“You must be overjoyed to be reunited with your husband, Lady Montcroix. More champagne?”
Lady Scottsbury was an attentive, and perhaps strategic, hostess. The free-flowing champagneloosened tongues. Gossip was currency, entertainment, and nourishment for the ton, and parties like this one were like watering holes.
Her dark eyes were sharp and merry, her dress was stunning green velvet and silk, and her breath smelled of champagne when she leaned ever closer to Alexandra to speak to her.
It seemed to Alexandra that every time she turned away from her glass it had been magically refilled, and she realized this before she was good and drunk, but not before she was a trifle tipsy.
“Oh thank you, I think not,” she said to the footman hovering behind her.
“The separation was not easy for either of us,” she told the countess, “but as usual he considered me above all other things, he made the gallant sacrifice in support of what was best for me and my family.”
Every bit of this was, on the face of it, true. Over the past few days she had, in fact, become adept at telling truths that weren’t precisely true. And at first it had been an interesting challenge, a test of her social dexterity.
But the more champagne she drank, and the more times she repeated this, the more it abraded her soul as though she’d a pebble in her shoe.
“I recall the years when the newspapers sometimes referred to him as Brightwall the Bachelor Beast! All those lovely ‘B’s together—the gossip sheets seem to revel in that sort of thing, don’t they? I have been featured there more than once,”Lady Scottsbury shared. “Both before and after I married Scottsbury.”
“I’m sorry you endured it, or happy if you benefited from it,” Alexandra said, which made Lady Scottsbury smile. “They do love their alliteration. I hope you noticed the article in the newspaper in which they called him the Magnificent Montcroix.”
She considered that little article a triumph.Well done, Magnus had said to her this morning over the newspaper, amused. It was just a few paragraphs suggesting London citizens might like to pay a visit to the new statue of the Magnificent Montcroix, but it was clearly progress on the reputation restoration front.
Alexandra had been dropping this little alliteration into conversation every chance she got tonight. She enjoyed seeing the eyebrow flicks and widened eyes that meant her conversational partners would be repeating it.
“Oh yes, I can imagine both you and Montcroix would prefer that to Mr. and Mrs. Beast.” She loved the way Lady Scottsbury had so casually said “Montcroix,” as if Magnus had been born an earl, and it was what he’d been called his entire life. “When those funny little pictures in the newspaper appeared, featuring his wife grappling with the army and whatnot, I confess I thought—surely it’sallaninvention.That dignified man can’t have married a woman who is mad enough to steal a carriage from a duke... that is, if he’s truly married at all. He was so verydiscreet about it! We all eventually heard that he’d married, of course, indirectly, and then there were a few little gossip items in the newspaper over the years... but we never really saw any... proof. We were beginning to think you were a myth. You’ve certainly kept to yourself.”
Lady Scottsbury lazily fanned her bodice, which was no doubt meant to call attention to either her bosom or her diamond necklace. Alexandra thought both were enviable. As was her subtlety, even if it was a trifle barbed. Alexandra understood this sort of person, and sometimes even rather enjoyed them for the challenge they presented. It was interesting to hear her refer to “we”—she meant the ton at large, as if they were a single organism.
“My goodness,” she said sympathetically. “Did you indeed think I was a myth? Surely you’re not suggesting anyone seriously believes my husband is the sort of man who traffics in fairy tales?” Alexandra’s eyes were wide with wounded innocence. “Or that he would lie to the populace?”
Lady Scottsbury froze. “Oh, my dear, no. I just...”
Alexandra’s eyebrow was an arrow shooting upward.
Lady Scottsbury leaned closer. “I’ve always thought that it was a pity, in truth, if it was indeed not true. I cannot help but take note of everything that could use a littlespiffing, as it were—from homes to clothes—and it always seemed to me that Brightwallneededa wife to take him in hand.A bit of domestication. He’s such an impressive man, but he wasn’t raised like you or I, my dear. He was born a ruffian. The hair, for instance. Good heavens, there’s such a lot of it. Now that he’s an earl, perhaps you can influence his choices.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Alexandra said with offhand cheer. Her temper was stirring on behalf of Magnus. “I thought it would be more efficient to take a husband who is perfect exactly the way he is. That way, instead of attempting to improve him I can instead simply enjoy his company. The hair, by the way, on the statue recently dedicated to him in Holland Park, is positively immaculate.”
Lady Scottsbury’s head went back a little, which was how Alexandra realized her delivery had been a bit vehement.
Finally, her hostess smiled fondly at her. “It sounds as though you are very proud of him, and rightly so. The whole of England is grateful to him, not the least for saving the life of General Blackmore.”
Alexandra suddenly felt deflated, as if she’d spent the last of her bravado. These moments in particular had begun to wear on her. Shewasproud of him; she felt she hadn’t the right to her pride, reflected or otherwise.
And yet she was saying it over and over again this evening, just as she had the previous evening. And the more time she spent with him, the more she viscerally understood his genuine greatness, even if, between the two of them, they had managed to bungle their marriage. Ought she to haveunderstood this five years ago, and been merely grateful to marry such a man? Did his greatness negate completely what she might have wanted, or dreamed of, for herself? Did her feelings matter at all, didshematter at all, in light of this? What sort of selfish madwoman kisses another man on the day of her wedding to a national hero?
The champagne was again blurring her reasoning.
Because if she’d had the keeping of him for the past five years, as a wife naturally would, she would have done it brilliantly.
And still she might have never stopped resenting him.
“I cannot take any credit for his accomplishments. I am confident in saying they arise wholly from his stellar character. But it is an honor to bear his name,” she said shortly.
“But surely you are a comfort and an inspiration to a man who has borne such weighty responsibilities. He must be proud of you as well.”
She could not reply. Her throat suddenly felt tight.
Alexandra whirled at a movement at the edge of her vision.