Chapter Three #3
"No, but I cannot imagine that becoming a difficulty. You have received more attention than any young lady could reasonably desire."
"That is because they believe me to be elegant and grateful for their notice.
" Caroline placed the sea glass beside the piece Thomas had given her in Scarborough and studied the small collection.
"Perhaps I have been approaching the matter in entirely the wrong way.
If Papa will not permit me to refuse London, then I must persuade London to refuse me. "
Martha stared at her reflection. "I hope you are not proposing to cause a scandal."
"Nothing so dramatic. I need only become the sort of woman no gentleman would willingly marry."
"And how do you mean to accomplish that?"
Caroline thought of the girls at the seminary and of the way they had looked at her from the first. To them, she had always been a tradesman’s daughter forever reaching for a place above her station.
She had spent those three miserable months trying to prove them wrong.
Now she wondered why she had bothered. If London already expected her to be ambitious, grasping and ashamed of where she came from, then she would become exactly what they feared.
She would make a display of her fortune, speak openly of her determination to rise and treat every useful connection with a familiarity so condescending that no one could doubt she considered their rank a stepping stone to her own advancement.
She would take all that had been most unpleasant in those girls and wear it like one of her new gowns.
"I shall allow them to believe everything they already suspect about me," she said.
"I shall be proud of Papa's money and ashamed that he earned it.
I shall find every house too small and every acquaintance beneath me.
By the time I have finished, even the most determined fortune hunter should begin to wonder whether twenty thousand pounds is sufficient compensation. "
Martha's lips twitched, though she quickly recovered herself. "You appear to have given this considerable thought in a very short time."
"It is a small price to pay for a lifetime with the man I love." Caroline looked down at her gown. "I shall need your help, of course. To begin with, which colour suits me least?"
"Orange," Martha replied without hesitation.
Caroline turned to look at her. "You might at least have pretended to consider it."
"I have been with you since you were thirteen, miss.
Do you remember the play you put on with your brother and sister?
The one where you insisted upon wearing that hideous orange cape from the attic because you were determined to be the fairy queen?
You looked quite, quite yellow. Less like royalty than an old gentleman with a serious complaint of the liver. Orange has never done you any favours."
"Perfect. We shall order a gown tomorrow, in the brightest shade the modiste can find, and it must have feathers."
"Feathers?"
"An overabundance of them. I should like to appear as though I am being set upon by a bird of paradise."
Martha's composure deserted her, and a laugh escaped before she could prevent it. Caroline felt the corners of her mouth tip up in answer, but Martha soon grew serious again.
"You do understand that this may do more than frighten away a few unwanted suitors. Society is quick to judge and slow to forget, particularly where a young woman is concerned. If you make yourself ridiculous now, you may not find it easy to persuade people otherwise later."
"I do not care what London or the ton thinks of me," Caroline said with conviction.
Martha regarded her for a moment before answering. "Perhaps not now. But one day you may find that harder to say."
Caroline looked at the pieces of sea glass, each one carried from the shore where she had first met Thomas. "Then I shall endure it when that day comes. For now, I need only remain unmarried until Thomas can return for me."
Martha was silent for a long moment. Concern remained plain upon her face, but beneath it Caroline saw the reluctant beginning of surrender. "If you are determined to attempt this foolishness," she said at last, "then I suppose someone must ensure you do not make a complete disaster of it."
Caroline turned towards her. "Does that mean you will help me?"
Martha sighed, though there was the faintest hint of amusement in her expression. "It means I shall come with you to choose this dreadful gown and do what I can to keep you from ruining yourself entirely. Beyond that, I make no promises."
Caroline caught both her hands. The laughter that rose through the last of her tears felt strange after so many unhappy weeks, but wonderfully welcome.
When Mr Penrose called the following day, he would not find the elegant young woman who had listened patiently while he discussed her father's fortune.
Caroline intended to make herself so thoroughly unpleasant that he would count himself fortunate to escape her.
The orange gown and its dreadful feathers could come later. Her grand plan had already begun.