Chapter One
London, England
July, 1829
Too Bad for Toogood!
Is there anything quite so pitiable as a woman past her prime without a husband to show for her advancing years? One wonders at the audacity of those ladies too long in the tooth who by all rights ought to retire gracefully from the husband hunt, but who choose instead to continue the charade well past the point of credibility.
Alas, modern women are known to be somewhat less well-mannered than their predecessors. One would think, after so many Seasons of abject failure to bring a respectable gentleman up to scratch, Miss Phoebe Toogood would have the courtesy to bow out of the marriage mart, but it seems she yet holds out some hope. The unfortunate woman was observed partaking of far too much lemon cake and champagne at Lady Trowbridge’s musicale Thursday last, much to the chagrin of her poor mama.
It is no wonder that Lord Windham defected rather abruptly last Season from Miss Toogood in favor of Miss Arabella Whittington, whose manner is in all ways refined andelegant. Perhaps this latest heartbreak will be the impetus for Miss Toogood to mend her ways and correct her course in life. While her age would suggest that Miss Toogood is unlikely to make a brilliant match, this Author supposes she might yet snare a particularly desperate widower—if she can learn to comport herself appropriately.
“You shouldn’t be reading that drivel, darling.”
Phoebe looked up from the paper, a wry smile curling the corners of her lips. “Perhaps you should, Mama. Some days it’s vastly entertaining. Did you know that Lord Windham abandoned me for Arabella Whittington? Because this is the first I’m hearing of it.”
Mama blinked in surprise. “Was Lord Windham courting you?”
“Not hardly.” It was just that the poor man was painfully shy, and they had ended up more often than not lingering at the edges of ballrooms together. At least until Phoebe had gently nudged him in Miss Whittington’s direction instead.
Mama’s eyes flicked back toward the paper—and to Phoebe’s fingers, which would undoubtedly be stained with ink, given that she had snatched up the paper this morning before Baxter had had a chance to iron it. “I wish they wouldn’t print such rubbish,” Mama said sourly, and Phoebe thought it telling that, even though Mama had not yet read the paper, she had clearly divined the nature of the column that had attracted Phoebe’s interest.
But then, there had been enough of them already, and a woman in her tenth Season made for an easy target.
“It’s practically libelous,” Mama said, as she carved up a bit of egg and popped it into her mouth. “I do wish your father would—”
“Now, now, Mama.” Phoebe folded up the paper and laid itbeside her plate. “You know what Papa says.”
Rolling her eyes heavenward, Mama quoted, “To acknowledge such things is to lend credence to them.” A sigh followed, punctuated by the scrape of her knife across her plate. “Nonetheless. I hate to see such nastiness in print,” she said, with a little moue. “Especially of my sweet, darling, precious—”
Phoebe smothered a snort into the palm of her hand.
“—beloveddaughter,” Mama concluded, but the narrowing of her eyes suggested that Phoebe had not been successful in concealing her amusement, and that at the momentbelovedwas an adjective very much called into question.
“I don’t mind them,” Phoebe said, and despite the doubtful look Mama slanted toward her, it was true. In fact, she had amassed quite the collection of columns, which she carefully snipped from the paper after it had passed through the household’s hands and kept them together in a tidy bundle within the drawer of her vanity.
It wasn’t that they were amusing, per se. But they were useful. Each passing Season represented the furtherance of her goal: escaping the marriage market unscathed—and, crucially, unmarried. Each new column that emerged, every new excoriation of her character and enumeration of her myriad flaws and failings promised the additional dwindling of her matrimonial prospects, which were already dismal indeed.
Mama would be disappointed, of course, when the Season passed once again without a proposal and subsequent wedding. Phoebe was the only remaining child of the plentiful Toogood brood to be unmarried, and Mama was certainthat one day, the gentlemen of theTonwould somehow collectively open their eyes and realize what a marvelous catch Phoebe was, and then she would simply be swimmingin flowers and calling cards and all that nonsense that came with courting.
Seven weddings had come and gone, and Phoebe’s siblings—older and younger—had all gone the way of spouses. Little Susannah, just three and twenty, had even snagged an Earl a few Seasons past. Of course, Phoebe loved her siblings and their collective horde of plump, squalling children; all twenty-seven of them at last count, and each noisier than the last.
She had simply never wanted any children herself.
But she had always known that Mama could never conceive of a reality in which the greatest aspiration of any of her daughters’ lives had not been to be a wife and a mother. There would be much wailing and gnashing of teeth once Mama was forced to admit that Phoebe’s chances of securing a husband had finally run their course. But only because Mama did love her so, and in that way of every good mother, she was convinced that everyone elseought to have loved her, too.
Mama cleared her throat. “And what have you planned for today, dearest?”
“Mm,” Phoebe said, around a mouthful of toast. “Well, I’ve already penned a letter to Arabella and Lord Windham.” Though she doubted she would get much of a response, since they were clearly enjoying their honeymoon. “I thought I would visit with Emma.”
“Do give her my love,” Mama said, a fond smile wreathing her lips. “And remember to take a maid with you. Don’t think I haven’t noticed your tendency to go about unescorted when you think I’m not watching.” The chiding glance she sent over the table suggested that she was alwayswatching.
“Mama, I am nine and twenty,” Phoebe said on a sigh of annoyance. “You know as well as I that no one will think anything of it.”
Mama turned her nose up primly and reached for the paper, though Phoebe knew she would studiously avoid reading anything ill that might have been said of her daughter. “That’s as may be,” she said. “But you dohave a terrible predilection formischief, darling—no, don’t bother denying it; I know the truth for what it is.”
Phoebe seriouslydoubted that, but she knew when it was wisest to hold her tongue. Instead she directed her gaze to her plate and pushed around the eggs that had long since grown cold with the tines of her fork. “Mama, I—”
