A Lady of Persuasion (The Wanton Dairymaid Trilogy #3)(34)

“Off with you, then,” he said, kissing her hand. “But don’t be long.”

“I don’t know how much time it will take,” she said ruefully. “Why don’t you find another partner for the next set?”

“At a ball held in honor of our engagement? No, no. Until you return, there’s no other lady for me.”

“But my dear Miss Grayson, surely you don’t expect Toby to be faithful to you.” Reclining carefully, Lady Violet shucked her slippers and propped her stockinged feet on the arm of the settee.

Hetta Osborne averted her gaze in an attempt to hide her disgust. Between the offense of Lady Violet’s remark and the unsightly bunion on the woman’s great toe, Hetta’s fingers itched for a scalpel.

From the corner of the room, Isabel gave a huff of shock. Lady Violet flicked it away with her gilt-edged fan.

A blunt scalpel, Hetta amended.

“Come now, we are all ladies here,” the matron said, baring her teeth in a predatory smile. “Of course we would not speak so frankly in the ballroom, but the retiring room is our feminine sanctuary. Here, we must be honest with one another. And honestly, we all know Toby to be the most incorrigible flirt.” She looked around the assembled ladies. “Is there any lady here who could claim she has never fallen under his spell?”

Forbidden to move by the seamstress repairing her hem, Isabel craned her neck, looking from woman to woman. Sophia and Lucy—and every other lady in the room—developed a sudden interest in the plush blue carpet. Well, Lucy was presumably studying the carpet, if she could spy it around her enormously pregnant belly.

“I haven’t,” Hetta said clearly, and honestly. From a clinical perspective, she could observe that Sir Toby possessed fine features and the aura of good health. But she had never felt any stirrings of attraction.

Not toward him, at any rate.

Lady Violet gave a throaty laugh and massaged her bunion-afflicted foot with one hand. “Of course you haven’t. You don’t count. Sir Toby may be a rake, but I’m sure he is not the sort to dally with the help.”

Before Hetta could clear the steam from her mind to fashion her own retort, Lucy jumped to her defense. As much as an enormously pregnant woman could jump.

“Miss Osborne is not ‘the help.’ She is my friend, and she is here in Town as a guest of the Earl of Kendall. And at this ball, she is a guest of Her Grace, the Duchess of Aldonbury.”

Lady Violet gave another dismissive flutter of her fan. “Calm down, my dear.”

“Don’t tell me to c—” Lucy began.

“Really, Lucy, it’s all right,” Hetta said, deciding to expend her reserve of patience on Lady Violet’s behalf. She was well acquainted with Lucy’s explosive temper, and pregnancy had only shortened the fuse. It would not do to make a scene. “I’m certain her ladyship did not mean to disparage me, but rather to praise Sir Toby.” In some bizarre, misbegotten way.

“Exactly so,” Lady Violet continued. “Toby may not be so low as to forage through the servants’ leavings—”

A blunt, rusted scalpel.

“—but he does have a healthy appetite. As all men do.”

“That is absurd,” Lucy said. “All arguments of honor and fidelity aside, there is no reason a man cannot be wholly satisfied within the confines of his marriage. If he and his wife are well matched, of course.” She gave Lady Violet a coy smile. “We ladies have our appetites, too.”

Laughter skittered through the room.

In an obvious attempt to escape the conversation, Sophia rose from her chair and made her way to the refreshment table.

“Why, Lady Grayson, do your appetites lead you to stray?” Lady Violet called after her. “I would think that strapping husband of yours would have no trouble satisfying you.”

Reaching for a tart, Sophia gave a little smile. “Of course he doesn’t. That’s why I’m so hungry.”

Lucy’s eyes lit, and she clapped her hands together. “Sophia, you sly thing. Why didn’t you say something before?”

Isabel’s brow wrinkled in confusion. “I’m sure I don’t know what any of you are talking about.”

“I’m sure you don’t,” Lucy said. “Really, Sophia, you must pass along The Book.”

“What book?” Isabel asked.

“None. There is no book. I know nothing about any book.” Sophia gave Lucy a quelling look, whispering, “Gray would murder me.”

“No, he wouldn’t. That’s the best thing about our condition—complete immunity from a husband’s displeasure.”

“What condition? What displeasure? What book?” Isabel stamped her foot. “Will someone please explain to me what is going on?”

Hetta took pity on her. “Your sister-in-law is with child.”

“Oh, Sophia!” Isabel exclaimed. She started toward her sister, but the seamstress yanked her to a halt. “How wonderful! But what does that have to do with a book?”

“Nothing,” Sophia replied.

“Everything,” Lucy said smugly.

Now Hetta was beginning to feel left out. “Why have I never seen this book?”

“Oh, I gave it to Sophia before I even arrived at Corbinsdale,” Lucy said. “And now she seems to be hoarding it.”