Page 11 of Bewitching Benedict (The Lovelorn Lads #1)
C laire had been to balls and soirees before.
Indeed, as the daughter of one of the wealthier families in her home town of Bodton, she had helped to host some fine fetes, or what had seemed to her at the time to be fine fetes.
Now, however, she gazed in astonishment at a crowd so large that every soul from Bodton could be placed in it and lost to one another's sight.
She could not, in the first moments, decide which was more impressive: the house and hall itself, or the sumptuously dressed, too-warm bodies within it.
The entry hall swept some twenty feet upward, with cornices enriching the ceiling where chandeliers did not drip.
The floors were marble. The walls were set with marvelous paintings of seasides and warfare and draped with velvet that could protect them when they were not on ostentatious display.
Vast archways and doors led into other rooms. Claire could see no more than the swish of gowns through them, but the entry hall alone seemed as impressive as any endless country manor could be.
Gowns ranging in every shade from purest white to deepest mourning purple were visible, so that a scattered rainbow seemed to sway across the floors.
Claire clutched the skirt of her own creamy, green-trimmed gown as if to reassure herself of its suitability, took a deep, steadying breath, and swayed.
The smell was, frankly, appalling. Even the finest perfumes and colognes could not overcome the number of overheated people and the astringent scent that rose from them.
Claire suffered a brief impulse to flee.
It was not to be; she had been announced, people had politely clapped a greeting, and somewhere in the crush was Nathaniel Cringlewood, who would dance with her.
She could not, despite the smell, retreat from a promised dance to one of the peerage, and so into chaos she descended.
But it wasn't chaos after all. There was a flow and ebb to the movement, surges that swept the Dalton cousins along, then slowed to allow them to greet other attendees.
Charles knew an astonishing number of people.
Claire met, smiled at, and mostly forgot them as new names and faces were introduced.
A few stood out, primarily a young woman upon whose shimmering white and silver gown Charles accidentally trod.
She, accepted his gracious apology with a nod and a gesture of rueful exasperation toward the crowd, as though to say, what else is to be expected?
before turning away. Claire breathed, "Who was that? "
Charles, mystified, replied, "I have no idea," before introducing Claire to a dowager duchess so resplendent in a deep purple gown thirty years out of fashion that even in the crush, she was afforded room to move.
"Cousin to the Regent on his mother's side," Charles informed her after they'd offered the duchess their greetings.
"The peak of society. Here at Cringlewood's request, probably.
I'd certainly never have met her if I lacked his friendship. "
The duchess and the rueful young woman were followed by a general whose curly white muttonchops extended a full five inches from either side of his face and gave the impression he was of one exact width from his pate to his pointed shoes.
Shortly thereafter, a young man approached and introduced himself to Charles with the clear purpose of then being introduced to Claire.
Out of the dozens she met, those four were the ones she remembered.
Of all of them, the last—a dashing youth with sandy gold hair and soulful brown eyes—bowed over her hand as a slightly bemused and wary Charles said, "Claire, may I present Mr Jack Graham. Mr Graham, my cousin, Miss Dalton."
"Forgive me my boldness, Miss Dalton, but I saw you arrive and knew that if I did not make your acquaintance before you reached the ballroom I would have no chance at all to request a dance. I confess to lurking here while you crossed the room in hopes of encountering you. May I have the honor?"
Claire looked at Charles, whose modestly elevated eyebrows left the decision to her. She returned her gaze to Mr Jack Graham. "Are you always so bold, Mr Graham?"
"Only in the presence of beauty, Miss Dalton," Graham said with such sincerity that Claire laughed.
"I'm afraid you've mistaken me for another, then. I will accept platitudes of prettiness, but beauty is beyond me. I haven't the nose for it."
Charles, to her utter surprise, murmured, "I think you do yourself a disservice, Claire," but Graham, the corner of his mouth rising in contained humor, replied, "I assure you that I am only being agreeable when I say you may be right.
Still, I was moved to remain—" his eyes sparkled at the contradictory words, making Claire smile again, "—here by the ballroom door in hopes of making your acquaintance, whether moved by beauty or tremendous prettiness.
I am forward, I know it, but will you dance with me? "
An absolute gentleman ought to have insisted on her beauty; that was the way it was done.
But a man who conceded that a woman's perception of her own attractiveness was appropriate was intriguing.
Before she knew it, Claire had said, "I would be pleased to dance with you, Mr Graham, although I have already promised the first two dances and then the first of the second set and—pardon, I must check my card. "
She did, deliberately tilting it so that Graham could see it was already nearly half full.
It would have been half full, she was certain, had Charles's large friend Mr Vincent not, the evening before, stepped upon the foot of the ruthlessly charming Mr O'Brien when he was about to claim a second dance for himself.
Or, indeed, if Mr Fairburn had roused himself to arrange a dance this evening ahead of time, but he had not.
Charles, however, had, and the result was that she looked quite popular before even setting foot in the ballroom.
"My word," Graham exclaimed at the sight of the card. "I am vindicated, Miss Dalton, in my brashness. Had I waited I would have been lost. Perhaps the third dance?"
"The third dance it shall be." Claire smiled as he wrote his name on the card and curtsied when he bowed and took his leave.
He was very handsome, she decided, and didn't realize she'd spoken aloud until Charles said, in slightly gruff agreement, "I suppose that he is. Not very tall, though, Claire."
"He's as tall as you are, Charles!"
Charles gave her an acknowledging smile. "As I said. Now, the dancing will be starting soon, and I must deliver you to Cringlewood. Don't promise all your dances before you get to him, Claire. He will have friends of his own here, all more noble than Jack Graham."
"Wait. Do you know Mr Graham? Is there something of which I should be warned?"
"Know him? No, not at all, which is how I know there are nobler men awaiting you." Charles offered his arm once more, and together they slipped into the ballroom.
Rumor ran ahead of Benedict Fairburn like a flood-swelled stream, informing all of Society of his forthcoming fortune.
He could no more pick out the words than he might have from a stream's babble, but he could see it clearly enough.
Feathered and bejeweled heads dipped together, murmurs were exchanged, and then those glittering blonds and brunettes lifted their gazes to look upon him with critical, calculating interest. On the mothers, that calculation never faded, though on most of the daughters it softened to comeliness and charm.
He was politely pleased to make the acquaintance of daughter after daughter, bowing and smiling and all the while suffering a terrifying constriction of breath in his throat.
No doubt it was the heat. So many people made for veritable waves of rising warmth, and the air he breathed felt as though it had been thinned by other lungs before it reached him.
Perhaps that was also why his hands, despite the heat, seemed so cold: his humors were off from too-thin air and the overwhelming number of young ladies being presented to him.
He had always supposed it would be splendid to be in such demand, and had upon occasion joined throngs of admiring young men in pursuit of a particular new Society beauty.
Now, faced with the same degree of pursuit, he had the sharp desire to find every single one of those young ladies and offer his devout apologies.
Here and there he requested a dance of an especially pretty daughter.
Once he regretted it before the question was even finished, as a small, well-rounded young woman changed from politely intriguing to simperingly cloy and clung to his arm as if already wed to him.
It was all Benedict could do to stop himself from actually shaking her off, and indeed he only managed to disengage when a striking strawberry blonde said, "Ah, there you are, Mr Fairburn," and nimbly inserted herself between Benedict and the round girl.
"Do forgive me," she said to the other girl, but rather than offer any excuse beyond that she simply walked Benedict toward the dance floor.
"Do forgive me," she repeated, this time to Benedict. "You looked in need of rescue. Miss Priscilla Hurst, and we had best behave as if we were previously acquainted."
"Miss Hurst, it is my great pleasure to renew our acquaintance," Benedict said quietly but heartily.
"I'm sure we met at the park recently. Would you care to dance so we might continue its renewal?
But no," he said almost instantly as his companion's beauty began to make itself known to him, "I'm sure this dance must already be promised. "