Page 14 of Much Ado About Margaret
Maggie wanted to disappear beneath the table. Her neck itched, and it felt like every inch of her was turning crimson. She respected Ann and wanted to count her as a close friend, and now her “filth” was being categorized as an intentional slight against Ann and her marriage to Lane. She glanced at Violet, wondering if her sister would help her feign an illness.
“Rather…” Mr. Darrow had spoken up, emerging from the silent, self-imposed exile of his capon consumption. He coughed lightly, drawing the attention of the gossiping ladies, who fixed him with stern, suspicious glares. Heartbeats earlier, he had been the object of their scorn. Maggie adopted his method, staring resolutely at her tortured food while she turned into a human candle, bright and burning. “The pages I was fortunate enough to find were diverting. I certainly wouldn’t call them ‘filth.’ In fact, I think it might be…a game of sorts. Perhaps we the guests are meant to piece the story together tonight at the masquerade. What do you think, Miss Arden?”
Her eyes raised slowly from the candelabra and flowers between them to his dark blue cravat to his stormy eyes. Maggie froze. Was herescuingher?
“A game,” she repeated, slowly. “Why…it’s possible. Ann does love a surprise.”
“Hmm.” The woman frowned. “She does tend toward the extravagant. Whoever thought to hold such a lavish wedding, and with a masquerade? Perhaps you two are on to something.”
“Mrs. Richmond looks at ease, does she not?” Darrow continued. The tables and cloth were cleared as the cake was being brought out, the many-coursed midmorning meal drawing to its conclusion. “Why, if this was some scheme against themarriage, she would have had Pressmore scoured of the offending pages in hours.”
The lady’s companion, seated farther down the row, was not convinced. She was dressed in muted pink, graying brown ringlets hanging in front of her ears, a Mrs. Allery or Valery or some such. “Or she is putting on a fine show. If it were my event ruined by this mystery, the perpetrator would not be welcome in my home or circle ever again.”
“And yet this occasion will be the talk of the ton for months,” said Darrow with a light shrug. “In this way, Mrs. Ann Richmond has triumphed.” Mrs. Allery or Valery sniffed. “If this is an insult, she has found a way to turn it in her favor. A remarkable skill, don’t you agree, Miss Arden?”
Maggie tried not to give herself away with a bark of laughter. “That is Ann, through and through.”
“And what do you make of the pages?” he pressed, holding her gaze. Maggie ached to look away but couldn’t. She felt breathless and a little stupid, as if no more than a searching look from him could rob her of all sense. Her first impression of him, before he opened his mouth, was devilishly hard to eradicate. Yes, he had tainted it with his nasty remarks about her book, but here he was, as darkly handsome as ever, attempting to steer her boat out of dangerous waters. Or mock her. Maggie stiffened and slipped away, and she saw the flicker of disappointment cross his face as she tore her attention from his arresting eyes and regarded her cup.
“Whoever it is,” she risked, unable to help herself, “I think they write very well, not at all overwrought, as some novels are these days.”
Mr. Darrow smirked, sitting back. “From what I gather, it could stand up to a bracing edit.”
Maggie laughed at him. “Is that so? Perhaps you should read the novel in its entirety before making any sweeping judgments as to its content or quality.”
“It is the nature of my profession to make these assessments,” said Darrow, his brow darkening. He rubbed a spot on the table with his forefinger, agitated. “I must ask, from what position of authority do you speak on the subject, Miss Arden? Are you yourself a novelist?”
The ladies recoiled and gasped.
“I speak from the position of my good opinion,” Maggie replied, sharp. “I have loved books all my life, sir. There is more ink than blood in my veins.”
He regarded her over a long, agonizing silence. That busy little muscle worked in his jaw again. His gaze was intent, igniting, and Maggie shifted in her chair. At last, he said, “There is no harm in the alteration of form, so long as the change is in the spirit of improvement.”
“Good heavens, how much of the thing have you found?” Mrs. Allery-Valery guffawed, breaking the spell that had fallen over them. Maggie nearly jumped. She didn’t like admitting it, but she wanted to feel that singular spark thrill through her again, the one that crackled through her when their eyes met.
Darrow cleared his throat, shook his head, and said, “Enough. Enough to see its great potential.”
“Perhaps you should publish it, Mr. Darrow!” cried the woman, extremely amused at herself. “Wouldn’t that be the best end to this mystery?”
Mr. Darrow tilted his head briefly to the side, his gaze sliding along Maggie’s left arm, up to her chin, and lingering there. It made her shiver. “Mm. I may have a mind to do just that.”
Over her untouched slice of cake, Maggie stilled. “If the author is discovered.”
“Indeed,” he repeated with a warm laugh. “If.”
“I, for one, will need it all resolved before we quit Pressmore.” Mrs. Allery-Valery sighed.
“Some things are better left to the imagination, I think,”Maggie murmured, remembering Aunt Eliza, remembering the challenge before her. To be good. To set an example. To put her sisters and future before her passion. “These days, not enough is left to dreams and wonder.”
Not long after, the men stayed to drink port, while the ladies scattered to the drawing room and the gardens. Maggie could feel Mr. Darrow trying to catch her attention as she left the ballroom, but she refused him. She was equally elated and dismayed to be parted from him, for wasn’t he utterly perplexing? First hating her book and then defending it! Gallant one moment and striking his brother publicly the next. She couldn’t fit him neatly into a person-shaped box, and the puzzling left her over-warm, so she was grateful, at least, for the freedom and air afforded by the outdoors, even if the sun was intent on blazing. She propped herself on a stone banister at the edge of the veranda and pressed the back of her hand to her cheeks, shocked at how feverish she had become.
The garden was swarming. Such colossal waves of guests were not at all common for a wedding, nor was the amount of family and friends who had arrived from every corner of the country to attend, nor the general extravagance, nor the celebratory masquerade that was to be held later that day, but Ann and Lane never did anything the expected way. Particularly Ann. She was the height of glamour and envy in London. Ann and Lane’s drums beat off-kilter, which was perhaps what had endeared them to each other in the first place, and what endeared them to Margaret as a couple. Their wealth afforded them the privilege of eccentricity, a quality shunned in the less advantaged but tolerated and sometimes celebrated among the rich. One could pick them immediately out of any crowd, with smiles like diamonds and almost identically stark belly laughs.
Winny had come out of the house with Ann’s sister, Emilia, and the young ladies chatted amiably, winding through the clusters of guests enjoying the sunshine and the morning.Ann’s tagalong cousin, Ruby, was also with them, lagging behind; she was strikingly tall, and someone must have pointed that out at an impressionable age, for she was always in the middle of performing a shorter stature—drooping, leaning, hunching. All around them, people spoke of the weather in an English way, and politely discussed Ann’s gown and the refreshments and the groundskeeping.
Bunched at the bottom of one of the pavilion poles, tangled among some fabric and green ribbons, Maggie spied another wayward page ofThe Killbride. Reddening, she hurried over to the pole, pretending to drop her glove to snatch up the crumpled paper. She slid away as smoothly as she could, aiming for Winny and Emilia, hoping at least to be distracted by their chitchat.
But she was intercepted by Ann, escorting a chilly beauty in a blue-and-silver gown. Her white-blond ringlets were piled on her head, the narrow column of her throat shining in the morning sunlight. Ann’s brown skin and sleek black hair contrasted starkly with the other woman, who looked like she might have been freshly plucked from a winter garden.
