Amy leaned close to Elizabeth. “You are thinking very deep thoughts, my friend.”
“Oh? I’m told that thinking in ladies is unattractive.”
“Usually it is, but it makes you appear quite mysterious. I approve.”
“Amy, you’re a bad influence on me.”
“Good! Now, do share.”
She took a deep breath. “I am thinking, what a pack of vultures.”
Amy burst out laughing, and the matrons and their daughters turned sharp looks to them, which caused Elizabeth’s friend to choke back even more laughter.
The gentlemen joined the ladies soon enough, and there was music and whist. The younger of the company drifted to an adjacent parlor, talking around the fireplace with the illusion of privacy, chaperoned by the company in the other room.
“I think our introduction to the neighborhood has been a great success, brothers,” said Francis, the merry one, as Elizabeth thought of him. “What say you, ladies?”
“A triumphant success, I think,” Amy exclaimed. “But you will have to hold a ball of your own soon to truly establish yourselves.”
“Ah, of course,” Francis said. “We cannot escape the balls, can we?”
Vincent and Edward showed sour expressions at this, though they made a good show of fortitude. The drawing room was not their natural habitat, as Edward had indicated. Francis masked discomfort by being forward. Vincent and Edward did not mask it at all.
“But now—I am going to be quite rude,” Amy said. “I hope you will not think ill of me for it.”
“How could anyone ever think ill of you?” Francis said.
“We know nothing about you,” she said. “Where are you from? What can you tell us of the Wilde family? If you do not wish to answer directly, perhaps we can play a game of questions. You need only answer yes or no, then.”
“There is nothing to tell, really,” Vincent said, eyeing his brothers.
“No, please, a game of questions would be delightful! Are you from the north?”
“Ah . . . no,” Vincent said.
“The south, then?”
“No.”
The young lady pursed her lips. “Well then, where are you from?”
“Miss Weston,” Edward said. He began to pace. “Do you play the pianoforte?”
Elizabeth flinched, startled. “Not very well, I’m afraid.”
Francis laughed. “Then we must hear you play, Miss Weston, for all ladies say they do not play well, to better display their genteel humility.”
Amy stood and gave a brilliant smile. All the gentlemen must swoon. “Mr. Wilde, we are having such a fine conversation, I’m sure no one wishes to leave it even for a moment just to play something.”
Rescue. Elizabeth’s relief was physical.
Francis seemed put out. “Really, I thought this was how it was done. The lady is asked to play, she demurs that she does not play well, her assembled friends assure her that she plays very well indeed, and then the lady is allowed to demonstrate her skill without being accused of undue pride.” He was teasing. His manner was bright, containing no malice at all, but Elizabeth might wish she weren’t the subject of his banter. She was ill equipped to bear it.
“Mr. Wilde, do be still,” Edward said, biting the words. Something rose up in him. His lips curled, showing teeth.
Their exteriors were polite. They did not tear into each other with claws—but they wanted to, with the looks they gave one another, raking each other up and down with sharp gazes. Their lips parted hungrily, their teeth were white and sharp.
Elizabeth stood. She did not have to feign an anxious tremor in her voice. “I think . . . I think I should like to take a walk. A turn about the room. To get some air.”
The brothers turned to her, still annoyed but they no longer seemed as if they wished to devour one another, and that made a great improvement on Elizabeth’s nerves.
“Miss Weston, are you well?” Vincent Wilde asked.
“In truth, the room seems somewhat . . . crowded.”
“There are less than a dozen of us here!” one of the other young ladies, one often frustrated with Elizabeth’s fragility, exclaimed.
“And yet I think the room is quite full.”
“Miss Weston displays a great deal of insight, I think,” Edward said. “If I may, I will escort you to the window for some air.”
“Thank you, sir.”
They went off a little ways, and Edward pushed open the window. The air that came in was cold and damp. Her mother would be horrified of a chill overtaking her, but Elizabeth breathed it in gratefully.
They had some privacy. They could speak alone in quiet voices. It seemed wonderfully illicit. Some of the others might think this had all been a ploy on her part to get Edward alone. Amy might have encouraged her to try such a trick, but she would know this was honest. Elizabeth wasn’t very good at ploys.
Edward’s concern was genuine. He did not think this was a ploy.
“Thank you,” she said softly. “I was quite overwhelmed.”
“You are not wrong about the room,” Edward said. “It is more full than it appears.”
“I think that is because the personalities of you and your brothers are so very large. When you were boys your mother and father must have despaired of ever having peace again. Except—you are not truly brothers, are you?”
“How do you guess that? I know we do not favor one another, but it is very forward of you to say so.”
“I have never done a forward thing in all my life but talk to you.”
“You—your insight . . . it astonishes me.” His whole manner had stiffened.
She had never wanted to understand someone as much as she wanted to understand him. At the moment, he was building walls in his mind to keep her out.
“I am not trying to astonish, truly.”
“It makes you all the more intriguing.”
She had never before wanted to kiss someone, but she could finally see why one might want to. If she leaned in, if she put her hand on his chest—it was scandalous. She also felt that if she tried to kiss him, he would let her.
He shook his head and took a step back, and she felt as if a chasm opened between them.
“I fear, Miss Weston, that I have misled you. I admire you, but I cannot do more than that. This is for your own safety, please believe me.”
He was not lying. But he was disguising the full truth.
“Mr. Wilde—” But he had already walked away.
Amy interrogated her thoroughly.
“But what did he say?”
Heads bent together, no one could hear them. The evening was over. Elizabeth was in her coat, waiting in the foyer for the carriages to be drawn up. The brothers Wilde were nowhere to be seen.
“That this was for my own safety, and then he left. He was unhappy, I could see that he was.”
“Of course he was, to give you up. My dear, he has used you very ill, to draw you in and then drop you like . . . like a handkerchief.” She frowned at her own metaphor.
“I do not know what I did wrong. Perhaps I spoke too freely—”
“Oh, do not blame yourself. Who can understand men?”
They kissed cheeks in farewell and the Westons left in their carriage. When her father asked her how she liked the evening, she only said that she liked it well enough, but that she was tired now and didn’t want to speak.