And as for her current proposal-free season—well, if the gentlemen of Britain couldn’t appreciate the inherent value of an intelligent female who knew her own mind, that was their problem, not hers.
Lady Danbury thumped her cane against the floor, narrowly missing Hyacinth’s right foot. “I say,” she said, “have either of you caught sight of my grandson?”
“Which grandson?” Hyacinth asked.
“Which grandson,” Lady D echoed impatiently. “Which grandson? The only one I like, that’s which.”
Hyacinth didn’t even bother to hide her shock. “Mr. St. Clair is coming tonight?”
“I know, I know,” Lady D cackled. “I can hardly believe it myself. I keep waiting for a shaft of heavenly light to burst through the ceiling.”
Penelope’s nose crinkled. “I think that might be blasphemous, but I’m not sure.”
“It’s not,” Hyacinth said, without even looking at her. “And why is he coming?”
Lady Danbury smiled slowly. Like a snake. “Why are you so interested?”
“I’m always interested in gossip,” Hyacinth said quite candidly. “About anyone. You should know that already.”
“Very well,” Lady D said, somewhat grumpily after having been thwarted. “He’s coming because I blackmailed him.”
Hyacinth and Penelope regarded her with identically arched brows.
“Very well,” Lady Danbury conceded, “if not blackmail, then a heavy dose of guilt.”
“Of course,” Penelope murmured, at the exact time Hyacinth said, “That makes much more sense.”
Lady D sighed. “I might have told him I wasn’t feeling well.”
Hyacinth was dubious. “Might have?”
“Did,” Lady D admitted.
“You must have done a very good job of it to get him to come tonight,” Hyacinth said admiringly. One had to appreciate Lady Danbury’s sense of the dramatic, especially when it resulted in such impressive manipulation of the people around her. It was a talent Hyacinth cultivated as well.
“I don’t think I have ever seen him at a musicale before,” Penelope remarked.
“Hmmmph,” Lady D grunted. “Not enough loose women for him, I’m sure.”
From anyone else, it would have been a shocking statement. But this was Lady Danbury, and Hyacinth (and the rest of the ton for that matter) had long since grown used to her rather startling turns of phrase.
And besides, one did have to consider the man in question.
Lady Danbury’s grandson was none other than the notorious Gareth St. Clair. Although it probably wasn’t entirely his fault that he had gained such a wicked reputation, Hyacinth reflected. There were plenty of other men who behaved with equal lack of propriety, and more than a few who were as handsome as sin, but Gareth St. Clair was the only one who managed to combine the two to such success.
But his reputation was abominable.
He was certainly of marriageable age, but he’d never, not even once, called upon a proper young lady at her home. Hyacinth was quite sure of that; if he’d ever even hinted at courting someone, the rumor mills would have run rampant. And furthermore, Hyacinth would have heard it from Lady Danbury, who loved gossip even more than she did.
And then, of course, there was the matter of his father, Lord St. Clair. They were rather famously estranged, although no one knew why. Hyacinth personally thought it spoke well of Gareth that he did not air his familial travails in public—especially since she’d met his father and thought him a boor, which led her to believe that whatever the matter was, the younger St. Clair was not at fault.
But the entire affair lent an air of mystery to the already charismatic man, and in Hyacinth’s opinion made him a bit of a challenge to the ladies of the ton. No one seemed quite certain how to view him. On the one hand, the matrons steered their daughters away; surely a connection with Gareth St. Clair could not enhance a girl’s reputation. On the other hand, his brother had died tragically young, almost a year earlier, and now he was the heir to the barony. Which had only served to make him a more romantic—and eligible—figure. Last month Hyacinth had seen a girl swoon—or at least pretend to—when he had deigned to attend the Bevelstoke Ball.
It had been appalling.
Hyacinth had tried to tell the foolish chit that he was only there because his grandmother had forced him into it, and of course because his father was out of town. After all, everyone knew that he only consorted with opera singers and actresses, and certainly not any of the ladies he might meet at the Bevelstoke Ball. But the girl would not be swayed from her overemotional state, and eventually she had collapsed onto a nearby settee in a suspiciously graceful heap.
Hyacinth had been the first to locate a vinaigrette and shove it under her nose. Really, some behavior just couldn’t be tolerated.
But as she stood there, reviving the foolish chit with the noxious fumes, she had caught sight of him staring at her in that vaguely mocking way of his, and she couldn’t shake the feeling that he found her amusing.
Much in the same way she found small children and large dogs amusing.
Needless to say, she hadn’t felt particularly complimented by his attention, fleeting though it was.
“Hmmph.”
Hyacinth turned to face Lady Danbury, who was still searching the room for her grandson. “I don’t think he’s here yet,” Hyacinth said, then added under her breath, “No one’s fainted.”
“Enh? What was that?”
“I said I don’t think he’s here yet.”
Lady D narrowed her eyes. “I heard that part.”
“It’s all I said,” Hyacinth fibbed.
“Liar.”
Hyacinth looked past her to Penelope. “She treats me quite abominably, did you know that?”
Penelope shrugged. “Someone has to.”
Lady Danbury’s face broke out into a wide grin, and she turned to Penelope, and said, “Now then, I must ask—” She looked over at the stage, craning her neck as she squinted at the quartet. “Is it the same girl on cello this year?”
Penelope nodded sadly.
Hyacinth looked at them. “What are you talking about?”
“If you don’t know,” Lady Danbury said loftily, “then you haven’t been paying attention, and shame on you for that.”
Hyacinth’s mouth fell open. “Well,” she said, since the alternative was to say nothing, and she never liked to do that. There was nothing more irritating than being left out of a joke. Except, perhaps, being scolded for something one didn’t even understand. She turned back to the stage, watching the cellist more closely. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, she twisted again to face her companions and opened her mouth to speak, but they were already deep in a conversation that did not include her.
She hated when that happened.
“Hmmmph.” Hyacinth sat back in her chair and did it again. “Hmmmph.”
“You sound,” came an amused voice from over her shoulder, “exactly like my grandmother.”
Hyacinth looked up. There he was, Gareth St. Clair, inevitably at the moment of her greatest discomfiture. And, of course, the only empty seat was next to her.