She glanced at him, then wrinkled her nose. “It’s like politics, but more cutthroat. If you fail within the ton, you rarely get a second chance. Politics is more forgiving.”
Jack swallowed a snort; from what he’d seen, she was right. The ornate gates at the end of the palace drive loomed before them. “Would you like me to escort you to this luncheon?”
The porter bowed and swung the gate open. Clarice stepped through, waited until Jack joined her, then smiled. “If you can spare the time. I’m really not sure what I might encounter. Having someone I trust by my side would be comforting.”
Jack met her eyes, and bit back the words that he would always have time to be by her side—saw in the dark depths an awareness that mirrored his own. Boadicea wasn’t in the habit of wanting the comfort of another’s presence, let alone requesting it.
Lips curving, he raised her hand, kissed. “For you, I’d brave any danger, even the ladies of the ton.”
She laughed and accepted his gallant offer. He hailed a hackney; they climbed aboard, and set out on their next adventure.
“Moira isn’t here.” Clarice met Jack’s eyes, her puzzlement clear.
Scanning the gaily dressed horde thronging the riverside lawn of Hamilton House, Jack shrugged. “Perhaps she decided after last night that her presence was no longer required, that there was no longer any point. Her daughters are all married, aren’t they?”
“Yes, but that won’t wash. She’s definitely angling to arrange a good match for Carlton. Wild horses shouldn’t have been enough to keep her away from a gathering of this tone.”
Clarice saw her aunt Camleigh through the crowd, caught her eye, and raised her brows pointedly. Her aunt shrugged and lifted her hands in a gesture that plainly stated she had no idea why Moira wasn’t there either. Clarice grimaced and turned to view the crowd. “I suppose the truth is I just don’t trust her. Know thine enemy and all that.”
When Jack didn’t respond, she glanced up, and saw him transfixed. Strangely wooden. She followed his gaze to a haughty matron, two young ladies in tow, sweeping toward them with the unstoppable determination of a galleon under full sail. The lady’s gaze was fixed on Jack.
Sweeping to a halt before them, she smiled delightedly at Jack. “Lord Warnefleet, isn’t it?”
Clarice didn’t stop to think, simply acted; she stepped across Jack, forcing the lady, startled, to meet her eyes. Clarice smiled, thinly. “I don’t believe we’ve been introduced.”
The lady blinked, met Clarice’s eyes, then swallowed, stepped back, and curtsied. Clarice looked at her charges; they quickly did the same.
“Lady Quintin, Lady Clarice. Lady Hamilton is my aunt.”
“Ah, yes. I believe she mentioned you.” Clarice looked at the young ladies. “And these are your daughters?”
Lady Quintin was clearly torn—to be first to engage the eminently eligible Lord Warnefleet on behalf of her charges, or instead gain the approbation of a lady as powerfully connected as Clarice Altwood…who was standing between her and her target. Her ladyship bowed to the dictates of reason, and smiled. “Indeed, my lady. Amelia and Melissa.”
With a facility acquired through countless hours spent in similar pursuits, Clarice chatted with the three, then artfully dismissed them. Behind her, Jack was called on to do no more than bow. Distantly.
“Thank heavens!” He took Clarice’s elbow as the three moved away, and turned her toward the house. “Let’s—” He broke off, then swore beneath his breath. “Saints preserve me—there’s an army of them!”
“Saints won’t do you much good, not in this arena.” Smoothly, Clarice disengaged from his hold and instead wound her arm with his. Briefly, she caught his eye. “Stay close, and I promise to keep you safe.”
The fraught look he cast her made her smile.
She turned that smile forward, on the mamas and their charges lying in wait. “No sense in trying to avoid this. We’ll have to fight our way through.”
They did, steadily moving toward the house, but each yard was gained only at the expense of an exchange with some matron and her daughter or niece, if not both. Initially Clarice wondered at Jack’s reticence, at his clear wish to remain as aloof as possible rather than employ his customary effortless charm, but then she looked more definitely at him, into his eyes, and realized it was his temper he distrusted, not his glib tongue.
For some reason, the matrons pressing their charges on his notice touched some nerve…perhaps not surprising. They all seemed to imagine that they’d be able to manage him, to manipulate him into behaving as they wished. For a man such as he, with a background such as he, to be treated so—it was a form of contempt—had to be galling. Especially as social strictures forbade him to react as he undoubtedly wished.
People had tried to manipulate her once; at least she’d been able to say “no.” For him, “no” wasn’t an option; the ton didn’t permit gentleme
n to be so ruthless, not in public.
She, of course, could be as ruthless as she wished, but in deference to Lady Hamilton and the Altwood name, she played by the accepted rules, and repelled the predatory mamas one by one, with a smile, a swift and sure tongue, and an absolute refusal to release Jack’s arm.
One couple—a veritable gorgon and her pretty but strangely nervous charge—remained in her mind. Not because of anything they said, but because of the tension that tightened Jack’s muscles while they’d faced them.
It took more than half an hour to gain the terrace, then another fifteen minutes before they could fall back against the cushions in a blessedly silent hackney and heave sighs of relief.
Clarice glanced sideways at Jack, beside her. “That was ghastly. Was it like that when you were in town before?”