Page 38 of One Perfect Dance
Even thinking of the possible consequences of that plan made her feel warm and trembly.
She reached her three friends, who had saved her a chair in their group of four. “Solemn thoughts, Regina?” asked Cordelia, which reminded Regina of another hiccup in her current plans. She had put off dealing with David Deffew out of sheer inertia, but the latest problem to rear its head was not as easy to manage.
“My mother is in town, ladies. She is staying with my brother William, so I am going to have to move my ball. Cordelia, is the offer of your ballroom still open?”
Cordelia was quick to reassure her. “It is, of course. We can send out a note to those who have been sent invitations.”
“Surely your mother…” Arial’s voice trailed off. “I beg your pardon, Regina. You know your own business best.”
Regina needed her friends to understand. “I do not want to put my mother at outs with my brother. He has walked a careful path over the years, remaining close to both of us. I would never ask him to choose between us.”
When William came to her this morning to say that Lady Kingsley had arrived unannounced, he had not asked for her to move the ball, but the relief on his face when she offered to speak to Cordelia spoke for itself.
She shrugged. “Besides, I want Geoffrey to come to my ball, and I do not know what my mother might say if she was forced to confront him.”
Her friends nodded thoughtfully, and Margaret asked what Regina had already wondered. “You don’t suppose, do you, that she has heard the rumors about his parentage?”
“I do not see how she could have avoided it,” Regina agreed. Richard Deffew’s scurrilous assumptions were doing the rounds. Regina and William, after discussing the matter with Geoffrey, had immediately told several of their friends the truth. Mother might, indeed, have heard the competing stories. Perhaps she had known the truth all along. What she planned to do about it, if anything, was another matter.
Cordelia changed the subject. “Come to my house tomorrow morning, Regina, and we shall inspect the ballroom together. With only a week to go until the ball, we have no time to lose.” She shot Regina a sideways look and a sly smile. “Unless you are engaged with Mr. Ashby, of course.”
Regina’s lips wanted to twist into a fatuous smile, but she would not allow them to do so. Nor would she respond to her friend’s teasing. “Tomorrow morning will be excellent. Arial? Margaret? Will you join us?”
*
Ash and Rexhad been summoned to the Foreign Office to make a report on the political situation in Russia. The tsar’s lack of a son to succeed him could mean a contentious succession, but both of Alexander’s brothers had declared their disinterest in becoming tsar. “They are serious,” Rex assured the man they knew only asTolliver. “I don’t blame them. I wouldn’t want to rule Russia, either.”
They talked for some time about that vast and fascinating land, and about what the travelers had observed on their long river journey and in the tsar’s court. Eventually, Tolliver’s questions ran out.
“Your country thanks you, gentlemen,” he said. “May I suggest a destination for your next journey?”
“No next journey,” Rex informed him. “I am a married man, and Ash has aspirations.”
Tolliver steepled his hands before his nose, his elbows resting on his desk, as he examined Ash. “Your first engagement after your arrival was a visit to Mrs. Gideon Paddimore, and you have since been seen escorting her to both day and evening events. Am I to wish you happy?”
Ash felt his cheeks heat. “I have not determined the lady’s sentiments on the matter, sir. But my own are fixed.”
Tolliver nodded. “Very well. That will be all, gentlemen. Thank you for calling.”
With that dismissal, they made their way through the winding corridors of the anonymous old building. The quickest way from there to Rex’s townhouse led through a courtyard where some maintenance was in progress. A scaffold reared against the wall behind them and the one to their left.
Two levels of planking up, a man was chipping away at stone, shaping a replacement for a window frame currently under repair. He’d made considerable progress since they’d passed him earlier, on their way to the meeting.
They stopped for a moment, drawn by the endless fascination of watching craftsmen at work. Perhaps he felt the weight of their eyes, for he looked over his shoulder. His eyes widened, and he shouted a wordless alarm.
Ash threw himself one way and Rex the other. Just in time. A large block of stone crashed right where they had been standing.
In no time at all, workers had converged, loudly protesting that they had been nowhere in the vicinity of the stone when it fell. Ash and Rex assured all and sundry that they were unharmed. Somewhat dusty, but not injured.
After they’d disentangled themselves from the conversation, they went on their way, Ash wondering, “Was that deliberate? And if so, was it for you or for me?”
Rex shrugged. “Or a case of mistaken identity. I can’t think of anyone who is that annoyed at me.”
“No one in India? A couple of those workers had the look.”
Rex shook his head. “I cannot think why.”
Ash thought about his own possible enemies. “The only person in England who might want me dead is Dilly Deffew.”
