"Very well, miss." Mira led her to the bed and sat on it next to her. "It's time for some honest talk."
Miss Cullpepper continued to sniff into the handkerchief. Mira pulled the handkerchief away and met her wet but sullen eyes.
"First of all, we both know that you do not suffer from fainting spells. You're as fit as a fiddle, if not fitter. But you are an excellent actress."
Miss Cullpepper sniffed. "You are an impertinent creature, Mira. I do not know why I allow you to speak to me like that."
"You have fooled everyone, including your mother. But not me. I believe you have been overdoing it. Extricating yourself out of undesirable social situations through fainting may work once or twice, but to the extent as you did it at the opera?" Mira shook her head in disapproval. "It won't do. You see, you only achieved the opposite of what you wanted. All the attention was on you, and now the invitations are flooding in for a delicate, frail wisp of a girl in need of protection. Men find that irresistible. I declare, if you keep fainting like that, you'll have Wellington himself worshipping at your feet."
Miss Cullpepper continued to sniff into her handkerchief. "But I don't want Wellington! And I shall have you dismissed for being saucy," she declared, then belied her words by throwing her arms around Mira and weeping into her neck. "Oh, Mira. What shall I do? I don't care about any of them. I only want my Tim!" And she burst into tears again.
Mira sighed as she patted the girl on the back.
It certainly was a tangle of sorts.
Miss Cullpepper had fallen head over heels in love with Timothy Parker, a young barrister. And while he seemed to be a decent sort of fellow, who, in turn, seemed to worship Miss Cullpepper, he had not a penny to his name. Woe to all if Lady Cullpepper ever found out.
"How certain are you that you love him?" Mira was convinced that once one of the Exquisites entered the scene and swept Miss Cullpepper off her feet, she would not waste a second thought on poor Timothy Parker. "Can it be youthful infatuation?"
"How can you even ask that?" Miss Cullpepper crumpled her handkerchief and threw it at Mira. "I love him with all my heart and soul! He wants to marry me, but as he is still at the beginning of his career, he says his income is not yet sufficient to support a family. He asked me to wait for him. I'll do so gladly. In fact, I'll do anything he asks of me. I'll be faithful to him until I die. Mama can't know because she wants me to marry the marquess." Her lips trembled.
"Well then." Mira crossed her arms. "Let me put it another way. How certain are you that this Timothy Parker is truly deserving of this sentiment and that he loves you equally well?"
Miss Cullpepper flared her nostrils. "I just know!" She clenched her hand into a fist and pounded it against her chest. "I know here! Only someone who has never been in love can talk like you."
"Well, I would make sure that it really is love. It might be a fleeting sentiment."
"I can see clearly that you have never been in love yourself," Miss Cullpepper snapped.
Mira's face froze, then she stood up and picked up the dress, shawl and hairbrush from the floor with mechanical movements. "It is just that I do not believe in love the way you do. I do not want you to waste your youth away waiting, forevermore waiting for someone who might turn out to be—not worthy. I don't want you to get hurt, miss. That is all."
Miss Cullpepper shook her head. "I'll never understand how one cannot believe in true love. Go now, for this discussion has made me feel peevish."
"Very well, miss." Mira curtsied and left the room with a sigh.
Lady Cullpepper was overjoyed,for the unthinkable had happened.
Her daughter, fragile and beautiful, had conquered the hearts of thetonby fainting in the middle of an opera, causing even the lead tenor to interrupt his aria to look up at them in concern. The director of the opera had appeared in person in the box, anxiously inquiring after Miss Cullpepper's health.
And then the bouquets came flooding in.
"Princess Florentina came to see you in person!" Lady Cullpepper sank into a chair, and Mira rushed away to fetch another set of smelling salts, the other having long since run out. "This is beyond my wildest dreams."
That evening, Lady Randolph came sailing into the Cullpepper parlour, triumphantly waving a cream card with gold lettering.
"I knew it would happen! What did I say, Amelia?"
Lady Cullpepper snatched the card from her and perused it. "Oh dear! My eyes do not deceive me? Can this be real? Rose? Rose! Where is that girl? Call Mira too."
Mira and Miss Cullpepper entered the drawing room, both wary of what was to come.
Lady Cullpepper breathed heavily then was so overcome with emotion that she was unable to say anything. Lady Randolph took the card.
"A personal invitation from Princess Florentina to a Christmas house party at Highcourt Abbey. I am to bring Miss Rose Cullpepper and her companion, Miss Mirabel Taylor." Now it was Lady Randolph's turn to be overcome with emotion.
"Highcourt Abbey. Where is that?" asked Miss Cullpepper timidly.
"In Shropshire."
