A Secret Affair

“Oh, yes,” she said with bright enthusiasm. “You are right. Oh, just look at all the flowers. And all the candles in the chandeliers. There must be dozens of them. And so many guests. I shall be dreaming of this when I leave here.”

He guessed that she was not the sort of lady who gushed with enthusiasm a great deal. Something had flustered her. His questions, probably, especially the last. And the answers she had given—and almost given. Did she realize now, he wondered, that he had been deliberately probing for information?

That had not been well done of him.

But who was Lady Young? He had never heard of either Markle or Sir Colin Young. The man might be a baronet, but he had never mingled in London society to Constantine’s knowledge.

They danced an elegant country dance with intricate, almost stately figures. She was a good dancer.

The duchess must have grown up in Markle too. Was that where she had met Dunbarton at a wedding? Whose wedding? Young’s?

He had already made Miss Leavensworth uncomfortable. He had already chastised himself for prying. There was no excuse, then, for continuing to do so. But he did.

“Sir Colin Young,” he said when the figures brought them together for perhaps a whole minute. “Was he not somehow connected with the Duke of Dunbarton?”

“A very distant cousin, I believe,” she said.

Fourteenth or so in line to the dukedom, if Constantine was not very much mistaken.

There was no casual way of asking for the duchess’s maiden name. But her family must be lower on the social scale than Young, or Miss Leavensworth would have named them as the most prominent family. Unless the duchess was a sister or daughter of Young, that was. It was a distinct possibility. Either way she had done extremely well for herself in snaring a duke for a husband even if he was an old man. Or perhaps especially because he was an old man. Marrying him had been a brilliant way of gaining instant status and wealth and the prospect of freedom not far distant.

It was the conventional way of seeing the Duchess of Dunbarton, of course.

But …

But she had converted the large bulk of the jewels Dunbarton had given her into cash, which she had given to “causes” in which she was interested. She kept the other jewels because of their sentimental value.

If she was to be believed, that was. But he believed her.

Was the duchess a bit of a mystery after all?

And why was he doing this? Of what possible interest could it be to him to discover just who she was? Or who she had been? He had never felt this compulsion with any of his other mistresses.

And then another thought struck him. Would he like her probing into the secret places of his life?

He must ask no more questions.

They had worked their way to the head of the lines, and it was their turn to twirl down between them to land at the foot and begin the upward climb all over again. Miss Leavensworth laughed as they twirled, and Constantine smiled at her.

He could not stop his thoughts, though.

They had been friends since childhood, she and the duchess. It had not struck him as strange until now. Miss Leavensworth was a woman of modest birth and aspirations, daughter of a retired vicar and betrothed of a working one. Yet the duchess had remained close to her in the eleven years or so since her marriage had elevated her in status far above the vicar’s daughter.

One more question.

“Do you and the Duchess of Dunbarton write to each other when you are not visiting her?” he asked when there was a chance for some verbal exchange again.

“Oh, at least once a week,” she said. “Sometimes more often if there is something more than usually interesting to report upon. We are inveterate letter writers, Hannah and I.”

“She never comes to visit you?” he asked.

“No,” she said.

No explanation.

“Though I am trying to persuade her to come for my wedding in August,” she said a few moments later. “It would mean so much to me to have my dearest friend there. She says no, but I have not given up hope yet.”

So she would not go back to Markle even for Miss Leavensworth’s wedding? The Duchess of Dunbarton he had thought he knew—the one the ton thought it knew—would surely have loved nothing better than to return home with a large entourage of servants to flaunt her title and wealth before the rural yokels among whom she had grown up.

Was it true that she had no family?

“She has no family with whom to stay?” he asked.

“She could stay with my parents,” she said. “They would be delighted to have her.”

Which could mean yes or no. But he must leave this. He felt vaguely guilty. Perhaps even a little more than vaguely. He was prying.

“Have you visited the Tower of London yet?” he asked.

“I have not,” she said. “But I am very much hoping to do so before I return home.”

“Perhaps,” he said, “you and the duchess will allow me to escort you there one afternoon.”

“Oh,” she said, “that is very obliging of you, Mr. Huxtable. I am not sure how interested Hannah is, though, in—”

“I shall remind her,” he said, “that she will be able to stand on the very spot on which Queen Anne Boleyn, among others over the years, had her head chopped off. I daresay that will draw her interest.”

She laughed.

“You are quite possibly right,” she said. “It is one spot I will quite studiously avoid, however.”

“I shall make arrangements with the duchess,” he said.

And he concentrated upon the dancing. It was an activity he had always enjoyed. He looked along the line of ladies opposite and could see his cousins—all of them, including Vanessa, and including Averil and Jessica, Elliott’s sisters. Only Cecily was absent, at home in the country awaiting her third confinement. The duchess was there too, looking stunningly beautiful. Next to her was the Countess of Lanting, Monty’s younger sister. And of course there were all the young misses who had recently been launched upon society and the marriage mart, some of them bright and eager, some affecting a fashionable ennui, as though this was something they were so accustomed to doing that it really was a quite colossal bore.

And on his side of the line, all the gentlemen.

The orchestra was lively. Feet thumped rhythmically on the wooden floor, a sound that always set his toes to tapping even if he was standing on the sidelines merely looking on. The air had become heavy with the scent of flowers and perfume and human exertion.

The Kitteridges must be breathing a sigh of relief. Their young daughter was dancing with Viscount Doran, an eligible young gentleman who had doubtless been hand-picked for the occasion, and they might deem their ball a grand success.

Constantine and Miss Leavensworth were approaching the head of the line again.

***

HANNAH DANCED the opening set with Lord Netherby, the second with Lord Hardingraye, a particular friend of hers with whom she could relax and converse at her ease. She was feeling the pleasure of anticipation. She would waltz later with Constantine. She would dance only that once with him, but it would be enough. There was no dance more splendid than the waltz when one was with an attractive partner, and none was more attractive than Constantine Huxtable.

She would waltz with him and then, after the ball was over, he would follow her carriage home, as he had done last evening, and she would go with him to spend the night—or what remained of it.

And this would be the pattern of her days—and her nights—for the rest of the spring. Oh, she wished it would go on forever. For once she was not at all eager for the summer to come. Let it linger. She did not feel