French, and very proud of it I am, too!” Maddy snapped, almost dancing with rage. “I know the marriage is not the grand one you’d hoped for, and no doubt I should have refused your nephew when he made his offer, but I could not! I simply could not—and don’t curl your lip at me like that—my reasons are my own, of concern only to Nash and myself, and if he is happy with the situation, then you should respect his choice. He’s a man, not a foolish boy suffering from a fit of gallantry.”
She glared at his brother. “And, yes, he is gallant, but you should be proud of that and not dismiss it with a sneer. If there were more gallant men in the world, it would be a better place.”
