Page 72 of Impetuous

“No,” Philip replied quickly, a little surprised at how much he disliked the idea of Cassandra residing under a different roof. “Of course she will stay at Neville House.” He sighed. “We will have to take a chaperon.”

He looked at his mother, but she quickly shook her head. “Oh, no, Philip, not I. I am not going to London. The season is in full swing, and the Haverlin girl is making her debut. I would have to give a party for her, and besides that, Cousin Amanda is there, and I would have to dance attendance on her. Besides,” she added triumphantly, “I cannot leave Haverly House. We have a number of guests.”

“Don’t look at me,” Lady Neville said, forestalling him even as he turned toward her. “I do not travel to London anymore. I am far too old.”

Philip ground his teeth. “Oh, all right, then I suppose we will have to take Cassandra’s aunt.”

Violet brightened appreciably. “Why, Philip, what a splendid idea! That would be just the thing.”

“Hmph. For you, maybe.” He thought about being stuck inside the carriage with the Moultons for the trip to London, and suddenly the trip seemed far less enjoyable. But one look at Cassandra’s shining face was enough to make him forget the annoyance. He would have done far more than that to have her look at him that way.

* * *

AUNT ARDIS’S DELIGHT at being the guest of Sir Philip Neville in London at the height of the season knew no bounds. They were all forced to listen to her effusive thanks and sly hints that Sir Philip’s affections for “a certain young lady” were the reason for the invitation. Violet smiled vaguely and murmured something noncommittal. In truth, she found herself agreeing with the Moulton woman, though, of course, she was not foolish enough to believe that it was Joanna who had caught Philip’s interest.

Lady Neville seemed to have arrived at the same conclusion, for she surprised her daughter-in-law by saying in a low voice as they walked together up the stairs later that evening, “I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there are wedding bells in the future for Philip. Odd that it should be a Verrere, though.”

“She seems a very nice girl.”

“Intelligent. Philip has always had a strange bent in that direction himself.” She frowned a little as she considered this oddity in her otherwise perfect grandson. “No money, of course. The Verreres never did have two pennies to rub together. My father-in-law must be spinning in his grave at the idea. No money and a Verrere to boot. But she does dress up well.”

“That will be nice. The shopping for a trousseau, I mean.” Violet brightened at the thought of several lengthy visits to fashionable modistes and millinery shops.

Lady Neville nodded. “I do hope that we shan’t have the frightful Moulton woman staying with us all the time.”

The woman in question was at this moment bending Cassandra’s ear in the drawing room, enlarging on her theme of Sir Philip’s infatuation with Joanna. Cassandra noticed with irritation that Joanna was preening under her mother’s words. She wondered how the two of them could be so blind to Philip’s obvious avoidance of Joanna’s company. He had bolted to the library as soon as his mother and grandmother had decided to retire to their bedrooms.

“Aunt Ardis,” she said at last, interrupting her aunt’s flow of chatter, unable to endure any more, “are you quite sure that Sir Philip is interested in Joanna?”

Her aunt looked shocked. “But of course. Why else would he have invited us to London?”

She could hardly tell her that Philip had been forced to bring them as chaperons in order that she herself could go. Aunt Ardis would probably refuse to go just to spite her. Cassandra took another tack. “Has he actually spoken to you about his regard for Joanna?”

“No,” the woman admitted, then added with a simper, “but it is too early for that. You are not as familiar as Joanna and I with the signs of a smitten male. Sir Philip exhibits them.”

“He does?”

“Oh, yes. Did you not see the way he picked up Joanna’s fan this evening?”

“She dropped it right in front of him. He could scarcely do anything else.”

“And he spends every evening by her side.”

“How can he help it?” Cassandra snapped. “Joanna attaches herself to him like a limpet the moment he walks in the door.”

“You’re jealous!” Joanna cried. “You have developed a tendre for him, haven’t you? I can tell. It wounds your pride that he prefers me. Look at how he sat by me tonight.”

“You sat by him,” Cassandra corrected. “You were on the sofa when he came in, and you changed to the blue chair next to him.”

Joanna glared at her. “I hope you don’t think that he has any interest in you, just because you spend all day closed up in the library working on that silly family history. No man is interested in a woman who knows so much about books.”

Cassandra pressed her lips together. She would not allow her irritating cousin to goad her into saying anything she would regret later. It was obvious that there was no hope of making her aunt and cousin see reality. They seemed determined to go galloping headlong toward the disappointment that awaited them.

“There is little point in continuing this,” she said tersely. “I believe I shall go up to bed, also.”

She left the room, ignoring Joanna’s triumphant smirk at having vanquished the enemy. She started toward the stairs, but paused at the bottom of them. It wasn’t late yet, and she really was not sleepy. She was too keyed up at the thought of going to London and finding the Queen’s Book. A moonlit walk around the garden sounded quite pleasant, and perhaps it would help her to sleep. So Cassandra turned left instead, walking to the conservatory and through it to the rose garden.

She strolled along, thinking of all the things she would have liked to say to Joanna and had not. Some deep feminine instinct longed to throw it in her cousin’s face that it was she Philip was interested in, not her beautiful cousin. But gradually, the soft evening breeze and the sweet scent of the roses worked to banish the tumult inside her, and her thoughts turned instead to the more pleasant prospect of finding the book they sought.