Page 4 of The Ruin of Miss Amelia Burrowes (The Matchmaker’s Ball #4)

“What have you done, Mama?” Dismayed, Amelia glared at the broad back and wide shoulders of Lord Ainsley as he disappeared into the crowd. “I thought you wished me to marry Mr. Burke.”

“I wish you to marry as well as possible, my dear.” Her mother, too, watched Lord Ainsley’s progress, a new light in her eyes. “Why settle for plain Mrs. Burke when you could perhaps be Lady Ainsley?”

“I assure you that will not happen. He doesn’t…” Amelia hated to speak the words. “He doesn’t know about me, Mama. About the scandal. He was out of the country when it happened and only knew that I was betrothed. Only just now did he learn that Carrington died. He’s thought me married all these years.”

“So much the better.” The delighted tone of voice assured Amelia that her mother would not set aside the notion of a proposal by Lord Ainsley any time soon. “If I read the signs right, I daresay he will be calling on Papa to ask permission for a formal courtship.”

“He will discover the truth, Mama. He has only to mention my name to anyone and the whole sordid mess will rear its head again. Do you want that?” It was the last thing Amelia wanted. Lord Ainsley seemed to remember her with fondness. She would like that to continue, but feared the next time she saw him, he would look at her with disdain, believing her a ruined woman.

“Of course not.” Mama sniffed but also smiled. “However, if his lordship is taken with you, he might choose to ignore or disregard the scandal. I seem to remember you were quite fond of him your first Season.” She suddenly peered closely at Amelia. “And he of you. That spark may well be kindling once again.”

The one thing for which Amelia scarcely dared to hope. She could not bear Lord Ainsley, for whom she’d developed a tendre those many years ago, to think ill of her now. Better to leave the past in the past where it could remain golden in her memory, rather than tarnish it with the scandal that had plagued her for ages. Her safest course, though certainly not the one she wanted, would be to marry Mr. Burke and settle for respectability while she still could. Put all thoughts of Lord Ainsley firmly away. Of course, having become reacquainted with him would make that a more difficult task. A more handsome and intelligent gentleman she had never met, with a wit that had drawn her to him long ago. If only he had not gone away…

“Miss Burrowes, at last.” Mr. Burke had finally come upon them, his frowning face dark as a rain cloud. He handed her a glass of lemonade. “I was beginning to fear Lord Ainsley had absconded with you for some nefarious purpose.”

Amelia had to bite her lip to keep from giving him a sharp retort. The pot calling the kettle black, indeed. “No, Lord Ainsley was a perfect gentleman. He took me outside for a breath of fresh air, which did restore me remarkably well. We may have lingered a moment or two as I particularly enjoyed the cool air after the heat inside.” She gave him a pointed look and was mollified when he dropped his gaze from hers. “Then he returned me to Mama as promised.”

“Well, I am glad to hear he behaved himself.” Mr. Burke’s bluster returned as he spoke to Mama. “I would not wish my future wife to be put upon by a rogue with a title.”

“Prospective future wife, Mr. Burke.” Her mother rapped his arm sharply with her folded fan. “There have been no settlements signed yet, if you recall. My daughter is still free to accept the suit of any man who presents himself.”

“Mrs. Burrowes, you cannot mean that!” Burke’s voice rose above the din of the ballroom, and a hush fell over the area where they stood. All eyes turned toward them, curious and suspicious.

Hoping no one would register who she was, Amelia fled toward the ladies’ retiring room, her violet slippers drumming a tattoo on the hardwood floors in her haste. Along the way, she thrust the untasted glass of lemonade into the hands of a startled footman, scarcely caring if it slopped onto her dress or not. If only she could spend the balance of the evening hiding there, perhaps this ill-omened re-entry to society would not be deemed a total disaster.

* * * *

“May I ask you something, Haversham?” Nathan had just finished a fine afternoon’s work deviling his best friend, the Earl of Haversham, by arranging for him to court his sister Kate, who was in her third Season with no prospects for a husband. He had a sneaking suspicion that the animosity between the two masked kindred spirits who would ignite a blazing passion if given the right circumstances.

“By God, I think you’ve asked enough of me for one day.” The earl eased back into his chair, sipping his third whiskey.

“This has nothing to do with Kate, so smooth your feathers.” He set his own glass on the table. “It has to do with a lady I met last night.” After he’d escorted his sister home last evening, he’d not been able to get Miss Burrowes out of his head. The hints she’d given him spoke tantalizingly of some tragedy in her life, although he couldn’t for the life of him conclude what it might be. Perhaps his friend might be able to shed some light on the situation.

“Ah, the truth comes out. You wish me to be leg-shackled to your sister in order to keep you company.” Haversham grinned, likely enjoying turning the tables on him.

“I have no idea of marrying the woman.” The dubious veracity of that statement Nathan chose to ignore for the moment. “I renewed our acquaintance briefly last evening, although we met initially over ten years ago, just before I took my Grand Tour.”

“She’s a widow?”

“No, although she was once betrothed, it seems. A Miss Amelia Burrowes.”

Haversham sat bolt upright, spewing whisky over himself and Nathan’s best Italian leather chair. “Miss Burrowes?”

“What the devil’s the matter with you?” Nathan grabbed his handkerchief from his pocket and attempted to save his favorite seat.

Haversham mopped his face and clothing with his own linen. “You did say Miss Burrowes, didn’t you?”

“I did. You say her name as though the lady was an ogre of some sort. I can assure you she is not.”

“Ogre, no. Outcast, yes.” The earl tossed the sopping handkerchief onto the table and set his glass next to it. “I am amazed she’s back in Society, even after all this time.”

“We cannot be talking about the same lady.” Nathan finished scrubbing the leather cushion and stood. “This is Miss Amelia Burrowes. A sweet but rather spirited lady even when I first met her.”

“I was also acquainted with her when she first came out. You’d made such startling remarks about her beauty I wanted to see her for myself and scraped an introduction.” He peered down at his cravat, baptized with dark stains. “Gads, Ainsley. I shall have to hurry home and change my linen. I’m not fit to be seen.”

“Tidy yourself later. What about Miss Burrowes?”

“Well, you were, of course, right about her beauty. So it’s no surprise that, not long after you left, she was snapped up by Lord Carrington.” Settling back in the chair once more, Haversham took up his drink again. “The most fashionable couple of the Season. They seemed very happy together…and very affectionate. Until Carrington suddenly fell gravely ill.”

“Deucedly bad luck.” Miss Burrowes must’ve been mad with worry. He remembered her being very tenderhearted.

“In more ways than one.” A pinched expression came over Haversham’s face. “Lord Carrington lingered for some weeks so that eventually Miss Burrowes and her family requested that the marriage go forward despite the gentleman’s infirmity. To ensure, they said, that the lady would be provided for. And had they married, she would, even now, be the wealthy widow of an earl. But Carrington died before the nuptials could be arranged, and so she remained Miss Burrowes.”

Frowning, Nathan poured another tot of spirits into his glass. “I do not see the point, Haversham. She was betrothed and the man died. If she was not suspected of poisoning him, I do not see how scandal comes into it.”

Swirling his libation slowly, Haversham kept his gaze on his glass. “That came afterward, Ainsley. Miss Burrowes was prostrate with grief at Carrington’s death. She and her family retired to their estate in Dorset where she fell ill herself for a time.”

“I still see no hint of scandal here, Haversham. A woman’s grief is no reason for her to be disgraced.” Was this a storm in a cream pot, after all?

Casting a look of disbelief at Nathan, his friend sat forward in his chair. “Perhaps none of your family or friends has become betrothed in the last ten or so years?”

Nathan shook his head. What was Haversham getting at?

“Are you not aware then that from almost the moment couples agree to marry, they feel it is permitted to anticipate the wedding night?”

“Well, yes, of course I know that.” Then with dawning realization… “So the ton believed that Miss Burrowes and Lord Carrington…?”

“Exactly. It would explain her family’s frantic desire to have them marry before he died. And her illness afterward.”

“Her illness?”

Haversham paused. “The on-dit at the time put it about that she had either birthed or lost a child.”

“Good God.” As though a rug had been pulled from beneath his feet, Nathan’s world shifted. The Miss Burrowes he had known would never have done such a thing.

Although…

He was back under the cherry tree, in Lady Hamilton’s garden, moonlight streaming around him and the lady with a thousand stars shining down on them and their passionate kiss…

“Ainsley? Ainsley.”

Haversham’s insistent voice brought him out of his reverie. “What?” He blinked several times to clear the vision of that night from his head.

“You seem stunned. You’d never heard this rumor before? About Miss Burrowes?” His friend looked at him askance.

“No, never. When I left for Italy, she’d just come out. My father wrote to me that she’d become betrothed to Lord Carrington shortly after I left, and I inquired about her no more.” And some time later, finally made peace with his heart. “When I returned a little over two years later, I had no cause to ask after her, assuming that she’d married. Only last night did I discover that the gentleman had died before they could do so.”

“I suppose the scandal had died down by the time you returned, but it was on everyone’s tongues for months.” Haversham stared frankly at him. “And now she has returned to Society. I wonder why?”

“She is to be married to a Mr. Burke from Derbyshire, it seems.”

“Then perhaps they are testing the waters of respectability.” Haversham nodded. “Such a marriage might help repair her reputation.”

“That seems likely.” And would explain much about last night. The embrace he’d interrupted, Burke’s overly affectionate treatment of Miss Burrowes, and her lack of affection for him. An arranged marriage to help bring her back into Society. “Though why now, after all these years, is a mystery.”

“And one we will simply have to ponder until the gossips inform us, as they most assuredly will.” His friend laughed, drained his glass, and rose. “I’ll wager—or rather would wager had I the funds—that there is already an on-dit in some news sheet about her presence at Lady Hamilton’s last night. I wonder the lady would even invite her.”

“That I can shed some light on.” Nathan rose as well. “Lady Hamilton is her aunt. I remember Miss Burrowes telling me that all those years ago. Perhaps she’s trying to assist the woman on her way back to respectability.”

“Better she than you or I. Nothing good can come of such a scheme. Getting embroiled in such unpleasantness would be disastrous to one’s own reputation, I’m certain.” Haversham looked at Nathan and stopped dead. “You haven’t… Ainsley, tell me you didn’t get ensnared in this business somehow?”

“I’m taking Miss Burrowes for a ride in my curricle this afternoon.” He tried to mitigate the defiance in his voice, but not much. It had occurred to Nathan that he might be, in part, responsible for Miss Burrowes’s downfall.

“Are you mad, Ainsley?” The anguish on the earl’s face spoke of genuine concern for him. “For God’s sake, cry off. Plead illness or business that cannot wait. Do not allow your name to be linked to this woman’s. Mark my words, you will either be pulled down with her or quash her hopes for a chance at respectability.”

“Do you think she did it, Haversham?” The question had been eating a hole in his heart ever since the revelation. “Do you think she allowed herself to be ruined because she was in love with the man?”

His question brought his friend up short. Haversham’s lips drew in, his brows down in a scowl. “As I do not know the lady well, I cannot hazard a guess. She and Carrington were, as I said earlier, very affectionate in their address in public. How that resolved itself in private, only she knows. But it matters not what I think, or what you think, or, God help us, what the truth of the matter actually is. Society has decreed her guilty, and unless that opinion can be changed, she may as well be.”