began to knot.
And then he finally—finally—glanced her way. It was just a flash of silver.
Rueful, though, that flash.
Even, perhaps, a bit . . . mischievous.
She loved and hated the relief that swooped through her like the winds off the sea. She understood what he was about now.
And it told her more than she wished she knew about how she felt about Captain Hardy.
She knew what to do next.
She moved from the little table, past Mr. Delacorte, who was patting his great thigh and humming along, past Angelique, who was looking reluctantly transfixed, as if it had been too long since she had heard music and was absorbing it like a flower absorbs rain, across to where Mr. Farraday was sitting in silence, reluctantly enjoying the performance, arms crossed tightly, and jouncing a leg.
She sat down next to him.
“It’s remarkable,” she confided to Mr. Farraday as Captain Hardy and Miss Bevan-Clark rounded on the second verse. “It’s been such a challenge to bring Captain Hardy out of his shell, and Miss Bevan-Clark seems to have done it within minutes. She must be a truly singular girl. One of a kind.”
“Yes,” he said tersely, after a delay. He was watching the singular girl and Captain Hardy, and his face was a battleground of subtle conflicts.
At last the song came to an end.
Everyone applauded with great enthusiasm.
Captain Hardy even took a bow.
“Hardy, I suspected you had hidden talents, you old sea dog!” Mr. Delacorte boomed.
Captain Hardy manfully suppressed a wince. “Not hidden, Delacorte. Simply rationed.”
Miss Bevan-Clark was gazing up at Captain Hardy as if he was responsible for the moon hanging in the sky.
Andrew Farraday was gazing at Captain Hardy as though he’d robbed him at knifepoint.
But then Miss Bevan-Clark’s head pivoted to seek Andrew Faraday’s gaze. And what she saw there made her blush pink again.
And duck her head.
Oh, the days when one blushed at everything.
Then she peeked up between her lashes.
Andrew was staring at her, with a faint frown, rather arrested, as if perhaps he hadn’t seen her in this light before.
“Perhaps now we can all dance!” Delacorte enthused.
Captain Hardy froze. “Optionally, perhaps we ought not get carried away, Delacorte.”
It was too late. Delacorte was carried away. He was already shoving furniture aside.
“Nonsense, nonsense,” he said happily. “If you can sing then you can dance, Captain. I dance a fair reel and we’ve enough people here for a quadrille. A waltz wouldn’t even go amiss if some of the ladies wouldn’t mind dancing with each other. Oh! Shall we waltz? No one is about to care whether we do it well. We needn’t stand on ceremony among friends.”
“A bit daring isn’t it,” Angelique said, “but then, we did play Faro.”
Very dryly said.
“It’s all between family here,” Mr. Delacorte said, which were such uncommonly sweet words to Delilah’s ears she was tempted to kiss him on the cheek. “We’ll make a lark of it. What say you all? Can you play a waltz, Miss Bevan-Clark?”
Miss Bevan-Clark opened her mouth.
Then closed it again.
Her expression revealed that she very much wanted to dance, rather than play the pianoforte.
“I can play a waltz,” Angelique volunteered. Just a tad slyly.
“Well, that is splendid!” Delacorte could not be more thrilled.
Angelique stood and smoothed her skirts. “And perhaps Mr. Farraday would like to show Lady Derring how once dances the waltz in Sussex,” she suggested.
Mr. Farraday’s eyes went wide.
But he could not, of course, refuse this suggestion and still be a gentleman.
Captain Hardy may have started it, but they were all colluding now.
“I should be honored if you would dance with me, Lady Derring,” Mr. Farraday said, because he possessed excellent manners and because Delilah was smiling sweetly at him and he was as putty in her hands. But then, in the hands of the right woman, Mr. Farraday was the sort who would be putty for the rest of his days.
Unlike the man who’d instigated this whole thing.
But a hunted look skittered across Miss Bevan-Clark’s face when he leaped to his feet and held his hand out to Delilah, who allowed the young man to pull her to her feet.
She stared at Delilah the way Farraday had stared at Captain Hardy. As if surely a grown woman—a widow, no less—no matter how pretty, couldn’t possibly appeal. She was practically a different species, in Miss Bevan-Clark’s mind.
“And I should be honored if you’d dance the waltz with me, Miss Bevan-Clark,” Captain Hardy said.
“I should be delighted, Captain Hardy,” Miss Bevan-Clark said as defiantly as if she was making