On the day of the ball, Harriet skipped the midday meal with the gaggle of adults in the dining room in favor of spending time with the children. She had put off for too long the painful duty of telling them she would be leaving. Sitting around the large round table in the main room of the nursery, they were having trifle for dessert.
“Ooh, my fav’ritest,” Tilly cooed.
“Just see you eat as much as you wear,” Robby said.
“Master Robert, that was unkind,” Nurse Tavenner admonished, wiping at Tilly’s cheek.
The boy made a face. “I’m sorry, but look at her bib!”
Harriet knew Robby was showing off for the three children of guests who were sitting with them, but she said, “Tilly has enjoyed her luncheon. When she is as grown up as you are, she will have learned to use her serviette.”
“Oh,” he said sheepishly, for his still lay near his place.
Their laughter broke off when Harriet said, “Now, children, I have something important to tell you.” They sensed something serious and the room grew very still. She hoped her voice would not break. “When Nana and Poppy go home to London, I am going with them.” The children had, since their own sojourn in the city, adopted Harriet’s pet names for their shared ancient relatives.
Everyone was quiet for a moment, then Elly asked in an excited voice, “Are we going too? I want to see the efflemunt again.”
“She’ll never get that right,” Robby said in disgust.
“No, darling,” Harriet answered the little girl. “You will stay here and have lessons with Miss Clarkson just as you have been doing the last few weeks.” She tried to keep her tone bright.
“But you’re coming back, aren’t you?” Sarah asked. “This is only for a week or two, isn’t it—like before?”
“No, Sarah. I do not know how long it will be, but certainly I will come to visit you just as soon as I can and perhaps you will be able to persuade Uncle Quint to bring you to visit me.”
Elly jumped down from her place at the table and came to stand at Harriet’s elbow. “No! I don’t want you to go.”
Harriet put her arm around her. “I am sorry, sweetheart, but I must go.” She raised her head to smile brightly at all of them. “And I want you to write me often—each one of you—and tell all the things you are learning and doing.”
Elly looked up at her with tear-filled eyes and asked plaintively, “Auntie Harry, don’t you love us anymore?”
Harriet came undone. She twisted in her chair, gathered Elly onto her lap, and buried her face in the little girl’s blonde curls. “Of course I do! I love you more than anything in the whole wide world!”
Maria came to Harriet’s rescue. She gathered Elly into her own arms and spoke ostensibly to Elly, but Harriet knew for the benefit of all her siblings. “Come on, Elly. Do not make this so hard for Aunt Harriet. Can you not see she is as sad about leaving as we are to have her go?”
“But—” Robby started.
“No buts, Robby! Leave it!” Maria ordered.
And he did.
Harriet merely mouthed a “Thank you” to Maria and hastily left the room.
Right outside the door she stumbled into Quint’s open arms and broke into sobs. He pressed her head against his shoulder, murmured soft words of comfort, and simply held her, caressing her back for several moments. At the time, she was scarcely aware of anything but the terrible sense of impending loss at leaving those young people she loved so dearly. Later she recalled just how Quint’s arms had been an immediate safe haven for her.
Within moments, she regained control of herself and stepped back, flustered. “I—uh—thank you. Why are you here—in the nursery wing—at this hour?”
“Looking for you. When you did not appear for lunch, I had an inkling of where you were and what you were doing—”
She saw such a deal of sympathy in his gaze that she nearly burst into tears again. “Oh, Quint, I just did not think it would be so hard,” she said. “I have always known this day would come, but it was always someday—you know?”
Without quite realizing it, they had taken the back stairs from the nursery down to the door of Harriet’s suite. He opened it, stepped inside with her, and embraced her again. “Do stop talking about it as though you will never see them again. This is by no means permanent.”
“I know.”
“God, how I’ve missed you!” He settled his mouth on hers.
“Mm. Me too.”
“And what I would like to do now is march your sweet body right into that other room and—”
She pulled away and pretended shock. “Colonel Burnes! Sir! My dear old grandmother could come in here at any moment!” In a more normal voice, she added, “Besides, there’s your mother’s grand ball tonight.”
“Oh, yes. That.” He held her gaze for a long moment. “Are you truly all right now?”
She nodded. “I will be. Thank you.” She stretched up to give him a quick kiss. “But I needed that.”
His hand on the door handle, he smiled down at her. “That, and much, much more, my sweet.”
Not wanting to dwell on the pain of that scene in the nursery, or even the sheer pleasure of Quint’s comforting as an antidote, Harriet sought her usual method of escape from life’s troubles: sleep. She took off her outer clothes, crawled into bed, and had a long nap.
She awoke wishing she could skip the ball, that somehow she could be whisked away—like some character in an Eastern fantasy—into some new time and place. Just get through this and be back in her old life in London and then—
And then?
“Aye, there’s the rub, eh, Hamlet?” she muttered to herself.
She dressed in her newest ball gown, one she had purchased in London in the midst of her rebellion against wearing all those dreary colors of mourning and dreaming about the shades of nature. The dress itself was a deep cerulean blue silk with a wide, deep V neckline extending from the shoulders. The brooch the children gave her hung on velvet ribbon matching the gown just at the top of her cleavage. Collins had woven a matching ribbon through her hair. The gown had a sheer, gossamer-like silver overskirt. She wore silver kid slippers and long silver-colored gloves.
“Don’t forget these,” Collins said, holding out aquamarine earrings.
She dashed upstairs to fetch Maria and Phillip and say good night as she had promised to the others.
“Ooh! Look! Auntie Harry is wearing our pin,” Elly pointed out and immediately demanded that Harriet prove she remembered which stones stood for whom. Luckily, she did.
Maria, in the customary white for a young girl not yet “out,” came in for her share praise. Her gown was silk and heavily embroidered with pink rosebuds and draped with a long pink sash across one shoulder. Phillip stood tall and straight in his black evening dress, leaning on only one crutch now, it too painted black with the padding covered in black silk.
“You two are looking just too smart for words!” Harriet said.
With Nurse Tavenner carefully protective of Harriet’s and Maria’s finery, the good night kisses and hugs were achieved to everyone’s satisfaction and the three were on their way down to collect Lord and Lady Hawthorne and Sir Charles and Elizabeth before going on to the ballroom.
Harriet, with Phillip and Maria, was several steps behind the grandparents and Charles and Elizabeth, when she heard Phillip whisper, “Ask her.”
Maria touched Harriet’s arm, and spoke softly, tentatively. “Aunt Harriet. Phillip and I want to know—is Grandmother—or—or Uncle Quint—forcing you to leave Sedwick?”
Harriet stopped abruptly, and so did they.
“If they are, I swear I will never forgive them,” Phillip said, his jaw clenched.
“Nor will I,” Maria said.
Harriet stood so she faced them squarely. She could not lie to them. Not now. She settled on an evasion. “You must not think that. It—it is truly quite complicated, you see, what with the change in plans for your education and for the younger ones and—well—I need to be in London to do some research there—and everything just seemed to come down at once—don’t you see?”
They nodded—reluctantly, it seemed to her.
She gathered them into a group hug, wary of Phillip’s crutch, and said, “Come now. Big smiles. Balls are supposed to be full of gaiety.”
Maria clapped her hands in delight as they entered the ballroom, which had been transformed into a fairy-tale forest with potted trees and flowering shrubbery here and there. The dowager, in a maroon gown and headdress with tall maroon ostrich feathers, fussed at them as they arrived and immediately settled Phillip into place at the head of the receiving line, then herself, Quint, and Maria. Harriet knew Lady Margaret had wanted only herself and her dear “Quinton” in that line, but, she thought bitterly, We do not always get what we want, do we, milady? She took a seat on the sidelines, along with her Nana, Poppy, Charles, and Elizabeth, watching and visiting as the room filled up and the orchestra tuned their instruments. It would be some time before all the guests arrived, for besides her houseguests, the dowager had invited literally anybody who might have a claim to be somebody for miles around. Her grand ball was to be the social affair for—well, for this miserable year at least, as she had put it to Elizabeth. Looking out on the room as it filled up, Harriet and Elizabeth agreed that Lady Margaret had achieved her goal: a veritable squeeze.
When the dancing began, Phillip and Maria, as planned, joined Harriet, and Quint led his mother out for the first dance.
“I still wish I could dance,” Maria said wistfully.
“I know, love,” Harriet said. “But think what a shocker that would be. You are already the talk of the tabbies, just being here. Now go along, both of you. Mrs. Hodges is sending a special tray of goodies up to the nursery rooms just to celebrate your first ball.”
“I’ll wager that was your idea,” Maria said, kissing her aunt on the cheek.
“Never mind whose idea. It is there. Save me a piece of lemon cake.”
“All right.”
When Harriet looked up from seeing Phillip and Maria off, Quint was no longer dancing with his mother, but with Lady Barbara. She gave Elizabeth an inquiring look.
Elizabeth grinned. “You missed it! Right in the middle of the set, Lady Margaret grabbed Lady Barbara’s hand—she was standing on the edge of the dance floor—and put it on Quint’s arm—said something about dancing being for young people and sat down!”
“Is Lady Margaret ill?” Harriet asked in alarm.
“Does not seem to be. She was fanning herself, but not especially vigorously.”
“Hmm.” Harriet had no more comment than this.
However, Elizabeth did. “If you ask me, she is a bit too obvious in pushing that match.”
Harriet shrugged. “What will be will be.”
“You are in a strange mood, my girl. Come on. Cheer up. This is a ball. I shall have Charles dance with you.”
“No. Don’t,” Harriet said, then wished otherwise as she saw Sir Desmond Humphreys approach her as the orchestra was beginning the notes of the next dance. Botheration! It was a waltz! The man’s formal evening wear was as tight-fitting as his other clothing, and he seemed to be having some difficulty navigating his way through the crowd. As he got closer and started to speak, Harriet realized he was already quite gone for drink. Good heavens. He must have arrived here half drunk.
“M-may I have thish dance, Miss Mayfield?” he asked, his voice surprisingly clear, but for that one little stumble.
But carrying, Harriet noted with a cringe, as she also noted that others standing nearby were Quint, his mother, Lady Barbara, and Lord Beaconfield. “I am sorry, Sir Desmond, I am not feeling well at the moment. Perhaps a country dance later?” The thought of this man’s arms about her in a waltz was slightly nauseating.
“What? Think you’re too good to dance wit’ me? I’m not askin’ you to marry me—now.” He laughed the raucous laugh of a drunk delighted with his own joke, totally unaware that his audience did not share it.
Charles rose from where he had been sitting next to Elizabeth and took Humphreys by the elbow. “See here, my good man. The lady said no. A gentleman must simply accept that.”
Humphreys shook free and looked at Charles bleary-eyed. “Just who are you to be saying I’m no g-genulmun?”
At that moment Quint and his mother came closer, apparently to try to defuse the situation. Their movement caught Humphreys’s attention. He pointed a trembling finger accusingly at Lady Margaret.
“You,” he said. “Y-your la-ship—you told me—tol’ me—she’d accept my suit. But—but she didn’t.” He swallowed visibly and gave Harriet a hang-dog look. “Turned me down flat.”
The dowager looked stricken. “I never—! Oh, good heavens! Get him out of here before he creates any more of a scene!”
Quint signaled two servants to do just that, but Humphreys was not going easily by any means. He was not a big man, but his silk clothing was slippery and held together well under stress. He slid out of their grasp, and, breathing hard, turned his attention on Quint.
“And you, Burnes. What a fool you are! Have no idea you’ve a cuckoo in your nest, do you?”
Harriet held her breath. She knew exactly what was coming. She glanced at her grandfather, who stepped close to put a hand on her shoulder.
Quint said, “Humphreys, you are drunk. Now, let these fellows get you some food and some coffee and a place to lie down.”
By now this part of the ballroom commanded the attention of every living being in the room. Nevertheless, with a strong footman holding to either of his arms, Humphreys raised his voice even more. “You still do not know, do you, Burnes, that she owns those shares of Sedwick Mills—and all that other Sedwick debt as well?” His drunken laugh ended in a cough.
Harriet closed her eyes, but she was sure he made a dramatic picture in his black evening wear pointing his accusing finger at her. She sank her head against her grandfather’s chest. The old man’s arms tightened protectively about her as Quint moved closer to them.
“Is what he says true?” he asked quietly, holding her gaze steadily.
Harriet nodded, her cheek rubbing painfully against the metallic silver thread of her grandfather’s waistcoat.
“I see.” Quint’s voice was calm, detached. He turned and walked away.
The dowager stared at Harriet in utter surprise, then followed her son. Soon the orchestra picked up the melody of a popular dance and the floor was once again full of color and the sounds of a grand ball as Harriet and her family members quietly left the ballroom.
The next morning she broke her fast with the children in the nursery and she was determinedly cheerful in telling them goodbye and admonishing them to write her faithfully. She made a point of charging Miss Clarkson and Mr. Knightly with the extra duty of seeing to it that the twins and Sarah and even Elly supplied the teachers a missive for Aunt Harriet once a week—or else.
“Or else what?” Robby demanded. “You won’t be here.”
“Ah, but I have my secret agents willing to help me,” Harriet warned. “If I do not get my letters, Mrs. Hodges just might end up being too tired or too busy to make those ginger biscuits or lemon tarts you like so well.”
“No fair,” Robby wailed.
Harriet gave him a hug. “Just write to me, Robert. I want to know all about the latest adventures of Sir Gawain.”
“And Muffin?” Elly asked.
“And Muffin.” Harriet gave the eldest of the siblings direct looks. “Phillip, Maria, I will look forward especially to hearing from you. I know you will not let me down.”
“No, ma’am,” they said in unison.
Three hours later, the coaches had been loaded and she had said her goodbyes to servants with whom she had been in almost daily contact for months now, and intermittently for years before. But of the leading adults of Sedwick Hall, she had seen nothing this day. She told herself she regretted there had been no opportunity to clear the air with Quint before she left, but so be it. The man was angry. Perhaps he was hurt as well as angry. She was the last to go out to the waiting coach and as she started out the door, Chet detained her.
“Couldn’t let you get away without saying goodbye,” he said, offering his arm to walk her to the vehicle.
“Thank you,” she said. “It is nice to know there is at least one adult in this household who does not hate me.”
“Few as hates ye, lass. Quite the contrary, I’d say. Quite.”
“I did not mean this to happen, Chet. Not this way.”
“I know, lass. Unlike some I could name, I have read those bank documents—all of them. Eventually, this will all come out. You’ll see.”
“It will for Phillip—and for his earldom and what he can, in turn, do for the others. That was always the end that justified the means.”
He not only held her hand as she mounted the step into the coach, but held her gaze very directly. “I’m thinking there is much more of concern here than just young Phillip and his inheritance.”
“Chet—” she started to admonish.
He released her hand. “Just don’t do anything rash, lass. Don’t do anything rash. Give it time. It is not only the mills of the gods that grind exceeding slow.”
She smiled. “Goodbye, Chet.” Impulsively, she kissed him on the cheek before taking her seat next to her grandmother, who patted her hand and said, “Goodbyes are always so hard.”
* * * *
From an upstairs window overlooking the stable yard, Quint had observed that farewell kiss. “Damn and blast!” he muttered to himself. Why should he care that she so freely showed simple affection to another man? He found himself—hours later—still consumed by cold fury. Why had she not told him? Good God! She had sat in that mill office, heard Stevens recite those problems in detail—and she knew all along! Was it some kind of game? Was that it? A joke?
No, that did not make sense. The sort of cold, cynical calculation it would take to enjoy such a joke was simply not in the makeup of a woman who could be so protective of children’s feelings over such thing as, say, a gift to their grandmother. Or one so innocently generous in sharing her body. And she had been—both innocent and generous in the act, had she not? A virgin, for God’s sake! That was it, wasn’t it? She had shared her body with him. And all the while—he realized now—he had thought they were sharing something more. Was that it? He asked himself again, and came up with same answer and more. That was it. He knew for a certainty it was. There was more. He had fallen in love with Harriet Mayfield. Deeply, irrevocably, eternally in love. With Harriet. And she did not even trust him.
And beyond that, what did he have to offer a woman like Harriet Mayfield? As an ex-soldier, he had whatever his commission was worth when he sold out. That was it—and the distinction of being the Sedwick heir’s guardian for a few more years. After that scene with Humphreys at the ball, a few discreet questions among other guests had been highly revealing. Apparently even his mother had been ignorant as to the extent of Harriet’s wealth.
“Good heavens! Had I known—” But Lady Margaret left the rest unsaid, and Quint thought that was probably just as well.
“And what is more,” one of the lady guests said enviously, “as a woman, she has total control of that vast fortune. What woman gets that kind of power?”
He suddenly realized that his brother’s wife must have come to her marriage with at least a comfortable dowry. But not enough to keep Sedwick afloat. He needed to go over those books again—and those infernal bank documents. Chet had been at him about those. Which brought him back to thinking about Harriet again. God! How he wanted her. Yes, that luscious body, but beyond that the woman who laughed with him and at him, the woman who could kiss away a child’s tears and take Parliament to task because soldiers were sleeping in the rain in Spain. He wanted her. But she was forever out of his reach now. And that was that. Life was life. Get on with it.
He watched until the small group of coaches was out of sight.
Over the next three days the remaining houseguests left Sedwick Hall to move onto another such affair in another part of the kingdom, or to return to their own estates.
All but one.
“I have asked dear Barbara to stay on for a while and she has agreed until St. Nicholas Day in early December. Is that not wonderful news?” Lady Margaret announced at breakfast the second morning after the ball.
Quint smiled and murmured an appropriate welcome to Lady Barbara, who returned his smile and said brightly how very much she had enjoyed her stay so far. Quint glanced at Chet, who had the cheek to grin at him and wink.
Phillip and Maria, along with their respective teachers, had already left the breakfast table for the library or music room when the dowager made her momentous announcement. Quint wondered idly how they would react to it. Not that it mattered, but he had not seen Barbara around the nursery set at all, though he knew her to be the mother of a five-year-old son, heir to an earl. He remembered asking her at the picnic if she missed him.
She had looked at him, surprised. “Heavens, no. I know he is well cared for. That is all that matters. I prefer children beyond the ‘puling’ age,” she said with a laugh, “out of the schoolroom—or even university!” She had then assumed an ultra-shy demeanor. “Oh, dear. Now you will think me a terrible mother.”
He had shrugged. “Not necessarily.” He had drawn her attention to a peculiar cloud formation, and shortly afterward, he and Barbara had been on the fringes of that Snow White scene at his mother’s picnic.
Sometime after the other guests had left, Quint lay stretched out on the wicker couch in the morning room one afternoon, actually recalling how much both he and Harriet enjoyed this room, when his mother popped in on him.
“There you are,” she said. “No, don’t get up. You look too comfortable.”
“You were looking for me?”
“Earlier. Sylvia and Barbara and I went into Hendley shopping. We thought it would be nice to have you drive us.” She sat down in a chair that gave her face-to-face communication with her son. Quint silently thanked whatever gods had spared him that drive.
“Quinton, dear,” she began with a phrase that always put him instantly on alert. “You really should be a little more attentive to Barbara.”
He twisted his head on a large green and yellow pillow to look at her more directly. “Why? She is your guest, is she not?”
She leaned forward in her chair. “She is our guest, and I invited her for you. Well, to be honest, for you and for her.”
“Mother—” The word came out as a bit of a moan.
“It is time you married, and dear Barbara would be perfect for you. You would be perfect for each other.”
“You mean she would be perfect for you,” he said sourly. “Yes, Lady Margaret. No, Lady Margaret. I quite agree, Lady Margaret.”
“Don’t be mean-spirited. I admit that we get on quite well, but I should think it would be a definite plus if a prospective bride got on well with one’s mother.”
He yawned. “It might—if said ‘one’ were looking for a bride. I am not.”
“Don’t be obtuse, my dear. She is yours for the asking—surely you know that. Moreover, she is very rich. And you are not.”
“You mean her late husband, the Earl of Riverton, was very rich.”
“No, I mean she has a huge fortune.”
Quint snorted. “There was certainly no sign of such ten years ago when she insisted she had to hang out for a rich husband.”
His mother looked smug. “Ten years ago, that was true. But then she inherited from a bachelor uncle who doted on her and a rich husband who settled a huge amount on her when she gave birth to his son—not to mention an outrageously generous widow’s portion.”
“Well, good for her,” Quint said disinterestedly.
“Quinton! Can you not see: if you marry Barbara, we can buy back those notes!”
“We?”
She ignored him and rushed on. “We shall be free of those horrid Mayfield connections. Things will be as they were when life was good and beautiful.”