Page 63 of Miss Desirable
And those were just the outings Nevin had learned of. If she was larking off to Vauxhall, Nevin might well not know of it or care to add that development to his report. Divided loyalties in a subordinate were tedious.
“My dear,” Armbruster said, taking both of Catherine’s hands. “Has the gossiping horde descended yet?”
Catherine withdrew her hands. “The condolence calls are a great comfort, and yes, they’ve begun. Lord and Lady Casriel led the charge, closely followed by Lord and Lady Trysting and their various relatives. Shall you have a seat, my lord?”
Armbruster’s note should have arrived days ago, and yet, he searched Catherine’s countenance in vain for any hint of disquiet. The younger Catherine had been an open book—eager, shy, lonely, curious, and much put upon to find herself far from Mayfair as she’d left the schoolroom.
Begging to be seduced, in other words.
This Catherine was everything that young lady should have been—poised, gracious, pleasant, and utterly self-possessed. A vague twinge from the mental vicinity of Armbruster’s conscience suggested he might have had something to do with Catherine’s transformation.
Or perhaps the apparent support of her titled family was to blame. They would drop her fast enough once they learned how far she’d strayed from propriety.
“I have been worried about you,” Armbruster said, taking the corner of the sofa nearest Catherine’s wing chair. “It’s the wrong time of year to be grieving the loss of a parent.”
Catherine lifted the lid of the teapot. “There’s a right time of year for bereavement?”
“Of course not, but spring is an especially hard time to be out of the whirl.”
Catherine poured two cups of tea and passed him his without adding any sugar or milk. “The lovely weather, the emerging foliage, and the flowers have been a consolation, my lord. Life goes on, and Mama loved spring. To battle fresh sorrow as winter descends would try my spirit sorely.”
Armbruster sipped his tea while Catherine did likewise. She wasn’t exactly pretty, but she was more attractive for having gained a few years. She’d taken to wearing her hair in a simple chignon that accented the planes and hollows of her face. Her eyes, for all their lamentable color, looked out on the world with a woman’s gravity rather than a girl’s passing moods.
“Does anything in particular plague your spirit of late?” Armbruster asked.
“The loss of my mother, of course. The business of taking charge of a fortune I never expected to manage.”
“The solicitors are on hand to deal with the boring financial matters. You know you can apply to me for advice as well, and if I might offer a passing observation, contributions to any fashionable charity will go some way toward quieting the talk.”
Catherine set her cup on its saucer. “Don’t be coy, Fortescue. What talk?” She seemed amused, though Armbruster knew very well how much she valued Society’s good opinion.
He studied the vase of daffodils on the windowsill and schooled his features to reflect reluctant honesty. “You’ve been seen, Catherine.”
“I do not aspire to invisibility, so this is hardly news.”
“I know how badly you deal with being ignored, Catherine, but I am not your enemy. I am, in fact, your friend.”
She glanced at the clock. “So as a friend, you are about to warn me of some dire rumor that will see me hounded from London?”
“I suspect it’s not a rumor.” He spoke gently, because Catherine’s world was about to shift, and she did not deal well with upheaval unless it was of her own creation.
“Out with it.”
While her expression remained serene, her words bore a hint of agitation, and that was encouraging.
“It has been remarked that you left Rome with your mother well ahead of your father. For more than a year, his lordship tarried in Rome and then traveled the Mediterranean and Adriatic, while you ladies…? Nobody seems to know what you got up to, and in a time of war, what could possibly prompt two unescorted women to wander at large? You and I had lost touch by then, so I could not offer any specific defense in your name.”
Catherine offered him the plate of shortbread. “Lost touch, Fortescue? You dismissed me as if I were some dolly-mop who’d asked for too much coin after an evening’s romp.”
Of course he had. Any man would given the expectations she’d developed. “My dear, you wanted my entire future when I hadn’t even the coin to pay my creditors. What sort of husband would I have made?”
“Vexatious, I’ll grant you, and I am not your dear.”
He waved away the shortbread. “I was your first. Can you honestly tell me that no affection for me, for the stupid, brash, passionate fellow I was, yet remains in your heart?”
Catherine dunked a piece of shortbread in her tea and munched in silence. This was her version of telling him to sod off, to take his rumors and leap into the Thames with them.
She was still headstrong, and curing her of that affliction would be a husband’s privilege.
