"So, my sister went so far as to declare she'd not come if he were to be in attendance?" Sebastian was surprised that Libby would be so transparent.
"She did not. In fact, it was Miss Reeves who said she would not come if her father were in attendance."
Sebastian noticed that Lady Quamby continued to look very meaningfully at him. He sighed. "What does Miss Reeves fear from her father?"
"Exactitude." It was Lady Quamby’s turn to sigh. "Miss Reeves’s father has ideas for his daughter's future that do not accord with her own, apparently. As you well know, she left his house in high dudgeon some weeks ago and has been staying, first with her aunt and now with us. With her father arriving unexpectedly, I felt it only fair to warn you that there may be...discord ahead." She hesitated. "Unless someone can persuade Miss Reeves’s exacting father that he really has no say in the affairs of his daughter's heart."
Sebastian was surprised that she felt it necessary to apprise him of this. And that she was looking at him as if he might volunteer to be that someone. Feeling awkward, he cleared his throat. "I've heard you are skilled in achieving every desired outcome, Lady Quamby." Sebastian recognized that she was a woman who thrived on praise, and he hoped it would release him. He was suddenly anxious to quit this exchange now that he'd noticed, to his horror upon glancing down once more, that one of Venetia's white stockings had inadvertently become lodged in his boot. The end was dangling out of the top cuff. It was not greatly in evidence, and he was certain he'd be the only one to notice, but he needed to remove it—and return it to its owner—as quickly as he could, else the loss might occasion great embarrassment to Venetia.
“You are too sweet, Mr Wells.” His hostess looked like a delighted schoolroom miss, but fortunately she let him go after, confusingly, squeezing his arm and saying with unsettling intensity, “Have no fear, Mr Wells; I’ve certainly worked hard to achieve this desired outcome. All will be well, I promise.”
He hadn't gone more than a few hundred yards when he was waylaid by another feminine voice.
Tinged with anxiety, and sweetly breathless, he imagined for one lovely minute that it was Venetia, rushing after him to reclaim her stocking. Instead, he turned to find Miss Reeves gazing at him from the path along which he had just trodden. Her cheeks were flushed, and some of her hair had come loose from its confines.
"Mr Wells, I have been looking for you! I believe you are the only person who can help me!" She hurried forward, her face a picture of distress, and to his surprise, gripped his wrist before she dropped it, stepping back quickly. "Oh Mr Wells, I don't know what to do. I've just learned my father is arriving for the Christmas Ball and it is the worst news, ever!"
To his even greater dismay she immediately began to cry, great shaking sobs, which left him standing like some oaf before he felt it incumbent upon him to take an awkward step forward and pat her on the shoulder.
"What shall I do!" she cried, taking his awkward attempt at comfort as an invitation for more, for suddenly her arms were about him and she was weeping, her head against his chest. "He wants me to marry Lord Yarrowby, and I’ve heard it’s possible that Yarrowby might accompany him. But I have my heart set on someone else. Someone Papa will find completely unworthy, yet our love is so strong and pure no one can ever come between us! You know who I mean. What can I do? Please, will you help me?”
Sebastian did the best he could. He could hardly push her away, so he let her cling to him while he patted her back and asked, "I suppose you just have to persuade your father of the merits of your beloved. I'm sure if your young man has some worthwhile occupation to compensate for the title or pocketbook your father requires, all will be well."
"Why, it's the music master, Signor Boticelli!" she wept. "How will I persuade my father that his address is every bit as equal to Lord Yarrowby’s."
"It will be difficult," Sebastian conceded, mentally comparing the oily-haired dancing tutor, whom he was sure must be a good fifteen years older than Miss Reeves, with the tall, broad-shouldered, easygoing Yarrowby that Sebastian knew as a jolly decent fellow whose legendary calm and patience had unfairly earned him a reputation for being dull and boring.
“Did you really not know?” she asked, raising her tearstained face to his. “About Signor Boticelli, I mean. I’ve been so afraid that everyone would have suspected, since we are so in love!”
Sebastian shook his head and wondered what else he’d failed to notice these past two days.
Really, he’d had eyes only for Venetia.
"Then...will you help me?" She continued to look up at him pleadingly. "Oh, I beg of you, Mr Wells, you can have no idea how eternally grateful I would be if you were to lend your assistance to my cause."
Sebastian, who was just glad she'd put a respectable distance between them since he’d gently disengaged her arms from about his neck, nodded dubiously. "Of course I will assist if it is in my power. Though I have no idea how anything I might say or do would lend any weight."
"But you would help me if you could?"
Sebastian glanced nervously at the tears that had gathered on her eyelashes, afraid of saying anything that might cause them to cascade onto her cheeks. Weeping women did not make him comfortable. Lady Banks, from whose tentacles he'd managed to extricate himself with only the utmost degree of difficulty, had entwined him with such a ploy. Tears. He wasn't about to make the same mistake twice.
"I will help you in any way that is practicable, but really, Miss Reeves, I think your best course is to use gentle persuasion on your father. If he's a fond parent, he's hardly going to force you to marry a man you do not wish to marry. Besides which, it's against the law."
"I'm more worried about him not allowing me to marry the man I wish to marry. Yarrowby is so dull, he won’t fight for me. He does everything I ask of him, and if I tell him it’s Signor Boticelli, he’s hardly going to make a fuss. No, I need my father to be persuaded to sanction my marriage to the one man who holds my heart in his hand." For someone so delicate and pretty, there was a great deal of strength and energy in the gesticulation that accompanied her words.
Sebastian shifted awkwardly. "Why can’t Signor Boticelli, himself, persuade your father of the merits of you marrying him? He will need to support you, after all, so it’s up to him to be able to reassure Mr Reeves. A father’s chief concern would be to ensure his child is comfortably situated. Not even true love can compensate for material necessities."
"Material necessities! What is that compared with love?" she declared with a mutinous tilt to her chin. "If you have never been in love with someone your family deems unsuitable, you would not know that the desire for the glorious everlasting union of two souls united in every possible way, transcends all else. I love this man, Mr Reeves. I would do anything to spend eternity with him. I care nothing for material necessities when, if parted, my heart will be forever crying out for him!”
Her words rang in his ears with unsettling intensity long after they had parted, she turning dramatically on her heel to flounce off to the lake, he to trudge toward the house. The sweet, amorous encounter he'd just enjoyed with Venetia confirmed that his heart, also, would be forever crying out for her, if they should be parted once more.