“I’m so glad it’s what you hoped for,” she told Constance. “If you don’t mind, I am going to retire for a few hours before I travel.”
“Yes, of course,” Constance said. “But first there is something I would like to give you. It’s waiting in your bedchamber.”
Constance followed her to the ivory room. The enormous mahogany bed was piled with large scarlet boxes wrapped with striking golden ribbon.
“What is all this?”
“Valeria finished your things.”
Poppy bit her lip. She had asked Constance to cancel the order and to excuse her from attending the ball, pleading lingering weakness in her ankle. Constance had agreed.
In retrospect, she had agreed far too easily, making almost no fuss.
“I know you said you would rather not attend, but truly you should. It would be a great favor to me.”
“Constance, I don’t want to argue with you, but I am quite exhausted.”
“Would you at least open the boxes?”
“Very well.”
She removed the ribbon from the largest box and sorted through layers of delicate paper to find a lustrous gown of pale green silk inlaid with tiny drops of opal. She ran her hands along the garment, hardly able to believe the beauty of it. The next box contained a set of stays to fit below the stomacher, panniers to lift the skirts up and out around her hips, and a fine sheer muslin chemise embroidered with flowers in pale green thread. She clutched the garment to her chest and shook her head at Constance’s generosity.
“This is beautiful. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Please wear it tonight. Please come. As my guest of honor. You have worked so hard, and I know that the benefits to you in attending will outweigh the discomfort.”
She met Poppy’s eye. “To your ankle,” she added after a brief pause.
Poppy wondered how much she had guessed about what had passed between her and Westmead. Surely, she could not know the full extent of it. And yet there was a glimmer in her eye that implied that little had escaped her.
Constance helped her open the remaining boxes, laying out gold slippers, fine stockings, and satin gloves. “I shall send my maid, Sylvie, to come and dress you and help you with your hair. Say you’ll come. Please.”
Poppy sighed.
“May I think about it?”
“Of course. Oh, and I almost forgot, there is this.” She pointed at a small, unopened box in plain white paper, overlooked in the pile of scarlet trimming. “It was here before. You must have another admirer.”
She kissed Poppy on the cheek, and turned to go. “Send word up to me if you decide to stay. I hope you will.”
Poppy waited for her to leave before opening the final box.
Inside were a clasped case and a folded note pressed with ruby wax—Westmead’s seal.
Cavendish—
Let the final humiliation between us be that I could not find adequate words to ask for your forgiveness. Know that as you ascend to ever-greater triumphs in what shall no doubt be a long and storied life, somewhere a rueful friend smiles, wishing you every happiness.
All regret.
Archer
Inside the velvet box was a crown of perfect white plumeria blossoms. She knew these flowers. They were from her greenhouse. From the very plant he had toppled the day that he’d burst in on her.
Later, after she had sent word to Constance that she would accept the invitation to stay after all, and Sylvie had come to dress her, the maid lifted up the delicate wreath of buds with a wrinkled nose.
“Well, is that all you plan to wear in your hair?” she asked, looking skeptical. “With the other finery, you’d be better with a tiara. Shall I see if her ladyship would loan you one? She has a set of emeralds that would suit you.”
Poppy shook her head.
There were no words for what she felt.
Only the sight of her image in the mirror: a woman with a modest headpiece and eyes that glowed like thawing ice.
Archer tried not to wince as the young Miss Bastian continued to prattle blandly in his ear. How he was going to summon the force of will to offer for her he didn’t know. At least his secrets would be safe with her as his duchess. In the many days of their acquaintance, she had yet to ask him a question.
“Lady Constance has made this place so beautiful,” she enthused, gesturing at the lushness that surrounded them. “You must be very proud of her.” She plucked a rope of flowers from a trellis and wound it around her neck—a gesture meant as flirtation that succeeded only in giving her the aspect of some dairy maiden’s favored milch cow.
He glanced over at his sister, glittering in an appropriately ludicrous pink confection that nearly swallowed her and her crowd of admirers whole.
“I am always proud of Constance. Though I suspect the credit for the beauty lies largely with Miss Cavendish. She has an unusual talent.”
Miss Bastian smiled in a way that was not kind. “She certainly seems to think so. How fine she looks, in that gown. A gardener in Valeria Parc. Imagine.”
He followed her gaze to the assembled crowd below.
She’d come.
He’d been informed she had declined the invitation, but there she was, standing beside Lady Rosecroft, who was introducing her to a group of elegantly dressed gentlemen.
Her lean frame was molded and stiffened into the curvier style of fashionable society, her skirts billowing out around panniers, her bust uplifted with stays. Her hair, for once, was not a riot, but was coiled elaborately around the sides of her head, drawing attention to the elegance of her long neck. She looked every bit the sophisticated London lady she might have been through a different accident of parentage.
Except for one detail.
His breath caught.
She had worn his flowers in her hair.
The simple wreath of plumeria was the only item that gave a hint of the woman she was beneath the finery—the waif in her smudged gardening gowns who stayed up all night drawing plants. The woman who had seen in a patch of wildflowers the makings of this verdant fantasy. No one would mistake her for an eccentric spinster in this crowd. No one would dare take her for an object of pity. And yet, he preferred her in her breeches, lugging plants in the sunshine. Not Miss Cavendish, but Poppy. The brilliant and singular Poppy.
Constance tapped him on the shoulder. “It is time to commence the dancing. I trust you will lead us in the first minuet?”
She gave him a meaningful look. Given he was widely known to eschew dancing, his participation would set the whole room atwitter. His choice of partner would no doubt be scrutinized like tea leaves for some sign of his intentions. There was one clear choice for whom he should ask, and she was standing next to him, fluttering her eyelashes in expectation of being made the envy of the room.
“Excuse me,” he said, nevertheless, to Miss Bastian.
He turned and walked toward Poppy. The gentlemen surrounding her greeted him with the grudging respect that marked his relations with London’s grandees. He rather enjoyed their incredulous expressions when he interrupted them to address the nurserywoman.
“Good evening, Miss Cavendish.”
She arranged her face into a polite, if chilly, smile. “Your Grace.”
“It’s a triumph, what you’ve done here,” he said. “I can’t fathom how you’ve managed it.”