Avery could see where she was headed from a mile away.

“So you see, Avery—”

Must he? He interrupted her. “The ball will be held here, of course,” he said with a sigh, and sipped his tea—it was just a little better than lukewarm. “Was there ever any doubt?”

“Well, there was,” she said. “Everyone knows you are finding this whole business with Anastasia tedious, Avery. You have not shown your face at Westcott House for a week or more, and you have not expressed one iota of interest in the progress we are making with her. She is not a relative of yours, of course, and you cannot be expected to care. I am delighted that you agree the ball must be held here. I shall borrow your Mr. Goddard, if I may, and start planning.”

“Ah, but I do not lend out Edwin’s services,” Avery said, setting his cup and saucer back on the tray and preparing to make his escape before he found himself being treated to a description of ball gowns. “He might be offended. I shall have a word with him, and you may provide him with a list of prospective guests in the unlikely event he should forget anyone, and with any special request that may occur to you.”

“That,” she said, “is what I meant by borrowing him, Avery.”

“Quite so,” he said, and strolled in the direction of the door. He had better warn his secretary of his impending doom.

He had been resigned to the fact that next year would be filled with tedious frivolity when Jessica made her come-out. But a ball at Archer House this year? It was enough to make one flee to a hermitage somewhere far away. There was no point, of course, in hoping that the guest list would be confined to a select few. His stepmother had distinctly referred to the occasion as a ball, and no ball in London could be deemed a success if it could not also be judged after the fact as having been a sad squeeze. The duchess and her mother and sisters would invite everyone with any pretension to gentility, and everyone with any pretension to gentility would accept, for Lady Anastasia Westcott was still the sensation of the hour, probably of the whole Season, the more so as her unveiling, so to speak, had been a tantalizingly slow process so far. Even at the theater no one outside their own party had secured an introduction to her.

“You will, of course,” the duchess said before he could effect his escape, “lead Anastasia into the opening set, Avery.”

“Will I?” he said, turning his head back toward her.

“It would certainly be remarked upon if you did not,” she told him. “And Alexander will lead her into the second.”

“And then a succession of possible suitors for her hand?” he asked.

“Well, she is twenty-five years old,” she reminded him. “There is no time to be lost.”

“But her fortune will knock several years off her age,” he said.

“Certainly,” she agreed, not having noticed any irony in his remark. “But I do wish she would take more advice about her clothes, especially her ball gowns. They are all so very plain, Avery. And she does not have much of a figure to compensate.”

Ah. He had not escaped the ball gowns after all.

“But,” he said, “it is always better to set the fashion than to follow it.”

“To set a fashion for plainness?” she said, her eyebrows shooting upward. “How absurd you are sometimes, Avery. And it was very unwise of her to insist upon employing that girl from Bath as her personal maid. An experienced maid could do much for her appearance. And that new young footman of hers—have you encountered him yet? He is quite extraordinary. But do not set me off.”

“I shall not,” he promised, recalling the scene in which said footman had laughed aloud with said maid at something he, Avery, had remarked, just as though they were all chums of long standing.

Finally he made his escape. Though not unscathed, by Jove. He was doomed to host a grand ball at Archer House within the next few weeks. What a crashing bore.

Though perhaps not. It would be Anna’s first real exposure to society, and it might be interesting to behold. She might be interesting to behold.

Ah, and he must ask Edwin Goddard after he was warned of what was looming if he had made any progress yet in his inquiries about the Reverend and Mrs. Snow, possibly still alive, possibly deceased, of somewhere in the vicinity of Bristol—somewhere with a church. But everywhere had a church. That was not much of a clue.

If they were to be discovered at all, however, his secretary would find them. Avery had recently raised his salary. He must do so again in the not-too-distant future. If Edwin were to leave his employ, he would feel rather as if a limb had been lopped off.

* * *

Anna’s debut into society had been the subject of much animated discussion with her grandmother and aunts. Her wishes had not been consulted. In Elizabeth’s opinion, delivered with a twinkling eye when they were alone together, the dowager and the aunts would come to some sort of agreement, and an opinion from the rest of them would be so much wasted breath. Lady Anastasia Westcott must be presented to Queen Charlotte at an upcoming Drawing Room. That had been unanimously agreed upon early. All else was open to argument.

At one end of the spectrum was the notion that Anna ought to be eased into society gradually by appearances at various select soirees and dinner parties and concerts. At the other end was the suggestion that her debut appearance ought to be at a grand ball hosted by one of their number. One was more likely to learn to swim, Aunt Mildred had said by way of analogy, if one was hurled into the middle of a deep lake than if one merely waded into the shallow edge of it.