“Yes, that would be my son Stephen, your cousin.”
“Really?” Catherine said, “How—how—interesting!”
So far, Lady Orrick was the only person to welcome her with any warmth at all. She could not repay this gentlewoman, who so resembled her father, by tale-bearing.
Lady Orrick studied her niece’s expression and the consternation she saw written on Mrs. Dawes’s round visage with interest. No doubt Catherine’s meeting with her son had been less than amicable. She hoped the ugly bruise on Catherine’s chaperone’s face was not some souvenir of their encounter. Well, that story she would get later from her scapegrace offspring.
“Let me introduce you to some of your other cousins,” Penelope said, skillfully drawing Catherine past Alicia towardthe others standing in the hall. Despite her sister’s ridiculous standoffish manner, the child needed welcoming.
Lady Harth regally nodded agreement, then turned to face Mr. and Mrs. Dawes. “Thank you for escorting my niece from Yorkshire. Give my butler your direction as you leave. I will see that you are adequately repaid for your efforts.”
“What! Well, I never,” began Maureen indignantly.
“Thank you very kindly,” interrupted Raymond, “but Sir Eugene Burke has already paid our expenses.”
Lady Orrick looked back over her shoulder at Raymond Dawes. She owned she had not paid much attention to the fellow previously, but Sir Eugene Burke's name piqued her interest. What did he have to do with her niece?
“Excellent,” Lady Harth told Dawes, neither recognizing nor caring about the identity of Sir Eugene Burke. “Good day.”
Catherine, hearing the last, looked over her shoulder to see the Dawes turning to leave and hastened to bid them goodbye.
Her Aunt Alicia was certainly strange. Catherine couldn’t decide if her initial summation of the woman was accurate or if her revised idea that she was genteelly impoverished yet proud was correct. Nevertheless, she surmised she’d stepped into a very unusual household.
Aunt Penelope patted her arm, drawing her attention to three beautiful blond young women standing at the base of the stairs. After a glance at the gray-streaked blond hair showing beneath her aunts’ lace caps, she began to understand how her cousin Orrick could doubt her Shreveton lineage.
The youngest two women were as matched as bookends, differing only in the color of the ribbons trimming their identical floral-printed muslin frocks. They were perfect specimens of china doll beauty and radiated as much warmth as a statue. They looked at Catherine with twin expressions of boredom.
“Catherine, these are your cousins, Lady Iris and Lady Dahlia, daughters of your uncle, the Earl of Whelan. Don’t try to tell them apart; I can assure you it is impossible!” Lady Orrick said gaily, though privately annoyed by the twins’ attitudes. “To accommodate us, they wear some article of clothing that enables us to differentiate between them. Girls,” she said, looking at them pointedly, “please help me make your cousin Catherine welcome.”
Lady Iris and Lady Dahlia looked at each other in private, unspoken communication, then turned back toward Catherine, their perfect bow-shaped mouths lifting upwards at the corners in exactly the same manner.
“Charmed,” the one with the blue ribbons murmured.
“Delighted,” the one with the red ribbons added.
Lady Orrick frowned briefly and steered Catherine away from the twins. Her brow cleared and a warm smile lit her face as they drew near her shy third niece. “This is your cousin Susannah, daughter of your uncle, Captain Glendon Shreveton.”
Susannah approached Catherine hesitatingly. She was tiny and delicately boned, her hair a richer golden blond than that of the twins, her eyes brown instead of blue, brown eyes that were as large and soft as a young doe’s.
Catherine spontaneously smiled at her.
Relieved, Susannah smiled back.
“Aunt Alicia, shouldn’t we be dressing for the Wyndersham musicale?” Red Ribbon interrupted. Blue Ribbon nodded agreement, smiling sweetly at their aunt.
“The Wyndershams! Of course, at once. We can’t let Catherine’s late arrival discommode us further. Quick, girls, upstairs, at once.”
“Alicia!” Penelope protested, “surely you’re not planning on Catherine’s attending an affair her first night in the city.”
“Most certainly not! She’ll need to be decently attired as befits a Shreveton before she may go anywhere.”
“You would have her stay here, alone, when she has just arrived?”
“But, Penelope,” protested her sister, “since you have been so disagreeable as to have other plans for this evening, I have no recourse.”
“Alicia!” Lady Orrick placed her hands on her ample hips and glared at her elder sister.
“Oh, very well,” Lady Harth said sourly, “Susannah may stay with Catherine.”
