A Crime of Manners (7 page)

“Good evening, Lady Fuddlesby. I pray you and that delightful fellow Knight are in good health?” he asked pleasantly. Brummell loved animals, so he looked with fondness upon someone who doted on her cat as Lady Fuddlesby did.

“Oh, you are too kind, dear sir! We are both well. May I present my niece, Miss Henrietta Lanford?”

In a carrying voice Brummell replied, “Miss Lanford, I am delighted to make the acquaintance of such a refreshing example of English womanhood. Would you honor me with this dance?”

Henrietta blushed to the roots of her hair. She rose and walked out onto the dance floor with Beau Brummell.

Their dance together caused yet another sensation. Observing Society’s interest in Miss Lanford and the Duke of Winterton, Lady Denby felt happily her ball would be the talk of London for days.

Henrietta thought Mr. Brummell was very much the gentleman. He teased her with amusing stories about various members of the assembled company, putting her at ease. She did not know what inspired his generosity but was grateful to him for bestowing his attention on her, and performed her part in the dance with style.

When the dance was over, they promenaded around the room, and just as Brummell was leading her back to Lady Fuddlesby, Henrietta turned to look up at him, a solemn expression on her face. “Sir, I most sincerely thank you for your kindness.”

Well pleased, Brummell spread it about Miss Lanford’s charming face matched a charming disposition. Fickle Society grew convinced the Duke of Winterton had played some kind of mischievous trick on them, and Miss Lanford was quite justified in her set-down of him.

The duke observed Brummell and Miss Lanford’s dance with a measure of relief. He felt the responsibility of bringing her into fashion lifted from his shoulders.

Now Henrietta did not lack for partners. Still smarting, she refused to look in the Duke of Winterton’s direction. However, this resolve perversely made necessary a constant need to know his whereabouts, so she might look the other way.

While she began to wonder where Lord Baddick was, that gentleman entered the ballroom in happy ignorance of all that had transpired in his absence. He had spent the early part of the evening in the arms of a dashing young widow, Lady Hoare. Her appetite in the bedroom proved voracious and she had been loath to release him from her clutches.

Therefore, it was a somewhat weary Lord Baddick who hastened forward to Henrietta, at Lady Fuddlesby’s side. “You are breathtaking this evening, Miss Lanford,” he declared, raising her gloved hand to his lips. “I am come to claim my dance.” He held out his arm to her and she accepted it, eyes sparkling up at him.

“With pleasure, my lord. I began to think you had forgotten your promise when you were so late in arriving.”

“Never! I was delayed helping a friend in need.”

Lord Baddick’s presence and compliments did much to restore Henrietta’s spirits. She would not care what the duke thought of her.

It was the supper dance and Henrietta, despite her resolve not to care two straws for the duke, felt compelled to fill Lord Baddick’s sympathetic ears with the tale of the duke’s perfidious behavior and Mr. Brummell’s subsequent rescue.

Lord Baddick spoke passionately. “Shall I call Winterton out, Miss Lanford? You have only to say the word.” He felt secure in making this rash statement, knowing Miss Lanford would never agree to it.

“Oh, no, my lord!” She swiftly denied him. But the Fantasy Henrietta indulged in a gratifying dream in which the two handsome men fought a duel over the slur to her name. Then she brought herself back to reality with a sharp self-admonition not to think of the duke as handsome after what he had done.

The dance ended and Lord Baddick led her to a place at one of the long tables in the supper room. He filled a plate for her and one for himself, then signaled a footman for champagne. Henrietta placed a little bit of everything from her plate on her fork, as was the custom. She had never tasted champagne and, sipping the wine cautiously, found it pleasing.

“Have you seen much of London since your shopping expedition?” asked Lord Baddick, making polite conversation while his hazel eyes stripped her naked. He noted with growing anticipation her innocence was in sharp contrast to the charms of Lady Hoare.

“No, Lady Fuddlesby and I have been busy with my wardrobe and have kept quite at home.”

She glanced to the head of the table where the Duke of Winterton was seated next to the blonde he had been dancing with. It seemed to Henrietta the top half of the lady’s gown was missing, it was cut so low. She then dropped her startled gaze back to her plate when her eyes met the duke’s cool gaze regarding her steadily.

At the duke’s end of the table, Clorinda’s next dancing partner presented himself, much to the lady’s annoyance, and took her away. Colonel Colchester seated himself next to his godson, looking after Clorinda with a faint air of distaste.

“My boy, you have still not given Miss Lanford your apology. I know she behaved a bit too spiritedly when you approached her, but can one blame her?”

“Good manners must always override one’s emotions,” Winterton replied stiffly, forgetting that when he’d vented his frustrations in front of Lord Kramer, he committed the very crime of manners he now claimed to deplore.

At his godfather’s frown, he sighed with an air of resignation. “You are right, sir, in that the lady is due an apology, much as it rankles me. How was I to know that prancing fool Kramer would make a piece of work over nothing? And what is Miss Lanford doing with an ugly customer like Baddick?”

The colonel glanced down the table curiously. “Why, what’s wrong with him?”

“It is not generally known, but I happen to be aware of Baddick’s unsavory exploits when it comes to women.” With a speculative look he continued, “I wonder that he has resorted to seducing virgins. There was a story going around after Christmas. I cannot bring it to mind and will have to inquire,” the duke finished, and then wondered why he should concern himself with Miss Lanford’s suitor.

Colonel Colchester rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he wondered the very same thing.

In the ballroom, Lord Baddick escorted Henrietta to Lady Fuddlesby, saying, “Miss Lanford, I beg you will promise me another dance.” Then, dropping his voice, he discreetly whispered in her ear, “I wish I might have a thousand dances with you!”

Henrietta wondered why the feel of his breath on her ear did not affect her as ardently as such things always did the heroines in novels. She attributed this lack of feeling on her part to the unusual circumstances of the evening. “Yes, my lord,” she replied, and curtsied.

Standing next to Lady Fuddlesby, Henrietta could hear her aunt speaking with Lady Cowper regarding vouchers for Almack’s. “And Miss Lanford’s mother’s mother was...”

Henrietta prevented herself from squirming under the skeptical Lady Cowper’s stare.

When the duke and Colonel Colchester approached, Henrietta felt the familiar telltale blush heat her cheeks. Winterton’s nearness released uncomfortable emotions in her.

The duke, cool and aloof, introduced his godfather. Colonel Colchester was happy to finally be presented to Lady Fuddlesby, whom he privately termed a sweet-looking treat.

Winterton studied the card dangling from Henrietta’s wrist. “Miss Lanford, how fortunate I am to find you free for the next dance. I thought I might have to wait until next Wednesday night at Almack’s to secure the pleasure of dancing with you,” he finished, glancing meaningfully at Lady Cowper. That lady nodded her acquiescence, and a smothered exclamation of delight came from Lady Fuddlesby.

Annoyed at his high-handed intervention on her behalf with Lady Cowper and his examination of her dance card, Henrietta said in a falsely apologetic voice, “Your Grace, I fear the next dance is a waltz and I have not been granted permission to dance it.”

The duke could hardly believe his ears. Was Miss Lanford trying to sidestep his invitation? No lady had ever been anything less than thrilled at his escort. He stood cold and austere.

Into the awkward silence that followed, Lady Cowper pronounced, “You have my approval, Miss Lanford.”

Outwitted, Henrietta turned to Lady Fuddlesby, but she would get no help from that quarter since her ladyship’s face was wreathed in smiles at the turn of events. Henrietta had no choice but to allow the duke to lead her to the dance floor.

Joining the other couples prepared to begin the dance, she said, hesitantly, “I feel I must warn you I have never performed the steps of the waltz, other than with my governess, Biddles. She would not allow my dancing master to instruct me, feeling it improper.”

“That is quite all right, Miss Lanford, you are safe with me,” he said condescendingly.

She let out an unladylike snort. “Yes, indeed, Your Grace, just think of how well you have treated me in the short time we have known one another.”

The duke ignored this sally. He moved close to her, slipping a gloved hand around her waist while his other hand held hers in a firm grasp.

Henrietta suddenly had difficulty breathing. She felt tiny sparks of energy radiating from their clasped hands up her arm, and the place where the duke’s hand touched her waist burned. Fighting an intolerable desire to arch herself into his arms, she instructed herself to no longer be attracted to the duke in light of his contemptible behavior.

Watching from the side of the dance floor, Lady Clorinda viciously pinched her mama’s arm, wringing a yelp from Lady Mawbly. “I wanted the duke to dance the waltz with me,” she whispered fiercely. “He has already drawn enough attention to that country nobody.”

Jewels clinking, Lady Mawbly turned to her daughter and said, “I am certain he is only doing it to stop the gossip, my pet. Why, you have only to look at Miss Lanford’s inadequate frame to know she could never compete with you.”

Clorinda vainly acknowledged this truth and positioned her bosom in the duke’s direction in case he chanced to look her way.

When the music began, the duke, at first slowly, then as he sensed Henrietta’s growing confidence, expertly, led her through the steps. Soon she swirled around the room in his arms. She had done so before, in her imagination, but the feeling it evoked was not equal to the variety of foreign sensations her body was now experiencing here in actuality.

Really, thought the duke, Lady Fuddlesby has done wonders with the chit. And those eyes, he did not recall they were so very blue. Her tiny waist made one feel protective. He pressed his lips together at the thought of her earlier humiliation.

“Miss Lanford,” he nobly began his apology, “I fear someone took a carelessly uttered word from me and used it to amuse his friends. I hope you have forgotten the matter.”

The duke’s words effectively broke the spell Henrietta had fallen under in his arms. All in that moment, she realized that the duke’s demeanor did not imply a reserved nature as she had naively believed after their previous meetings. The Duke of Winterton suffered from an excess of conceit and pride!

“Was that intended as an apology, Your Grace?” she said. The eyes the duke had just been silently admiring now glittered. “If so, I find it sadly lacking.”

The duke looked down his nose at the girl in his arms.

“Miss Lanford, allow me to impart a piece of brotherly advice. If you will be going about in Society, you must learn something of the conventions.  When a gentleman asks a lady to dance and then apologizes for an unpleasant occurrence, a lady accepts the apology graciously.”

Henrietta chafed at the word “brotherly.” Her feelings for him had not run along those lines. “It appears to me that a gentleman would take responsibility for his words and not try to foist the blame of their consequences onto someone else,” she lectured.

The duke gritted his teeth. With a sinking feeling, he realized she was correct. It was past bearing, but his sense of honor came to the fore.

“Very well, Miss Lanford, I own myself at fault and ask your forgiveness. My churlish words were spoken in anger without any forethought.”

At her puzzled frown, he went on, his usual air of hauteur gone for the moment.

“You see, I have been pursued for my title and fortune this age by many ladies and then- mamas. It appeared at our meeting at Lady Fuddlesby’s this was once again the case. I grow weary of the game and directed my distaste at you unjustly.”

He quietly uttered the words she realized she most wanted to hear. “The feminine beauty I see before me is the strongest argument that my regrettable comparison of you to a horse could not possibly be further from the truth.” His gray eyes turned silver for a moment, and Henrietta caught her breath.

Her own pride made her lie, “You may be easy, your grace, in that I have entertained no notions of attracting your attentions.”

He smiled indulgently at what he believed a patent falsehood. Every miss of marriageable age wished to attract his attention. “Then we shall forget the matter.”

She began to think he might have some understanding after all.

This feeling was dashed by the duke’s next words.

“I observe you have taken up with the Viscount Baddick. I feel it my duty to warn you he is not what he seems.” He spoke in the commanding air one might use when addressing a child.

He felt Henrietta stiffen and then move to break from his grasp. He tightened his hold on her. “Oh no, Miss Lanford, you will not flare up and bring another scene upon our heads this evening.”

“You are insufferable, sir,” she responded with some heat. “I do not know what you can mean when you say I have ‘taken up with’ Lord Baddick. And I assure you, not that it is at all your concern, and that he has behaved as a gentleman.”

Henrietta ruined this biting speech by throwing her head back defiantly, causing them both to lose their footing. With a quickness on his feet that could be credited to regular efforts at Gentleman Jackson’s, the duke adeptly righted them.

Fortunately for the two combatants, the dance ended. Winterton gladly escorted Henrietta back to Lady Fuddlesby. With a chilly bow, he took himself off to the card room for the rest of the evening, much to the dismay of several ladies present, not the least of whom was Lady Clorinda.