Page 50 of Not Quite a Lady
He steered her down the room, closer to the entrance staircase. ‘I say, that’s a frightening turban just come in.’
Lily looked up, saw Lady Philpott in one of her signature purple head dresses and tried not to smile. ‘Her ladyship looks very…imposing,’ she countered repressively.
‘Lord Allerton!’ The footman’s voice lifted above a lull in the music.
‘Who? Never heard of him.’ Lord Gledhill glanced at the head of the stairs with mild curiosity. ‘Never seen him before either. Not a fellow you’d miss – must have been out of the country.’
Lily, still smiling at the outrageous toque, followed his gaze.
Just turning from shaking hands with the duchess was a tall, broad-shouldered man. His linen was immaculate, his dark head ruthlessly barbered into a fashionable Brutus cut.
He paused at the head of the stairs, his eyes scanning the crowd below, then began to descend in a leisurely manner. He was heading in her direction.
‘Jack?’It couldn’t be – unless he had a double.
‘Know him do you, Miss France?’
‘Yes. I mean, no. No, absolutely not. I have never heard of Lord Allerton. It must be a coincidental likeness.’
But of course it could not be. She could see the red lineof the newly healed scar on his temple now, exposed by the severe crop. What was he doing here, pretending to be someone else entirely? How on earth had he bluffed his way past the formidable Duchess of Oldbury? There would be the most dreadful scandal when he was unmasked.
And he was coming directly towards her. With the same ability she had noticed when he had cut his way through the mob outside her house, Jack was finding a path through the fashionable crowd.
People were watching him with scarcely veiled interest. It seemed that his assumed title was mystifying most of them, as was his appearance.
‘He’s been in the wars, our mystery man,’ George Gledhill remarked. And now Jack was closer Lily could see a darkening bruise on his cheek and a cut near the corner of his mouth. He looked dangerous in the midst of this elegant throng, for all his formal attire and scrupulous grooming.
What am I going to say to him? Why is he here? Who has he been fighting?
Her heart was thudding, but through the confusion and the anxiety Lily could feel nothing but happiness at the sight of him. She tried to push the feeling away because there was nothing that could be between them, he had made that very clear. Whatever was about to happen was going to mean nothing but trouble.
‘Allerton?’ The voice behind her made her turn to see Lord Winstanly frowning in thought. ‘Now that’s a title I haven’t heard for a long while.’
Oh Lord! Jack what on earth are you doing?
Lily braced herself to confront him, wondering if she could persuade him to leave before his imposture was revealed to everyone. Then she saw he was not making directly for her, but for a group of men standing somewhat to the side of her.
‘Adrian.’
‘Miss France?’
She must have spoken out loud. ‘Lord Gledhill, I am very much afraid there is going to be some sort of confrontation.’
She began to make her way through the crowd, most of whom had lost their momentary interest in the new face and were making up sets for the first of the country dances.
‘Look here, Miss France, if there is going to be trouble, don’t you think you should stay well away?’
‘No.’ She sighed as she dodged behind the back of the Marquis of Haverstock. ‘No. Whatever it is will be all my fault, I cannot run away from it.’
She reached the edge of the circle of friends and sycophants who always surrounded Lord Randall at any social gathering, stopping where she could watch unobserved from behind a potted palm.
He was flirting languidly with a pair of giggling young ladies and his attention, and those of his friends, were focussed on the girls and not towards the entrance. Adrian seemed quite unawares of who had entered the ballroom and was now almost directly behind him.
‘We all thought you were lost to us, Lord Randall.’ It was Miss Berwick, a pert blonde who most mamas stigmatised as unbecomingly forward. ‘When we heard you were engaged to be married to Miss France, why hearts were broken all across London.’
‘What a terrible rumour to put about,’ her friend struck in, eager not to be left out of the contest for his attention. ‘As if Lord Randall would have contemplated such a thing.’
‘Oh, but I did contemplate it, my dear.’ Adrian caressed her with his intense blue gaze and she wriggled like a puppy at the attention. ‘We men are weak you know, that lovely money can make fools of us all.’
