The Wallflower's Mistletoe Wedding. Amanda McCabe
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he was just as good looking, he did not have the same frightening magnetism.
‘Nowhere as useful as my brother, I assure you, Lady Ramsay,’ he said with a bow. ‘But I haven’t had a proper dance in ages and, unlike Harry, I miss it more than I can say.’
‘That is one thing I can promise here. I hired the best orchestra from miles around.’ Jane drew Rose and Emma forward. ‘Emma, Rose, may I present two of our neighbours? Captain Henry St George, who was a great hero at Waterloo, and his brother, Mr Charles St George. Gentlemen, this my sister, Mrs Emma Carrington, and my cousin Miss Rose Parker.’
Charles was the first to bow to them, with grand courtly flourishes that made Rose laugh and even had Emma smiling. ‘Ladies, I fear that unlike my dashing brother I am hero of very little except the billiards room, but I do claim some proficiency at waltzing, if you will do me the honour?’
Emma did laugh—the first time Rose had heard it since the young widow had returned to Barton—but Rose could still not find a way to tear her attention completely away from Captain St George. How very intriguing he looked, with his wry flash of a smile!
‘Do you live near Barton, Miss Parker?’ he asked, his voice low and deep, almost rough. He watched her closely, as if he listened only to her in the whole room.
‘Oh,’ Rose answered, and for an instant it was as if every word she had ever known flew out of her mind. She had to laugh at herself; it was quite unlike the sensible nature she usually prided herself on. Yet she comforted herself that no lady could surely be entirely immune from such a pair of eyes when they were focused so closely on oneself.
‘Not too far,’ she said. ‘We used to visit often when we were children, my sister and I, and hunt for treasure with Jane and Emma.’
He smiled, his dark eyes crinkling at the corners. ‘Treasure? That does sound intriguing.’
‘Oh, it was!’ she said, absurdly pleased to have ‘intrigued’ him. She found she wanted more than anything to make him smile that smile at her again. ‘It is a wonderful old tale, about the lover of a Royalist soldier, Arabella Bancroft, hiding a royal fortune on the grounds of the estate, in the hope she and her love would one day be reunited to spend it together. Or something like that. We were quite hazy on the details when we were children.’
‘And did you ever find it?’
‘No, not even a farthing. It’s just a legend, of course, but we did have some marvellous adventures digging for it in the woods. We would climb the trees and pretend we were the Royalists defending our fortress from Cromwell, with tree trunks for cannons...’ She suddenly remembered he was a true captain, a hero of the terrible carnage at Waterloo, and felt her cheeks turn warm. ‘Not at all like real battle, of course.’
A shadow flickered over his smile and he glanced away. ‘Much more fun, though, I would wager. Real battle is all mud and noise, I fear, Miss Parker. But trees and branches as guns—just fun.’
Rose nervously twitched her skirts into place, feeling terrible at reminding him of such things when he was meant to be enjoying himself at Jane’s party. Not for the first time, she wished she had some of Lily’s gift of easy laughter and chatter. ‘I am sure it was. I’m sorry for bringing up any bad memories, Captain.’
He gave her a wry smile. ‘The memories are always there, Miss Parker, but they don’t plague me on a night like this.’ He paused to adjust a glove. ‘And did they ever find each other again?’
‘Find each other?’ she said, confused.
‘Arabella Bancroft and her Royalist.’
‘Oh. No. He never came back. I think she married someone else in the end and abandoned Barton Park.’
‘Then there is hope the treasure is still out there.’
‘I never thought of it like that,’ Rose exclaimed. ‘Perhaps it is.’
Captain St George’s brother suddenly turned towards them with a grin. ‘Harry, I have just secured Mrs Carrington’s promise for the first dance and Lady Ramsay tells me there are not yet enough couples for a proper set. You must find yourself a partner and do your bit for the party.’
‘Charlie, you know I am hopeless dancer indeed,’ the Captain protested.
‘Of course you are not!’ Charles said. ‘Do not be an old stick in the mud again. Aren’t you all about doing your duty? Well, being merry is your only duty tonight.’
Harry laughed, and turned back to Rose. ‘Well, then, Miss Parker. Would you be brave enough to take me on for the first dance? With fair warning that grace is not my strong suit.’
Rose was not at all sure that could be true. He had such a lean, coiled stillness, she imagined that in motion he would be as elegant and lethal as a jungle cat. She longed to dance with him, more than she had ever longed for anything before, but she also feared he was asking only because she was the closest lady at the moment.
Not that it mattered. When would she ever be able to dance with such a man again?
‘I—no, nor is it mine, Captain St George,’ she answered. ‘I do have a terrible tendency to trip over my own feet—my sister always hated sharing her dancing lessons with me. Perhaps we can figure it out together?’
He laughed and suddenly he looked so young, so carefree. Rose imagined perhaps he was like that all the time before he went to war and became so watchful. ‘I am quite sure we can. The first dance, then, Miss Parker.’
‘Yes, thank you, Captain,’ she answered, and suddenly felt a hand on her arm. She turned to see Lily standing beside her, her sky-blue eyes wide.
‘Oh, Rose!’ she cried. ‘He isn’t here yet! What if he changed his mind?’
Before Rose could answer, the front doors flew open again as if in a stormy gale and a most fearsome figure appeared. As wide as she was tall, with iron-grey hair high-piled in the style of pre–Revolutionary France, and swathed in lace and satin, her dried-apple face was heavily rouged. Armed as she was with a carved walking stick with the head of a snarling dragon, she seemed the combination of Empress Maria Theresa and a Viking, combined with an ancient tree spirit.
‘Aunt Sylvia,’ Jane gasped. She hurried forward to try to help her, but the old lady impatiently pushed her away. ‘How lovely to see you. We thought you could not attend tonight.’
Aunt Sylvia Pemberton. Rose stared at her in astonishment. She had thought the old lady, a sister of her own great-grandfather and Jane’s and Emma’s as well, was only some sort of legend, but now here she was before them. She lived in a vast house nearby, rich as Croesus and widowed for decades, but she never ventured beyond its gates. Even Captain St George seemed amazed by the sight, even after all he must have seen at Waterloo.
‘I should never have ventured out indeed, Jane. A most disagreeable night and my rheumatism so terrible,’ Aunt Sylvia growled. ‘But I had to see what you have done with the old house, now that all your modern folderols have finished. You’ve quite ruined it, I must say. The windows are terrible and what kind of colour is that for walls?’ She looked around, waving her stick as if the new pale blue paint was a personal affront.
‘Ah,’ she went on, ‘and here is that disgraceful Emma, I see. And who is this? The Parker chits? How pale you are, girl. And the other one—too tall. Come here where I can see you better.’
Lily did indeed look quite white under such scrutiny and she clutched at Rose’s hand. ‘Must we?’ Lily whispered.
Rose thought of the grandness of Aunt Sylvia’s mansion and the tininess of their own cottage. She sighed. ‘I think we must.’ She glanced over her shoulder, but the Captain had quite vanished into the crowd. She could only fervently hope he remembered their dance.
‘Don’t worry, Lily dearest,’ she whispered. ‘We just have to say hello and then we can slip away. I am sure Mr Hewlitt will be here at any moment.’
‘She