And Then She Fell(115)

“No.” Henrietta held her gaze steadily. “Thank you. I know you’ve been waiting for this—to receive the necklace and be able to wear it and so find your own hero—literally for years. Even though you’re generally so impatient, you waited patiently—and then you pushed at just the right moment. I truly believe you were influenced by The Lady in that, that you’ve already felt Her hand, for you certainly played a major part in bringing me and James together.”

Henrietta paused to draw in a huge breath, then she smiled one of what Mary privately dubbed her over-the-moon-joyous smiles. “For that—for all of that—I wish you the very best of success in finding your own hero.”

Mary felt the warm wash of affection as Henrietta swooped and embraced her. She returned the hug with equal joy; she was sincerely happy, from the depths of her heart happy, to see Henrietta so perfectly matched. This was her sister’s fairy-tale ending; now it was her turn to go out and find hers.

“Henrietta!”

Releasing each other, they both straightened. Turning, they saw Louise beckoning imperiously. “Come along—we need you in the receiving line. And Mary, too—you should already be upstairs.”

Mary and Henrietta shared a glance, then they laughed and hurried to where Louise waited. Together, they swept their harried mother up the stairs.

“Really, I don’t know what’s got into you,” Louise said to Mary once the receiving line had been reached. Louise noted the necklace around Mary’s throat, hesitated, but then said, “But off you go and enjoy yourself.” With one hand, she made a shooing motion. “Just behave.”

“Yes, Mama!” Delighted—with the evening, with life in general—Mary was only too ready to obey. Her first task was to quarter the room, to see who was there and note the new arrivals as they streamed into the fabulous white, pale green, and gilt ballroom.

Very soon, the room was pleasantly crowded. Then more guests arrived, and the event became a certified crush.

Mary tacked through the groups, stopping to chat as the mood and the company took her; as a Cynster young lady raised very much in the bosom of the ton, such an event held no terrors. She’d cut her eyeteeth on the correct way of doing things, and knew every possible way around any social situation. Even the grandes dames, after observing her over the past four years, had accepted that she was entirely at home in this sphere and unlikely to put her dainty foot wrong, even while stubbornly following her own path.

Tonight, however, there was no advance to be made on her already defined way forward; the name of the gentleman she’d set her sights upon had not appeared on the guest list. Consequently, she had no particular aim beyond obeying her mother and enjoying herself.

Then the violins started playing the engagement waltz, and James and Henrietta circled the floor, so lost in each other’s eyes, with James so blatantly proud and Henrietta positively glowing with joy, that the company was held spellbound. When the affianced couple completed their circuit and other couples started to join them on the floor, Charlie Hastings, with whom Mary had been conversing, solicited her hand, which she happily granted.

Waltzing with Charlie was pleasant; Mary viewed him as an older brother. He had his eye on Miss Worthington, a young lady Mary was acquainted with, and she was pleased to encourage him by telling him all she knew.

But as the evening wore on, she drifted closer and closer to the wall. While she could chatter and converse with the best of them, and usually, when she had some end in view, she found the exercise stimulating, now, when she knew there was no point—when there was nothing she could or wished to gain from any conversation—she found her interest flagging.

She couldn’t, she decided, risk slipping out of the ballroom. Even though it had happened years ago, her cousin Eliza had been kidnapped from this very house during her sister Heather’s engagement ball. If Mary appeared to have vanished from Henrietta’s engagement ball . . . that was the sort of error Mary did not make.

But there were two alcoves, one at either end of the long room, both housing large nude statues and consequently, for the evening, screened by large palms. She elected to make for the alcove between the pair of double doors, the one less likely to have been appropriated by anyone else.

She was nearing that end of the room, several yards short of her goal, when, abruptly, she was brought to a quivering halt, nose to lower folds of an exquisitely tied cravat. To either side of the cravat stretched a wall of black-clad male chest.