Chapter 15
Fifteen
“Ithink we will need to go to London soon, my lady,” Smythe said as she helped Harry put her dress on over her head.
As far as Harry was concerned, that was an impossibility.
“Why?” Harry’s gruff voice was muffled as she sought her arm holes.
“Your clothes, my lady. You are much more shapely now. You need proper accommodation.”
“Bother.” Harry’s head had finally popped through. She looked at the cheval glass, something she rarely did. “You can see the top of my bosom!”
“Yes, my lady.”
“Well, that’s rather horrid. I should cover it up. I might catch cold.”
“Not today, my lady. It is so warm.”
“That’s true,” Harry said and strode to the window. She looked down at her own chest. Such a nuisance.
“And you need some new corsets, including one that can take a busk.”
“A busk? No, Smythe, no, I will not wear a piece of wood down my front so I can’t lean over.”
“Just for formal occasions, my lady. We will have some corsets fitted and at least one made so it could have a busk. Then you could try it once and see if you could tolerate it.”
“All right,” Harry conceded and turned away from the window. “But I am sure I’ll never wear it.”
On one point Harry was firm. She didn’t want to go to London. Too long of a journey. Too much wasted time. Smythe suggested they go to a dressmaker in Tavishbourn, a town of some size, only an hour away by carriage. Harry agreed.
At luncheon, Harry told Thomas of the planned trip.
“Why are you going to Tavishbourn?” He was curious. Harry had gone nowhere since she had come to Sommerleigh.
“Smythe says I must have new clothes.”
Thomas leaned forwards. “But you won’t get the latest fashions in Tavishbourn. Much better to take several days and go to London. You can see your stepmother and your sister and your usual dressmaker. Perhaps I’ll come with you.”
“I don’t care for fashion, my lord. And I don’t have the time to go to London.” Harry threw her napkin down in exasperation.
“Then why the new clothes? We do not entertain here.”
Harry looked down. “Smythe says . . . I must.”
Thomas steepled his fingers. “Does Smythe have some magical power to persuade you to do things that I don’t?”
“I have— That is, my clothes . . . I am getting fat! I knew all this food was a mistake. I waste time in eating it, and now I must waste time in getting new clothes.” Harry’s face became pink. “If you must know, my bosom grows!”
Thomas did not need Harry to inform him of that fact.
He had, for some time, been privately following the development of Harry’s chest. She had gone from being completely flat to having two subtle protuberances.
Very subtle, indeed, but Thomas felt himself a connoisseur and thus well able to appreciate the change.
He looked now beyond her bosom and saw that the shoulders of her current dress were quite strained. There was no rupture of seams, but the dress looked tight and uncomfortable.
“I beg your pardon, my lady. I defer entirely to Smythe’s judgment.” Thomas wanted to find a way to tell Harry he liked her fledgling breasts and she was still much too thin, but he could not. Instead, he said, “Do you not find yourself enjoying your meals?”
“Enjoying? Enjoyment is not the ruler by which I measure my life, Lord Drake.” Harry’s voice was rising in pitch and volume.
“In a hundred years, no one will care about the number of potatoes I ate. Or, for that matter, the number of whores you’ve bedded.
But they will care that a woman solved Fermat’s conjecture! ”
Thomas summoned his mildest voice. “It seems hard to give up so much of one’s life in a bid for posterity.”
“You think this is all about self-glorification!” Harry was seething.
Thomas had never seen her like this. Even her episode of keening and head thumping seemed calm compared to this.
This was red-faced screaming with spittle flying from her mouth.
“You know nothing!” she bellowed and stormed from the room.
A half an hour later, Thomas went up to Harry’s aerie and stood outside the door. He thought he heard a pen scratching, her muttering. He walked down two flights and went in search of Smythe. He found her coming out of Harry’s bedchamber, carrying a pair of boots caked in mud.
“I see my lady at least had a good walk this morning.”
Smythe curtsied. “Yes, my lord.”
“She lost her temper at luncheon,” Thomas said. “Or, I should say, she lost her temper at me.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“I was astonished.”
Smythe bit her lip and curtsied.
Thomas crossed his arms in front of his chest and leaned on the doorjamb. “Say what you like, Smythe. You’re the one who knows her best. Give me the benefit of your wisdom.”
“In truth, my lord, I am surprised it has taken so many weeks for her to have a rage at you. But it will pass quickly. She won’t apologize, but by dinnertime she will be quite calm, almost sweet, and will act as if it had never happened.”
Thomas thought it might be interesting to see Harry’s version of sweet. He smiled at the idea.
“Since the countess seems to resent having new clothes made, perhaps you could induce the dressmaker at Tavishbourn to make several dresses in the same style and color but increasing in size? I would not want my wife to stop eating just to avoid a trip to the dressmaker.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“And perhaps, you could make sure . . .” He tilted his head to the side and squinted at her.
Smythe waited.
“No brown, no gray, no green, no yellow. Blue, I think. And none of your faded, insipid blues. A good, strong blue. Yes, at least one blue gown. And pink. And red.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“And two warm cloaks, one with a fur lining, one without. I want her to be able to continue her walks in all weather. I think, perhaps, red wool?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“And get her measured for some new boots as well.”
“I will do my best, my lord.” Smythe curtsied.
Thomas looked at her. Neat, tidy. A sensible woman of middle age. “You’ve done very well for Harry, Smythe. I suspect she does not thank you, so let me.”
“It is a privilege to wait on Lady Drake.”
Thomas turned to leave but was arrested by Smythe’s voice.
“And if I may be so bold, my lord, you’ve done very well for her, too.”
Thomas nodded and walked down the passage.
That evening, Jackson told Thomas he had to stop grinning because it made his lordship devilishly difficult to shave for dinner.