Rumours in the Regency Ballroom. Diane Gaston

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      But Lydia needed to go to the shops. Had she not, they would have had no money at all. She’d taken several pieces of her jewellery to Mr Gray on Sackville Street and he had given her a fair price.

      “Do not fret, Mary,” Lydia responded. “I would have twisted my ankle had you been there or not.” That odious newspaperman would not have allowed a mere maid to deter his pursuit, but events would have transpired very differently if Mary had been there when Adrian had come to the rescue.

      She must not think of him.

      “You deserved a visit to your mother.” Lydia’s voice came out louder than she intended. “Is she well?”

      “Indeed, very well, my lady, thank you for asking.” The girl curtsied. “My brothers and sisters are growing so big. Mum expects them to go into service soon. She is making inquiries.”

      “I wish I could help them.” Once Lydia might have given Mary’s siblings a recommendation, but now a connection to the scandalous Lady Wexin was best hidden.

      “They’ll find work, never you fear,” said Mary, plumping the pillows.

      Would Mary be able to smell Adrian upon the linens? Lydia could. She felt her cheeks burn again and turned her face away, pretending to adjust the coverlet.

      “Lord knows how you got yourself home and up the stairs,” Mary went on. She peered in the direction of Lydia’s foot, even though it was under the covers. “You even wrapped your ankle.” She looked pensive. “And managed to undress yourself.”

      “I wanted to get in bed.” Lydia’s cheeks flamed. How true those words were!

      She glanced quickly at Mary, but the girl did not seem to notice any change in her complexion. Lydia would be mortified if even her loyal Mary discovered her great moral lapse.

      Mary straightened the bedcovers again and stepped back. “Is there anything else I can do for you, my lady?”

      Dixon, her butler, and Cook would be waiting for Mary below stairs where they would share their meal in the kitchen, the other warm room in the house. “You took the purse to Dixon, did you not? Was there enough to pay the household accounts?”

      “I gave him the purse, my lady, but I do not know about the household accounts. Shall I ask Mr Dixon to come up to speak to you?”

      Lydia shook her head. “I would not trouble him now. Tomorrow will do.” Let her servants enjoy an evening of idleness. Goodness knows the three of them had toiled hard to keep the house in order and to take care of her, doing the work of eight. Lydia missed the footmen, housemaids and kitchen maid she’d had to dismiss. The house was so quiet without them.

      Mary curtsied again. “I’ll come back for the tray and to ready you for bed.”

      Lydia gazed at the girl, so young and pretty and eager to please. Mary would be valued in any household, yet she’d chosen to remain with Lydia. Tears filled her eyes. She did not know if she could ever pay her, let alone repay her. “Thank you, Mary.”

      Mary curtsied again and left the room.

      Adrian’s father lingered after Heronvale and Levenhorne took their leave, both hurrying home to dinner with their wives. “What diversion awaits you this evening, son?”

      Adrian tilted his chin. “None, unless I accepted an invitation I no longer recall.”

      His father looked at him queryingly. “No visits to a gaming hell? Or, better yet, no lusty opera dancer awaiting you after her performance? A young buck like you must have something exciting planned.”

      Adrian finished his second glass of port. “Not a thing.”

      “You are welcome to dinner, then. Your mother and I dine alone this evening. I am certain she would be pleased to see you.” His father stood. “Come.”

      Why not? thought Adrian. A glance around the room revealed no better company with whom to pass the time, and he had a particular dislike of being alone this night.

      As they strolled through the streets of Mayfair where all the fashionable people lived, Adrian was mindful that he’d walked nearly this same route before. The Varcourt house, part of his father’s new inheritance, was on Berkeley Square, only a few roads away from Lydia’s townhouse on Hill Street.

      And the garden gate he’d carried her through on John Street.

      “You are quiet today,” his father remarked.

      Adrian glanced over at him, realising he had not uttered a word since they’d left White’s. “Forgive me, Father. I suppose I was woolgathering.”

      His father’s brow wrinkled. “It is not like you at all. Are you ill? Or have you got yourself in some scrape or another?”

      “Neither.” Adrian smiled. “Not likely I’d tell you if I were in a scrape, though.”

      His father laughed. “You have the right of it. Never knew you not to get yourself out of whatever bumble-broth you’d landed in.”

      It was perhaps more accurate to say Tanner always managed the disentanglement, but Adrian’s father probably knew that very well.

      “What is it, then, my son?” his father persisted.

      Adrian certainly did not intend to tell his father about his encounter with Lady Wexin. Likely his father would see it as a conquest about which he could brag to his friends. Adrian was not in the habit of worrying over the secrecy of his affairs, but Lady Wexin’s name had been bandied about so unfairly, he had no wish to add to the gossip about her.

      Adrian did wish he could explain to his father the discontent he’d been feeling lately. His father would in all likelihood pooh-pooh it as nonsense, however.

      His father seemed to believe there could be no better life than the one Adrian led, spending his days and nights gambling, womanising and sporting. Adrian had lately wished for more than horse races or card games or opera dancers, however. He was tired of having no occupation, no purpose, of feeling it would take his father’s death to bring some utility to his existence.

      Adrian’s discontent had begun about a year ago when he’d accompanied Tanner on a tour of his friend’s estates. He’d marvelled at Tanner’s knowledge of his properties and the people who saw to the running of them. Adrian had learned a great deal about farming, raising livestock, and managing a country estate during that trip, more than his father had ever taught him. Adrian’s restlessness had increased recently after learning of Tanner’s sudden marriage. He did not begrudge his friend’s newfound domestic happiness; surprisingly enough, he envied it.

      His father came to an abrupt halt. “Good God, this is not about some woman, is it? Do not tell me. I’ll wager it is Lady Denson. The word is she is quite enamoured of you, as well any woman would be.”

      An image of Lydia flew into Adrian’s mind, not Viola Denson, who had indeed engaged in a flirtation with Adrian, but one in which he could not sustain an interest.

      “Not Lady Denson,” he replied. “Nor any woman, if you must know.”

      And it seemed his father always wanted to СКАЧАТЬ