Simply Magic

after he went into the ballroom, and turned his eyes on Susanna.

“Miss Osbourne?” he said. “I trust you are well?”

“Yes, thank you,” she said with perfect composure and a polite smile on her face- as if they had never lain together on a secluded hill above the river at Barclay Court. “And you, my lord?”

“Quite well,” he said, “thank you.”

Good Lord, where was his arsenal of small talk when he most needed it? But perhaps it was as well it had deserted him utterly, or he might have found himself saying something totally asinine like great beauty having to be a prerequisite for a teaching position at Miss Martin’s School for Girls. He had the feeling that present company would not be at all amused by such a compliment.

“My lord,” Susanna said before he could make his escape to his own table, “may I present Miss Martin, owner of the school where I teach? This is Viscount Whitleaf, Claudia. He was staying not far from Barclay Court while I was a guest there.”

The severe-looking stranger whose identity he had guessed earlier inclined her head while he bowed and favored her with his most charming smile.

“Ma’am,” he said. “This is a pleasure I have long desired.”

They were only mildly extravagant words, but looking into her unsmiling gray eyes, he felt suddenly stripped naked. Not in any physical way, it was true, but he felt as if every layer of artifice were being stripped away and she was recognizing him for the shallow fribble that he was. He wondered if Susanna had told her anything about him.

“How do you do, Lord Whitleaf,” she said.

He retreated in reasonably good order after that and sat with his back to their table while he took tea and conversed with all around him and listened to the few speeches and toasts that followed it. He would have enjoyed the afternoon, he knew, if there had not been those few minutes of uncharacteristic gaucherie to bother him. And if he could have convinced himself that he had any business being here.

He knew she was not pleased to see him.

“You may all expect,” Sydnam Butler was saying to the whole gathering after commenting on the surprise of finding so many guests awaiting them here, “that Anne and I will put our heads together over the winter when there is nothing else to do and devise a suitable revenge.”

Peter joined in the general laughter.

And then, soon after the speeches and toasts were at an end, his ears sharpened to something Hallmere was saying at the next table.

“It was just here that we waltzed for the first time, Freyja,” he said. “Do you remember?”

Peter had been wondering how Susanna felt to be in the same room with Lady Hallmere, who had once refused to give her employment as her maid and who had perhaps been responsible for sending her to Bath as a charity pupil in Miss Martin’s school. And he had been wondering if Lady Hallmere remembered her.

But the lady was speaking.

“How could I forget?” she said. “It was while we waltzed that you begged me to enter into a fake betrothal with you, and before we knew it we were in a marriage together-but not a fake one at all.”

They both laughed-as did everyone else at their table and a few at Peter’s.

Kit had certainly heard the exchange.

“It would be a shame,” he said, raising his voice and getting to his feet at the same time, “to have an orchestra and the use of one of the most famous ballrooms in the country and not dance. I shall instruct the orchestra to play a waltz. But we must remember that this is a wedding celebration. The bride must dance first. Will you waltz with me, Anne?”

Sydnam stood up too.

“Thank you, Kit,” he said firmly, “but if it is not the custom for the bridegroom to be first to dance with his bride, then it ought to be. Anne, will you waltz with me?”

It was a courageous offer, Peter thought amid the general buzz of excitement as chairs scraped back and guests got to their feet to remove to the ballroom, from which music had been wafting all during tea. How did one waltz when one was missing a right arm-as well as an eye?

“Yes, I will,” Mrs. Butler said-and it struck Peter at that very moment that theirs was a love match.

He watched them waltz alone together a few minutes later, a little awkwardly at first, then more smoothly and confidently. And then Hallmere led the marchioness onto the floor to join them, and Kit and Lauren, Edgecombe and the countess, Bewcastle and the duchess, followed after them. Other gentlemen were taking their partners.

It was a waltz.

Peter never missed an opportunity to dance it at any of the balls he attended. But he was actually remembering the last time he had waltzed. He had enjoyed it enormously even though it had been at a small, unsophisticated country assembly. It had also been a prelude to all his woes, though-well, to the worst of them anyway. Without that waltz, there would probably have not been that kiss. And without that kiss, there probably would not have been…

Well.

Greeting her at the tea table had simply not been enough, had it? That atoned for absolutely nothing. Having made the decision to come, he must now make the further effort to find out what he had come to learn. And what better time than now?

He strode over to where she stood watching the dancers, between Miss Martin and Miss Thompson, who in his fancy resembled two stern avenging angels, except that Miss Martin had tears in her eyes as she watched the bridal couple dance and Miss Thompson looked amused.

He bowed in front of them and donned his most disarming smile.

“Miss Osbourne,” he said, “would you do me the honor of waltzing with me?”

He was aware of the eyes of the headmistress suddenly turned on him, sharp despite her tears though he looked only at Susanna, whose green eyes were fathomless as she gazed back at him.

He thought she was going to refuse him. Dash it, what an unexpected humiliation that would be-but one he doubtless thoroughly deserved.

“Yes,” she said then and licked her lips. “Yes, thank you, my lord.”

He held out his hand, palm-up, and she placed her own on it.

And he was immediately assaulted by familiar words speaking loudly and distinctly in his head-though one word was different from usual.

Here she is,the voice said.

And it was quite indisputable, was it not? Here she was indeed, her hand on his, about to waltz with him.

Susanna had been trying to convince herself for the past two and a half months that she was not nursing a broken heart.

Now, finally, she had succeeded.

Viscount Whitleaf was in no way worthy of the tears she had shed over him, the painful dreams she had woven about him, the guilty memories of him in which she had sometimes indulged.

He ought not to have come without any warning like this. He must have known that she would be here. What interest could he possibly have in Anne? Or in Anne’s husband either, even if Mr. Butler was Viscountess Ravensberg’s brother-in-law?

When she had looked around the tearoom after hugging Anne, feeling completely happy for once because it had been instantly apparent to her that Mr. Butler did indeed care for Anne and that Anne