“As Tom would now say, a churlish canker-blossom.”
They exchanged a smile, which heartened Arthur. He valued his friendship with Mrs. Thorpe.
“I enjoyed our conversation,” she continued. “And found other occasions to talk with Señora Alvarez. When I discovered that she was looking for occupation and that she was a talented watercolorist, I put in a word at the workshop. For several months now, she has been painting exquisite scenery there.”
Arthur nodded.
“Then recently, she was even more helpful. She stepped in to mediate a dispute among the opera dancers.” She cast him a look. “Many of them are émigrées, you know, and Señora Alvarez speaks Spanish, of course, but also French and some Portuguese and Italian.”
“She’s well educated then,” said Arthur. He’d known she must be.
“She also has sympathy for the girls’ troubles, which many do not.”
“Troubles?” Arthur had never thought much about opera dancers. Beyond appreciating their performances now and then.
Mrs. Thorpe looked disappointed in him, another unaccustomed experience. “They have quite a hard time of it, Lord Macklin. Low pay, and if they’re just five minutes late to rehearsal, they’re fined out of that small wage. They’re expected to pay for their shoes and costumes out of it, too. Many live on the verge of starvation and dangerously close to illness.” She frowned as if this could somehow be his fault. “And of course there are the gentlemen who consider their backstage room at the theater a marketplace for mistresses.”
Arthur knew this to be true. He had heard men joke about it. He had never been one of them, however.
“Some don’t mind the offers flung at them,” Mrs. Thorpe went on, as if taken by her own thoughts. “And indeed encourage them for the money they bring. But others feel forced. I do what I can to help out, and Señora Alvarez has joined me in that.”
“She has a caring heart,” said Arthur appreciatively.
Mrs. Thorpe raised her brows as if he’d missed an important point. “She does, but…”
“Yes?”
His hostess hesitated before adding, “The señora seems contented with her life as it is, Lord Macklin. Perhaps you should leave her alone.”
“What do you mean? I don’t intend to do anything to her.”
“Your interest is a thing.”
Rebellion stirred in his breast. “I wouldn’t do her any harm.”
“You won’t mean to. You’re a kind man. And yet, you are a man.”
“And thus a blundering fool?” Arthur had never been angry at Mrs. Thorpe in the years they’d been acquainted. Until now.
“Not that. But blind to certain things. It is not your fault. You are trained so.”
“Whereas you are all knowing?”
“Of course not. Yet you must admit I know more about the life of a woman than you.”
He couldn’t argue with that, though he wanted to. Fearing what he might say in his current mood, Arthur rose. “I shouldn’t keep you any longer.”
Mrs. Thorpe hesitated, then went to ring for a servant. “Further conversation does seem pointless just now,” she said, which only irritated Arthur further.
Striding along the street a few minutes later, he wrestled with his annoyance. For the life of him, he could not see how he had deserved the…judgment his supposed friend had levied upon him. He could call it nothing else. And he could only see it as unfair. She was as bad as Señora Alvarez. Two of them in as many days! It was outrageous.
Three
Arthur was still brooding over these encounters at the first great occasion of the season that year, a grand ball given by Lady Castlereagh. Standing to one side, watching the cream of society arrive, he found himself imagining Señora Alvarez here, vivid as a rose among daisies. He would like to dance with her, take her in to supper later, talk to her for more than a few minutes, and learn more about her. He wanted to show her that he was charming, he realized with chagrin. He wanted to make her smile as warmly at him as she had at Tom. But she wasn’t present, and she wouldn’t be at any of the festivities of the season, which suddenly seemed tedious.
She occupied his thoughts far more than any woman in his recent experience—the flash of her dark eyes, the enticing shape of her lips, the perfection of her form, and on the other hand, the…calculated impertinence of her manner. That was a good label for it. Purposefully insolent. She couldn’t really want to offend him. Could she? He would have said certainly not, any more than Mrs. Thorpe would ever insult him. Yet these things had happened. He should simply try to forget the woman. Yet he found he couldn’t.
Must he be bound by convention? Couldn’t he call on Señora Alvarez even if it was improper? Rebellion stirred in Arthur once again. He could do as he liked. Who would dare question him? And as if she stood beside him, he heard Mrs. Thorpe’s voice pointing out that the same wasn’t true for the señora. She would bear the consequences if gossip began.
Arthur set his jaw. He’d promised not to cause the lady difficulties. And he wouldn’t. He didn’t wish to! But neither would he avoid all chance of seeing her. He’d visited Tom at the workshop before; he could do so again. That would rouse no talk. He would show the señora that he was a friend worth cultivating. The resolve built in him as he realized that he wanted this more than anything he’d wished for in a long time.
More than he wished to be at this ball, for example. How would Señora Alvarez look at the bedecked and bejeweled crowd? How would Mrs. Thorpe? Arthur suspected, after his recent conversations, that it would not be as he saw them. He tried to summon their different points of view as he ran his eye over the people before him. But he didn’t know enough to do so, which was oddly frustrating. Most of the crowd was familiar, some of them even friends. And yet he wasn’t moved to go and speak to them. He knew they would exchange commonplace phrases that they’d used many times before. Was this his thirtieth season? More than that? Had he become jaded? He didn’t like that idea.
As if to illustrate the opposite end of the spectrum, a lively party came through the archway just then. The young Duke of Compton and his fiancée, Ada Grandison, were accompanied by her three close friends. Arthur had met all of them in the autumn under far different circumstances, and he knew this was their first venture into London society. Excitement showed on all their faces. The large and stately figure of Miss Julia Grandison, Miss Ada’s aunt, loomed behind them.
Compton came to join him while the ladies were detained by an acquaintance of the aunt. “My new coat,” said the younger man when he reached Arthur. He turned to show it off. “Perfection, according to Ada. Thank you for the recommendation of a tailor.”