But even remembering that the number of his working upper limbs had been decreased from plural to singular did not lessen his resolve. He would do everything to make this ball—and himself—a success. Even if he could hardly dance anymore, he would find the joys left to him. Caro would help him do it.

I would be honored, he wrote back, his printing still clumsy and slow. You may have any dance you desire.

Maybe he could have something he desired too. He had the hope of it, and he would promise anything just for the pleasure of having hope again.

Seven

“This is snug. Quaint. And I do not mean that as an insult, Hal, though those words usually mean social ruin.”

Henry accepted this magnanimous praise from Emily, who perched at the edge of a delicate chair of gilded beech. Her hands were folded neatly in her lap as she surveyed her small domain.

Small their evening gathering was, at Henry’s request. Only Bart, Caro, and Frances had joined the family party at Tallant House. Dinner now over, the six sat in the gilt-papered, lamp-lit drawing room. A low coal fire winked, banishing clamminess from the long reach of the room. A space for cards, a space for books, a space for music, a space for just sitting and wishing one had a cheroot to smoke.

Henry and Emily sat in the latter space, while the other four battled through a rubber of whist. “Would you care for a cheroot, Emily?”

Her eyebrows lifted. “You’d regret it if I said yes. Jem would have my head for it, and then he’d be hanged for beheading me. And then you would have to assume the care of John and Stephen. They can be absolute hellions, and I do mean that as an insult. Though also as a statement of fact.”

“Just a suggestion,” Henry said lightly.

Emily paused. “This plan of yours. Dinner at home. Hal… it was a good idea.” Her brows puckered, an expression of doubt she wore with enviable rarity. “Perhaps I should have arranged more small events like this one, instead of the grand ball in the Argyll Rooms next week.”

Such an admission was akin to Bonaparte saying that perhaps he should have stayed on Elba and not caused so much trouble on the Continent.

“It’s all right, Emily,” Henry said, hiding his astonishment. “Thank you for arranging the dinner tonight.”

Her aplomb reappeared in an instant. “It’s all part of the plot,” she said with a dismissive flick of fingers.

“The throwing-me-a-ball plot?”

“No.” She peeked over the high back of her chair, then ducked down and whispered, “The finding-a-wife plot.”

“Ah. Yes. That.” Discomfiture knotted Henry’s stomach. After his first introduction to Caro, he had wanted to take on the rest of his courtship without interference.

At least, without any interference besides what he sought out on his own.

It was damned difficult to keep up a wall of confidence when no one had faith he could rebuild his life. Maybe not even himself. Why else would he have asked Frances to help him win Caro, if not doubt that he could triumph alone?

He peered around the back of his own chair. Frances was laughing and sliding coins across the card table to her partner, Bart. Caro gave an exaggerated sigh and tossed her cards down. “Jem,” Henry heard her say, “we’re going to be roasted and toasted, you and I.”

Chagrin, confusion, unease—whatever one called it, it twisted through Henry’s chest at the sight of Frances’s smile. Already, he had wrapped her tightly into his fledgling courtship of Caro. He couldn’t write a letter to Caro without recalling Frances helping him shape letters; he couldn’t give her flowers without thinking of Frances’s advice. He couldn’t hear Caro’s voice or see her face without his eyes seeking Frances, his ears sifting sounds for the careful speech and wicked laugh of his own ally.

And yet, with all the help Frances had given him, he had given her very little in return. It was hardly flattering to ask the help of an unmarried woman in winning the hand of another. It implied that she wasn’t worthy of attention herself… didn’t it?

He didn’t mean to do that. It certainly wasn’t true. She looked vivid in the low glow of fire and lamp, her strong features all shadow and light. Deep eyes and a mouth made for secrets. Chiaroscuro, that stark Italian technique, would be the perfect way to paint her.

If he could paint.

Which he couldn’t.

Which was why he needed Caro.

There was no denying the countess was as lovely as Botticelli’s Venus. If he could persuade her to look his way, it would be no hardship to look back at her.

That was the odd thing, though—she hadn’t looked his way much this evening. Certainly not as much as one would expect from the partner in a secret correspondence.

“Excuse me, Hal.” Emily had perked up. “They finished their rubber of whist. I shall arrange things to further our plot.” She called, “Jemmy, do deal me a hand. But I shall scream if I have to partner you.”

She glided over to the card table, while Henry stared at the grate. The coals were glowing, not much more than ash now, occasionally split by faint fire. He could see the slanting flickers through the milky glass of the fireplace screen. It was walnut framed, painted with a snowy marble temple flanked by two sturdy oaks, their wavy branches intertwining.

It had been Henry’s wedding present to Jem and Emily a decade before. He’d thought himself very clever, representing the story of Baucis and Philemon: the couple who grew old together, kindhearted, and were transformed into trees after their deaths so they could live on side by side.

The story was apt. But he hadn’t been clever enough to fix his colors. The glass hadn’t been fired well after he had painted it, and the paints had bubbled and dimmed, the colors smoky.

Oh, well. It still looked better than Aunt Matilda’s greasy red-painted baroque table.

He heard Emily shriek, heard the others laugh, and realized his sister-in-law had been paired with Jem after all. So someone else would come to join Henry at the fireside now. Fair enough. He could handle these small bites of friendship, which he need not lift a finger to consume. Which was well, since he had only half the usual working complement of fingers.

He gritted his teeth. It was tedious how his mind worked sometimes. How dearly he would love to forget that anything had changed. Or barring that, have it not matter.

Enough.

He shoved himself out of the chair and joined the rest of the party.

“What’s all the screaming about?” he said in a jovial voice as he skirted the card players.

“Oh, Hal,” Emily collapsed into a chair at the velvet-draped card table. “I am ruined. Your brother can never remember the cards that have been played, and I shall lose all my pin money.”

“And I shall win it,” said Frances, snapping and bridging the cards before handing them to Jem to deal. “Or we shall, Mr. Crosby.” She flashed a bright smile at her partner, Bart.

Henry suddenly wished very much that he were part of the game.

But if he was not, Caro was not either for this rubber. “So you have been dealt out, Lady Stratton?”

Caro smiled. “Indeed. I am not sure now whether I have been lucky or unlucky.”

“You are lucky if you were partnering Jem. I only thank heaven Hal is not playing,” Emily said with mock innocence. “He cheats.”

“I do not,” Henry protested.

“Good lord, Em,” Jem interjected. “It’s a good thing you’re not a man. You’d be called out for saying such a thing.”

Emily rearranged the cards in her hand. “My dear husband, it’s a good thing I’m not a man for many reasons besides that one. Besides, I am only teasing Hal. I do it out of my bitterness, knowing that I am going to lose my pin money.”

“I’ll give you more,” Jem said. “Only you must remind me what trump is. Hearts?”

Emily shot Henry a what-did-I-tell-you look. “Yes, my dear heart, it is hearts. Caro, would you be willing to sing something to keep us company?”

Frances didn’t even look up from her cards. “I would consider Lady Stratton’s singing to be a blatant attempt to undermine our concentration.”

“Would it?” Bart sounded interested. “Are you very accomplished, my lady?”

Caro shook her head. “Not at all. I sound like a raven crowing. Or croaking, or whatever they do.”

“Caw, maybe.” Henry peered over Bart’s shoulder. Not a trump in his hand, poor fellow. “Good lord, Bart. Seven trumps? Jem is clearly the one who cheats, since he’s dealt you so many.”

“You are a child, Hal,” Emily said, her brow furrowing as she selected her next play. “You are almost as bad as my Stephen, who reads out everyone’s cards, and he is only eight years old.”

“I was the one who shuffled the deck,” Frances said. “Does that mean I cheat at cards too?”

Henry smiled. “I would believe you capable of anything, Mrs. Whittier. You are sinister; you told me so yourself.” He was inordinately pleased to see color rise to her cheeks.

Caro began to peep at the hands of each of the card players. “My, my, Emily. Your pin money is surely gone. Frannie is frighteningly capable. I believe she could have cheated at cards anytime, and none of you would have suspected a thing.”

Frances slapped a low diamond onto the table with a frown. “If I truly cheated, I would have made certain that I got a better hand.”

“Or that I did,” Bart murmured. “I only wish I truly did have seven trumps.”

Jem tossed his cards onto the table, facedown. “Jupiter’s nightgown, how am I to think with you all talking? Is everybody cheating now?”

“Jemmy, how unkind of you. I shall call you out if you say such a thing again,” Emily said. “Drat; no, I won’t. With you dead, we would surely lose the rubber.”

Jem blinked. “Was that a compliment, Em?”

She sighed. “I suppose, though I only implied that you played better than a corpse.”

Before Jem could reply, there was a scratch at the door then the butler Sowerberry peeped his angular head into the drawing room. “I beg your pardon, Lord Tallant, but Master John and Master Stephen are asking you for a…” He paused and enunciated the next words as if they were in a language he did not understand. “A bedtime story, my lord. They insist that you promised them one if they spent the evening without breaking anything. They have requested that it be horrible.”

Henry smirked. “Oh, it’ll be horrible.”

The cuff on his shoulder as Jem stood felt blessedly normal. But after Jem left, Henry felt slow and stupid as he tried to think of the perfect thing to say. Or anything to say at all.

Because if there was one thing he could not do, it was take his brother’s place in the game and hold a sheaf of cards for whist. Not with one hand.

Maybe Emily noticed his sudden awkwardness, because she shrugged off the idea of further cards. “Well, that game was brief and combative. I am sorry for that. Though I am relieved not to lose any money to you flock of carrion crows. Mrs. Whittier, do come and play the piano, so Bart and I can have a dance.” She laughed when Bart’s face reddened at her teasing.

Briskly, Emily sorted them all out. Frances shuffled through music, and Caro joined her, exclaiming over a waltz. “Rather fast of you, isn’t this, Em?”

She looked as light and lovely as one of Leonardo’s angels as she shifted a lamp into place to study the music and began humming tunelessly. Next to her, Frances fell into shadow.

“Not a waltz, please,” Bart said, growing still more red.

Caro laughed again and set the scandalous music aside. “Perhaps a reel, then, for two couples? Frannie could play for us.” Her bright eyes twinkled as she held a hand out to Bart.

It felt like she’d slapped Henry with it.

So, she would write to him in private, but she wouldn’t acknowledge their closeness even in such a small party? And yet close was exactly how she wanted to hold him. She had written him so.

He felt hot-headed and hot-blooded, wanting to cut in and take her hand, wanting her to extend it to him.

Instead, he beat a strategic retreat to the fireside, unwilling to watch himself be defeated.

“I think I’ll sit out the dancing, ladies, if you don’t mind,” he said. “Though I’ll be happy to observe and critique your form.”

When all three women pulled faces at him, Henry knew his grin had stayed in place and no one suspected the truth.