The Devil's Web Read Online Free PDF Page B

clothes, which had been perfectly fashionable in Montreal, would be laughed at in London, she had said. And her manners, which had been quite acceptable in Montreal society, would appear awkward here. Besides, he was being kind. He could not really want her with him when he would have his mother and father and his sister and brother-in-law, the earl, for company.
    But he had wanted her with him. He had not had to use any hypocrisy in assuring her of that. Her anxiety and her eagerness had appeared very endearing to him after the artificiality of Madeline’s behavior earlier that afternoon. But he would not think of that, or of her, again. He had been right in his original impression of her. She was shallow and silly. Certainly not worthy of the kind of obsession that had haunted him for four years. He would put her from his mind. He was free of her now at last.
    Jean blushed and looked at him with large, questioning eyes when Alexandra turned to her inside the crowded hallway and suggested that they go together in search of the cloakroom. She seemed quite overawed by the fact that she was being addressed by a live countess. His parents proceeded on their way upstairs.
    He found himself smiling gently down at the girl as he released her arm and feeling a definite surge of tenderness for her. And of nostalgia for Canada, where he had met her and where he had learned to live in relative peace with himself. He wished he were there now. He wished he had not come back.
    There was no sign in the hallway of the dowager Lady Amberley’s party. They might be upstairs already in the concert room. Or theirs might be among the crush of carriages still outside. He hoped Alex and Jean would not be long. He felt alone and exposed, standing with his brother-in-law, his hands clasped behind his back.
    And he wished again that he could relive that afternoon, or rather that he had lived it differently at the time. It could have been all over now, just as it was in his emotions. He had seen her and realized that she was every bit as lovely and as attractive as she had ever been. And he had heard her and known that she was as foolish as he had ever thought her. He had understood and accepted that he could never have loved her, that he had invented the woman who had lived unwillingly in his dreams throughout his exile from England.
    But he had ignored her. And having done so once, he had set up an awkward situation that could only get worse with every meeting. Or with every nonmeeting. Why had he put himself in this ridiculous situation when she was nothing to him?
    He listened to his brother-in-law’s amiable chatter and watched the doorway with unease and the hallway leading to the ladies’ withdrawing room with impatience. Just like a schoolboy who did not know how to conduct himself in company.
    â€œAh,” the Earl of Amberley said from beside him, “we have not been abandoned after all, James. The ladies are returning, having assured themselves, doubtless, that the unthinkable has not happened and a curl worked loose during the carriage ride here.” He smiled at his wife.
    â€œAre you satisfied that you are as beautiful as I told you you were when I helped you down from the carriage, Alex?”
    â€œYes,” she said. “Having looked in the mirror, I can safely say that you were quite right, Edmund. I apologize for having doubted your word.”
    The earl chuckled and Jean looked up into James’s face in some surprise. It seemed to amaze her that an earl and his countess could joke with each other. James offered her his arm and smiled reassuringly at her.
    â€œI am so afraid to walk into that room,” she said breathlessly as they climbed the stairs. “You will let me hold to your arm the whole time, James?”
    â€œOf course,” he said. “And then all the gentlemen will look at you and from you to me with envy.”
    â€œOh, how silly,” she said, and giggled.
    What she