“What?”Malcolm said.“You promised only servants.”
“We have to work with what we have,” Mrs.Salisbury said.
“Isn’t that indecent?A young lady all that way out there by herself?Withme?”
“Oh, Malcolm,” Mrs.Salisbury said.“You’re hardly some reprobate.And she will have a maid.”
“And that’s not all,” Beatrice said.
Dear God, Malcolm thought,what could be worse?
“She needs to be attended into dinner by a gentleman,” Mrs.Salisbury said.“Especially because of her relationship with Miss Perkins.It would not do to slight her.”
“Any more than lodging her a half mile from her sister?”
“Yes,” Mrs.Salisbury said.“Particularly on this first night.We must even out the numbers.We must have the right amount of gentlemen to ladies.And you are the only gentleman left near Parkhorne available, Malcolm.”
“I am not a gentleman,” Malcolm grumbled, glowering at Beatrice, who looked far too delighted by this turn of events.“And I am not available.I don’t even have clothes for dinner.”
“We can find you something suitable,” Beatrice said.“And you have no choice, Malcolm.You wouldn’t want the poor young lady humiliated, would you?”
His sister had no notion of actual humiliation.
Humiliation was not being the odd lady at a country supper.
Humiliation was what he would experience pretending to be acceptable to London society.
Humiliation was trying to look and act presentable to people of fashion when he was just a coarse farmer.
“Please, Malcolm,” Beatrice scolded.“It will only be until Leith arrives later in the week.Then our numbers will be even once more.”
Beatrice, Mrs.Salisbury, and the others thought that because he knew them so well, he must be comfortable in their sphere.And while he knew which fork to use when and how to offer a lady wine, and basically how to dance, it wasn’t enough.Nowhere near it.All of these London people would read him instantly for what he was.
But he couldn’t say that aloud here.Not now.
Because while it was going to be humiliating to be trotted out as the last acceptable man available in twenty square miles, it would be even more mortifying to admit that it bothered him.
“Very well.I’ll do whatever I can to help, Mrs.Salisbury.”
Malcolm consoled himself that the arrangement wouldn’t be necessary for long.A week.A small eternity.But at least not the entire month.
“Eleanora,” Mrs.Salisbury corrected.“Please call me Eleanora.”
Chapter Two
“Scarlett!Scarlett!Wakeup!We’re here.”
Miss Scarlett Perkins startled into consciousness.
“Lor!”Tilly said.“Youdosleep deep.”
Scarlett felt herself blush.It was her particular misfortune to be named Scarlett and to be the kind of person whose complexion showed every sea change in her emotions.
Tilly and her stepmother, Vera, always teased her for how deeply she slept.
What Tilly and her stepmother didnotknow was that, for years now, Scarlett had been plagued by the most indecent dreams.No one would guess that plump, plain, very on-the-shelf Scarlett would have such torrid nighttime visitations.
The dreams had begun seven years ago, after the death and ruin of her father and her broken engagement to Thomas Garrison.When she realized that she would never marry.She would be a dowdy maiden aunt to Tilly’s children and a devoted stepdaughter to Vera for the rest of her days.It was to be her fate.
