your grandmother and aunt, if I may, Jessica. They have been very kind to me. What lovely ladies they are.”
Gabriel smiled rather grimly at Jessica as Mary moved away, and she looked back—ah, with that wide, sunny smile that always rocked him back on his heels.
Lady Farraday’s guests had allowed Mr. Manley Rochford and his wife and son to leave without attempting to stop them. It was, of course, otherwise with Gabriel. It made perfect sense to Jessica.
Some wished merely to shake his hand and congratulate him, calling him my lord or Lyndale as they did so. Others wished to assure him that they did not believe for a single moment that he was guilty of what he had been accused of and were very glad that he had a solid alibi for both charges. A few were bold enough to ask him if he knew who was guilty. Was it Mr. Manley Rochford himself? No one asked that specific question, but all wondered. Or so it seemed to Jessica.
“What the devil?” Mr. Albert Vickers said, pumping Gabriel’s hand, seemingly unaware that there were ladies within earshot, including Jessica. “What the devil, Gabe? I jolly well hope you have those letters in a safe place.”
“I do,” Gabriel assured him.
Jessica was not ignored. She was congratulated—upon her marriage and upon the fact that she was the Countess of Lyndale. She was assured that no one believed any of those nasty things Mr. Rochford had said about the earl, her husband. Predictably, a few people told her they had not really liked or trusted the man from their first sight of him at church on Sunday.
The orchestra was poised and ready and Lady Farraday was looking a bit anxious again. Finally Gabriel drew Jessica’s arm through his and they were able to leave the ballroom to rather embarrassing applause.
Alexander was waiting outside the ballroom doors with Mary.
“Tomorrow morning, then,” he said, “in a private dining room at your hotel? The arrangement has not changed?”
He and Avery were planning to meet Gabriel for breakfast tomorrow morning, to assess what had happened tonight, to discuss what ought to happen next. Gabriel had been unwilling to make plans for the latter ahead of time. They had had no way of knowing how their plans for the ball itself would turn out.
“I have reserved a room,” Gabriel told him, shaking his hand. “I appreciate the support, Riverdale, even though I am such a new member of the family.”
Alexander grinned. “We thrive upon such crises,” he said. “I hope you reserved a largish room. I suspect Wren and Anna will insist upon coming too, and I would not bet against a few others. Jessica, for example.” He turned to her and hugged her tightly.
“Thank you, Alexander,” she said. “You look very impressive as Alexander the Great.”
He laughed.
And finally they left.
Mary, seated beside Jessica on one carriage seat while Gabriel sat with his back to the horses, was very quiet.
“You are tired, Mary?” Jessica asked her.
“I believe,” she said, “I could sleep for a week if no one disturbed me. What will happen to him, Gabriel?”
“I am not sure,” he told her. “It is what will be discussed at tomorrow’s breakfast meeting. I suppose, Mary, you feel sorry for him?”
She thought about it in her serious, quiet way. “We diminish ourselves too,” she said at last, “when feeling sorry for someone who has done a dreadful wrong leads us to excuse him and simply hope he will mend his ways. Feeling sorry for someone but acknowledging that justice ought nevertheless to be done is more appropriate to moral beings. Yes, Gabriel, I feel sorry for him—and I feel real sorrow for his wife and his son, who appears vain and occasionally callous, but is perhaps not really vicious. For Manley Rochford I feel pity and hope for justice. It breaks my heart.”
“Even though he was intent upon making you homeless and destitute?” Jessica asked.
“Even though,” Mary said, patting her hand.
None of them said anything else during the ride home—home, for the present at least, being a hotel. They both saw Mary to her room, which was close to their suite. Ruth was waiting for her inside.
“My dear Ruth,” Mary was saying as Gabriel was closing the door, “you ought not to have waited up so late just for me. You must lie down on that truckle bed right away. I hope it is comfortable.”
The first thing Gabriel did when they stepped inside their own suite was to summon