Simply Magic

Lauren and Kit. After all, she explained with a laugh while the duke looked on with a supercilious air and incongruously fond silver eyes resting upon his lady, it would be a tragic thing indeed if the presence of the ballroom aroused in anyone a desire to dance but there was no music to make dancing possible.

“What you mean, Christine,” Bewcastle said, his long fingers curling about the handle of his quizzing glass and raising it halfway to his eye, “is that you are quite determined to dance if only Sydnam and Mrs. Butler can be persuaded to lead the way.”

“You know me all too well, Wulfric,” the duchess said with a laugh.

Peter was looking forward to the social gathering with uncharacteristic unease. He probably ought not to have come. If he suddenly, after several months of inaction, felt it necessary to check on Susanna’s health-marvelous euphemism-then he ought to have done it by writing to her or calling at the school. He ought at the very least to have somehow let her know that he was going to be here today. He was almost certain that she was. Lauren had told him that four teachers were coming from the school as well as the former teacher who was now married to the Earl of Edgecombe.

And yet it struck Peter even as he entertained these troubled thoughts that the chance to meet Susanna again this afternoon ought to have been a cause of pleasure to both of them. They really had been friends-until the very end. How he kicked himself now for not having stayed in the drawing room with her that last afternoon-or for not taking Edgecombe up on his suggestion that he and the countess accompany them on their walk. Then they would have been meeting today with shared pleasure as friends who had not expected to see each other again so soon.

Other guests began to arrive. Peter was introduced to Mrs. Butler’s parents and siblings and their spouses from Gloucestershire and to Lord and Lady Aidan Bedwyn, whom he had not met before. He hailed Lord and Lady Alleyne Bedwyn and a number of Kit and Sydnam’s cousins, whom he had met on various occasions at Alvesley.

Normally he would have been in his element.

But his uneasiness was growing by the minute, and he found himself glancing at the door every few seconds instead of concentrating upon making himself agreeable to those with whom he conversed. A dozen or more times he thought about making his escape before it was too late, but escape might well be impossible, he realized as time went on. Even if he dashed out now, he had a long hall to traverse and a largish courtyard outside to cross before he could hope to slink out of sight of someone who would surely be arriving at any moment.

He wandered in the direction of the ballroom and forgot his woes for a while after Andrew and Sophia, two of Lauren’s children, grabbed a hand each, dragged him triumphantly inside the large room, and demanded that he play with them. A whole host of other children gathered hopefully about him, and he proceeded to play Blind Man’s Buff with them with a great deal of noise and energy and good humor.

It was only when he heard a loud burst of applause and even cheering coming from the tearoom that he realized the guests of honor must have arrived and that therefore all the other guests must now be gathered there too.

Even then he was tempted to slip out and hope no one would notice his absence.

But he would not add arrant cowardice to his other shortcomings, which were legion. He extricated himself from the children’s game and went to stand in the shadowed half of the doorway into the tearoom so that he could peer cautiously about him.

Like a thief in the night, he thought with some disgust.

Sydnam Butler and a lady dressed in rose pink, who was presumably his bride, stood in a pool of red rose petals inside the door at the far side of the room, looking startled and bewildered. The Duchess of Bewcastle was clapping her hands for silence.

“Well, Mr. and Mrs. Butler,” she said, her voice warm and cheerful, “you may have thought yourselves very clever indeed when you married in great secrecy a few weeks ago. But your relatives and friends have caught up with you after all. Welcome to your wedding breakfast.”

The children, without the distraction of an adult to play with them in the ballroom, had left it and were streaming past Peter to see what all the fuss was about. They were soon adding to the cheerful mayhem that ensued for a few minutes while everyone attempted to get close to the bride and groom and pump the hand of the one and kiss the cheek of the other.

But Peter, still and silent in the doorway, took no part in the collective merriment.

He had seen her.

She was dressed neatly in pale blue, her short curls vibrantly auburn in contrast. She was bending down to hug a little boy who, he guessed, must be Mrs. Butler’s son, and then she was reaching for Mrs. Butler herself and holding her in a close embrace for several seconds. She was laughing and tearful and bright-eyed and dazzling.

For several moments he simply gazed at her, his reluctance to see her again vanished without a trace. By Jove, he had missed her. He drank in the sight of her, more lovely and more vibrant than any other lady he had ever met.

She stepped aside so that the ladies with her-the Countess of Edgecombe and a brown-haired, severe-looking though not unhandsome woman who was probably Miss Martin-could take their turns greeting the bride. Susanna was waiting to pay her respects to Butler and was looking around at the other guests as she did so with bright, happy eyes.

And then those same eyes met his across the room-and her smile froze and then died altogether.

Peter was instantly conscious of himself again-and of the dashed uncomfortable fact that he had ruined her, made her a dishonorable offer, and left her without a backward glance, all within the space of one afternoon. And that now he was reappearing in her life without any warning and at just the time when she was celebrating the marriage of her friend.

He really ought not to have come, he thought again.

But dash it all, it was too late now to go away.

He strode purposefully across the room, intending to speak with her. But Lauren, flushed and animated, caught his arm as he approached, linking her own through it, led him up to the newlyweds, and proceeded to introduce him to Mrs. Butler, who was, he discovered, very lovely indeed. He bowed over her hand and raised it to his lips. He shook Sydnam’s left hand with his left and wished him well. Then he shook the boy’s hand-he was David Jewell-and winked and grinned at him.

“If you want to make your escape anytime soon,” he said, “you will doubtless find hordes of other young people in the ballroom-once they have found their way back there.”

The boy smiled back.

“Do come and sit at our table, Peter,” Lauren said as order began to replace the cheerful chaos of the past several minutes and the children made their way back to the ballroom rather than be caught up in the tedium of an adult tea party.

“I will, thank you, Lauren,” he said, “but there is someone to whom I must pay my respects first.”

Before he could delay too long and set up a greater awkwardness than he already felt, he strode over to the table where Susanna sat with Edgecombe and the countess, Lord and Lady Aidan Bedwyn, the unknown severe-looking lady, and the duchess’s sister, Miss Thompson.

“Whitleaf,” Edgecombe said, standing to shake hands with him. “Good to see you again.”

“But of course,” the countess said, smiling at him, “you are related to Lady Ravensberg, are you not? It is a pleasure to see you again, Lord Whitleaf.”

And yet there was a hint of something in her tone that suggested she was not entirely pleased. Or perhaps his conscience was just playing tricks on him.

He bowed to her and to Miss Thompson, who must have arrived with her mother