“One of the royal dukes, then?”
“You’re dreaming, Priscilla. They must marry princesses.”
“The daughter of a duke is the very lowest they might consider.”
“But for Zoe…Suppose the gentleman was of exceedingly high rank—”
“If he ranked high enough, the hostesses would not risk offending him. They must accept his wife.”
“To offend certain gentlemen is to commit social suicide. Someone like Mr. Brummell is required: a truly fashionable gentleman whose appearance—even if it is only for ten minutes—determines the success of a gathering.”
Silence again while the sisters pondered.
A moment later:
“Still, he must standveryhigh. Lady Holland is not invited anywhere because she’s a divorcée.”
“Lord Holland is a baron. Not nearly high enough.”
“How high must the rank be?” said Zoe.
“It’s out of the question,” Augusta said impatiently. “We waste our time cudgeling our brains. Of the few noblemen of sufficiently high rank, nearly all are married.”
“How many are not?” Zoe said.
Dorothea counted on her plump, be-ringed fingers. “Three dukes. No, four.”
“One marquess,” said Priscilla. “That is not counting the courtesy titles. Ought we to count those?”
“It is an exercise in futility to even contemplate such a thing,” said Augusta.
“In the first place, how would one of these gentlemen meet her, when no one will invite her to a gathering?” said Gertrude.
Augusta and Gertrude had always been the killjoys.
“Oh, dear,” said Priscilla.
“Even if they could be made to meet her, it’s out of the question.”
“You’re quite right, Augusta. She, a woman of four and twenty—who’s lived in aharem, who may or may not have been married to a Mohammedan person, who cannot speak proper English, and has no notion of what is and is not a fit topic of conversation?”
Zoe had found out that one was not allowed to mention a great many subjects: certain body parts, pleasuring oneself, pleasuring another, desire, impotence, concubines, eunuchs…
The list went on to infinity. She was competent and intelligent, but in this environment she was still too much at sea. She’d recovered her English during the journey home. In coming home, though, she’d entered a world as alien as the harem had been at first. Precious little of what she’d been taught up to the age of twelve had stuck in her brain as well as her native language had done.
“She can learn,” Papa said. “Zoe always was a clever girl.”
“She hasn’t time to learn,” said Gertrude. “Papa, if you would only put your parental affection aside—”
“I hope I should never do so.”
“That is a worthy hope, I am sure, Papa,” said Augusta. “But the difficulty is, it prevents your viewing the matter objectively. What nobleman, I ask you, would want Zoe when he might have a fresh, young,innocentbride of eighteen or nineteen?”
The door to the small drawing room opened.
“His Grace the Duke of Marchmont,” the butler announced.
Two
