Heartless

by Mary Balogh

  And yet it was not of herself that she thought in the last few minutes before the carriage arrived, and it was not her own appearance or expectations that had brought a flush to her cheeks and a sparkle to her eyes. She was watching Agnes as her sister came into the salon where Anna waited with Lady Sterne, and was filled with wonder that this could be the same girl who had been a child but yesterday—or so it seemed.

  “Agnes,” she said, her hands clasped to her bosom. “Oh, Agnes, you look . . . beautiful.” How could she fail to attract suitors? Surely there would be enough of them even after just tonight that Agnes would have a choice.

  “Yes,” Lady Sterne agreed. “I vow you will do, child. And we were quite right to choose that particular shade of blue with your fair coloring.”

  But Agnes, modest as she always was about her own appearance, had eyes for no one but her sister. “Anna,” she said, stretching out her hands and taking her sister’s. “You have always been lovely—oh, more lovely than anyone else I know. But now you look—ah, I cannot find the words. Does she not, Aunt Marjorie?”

  “Faith, child,” Lady Sterne said, “I believe I should carry a stout stick with me to the ball in order to beat back all the young gentlemen who will crowd about the two of you. But I hear someone at the door. It will be Theodore with the carriage. Perhaps he has brought his cane. He will certainly be wearing his sword. I vow he will need it.”

  Both sisters laughed and each eyed the other admiringly. And both felt suddenly breathless. It was true that they were the daughters of the late Earl of Royce and as such had entertained and been entertained by persons of quality and had danced at local balls and assemblies. But London seemed like a different world to them. Even after Lord Quinn had bowed over the hand of each and declared that he had not seen two such lovely gels in a month of Sundays—whatever that meant—and had ushered them into his carriage with Lady Sterne; even after he vowed that he would be challenged to a dozen duels before the night was out for greedily surrounding himself with the three most fascinating ladies at the ball—even after that there was still uncertainty. What if their manners were just too rustic for town tastes? What if their conversation was too dull? What if the dance steps with which they were familiar were different from the way the same dances were performed in town?

  And what if no one wanted to dance with Agnes?

  It seemed impossible to Anna, looking at her sister, to imagine that such a thing could possibly happen, especially when she was sure that Lady Sterne would see to it that she had partners, but even so it was an anxious time. Her stomach felt somewhat queasy as the carriage slowed and a glance out the window revealed a large mansion with all its windows ablaze with light. Its front doors were thrown back so that light spilled forth and splendidly clad ladies and gentlemen could be seen in the hall. A carpet had been laid down over the steps and across the pavement so that those alighting from carriages would not have to set their feet on hard ground.

  Agnes’s eyes were rather like saucers.

  “Egad,” Lord Quinn said as he handed down the ladies from his carriage, “but ’tis many a long day since I was like to be so much the focus of attention and envy. ’Tis to be wished that I had three arms, but I have been blessed with no more than two. Will you walk unescorted, Marj?”

  Anna had met Lord Quinn the day before and had been introduced to him as an old friend of her godmother’s. She liked him. He was of average height and inclined to stoutness. He was pleasant-looking and had kindly eyes. He must be about the same age as—as him, but very different in every other way. And he had a way of setting one at one’s ease. At the moment, as she took one of his arms and Agnes took the other, she could think of no one with whom she would rather make her entrance to her first London ball.

  “Nervous, my dear?” he was asking Agnes.

  “A little, my lord,” Agnes admitted.

  “Some young man will dance the first minuet with you,” he said, “and after five minutes, if you remember at all that you were nervous, you will wonder at yourself and settle to enjoying the rest of the evening. And you, my dear?” He turned to Anna.

  “No, my lord,” she lied. “I have come to observe and to enjoy the sights and sounds of a society ball. I have nothing to be nervous about.”

  He chuckled, and then Lady Sterne whisked the sisters away to the withdrawing room to straighten their skirts and check their hair and caps in the looking glass though there had been no wind outside to effect any damage.

  And so the moment came when they stepped for the first time inside a London ballroom. It was decked out with flowers and greenery so that it smelled like a summer garden in full bloom on a hot day. But the flowers were superfluous, Anna thought, gazing about her, robbed of breath for a moment. All the most sumptuous satins and silks and laces and jewels must be assembled in this one room, decking out the persons of the guests gathered there. It was hard to say whether the gentlemen or the ladies were the more colorful and gorgeous. The ladies perhaps had the advantage in the sheer size of their skirts and the amount of fabric and decoration that could be displayed. But the gentlemen had the advantage in the elegant cut of full-skirted coats and in the long waistcoats beneath, on which all of an embroiderer’s art could be displayed to full advantage.

  Anna thought of the rather sober, staid styles worn at home, and looked about her at London fashions.

  “Well?” Lady Sterne was asking her, a smile on her face.

  “’Tis a new world,” Anna said. “One of whose existence I thought I was aware but was not.”

  “The wonder you feel is in your face, child,” her godmother said. “You are not sorry now that I persuaded you to come?”

  “Oh, no,” Anna said.

  When she thought back over the last two years, her mind thought in color—or rather in the absence of color. Black and gray, all of it. Of course, those were the colors they had worn for two years. Only in the last two months had they put off their mourning. And there had been the grief, first over the lingering illness and death of Mama and then over the sudden death of Papa. But it was not just the mourning that had sapped life of its color. There had been everything else too. The fight to keep the family together despite adversity, the struggle to avoid ruin and to keep Papa from debtors’ prison and her brother and sisters from destitution, the futile, futile efforts to pay off or redeem all the debts. And the greatest blackness of all—the web that had been woven inexorably about herself, drawing her ever inward, trapping her in a forever after of enslavement. Except that he had gone away after Papa’s death. He had gone to America, promising to come back, promising to come to claim her. But he had been gone for longer than a year, and perhaps—oh, she prayed for it—he would not come back after all.

  And now she was in a different world.

  Anna smiled suddenly as Lord Quinn caught her eye and winked. And the smile held and spread. She felt an unexpected welling of excitement and happiness. She was in a new world, a world of splendor, a fairy-tale world that she had only ever dreamed of a long, long time ago, when there still seemed to be some point in dreaming. It was true that it was for only a brief time. It was true that he might, after all, come back to claim her and bring back the darkness. But now, at this moment, she was in a London ballroom at the start of a ball. And she was going to enjoy herself.

  Oh, yes, she was. She was going to enjoy herself as she had never enjoyed anything else in her life before. She lifted the fan that hung from her wrist by a ribbon, opened it, and cooled her face with it. And she gazed about her with a wondering smile and sparkling eyes.

  3

  LUKE arrived as the opening minuet was ending. It was unusually early for him, but latecomers at a ball in London were frowned upon, it seemed. Or so his uncle had warned him. Actually his uncle was up to something, and it did not take a genius to guess what.

  “Marjorie has her goddaughter up from the country for the spring,�
�� Lord Quinn had remarked casually the evening before. “The Earl of Royce’s daughter. And her younger sister too. A pair of lovely gels, I warrant you, lad.”

  Which one, Luke had wondered, did his uncle intend as his bride?

  “Indeed?” he had commented. “A little rustic, are they, Theo?”

  “Egad, no,” his uncle had replied. “Not with Marjorie to look to outfitting them. They are lovely enough and well-bred enough to make one forgive some rusticity anyway. Pox on it, lad, if I were twenty years younger—”

  “If you were twenty years younger, my dear,” Luke had said, “you would still be attached to Lady Sterne but somewhat embarrassed at the age gap.”

  His uncle had thrown back his head and laughed heartily. “And so I would, lad,” he had said. “And so I would. Now in your case . . .”

  “I suppose,” Luke had said, “Lady Sterne is to be at the Diddering ball tomorrow evening? With her charges?”

  “What?” His uncle had looked startled. “Tomorrow evening already is that, lad? Zounds, and so it is. Marjorie will be there with the gels? It is altogether possible, I suppose. Yes, they may well be there. I hope someone asks them to dance, Luke. Apart from me, that is. They are strangers and all that.”

  “But lovely strangers,” Luke had said. His uncle was overdoing the carelessness.

  “Lovely? Zounds, yes,” Lord Quinn had said. “I daresay they will not lack for partners, will they?”

  Luke had not replied. He had changed the subject. But it was as clear to him as a bright summer day what his uncle was up to.

  He had come alone to the ball, though Angélique, Marquise d’Étienne, had hinted that she would be pleased with his escort. She had declared her own intention of spending a month or two in London soon after he had decided to come home. Life was too, too tedious in Paris at times, she had said with a sigh. And she had heard that London could sometimes be amusing. They had not traveled together and had taken only one walk together in public, though he had paid her two lengthy visits at her hotel. He had no intention of their names being linked as an established couple.

  The minuet had ended. The floor was clearing. Young ladies were being returned to their chaperones. His eyes picked out the elegant figure of Lady Sterne, whom he would have recognized even if his uncle had not been standing beside her. From across the ballroom she appeared not to have aged since he saw her last, in Paris, at least eight years ago. There was one young lady with them—actually, young girl would be a better description. She looked shy and sweet and very, very young. Luke undressed her with practiced eyes and felt that he was committing some obscenity. She was a child. Theo must have taken leave of his senses.

  And then another couple joined them. The gentleman bowed and strolled away, leaving behind his partner. Doubtless she was the other of Royce’s daughters. Luke looked at her critically. Although he could see her only in profile, she was clearly the elder sister. She was fashionably dressed in a shade of green that made her look fresh and inviting. She was fanning her face and talking to Lady Sterne. He drew his own fan from a pocket, opened it, and plied it absently.

  She turned, having finished what she had to say. Her face was smiling and animated. Ah, yes, definitely rustic. A few months in Paris—or even perhaps in London—would soon wipe that expression from her face and replace it with a look of languid ennui. She was gazing all about her with an eagerness that was almost palpable. Her foot was tapping even though there was no music playing. It set her skirt to swaying invitingly.

  Her eyes passed over him and smiled impersonally. And then a few moments later they returned and held on him. Had her expression not been so bright and so open, he would have sworn that she was doing the same to him as he had just done to her younger sister. She seemed to realize suddenly that he was looking directly back at her. She smiled dazzlingly, raised her fan to cover her mouth, and continued to smile with her eyes over the top of it.

  He raised his eyebrows and inclined his head a little. By God. She was a flirt.

  But Angélique had found him.

  “Luc,” she said in heavily accented English, setting one delicate white hand against the wide cuff of his sleeve, “you ’ave come, cheri. This is all very quaint, non?”

  Quaint? Was it? He looked about him. English fashions did not appear to be lagging so very far behind those of Paris, though the French were in the habit of scorning the backward English or at least of treating them with condescension. Of course, there were subtle differences—a little more hair, a little less powder and paint, for example, than he was accustomed to seeing at a fashionable gathering. And he intercepted a look of mingled shock and contempt on the face of an elderly lady whose eyes were fixed on his waving fan.

  “It is all very English, Angélique,” he said. “But we are in England now. A quadrille is to be next? You will do me the honor?”

  Although he was to all effects a stranger to English society, there were people he had met in Paris and people who remembered his father or his brother and gentlemen he had met at White’s. And of course there were his mother and Doris and Ashley, to whom he paid his respects when the quadrille came to an end. He charmed the ladies and conversed with the gentlemen and felt quite at home within an hour of his arrival. He always enjoyed balls. He liked to dance.

  For longer than an hour he avoided Lady Sterne and her goddaughters—though apparently only the elder sister was that. His uncle made no move to draw him into their circle—the old devil was too cunning for that, or thought he was. He probably did not even know that Luke realized what he was up to.

  But Luke kept an eye on the older sister. She continued to smile and sparkle and enjoy herself quite openly, and she did not lack for partners, though the younger girl, who might have been considered prettier by many, missed one set. And the older sister was not unaware of him, either. Her eyes seemed to alight on his person altogether too often for it to be accidental, and her smile always deepened when their eyes met.

  Interesting. He would meet her without reluctance when Theo considered the time right. He would discover whether her manner was as flirtatious at close quarters as it was at a distance. He wondered with some amusement if she realized that Theo had picked him out as her future husband. And then he sobered. If Theo had set out to promote the match, it was altogether likely that Lady Sterne was a coconspirator. And it was possible that the goddaughter knew about it—if she was the one, of course. Perhaps they had chosen the younger girl for him.

  He must be careful. He had no intention whatsoever of being trapped into marrying a rustic, bright-eyed young innocent. Or into marrying anyone for that matter.

  • • •

  Lady Sterne and Lord Quinn between them had made very sure that she and Agnes had partners for the opening minuet. That was very clear to Anna. And she was grateful to them. Although she had come to the ball merely to observe and to give Agnes a chance to meet eligible gentlemen, once she was there she wanted to be a part of it all too. She wanted to enjoy herself. She wanted to dance. And dance she did, with a friend of Lord Quinn’s. Her feet moved gracefully through the steps; her ears appreciated the rich sounds of a whole orchestra playing the music; her nostrils breathed in the myriad scents of flowers and expensive perfumes; and her eyes were dazzled by the color and movement of silks and satins and jewels. It was surely one of the happiest half hours of her life. She thought it even though her partner was not a handsome man or a young man or one with a great deal of conversation. But he danced well.

  Her eyes feasted on the sight of so much splendor as she stood with Agnes, her godmother, and Lord Quinn after the minuet was over, and she tapped her foot, almost as if she could still hear the music. She hoped—oh, she hoped someone else would ask her to dance. She wanted to dance all night without stopping. She wanted to dance until her toes were all blisters and her legs would no longer hold her up. She smiled gaily at her foolish thoughts.
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br />   She felt young and pretty, and filled to the brim and beyond with youthful energy. She had never been young, she realized suddenly. She had never had a chance to be young. At the age of five-and-twenty, it might have been thought that youth had forever passed her by. But it had not. There was tonight, this magical night in which she was young and free and pretty and . . . and happy. She was so happy that she could scarcely contain her exuberance.

  And then her mind registered what her eyes had seen a few moments before. She looked back to the man standing alone in the doorway. She had thought herself surrounded by the epitome of splendor, but he was—was there a more powerful word than splendid? He was gorgeous. It seemed not quite the word to use for a man.

  He was not very tall and he was quite slender. He was graceful—another word that seemed not quite suitable for a man. He wore a coat of crimson satin and a waistcoat of gold, both so bedecked with embroidery and jewels that they shimmered. His shoes had jeweled buckles and high red heels, encrusted with more jewels. The hilt of his dress sword was embossed with rubies. His hair—she was sure it was his own even though it was heavily powdered—was dressed neatly in side rolls and bagged in black silk behind. Even across the distance she could see in some shock that he wore cosmetics—powder and rouge—unlike most of the men in the ballroom.

  But the feature that had caught her attention more than any other and had caused her to look back at him was the small ivory fan that he was waving before his face.

  He should look effeminate, Anna thought as her eyes wandered over him. Why did he not? There was something about him that was almost suffocatingly masculine. Something about his eyes, perhaps? They looked very steadily and very directly at her from beneath rather heavy lids.

  And then she realized that she had been staring and that he had observed her doing so. But if he had done so, then it was because he was staring at her too. He had been as ill-mannered as she. She felt a flutter of physical attraction to the man. And because this was a new world and not quite the real world, and because she was feeling young and pretty and free, she ignored her first impulse, which was to look away in some confusion, and instead continued to look back at him and smiled in acknowledgment of the fact that they had caught each other doing the same thing. Sizing each other up.