“A separate building?”Vera cried.“No, no, that cannot be.We need Scarlett near us.”
“We only brought one maid,” Scarlett broke in, trying to keep her panic out of her voice.“And she will need to be with my sister and mother.”
“It is not proper for her to stay elsewhere unaccompanied,” Vera stated.
“Surely,” Tilly said, “there is space—”
“We have assigned one of our own maids to attend Miss Perkins.The Marchioness of Leith has brought a few of her very own servants from London to attend our guests.She has sent her junior lady’s maid to attend Miss Perkins—surely, that will suffice?”
At the mention of the marchioness, Vera fell silent.It was the highest compliment to be attended by one of Lady Leith’s own maids.
Tilly, however, did not look convinced.
“I don’t see why Scarlett can’t stay here—”
“It isn’t possible, my dear,” Vera said, in the voice that both Tilly and Scarlett knew meant that they needed, in no uncertain terms, toshut up.“Scarlett will be taken care of.”
“I apologize for the inconvenience,” the housekeeper said.“Parkhorne is a lovely estate, but it is, unfortunately, not large.”
Scarlett felt a hard, nasty pit in her stomach.
She knew why she was being exiled to a distant building.The roomsinParkhorne Hall were being reserved for the girls who were actual prospects of Mr.George Salisbury.Spinster sisters of eight-and-twenty did not need accommodation inside the hall itself.
“This way, miss,” the footman said, directing her once more outside.
Using all her strength tonotblush and aware that she was failing, Scarlett at least kept her voice brisk as she bid goodbye to Vera and Tilly.She promised to rejoin them at the hall as soon as possible.
When they reached the outside, she realized the footman was directing her to a small gig.
“How far is this other building?”she asked, dismay and humiliation in her heart.
“It’s an old hunting lodge, ma’am.But done up into quarters.Very fine, if you ask me.It’s no’ far.Only a half mile off.”
A half mile.
Scarlett had thought she had acclimated to her place in society.
After all, in London, it wasn’t so unusual to be an unmarried young woman.Every family, even the highest, had its spinsters.
But it appeared, out here, at a country house party ofthisvariety, her superfluity could not be ignored.Even by her.
With a deep throb, she longed for London.The anonymity of the city streets, the way she could melt into the crowd and shuck off her identity for an hour or two.There, amongst the crowds, she might be anyone.She had never liked the country—and perhaps that was why.
Either way, right now, despite the sweet air and pretty fields surrounding her, she would give anything to be back amongst the soot and clamor of London.
The gig started down the bumpy road and Scarlett fought to keep her posture erect.
She hoped none of the people they knew from town were peering out of windows of Parkhorne Hall right now.Usually, she felt that she was able to win value for herself in society as the practical, intelligent older sister of the very well-dowered, very pretty Miss Tilly Perkins.But she was always aware that she was a hair’s breadth away from being regarded as an unfortunate.That perhaps, to some, she always would be seen as pitiable, merely because she was, at the end of the day, a penniless spinster with no hope of ever becoming anything else.
No, she couldn’t letanyonesee how this exile pierced her heart.
That thought, and that thought alone, allowed her to blink back her tears.
Chapter Three
“My dear,” Verasaid,sotto voce,the moment Scarlett found her stepmother and sister in the drawing room a few hours later.“I am very sorry about thissituation.Will you be well so far from us?”
Scarlett took a steadying breath.In the end, while her lodgings were far from the main house and were an undoubted testament to her insignificance, they had not proven to be a true deprivation.The short drive had ended up being very pretty, and her room was extremely neat, very tastefully appointed, and looked out on a beautiful view of one of Parkhorne’s dewy summer meadows.In fact, while the maid, Martha, had helped Scarlett ready for dinner, she had felt the next month could be tolerable.
