Page 7 of How to Lose a Lord in Ten Days

‘The ballroom, I should think?’ Mr Brandon said helpfully, seeming as cheery as Ashford was chilly, as fair as he was dark. ‘Perfect! Ashford, weren’t you just saying you need a partner for the waltz?’

‘Was I?’ Ashford said. ‘My wretched memory, but I do not recollect …’

He and Mr Brandon stared at one another for a beat, embroiled in a silent argument that ignored Lydia entirely. She stood there, pink-faced and awkward, wishing, desperately that she had left the corridor when she’d had the chance, until Ashford turned back, extending a hand to Lydia in unenthusiastic invitation.

Indignation warred with humiliation in her chest. How she wished she might decline the offer! But she could not, could she? It could very well ruin her whole Season. Besides, she had heard what he had said. A hot-headed rejection would be just the mannerless behaviour he would expect from a Cit’s daughter, wouldn’t it? No, she would not give him the satisfaction.

‘I should be delighted,’ she said primly, placing her hand upon his arm and smiling at him – without teeth – just as she had been taught. Indeed, for that dance, and every interaction that followed, she made sure to follow every single directive Aunt Agatha had ever taught her: speaking quietly and briefly and only of ladylike subjects, professed a fascination in every one of his opinions while having none of her own and laughing at all his jests (such as they were).

‘I just wanted to prove him wrong,’ she bemoaned now. ‘I had no notion of where it would lead.’

‘You think that’s why he fell in love with you?’ Pip asked.

‘Can he have fallen in love with me? That seemed to be what he was suggesting, with the proposal.’

‘A good first clue,’ Pip agreed.

‘But he has given no other sign of it!’

She had noticed – of course she had, Aunt Agatha had been tickled pink – that he had begun asking her to dance, whenever they were both at the same ball, had begun spending a few minutes in her company whenever they crossed paths, but she had not thought much of it. He did, after all, still dance and speak with every other young lady presented to him, in just the same manner.

‘He’s a very starched-up fellow,’ Pip observed, ‘but his affections must be engaged. Stands to reason. Why else would he stoop so low?’

‘Stoop?!’

‘What I mean is,’ Pip corrected himself hastily. ‘He has no dearth of options, does he?’

‘Apparently there is a dearth,’ she said. ‘No lady thus far has been able to meet his impossible standards.’

Was it possible that her perfect behaviour had not only encouraged him, but also somehow made her attain every item on his – and the duke’s – implausible specifications? Or was Pip correct, and did Ashford’s tepid warmth mask a deeper attachment?

‘It doesn’t signify, anyway,’ she reminded. ‘I don’t love him.’

‘Only one thing for it,’ Pip said. ‘Have to cry off. Pay a visit to him today, before this house party nonsense.’

His expression darkened at this fresh reminder of their impending departure from London.

‘I don’t mind telling you, it’s come at a very inconvenient time,’ he added. ‘What if there is a case, while I am away?’

A month previous, Pip had – by utter happenstance – aided the Bow Street Runners in apprehending a thief, accidentally tripping the fellow as he fled the scene of the crime. The experience had captured his imagination: overnight, he had taken to smoking a pipe, wearing a quizzing glass and haunting their offices to ‘assist’ in investigations.

‘Mr Simmons has just begun tutoring me on my investigation skills,’ Pip said, aggrieved.

Mr Simmons was a Senior Officer at Bow Street. Lydia did not know the exact nature of their relationship, but the fellow was certainly the idol to which Pip currently worshipped. Not an hour went by that he was not quoted, imitated, or otherwise referenced.

‘It was not my idea!’ she said. ‘Besides, Ashford has already left for the country.’

‘Suspicious,’ Pip said darkly. ‘Very suspicious.’

Since he had begun working with the Runners, Pip declared a great many things to be suspicious.

‘You’ll have to do it in Kent, then,’ he said. ‘Can’t promise he’ll take it well, and then you could still set your cap at Captain von Pratt.’

‘Von Prett,’ Lydia corrected, kicking at a stone.

Ah, the noble captain! She had met Captain von Prett, the celebrated explorer, at his lecture a week earlier, and it had been – for her at least – a coup de foudre. Her heartstrings had been pulled by his moving tribute to his late wife, and a few brief moments of eye contact had sent her heart to thumping for hours afterwards. Understandably, she was desirous of pursuing the acquaintance. But first she needed to get out of this cursed engagement. Ladies were, technically, permitted to call off engagements – if they accepted the accompanying shame – and Ashford’s insistence on secrecy should make that all the easier, but there was still Uncle Edmund and Aunt Agatha to consider.

‘I’d be sent to Aunt Mildred, as quick as a flash,’ she said.