“Iam not going to be a diamond or a debutante or even a guest at the Season’s events,” Frances reminded her friend. “What need do I have for a new dress?”
Indeed, as she felt that slippery, silky muslin one more time, she wondered if the pretend dinner party was the last occasion she would ever attend.
Three hours and seven orders later, and even Harriet seemed exhausted by the effort it took to be a fashionable member of society. The three women—Frances, Harriet, and Catherine—stumbled back out onto the street as if they had just been spat out by another realm, dazed and confused by the lower position of the sun in the sky.
“Goodness, if you were gentlemen, I would declare that you were all in need of a stiff drink!” Hugo called out as he wandered up the street to meet them. “You look as if you have all been told that you have lost your worldly fortune and your dog has taken ill.”
Harriet leaned back against the nearest wall in a most inelegant manner, but Frances no longer had the strength to scold her, for her will had been sapped by the endless array of fabrics and the equally endless discussions about design.
“I did not know that choosing dresses required such endurance,” Harriet said. “And why is silk, silk, but it can also be satin or taffeta or chiffon? Why are there so many kinds of weaves? And who needs so many buttons to choose from? Oh, and do not begin to mention ribbons and hems and underlayers and embellishments and beading!”
Hugo chuckled as he handed a somewhat flat, square box to Harriet. “Your poor father must be grimacing at the cost.” He peered through the shop window, as if to see the sight for himself. “Alas, it is much easier to be a gentleman. Once you have a tailor, you need only send word that you require a new tailcoat or waistcoat, and one appears just a week later.”
“What is this?” Harriet asked, regaining some of her excitement.
“You shall have to look and see,” Hugo replied.
With an eager smile, Harriet unfastened the clasp on the box and opened it up. A gasp escaped her as she stared, fixated, upon the contents. “A necklace for me?”
“I bought it for myself, but I had second thoughts.” Hugo grinned. “Do you like it?”
“I adore it!” Harriet snapped the box shut and threw her arms around her honorary uncle, provoking Frances’ impulse to chide her once again. It would have been an unseemly display, even if the girl had been hugging her father.
Yet, the scene was so endearing that Frances held her tongue. Although, she made a mental note to remind Harrietnotto do anything like that with other, unrelated gentlemen once she was in London. A hug would see her cast out faster than any slap to a wretched man’s cheek.
Unwise, indeed.
Dominic’s words gnawed away at the back of her mind, her traitorous heart wishing she had just taken his arm when he offered it. A moment of closeness would not have condemned her any more than she already was, and though she had tried not to, she had missed his presence over the past two days.
“If you like that,” Hugo said, “you shall like this even more.”
Harriet pulled back, pink-cheeked with happiness. “What, Uncle?”
He cupped his hand around the side of his mouth and whispered conspiratorially, “There is a fair in the park. It looks to be a very fine one, with all sorts of amusements and delicacies.” He nodded in a vaguely western direction. “I wandered around it earlier, while you were choosing buttons and embellishments.”
“A fair?” Harriet clasped her hands together, the necklace box between them. “Do you think we might go? Oh, do you think we can? I have not been to a fair in an age, not since…”
She trailed off. The rest of the sentence did not need to be spoken, not to Frances at least. Everything had changed for that girl when her mother died, and Frances knew that feeling all too well.
“Ithink it is a splendid way to spend the rest of such a momentous day. Little Harriet, out in civilization once more,” Hugo replied, a slight shrug shifting his shoulders. “But you shall have to ask your father.”
“Ask her father what?” Dominic asked, appearing at the door of the modiste. He folded a piece of paper, presumably detailing the gouge that had just been made in his coffers, and pushed it into his pocket.
Harriet rushed forward and grabbed her father’s sleeve. “Papa, please say that we can go. Uncle Hugo was just telling us that there is a fair in the park, and I was just telling him that I have not been to a fair in years, not since Mama died.” She tugged on his arm a little more insistently. “Please, can we attend? Just for an hour?”
“It is too cold for fairs,” Dominic replied, a line appearing between his eyebrows. “You will catch a chill.”
“Papa, please,” Harriet urged, her voice catching.
“A rehearsal!” Frances blurted out, her heart breaking for the girl.
Both Harriet and Dominic stared at her as if she had shouted an expletive instead. Even Hugo and Catherine seemed startled by the outburst.
“Pardon?” Dominic said, that line between his eyebrows deepening.
“We have practiced all we can at Alderwick,” Frances replied in a rush, her mind racing to conjure the solution. “A wander through a fair would be the perfect opportunity for Harriet to practice her promenading, and to practice her deportment among people. A rehearsal for what is to come.”
A glint of something like relief or hope flashed in Harriet’s eyes, while Dominic’s seemed to cloud over, evidently less than impressed by Frances’ suggestion.
