A Breach of Promise - Anne Perry [11]
She accepted with a smile and he excused himself and offered her his arm to lead her to the floor. She took it lightly—he could barely feel her hand—and followed him without meeting his eyes.
They had been dancing for several minutes before she spoke, and then it was hesitant.
“I am sorry Mama is so … forward. I hope she did not embarrass you, Sir Oliver.”
“Not at all,” he said honestly. It was she who had been embarrassed. He had been merely angry. “She is only behaving as all mothers do.” He wanted to think of something else to add which would make her feel easier, but he could imagine nothing. This would go on, and they both knew it. It was a ritual. Some young women found a certain excitement in it or had a self-confidence which bore them along. Some were not sufficiently sensitive or imaginative to suffer the humiliation or to perceive the young man’s awkwardness or knowledge of being manipulated, almost hunted, and the burden of expectation upon him.
He must find a conversation to hold with Margaret. She was dancing with her head turned away, self-conscious, almost as if she feared he had invited her only to save her embarrassment. It was half true. He wished to make it wholly a lie. She seemed so very vulnerable.
“Do you know this architect, Killian Melville?” he asked.
“I have met him three or four times,” she answered, a slight lift of surprise in her voice, and she looked up towards him. “Are you interested in architecture, Sir Oliver?”
“Not especially,” he said with a smile. “I suppose I tend to be most aware of it when it offends me. I am rather used to agreeable surroundings. Perhaps I take them for granted. What is his work like? A less biased opinion than Miss Lambert’s, if you have one….”
She laughed. “Oh, yes indeed. I did like him. He was so easy to talk to. Not in the least … brash or—oh, dear, I don’t know how to pursue it without sounding …” She stopped again.
“Now you have me fascinated,” he admitted. “Please tell me. Speak frankly, and I promise not to take offense—or to repeat it.”
She regarded him uncertainly, then relaxed, and her eyes lost the anxiety they had held until that moment. He realized that without the artificial necessity to be charming, biddable, pretty and accommodating, she was almost certainly an intelligent and most likable person.
“Yes?” he prompted.
She laughed. “I found Mr. Melville one of the most comfortable people I ever encountered,” she said, swirling gracefully in his arms as they negotiated a complicated corner, her huge, pale skirts flying. “He never seemed to misunderstand or to need to prove himself and—and parade … as so many young men do … I—” She bit her lip. “I hope that does not sound too unkind?”
“Not at all,” he assured her. “Merely very candid. I know precisely what you mean. I have observed it, and I daresay if I were to glance around now I should see a score of examples. I was doubtless guilty of it myself … a few years ago.”
She wanted to laugh. He could see it in her eyes, but good manners, and the slightness of their acquaintance, forbade it.
“Perhaps I still do….” He said it before she could complete the thought.
“Oh no,” she denied. “I’m sure not now. You don’t need to, and you must know that.”
“The advantage of age.” He laughed at himself.
Suddenly the vulnerability was back in her eyes, and he knew she was afraid he had referred to the difference in their ages to distance himself from her, to let her know gently that this was merely a courtesy acquaintance and could be nothing more. That was true, but because of his feelings for Hester, not anything to do with Margaret Ballinger. Were it not for Hester, he might well have sought to know Margaret a good deal better.
He was chilled by the realization of how easy it was to hurt, without the slightest intention, simply because one was thinking of something else, watching some other imperative.
“Well, perhaps it is more the assurance one gains from some professional success,” he amended, then wished he had not. He was only making it worse. “Tell me more