“My point, I think,” said Arabella. “You’d best be going.”
Turnip still didn’t look convinced, but he nodded anyway. “You go in this door. I’ll take the other.” He indicated another door into the ballroom, farther down the balcony. “Wouldn’t want to give Danforth ammunition.”
“I thought the dowager was planning to do just that,” said Arabella lightly, but Turnip didn’t smile. “Turnip?”
Something was bothering him. He cocked his head to one side and shifted from one foot to another, opened his mouth to say something, thought better of it, closed it again, narrowed his eyes in an expression of great concentration, shook his head, and finally gave up.
“Oh, bother it,” he said, then grabbed her by the shoulders and kissed her.
Having made up his mind, there was nothing the least bit tentative about Turnip’s kiss. One minute Arabella was peaceably standing beside the balustrade; the next she was half bent over the balustrade, clinging to Turnip’s neck for dear life, while little specks of light exploded against the back of her eyelids like the royal fireworks during a particularly rousing performance of the Hallelujah chorus.
Arabella gave a silent hallelujah of her own, wrapped her arms more firmly around his neck, and kissed him back. Through the open ballroom door, she could hear violins playing, singing out a high, sweet strain.
“I’ve been wanting to do that all evening,” said Turnip with satisfaction, setting her back on her feet. He thought about it for a moment. “All week, actually.”
“Oh,” said Arabella, which was about the most she could manage. Her knees didn’t seem to want to work properly anymore. She held on to Turnip’s shoulders for balance. She blinked up at him, searching for the scattered remains of her wits. “You waited until now?”
Turnip grinned and butted his nose against hers. “Sorry. Bad timing.”
“You could say that,” agreed Arabella, although the word “bad” no longer really had a place in her lexicon. That had been quite good, actually. More than good. Would spectacular be going too far?
“Fitzhugh... ,” drawled Danforth.
“I could learn to dislike that man,” said Arabella.
“I already have.” Dropping one last kiss on the top of her head, Turnip released her and stepped back. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. Don’t do anything reckless.”
“Mmmph,” said Arabella. It seemed like a perfectly reasonable response at the time.
Arabella floated back into the ballroom on a wave of euphoria, sparing one last glance for the shadowy balcony behind her, with its broad stone balustrade and ornamental urns.
So that’s what a balustrade is for, she thought, and experienced a very silly urge to giggle.
Inside, the ballroom looked more like a scene of an impromptu siege than a country dance. Red-faced squires were lovingly loading ancient fowling pieces, while the young bucks nonchalantly dangled expensive dueling pistols from gloved fingertips. The musicians were packing up their instruments, carting them away to make room for the London musicians who were to take their places for the following night’s far larger and grander ball. In the center of the room, where the dancing had been, Martin Frobisher and Percy Ponsonby were comparing the size of their pistols, Frobisher insisting that his was bigger. Freddy Staines, red-faced from windburn, was called in as referee.
Arabella wondered if her face had the same telltale flush. Probably. But she couldn’t bring herself to care. She couldn’t seem to stop smiling. She smiled at the old gentlemen sifting powder into their muskets, at the musicians hauling away their stands, at the young daughters of the local gentry, with their unfashionably long curls and last seasons’ clothes, goggling at the magnificence of the London gentlemen in their tight breaches and extravagant cravats.
One smiled back at her, shyly, and then quickly ducked her head. Arabella realized, with amusement, that they had marked her down as one of the London ladies, grand and full of her own consequence. Her heart was too full to mind.
A few feet away, Lady Charlotte Lansdowne, the duchess’s granddaughter, was attempting to explain the martial preparations to the new duke, who was looking with a distinctly unenthusiastic eye at the firearms being paraded around what was, at least in theory, his ballroom.
“It’s an old country tradition,” Lady Charlotte was saying, in that earnest way of hers. “On Epiphany Eve, the gentlemen gather round the biggest tree on the estate — or at least the most convenient big tree — to scare away the evil spirits.”
The Duke of Dovedale, who was more a stranger in his own home than most of his guests, looked dubious at the prospect. “How does one go about doing that?”
Lord Henry Innes clapped him on the shoulder in passing. “You shoot them, man. What else?”
He was a big, bruising man, Lord Henry, with thick features and a pugilist’s physique. There was an air of barely suppressed physicality about him.
It would have been ridiculously easy for him to haul her back into the bushes. But once there, Arabella couldn’t see him resorting to the refinement of a knife, or the subtlety of threats. Those large hands would have fit far too easily around her throat.
Behind Lord Henry, Turnip jerked his head to the side like a bird having an epileptic fit.
Arabella made an inquisitive face.
Turnip mimed something. If they had been playing charades, Arabella would have guessed “squirrel.” Or maybe “chipmunk.” “Stealthy chipmunk”? Ah, right. Stealthy chipmunk appeared to be aimed at Lord Henry’s back. In other words, Turnip was going to shadow Lord Henry while they were outside.
It was gallant and absurd and probably pointless. Arabella looked across at her very own Don Quixote, all pleased at his own cleverness, and felt such a rush of affection that it was a wonder that they couldn’t light the ballroom with it.
“Arabella.” It took a few moments for the name to filter through to Arabella’s consciousness. She was too busy beaming at Turnip like an idiot. Or a woman in love. Which, when one thought about it, were probably much the same thing. “Arabella.”
The name-caller sounded distinctly displeased at having to repeat himself.
It was with the utmost reluctance that Arabella dragged her attention away from Turnip and forced herself to focus on Captain Musgrave, who was buzzing away, like a particularly large fly, somewhere in the vicinity of his left shoulder.
She looked at him and felt... nothing. Not make-believe nothing, the sort of nothing one pretended to salve a wounded pride, but genuine nothing.
“Yes?” she said.
Captain Musgrave was still sulking over having been ignored. “Your aunt was looking for you,” he said.
Musgrave looked at her gravely, waiting for an explanation, an apology. Once, Arabella might have felt duty-bound to provide one, to justify her dereliction. But the world had changed.
“Where is my aunt?” she asked lightly.
It wasn’t what he had been expecting. “Upstairs,” he said brusquely. “In her room.” In a belated attempt to recover the ground he had lost, he added, “She’ll be wanting to see you.”
That was pure nonsense. The only things Aunt Osborne wanted to see after a party were her maid and a large glass of ratafia.
“I’ll take you to her,” volunteered her new uncle.
Arabella dodged his outstretched arm. “I’ll go to her by and by,” she hedged. “Excuse me.”
Captain Musgrave moved to block her. “She wants to talk to you now. About your behavior. With Fitzhugh.”
Arabella’s serene expression was beginning to crack around the edges. “My behavior,” she said dangerously, “is no longer my aunt’s concern. Or yours.”
Musgrave’s mouth opened, but whatever he had been about to say was drowned out by an exuberant cry of “To the tree!” that seemed to rattle the very chandeliers on their chains.
“To the tree! The Epiphany tree!” was taken up all around the room.