A Kiss at Midnight

The way he said my uncle was entirely different now that he’d met the man in question. Kate had the definite impression that Algie would be dining out for years to come on his relationship to royalty.

“I’ll see you tomorrow morning,” she told him, turning toward the door of the drawing room. The room was thronged now, and the air filled with the clamor of fifteen simultaneous conversations. Kate was almost at the door when an extraordinary woman blocked her path.

She was probably forty years old, and stunning in an opulent, deluxe sort of way. Unlike most of the women in the room, she hadn’t shorn her hair; instead, she’d piled it on top of her head and then powdered it strawberry color. It clashed madly with her dark blue eyes, but, somehow, the effect was marvelous.

“You!” she said.

Kate was trying to slide sideways, but at this command she stopped.

“I know you.”

She could hardly say, “You must know my sister,” so she plastered on a rather mad smile and said, “Oh! Of course, how are you?”

“Not know you that way,” the woman said impatiently, waving a jeweled fan in the air. “Now who are you? Who are you?”

Kate curtsied. “I’m Miss—”

“Of course! You’re the spitting image of Victor. Devil’s spawn that he was.” But she said it affectionately. “You’ve his nose and his eyes.”

“You knew my father,” Kate said, stammering a bit.

“ Quite well,” the woman said, grinning. It was the sort of grin one didn’t expect from a lady so obviously well-born. “And your name is Katherine. How do I know that, you might ask?”

Kate suddenly realized with a pulse of alarm that anyone might overhear the conversation. “Actually—” she began, but was interrupted.

“Because I’m your godmother, that’s why! My goodness, it’s been forever. Appalling how the years go by. You were just a wee thing last I saw you, all plump cheeks and big ears.” She peered closer. “Look at you now. Just like your father, though that wig does nothing for you, darling, if you don’t mind my saying so. You’re lucky enough to have his eyes; for God’s sake don’t pair them with a purple wig.”

Kate felt a little flush rising up her neck, but her godmother— her godmother?— wasn’t done surveying her. “And that padding in front isn’t doing you any favors either. There’s too much of it. It looks like you’ve got two pudding bags suspended from your neck.”

The flush was up to her ears. “I’m just retiring for the night,” Kate said, dropping another curtsy. “If you’ll forgive me.”

“Offended you, have I? You’re looking a bit feverish. Now that was one thing that Victor had control of: his temper. Didn’t control anything else, but I never saw him blow his dickey, even when he was three sheets to the wind.”

Kate blinked. Blow his —

“Offended you again,” her godmother said with satisfaction. “Come along, then. We’ll go to my chambers. The butler put me in one of the towers, and it’s utterly heavenly, like being stuck in the clouds except for the pigeons crapping on the windows.”

“But—I don’t—what is your name?” Kate finally asked.

She raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow. “Didn’t your father ever tell you about me?”

“I’m afraid that he died before he had a chance.”

“The old sod,” she said. “He swore that he’d tell you all about me. I’ll give you the story, but not here. This castle is crammed with people longing for gossip and making it up as fast as they can. No need to feed the blaze.”

Kate held her ground. “And you are?”

“Lady Wrothe, though you might as well call me Henry, which is short for Henrietta. Leominster, my husband, is over there getting drunk with the Prince of Württemberg. Poor Leo simply can’t bear to let a glass of brandy pass him by.” She reached out and took hold of Kate’s wrist. “That’s enough of an introduction; let’s go.”

She towed Kate up stairs, through corridors, up more stairs, and finally into her chamber, pushed her onto the bed, and plucked off her wig. “You’ve got Victor’s hair. You’re a beauty, then, aren’t you?”

Kate felt as if a whirlwind had come out of nowhere, picked her up, and deposited her in the tower room. “Did you know my father well?”

“I almost married him,” Lady Wrothe said promptly. “Except that he never asked me. I still remember meeting your father for the first time. It was at the Fortune Theater, during an interval of Othello . I knew instantly that I’d love to play Desdemona to his Moor.”

“Was my mother there?” Kate asked, feeling a surge of loyalty for her poor mother, who appeared to have been overlooked not only by Mariana, but by Lady Wrothe as well.

“No, no, he hadn’t met her yet.”

“Oh,” Kate said, feeling better.

“We had the most delicious flirtation,” Lady Wrothe said, looking a bit dreamy. “But your mother already had her eye on him, and within a few months her father—your grandfather—had reeled Victor in like a half-dead trout. Victor was fantastically poor,” she explained.

“Oh,” Kate said again.

“Luckily for him, he was a handsome beast of a man, all that dark buttery hair and your eyes, and then the cheekbones . . . if things had been different, I would have married him in a moment.”

Kate nodded.

“Of course, he would have been unfaithful to me and then I’d have shot him in a private area,” Lady Wrothe said thoughtfully, “so it’s just as well.”

A giggle escaped Kate’s mouth. It was wrong to laugh, just wrong, when she was listening to tales of her father’s rampant infidelity.

“He just couldn’t help it. Some men are like that. I suppose you’ve met the prince? He’s one of them. No woman will be able to keep that man at home, and though they’re delightful to play with, it’s best to avoid them. I’ve been married three times, darling, so I know.”

“So my godfather must be dead,” Kate said. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“It was a long time ago,” Lady Wrothe said. Then she gave Kate a lopsided, secret smile. “Your father and I—he—”

“You had an affaire ,” Kate said, resigned.

“Oh no. Perhaps it would have been better for both of us if we had. We were young and foolish when we met, which meant that it was all talk of love and roses, rather than beds. And Victor couldn’t marry me because my dowry wasn’t large enough.”

The more she learned of her father, the less she liked what she heard.

“Classic Romeo and Juliet,” Lady Wrothe said, “but without all the stabbing and poison, thank you very much. Instead your father simply married your mother, and that was the end of it.”

“Did you know her as well?”

Lady Wrothe sat down at the stool before her dressing table, so Kate couldn’t see her eyes. “Your mother hadn’t been strong enough to have a proper season, so I didn’t meet her until your baptism.”

“I have wondered how my mother and father managed to meet, since my mother was so frequently abed,” Kate admitted.