Silence swept up one side of the table and down the other. Even the boys paused in eating their pudding to stare at her with big eyes.
‘Lily, apologise to your sister at once,’ her father demanded. ‘The remark was uncalled for.’
‘It wasn’t.’ Lily kept her back straight despite the scrutiny being given to her. ‘Can’t you see how she’s behaving?’
He levelled a forkful of pudding at her. ‘That’s for me and your mother to worry about, not you.’
‘You should worry about it. It might be fine here with the family, but what if she does it somewhere else, in front of someone who might mind.’ She looked pointedly at Lord Marbrook. ‘She’ll embarrass herself and all of us.’
‘You’re the only one embarrassing yourself tonight,’ her father snorted and stuffed the pudding in his mouth.
She looked down at her hands in her lap and the orange paint still staining the corner of one thumbnail. She scratched at it but it wouldn’t budge, the skin around it turning red with her effort. She’d wanted so much to appear confident in front of Lord Marbrook. Instead, she’d once again been made to look ridiculous, this time by the people who were supposed to love her the most. A loneliness she hadn’t experienced since she’d sat on the ballroom floor while the other young ladies had laughed at her filled her again.
‘Enough scolding for one night.’ Lily’s mother rose from the table, bringing the men to their feet. ‘It’s Christmas Eve and we must enjoy ourselves. If the men don’t mind forgoing their port, we’ll play charades, then Aunt Alice will play the pianoforte so we may all sing carols.’
‘I think we can sacrifice our port for tonight of all nights,’ Sir Timothy offered, his usual joviality returning as he held out his arm to his wife. ‘Come along, everyone.’
The adults filed out of the room, ushering the children along in front of them. The young ones resumed their lively banter, all except Daisy, who stomped away on Rose’s arm complaining bitterly about Lily.
Lily didn’t rise, but stared at the uneaten pudding in the silver dish in the centre of the table until only she and Lord Marbrook remained.
‘You should go with the others, or you’ll miss charades.’ She wished he’d leave, she very much wanted to be alone, but he didn’t.
‘I’m sorry about what happened, I didn’t mean to cause you distress.’
‘This time it’s not your fault, it’s mine, always mine.’ She snatched the napkin off her lap and tossed it on the table. ‘My family can act as ridiculous as they please, but if I dare point it out, or suggest they show some restraint so they don’t become laughing stocks, I’m the wicked one, not my sisters, my brother or even my nephews. Only me.’
He laid his hands on the back of the chair beside hers, his fingers long and graceful beneath the crisp white of his shirt cuff. ‘I know what it’s like to sit outside the circle of your family and feel they don’t understand you and how lonely it can make you, even in the midst of so many. Unlike my family, yours is happy and they love you. It’s something to cherish far more than the opinions of others.’
He was right and she didn’t want him to be right, she didn’t want anything except to be alone with her paints and the patience of the canvas. Instead she was here, being reminded again of her awkwardness and loneliness. If only someone would cherish her. Rose and Petunia had Charles and Edgar, but there was no one to stand beside her and support her when people scolded her for trying to be sensible and there likely never would be.
Swallowing hard against the pain in her chest, she rose and at last faced Lord Marbrook. The tender sympathy in his eyes tore into her as much as her father’s rebuke. She didn’t want Lord Marbrook’s sympathy, or to appear so pathetic in front of him.
‘If you’ll excuse me, I don’t want to miss charades.’
She fled the room, afraid if she stayed he would see her tears.
It was some time before Gregor slipped into the sitting room to join the Rutherfords in their game of charades. Laurus stood in front of the fireplace, entertaining everyone with what could only be described as a feeble attempt to depict an elephant. It amused the children who sat in a half circle on the carpet in front of him guessing all manner of large animals and roaring with laughter. Gregor allowed himself a small smile at the sight. He’d never sat at his parents’ feet to watch some relative make a spectacle of themselves. He’d never sat on the sitting room carpet in his entire life, even the carpet on the nursery floor had been for walking on, never sitting, or playing or, heaven forbid, laughing.
Miss Rutherford sat in the back of the room near the French doors, the glow of excitement surrounding the others failing to reach her. The moonlight from outside spilled over her sadly rounded shoulders while the fire from the Yule log warmed her high cheeks and flickered in her eyes, though the light wasn’t enough to reignite the sparkle which had filled them this afternoon.
Pygmalion trotted away from Gregor to join Miss Rutherford, rising up on his back feet and placing his front paws on her knees. She frowned at the small dog and raised her hand. Gregor thought she meant to shoo him away. Instead, she drew the dog up into her lap, clutching her to him and stroking his fur as though he were her last friend in the world. The sight of it tore at Gregor and he moved around the back of the room, behind the family, to join her.
‘I think the rumours of the beast’s ferociousness are unfounded,’ Gregor offered as he settled himself in the lyre-backed chair beside hers.
‘I’m stunned.’ She shook her head at the animal. ‘He’s never sat with me before.’
‘Perhaps he recognises someone in need of a friend.’
Her hand paused between the dog’s ears before she resumed her steady scratching, making the dog’s eyes narrow with delight. If it could sigh, Gregor felt sure it would. Miss Rutherford did, a small one which whispered across Gregor’s hand where it rested on his thigh, making him want to slide his arm around her and draw her head down on to his shoulder, the same way her eldest sister now sat with her husband.
Damned fool, his father would have said if he’d seen such a display, always disapproving of the regard Gregor had shown to others, but he wasn’t here to stand over him with censure at best and indifference at worst.
‘You asked me in the dining room what I hoped to achieve with my apology,’ Gregor hazarded, determined to finish what he’d come here to do. ‘I’d very much like to be your friend and for you to be mine.’
Lily stroked the dog, staring straight ahead as her brother finished his turn and relinquished the floor to Lord Winford. ‘Why?’
Gregor took a deep breath, then began in a voice just above a whisper. ‘Many times in France I thought of you and the way you’d sat beside me in the alcove listening to my complaints. We were strangers and yet you treated me with the tenderness of an old friend. It would have been nice while I was in France to have received letters from you and known there was someone, besides Laurus, who cared if I came home safe.’
Lily drew the dog a little closer to her chest. ‘Surely your parents cared, even a little.’
‘They didn’t. I wasn’t my brother, only an unwanted disappointment best got out of the way.’ He rubbed his thumb in a circle over the scar on his thigh hidden by his breeches. ‘I’m sorry, Miss Rutherford, to burden you with such things. I know it isn’t proper, but for some reason I feel you more than anyone else will understand.’
She shifted in the chair, holding tight to the dog as she moved, and he thought she might rise and flee from him as she’d done in the dining room, but she didn’t.
‘I do understand