Noble Satyr: A Georgian Historical Romance (56 page)

He saw her from across the ballroom.

A striking beauty was staring straight at
him.

Jonathon brought himself up short and stared
back.

He couldn’t help himself.

He could count on three fingers the
occasions he had crossed paths with exquisite feminine beauty that
it stopped the breath in his throat; twice on the Indian
subcontinent, once in the East Indies, and now here, this very
minute, in this ballroom, on this green wet island. So it was only
natural he should give himself the leisure to drink her in. His
admiring gaze wandered from her honey-blonde hair that fell in
heavy ringlets over one bare shoulder, to the porcelain skin of her
décolletage glowing flawless against the bottomless black of her
gown. He would not have been male had his gaze not lingered on her
ample breasts, barely contained in a square cut bodice. He tried to
find fault with her heart-shaped face, with the small straight nose
and determined chin, and with her unusually oblique eyes, but what
was there to fault?

Smiling to himself, he fancied everything he
saw, and everything he could not he was sure was just as
alluring.

He wondered at her age. Not that it
mattered. It was a game he played to pass the time at social
functions such as this. Dressed all in black and wearing no jewelry
about her slender throat or wrists he supposed she was a widow, and
thus not in the first flush of youth.

What was a widow doing here?

His fascination increased tenfold.

For all his limited experience of the London
social scene, Jonathon knew well enough that widows did not attend
social gatherings of this sort, particularly not such a renowned
event at the height of the Season. Perhaps her mourning was almost
at an end and she was chaperoning one of the young things here
tonight? Surely, she was not old enough to have a daughter of
marriageable age? Jonathon pulled a face. For some unfathomable
reason he did not like the idea that she may have been a
child-bride.

Why was she staring at him?

She stood so still, with her hands clasped
in front of her, as if she was a statue carved of alabaster draped
in black cloth; as much a fixture of the ballroom as a blazing
chandelier or the enormous, richly woven tapestry hanging behind
her. And so it seemed when dancers began pairing up and passed her
as if she was indeed no more than part of the furniture. Why?
Perhaps she was so well known in Society that her incredible beauty
was taken for granted? In a ballroom awash with beautiful young
things draped in silks of soft creams, pinks, and blues, she was a
real head turner.

Jonathon found it impossible not to
stare.

He watched as some of the guests even went
so far as to go out of their way not to look at her, passing in a
wide arc, eyes fixed forward or down to the polished floorboards.
The one or two young ladies who did cast a curious, furtive glance
in the beauty’s direction were instantly reprimanded in furious
undertones by parents and guardians alike and quickly cast their
gaze away, heads hung, as if in shame at having committed a grave
transgression.

Why was she being deliberately avoided?

Why did no one acknowledge her?

Why did no one stop and talk to her?

Why was she being neglected?

It burned him up to see her alone and
forsaken.

It was unlikely the beauty had a sordid past
or lived openly as some lucky nobleman’s mistress for she wouldn’t
have been invited amongst this august company. The Duke of Roxton
was an incorruptible prude and devoted family man, a rare bird
amongst his preening peers. The King couldn’t praise the Duke’s
example highly enough; a compliment that was so much sniggered
about in Society drawing rooms that even Jonathon, just six months
in the capital, had heard it repeated often enough. Whatever the
reason for her social ostracism, it was of supreme indifference to
him. He was determined to make her acquaintance, curiosity and
allure compelled him.

A burst of wild laughter close by brought
him out of his reverie. Tommy would know the beauty’s identity and
her story. He always had the latest gossip. Collecting social
minutiae about Society that families desperately tried to suppress
was Tommy Cavendish’s favorite pastime, second only to eating. And
so with no regard for the two turbaned dowagers who were filling
Lord Cavendish’s insatiable appetite for scandal with the latest
wicked crumbs, Jonathon caught at the stiff skirts of the
nobleman’s frockcoat and unceremoniously pulled him backwards to
stand at his side.

“Tommy! Tommy, attend me!” he demanded
without taking his gaze from the beauty. “She’s in widow’s drapery
and she’s being ignored. Why? What is she doing here?”

“Good Lord, don’t tell me one of the fairer
sex has finally piqued your interest? Bravo! Who, old dear?” asked
his lordship, a wave of his lace handkerchief to the departing
dowagers who flounced off in disgust at being so rudely interrupted
by a tanned colossus of undetermined social consequence. He
hurriedly plastered his quizzing glass to a watery eye and swept an
eager roving stare out across the ballroom, the first minuet of the
evening underway, before running his eye down to Jonathon’s large
feet, then up to his head of thick, shoulder-length hair. “Are you
truly six feet
four
inches?”

Jonathon pulled the quizzing glass out of
Lord Cavendish’s chubby fingers and let it drop loose on its
riband. “Have done with that silly affectation, Tommy. And that
hideous black patch, if that’s what it is, is also beyond enough. A
wart at best.”

“Brute,” Lord Cavendish responded without
offence as he touched the corner of his mouth with a fat pinkie to
reassure himself the heart-shaped mouche remained in place. “Those
of us who can’t be Samsons must attract Delilahs in other
ways.”

“Patch and paint doesn’t do it for you,
Tommy. Trust me. What would Kitty say?”

Lord Cavendish shrugged and patted his
portly belly, very snug in its tight-fitting Chinoiserie silk
waistcoat. “
M’wife
? Told me to wear a half-moon rather than
a heart, and at the temple not the mouth. But what would dearest
Kitty know about patches and paint? And, I’m not the one who needs
a wife—”

“Tommy, don’t start.”

Lord Cavendish pretended ignorance and swept
a silken arm out towards the crowd gathered on the edge of the
dance floor. “Start? My dear friend, the bridal campaign started in
earnest months back, if you hadn’t noticed. And where better to
find a nice little wife than at this esteemed gathering. Pick of
the grapes, this bunch. No one with a relative below the rank of
Viscount and it’s not as if you have to marry money. There’s a few
dainty dishes with a pedigree as long as
your
arm and no
funds to match. Kitty thinks—”

“No, Tommy!
No
.”

“—that there are at least five delicious
puddings for you to choose from; all in their early twenties and in
their second Season. Although, I wouldn’t discount the
Porter-Lewisham pikelet, even if she is eighteen.”

“
Eighteen
?” Jonathon was revolted.
His daughter was just nineteen years old. He turned his portly
friend’s shoulder towards the dance floor. “Attend, Tommy! The
beauty over there. Who is she?”

Lord Cavendish fumbled for his quizzing
glass.

“Where is this vision of loveliness, this
delectable éclair that has whet your manly appetite?”

“Not over
there
. Over
here
,”
Jonathon said impatiently. “To my left. The tapestry. She’s staring
straight at me.”

Lord Cavendish made another sweep of the
ballroom with his magnified eye, careful not to linger on any
particular pretty face for more than a few seconds, but if there
was an eligible beauty amongst the press of silk petticoats and
fluttering fans, he could not discover her; pretty, yes, but no
female so striking as to cause his tall friend to get steamed up
under his cravat, unless... No! His smile remained fixed but his
brow furrowed. He glanced up at Jonathon and followed his
unblinking gaze...
Oh God. No
. He mentally gulped and let
drop the quizzing glass, mouth at half cock, and mumbled something
unintelligible. It was a few moments before he found his voice,
long enough for Jonathon to witness two dour faced creatures, both
dressed in dove-grey silk and with all the charisma of strong-armed
jailers, approach the beauty from behind to stand two paces back on
either side of her. They reminded him of a couple of gargoyles. The
almost imperceptible way in which the beauty squared her snowy
white shoulders told him she was aware of their presence and that
they were an unwarranted intrusion. But she did not speak, nor did
she look at them.

His assessment of these women was justified
when a gentleman carrying two glasses of champagne staggered out of
the refreshment room, skirted the dance floor ringed with
onlookers, and headed straight for the beauty. He lifted both
glasses in the air as he twirled this way and that to avoid
spilling a precious drop of bubbly, and came face to face with one
of the humorless gargoyles who stepped forward and waylaid him
before he could get within ten feet of their mistress. He was
quietly taken in hand by two liveried footmen, who appeared from
the crowd as if from thin air, and was marched away, the champagne
soaking the front of his canary-yellow frockcoat.

“Well?” he demanded of Lord Cavendish as the
Countess of Strathsay curtsied low before the beauty and then rose
up to speak a few words. “Who is she that such a sanctimonious
stickler for breeding and rank as the Lady Strathsay curtseys until
her long nose scrapes the floorboards?”

Tommy Cavendish’s mouth was still forming
words but then it fixed itself in a tight smile and he tapped
Jonathon’s arm with the edge of his quizzing glass. “Strang! You
cunning steak and kidney pie. For a moment you had me believing
you. You can’t bamboozle me that easily.”

“I’m not. I’ve never seen her before tonight
and I want to know who she is so I don’t make a fool of myself upon
first introduction. Your contribution would be much appreciated but
I will do without it if I must.”

Lord Cavendish’s usual bonhomie evaporated.
He wished Kitty with him. His wife would know how to explain
matters much better than he.

“Ah… Yes… Should’ve realized. She doesn’t go
out in society any more. Damn shame, if you ask me. Damn waste of a
beautiful woman.”

“Well?” Jonathon repeated rudely. He watched
Lady Strathsay take her leave, shuffling backwards a few feet
before turning and abandoning the beauty to the watchful eye of the
two gargoyles. “Come on, Tommy. If she’s a recluse she could up and
leave this claustrophobic social get-together at any moment. So out
with it before I lose patience and take the plunge and ask her to
dance without the benefit of your assistance.”

Lord Cavendish shook his powdered head.

“No, Strang. You do not want to go over
there. It will be very bad for you if you do. Believe me, by going
over there you’ll certainly make a fool of yourself. You’ll be
boiled mutton for broth before you can be minced for steak tartar.”
When Jonathon gave a huff of disbelief, his lordship sighed and
dropped his quizzing glass to say without artifice, “Strang. Trust
me in this. Deb Roxton has favored your dearest Sarah-Jane with her
patronage. The Duchess doesn’t favor all her Cavendish relatives.
Such noble benefaction is not to be scorned. If your daughter is to
bag a baronet at the very least, you want to avoid incurring the
Duke’s displeasure at all costs. Believe me, you, like the rest of
us red-blooded males, must admire that divine beauty from
afar.”

Jonathon was unimpressed. He stared out
across the noble bewigged and powdered heads gathering in the vast
ballroom and caught sight of the very nobleman whom they were
discussing. He watched the Duke make his way through the crowd to
come stand beside the beauty. She reached no higher than His
Grace’s shoulder and, Jonathon suspected, this in heels. The Duke
inclined his head, took out his snuffbox and said a few words to
which the beauty did not respond. Finally, she turned and tilted
her chin up at him, gave a response, and flicked open her fan of
black feathers with a quick agitated movement. After an exchange
that lasted a few minutes she dared to turn her bare shoulder on
the Duke to look the other way. His Grace remained at her side,
watching the dancers with an enigmatic smile, and by the
inclination of his head he was continuing to talk to her under his
breath despite being deliberately ignored. It was Jonathon’s
opinion that one would have to be blind not to see the impenetrable
wall of ice bricks that separated these two.

“If the man who offers for Sarah-Jane is
spineless enough to put his Grace of Roxton’s good opinion of him
before his love for my daughter, then I do not wish Sarah-Jane to
be so favored.”