SUTTON MANOR, LONDON - OCTOBER 3, 1812
KATE
Breakfast wassure to be an unpleasant affair. Aunt Prudence would not be pleased with my showing last night.
I fought every instinct to dawdle before heading to the breakfast room, knowing it would only add to her complaints. The worst was the understanding that last evening had started with such promise. A dance with a duke, my aunt could have no cause for complaint in that respect.
If only it hadn’t been immediately followed by such a humiliating incident. I still cringed every time I closed my eyes. The images of the night before refusing to leave my eyelids. They were permanently burned there, and I was to spend every moment of the rest of my life reliving the shame.
I made my way to the breakfast room, a few minutes early as Aunt Prudence insisted. At least, she would not have that failing to add onto the list.
Of course, she was already waiting for me. Not for the first time, I cursed her refusal to take a tray in her room like other ladies of her station.
“Good morning, Aunt. I trust you slept well?”
“Good morning, Katherine. I slept well enough, indeed.”
Indeed—that means she slept poorly. It’s how she offers complaints since it’s “unladylike to express displeasure or ill-health.”
“I understand you had quite the eventful evening,” she added, pursing her lips around the last words as though she ate something sour. It was the only physical manifestation of her irritation. She was unaware of it, I was certain, or she would have stopped that, too. In fact, I suspected the few wrinkles around her mouth that managed to defy her have deepened with my visit.
Even in her distaste, my aunt was every bit the elegant dowager duchess. Having raised her own children to much acclaim and superior matches, she set her sights on her most unfortunate brother’s even more unfortunate daughter. Me.
As the second son of an earl, my father found the life of a clergyman suited him well. He married the daughter of a wealthy but untitled gentleman for love.
In the Lincolnshire Wolds of Alford, he raised two daughters and a son to have modest expectations for life. My sister married a farmer and was raising my four beautiful nieces and nephews. My brother was studying to be a solicitor in town. And I had the misfortune to be unmarried and unoccupied when Aunt Prudence discovered that the season was most uninteresting without matchmaking prospects. Apparently, doting on a grandson of only two years and cooing at a newborn babe occupied very little of one’s day.
What my aunt failed to grasp was that I was not raised for a society match. No amount of dancing lessons and propriety lectures could counteract twenty years of tussling with parish children and racing across the countryside astride a horse.
Still, I appreciated her efforts, and I did try to heed her lessons.
“Yes, Aunt. Unfortunately, there was an incident with some lemonade.”
“So I heard. With Lord Grayson as well. You could not have chosen an untitled gentleman to spill all over?”
“It was a mistake, Aunt Prudence. I apologized.”
“Yes, I heard about that as well. A lady does not fall all over herself apologizing, once is sufficient.”
“Yes, Aunt Prudence.”
“In the future, should you commit such a foible, allow the gentleman to blot his own chest. Yes?”
“Yes, Aunt Prudence.”
“Good. I don’t expect you will have many callers today given your showing last evening. Nonetheless, we must be at home to receive any who dare to brave your potential mishaps. That dress does nothing for your coloring. Go change into the yellow one after breakfast.”
The robin’s-egg blue gown I was wearing did more for my complexion than the yellow one she mentioned. None of the pastels favored by debutantes did much for my pale coloring. I much preferred richer jewel tones. Even the earthen tones I favored in the countryside for their practicality were preferable. Especially after last evening’s betrayal by the lavender, I abhorred the pastels.
Still, it was not worth an argument with her. Especially since I received rather less scolding than I deserved after last night’s poor showing.
* * *
My aunt was proven correct.
It was two days without a single caller before she allowed me a respite. Finally, I was given leave to call on Jules and Aunt Sophie at Dalton Place.
My mother’s sister, Sophie, married the Earl of Westfield who had an infant daughter from his first marriage, Juliet. She and I were close friends and confidantes. She wrote to me regularly from the time we both learned our letters.
