Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
Lord Hartley has strict requirements for his heir’s prospective wife, particularly that she have ‘a striking appearance and a presentable wit.’ One only hopes that the heir apparent recognizes what his father does not—that a woman with a presentable appearance and a striking wit is far more interesting.
Felicity scowled at the pale-cheeked face in the huge mirror over her dressing table. Fool! Ninny! Ridiculous dreamer!
She had no reason to be so somber, and certainly no reason to let her listlessness show in her face.
In the week since her return from the country, she’d gone to four Christmas balls, three parties, and a special concert.
She’d provided Mr. Pilkington with six good columns for which he’d paid her decently.
Tonight she was attending Lady Brumley’s annual St. Thomas’s Day party, the most prestigious ball of the season, with London’s most interesting characters, who would provide her with ample material for even more columns. So why did her malaise persist?
Because of him, of course. That false-hearted viscount with the roving eye.
He would attend tonight, too, dancing with one woman after another, seeking out a wife with blithe nonchalance. It was what she wanted, wasn’t it? She’d refused him, after all. What did she expect him to do—pine for her?
Precisely. That’s what she’d expected, fool that she was. But she should have known better. Why should he pine after her? She’d done nothing but torment the man since the day she met him. Not that he didn’t deserve it, because he did. Still ...
Glancing back at the mirror, she scowled again. No wonder he’d given up on her so easily. Look at her colorless face and dull expression. She looked exactly like the common-born woman she was.
Furiously, she dabbed rouge onto her cheeks, then just as furiously, scoured it off. No respectable woman wore rouge these days. Mama had done so in her day, but it was acceptable then.
Why did she care what he thought of her, anyway? They were quits now. She needn’t worry overmuch about him.
“Lissy, what’s that red stuff you’re playing with?”
It was Ansel, but all her little tin soldiers were ranged at her back, having invaded her chamber en masse this evening.
James sat cross-legged on her closed trunk, keeping his posture meticulously erect as he’d been taught at Islington Academy.
Devoid of such training, William and Ansel sprawled on their bellies across her bed with their heads resting on their hands and their bare feet kicking idly in the air.
And George, true to form, wandered the room in search of mischief.
“I’m not playing with it.” She set her mother’s old rouge pot firmly aside. She would not give Ian the satisfaction of seeing her appear all rouged and plucked like some tart. Then he’d know how she regretted refusing his proposal.
Regretted? Hah! She did not regret refusing to marry a man for whom women were merely an amusement and a wife was a manufacturer of dutiful children. Marry a man with a mistress? A man who within a day of her refusal was courting every eligible female thrown his way? Never!
“Do you have to go to a ball tonight?” Ansel asked, his golden head cocked to one side as he watched her latch Mama’s paste ruby necklace about her neck.
“Yes, Lissy, do you have to?” Georgie put in. “You’ve been going to parties all week. Don’t see why you can’t stay here with us tonight.”
James supplied an answer for her. “Lissy’s got to have something to write about, lads, so she has to go to parties. You know that. If she doesn’t, then we shan’t have enough money for Christmas goose. You wouldn’t want that, would you?”
The triplets shook their heads in unison, and Felicity bit back a smile. “Tomorrow I promise to spend the entire day with you. Mr. Pilkington sent over tickets to Madame Tussaud’s Waxworks Exhibition. It’s in the Strand again. Would you like to go see it?”
Even James took notice of that. “Can we, Lissy, truly? You’ll take us?”
“I most certainly will.” She’d seen the exhibition often as a girl and looked forward to discovering what Madame Tussaud had added to the collection.
“Can we go into The Separate Room?” Georgie asked in a hushed whisper.
Felicity frowned at his mention of the notorious collection of death masks from the French Revolution that had started Madame Tussaud on the path of such a strange profession. “Indeed, you may not! It’ll give you nightmares.”
“No, it won’t!” Georgie protested. “Nothin’ scares me, Lissy!”
She cast a dirty look into the heavens, questioning God for his wisdom in making little boys so fearless in theory and craven in practice. The triplets were generally all bluster and bombast ... until nighttime brought the usual childhood nightmares.
“We’ll see,” she said noncommittally.
The door to her bedroom swung open, and Mrs. Box hurried in. “The Worthin’s has arrived. You don’t want to keep ‘em waitin’, luv.”
Snatching up her fan, she rose from the dressing table and faced her brothers. “Well? How do I look?”
“You look like a peacock!” William said, giving his highest compliment.
“She don’t look like no peacock, Will.” Georgie sneered at his brother. “There ain’t a single feather on that dress.”
Felicity opened her mouth, then shut it, realizing it was pointless to correct so many grammatical errors at once. It was all she could do merely to keep track of Georgie’s errors these days. He really must stop spending time with Mrs. Box and Joseph, neither of whom had adequate grammar.
“You look very beautiful,” James said artlessly, ignoring his brothers who now argued over William’s words. At least James’ grammar was presentable. James left the trunk and approached with arm extended. “May I escort you downstairs, lovely lady?”
Stifling a laugh, she nodded and took his arm. “I’d be honored, kind sir.”
With a haughty expression, James waved his brothers closer. “You may carry the train, lads, if you like.”
“I don’t have a train,” Felicity protested, but it was too late.
Three pairs of grimy hands now struggled for purchase on the back edge of her peach skirt.
She winced, but didn’t stop them. Her skirts would no doubt be soiled the moment she walked into the muddy street anyway.
And though the boys held her skirt high enough to reveal a full foot of her petticoat, she knew she must give them some chance to participate in her evening, or they’d be little terrors for Mrs. Box the rest of the night.
Nonetheless, she decided to extricate herself from them once she and James reached the top of the stairs.
The possibility of tumbling to the bottom with the three of them tangled in her gown was too real to risk.
With a gentle word, she shook them free like so many clinging kittens.
“Now, boys, you might as well stay here—”
“But we want to talk to Lord Worthing,” Georgie protested. “He hasn’t come with Lady Worthing before. Ain’t he the pirate?”
With a quick glance down to where the Worthings conversed with Mrs. Box, she hissed under her breath, “Who told you that?”
“You did,” Ansel put in. “The day you got back from your trip.”
She’d forgotten. And of course, they didn’t care that the man was now a respected earl. No, they were only interested in his adventures on the high seas. That was precisely what she did not need—the triplets cornering an earl with earnest questions about how to run a man through.
“Can we talk to him, huh, Lissy?” William asked.
She forced a smile. “Not tonight. Another time, all right?” At their crestfallen expressions, she bent down to buss each one on the cheek. “You’ll see plenty of pirates at Madame Tussaud’s Exhibition tomorrow.”
That wiped the disappointment from their faces.
“Be sure to mind Mrs. Box,” she added, ruffling Georgie’s hair with affection. “And don’t stay up waiting for me. I’ll be late.”
She felt their eyes on her as James, looking quite the adult, led her downstairs.
The boys were growing up much too quickly.
Although some days she couldn’t wait until they could shoulder some of the family’s financial burden, most days she regretted the circumstances that would thrust them into adulthood far too soon.
Mrs. Box looked up, caught sight of her and James, and smiled broadly. “There she is, milady. And the young master with her.”
James drew himself up straighter, and a lump lodged in Felicity’s throat.
He wouldn’t be master of anything soon. Today three different creditors had assaulted her—the butcher, a shopkeeper from Cheapside, and some gambling companion of her father’s.
The last man, a knight, had threatened to bring the magistrate after her if she didn’t pay off her father’s debt.
Thankfully, she’d had the coal money to give him, or there was no telling what he would have done.
But the other two she’d sent away empty-handed.
Good Lord, did she need money—bushels and bushels of it. She’d never pay off all the debts at the rate she was going. And she’d been lucky so far that none of Papa’s creditors had guessed how dire her circumstances were.
Tonight she’d have to gather more material than usual. Perhaps if she could find enough, she might secretly approach a rival newspaper about writing a second column under a second name. If she could only pay a large sum on the worst of the bills ...
“You’re looking well this evening,” Sara commented as Felicity reached the bottom of the stairs. With a warm smile, the countess turned to James. “And what a handsome man you have at your side.”
James fairly beamed at the countess’s praise. He’d been half in love with the woman from the day the Worthings had brought Felicity home from the country.
“I suppose the triplets are already in bed.” Sara’s face showed disappointment. “I do so enjoy the darlings, and I’d hoped to introduce Gideon to them. They were asleep when we arrived from the country last week.”
“Actually—” James began.