"Congratulations on your marriage, Stoneridge." Neil filled two glasses from the decanter on the table. "Is Lady Stoneridge also in town?"
Whom did he think he'd seen in the Fisherman's Rest? Sylvester wondered as he said, "Yes, indeed, she is. Her mother and sisters are here, also."
"Not all under your roof, I trust," Neil said with a laugh. "A man can't call his soul his own with a monstrous regiment of women at his table."
Sylvester smiled faintly at this sally. "Lady Belmont has her own establishment on Brook Street."
"I shall do myself the honor of calling upon Lady Stoneridge,"
Neil said. "I assume she'll be attending the Subscription Ball at Almack's this evening."
"Yes, with her mother and sisters." Sylvester sipped claret, leaning back in his chair, legs crossed, his eyes resting placidly on his companion across the table.
"I thought I'd drop in myself," Neil said. "Show m' face, you know. I've only just come to town."
"I thought I hadn't seen you," Sylvester said deliberately. Did he imagine the twitch of Neil's eyelid? But his companion was continuing in the same hearty tone.
"You must dine with me, Sylvester. It's been a long time since we dined together."
"At least three years," Sylvester agreed without expression.
"Good… good. Shall we say Thursday?" Neil's flat brown eyes shifted, although his mouth smiled.
"I should be honored."
"Good. Half Moon Street at eight, shall we say? And a few hands of whist after. You were always a formidable opponent at the whist table."
"You exaggerate," Sylvester said, with the same placid smile.
"You're not thinking of dropping in at the Assembly Rooms yourself tonight?"
"I hadn't been," Sylvester responded.
"It's a trifle insipid, of course," Neil agreed. "But one must be seen, mustn't one?" He laughed, but his eyes shifted again. "I don't suppose you'd care to accompany me?"
If he entered Almack's at the height of a Subscription Ball in the company of Neil Gerard, his rehabilitation would be complete. Just what in the devil's name was the man up to? But if he didn't play along, he'd never discover.
"Why not?" he said casually. "I'll have to go home and change." He gestured to Neil's satin knee britches, striped stockings, and white waistcoat.
"Then I'll meet you here later and we can stroll across together."
Sylvester nodded his agreement and took his leave after another five minutes of desultory chat. As he left the salon, a few hands were raised in greeting. He responded with a bow, but his cool smile couldn't disguise the ironical glitter in his eye. Two old friends had publicly made up their quarrel; how very satisfying for the audience.
But the game was now in the open, and he had an enemy he could see. And an enemy he knew he could defeat His heart lifted on a surge of jubilation. He knew Neil Gerard's weaknesses as if they were his own. He'd known them from childhood. And within those weaknesses lay the answer to Vimiera.
The two of them arrived at Almack's Assembly Rooms just five minutes before the doors were closed at eleven o'clock.
They strolled up the stairs and entered the ballroom. Lady Sefton was the first of the patronesses to see them and came gliding over. "Lord Stoneridge, your wife has made quite an impression on us all," she declared, raising her lorgnette and subjected him to a piercing scrutiny. "Quite an unusual young woman, we find. Captain Gerard. You've just come to town."
Both men bowed since neither of her Ladyship's statements required a response.
Sylvester's eyes searched for his wife. She was waltzing with a gentleman of middle height, his appearance distinguished by his silver eyebrows and the matching silver flashes at his temples. There was an indefinable aura of authority about him, but he and Theo seemed to be engaged in a most earnest conversation, enlivened by glimpses of Theo's mischievous smile and the enthusiastic glow in her eyes.
She was wearing a simple gown of bronze silk over a half slip of cream lace, a costume that, despite her own lack of interest in her wardrobe, was in the first style of elegance. But they had Lady Belmont to thank for that, he thought with a half smile. The Stoneridge topaz necklace was clasped at her throat, delicate matching studs glimmered in her ears, and her hair was drawn into a heavy knot at her nape, with artful ringlets drifting over her ears.
It was an old-fashioned hairstyle, but it was the perfect foil for her gamine face and those great pansy-blue eyes. And when he took the pins out later, that raven's-wing cascade would serve as the most erotic nightgown.
"You must make me known to Lady Stoneridge," Neil said casually, putting an abrupt stop to Sylvester's unruly train of thought. "Oh, there's Garsington, signaling to us. I've been meaning to ask him what he fancies at Harringay next week. You know how reliable he is when it comes to form."
Sylvester allowed himself to be ushered across the room to where the viscount and his cronies stood gathered. Their reaction to the sight of him with Gerard was the same as the men's at White's. Surprise followed by confusion followed by hasty rearrangement of expression into one of casually friendly greeting.
Theo broke off in the middle of her conversation with Nathaniel, Lord Praed, and almost stopped in the middle of the dance floor.
"Is something the matter, Lady Stoneridge?" Lord Praed, never much of a dancer, nearly tripped over her suddenly slowed feet.
"Oh, no… no, I do beg your pardon. Did I trip you up? It's just that my husband's arrived."
"A matter for astonishment, clearly." He raised a silver eyebrow.
Theo looked self-conscious and said awkwardly, "Well, yes it is. He doesn't care for such occasions, you should understand."
"Oh, I do," Lord Praed said immediately. "Both understand and sympathize. I detest them myself."
Theo looked up at him. "How very ungallant of you, sir. And there was I thinking I was keeping you tolerably amused."
Lord Praed laughed. "Ma'am, I can safely say I have never had such an entertaining discussion on the subject of fertilizers with anyone."
Theo chuckled, but it was clear she was distracted, and after another turn his lordship suggested he escort her to her husband.
"Yes, if you don't mind," Theo said with betraying eagerness. What could have brought Sylvester here? And what had happened? He was perfectly at his ease in a group of men talking and laughing as if they'd known each other intimately for years. Had they never heard of the scandal of Vimiera? Was it possible?
Sylvester excused himself as he saw Theo and her partner leave the floor. He moved round the room to where Elinor sat talking with a tall titian-haired woman in a startling gown of black velvet.
"Lady Belmont, I give you good evening." He bowed and she smiled, but he could detect the curiosity behind the serene exterior. Elinor couldn't fail to notice how his reception differed this evening from that he'd received in her drawing room. However, she'd said nothing then, and he couldn't imagine she'd comment now.
"Stoneridge, what a pleasant surprise. Are you acquainted with Lady Praed?"
"Not as well as I would wish," he said, raising her hand to his lips. "I see my wife was dancing with your husband."
"Gabrielle," Lady Praed chuckled. "Nathaniel detests dancing, but he and Lady Stoneridge seem to share the same enthusiasm for marl. Your wife was describing a marl pit recently discovered on Stoneridge land, and he swept her onto the floor, where they could discuss its various merits as a fertilizer without interruption."
Sylvester laughed, but before he could respond, Theo and Lord Praed reached them.
"Allow me to return your wife, Stoneridge," Nathaniel said. "Your arrival for some reason eclipsed my own poor attempts to entertain her."