Chapter 11
Eleven
A few hours later, after having been stabbed with a variety of pins and tut-tutted over by both modiste and chatelaine, Aurora was allowed to return to her room.
Heedless of whatever damage it would do to her dress, she crawled up on the bed and lay down, curling into a ball.
Her head still pounded, and images of the past few hours looped through her mind, around and around and around again.
In a quiet moment in between fittings, while she was watching Missie turn this way and that in front of the glass, and Hyacinth had stepped away for the moment with Madame Vachon, Aurora had burst out with, “Missie, your family, so much trouble, I—”
Missie turned a placid look on her, completely unruffled.
“Oh, it’s no trouble. I expect Papa has run into a spot of bother again: debts,” she clarified, looking at Aurora.
Her voice stayed matter of fact. “I wouldn’t be surprised if your father hasn’t helped him out, in exchange for us helping you out.
Very practical, really.” Her face settled back into its porcelain doll features.
While Missie’s words shocked Aurora (How could she be so calm about a father who gambled and lost so much money?), she also knew her friend well enough to take her at her word.
Missie was extremely practical. She knew who she was, what her position was, and what she needed to do to maintain it.
That required knowledge of not only how Society worked, but also the nuances of speech, dress, and the like.
To achieve said knowledge, Missie had devoted herself assiduously.
I should take a page from Missie’s book. But how can I even try?
With a sudden move, Aurora rolled to the bed’s edge and leaned way over the side, stretching to try and reach the second small valise, which she had brought with her and which she kept locked.
It was still there. It was old, worn, and cracked, but she loved it because it had been one of her father’s, from his days of doctoring.
Before he had left that all behind to run the manufactory.
She didn’t trust Hyacinth not to do something with it but, so far, that worthy party had respected her wishes and left it where Aurora had placed it.
Why had she brought it? Because—she acknowledged it was her cowardice speaking—it might help her escape, should the situation in London become too much.
Oh, how she longed to run away, go home, and have life go back to the way it used to be.
Also, by touching the soft and well-worn leather, she could imagine herself comfortably tucked away in her father’s study.
She remembered the misery of her first week at Miss Fielding’s Select Academy, all those years ago.
It had been the worst of her life. At least, up until now.
Bewildered, unused to the society of other girls (or other children entirely—she’d been raised very much on her own), she had made one blunder after another.
The things she had done at home which had won her the approbation of her parents carried no value here.
She was also unused to being considered a dunce.
Mademoiselle was forever rapping her on her knuckles and rolling her eyes at her execrable accent, and Aurora had clomped so much and trod on her partner’s toes that the dancing master would fling up his arms in despair.
Into this misery had stepped the most angelic looking creature Aurora had ever seen.
She looked like a little porcelain doll until a smile appeared, and then her eyes would begin to dance, usually with mischief.
As a baron (Baron Hinchcliffe, to be precise), Lord Wentworth was the ne plus ultra of all the parents at Miss Fielding’s, and Missie occupied pride of place.
Sitting in the schoolroom and blotting her French assignment with her tears one afternoon, Aurora felt a cool hand on the back of her neck and heard a musical voice say, “I don’t think you conjugate the verb ‘faire’ quite like that. ”
And that is how they became friends. Over the past few years, Missie had grown tall and elegant; “A real beauty,” Miss Fielding had cooed to her parents.
Aurora, on the other hand, remained slight of figure and not terribly tall.
She enumerated her oft-repeated failures to herself: she was not beautiful—her mouth was too wide, and her nose was neither delicate nor Roman, instead somewhere indeterminately in-between.
Her hair, while thick and with a slight curl, was not considered worthwhile of notice.
She had even heard one of the girls refer to it as insipid.
Her parents ensured she had the latest fashions to wear, though she knew she didn’t carry them with that indefinable air Missie possessed.
Aurora was so lost in her miserable recounting of all her failings, she didn’t hear the scratch at the door or Lucy’s light footsteps until she heard the quiet, “Please, miss. I heard your head was poorly. I’ve brought a posset from Cook.”
Feeling suddenly ashamed of her megrims, Aurora struggled into a sitting position and watched as Lucy set the tray down on the bedside table, then shyly handed her the cup.
Aurora took a sip and nearly gagged on it, but Lucy’s hopeful expression made her take hold of herself and down the whole dreadful concoction, handing back the empty cup to be replaced on the tray.
Satisfied Aurora had drunk it down, Lucy quickly moved to each of the windows, closing the curtains and muffling the light in the room.
“Now, you must get some rest, miss. London can be a terrible excitement for a young lady.”
Aurora laughed, startling the girl, unnerving her even further when the laugh turned into a hiccup or a sob, which she quickly stifled.
“Yes, a terrible excitement. Bears and dukes and, oh, Lucy, ever so many people. I feel like such a country girl. There is a world of difference between the words in a guidebook and the actuality. I am going to get through this Season, Lucy. In spite of everything. I cannot let them down.” She sat up a little straighter and lifted her chin.
Lucy’s eyes shone at being taken into confidence. “Oh, yes, miss.” She picked up the tray and headed towards the door but came to a stop at Aurora’s question.
“Lucy, where is Hyacinth?”
“She is in with Miss Millicent in her bedchamber. They are discussing how she will wear her hair at Lady Hinsdale’s.”
“Ah, yes, Lady Hinsdale.” Aurora started to lie down again, then remembered her gown.
“Lucy, before you leave, if you would please help me out of my dress. I do not wish to crush it any more than I have already. If you would, please have Hyacinth wake me in two hours. I will need to discuss my hair for Lady Hinsdale’s as well.
If I am to do my parents proud, I must take great care at this first event. ”
With a quick bob, Lucy set down the tray and returned to the bed, where she helped Aurora out of her dress.
Smoothing it over her arm, Lucy headed again toward the door.
She turned before she went out. “I will take this down to be pressed, miss. And I will return for the tray directly, if that is all right.”
“Yes, thank you, Lucy.” Aurora lay back down on the bed, the effects of the posset already taking effect. She was asleep before her head hit the pillow.