"Ooh, you do look a picture, miss," she said in admiration.
Henry smiled grimly back and headed for the door. "Time to go down to the drawing room. The receiving line will be forming soon, I suppose," she said.
As she reached the door, it opened from the other side and Lady Tallant came in. "Henrietta, my dear," she gushed, the plumes in her hair nodding in approval, "you look remarkably pretty. Do let us hasten downstairs. We must not keep the earl and countess waiting."
Henry hardly admitted to herself as she followed her sister-in-law meekly down the stairs that she felt a little nervous. Not that she cared a fig for dancing, of course, or for the opinions of all the people who would be coming to look her over. But 'she did wonder if the Duke of Eversleigh really would put in an appearance and what type of man this was that she was supposed to lure into a proposal. She did not feel any doubts about her own success if only the man would not neglect to come.
She was feeling quite anxious an hour and a half later. She had been standing in the receiving line with the Earl and Countess of Lambert, the Honorable Althea, Sir Peter and Lady Marian, shaking hands with and curtsying to so many people that she was convinced that her right hand must be swollen to twice its normal size and that the smile on her face must be frozen there forever. She was thoroughly sick of answering impertinent questions from all the old tabbies and of being ogled by the young bucks and sized up critically by the young ladies. But when she and Althea were told that they could leave the line and begin the dancing, the Duke of Eversleigh had still not arrived.
An hour later, it seemed that Henry was destined to be a moderate success. Although she had not attracted the attention of any important member of the ton, she had been partnered for all dances except one, and that one was a waltz. Knowing that this was her first ball, the gentlemen tactfully left her on the sidelines, realizing that she would not yet have been granted permission to waltz by any of the patronesses of Almack's. It would have been death to any girl's social reputation to waltz until such approval had been given. The older ladies and chaperones who lined the walls of the ballroom (those, that is, who had not retired to the card room) looked on her, if not with open friendliness, at least with tolerance. Two of them, it is true, had commented on the deplorable color of her skin.
"Foreign blood, you may be sure," one of them said.
"Or else she has been exposed to the sun," the other suggested.
"Surely not," said the first. "Her brother, Sir Peter Tallant, is a most gentlemanly man."
"I hear she has only recently arrived in town," the second continued. "I do believe she has some freckles, too.
The other drew herself erect and regarded Henry with piercing disapproval. She looked offended that she had been invited to the come-out of a sunburned, freckled girl.
Henry was accepting a glass of lemonade from a very linen pleasant-faced young man, when Althea, who had been standing close by, grabbed her suddenly by the arm and caused her to spill some of the liquid down the front of her gown.
"Oh, I am frightfully sorry, Henrietta!" she apologized, dabbing ineffectively at the lace with her gloved hands. "He's here, Henrietta. What am I to do?" She turned her back to the doorway of the ballroom, trying to appear inconspicuous.
Henry stared with open curiosity at the man who stood in the doorway. She was hardly encouraged by what she saw. The man was tall and gracefully slim, though there was a disturbing suggestion of strength about his shoulders and chest. He had a disconcertingly strong and handsome face. His coat and knee breeches were unrelieved black, his linen a crisp and sparkling white. He looked completely unself-conscious, though his arrival had caused a very noticeable stir among the gathered company. He was surveying the guests unhurriedly through a quizzing glass. The word impossible had never been part of Henry's vocabulary, but she had a funny feeling in the pit of her stomach that winning her wager was going to be the biggest challenge of her life.
As she (and the majority of the assembled guests) watched, the Countess of Lambert swept up to the duke and took his arm in a gesture of deliberate familiarity. He lowered his glass and looked at her from beneath sleepy eyelids.
Henry's stomach became decidedly queasy as the two figures came closer. She could almost understand why Althea was so afraid of this man. The countess was quite unconcerned with the presence of Henry and her young swain. She was intent only on presenting her cousin to her daughter and seeing them partnered for the next dance, a quadrille. For her, this was the coup of the Season. The success of her daughter was now assured.
Eversleigh danced with two more partners, each a young and flustered debutante. The boredom and cynicism of his expression did not change as his partners blushed and fluttered and giggled through the experience of dancing with the most eligible and most elusive bachelor in London.
Oliver Cranshawe, who had emerged from the card room in time to witness this extraordinary behavior of his cousin, moved gradually closer to Suzanne Broughton, who was not dancing, but who was surrounded by her usual court of admirers.
"So, my dear Suzanne," he commented when her attention moved his way, "you are being upstaged tonight?"
"Upstaged?" she queried, viewing him with hauteur. "Whatever do you mean, Oliver?"
"I see that Marius is eyeing all the little girls," he said, smiling charmingly, as if he had just complimented her on her gown.
She laughed airily. "Poor Marius!" she tittered. "He has been afflicted with a case of family duty, Oliver. Althea is his cousin, you know."
"Really?" he drawled. "It is surely the first case of its kind that I have ever known. He could not be dangling after a wife, could he?"
"Don't be ridiculous, Oliver," Suzanne said more sharply than she had intended. "Can you imagine Marius with a young girl? He would die of boredom in a fortnight."
"That sure of yourself, are you, Suzanne?" Cranshawe asked, a glint of something unpleasant in his eyes. "I think we had better keep a close eye on his Grace, my dear. We do have a common interest in the matter after all, do we not?"
She did not pretend to misunderstand him, though she did not reply. She turned her attention back to the group of gentlemen who were still waiting in the vicinity.
Eversleigh returned his second partner to her chaperone and stood alone close to the doorway. He looked as if lie would dearly love to escape, Henry thought as she too stood momentarily alone at the other side of the ballroom. In fact, she was very much afraid that he would escape soon and that she would have lost perhaps her only chance to meet him within the time period of her wager. She did not know how to attract his attention. She had considered asking the countess or Althea to introduce them, but that seemed too brazen even for her. But something had to be done fast.
As she pondered the problem, a young gentleman with whom she had already danced once asked her to partner him in the next dance, too. She gave him a brilliant smile.
"It is so kind of you to ask," she said, "but I am afraid I have already promised the next one. Perhaps later? And excuse me, please. I must go to the ladies' room."