Marquesses at the Masquerade(44)
Her aunt laughed. “Ha! Mr. Sommerville is so witty.”
Annalise didn’t see the joke but laughed along to be polite.
“You may as well bring her trunks inside,” he commanded his manservant. “Sally, see to dinner. You girls can catch up on your inane gossip later.”
“Of course, my dearest,” his wife said obediently.
“You there,” Mr. Sommerville addressed Mrs. Bailey, “see to putting away Miss Van Der Keer’s things. Annalise, come to my library after you have freshened up and no longer smell like every coaching inn between here and Exeter.”
*
“Sit down, Annalise.” Her uncle pointed to the winged chair in his library. He took his usual chair beside his writing bureau and crossed his legs. He adopted the mocking falsetto tone again. “Oh, Annalise is coming, how she will love to shop. Oh, Annalise is coming, whatever parties shall we attend?” His voice lowered to its normal range as he studied Annalise. “I had no choice but to allow you to return to my home. I would have no peace otherwise. I entrusted you to my wife during your last visit, not realizing the full extent of her irresponsibility to her matronly duties. I did not see the damage of your silly, thoughtless behavior until it was far too late. Hear me, my child, you will not be ill-supervised again. I shan’t have you ruining Phoebe’s chances. Dear God, may I rid myself of one troublesome female.” He paused. “What do you say to me?”
Annalise blinked. “Pardon?”
“You should thank me for kindly giving you a second chance.”
A second chance? She had often contemplated her disastrous Season, which had been fueled by an obsessive love that overwhelmed any reason. Everything had been about Patrick. Nothing else had mattered to her. Back at home in the quiet country, as she’d had hours and hours to think as she replaced her father’s sheets, softened his food, and made up the medicines the physician recommended, she’d wondered if her problem was that she felt more than other people. Maybe her idea of love—all-consuming, frantic with desire, and unending—wasn’t everyone else’s conception. But she still loved Patrick that way, and she couldn’t imagine feeling any less.
“Thank you,” she said quietly. “I am very happy to be in London again, to be near my cousins.”
“How poorly you deceive, Annalise. You came only to attend balls and shows and to sink your pretty lacy hooks into some poor gentleman, who, up until that point, had been contently swimming about in the sea. What else would you have to talk about? Astronomy? Mathematics?” He chuckled, tickled at his witticism.
Annalise couldn’t explain why, but the image of her father in his invalid chair, sitting in the sunlit garden, filled her mind. In the last years of his life, father and daughter had grown close and spent hours together, talking about botany and his scientific papers—things she’d once found so boring.
She hadn’t realized that she’d sunk so deeply into this gentle memory until she heard her uncle loudly clear his throat. “You, ramshackle girl, have you not heard a word I’ve uttered?”
Annalise glanced up. No, she couldn’t remember a word of her uncle’s lecture, but it didn’t take a far leap of the imagination to speculate. “You needn’t worry, Uncle. I shall not attend balls or parties, and shall make myself content instead with walking in Hyde Park or attending lectures.” In truth, she would be content merely revisiting the places associated with Patrick.
He studied her, as if not expecting the reasoned answer. “Not attend balls? Why must you always upset my household? No, you will attend those balls, so that I may have some small peace in my life. Have mercy, silly girl.”
Annalise stared. Others considered her uncle droll. He prided himself on making the wry observation upon the follies of others, including his own family. She had always laughed along. Now she felt a stab of annoyance at his put-upon cynicism. What had he to be cynical about, after all? She had watched her mother writhe in pain in the last days, begging for relief. She had listened to the minutes tick, tick, tick by for weeks at her father’s deathbed as cancer ravaged him.
She burst out, “Did you know that in Sweden, coveys of partridges will crowd together beneath the snow to keep warm?”
He jerked his head back. “Excuse me?”
“Certain species of cuckoos lay an egg in the nest of other birds, and then the young cuckoo chick hatches first and tosses out the other eggs.”
He stared, one brow raised. “Well,” he said after a moment. “That must have occupied most of your brain.” He made a shooing motion. “There, there, go. I’m assuming from the ear-piercing shrilling when the post arrived that a new La Belle Assemblée or other such rubbish has come. I’m sure it will entertain you and your cousins’ simple minds until dinner.”
Annalise stifled the desire to mention something derogatory concerning her uncle’s mind and the copy of The Rambler on his desk. She quietly rose, crossed to the door, and rested her hand on the door handle. She couldn’t leave yet. She had to know. “Have—have you heard if Mr. Hume is still in India?” She tried to sound casual.
Her uncle hiked a brow, “Still angling for him, old girl?”
“No, I’m—I’m merely curious.”
“Lying ladies are so transparent. No, child, he’s in India, and for my sake, I desire that he will remain there for the duration of your stay, which I hope shall be brief. Perhaps you will find a gentleman who hasn’t the sense to run away from you like the last one.” He chuckled, amused at himself.