The rat.
But it had given her a question to answer that she knew would drive her distracted if she let it. Which was really the mask he wore? That glowering, angry expression that seemed to cling to him like a second skin, with an accompanying cloak of misery so thick and dark that no one dare get close? Or had it perhaps been that fleeting, ephemeral smile that seemed so unlikely and had disappeared so fast that she wondered if she had simply imagined it?
She felt the desperate desire to know, and yet knew it to be a puzzle that would not be hers to solve. A man like that would not trust easily, and the only person who would have a chance to gain the intimacy required to attempt such a thing would be his wife. She smothered a choking laugh at the idea of the man actually offering for her. Good Lord, she wasn’t so deluded as to believe that would ever happen! He clearly couldn’t stand her, and was likely just doing his level best to throw her into confusion with his smirks and smiles.
It was working.
Drat him.
Belle watched the men enter the room and prayed that Lord Nibley would seek her out without her having to arrange a conversation with him herself. She had thrown herself in his way as much as she dared, and he seemed always rather pleased to see her. The trouble was she couldn’t help but feel it was relief at finding someone who he no longer needed to stutter around a conversation with, rather than actual pleasure. But he should feel comfortable with a woman he offered for, she reasoned, and then remembered the urgent, desperate feeling she had felt with the marquess. That was a man who no woman in their right mind could ever feel merely comfortable with, and she couldn’t help but wonder if he felt the same.
With an inward curse, she scolded herself for allowing her thoughts to return to him yet again, and tried to follow the conversation Crecy was having with the Bridgeford twins.
“Yes, I love Mrs Radcliffe, naturally,” Crecy said, nodding, her grey eyes alight with interest. “But I’ve heard rumours of a simply wonderful story being published in the new year. It’s a retelling of Prometheus, about a scientist and his work to create new life. He takes bits of lots of different bodies and sews them all back together to bring a man back from the dead.”
Her sister’s voice gave this information with the air of someone revealing a great treat as the twins simply paled and blinked at her in stunned silence. Even Belle swallowed with distaste at the idea.
Crecy stared at them in surprise.
“But doesn’t that sound the most fascinating story?” she demanded.
“It sounds like heresy to me,” said a deceptively sweet voice from behind them. “I mean, a man playing God?” Isabella Scranford said, her pretty face screwed up in horror, one slender hand pressed her to heart as though she might faint dead away. “How can you think that interesting? It certainly doesn’t seem like a suitable topic for a young lady.”
To Belle’s horror, Crecy’s admirers had insinuated themselves closer, and were now listening into this conversation with a mixture of interest and discomfort. Even worse, the marquess had taken several steps closer, obviously having caught the nature of the argument. Coming to gloat, no doubt.
Belle bit her lip in agitation, sensing disaster at the scene unfolding before her. She noted, with mounting anxiety, that Crecy was about to bubble over with fury. Before she could cudgel her poor brain into finding a way to diffuse the situation, however, Crecy had boiled over.
“I think it is stupid in the extreme to judge a work before one has even had the opportunity to expend the necessary time and thought required to make such a judgement,” she said, and Belle could only admire her sharp mind and sharper tongue, even though she was about to wreck everything. “The point of the story, as I am given to understand it, is to illustrate the fact that such attempts by mankind are abhorrent, and can only lead to disaster, so hardly heretical. It warns us that there is great responsibility with scientific discovery, that some things, once created or discovered, cannot be put back in the box, as Pandora found herself. And as for it not being fit for a lady!” she added in utter contempt, her lovely face flushed with anger as her voice rose with her temper. “It was written by a woman, and I at least am not such a poor creature as to succumb to a fit of the vapours at the very idea of it!”
“Oh no,” Isabella tittered with a venomous glint in her eyes. “We can all see that you are not a woman of delicate sensibilities, Miss Lucretia,” the young woman said, her tone mocking as she took in the rather shocked faces of the gentlemen around them. “I’m sure there is nothing in the world that you could not face,” she said on a sigh, waving a delicate arm. “I, however, have no taste for such ... such morbid and indelicate subjects, and would leave such things to the gentlemen and their stronger constitutions, if such disturbing things appeal to them. I’m sure the very idea makes me feel quite ... quite faint.” In what Belle could only admire as a truly remarkable piece of work, Lady Scranford placed a fluttering hand over her heart and batted her eyelashes in the manner of someone about to swoon.
“One of you men, take the woman outside to get some air,” came a harsh voice, cutting into Belle’s appalled brain like a heroic sword. “She looks like she’s going to vomit, and I’d rather it wasn’t on my Axminster.”
At this rather prosaic observation by none other than the marquess himself, Lady Scranford snapped back to life with a horrified gasp. Belle, quite overcome, had to feign a fit of choking to disguise the hysterical bubble of mirth that broke free at the sight of the spiteful creature’s embarrassment. At that moment, she could happily have kissed the man, but as she looked up to meet his gaze, hoping to share in the enjoyment of the moment, he looked away.
She found herself ridiculously disappointed and somehow cheated by this, as she felt quite certain that he’d found the situation as amusing and ludicrous as she had.
“Miss Bridgeford, perhaps you and your sister would accompany Lady Scranford for propriety’s sake,” the marquess added with a rather brusque jerk of his head that had the twins scurrying away with alacrity.
Belle noticed, with a sinking heart, that the risk of the lady vomiting notwithstanding, many of Crecy’s admirers had gone with the wretched woman, and the others who remained left to find more convivial conversation elsewhere.
Crecy was nowhere to be seen.
Belle felt a jolt of anxiety and scanned the room. She turned, only to find that the marquess hadn’t moved and that they were standing alone together. Her heart began a rapid dance in her chest, and Belle promised herself that she would not do or say anything rash or ... or improper.