“Aaah, and the welcome was extended for as long as the countess was willing to acknowledge the relationship?”
“Oh, Letty, you are always so cynical. But in this case you are correct. I will not say the countess ever fawned over them, but she did refer to them more frequently than necessary as Dear Cousin Willard and Dear Cousin Rosemary.”
“And such is the way of the world, that doors hitherto closed to the higgler’s grandson were now magically opened.”
“Of course. Can you doubt it? Unfortunately, the countess had a deplorable habit of quacking herself. I believe it was ‘Dr. Blackwell’s Golden Elixir,’ guaranteed to restore the youthful bloom to her cheeks, which finally secured her a permanent spot in the churchyard,”
“Rather a setback for the Pierce-Smythes, it would seem.”
“Oh, they made a beautiful recovery. Simply substituted the daughter for the mother, as it were. Only ten years of age at the time, but admirably trained to recite ‘Dear Uncle Willard’ and ‘Dear Aunt Rosemary’ on cue. The great disaster began the year Lady Gloriana turned thirteen and began to grow.”
“She became fat?”
“No, although I will allow she would be more pleasing if she lost a stone or two. The problem is she has grown so tall. I myself have remarked her standing next to the blacksmith, who is known to be six feet three, and I would estimate she is no more than an inch shorter than he is. Such a catastrophe for the Pierce-Smythes, who would have done better not to inflict the presence of schoolgirls upon their adult company, for you must know, I do not at all approve of such modern practices. But having once introduced her to society at such a tender age, how can they now shut her up in the attic, so to speak?
“As sorry as I feel for the gel, I must admit I have enjoyed watching the Pierce-Smythes try to come about. When Lady Gloriana reached five feet nine or so, they sent a letter off posthaste to the vicar, her grandfather, requesting he come and remove her, but he had already gone to claim his heavenly reward.”
There was a light rap at the door, then the housekeeper entered bearing not only the fresh tea, but also a letter from Mrs. Pierce-Smythe.
Perusing the missive, Amelia gasped. “The gall of that woman. She has the nerve to invite me and my houseguest to dine with her en famille this evening. You may count on it, Letty, she has ferreted out your identity, even though she pretends not to know your name. Have I not told you she was encroaching? Of course I shall decline.”
“Do not be so hasty. I am not at all sure my stomach is up to another of the burnt offerings from your kitchen. I assume Mrs. Pierce-Smythe has chosen her cook for her culinary abilities rather than for her propensity to gossip?”
“Actually, she has a French chef, and her idea of potluck will probably be a dozen courses of four removes each. But my dear Letty, do please consider that if I should accept her hospitality, which I have not the slightest intention of doing, I would then be forced to acknowledge her, and though I am not so high in the instep that I am unwilling to give the squire’s wife a nod on Sunday, one must draw the line somewhere.”
“But my dear, surely you do not wish me to miss such an opportunity to observe this farce first hand?”
“Do not try to turn me up sweet, Letty. I know perfectly well what your intentions are. You plan to—to interfere. That has always been the chief difference between us. Where I am content to observe, you delight in playing the role of deus ex machina.”
“My dear departed second husband, Mr. Edward Newbold, was wont to call it meddling, but even he agreed I am a dab hand at arranging other people’s lives.”
“Newbold! I knew that name sounded familiar. Was he perhaps ...”
“Related to the enterprising Miss Newbold? Her nephew, in fact, which is how I was so fortunate as to hear the whole story. Quite the most lusty of my husbands, so if his aunt was anything like him, it is understandable that the king should have been led to stray from the strait and narrow path. I feel compelled, therefore, to do my puny best to aid my husband’s unfortunate young cousin. But you need not accompany me. I am quite capable of depressing the pretensions of mushrooms.”
“Well, if you refuse to listen to reason, I might as well make a start on packing. Once you mention how I am your very dear friend, and somehow I feel sure you will find the opportunity to do so, that wretched woman will give me no peace. She will be ringing my doorbell at all hours and lying in wait for me every time I set foot outside my garden. I declare, you have made it necessary for me to endure three months of visiting my daughters after I have been so successful in wriggling out of that obligation this year. I only hope that I will be gone long enough for Mrs. Pierce-Smythe to lose interest in me.”
“You might, if you prefer, accompany me to Edinburgh.”
“And why, pray, should I do that?”
“Well, to begin with, you could stand up with me.”
“Letty, you are not planning to walk down the aisle a fourth time!”
“But what is a woman without a man beside her? I confess, dear George caught me in a moment of weakness, and I accepted his offer. We are to be wed in the Cathedral in Edinburgh. That seems suitably far removed from London so that we can avoid attracting undue attention, especially from my sons and daughters-in-law.”
“Attention? Can it be— Is George perhaps Mr.— No, he cannot be.”
“Mr. George Morrough? But of course. What other George do I number in my acquaintance?’“
“But Letty, he is a good five years younger than you and a veritable nabob!”
“Are you accusing me of being a cradle robber or a fortune hunter? I assure you, I am neither. It is his other attributes that have persuaded me to agree to the match.”
“Letty!”
“I was referring, of course, to his educated mind and his amusing wit. Pray, what did you think I meant?”
Amelia Carlisle blushed, but did not answer the question.
* * * *
Feeling as if she had wandered by mistake into a gross parody of a rose garden, which did not belong in her worst nightmare, Lady Letitia seated herself on the only gilt chair in the Pierce-Smythes’ drawing room that was not ornamented with yellow roses done in needlepoint. To compound the horror of her surroundings, giant pink tea roses adorned the wallpaper and were repeated in the carpet. Tucked into the corners of the settees were plump pillows embroidered with improbable orange roses, which clashed dreadfully with the lavender roses in the upholstery. Nor had Mrs. Pierce-Smythe neglected the real roses, which were arranged flamboyantly in large vases scattered here and there around the room.
After closing her eyes for a moment to gather her strength, and realizing nothing could shut out the overpowering perfume of the flowers, Lady Letitia managed to smile sweetly at her hostess. “It was really fortuitous of you to issue your kind invitation to dine with you this evening. I can only regret that Mrs. Carlisle, who is, as I am sure you know, my very dearest friend, was unable to accompany me this evening. I had meant to call upon you on the morrow, but this will give me a better chance to become acquainted with my late husband’s young cousin.”
“Cousin?”
Three blank stares met Lady Letitia’s imperturbable gaze. “But of course—dear Lady Gloriana. How does she get on? She will be joining us for dinner, will she not?”
“Oh, of course,” Mrs. Pierce-Smythe said faintly. “I had better ... if you will excuse me, I shall see what is delaying her.”
With an expression on her face that more nearly resembled a grimace than a smile, she hurriedly left the room.
Her husband harrumphed and cleared his throat, but made no other attempt to entertain his guest. The joys of dining en famille were vastly overrated in Lady Letitia’s considered opinion. On the other hand, with a few embellishments, the account of this evening should make a vastly amusing story for dear George.
“I am ten years old now,” Rosabelle said, apparently feeling called upon to take up the conversational slack left by her mother�
��s sudden departure. Her legs crossed daintily at the ankle, her rose-colored skirts arrayed neatly around her, and her hands folded primly in her lap, she sat beside her remaining parent, who bestowed a doting look on her. “My father bought me a little gray pony for my birthday. She is the most beautiful pony in the whole world, and I love her dearly. And I have the most cunning saddle that is all my very own. My riding habit is pink. That is my favorite color.”
“And very pretty you look in it, too, my sweet.” Her father beamed down at her and patted her hand.
Nauseating child, Lady Letitia thought. Someone should tell her that she would be vastly more attractive if she were not so smugly conscious of her own looks. And someone should tell her parents that ten-year-old children are better kept in the schoolroom, no matter how precocious their parents think them.
“Ah, here we are now.” Mrs. Pierce-Smythe sailed into the room, trailed by ...
Gracious me, Lady Letitia thought, what have I gotten myself mixed up in? Any ideas she might have had about taking the chit along with her to Edinburgh died aborning.
Lady Gloriana’s height was the least of her problems. Her posture was deplorable in the extreme, her complexion was spotty, her lank brown hair did not deserve mention, and in the appalling frock Mrs. Pierce-Smythe had forced her into, she had no more shape than a bag of flour tied around the middle. Without looking up, the girl mumbled her greetings.
“Now that we are all here, let us go in to dinner. My dear Mr. Pierce-Smythe, if you will escort our guest, the girls and I shall be pleased to follow.”
What to do, what to do? Lady Letitia’s situation, instead of improving, became steadily worse. As the evening progressed it became clear to her that Mr. Pierce-Smythe considered the intellect of females only slightly greater than that of cabbages, and the education Lady Gloriana had apparently so far received fitted her for nothing other than staring blankly into space and eating chocolates, her present occupation.
It was only during the fourth course, when her host was expounding on the deleterious effects for females of the slightest physical exertion, that an image arose in Lady Letitia’s mind—the image of a woman whose idea of a little walk to settle one’s meal was a brisk fifteen-mile hike done in double-time.
She paused to consider. Lady Sidonia was dear Edward’s first cousin, which would make her Lady Gloriana’s great-aunt. Perfect. A bit eccentric, Sidie was exactly what the poor overgrown girl needed to recover from the harm caused by ten years of being exposed to the Pierce-Smythes.
There would, of course, be no problem with persuading the Pierce-Smythes that Lady Sidonia had more need of her grand-niece’s company than they did.
But how to convince Sidie to bother herself with the chit when she had no experience with raising children of her own? Nor any interest in the younger generation. In fact, Sidie had once expressed a strong aversion to having anything to do with anyone under the age of twenty, and even that she allowed was frequently still a bit too young.
All in all, if ‘twere done, ‘twere best done without warning, Lady Letitia decided. I shall simply write a letter and send it along with the child. Martinet though she can be, dear Sidie will surely not be so hard-hearted as to send back her own flesh and blood. Especially not when I describe to her Mr. Pierce-Smythe’s views on the type of education suitable for females.
* * * *
... and my dear, then he said that reading history was known to cause softening of the brain in females, and it were best if such complicated subjects were left strictly to men, who are better able to understand the politics involved.
Lady Sidonia skimmed the rest of the letter, then glanced up at the girl standing forlornly in front of her.
Well, the bones were good, or would be if they were not buried under a layer of puppy fat. Whether the mind was still functional after years of disuse was another question. Looking down at the letter again, she re-read the last sentence. “If you can take care of her until she is eighteen, then I will see to finding her a husband.”
A husband, bah! Husbands were totally unnecessary encumbrances. “Preposterous,” she muttered out loud.
“‘Tis not my fault.” The girl in front of her wiped her eyes with a sleeve that had apparently served her quite some time as a handkerchief. “It truly is not.”
Lady Sidonia rose to her feet. “Stand up straight, gel, shoulders back. Let us have a look at you.”
Her eyes still downcast, the girl made a half-hearted attempt to square her shoulders, then slowly her gaze traveled from Lady Sidonia’s stout boots up past her black split riding skirt, up, up, until she was eyeball to eyeball with the older woman.
“But ... but you are as tall as I am!” she cried with the first show of spirit Lady Sidonia had yet seen in her.
“Of course I am. We get it from my mother, your great-grandmother. Anne Newbold she was. Almost caught herself a king, she did, although I never could see why she should have wanted a dunderhead like him. Aye, you have got her height, but we have yet to see if you have also inherited any of her wit or gumption.”
Chapter One
May 1806
“I believe there has been some mistake. I do not accept temporary positions.” Miss Anne Hemsworth, a most highly recommended governess, rose majestically to her feet and looked down at her would-be employer.
He was a short man, though he did his best to disguise the fact by wearing shoes with extremely high heels. Dressed as he was in a deep plum jacket, which was padded at the shoulders and nipped in at the waist, and biscuit-colored unmentionables, his lilac waistcoat would have been unexceptional were it not for mother-of-pearl buttons of extraordinary size. They and his collar, which was too high to permit the turning of his head, proclaimed him a dandy.
His unlined face gave the impression of youth, and on first making his acquaintance, Anne had thought him to be only slightly older than her own seven and twenty years. But upon closer inspection, a certain sagging about the jowls led her to believe he was already on the shady side of forty.
Now, however, frown lines wrinkled his forehead. “But—but, do please reconsider. It is an excellent offer I am making you.”
He reached for her arm to detain her, but she avoided his hand and turned to leave. The little man scurried after her, reminding her of a toy poodle being dragged along on a leash. Not that she had anything against poodles, except, of course, those of the breed that had a tendency to yap constantly.
Her tolerance for lapdogs did not extend, however, to short men who seemed unable to raise their eyes above the level of her bosom.
“But you would be passing up the opportunity to work in the household of a marquess. Only do think how it would raise your consequence to have a reference from an actual marquess.” Added to his propensity to rub his hands surreptitiously on his unmentionables every time he looked at her, this was the last straw. Having spent the first fifteen years of her life trading on the fact that she was Lady Gloriana Marybell Dorinda Elizabeth Hemsworth, the daughter of the earl of Faussley, and having spent the last twelve learning to stand on her own two feet, Anne was not at all in doubt as to which was more rewarding. She knew better than most people how little real value a title carried.
Pausing at the door of the hotel parlor where the interview was being conducted, she turned to face Mr. Trussell. “I have no need of references from a ten-year-old marquess. My reputation is already such that I am able to pick and choose where I will.” Surveying him impassively from top to bottom, she concluded, “And I do not choose to be in your employ.” Deliberately throwing back her shoulders, which only made his eyes goggle all the more, she turned and sailed majestically through the doorway.
* * * *
Mrs. Dorothy Wiggins, for the last twenty-one years part owner and sole manager of one of London’s most elite employment agencies, sat at her wide oak desk and listened to Anne describe the abortive interview she had just terminated.
Really, Lady Letitia had been mistaken i
n her belief that it would be an easy matter to maneuver Anne into taking the position in Devon. But as difficult as it might be, Dorothy was in full agreement with her friend and partner that allowing Anne to waste her life as a governess, to live and die a spinster, was a crime against nature. It was therefore up to Dorothy to convince Anne to accept this temporary position in Devon, even though Lady Letitia was keeping her own counsel as to who the prospective bridegroom was.
“It is all very well and good to know one’s worth, but before one can pick and choose, one must have more than one job to pick and choose among,” Mrs. Wiggins pointed out. “And in the autumn, of course, there will undoubtedly be an abundance of positions open. But with summer upon us, it is not the best time of the year to be between positions.” If one discounted, of course, the two ladies who had specifically requested that they be notified the moment Anne became free to accept a new position.
“Be that as it may, I am not the slightest bit inclined to be in the employ of that little worm of a man.”
“My dear, Mr. Creighton Trussell is most highly esteemed and a perfect gentleman. I should not describe him in such slighting terms if I were you.”
“If he had slavered over your hand and drooled every time he gawked at your bosom, you would think it a mild enough description.”
“Surely by this time you have accustomed yourself to attracting attention. You cannot blame the poor man for taking one look at you and becoming completely besotted.”
“Besotted? Is that what you call it when a man is so lost to propriety as to stare rudely at a woman’s chest?”
“Of course. This may come as a shock to you, my dear Anne, but your singular height is not the only reason men’s heads turn when you walk down the street. Indeed, I would say it is not even one of the principle reasons. Even dressed as a governess, you are quite beautiful, and you need not point out that you are not at all in the mode. This Season’s ideal of beauty may be a little china doll dressed in ribbons and flounces, but that will not stop men from appreciating your flawless skin—”
Charlotte Louise Dolan Page 2