Page 5 of My Own True Duchess
Diana sat up straight and put down her spoon. “Chocolates?”
Seraphina maintained a dignified silence, though her gaze was painfully hopeful.
Theo extracted the chocolates from her pocket and unwrapped the table napkin she’d tucked them into.
“One for each of you. You may eat them at the time of your choosing.”
“I choose now!” Diana plucked the nearest sweet from the linen. “My favorite color just became chocolate brown.”
Seraphina set the remaining chocolate on the edge of her plate. “Perhaps after luncheon or last thing tonight.”
Theo had had the same sighing sense of self-denial where Mr. Tresham was concerned. She could have flirted with him. He was a man much in need of flirtation, and once upon a time, she’d been good at it. She might have bid him to stay rather than seek out Dora Louise, and he might have put aside his scheme to repair Dora’s fortunes for at least another half hour.
Diana popped the entire chocolate into her mouth, her cheek bulging. “This is so good.”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Seraphina snapped before Theo could offer the same admonition in a gentler form.
“Don’t let your chocolate get stale before you enjoy it,” Diana retorted.
“Somewhere between heedless gluttony and endless denial lies a sensible course,” Theo said. “I hope you both find it, though being scolded and judged and carped at never did improve my outlook. I’ll be in the study this morning if either of you need help with your lessons.”
“I’ll help Di,” Seraphina said, the martyred lament of an adolescent.
“Mama said she would help me,” Diana replied, now sporting a dab of chocolate at the corner of her lips. “She knows more than you do.”
Stop. Stop, stop, stop. Was this how Mr. Tresham had felt in Lord Bellefonte’s ballroom? A beleaguered hare pursued by a pack running riot?
“Your mama has ledgers to deal with,” Seraphina said, not meanly. “I know enough to sort out the occasional word, Di, and I like a break from my French.”
“What is the French word for peach?” Diana asked.
Mr. Tresham would know—if the French had such a word. Dora Louise had caught him unawares through cunning and determination, but he’d not be caught the same way again.
“Will you finish that toast?” Diana asked.
Theo passed over the last, best quarter slice of toast. Diana was not stout—yet—but she was certainly sturdy.
“We’ll go for a walk in the park this afternoon if the weather’s fair,” Theo said, which provoked rare matching smiles from both girls. “I’m hungry for sunshine and birdsong.”
Which were free, unlike dancing slippers, bread, and jam. In the park, Seraphina would mince along at a ladylike gait, while peering about in hopes of being noticed by a handsome young gentleman. Diana would lark around like a kite in a breeze.
While Theo tried not to worry.
“Excuse me, ma’am.” Williams, the maid-of-all-work, hovered in the doorway. “You’ve had a delivery.”
Not another dunning notice. “What sort of delivery?”
“Flowers, ma’am, and a basket.” Williams ducked back down the corridor and returned carrying a bouquet in a silver bowl.
That bowl will fetch a few coins warred with an inarticulate pleasure. The flowers were a combination of hydrangeas and sweet pea with sprigs of heather and ferns for greenery. The bouquet was neither exotic nor extravagant, but such an unexpected occasion of beauty that Theo was torn between burying her face amid the blooms and telling Williams to take them away.
“The ferns mean fascination,” Seraphina said, studying not the flowers, but Theo.
“In this case, they mean shelter,” Theo replied. “I shared a quiet respite from the dance floor with a gentleman.” For who else could have sent Theo flowers? Please let them be from him. “Was there a note?”
“The footman who delivered them wore the Duke of Quimbey’s livery, ma’am. No note.”
Mr. Tresham was His Grace’s heir.
