Montgomery was currently saying something that had the Prince of Wales nodding and chuckling.

“There were no objections to either wording or content from Millicent Fawcett, nor our legal advisors,” Lucie said. “I do have a few objections.”

“Naturally.”

She shrugged. “But if they were addressed, the amendment would not get past our usual suspects in the House of Lords. The current proposal stands a chance. We could build on it in a next round of amendments.”

“Montgomery knows how to draft his policies,” Melvin said. “He makes them as slick as an oiled eel and before you know it, they have slipped through your grip and passed.”

“Indeed.” She eyed her plate. The vegetables were wilting. And the image of an oiled eel pressing on her mind rather tempered her appetite.

Melvin’s eyes were still on the head of the main table, ever a politician, drawn to power like a moth to the flame. “It’s the influence of the duchess,” he said, his voice low, “Montgomery’s new policies.”

For a moment, they both sat and watched discreetly how Annabelle was making an interested face at some tale the Prince of Wales was telling. The heir to the throne became animated, his right hand threatening to knock over his wineglass as he gestured without taking his eyes off the duchess. And everyone else in the vast hall was seeing it, too. Lucie felt a swell of satisfaction. Cat incident or not, no one could dismiss the approval of the prince, and he was presently stamping it all over Annabelle.

“Astonishing, isn’t it. I can see why my fellow men would object to giving the fair sex more power,” murmured Lord Melvin.

Lucie slowly turned in her chair to face him. “Whatever do you mean, my lord?”

He kept his eyes on the prince. “Her Grace used to be a country woman, wasn’t she?”

Her defenses were rising on Annabelle’s behalf. “She was, yes.”

He nodded. “And yet here she is, influencing a duke and charming the future king. Most men only obtain such a position through birthright, then tireless politicking. Naturally, people wonder why women should need political powers when they already hold so much power simply by being women.”

Her smile was bemused. “I assume you are playing devil’s advocate, Lord Melvin.”

“Assume that I am—how would you declaw someone who argued this?”

“I’d suggest he study the definition of liberty under L in the Oxford Dictionary.”

Melvin raised his brows, as though she were an ill-mannered pupil.

“Truly,” she said. “How many of your hypothetical fellow’s female acquaintances equal the duchess in all her beauty, youth, and wit?”

His brows came down. “A gentleman has nothing but compliments for the appearance and accomplishments of any lady of his acquaintance.”

“Of course,” Lucie said evenly. “And niceties aside, Her Grace possesses a rare combination of attributes that would drive most men to distraction. But is a gentleman’s influence and dignity contingent upon something as fleeting as his natural charms? Must he be outstanding to count? No. He officially has a voice simply because he is a man.”

The corner of Lord Melvin’s mouth tipped up. “Unless he has no property. Then his voice counts for little.”

She had a feeling that he quite liked the devil’s advocate position. “A man’s lack of voice is connected to his lack of property,” she murmured. “A woman’s lack of voice is forever connected to the fact that she is a woman.”

“Indeed.” Approval glinted in Melvin’s eyes, and he raised his glass to her. “I’m well pleased with tonight’s seating order. Always a pleasure to converse with someone who hasn’t yet lost their passion. Too many treat politics as a self-referencing play these days.”

She could see herself in his dark iris, the complicated coronet of blond hair and silk flowers atop her head an unfamiliar sight. Belatedly, she gave a nod.

Lord Melvin was intelligent. He was on her side. Parliament heralded him as the next John Stuart Mill, and she respected and admired him for his work, when she rarely admired much of anything.

Could joy be had from him? Would he make her feel molten and mindless, as she had today when staring into the mocking eyes of a man who had very little to recommend him?

She looked away and looked back at him again. Faint lines bracketed his mouth. She suspected that while he was passionate in his speeches, in private he would display the stiff upper lip of any self-respecting aristocratic male. Likely, he was starchy.

Lord Melvin’s expression turned bemused under her inspection.

She reached for her wineglass.

A lady should never be seen indulging in food and wine, and it would be best if she did not take enjoyment from it at all—pace your bites, Lucinda; you are a lady, not a horse.

The past was nipping at her heels, here in the ducal dining room amid glinting crystal and silver terrines. Another version of herself could be attending this very same event tonight, could be sitting in the same seat: a respected lady, a mother of children, married to someone like Lord Melvin. Not necessarily content; if it was not the state of women’s rights in Britain one took issue with, one could be discontent about the curtains, or a lousy season, or a tyrannical husband. All that separated her from that woman had been a few books and pamphlets, read at the right time . . . or had the diversion begun sooner? Had there always been something in her disposition that had gradually edged her off the beaten path?

She brushed the musings aside. However she had reached this point, the only way now was forward.

* * *

Lord Melvin made himself her escort to the green drawing room, but his attention was on other members of the House of Lords drifting alongside them through the Great Hall.

Ahead of her in the throng was Tristan. And on his arm was Cecily. Her face was in profile, her eyes riveted on her escort as though he had just hung the moon and the stars for her. A memory flashed, of Cecily the girl running after a lankier version of Tristan, her blond braids and the strings of her white pinafore flying behind her. Now her cousin was gliding along on Tristan’s arm with the poise of a swan on a pond, the train of her snowy dress languidly trailing behind, and the sight grated. Why was her mother nowhere in sight to keep an eye on Cecily’s reputation? At least there was Tommy—Thomas—a few steps behind the pair, his back stiff with displeasure.

“Lady Lucinda?” Melvin was looking down at her quizzically.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Are you looking forward to the evening program?” he repeated patiently.

“Certainly.”

“I heard Lord Ballentine will gift us with a poem.”

“Riveting,” she said dryly.

“You do not sound charmed,” Melvin observed.

“Oh, I am charmed,” she said quickly. “Excessively charmed.”

The evening would be a terrible bore.

Thankfully, Hattie and Catriona were waiting for her at the entrance to the menagerie. The cavernous green-walled room had been rearranged to accommodate a semicircle of four hundred gilded chairs with thick red velvet upholstery. At the center of the circle gleamed a black lacquered Steinway.

She followed Hattie down one of the two aisles that allowed guests access to their seats. Close on her heels was Lord Melvin, when there was really no good reason for him to keep escorting her.

The crown prince sat next to Montgomery in the first row opposite, in a special chair that blocked the view of anyone unfortunate enough to be seated behind him.

Hattie was craning her neck around the room the moment she had arranged her skirts on the chair. “Have you heard?” she murmured. “Lord Ballentine is going to recite a poem.”

“I heard.”

“I hope it is going to be ‘The Ballad of the Shieldmaiden,’” Hattie said, her eyes still searching.

“He is seated right opposite, second row to the left.”

“I wasn’t looking for him,” Hattie lied.

There would be no escape. This would be the sole topic of conversation among the ladies once the men had retreated to the smoking rooms: Ballentine and his poems.

And all the while, his prank in the stables continued to smart, like the prolonged sting of a burn. To add insult to injury, he had apparently become society’s darling the moment he had returned the bloody cat, which she had, quite literally, dropped into his lap.

“That is your cousin, next to him, isn’t it?” Hattie murmured, watching Cecily.

“The very same.”

“Very pretty,” Hattie said, “a Botticelli. The angel kind, not the Venus.”

“I suppose,” Lucie said. She didn’t have an artistic bone in her body. She did, however, notice the look of rapture on her brother’s face while he was watching Cecily, while she was making conversation with Tristan. Interesting.

The program opened with the rapid tune of Mozart’s Alla turca; a young lady had taken her place at the Steinway and let her fingers fly over the keys.

Inevitably, her mind wandered back to the incident in the stable. She would feel less preoccupied had Tristan just been his usual self during the past week. But he had helped her in the park, and she had received a mysterious donation from the fencing club. It must have raised her expectations of him despite herself. At the very least, it had made her wonder about him, and now she knew how good his hair felt, and she would not be able to unfeel it.