“Viscount Ravensberg to call upon Miss Edgeworth,” he said and stepped boldly into the hall.
It was to be easier than he had expected. Perhaps so few visitors were turned away on these at-home days that it did not even occur to the butler to carry the card upstairs first to ascertain that the lady was willing to receive him. Or perhaps the butler recognized his name as the sender of roses this morning and assumed his visit in person would be welcome. Or perhaps it had not occurred to Portfrey—as it doubtless would have to Anburey—to leave instructions that he was to be denied admittance if he called.
“Follow me, if you please, my lord,” the butler said with another bow before leading the way to the staircase.
The sound of voices engaged in polite conversation wafted from the drawing room as soon as a footman opened the doors at their approach. The butler stepped into the doorway.
“Viscount Ravensberg for Miss Edgeworth, your grace,” he announced.
An unnatural silence fell as Kit strode into the room. He recognized Sutton and Attingsborough in one swift glance about the room. And he saw too that Lauren Edgeworth, seated in the middle of a group close to the window, was rising to her feet, a look of astonishment on her face. A handsome lady of regal bearing—despite the visible evidence that she was breeding—was hurrying toward him, her right hand outstretched, a smile of polite welcome on her face. Kit bowed to her.
“Your grace,” he said and took her offered hand in his.
“Lord Ravensberg. How delightful.” If she was shocked at his appearance in her drawing room or chagrined with her butler for allowing him up without question, she was too well bred to show it.
“Ravensberg?” The Duke of Portfrey, whom Kit knew by sight, had come to stand beside his duchess. He was rather more poker-faced than she.
“I have come to pay my respects to Miss Edgeworth. She was gracious enough to dance with me last evening,” Kit explained. The room, he was aware, was half filled with visitors. Most of them were still gaping at him rather as if Portfrey’s butler had just committed the faux pas of ushering the chimney sweep into their presence. This moment, he suspected, would be discussed with some relish in a few more drawing rooms before the afternoon was out.
Miss Edgeworth came toward him herself, then, and the duke and duchess returned their attention to their other visitors. Those same guests had recovered their manners and were resuming their interrupted conversations.
“How kind of you to call, my lord,” she said. “Thank you for the roses. They are exquisite.”
If the roses were in front of her face at that particular moment, he thought, they would surely freeze upon their stems, her gaze was so cold.
“It was not merely the reflection of your gown, then,” he said softly, dipping his head a little closer to hers. “Today you wear green, but your eyes are still unmistakably violet.” She looked every bit as lovely as she had last evening even though her dark, glossy hair was dressed with a great deal more simplicity today.
She showed not the slightest pleasure in the implied compliment.
“Do have a seat, my lord,” she said with gracious condescension—a stranger would surely have mistaken her for the duchess. She turned and indicated an empty chair in the midst of the crowd of young people among whom she had been sitting. “I shall fetch you a cup of tea.”
When she took her place again, he noticed that she sat very straight, her spine not quite touching the back of her chair. She launched into conversation about music, and a spirited discussion of various composers and the relative merits of different solo musical instruments followed.
Kit did not attempt to participate but amused himself by observing the other members of the group. His appearance had obviously discomposed several of them. The red-haired Lady Wilma Fawcitt was looking prunish, Sutton haughty, Attingsborough watchful and faintly amused. The skeletal young man whose name had escaped Kit for the moment was looking irritated, George Stennson openly hostile. Miss Edgeworth seemed the only one who was serenely unaware of his very existence. Kit sipped his tea.
“Miss Edgeworth,” he said at last, taking advantage of a brief lull in the conversation, “would you allow me the honor of driving you to the park in my curricle later this afternoon?”
He was gazing directly at her and so was fully aware of the momentary widening of her lovely eyes and parting of her lips. The next moment she was looking coolly back at him, her expression politely bland. He was sure she was about to refuse him. Perhaps he had proceeded too precipitously. How would he win his wager if she said no?
“Oh, I say,” the skeletal, still unidentified young man said indignantly, “I came to ask the same favor, Miss Edgeworth, but thought to do the correct thing and wait until I could speak privately with you when I took my leave. I was here before Viscount Ravensberg,” he added feebly.
Kit raised his eyebrows. “I do beg your pardon,” he said. “Did I do the incorrect thing? Having spent so many years of my adult life away from England, I must confess myself unsure of the finer points of etiquette.” With his eyes he laughed at Lauren Edgeworth.
“Oh, I say!” The anonymous gentleman sounded distinctly uncomfortable. “I did not mean to imply—”
“I believe,” Attingsborough said smoothly, “it might have been for this afternoon that you and I made our appointment to drive to the library together, Lauren. You will refresh my memory if I am wrong.”
“Sutton has quite set his heart on taking you and me for a turn in his new barouche after tea, Lauren,” Lady Wilma said with a toss of her red curls. She tittered. “I am quite counting on you to act as my chaperone.”
Kit continued to smile into Lauren Edgeworth’s violet eyes, which had not wavered from his own. There was not the faintest suggestion of an answering smile there.
She looked away. “No, you are wrong, Joseph,” she said. “It was not for today. And you certainly do not need a chaperone when riding in an open carriage with your betrothed, Wilma. Perhaps some other day, Mr. Bartlett-Howe? Thank you, Lord Ravensberg. That would be very pleasant.”
He had the other members of the group to thank, of course, Kit realized as he rose to take his leave. He was quite certain she had been going to refuse him until they had all rushed in so gallantly to rescue her from the horror of being obliged to drive out with a notorious rakehell. She might be cold and imperturbably self-contained, his intended bride, but she was not immune to a challenge.
It was an intriguing thought.
“Until later, then, Miss Edgeworth,” he said, bowing to her, nodding affably to the group at large, and then strolling across the room to take his leave of the Duchess of Portfrey.
He grinned as he ran down the steps outside the house a few minutes later and summoned his tiger, who was walking the horses about the square. Breaching the formidable defenses of Miss Lauren Edgeworth was going to be a challenge worthy of his best efforts. He must hope, perhaps, that all her relatives and friends would come to his assistance by persistently warning her against him and attempting to shield her from him—the idiots.
But for a while at least later in the afternoon he would have her all to himself.
Lauren sat straight-backed beside Viscount Ravensberg, holding her parasol over her head with both hands to shield her complexion from the harmful rays of the sun. She was unaccustomed to riding in a sporting curricle, and she felt very far above the ground and alarmingly unsafe. But it would be unladylike to show a lack of trust in the skill of the gentleman plying the ribbons by clinging to the rail beside her.
The gloved hands that held the ribbons were slim. They were also demonstrably capable of controlling his high-spirited and perfectly matched pair of grays. His legs, encased in tight, biscuit-colored pantaloons and supple, highly polished Hessian boots, were slender but shapely and well muscled in all the right places.