A Lady’s Lesson in Scandal (30 page)

His mouth was so beautifully shaped. Full, well-chiseled lips. She wished he wouldn’t waste them on flattery. They had such better uses.

Her next words sounded hoarse. “Thank you; that’s very kind.” Mrs. Hemple had told her that a lady never argued with a compliment.

His smile widened briefly before disappearing. “This is for you,” he said in a different, more formal voice.

She felt a flicker of unease as he opened the box—something in his manner put her on the alert. But the contents within the velvet-lined compartment robbed her of her wariness.

The necklace sported emeralds the size of robin’s eggs. Those on the bracelet were not much smaller. The stones seemed alive in the light, casting a sparkle so vivid that she hesitated to touch them for some irrational fear they would singe her.

These jewels were fit for a queen.

“These have always belonged to the Countess of Rushden,” Simon said. “Your mother wore them. She particularly loved the bracelet. In many of my memories of her …”

She looked up as he trailed off. His expression was impassive but she wasn’t fooled. He had a knack for making his face unreadable at those moments when he felt the most.

“I loved her, of course,” he said lightly. “Now they’re yours.”

She had no idea why tears suddenly stung her eyes. She reached up to touch his face. His eyes held hers, deeper and graver than she’d ever seen them. “Thank you,” she said.

Her throat felt thick as she turned to face the mirror. She watched as he laid the necklace around her throat. His mouth touched her nape, a light, warm brush that made her shiver. His fingers slid along hers as he coaxed the bracelet onto her wrist, promises in the slow stroke of his fingertips.

The woman in the mirror colored. She took a large breath, then smiled—a strange and wise smile that sent a shock of recognition through Nell.

It was not a factory girl she saw in the glass, but a woman with jewels at her throat, with assurance in her proud carriage, with serene confidence in her eyes.

She had seen this lady before, in a photograph that hung in a shop window.

The Allentons’ drawing room was candlelit. From the high ceiling, rosy Grecian gods looked down on guests who gleamed in silk and satin. The gold brocade of the damask upholstery winked in the low, inconstant light; gems flashed on throats and wrists. Some sweet, subtle spice scented the air. The soft bowing of a violinist hidden by a screen of ferns vied with the pleasant, steady murmur of conversation.

Nell’s stomach cramped as she hesitated on the threshold. Here was a perfect dream of wealth. Right and left, luxury and smiles and gentle, understated laughter flourished. These people had no idea that they were about to meet a factory girl—about to curtsy to her, even.

Simon leaned near. “You belong here,” he murmured.

She forced a smile to her lips. “I’m not nervous,” she lied. She knew she wasn’t a coward. On a deep breath, she took the step across the threshold.

“Lord Rushden!”

Simon steered her gently around to greet their approaching hostess, a short, plump, auburn-haired matron with the unremarkable but pleasant features of a Madonna.

The woman laid eyes on Nell and her serene smile collapsed. “I …” As Lady Allenton drew up, she looked rapidly between them. “Lady Katherine, good evening to you.”

“Ah, I fear you misunderstand,” said Simon courteously. “Lady Rushden, may I present Lady Richard Allenton? Lady Allenton, my wife, the Countess of Rushden.”

Hearing her cue, Nell watched her own arm pop out like the stiff limb of a cranked automaton.
Harmonic poise
, Mrs. Hemple’s voice silently chided.

But their hostess was too startled to note the finer points of the performance. “My goodness,” said the lady. Bright color bloomed on her cheeks as she took Nell’s fingers. She gave them a light press and bent her knee slightly.

There: the first curtsy. It triggered in Nell a rising tide of hilarity. Somebody with a
Lady
before her name had just
curtsied
to her.

Simon’s shoulder brushed hers—a subtle nudge.
Right
. She wet her lips. “How do you do,” she said.

“Very well,” Lady Allenton said breathlessly. “But I had no idea—that is, my very best wishes to you, Kitty.” Pursing her lips, she corrected herself: “Lady Rushden.”

Nell’s breath briefly stopped. “Lady Allenton,” Simon said gently. “I fear you mistake my wife for her sister.”

The lady’s hand clamped around Nell’s, then just
as quickly let go. She retreated a pace, her eyes huge. “I—” She swallowed. Shook her head. Then managed a little laugh. “Did I mishear you? I don’t quite …”

“Forgive me,” Simon said, “for breaking the news so suddenly.”

Nell dared a brief look at him. His eyes met hers, the smallest smile curling the corner of his mouth. Didn’t he look bloody jolly! She tried to smile back but her lips wouldn’t do it.

“Well!” Lady Allenton shook her head once, then fell silent, as pop-eyed as a reverend at the devil. A pulse was beating visibly in her throat. Was she going to throw them out? Would she call for a guard? Would she—”You naughty, clever boy,” she said, a look of humor entering her face as she turned to Simon.

Nell exhaled. Simon’s dimple was flashing. “What can I say?” he replied.

“I can’t even begin to imagine.” Lady Allenton’s eyes turned back to Nell. “I—what a pleasure! I don’t expect you recall—” Her words now picked up speed, tumbling breathily over one another. “I knew your mother, of course, but you were so small—no, you wouldn’t—but how devastated we were, afterward, how hopeless—” Her lips clamped shut, but her wondering gaze continued to rove over Nell’s face. “I must ask,” she burst out. “Where have you
been
?”

“And here you are!” A strapping, ginger-haired man bounded up to clap Simon on the shoulder. He sent a quizzical glance toward his frozen hostess, then looked onward to Nell. “Oh,” he said, swallowing noisily. “Quite—quite right. Lady Rushden, then?”

“Lady Rushden,” Simon said equably. “My lady, Lord Reginald Harcourt, a friend of old.”

Nell gamely extended a hand, but the redhead had
bowed too quickly for her. “Terribly glad to meet you,” he said as he popped up again, the grin on his face putting her in mind of a jack-in-the-box. She recognized his type. Sporting, jolly: he’d be comfortable down at the pub, singing sailor songs at the bar with the lads who liked to brawl after their fifth or sixth glass. “Expect you’ve come to set the crowd on its ear, eh?” He cocked an eyebrow at Lady Allenton. “The first victim.”

“I am quite well,” Lady Allenton murmured.

“No doubt of that,” the man agreed. “Soiree of the season, what? A hard title to come by, once June rolls around, but I expect Rushden has clinched it for you.”

The words seemed to rouse Lady Allenton. She looked around her as though coming awake. Her eyes narrowed as they returned to Nell, and then she smiled, suddenly and perfectly delighted.

“But what an honor,” she said. “What an honor, that you should choose my little party to announce this—this miracle!” Her trilling laugh steadied, edging into robust glee. “Oh, yes. Lady Rushden, you
must
allow me to introduce you.”

And so, at their hostess’s direction, they walked from group to group, the first and second knots of guests greeting Nell with confusion—and then shock, much as Lady Allenton had done. But as their progress continued, leaving astonished exclamations in its wake, the entire room began to catch on. The genteel atmosphere dissolved into a sharp, increasingly frenetic babble that drowned out the violins. Only two words leapt clearly out of the hubbub:
Cornelia Aubyn
.

To her own surprise, Nell relaxed; she actually began to enjoy herself. Mrs. Hemple had framed this
evening as a test, but Simon had been more correct: it wasn’t a test as much as a spectacle, and her part in it barely required words. With each new person, she extended her hand, made a shallow curtsy, and then settled back to let them gawp and ogle her. Simon managed all the rest: he guided the stunned guests through their disbelief and into excitement; dexterously deflected their more complex inquiries about her former whereabouts; laughed often, generously, until his interlocutors laughed, too; accepted compliments on her behalf; and smoothed over those moments in which a question was put to her that she had no idea how to answer. “No, she’s not so fond of hunting, but what a lovely invitation; and, yes, I’m working to change her mind”; “The gown is Worth, I believe, but altered by Madame Poitiers; you know she has a gift for muting the harsh French angles”; “Why, no, we were discussing it just last night; she hasn’t chosen a favorite yet, but I’m wagering on Hunsdown’s filly to take the race.”

Nonsense, clever nonsense, all spun in Simon’s low, smooth voice. He was a bloody genius with these people, slicker than any confidence artist, more popular than whisky in a room full of Irishmen. People doted on his remarks. They courted him and he rewarded them for it, lavishing his charm on anyone who wanted it, using his free hand to flirt, to deliver glancing brushes over ladies’ wrists and solid, manly claps to gentlemen’s shoulders. He radiated approval, amusement,
belonging
, and people gathered to him like stars around the moon. Under his influence, their avid curiosity about her shifted into simpler warmth; they looked at her anew, seeing not a grotesque surprise but a delightful discovery,
Rushden’s
discovery.

When somebody pressed a glass of champagne into her hand, Nell lifted it to him in a silent toast, congratulating his cleverness. His eyes laughed back at her; in the pretext of inclining to speak in her ear, his lips brushed her temple. “Steady on,” he said. “You’re doing brilliantly.”

She flushed at the compliment, though she hardly deserved it. In this hullabaloo, nobody noticed if her vowels occasionally collapsed on certain syllables; if, once, she slipped up and called a marquess
your lordship
, like a servant. But oh, sweet irony! Her tutors would have despaired at how this richly dressed crowd stared and stammered. As Lady Somebody-or-Other gabbled at her about the glorious righting of terrible injustices, she nodded and patted the woman’s hand and thought,
Mind your E’s, there, duck, and don’t step so close when you speak to a girl: it ain’t polite
.

When that lady finally stepped away, another took her place: a scarlet-gowned woman whose pale, heart-shaped face might have blurred with all the others had the sight of it not caused Simon to hesitate briefly before issuing a greeting.

The Viscountess Swanby was tall and dramatically curved, with pale blue eyes as sharp in their sparkle as glass. She received news of Nell’s resurrection with unusual serenity, nodding through the introduction and then immediately inquiring whether or not Simon had received her invitation to a performance by some Hungarian pianist.

“Thank you, I did,” he said.

Mrs. Hemple had told Nell one wasn’t meant to allude to invitations in public, lest one’s companions realize they’d been omitted from the guest list. But the blonde did not seem to realize her faux pas. “You can’t
miss the performance,” she said. “I believe his
piano
is another man’s
pianissimo
.”

The Hungarian bloke had taken somebody else’s … piano? Was a
pianissimo
a fancy brand of piano? Nell glanced uncertainly to Simon, who was nodding. “Certainly he has an unrivaled grasp of the counterpoint,” he said.

Counterpoint. Now there was a word that
sounded
plain enough, but Nell couldn’t imagine the meaning.

The viscountess, however, seemed clear on it. “Oh, yes,” she enthused. “He makes me look with new wonder on the connection between musician and instrument. Why …” Her voice lowered. “I’ve never encountered a softer, more skillful touch.”

Touch
. In the viscountess’s purring voice, the word seemed suggestive. Nell looked sharply toward Simon and saw that he was not smiling. For the first time all night, he made no effort to appear entertained. “Is that so?” he asked.

“Well, I’ve experienced it only once, of course,” the viscountess replied. With a cold start, Nell realized that she was inching closer to Simon. “But I’ve never managed to forget it.” Her ice-blue gaze trailed down Simon’s body to the vicinity of his … hands. “Ever since, I’ve been longing to have him perform again.”

Comprehension iced through Nell’s stomach. This conversation might have been in Chinese and she still would have sensed the undercurrent here. “I suppose it might be more complicated than you expect,” she said flatly. She could send her own message; she understood the idea of a
performance
, at least. “For you to arrange another show, I mean.”

Simon’s arm tensed beneath her hand.
Yes
, she thought blackly,
I’m not an idiot
.

The viscountess flicked her a dismissive glance. “Does Lady Rushden take a real interest in the arts, then?”

“She has a remarkable instinct for them,” Simon said, his voice unreadable. “I should trust her opinion on any question touching on such matters.”

For a second, faced with this bloodless exchange, Nell doubted her own suspicions. But then the viscountess lifted her brows, and her thin lips took on a superior, sneering curve as she said directly to Nell, “How lovely! Of course, when it comes to the arts, one must wish for a variety of diverse opinions, the better to invigorate the debate. Don’t you think?”

The sneer in her voice dispelled all doubt. In Nell, this woman saw a rival.

Nell took a hard breath. In Bethnal Green, a wife would be lifting her fist about now. A wise husband would be retreating. Nobody would tolerate this odd, elliptical sparring. “I expect the right opinion is the only one you need,” she said.

“If you’ll excuse us,” Simon said, but Nell resisted the pressure he was exerting on her arm, for the viscountess was opening her mouth to speak and you didn’t turn your back on a snake.

“I must solicit your opinion, then,” the viscountess said to her. “The last time I spoke with Lord Rushden, we had a very passionate discussion of Andreasson’s tone-color effects.
I
feel that Bach’s fugues tolerate it very well, but perhaps you do not.” Her tone was pleasant, but her eyes nailed into Nell’s, steady and hard, as though she saw straight to the truth and knew Nell had not an inkling of such matters. “Such a hot debate under way! May I know where you stand?”