Page 56 of The Heiress's Daughter
Finally, blessedly, Miss Cicely finished, and supper was announced. Miss Studley rose, murmured something to her chaperone and they both hurried from the room.
Call of nature, he decided, and sauntered out to the supper room to await her return. Ten minutes passed, then another ten. Where was she? Was she ill?
He waited another few minutes and then took himself to the hall outside the ladies’ retiring room. An elderly lady he didn’t know was about to enter. “Could you tell me if my er, cousin is in there, please?” he asked her. “Her hair is a soft brown and she’s wearing a pale green dress.”
A few minutes later the old lady came out. “Nobody else in there at all,” she said. “She’ll be in the supper room. The Gastonbury suppers are famous. Nobody wants to miss them.”
But she wasn’t in the supper room at all. She’d left. Understandable—her ears were probably bleeding. But she knew he was here and that he clearly wanted to talk to her. But apart from the murmured greeting when he first arrived, she hadn’t spoken a word to him.
She was avoiding him. Why?
“Coming back in, young Randall?” Sir Oswald clapped him on the back. “You’ll get a seat this time. Smaller audience in the second half—a lot leave after the supper. Don’t understand it, m’self.”
There was more alleged music to come? Race was appalled. Murmuring some excuse, he took his leave from Sir Oswald, thanked Lady Gastonbury and Cicely, lied in his teeth about how delightful the evening had been, and how sorry he was that he was expected elsewhere, and fled.
“Would you like meor Joan to make you a nice, soothing tisane, miss?” Betty said in a solicitous voice as she lifted Clarissa’s dress carefully over her head.
“No thank you,” Clarissa said. It wasn’t a soothing tisane she needed, it was a purge, a Lord Randall purge.
“Well, if you’re sure, miss. It’s no trouble.” Betty was helping Clarissa get ready for bed, and at the same time issuing a low-voiced series of instructions to the maid-in-training, Joan, explaining how to wash miss’s good silk stockings, clean her shoes and put away her lovely dress—wrapping it in tissue just so, to prevent it creasing. Secrets of a lady’s maid.
“Thank you, but no, I just need to sleep.” She didn’t deserve Betty’s concern. She was becoming a liar. This was the second time in a week she’d used an imaginary headache as an excuse to leave a function early. But what else could she do?
The way Lord Randall had lounged against the wall, arms crossed, pretending to listen to poor Cicely’s singing, when all the time he was watching Clarissa like a hawk—she couldfeelhis gaze resting on her like a warm caress. It made her ridiculously self-conscious. She was sure everyone must have noticed how she was blushing.
Betty finished undoing her corset and set it aside, leaving Clarissa in her chemise. Her nightgown lay ready, draped across the end of the bed.
“Shall I—” Betty began.
“No, that will be all, thank you, Betty—and Joan.” She smiled at the new girl. “I want to wash first. I won’t need you again tonight—thank you for waiting up.”
“You’ll need hot water then,” Betty said. “Joan—”
“No, no, cold will do very well, thank you. Good night.” Cold water was exactly what she needed, in more ways than one.
The maids left and Clarissa washed, using the large ewer of cold water on the marble-topped side table.
She had to find some way of squashing these inappropriate and unwelcome feelings she had for him. She should never have allowed that kiss, that magical, intoxicating, deeply disturbing kiss. She couldn’t get it out of her mind.
She smoothed the cool face flannel over her hot cheeks.
What was he trying to do? He never attended things like musical evenings, though people had hinted that he often attended the opera. Not that she ever asked about him, but he was a common subject of gossip among some of the ladies she was acquainted with, and the ladies she’d overheard weren’t usually talking directly to her.
The consensus seemed to be that it wasn’t the music that attracted him to the opera, so much as the opera dancers. It’s what attracted most men, according to the gossips. Opera dancers, Clarissa gathered, reading between the lines, were attractive young women of loose morals. Very loose morals.
She was inclined to believe it. Nobody who loved music would attend Lady Gastonbury’s soirées unless they were deaf, fond of the old lady and Cicely, or desperate for a good supper, and in Lord Randall’s case she doubted any of those applied.
He must have come because of her—but how did he know she was planning to attend?
She climbed into bed and pulled the covers up.
His cousin. Of course. She had mentioned her intention to Maggie the other day, and Maggie had teased her, saying that her ears would regret it.
He was spying on her, and his cousin was helping him.
It was a very lowering reflection. She punched her pillow into shape and lay down. She’d thought she and Maggie were becoming friends. How disheartening to realize it wasn’t true friendship at all, that the lively lady had an underlying intention: to keep Lord Randall informed.
It was more than disheartening, it was infuriating. Leomusthave set Lord Randall to watch over her. He could deny it all he liked: she knew better now.
