Wren hesitated for only a moment. “What veil?” she said, and they both laughed again.

The door opened once more at that moment to admit Harry and Abigail and Jessica. They seemed to bring youth and energy and sunshine in with them—and chatter and laughter. Harry made his bow, and the young ladies hugged them both.

“Did you like the description of yourself as a fabulously wealthy heiress?” Jessica asked Wren with a laugh. “Avery, of course, pointed out that heiress is an inaccurate word since you are already the owner of the glassware fortune.”

“I did not like that description at all,” Abigail said, “implying as it did, ever so slyly, that Alex married you for the fortune and nothing else. Alex has always been a favorite of mine. I have always admired him, and I know it is something he would never, ever do even if he does need money to repair all the damage to that heap Papa left him. You looked absolutely beautiful yesterday, Wren, and quite radiant.”

“You still look radiant this morning,” Jessica said, and giggled a bit self-consciously. “I hope you do not mind that I have come here with Abby and Harry. I suppose Alex has gone off to the House of Lords?”

“I warned you not to bet against me, Jess,” Harry said, flopping into a chair, looking pale and cheerful and rather tired.

“Have you seen Josephine, Wren?” Abigail asked. “Anastasia and Avery’s baby? She is gorgeous. Oh, Mama, you must go and see her. Anastasia says you must. She is disappointed, of course, that I will not be able to go to Morland Abbey for the summer, as she had originally hoped, but she understands that you and I will wish to be in Bath for Camille’s confinement. She says she and Avery will probably go there too after the baby is born.”

Harry was yawning.

Mrs. Westcott and Elizabeth arrived home a few minutes later, and the buzz of conversation proceeded with more volume and enthusiasm. Wren laughed quietly to herself. Had she really expected a quiet day? Had she really wanted one? She was actually enjoying this sense of family and of being part of it.

“I suppose,” Elizabeth said, “Alex has taken himself off to the House of Lords. Sometimes I could shake that brother of mine.”

“You look more than usually lovely this morning, Wren,” her mother-in-law said with a little nod of satisfaction, and Wren knew that what she was really saying was that her daughter-in-law looked well and truly bedded. But since the words and the nod had been delivered unobtrusively while everyone else chattered, Wren did not feel unduly embarrassed.

And then the door opened one more time, and it was Alexander himself, looking rather surprised and achingly handsome. Wren got to her feet.

“Ah,” he said, “a family party while the master of the house is away? Is this what comes of now having a mistress of the house?”

“Actually, Alex,” Elizabeth said, “your presence is quite superfluous.”

“Hmm,” he said, meeting Wren halfway across the room and raising her hand to his lips. “I left the Lords early to take you for that drive to Kew you did not have last week. I pictured you languishing here alone.”

“Then you were quite wrong,” she said. “Today I am a Westcott, my lord, and am enjoying the company of my family.”

He grinned at her.

“That is putting you in your place, Alex,” Harry said, yawning again.

“However,” Wren said, “I will forgo the further pleasure of their company in order to go for a drive with my husband.”

His grin widened. “And I am the bearer of another invitation for this evening,” he said. “Netherby is taking Anna to the theater but declares that his private box is far too spacious for them to rattle about in alone—his words. He wants us to join them there. And he wants Cousin Viola and Abigail to come too and Harry if he feels up to it. I gave him no answer. I did, however, warn him that you would all very possibly decline the invitation. He merely shrugged and looked bored in that way he has. You must none of you feel under any obligation. I shall be perfectly happy to spend the evening at home in present company.”

“Oh.” Wren turned her head to look at Viola and they exchanged identical smirks.

“An even more daunting challenge than the one we devised,” Viola said.

Everyone looked at her blankly—except Wren. “Do we have the courage?” she asked. And oh goodness, did she? Ought she?

Viola lifted her chin, thought a moment, and nodded.

Wren returned her attention to Alexander. “We would be in a private box?” she asked. “In a darkened theater?”

He hesitated. “In a private box, yes,” he said. “But before the play begins the theater will be well lit and everyone will be looking around to see who else is present and who is with whom and what food for gossip is to be had. You would be very much on display during that time. After this morning’s announcement, there would be great curiosity to have that first glimpse of the new Countess of Riverdale—the fabulously wealthy Heyden glassware heiress. And after the events of last year there would be much food for gossip in the reappearance of the former countess and her son and daughter. I am afraid there would be as much focus upon Netherby’s box before the performance as there would be on the stage later.”

“You think we ought not to go, then?” she asked him.

“This is not my decision to make,” he said firmly.

“By thunder,” Harry said, “I would rather face a column of Boney’s men on the attack, all yelling vive l’empereur between beats of the drum in that unnerving way of theirs. I am not going. Besides, I am going to be ready to crawl off to my bed to sleep the clock around by the time this evening comes.”

“I will go,” Abigail said, “if Jessica can come too. I was never allowed to attend the theater before I was eighteen, and then I could not. I will go.”

“And so will I, Abby,” Viola said.

Oh, this was not fair, Wren thought. Inch by excruciating inch she was being dragged out into the open, where she had never intended to go. Except that there was no unfairness involved. The invitation had been extended and the decision of whether she would accept it or not was entirely hers.

“I will do it,” she said.

Alexander caught both her hands in his and squeezed tightly while there was a slight cheer behind her and then laughter.

“Oh, bravo, Wren,” Elizabeth said. “And Viola and Abigail too.”

“I would have won my wager, then,” Alexander said. “Unfortunately for me, Netherby was unwilling to bet against me.”

Now what had she done? Wren thought, feeling a twinge of panic. Whatever had she done? “But first,” she said, “I want to see Kew Gardens.”

Seventeen

Those who went to the theater in search of fresh material for gossip as much as entertainment from the stage were to find more than sufficient that evening without looking farther than the Duke of Netherby’s private box. The duke and his duchess were there. So was the Earl of Riverdale with his mysterious new bride, the fabulously wealthy Heyden glassware heiress, whom a few people claimed to have seen with him in Hyde Park, though none had had a satisfyingly good look. Some had even said she went about heavily veiled. The former, dispossessed countess, whom no one had seen in more than a year, was also in the box, the old and the new in company together, and so was her bastard daughter. The Duke of Netherby’s sister, young Lady Jessica Archer, whose beauty had taken the ton by storm during her come-out this year, was scarcely noticed amid the sensational appearance of her companions.