Eventually, routed, Mr. Willoughby rose, ostensibly to return Miss Spence to her parent. Watching his retreat with laughing eyes, Caroline returned her gaze to her guardian, only to see him look pointedly at the door from the ballroom. She glanced across and saw Arabella enter, slightly flushed and with a too-bright smile on
her lips. She made straight for the table where Sarah was sitting with a number of others and, with her usual facility, merged with the group, laughing up at the young man who leapt to his feet to offer her his chair.
Caroline turned to Max, a slight frown in her eyes, to find his attention had returned to the door. She followed his gaze and saw Lord Denbigh enter.
To any casual observer, Hugh was merely coming late to the supper-room, his languid gaze and sleepy smile giving no hint of any more pressing emotion than to discover whether there were any lobster patties left. Max Rotherbridge, however, was a far from casual observer. As he saw the expression in his lordship’s heavy-lidded eyes as they flicked across the room to where Arabella sat, teasing her company unmercifully, His Grace of Twyford’s black brows rose in genuine astonishment. Oh, God! Another one?
———
Resigned to yet another evening spent with no progress in the matter of his eldest ward, Max calmly escorted her back to the ballroom and, releasing her to the attentions of her admirers, not without a particularly penetrating stare at two gentlemen of dubious standing who had had the temerity to attempt to join her circle, he prepared to quit the ballroom. He had hoped to have persuaded Miss Twinning to view the moonlight from the terrace. There was a useful bench he knew of, under a concealing willow, which would have come in handy. However, he had no illusions concerning his ability to make love to a woman who was on tenterhooks over the happiness of not one but two sisters. So he headed for the card-room.
On his way, he passed Arabella, holding court once again in something close to her usual style. His bluegaze searched her face. As if sensing his regard, she turned and saw him. For a moment, she looked lost. He smiled encouragingly. After a fractional pause, she flashed her brilliant smile back and, putting up her chin, turned back to her companions, laughing at some comment.
Max moved on. Clearly, Caroline did have another problem on her hands. He paused at the entrance to the card-room and, automatically, scanned the packed ballroom. Turning, he was about to cross the threshold when a disturbing thought struck him. He turned back to the ballroom.
“Make up your mind! Make up your mind! Oh, it’s you, Twyford. What are you doing at such an occasion? Hardly your style these days, what?”
Excusing himself to Colonel Weatherspoon, Max moved out of the doorway and checked the room again. Where was Lizzie? He had not seen her at supper, but then again he had not looked. He had mentally dubbed her the baby of the family but his rational mind informed him that she was far from too young. He was about to cross the room to where his aunt Augusta sat, resplendent in bronze bombazine, when a movement by the windows drew his eyes.
Lizzie entered from the terrace, a shy and entirely guileless smile on her lips. Her small hand rested with easy assurance on his brother’s arm. As he watched, she turned and smiled up at Martin, a look so full of trust that a newborn lamb could not have bettered it. And Martin, wolf that he was, returned the smile readily.
Abruptly, Max turned on his heel and strode into the card-room. He needed a drink.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Arabella swatted at the bumble-bee blundering noisily by her head. She was lying on her stomach on the stone surround of the pond in the courtyard of Twyford House, idly trailing her fingers in the cool green water. Her delicate mull muslin, petal-pink in hue, clung revealingly to her curvaceous form while a straw hat protected her delicate complexion from the afternoon sun. Most other young ladies in a similar pose would have looked childish. Arabella, with her strangely wistful air, contrived to look mysteriously enchanting.
Her sisters were similarly at their ease. Sarah was propped by the base of the sundial, her bergere hat shading her face as she threaded daisies into a chain. The dark green cambric gown she wore emphasized her arrestingly pale face, dominated by huge brown eyes, darkened now by the hint of misery. Lizzie sat beside the rockery, poking at a piece of embroidery with a noticeable lack of enthusiasm. Her sprigged mauve muslin proclaimed her youth yet its effect was ameliorated by her far from youthful figure.
Caroline watched her sisters from her perch in a cushioned hammock strung between two cherry trees. If her guardian could have seen her, he would undoubtedly have approved of the simple round gownof particularly fine amber muslin she had donned for the warm day. The fabric clung tantalizingly to her mature figure while the neckline revealed an expanse of soft ivory breasts.
The sisters had gradually drifted here, one by one, drawn by the warm spring afternoon and the heady scents rising from the rioting flowers which crammed the beds and overflowed on to the stone flags. The period between luncheon and the obligatory appearance in the Park was a quiet time they were coming increasingly to appreciate as the Season wore on. Whenever possible, they tended to spend it together, a last vestige, Caroline thought, of the days when they had only had each other for company.
Sarah sighed. She laid aside her hat and looped the completed daisy chain around her neck. Cramming her headgear back over her dark curls, she said, “Well, what are we going to do?”
Three pairs of eyes turned her way. When no answer was forthcoming, she continued, explaining her case with all reasonableness, “Well, we can’t go on as we are, can we? None of us is getting anywhere.”
Arabella turned on her side better to view her sisters. “But what can we do? In your case, Lord Darcy’s not even in London.”
“True,” returned the practical Sarah. “But it’s just occurred to me that he must have friends still in London. Ones who would write to him, I mean. Other than our guardian.”
Caroline grinned. “Whatever you do, my love, kindly explain all to me before you set the ton ablaze. I don’t think I could stomach our guardian demanding an explanation and not having one to give him.”
Sarah chuckled. “Has he been difficult?”
But Caroline would only smile, a secret smile of which both Sarah and Arabella took due note.
“He hasn’t said anything about me, has he?” came Lizzie’s slightly breathless voice. Under her sisters’ gaze, she blushed. “About me and Martin,” she mumbled, suddenly becoming engrossed in her petit point.
Arabella laughed. “Artful puss. As things stand, you’re the only one with all sails hoisted and a clear wind blowing. The rest of us are becalmed, for one reason or another.”
Caroline’s brow had furrowed. “Why do you ask? Has Max given you any reason to suppose he disapproves?”
“Well,” temporized Lizzie, “he doesn’t seem entirely… happy, about us seeing so much of each other.”
Her attachment to Martin Rotherbridge had progressed in leaps and bounds. Despite Max’s warning and his own innate sense of danger, Martin had not been able to resist the temptation posed by Lizzie Twinning. From that first undeniably innocent kiss he had, by subtle degrees, led her to the point where,… finding herself in his arms in the gazebo in Lady Malling’s garden, she had permitted him to kiss her again. Only this time, it had been Martin leading the way. Lizzie, all innocence, had been thoroughly enthralled by the experience and stunned by her own response to the delightful sensations it had engendered. Unbeknownst to her, Martin Rotherbridge had been stunned, too.
Belatedly, he had tried to dampen his own increasing desires, only to find, as his brother could have told him, that that was easier imagined than accomplished. Abstinence had only led to intemperance. In the end, he had capitulated and returned to spend every moment possible at Lizzie’s side, if not her feet.