Page 53 of The Unlovable Lady

Then everyone seemed to move at once.

Augusta came to Rosalind’s other side and turned one flat look upon Lady Pelham at the window. The viscountess looked away first.

“Marbury,” Augusta said. Eleven years sat in the single word. Then her voice softened by one degree. “That was well done. Late, but well done. Cecily would say so, and I shall say it for her, the once.”

Phoebe crossed the floor next. She left her mother’s side in front of everyone and came straight to Rosalind without looking back.

Charlotte came too and took Rosalind’s other arm.

“I saw her first,” she said, with her chin up. “I am not looking away now.”

Only Cassandra did not cross. She stood half a step behind her mother, then moved half a step away from her as though she no longer knew where she belonged.

Rosalind looked down at her father’s hand upon the green sleeve. The touch did not undo the years, but it was here now. He had finally reached for her.

“Thank you, Papa,” she said softly.

He nodded once.

Across the room, Selina reached for her husband’s arm. Lord Marbury did not turn.

Rosalind looked at James. He was still holding her hand.

Then she looked at the door.

“Take me out of here, James,” she said. “I find I have nothing left to mend in this room.”

He gave her his arm, and they went.

Chapter Seventeen

“The morning post, my lord.”

James took the single card from the salver and read it twice before he understood what he held. Lady Renton. She had invited him to her Twelfth Night rout only a fortnight since, and now the invitation was withdrawn. Three lines, perfectly civil. There had been a change in her arrangements, and her list was much reduced.

“Well?” Westcott asked from the chair by the fire, where he had sat a quarter of an hour over coffee he had invited himself to. “You have read it twice. Is it bad news?”

“Lady Renton regrets.” James handed the card across. “Her list is much reduced.”

Westcott read it, and his brows went up. “Reduced by one viscount. That was quick work — the ball was Friday, and this is Saturday’s post.” He turned the card over and set it down. “Three lines. Well. Nobody can say she wasted your morning.”

“It is the first, I imagine. It will not be the last.”

“No, it will not.” The idleness went out of Westcott. “I heard some of it at the club last night. I shall not repeat the half of it. But you ought to know the size of the thing before you go out into it. It is not small, Dover.”

“How large, then?”

“Half the Season, or near it. Lady Pelham’s set, mostly. When she turns her shoulder on somebody, the rest do the same.” He hesitated. “I am sorry for it. I would tell you it will all blow over by Easter, but you taught me never to say a thing only because it is comfortable.”

James waited for the sting of it to arrive. It did not come. That was the strange part — he sat in his own breakfast-room with the proof of his diminished credit face up upon the salver, and felt nothing but a curious lightness, as though someone had lifted away a weight he had carried so long he had stopped feeling it.

“You are smiling,” Westcott said. “I bring you the worst news you have had all Season, and you sit there smiling at it. What is the matter with you?”

“I was thinking that Letitia would have wept over that card for a week. Then she would have sent me to Lady Renton to get it back.”

“She would.” Westcott watched him. “And you?”

“I never liked her wine.” James rose and rang for his coat. “I am going out.”