Brummell touched his fingers to his chest. “The entire world is commoner than I.”
The prince laughed again and turned to Lucy. “He is a buffoon, but he amuses me. I am sorry if he injured you with his inappropriate tongue. How shall I punish him?”
Lucy looked at Mr. Brummell long and hard, and thought she saw something there very sad, like a piece of crystal—beautiful and exquisite, but so delicate that it must, in time, shatter. “I believe,” she said, “he shall punish himself in due course.”
There was an awkward moment of silence among the three. Then Byron turned to Brummell. “If this lady says such a thing to you, then you are a fool to ignore it.” To Lucy he said, “It is time to dance.”
Before she could object, or perhaps before she could have time to decide if she wished to object, Lucy was upon the dance floor with Byron, lost in a massive swirl of expensive clothes and even more expensive perfumes. One could hardly hear the music, fine though it was, over the low hum of conversation, for every couple spoke in low and meaningful tones, and Lucy wondered who around her was planning an illicit assignation. Everyone? Was she? She could hardly think so, and yet here was Byron, and for all the terrible things he had said and done, she enjoyed his company, enjoyed being near him. And she understood all too well that his beauty was, in itself, a kind of magic.
“You have no idea how I’ve missed you, Lucy,” he said to her in a low whisper, almost a growl. “I’ve thought of you every minute.”
Lucy said nothing. Part of her found him revolting, disgusting, vile. Another part, however, saw him as something far greater.
“You are not still angry with me, I hope? You cannot be jealous of that girl at Newstead, as you had already rejected me.”
Lucy could only shake her head. That he would say such a thing, imagine that somehow she had come to see his way of life as normal as he did, struck her as amazing. However what would have seemed like madness only weeks before—spells and talismans and magical components—was now perfectly normal. Byron’s own dissolute life must seem the same to him. And if it did seem normal to him, no more than the way he lived, then did it make him evil? If he saw no harm in what he did, and no one resented him for his actions, was he a bad man or merely a different kind of man?
“That poor girl loves you, you know,” Lucy said. “It is not a simple diversion to her. It is everything.”
“More women love me than you would suppose, Lucy,” he said utterly without pride. If anything, he sounded weary.
“You need not take advantage of them.”
“How advantage? Are they not human beings, free to make choices as well as I? Poor deaf Sophie, as you would style her, is not a child. Her deafness has not injured her mind. She is a clever young lady who knows what the world is, how it condemns those who spurn its petty rules, and she made her choice with her eyes open. I made mine, and I say you are in no position to judge. Indeed, you insult Sophie by presuming to know her life better than she does.”
Lucy shook her head, half in disbelief and half in amusement. “Lord Byron, you are truly an unusual man. You could argue that up is down, and I fear I would believe you ere long.”
He laughed. “If Lucy Derrick believes I am unusual, then it must be so. Tell me, what are you doing in London with those awful people? It is one thing to associate with your uncle, which you cannot help, but Gilley is the worst sort of climber, and his daughter looks like a wily slut.”
“I shall, for the moment, refrain from responding to your insults upon my friends. I am here because it is the only way I could get to London, and so have freedom. Or so I thought. I must get to Kent.”
“To find whatever book you and Morrison wished to pilfer from my library?”
“What is between you two, if I may ask? Why do you hate him?”
“I hate no man,” said Byron, “but I think him an insufferable prig, and he never hesitates to find fault with how I live.”
“But that is enough for you to dislike him so?”
“To dislike a man such as he is its own pleasure. But now it is my turn for a question. Why were you with him? Why did you break open my house in search of a book in my library? It obviously matters to you as well as to him.”
Lucy wanted to trust him. He was so astonishingly beautiful and, in his own strange way, completely forthright. What offended her most about him was his very truthfulness, and, when looked at from a certain perspective, that could not be offensive at all. “Lord Byron, I can only tell you that it is important to me, but to say more would strain your credulity and cause me to suffer in the relating. I will also say that Mr. Morrison is no friend of mine. I may have deceived him as to my feelings, but it is no more than he deserves.”
Byron smiled at this revelation. “I had not thought I could like you better, but I now do. Deceiving Morrison for your own ends indeed. How can I serve you?”
Lucy took a deep breath. “I must get to Lady Harriett’s estate, and I do not know how to go about it. I have no one to ask. Except—except you. Can I impose on you to inquire how I would find a coach to take the shortest, fastest route to Kent?”
The dance was now over, and Byron led her away from the dance floor toward the periphery, perhaps choosing the spot in the room farthest from Mr. Gilley and his daughter, who were, even now, straining their necks in search of Lucy. Lucy and Byron stood near the wall thick with paintings, and he smiled down upon her.
“I shall do better,” he said. “I shall take you to Kent myself.”
Lucy felt, all at once, terror and excitement. To go off alone with Byron! Why, it was scandalous, but perhaps no less scandalous than taking a coach by herself to Kent.
“You are truly kind,” said Lucy. “I know not if I should accept your generous offer.”
“Oh, your virginity is safe with me, Lucy. I will not again declare my feelings, and you need not worry that I will attempt to persuade you into circumstances that are not to your liking. You have seen for yourself that I need not resort to cruel measures to find solace in this world.”
Lucy blushed so deeply she feared she might swoon. No man had ever spoken thus to her, and yet there was something reassuring in it. With Byron there was no dance of pretense and posture and performance. He said what he meant and expressed how he felt. Perhaps that made him the safest companion she could find.
“You can tell no one what you do. I may be fool enough to trust you, but no one would believe such a voyage to be an innocent thing. I cannot sacrifice my reputation.”
“Of course, I will tell no one. You will have to manage to explain your absence to your hosts. That is your concern. I can only take you where you wish to go, and do it with all the discretion you desire.”
“Then I shall gratefully accept your generous offer,” said Lucy, already thinking about how she would conceal this visit from Norah and her family, and thinking that the time would come, very soon, when she would be alone with Byron, with no one to supervise or interfere or object. This notion thrilled her as much as it terrified her.
It was at that moment that Norah arrived, with her parents in tow. They looked slightly winded, and Mrs. Gilley straightened her gown, as though the effort of finding Lucy had tired her. Nevertheless, now that they had found her, they chose to act as though all was well.
“Ah, Miss Derrick,” said Mr. Gilley. “Here you are at last. I did not know you would walk off so readily with a stranger.” The moment he stopped speaking, his face drew into a tight line, and he gazed upon Byron through narrowed eyes.
Byron bowed at Mr. Gilley. “Hardly strangers, sir,” said Byron. “Miss Derrick is my near neighbor in Nottingham, much as you are, and as you and I are acquainted, it is odd that you should think I do not know this lady’s family.”
“I see,” said Mr. Gilley. “I was unaware there was a connection. In any event, Miss Derrick, you alarmed us by disappearing as you did without a word.”
Lucy curtsied. “It is merely that the room was so crowded, and we were separated by the crush of people.” Feeling herself blush once more, Lucy turned away. She had vanished for a few minutes in a crowded gathering, and already they implied she had behaved inappropriately. What would they suggest when she vanished, for days perhaps, with Byron? The trick, of course, would be arranging things so that no one would find out.
