Page 49 of Lady of Fortune
She made herself comfortable as she lay back on the settee for an hour of preparing her mind for the race. She looked around the room that she had come to know so well she hardly gave it a second glance.
The room suited her mother, she thought to herself. The walls were an interesting shade of lavender, covered in portraits and landscapes, all relating to the St. Albans family. The dominant purple color even matched their racing silks, Julia thought humorously.
At the very least, the settee was comfortable and, on a regular day, allowed her to look up from her books now and again to see the expansive hills flowing down from the window next to her all the way to the acreage beside them.
Today, however, she didn’t think there was any way she could focus on a book, nor anything at all really, what with Eddie and the Two Thousand Guineas to come this afternoon. For there were not only her prospects in the race alone, but what would happen afterward? Would she return to London with her family, to never see Eddie again but for the chance encounter at future races, or when she would watch him from the grandstand? She wasn’t sure she would ever be able to enter another racecourse with the knowledge she could only see him from afar.
Restless now, Julia stood and began to walk around the room. She would wait until after the race — hopefully at the party tonight, if he would attend. Then she would tell him that she was leaving her family to be with him — if he would have her.
“Julia?”
Julia nearly jumped in fright from the sound of her mother’s voice in the door of the drawing room, and she turned from where she now stood at the window with a hand on her breast.
“Mother,” she said, laughing slightly at her own shock. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t hear you come in.”
“You were deep within your thoughts,” her mother said with a smile. “Which I understand.”
“You… do?”’ Julia responded with a touch of trepidation. Her mother had no idea what she was currently involved in, did she?
“Of course I do,” Lady St. Albans said. “A mother knows when her daughter is in love.”
Julia let out a small chuckle of relief at her mother’s words. “In love? Why would you think such a thing?”
“I can see it in within you,” her mother said, taking Julia’s hand and sitting her down on the settee next to her. She clasped both of Julia’s hands within her own and looked her daughter deep in the eyes.
“You are dreamier than you usually are, and you have been rather forgetful. Never mind the fact that you have been sneaking out of the house at all hours of the day.”
“But… I didn’t — that is I never—”
“I know you have done nothing untoward,” her mother said. “I trust you in that. But I worry about you, Julia. You have to be careful.”
“I know, Mother,” she said with a nod, feeling guilty that she had put her mother — and perhaps her father — through unnecessary worry. “I never meant to concern you.”
“A mother is always concerned,” Lady St. Albans said. “From the day she learns she is carrying a child until her very last breath, she worries about her children.”
“Some do,” Julia said, grateful that she had such a mother. “And I appreciate that. I will try not to concern you anymore.”
Lady St. Albans waved a hand in the air. “Being in love is a magical thing. I should know — I have been in love my entire life. I am well aware just how lucky a woman I am. You know, Julia, that more than anything I want you to be happy. And I know you have chosen an excellent man. I am not one who believes you must chase after the highest title, as I have always told you.”
Julia nodded, her heart beating anxiously in her chest. Her mother understood. Thank goodness. Though how she knew about Eddie, Julia had no idea.
“However, I cannot say that I am displeased that you have found a man whose ranking is one of England’s highest.”
Julia’s jaw dropped open.
“Pardon me?”
“Well, the Duke of Clarence is the first choice of nearly every mother of thetonfor her daughter,” Julia’s mother continued. “I never pushed you toward him, but I have to say that I am so glad you have found your way together.”
“Oh, Mother,” Julia said, nearly forlornly. “Why would you think I am interested in the Duke?”
It was her mother’s turn to look confused. “Well, he came to call upon you the other day. He has been asking your father whether there is any other man who has been courting you. And when I saw you dance together last night, oh, you were so lovely, Julia.”
“I do not think we match exactly,” Julia murmured. “The man towers over me.”
“He’s very masculine,” her mother said with a knowing smile, and Julia nearly groaned aloud.
“That may be, but —”
