Up ahead, Langford stopped his stroll with Emilia. He waited for them to catch up. Emilia appeared heady with delight. She kept looking up at Langford like he mesmerized her.
“Oh, dear,” Clara murmured.
“Do not worry. I will throw more appropriate men at her,” Stratton said. “Safe ones, who are not dangerous in any way. She will quickly forget an afternoon’s infatuation.”
* * *
“Now, that was an odd call.” Langford offered the opinion as he and Adam turned their horses onto Bond Street.
“How so?”
“How so, he asks innocently. You know how so. If I did not know better, I would say that you brought me so that you could throw me at that girl, despite your assurances. Well, I won’t have it. And if the dowager is foolish enough to risk her granddaughter’s virtue with me, she will have to put the girl in line behind the other girls whose mothers are also so careless.”
“The intention was not to throw you at the girl but to avoid having me thrown at her. I had never met her before and did not want her family thinking a mere social call meant more than that.”
“I am so happy that you found me convenient to your purpose. The next time, please give the honor to Brentworth.”
“He would have frightened her to where she could not speak a word. Nor would he have been so careless as to allow me to risk his name being connected to hers.”
“You are saying you chose me because I am an accommodating idiot. I do not want my name linked either. If it is, if Marwood starts rumors, I swear I will—”
“Here is what you should do. Call on them again in several days—”
“Do I look mad to you? We are talking about the Countess of Marwood. She who ruins women for fun and humiliates men as a game. I may survive this Season if I do battle only with the mothers now armed against me. I will surely fall if I must also watch my flank from this woman.”
“I had forgotten how dramatic you are. Hear me out. Call again in several days, but do as I did. Bring another with you. Your brother, for example.”
“Harry? He will bore the girl to death.”
“She is very young. Calm, studious Harry will not overwhelm her, and she will have a friend in town. With time, who knows what might happen. He will have a clear field, after all.”
Langford thought that over. “It might work. Did you take lessons in France in matchmaking?”
“I had lessons in all kinds of things. Now, I must stop here for a spell.” He swung off his horse. “You are welcome to go on your way.”
Langford looked down at the shop where Adam tied up his horse. “You are buying jewelry?”
“A small bauble.”
Langford dismounted. “For whom?”
“For my lady fair. I will see her a few more times before gifting her with it, but it is time to choose something.” He entered the shop, with Langford on his heels.
“Now I am confused, Stratton. You just advised that I throw my brother at her, and you all but ignored her today—” He stopped in his tracks. “Oh, hell. It isn’t the girl at all, but the older one, isn’t it? Tell me I am wrong, because it would be the worst match ever devised by hell.”
Adam asked the clerk to bring out the pearl earbobs. Langford elbowed next to him at the counter. “If I am correct, pearls are the wrong choice. Pearls are modest, discreet, and conventional. That harridan begs for something bright and unexpected. Something that declares she bows to no man. Something that—”
“I am beginning to think you do not like her.”
“No man does much, Stratton. The way she thumbs her nose at every suitor hardly encourages generosity in return.” He gestured to the clerk to take away the tray of pearls. “Bring out your rubies instead, my good man. The bigger and more outré, the better.”
Chapter Six
“I have decided that I have to move here.” Clara shared the thought with Althea after they finished proofing the journal. It waited, all wrapped, for Althea to deliver it to the printer and arrange final printing.
“Are your relatives being a trial?”
“My grandmother thinks she can dictate my movements and command me to join her on any calls she chooses to make. My freedom in coming and going is over. I am reduced to sneaking away as I did today to meet you here. I half expect her to open my mail.”
