Mary Balogh: Secrets of the Heart

Cranwell was not cheered by the sight that met his eyes when they entered the Pump Room. Despite the earliness of the hour, the room was crowded. Some people were clustered around the water vendors; most were strolling or standing in small groups, talking. He sighed inwardly. It was unlikely that he knew many of the room's occupants. He had not ventured far from his home in the previous few years. But undoubtedly Lady Cavendish would know many people; she spent several weeks of each year in both London and Bath. And, of course, they would all be expected to make new acquaintances and to socialize almost constantly. It was an unwritten rule of Bath, he had heard, that one be part of the social life and participate in the many and varied activities that the city offered.

Fanny was exclaiming with enthusiasm as she gazed down at the King's Bath below the window. Lady Cavendish was explaining something to her. Cranwell too stopped and turned to his companion.

"Did you expect such a squeeze, my dear?" he asked. "I must confess that this all takes me somewhat by surprise."

"Grandmama has told me that we would meet many people here, your grace," she said. Her voice was toneless. She did not look up at him but directed her eyes through the window.

He opened his mouth to continue this unpromising line of conversation.

"Yoo-hoo! Bertha!" a voice called from behind them.

Cranwell had turned before he could stop himself. But then he noticed that many other people had done the same thing. It was not difficult to locate the source of the greeting. A very plump elderly lady sat on a chair not far away, waving a handkerchief in the air. Cranwell was about to turn away and draw his party farther down the room away from such a vulgar display when he realized with some dismay that the handkerchief was waving exactly in their direction. And Lady Cavendish was Bertha, was she not?

He drew Hannah's arm a little more firmly through his own and glanced quickly around to make sure that Fanny was close by. Then he looked back at the elderly person in the chair, who was now smiling and still waving the handkerchief. A gentleman approaching his middle years stood to one side of her and a young lady at her shoulder. Both looked perfectly respectable.

His eyes passed carefully over each of them. But if he had felt dismay at having his party so singled out for public attention, he was struck by a paralyzing horror when his eyes came fully to rest on the face of the young lady. It could not be! was his first reaction. His eyes and his mind were playing tricks on him. But it was. It surely was. There could be no mistaking that golden-red hair, half-hidden though it was beneath her bonnet. No mistaking those arched eyebrows, which always gave her face a look of surprise, and that full, curvaceous figure. It was Sarah, right enough. The one woman in this world whom he had hoped never to set eyes upon again.

"Well, Adelaide Murdoch, I declare," said Lady Cavendish. "I might have known it without even looking. No one else of my acquaintance could hail a person in such an improper manner and get away with it."

She swept across the floor in the direction of Lady Murdoch, her face beaming, her hands outstretched. "Adelaide, my dear friend," she said, "what a delight it is to see you again. It must be all of five years."

Lady Murdoch reached for Sarah's outstretched arm as a support on which to raise her considerable bulk to her feet. "Bertha," she said, "I knew as soon as I saw you standing over there that there could be no other female of your age who has kept her figure and her health so well. How do you do it?"

Lady Cavendish acknowledged the compliment with a nod. "What are you doing in Bath, Adelaide?" she asked. "Taking the waters? Allow me to present my granddaughter to you. Hannah, my love, meet one of the dearest friends of my youth, Lady Adelaide Murdoch."

Lady Murdoch clasped the hand of the girl who curtsied before her, having handed her empty glass to Mr. Phelps. "Yes," she said, "your grandmama and I have been friends since we were your age, my dear. Ah, and in those days we were both as slim as you, too."

"May I also present Lady Fanny Montagu and her brother, the Duke of Cranwell?" Lady Cavendish continued. "Hannah and his grace are to be wed before Christmas."

Fanny curtsied and Cranwell made his bow.

"The Duke of Cranwell!" Lady Murdoch exclaimed, clasping her hands over her ample bosom and gawking at him. "Well, I declare. Oh, pardon me, your grace. It is not every day one meets someone of such superior rank. I have heard about you, you know. My dear friends the Withersmiths were given a tour of your home last summer when they passed through Wiltshire, and talked of nothing else for weeks afterward. You were from home at the time. Your housekeeper did the honors, I understand."

Cranwell bowed again and murmured some platitude about being sorry that he had missed making the acquaintance of the Withersmiths.

"And my manners have certainly gone begging!" Lady Murdoch exclaimed, gripping more tightly the arm on which she leaned and turning sharp eyes on Sarah. "May I present my cousin and dear companion, Miss Sarah Fifield? And Mr. Marcus Phelps, who was a dear friend of poor Dicky's, Bertha."

Somehow Sarah lived through the introductions and the ten-minute conversation that ensued. But she did not know afterward how she had done it. He looked so familiar standing there, though she had not set eyes on him for four years. The same slight, graceful figure that somehow escaped being either puny or effeminate. The same dark, shining hair and thin, ascetic face with the straight nose and sensitive mouth and deep blue eyes. And that same elusive aura of attractiveness, which owed its existence to no nameable physical feature.

She looked directly at him when her name was mentioned and found that he was looking back with raised eyebrows. He inclined his head in a stiff half-bow and did not look at her again. She could not move. She hardly dared breathe. What would he do now? Lead his party away from her contaminating presence as soon as he decently could and stay as far from her as possible for the remainder of his visit in Bath? It seemed unlikely. Lady Cavendish and Lady Murdoch seemed mutually eager to renew their friendship. Would he expose her publicly as the fraud she was? Perhaps not publicly. George had much to lose himself by doing that. But privately, maybe, when he had his little group of ladies alone? Her acquaintance and doubtless that of Lady Murdoch would be cut quietly. Rumors would begin to circulate in Bath and the nightmare she had dreaded for four years would he reality.

Lady Cavendish was assuring her friend that, yes, indeed, his grace had paid their subscriptions the night before, immediately after their arrival, and yes, they would most certainly be at the Upper Assembly Rooms that night to take tea. Sarah looked at Lady Hannah. She was very young, very pretty. Very innocent. Yes, those qualities would appeal to him. She would be a very suitable bride for the Duke of Cranwell. Sarah lelt sick. Four years, after all, did not seem such a long time. Could he really be considering marriage already? Why had she not worked harder during those years to stop loving him? He looked so familiar, yet was so totally unapproachable.

The Duke of Cranwell had often wondered in the years since he saw Sarah last why he had fallen so headlong in love with her. He must have been merely ripe for an infatuation, he had persuaded himself. No female could be as beautiful, as fascinating, and as physically appealing as he had thought her. He had convinced himself that he had never really loved her and that therefore his loss had not been so great. But lie had to admit to himself now, having permitted himself one searching look into those green eyes, that tic had certainly not underestimated her beauty and physical appeal. She looked appallingly familiar to him, as if it had all happened but yesterday, although it he had tried to recall her face and figure the day before, he could not have done so with any exactness.