“I don’t think so,” Reese said, indignant. “Lizzie told Mr. Darcy she wouldn’t dance with him.”
“You have readPride and Prejudice?” Ellen perked up.
“Of course she has,” Jem said. “All the ladies have read that one.”
“As have I,” Ellen said. “My brother does not approve of my reading novels. He fears I will become a bluestocking and not make a suitable match.”
Reese, who already didn’t have a high opinion of this brother, grew angry.
“And what’s wrong with a well-read woman? Men don’t want a wife they can actually hold an intelligent conversation with?”
“You’re doing it again,” Jem said, softly.
Reese snapped her mouth shut, frustrated at herself. Nellie’s tonic sure didn’t give her discretion. Maybe she should just sleep through the next month. She tapped Jem’s arm.
“Please give Aunt Nellie my apologies. I have a headache and am retiring early.” She turned and left the room.
***
Jem watched Reese go, not sure if he ought to follow after her but not sure what he would say. Maybe he was the problem, pointing out things she shouldn’t say. She normally had more tact. He wondered if Nellie’s soothing tonic was having an odd effect on her by making her feel too free.
Since their arrival, he had been trying to recall what he knew of the Victorian era to help not make some of the same mistakes. He knew more about the Regency period because that was what Kaitlyn had been fascinated with. She’d mentioned reading a few books from the period, and he’d picked up a few to give them things to talk about.
What had struck him the most had been the mentality of the time period. The “Quality” had held a different view on relationships. Marriages had been looked on as business arrangements, ways to increase status, wealth, and property holdings.
Austen might have joked that a single man with a fortune must be in need of a wife, but Jem wondered how many men of this day went looking for fortunes too. He thought men had also participated in the Marriage Mart.
If Nellie spread the word that the girls were American heiresses, the house could be flooded by eligible men wanting to marry a fortune. He wished he’d been there when Nellie had told Reese about that. How many of the guys would be fortune hunters? What a surprise for them when they found out none of them had any money.
He stared into the air. Reese couldn’t be lured by a title and fortune, could she?
Beside him, Lady Ellen shifted.
“I must apologize for my cousin,” Jem said, remembering his manners. “She’s unhappy with the cultural differences.”
“I had not thought them to be so very different.” Ellen glanced over Jem’s shoulder and a little crease appeared between her brows, though she schooled her expression quickly. He turned around.
A well-dressed, middle-aged man swaggered toward them, his attention on Ellen. Even with Jem’s limited knowledge of 1850 men’s fashions, the quality of the man’s clothing was impressive. In a room full of impeccably dressed people, this guy stood in a class of his own. His mannerisms were too effeminate for Jem’s modern sensibilities, but many admiring glances were cast his way.
“Thinks a lot of himself, doesn’t he?” Jem pitched his voice so only Ellen could hear it, and she gave a soft sound, much like a choked-back laugh.
“Why, yes,” she said under her breath as she executed a perfect curtsy. “Yes, indeed.”
“Lady Ellen.” The man bowed over her hand, almost possessive in the way he held it. “I believe I have the first two dances.”
“You do, Lord March.” She indicated Jem. “Might I introduce Aunt Nellie’s American guest, Mr. Jamison Taylor, to you?”
Jem hesitated, not sure if he should extend his hand. When March peered at him like Jem was so much lint on his sleeve, Jem was glad he hadn’t.
“Shall we, Lady Ellen?” Lord March didn’t wait for an answer but guided her firmly to the dance floor.
Opening and closing his fists, Jem watched them. There was a term he’d heard Kaitlyn use before from the Regency time, one that described what the lord had just done.Cut direct. That was it. So, this guy thought he could socially ostracize Jem. Why would he do that to a total stranger?
For the first time, Jem sympathized with Reese’s sentiments about the wealthy. Not that he’d had all that much experience interacting with really rich people in their own time. His parents were well enough off, having inherited horse property, but he and Kaitlyn had never run with the rich kids.
Ellen’s response to March bothered him. She seemed like a nice kid, and that lord must be twice her age. As Jem watched them dance, he noted how her body language contradicted her fake smile. Why did he feel so protective of her? She had probably died of old age more than a century ago. Yet, as he watched her, all those things about women in history that Reese was always ranting about struck home. He could have used some of her insight right now about this. If a guy ever looked at Kaitlyn like that—
Alarmed, he scanned the room. What a loser brother he was, to leave her to be preyed on by some Victorian vulture. Jem spotted his sister dancing with Cyrus and let out his breath. She would be safe with him.
