“Thank you for the dance, Miss Skeffington.” Mr Gouldsmith smiled as he guided her to the edge of the dancefloor and bowed respectfully, making his farewells. Alice was just beginning to think that she might be able to slip away to rest her feet or maybe even go to bed when she felt someone stepping up beside her.
Gritting her teeth to prepare for whichever gentleman wanted to talk to her now, she closed her eyes for a second and sucked in a deep breath, surprised when she looked around to find her mother smiling at her.
Oh no!Alice thought with alarm as she saw the pleased and expectant expression on her mother’s face. Save for her wrinkles and the older wisdom in her eyes, Alice felt as though she were looking into the mirror. That was until her mother began to speak and she realised that they could not have been more different in their opinions.
“Mr Gouldsmith seems quite charmed,” her mother announced, glancing out across the dancefloor as though surveying the mood of the room, keeping an eye out for any other gentleman who might wish to dance with her daughter.
Though Alice would have rather turned and run than have this conversation with her mother, she was well aware that her mother would only follow her. After all, even in a large manor such as Kendall Hall, there were only so many places that she could hide before she would be forced to stand and listen. “What do you think to him?”
Why him?Alice wondered, trying to tell herself that it was merely because he was the last gentleman she had danced with. Yet there was something instinctual in her gut that told her it was more than that. The glint in her mother’s gaze when she mentioned him told Alice that there was something far more to her mother’s reasoning for asking.
“Mr Gouldsmith is a gentleman like any other.” Alice shrugged her shoulders discreetly, glancing around in the hopes that nobody else would be nearby listening. She could almost imagine Nancy hiding just around the corner, waiting to interject if she believed that her conversation with her mother was not going as planned.
“Then am I wrong to hope?” her mother asked, and Alice felt her heart skip a beat. Bile rose in the back of her throat, and she was forced to remember once more why her closest friend had orchestrated this entire week. Many young ladies would have been honoured and thrilled to have an entire week dedicated to finding her a husband.
Many would be thrilled at all the attention she was receiving, and yet Alice could think of nothing worse. She would have liked to melt into the wall and disappear, hiding until the week was over and she could go back to the rest of her life.
“Wrong to hope for what, Mother?” Alice asked only trying to avoid the inevitable.
“Mr Gouldsmith is a fine gentleman,” her mother insisted, smiling at Alice, and looking at her out of the corner of her eye as if she were discreetly trying to judge her daughter’s reaction to her comment. “Your father and I have had an eye on him for quite some time now.”
“Mother,” Alice groaned, knowing all too well where the conversation was headed. They were becoming more and more frequent, her mother trying to push her wishes onto her as if she hoped that if she talked about it enough Alice would simply give in and accept her fate. “I am quite content as I am.”
“But could you not be content with a man such as Mr Gouldsmith?” her mother questioned, offering a brilliant smile to Baron Colton who passed by with a nod of his head in their direction. Alice could not help but feel as though some of the gentlemen were milling around like vultures, merely waiting for her to cower to her mother’s request and finally fall at their feet to beg her to marry her.
When will they realise that this is my life?Alice asked herself, meeting Nancy’s gaze across the dancefloor. There was an expectant expression on her face, a hopeful glint in her eye, and Alice knew very well that her friend knew exactly what she and her mother were talking about.
She imagined that Lady Skeffington and Lady Kendall had been conspiring the entire time that she had been stuck dancing with this gentleman or that nobleman. It was more than a little infuriating, especially when they did so little to try and hide the fact when they knew how she felt about it.
“Mother, I am quite tired,” Alice said with a sigh, feigning a yawn that turned into a real one, “I do believe I ought to go to bed or I will be dreadfully tired in the morning.”
“Alice…” her mother began, as if she were going to scold her for trying to change the subject, but Alice did not offer her mother the chance. She merely curtseyed in her mother’s direction and then began to head toward the ballroom doors and the safety of the hallway beyond, hoping that nobody would try to prevent her from making her way to bed.
After all the dancing and with how sore her feet had become, she was in no mood to be hindered and she was not entirely sure she would not be able to stop herself from snapping at whoever tried to get in her way. Luckily for her and for them, the only person who did get in her way was the butler, asking if she were well and if she required anything.
All too relieved to find her way to the staircase without incident, Alice yawned loudly as she headed up to bed, the sounds of the ballroom fading into the distance along with any thoughts she had on all the dances she had been forced into that evening.