“Yes, it’s barley next.”
“I admit I was skeptical about the Norfolk system with all of those crop rotations,” Lord Forsythe said. “But I am pleased you found success. Will you keep with it?”
“Yes, I think so. And will you try it now, my lord?”
“I believe I shall, with you to recommend it.”
She could feel Dougal’s surprise from across the table. He was meant to be focusing on the guests beside him, not paying attention to the spinster on the other side of the flower arrangements. The duke had chosen dahlias and roses for the ball. Or rather, his housekeeper, Mrs. Hastings, had. She had a keen eye for decorations and the duke was fussy about how he displayed his Ancient Egyptian and Roman artifacts, but not much else. He grinned at Dougal, catching his glance. “No one knows more about farming than my Meg,” he said proudly.
Which was patently untrue, Meg thought, smiling at him. But she would hazard that she did know more about it than any daughter of any other viscount. Needs must and all. At harvest time she snuck into her uncle’s fields to pick turnips for her larder. Turnip mash, turnip soup, turnip roast.
She hated turnips.
“I had no idea debutantes were so well versed,” Dougal replied.
Tamsin and Lady Forsythe shared an eye roll. “We aren’t generally,” Tamsin admitted cheerfully as they rose to make their way back to the ballroom. “But being a goddaughter of a duke does afford one some opportunities, I suppose.”
As a daughter of a duke as well as goddaughter to another, Tamsin could afford to take them for granted. And as a countess, Lady Forsythe could choose to be bored by four-crop rotation and how to best lay drainage for a field. Meg couldn’t. Not when her uncle cared so little for anything but his own comforts. He collected the rents, raised them when he needed more gambling funds, and did very little to help in between.
Meg remembered both her parents tramping through the mud, arguing about soil and how the Enclosure Acts would drive farmers into cities when they weren’t left with enough land to use the new crop rotation style instead of the old method of alternating between pasturing and growing grain. It might seem odd to the others, but it was one of her favorite memories. She’d read all of her mother’s books on agriculture, stealing them from the library when she was fourteen years old. Her uncle had never noticed. Not exactly a surprise, that.
Still, Tamsin was right, being a favorite of the duke afforded Meg a certain amount of space to breathe. And just three months ago, Meg had been chasing a traitor to the Crown through Pendleton’s statuary garden, after a ball much like this one.
What did it say about Meg that she found she preferred that evening’s entertainment to this one?
It was ungrateful of her, and she felt a pang of guilt. She knew all too well how precious it was to have hours to devote to entertainment. Her uncle wouldn’t have dreamed of inviting her to his soirees, not unless he needed her to act as a lady’s maid. She had taking to sleeping with a kitchen knife under her bed when a certain type of guest congregated. One of the footmen had even started sleeping in her hall as her uncle’s taste in friends deteriorated.
She looked forward to her visits to Pendleton Hall, even for the horrid Cinderella balls. It was a balm to see the friends whom she considered her true family. At home she saw the cottagers during the day when they were able, her uncle when he set her on chores just to prove he could, and then no one at all. She spent hours alone, painting and embroidering.
And now here she was, drinking champagne by the light of honey candles, surrounded by opulence and laughter and sugar sculptures shaped like birds. It shouldn’t make her feel so…itchy. Should it? She usually loved these vacations, stolen days outside of her regular life when she could dance just for the sake of dancing. Like Tamsin who was at this very moment, gliding and turning and laughing and enjoying herself as only she could. She came alive at parties, floating from conversation to conversation and dancing until her slippers gave out. She knew everyone and everyone knew her.
Surely it was only that Meg was a little tired. It had been a grueling harvest season. She was glad for the silk gloves that covered the calluses on her palms, and the questions they would generate which she could not answer. She searched the room for Dougal. She shouldn’t be doing any such thing, but she found she couldn’t help herself. He was unlike anyone she had ever met. And not just for the obvious reasons.
When Mr. Hanson asked her to join him in the quadrille, she accepted and determined to enjoy herself. If she was going to be paraded about like a lonely spinster to be sold off to the highest bidder, she may as well dance. And devour custard tarts.
She danced three more sets, each with a perfectly amiable gentleman she had no intention of marrying and who had no intention of marrying her. The beeswax candles in the crystal chandeliers above them began to drip and the chalk used on the bottom of their dancing slippers made the shining parquet floor look as though it had been snowing. She declined her last partner’s offer of joining him in the card room and joined Priya instead.
“I’m exhausted just looking at her,” Priya said, nodding at Tamsin, who was still dancing. “Never mind the musical galloping but all that smiling.” She shuddered lightly.
Meg grinned at her, feeling some of the odd mood that gripped her float away. Lady Priya Langdon was beautiful with her black hair and dark eyes, and she was also practical and sharp as a knife. There were many who feared her and many more who ought to fear her. But Meg knew exactly how hard Priya could be with her friends: to whit, as hard as the Blancmange pudding Meg might one day still try to steal.
There was nothing Priya would not do for her loved ones. As to that, Meg made sure her smile did not invite concern. She could hardly explain why she was out of sorts. Taking in the harvest was difficult enough when you weren’t supposed to be doing it in the first place. Add to that her uncle’s new friends who prowled around the estate drinking and shooting at birds, foxes, and once, someone’s pig, and she hadn’t slept properly in weeks. Or eaten, for that matter. It had been at least an hour since supper, surely she could sneak a pastry.
“What is it?” Priya asked, concerned.
Meg adjusted her smile. Everyone else believed her placid, polite façade without question. “I’m just a little tired,” she said, and it was mostly the truth. She’d be herself again by morning. More tea, a good night’s sleep; there was no better tonic. “I only just arrived today.”
“Hhmph.”
“Have you heard from Persephone?” Meg asked to distract her.
“I received a letter from Conall,” she replied. “He says Persephone is writing a journal she plans to share with us. She’s on volume three.” She made a face. “I want to know that she’s enjoying herself, but honestly I’d rather not read about how pyramid stones were cut and then be quizzed about it later.”
Meg smiled fondly. Persephone was excessively devoted to her antiquarian pursuits and could never understand why the rest of them weren’t excited to dig in the mud looking for human bones and broken pottery.
“Miss Swift, are those red birds embroidered on your gloves?” Lady Blackwell said stopping to join them by the refreshment table. “How cunning you are.”
“Thank you, Lady Blackwell.” She had stitched them along the top, adding a matching red ribbon. She and the others teased Persephone’s grandmother about her love of ribbons, but those same ribbons she foisted on every single lady had helped them restrain a traitor not too long ago. Meg was now a fervent believer in the wisdom of always having a ribbon and a sharp pin on one’s person. And truth be told, she had a closet of white dresses that had seen better days and ribbons and embroidery had become a necessity.