to keep her emotions from her countenance. Tom had not told her he would be marrying soon. Quite the opposite. And that meant either Tom or his grandmother were being dishonest.
Misgiving cramped her stomach. “I am sorry to hear of His Grace’s maladies. However, as I have already told you, Lord Sidmouth is merely my neighbor.”
Ha! What balderdash that was. But she was not about to show the woman before her a hint of weakness.
The duchess drew herself up, rather reminiscent of a peacock with feathers on full display. “Prevaricate as you wish. But do keep in mind, my call was a courtesy to you, Lady Southwick. It would not behoove you to overreach, and I will do everything in my power to make certain his lordship does not allow you to hurt my family and hinder his search for a bride.”
Having issued her decree, the Duchess of Arrington swept past Hyacinth, leaving her and Lady alone in the cheerful brightness of her salon.
Chapter Twelve
Grandmère was plotting something.
Tom had suspected it from the moment she had arrived, once more unexpectedly, to announce she required his presence at dinner that evening at Arrington House. He was not meant to meet Hyacinth in St. John’s Wood until later, but he had been reluctant to accept his grandmother’s thinly veiled coercion just the same. After all, he and Hyacinth only had a limited amount of time together, and he intended to use each second to its fullest. Tarrying too long at Arrington House did not fit into his plans.
But Grandmère had been insistent, once more claiming Arrington’s desperately ill health would be restored by a visit from Tom. And when she wanted something, the Duchess of Arrington was more stubborn than a dog with her bone. Still, whilst she had employed the proper amount of familial guilt, it had only been her allusion to her and Arrington’s limited years remaining on terra firma that had finally tipped the scales in her favor.
His suspicion blossomed into a full bloom of confirmation when he realized he was not the only dinner guest. Rather, there was a veritable bevy of young, unmarried chits in attendance. And neither was Arrington looking any frailer than he had upon the last occasion when their paths had crossed. Indeed, the duke appeared quite hale for a gentleman approaching his eightieth year.
No, indeed.
Grandmère was not just plotting. She was matchmaking.
Shudder. Perish the thought.
Tom had no desire to be matched to anyone, as he had already informed her. Nor did he have any wish to marry. Had she not said it best when she had told him love was the currency of fools?
Lady Hermione Wallace was speaking to him of the weather as the savory entremets arrived, giving further proof it was. Surely only a fool could be so entertained by anyone as to suffer through endless nattering. Her liberal discussion of ribbons and flowers had already had him nodding off alternately through the soup course, the fish course, and the relevé.
By now, his ears were positively bleeding.
As was his soul.
Lady Ariadne Hill, on the other hand, was quiet as a mouse and meeker than one, too. Miss Beatrice Bright interjected periodically with an admirable attempt to turn the discussion to literature. But Lady Hermione possessed a staggering ability to speak atop anyone else, almost as if hers was the sole voice she was capable of hearing.
“I do find the fog so repressively cheerful,” Lady Hermione was saying now.
Tom eyed the distance between himself and the door to the dining room. Fifteen paces. Mayhap less. Freedom so close and yet so far away.
“Repressively cheerful?” asked Miss Bright, sounding as perplexed as Tom felt.
“Indeed, Miss Bright.” Lady Hermione arched a dark brow, as if to censure her fellow diner. “Cheerful and repressive at once.”
“But that hardly makes sense,” Miss Bright persisted. “If one finds something repressive, how can one also find it cheerful at the same time? The two states are quite opposite, I should think.”
“Of course, Miss Bright,” Lady Hermione said with a patronizing smile. “Unfortunately, we cannot all be blessed with an artist’s soul.”
Good God. The woman was ludicrous.
Miss Bright flushed; but while on Hyacinth, a flush incited him to the point of madness, rosy cheeks had no such effect upon him on any other woman. His time alone with her this evening beckoned like a lighthouse luring his ship across storm-tossed waters. He could scarcely wait to see her.
“Artist’s soul or no, there is logic and reason, and there is