Page 17 of Henrietta

Hetty said she was. Sir Marcus, unsurprised by this brevity, continued easily on: ‘Kean does Iago very well, does he not?’

Hetty agreed that he did.

‘May I say how well you are looking, Miss Clithero!’ Lord Fenton put in jovially.

‘That is a very fine gown,’ Mr Neal said with such little inflection that Arthur was at once certain he had rehearsed this line very much in advance.

Hetty stammered out her thanks.

‘I thought I knew all the gowns in your wardrobe, but it seems I was mistaken,’ Sir Marcus agreed, causing Hetty to wish very much she had held on to her cloak after all.

‘I am glad of it!’ Lord Fenton said tartly. ‘Perhaps I ought to teach you both a thing or two about giving a lady a compliment, dear boys!’

‘A grandfather’s prerogative,’ Sir Marcus murmured rather caustically.

Lord Fenton – who was rather hard of hearing these days – did not pay this any mind. ‘One ought to praise Miss Clithero’s beauty, you know – not the gown!’

Hetty’s colour rose. Keenly aware of Arthur’s observation, she felt even more objectionably awkward than usual. Arthur, for his part, was suddenly able to perceive why Trixie had thought Hetty needed their aid in courting her Belgian.

‘Was that the interval bell?’ Arthur wondered, though Hetty had not heard anything. ‘Yes, I think it was!’

He ushered them out of the box with as much politeness as he could muster. In the wake of their departure, Hetty continued to avoid his eyes. She would have given a great deal of her fortune to have prevented him seeing such a scene as this.

‘Hetty—’

But once again he was interrupted – this time by the appearance of Timothy, who stalked into the box in high dudgeon, brandishing two glasses of lemonade. He was followed by his friend, the Honourable Robert Hargan, who had somehow managed to balance three glasses in his hands, though as soon as he set eyes upon Arthur he forgot this circumstance and attempted a deep bow.

‘Steady!’ Timothy barked as the lemonades sloshed dangerously.

‘Begging your pardon, I—’

‘Shall I—?’ Hetty stepped forward to relieve him of one of his glasses.

Catching her eye, Mr Hargan flushed. ‘We – ah – missed you in Hyde Park this morning, Miss Clithero.’

Mr Hargan was Hetty’s last, and preferred suitor, for his shyness so far eclipsed her own that she felt positively sparkling by comparison.

‘I must go,’ Timothy announced. ‘Make my excuses to Mother, will you?’

‘You are leaving? Why?’

‘Corky,’ Timothy spat out in explanation. ‘He spilt lemonade upon my trousers. Says it was an accident, but it was not – as Hargan will tell you! He saw it all.’

Hargan admitted he had, indeed, witnessed the dreadful event.

‘You see!’

Arthur looked down to Timothy’s nether limbs, but could see nothing. ‘I cannot see anything.’

‘It can only have been the tiniest splash,’ Hetty agreed.

‘To you, perhaps,’ Timothy said, aggrieved, ‘but dash it, I have a reputation to uphold. I cannot be – be – besmirched in such a way!’

‘N-no.’ Arthur kept his voice level with great effort. He could not look at Hetty; he would be lost then. ‘I can understand that.’

‘… he was perfectly pleasant, certainly,’ Lady Allerton was saying as she and Trixie re-entered the box.

Trixie was nodding. ‘Poor Captain Edgewood, to be so misunderstood.’