Page 20
Smack her with a cod.
A way out?
A way to escape Mama and Adelinda?
She wiggled her toes and gave a tiny glee-filled bounce upon her seat.
Aunt Theo had tried for years to persuade Mama to let Jemmah live with her, but truth be told, Mama was reluctant to lose Jemmah as a servant.
But turn down the dowager’s sponsorship?
That Mama wouldn’t do.
The only thing she valued more than Adelinda was money, something the Daments were perpetually short of.
Jemmah laid her hand atop the dowager’s. “I would consider it the greatest honor to be your companion, your ladyship, and there’s no need to sponsor me. I’m not meant for routs and balls and such.”
“Oh, posh. What rot. Of course you are, my dear,” Lady Lockhart assured Jemmah. “But if it makes you more comfortable, you may begin as my companion straightaway. We’ll take the Season sponsorship a jot slower.”
“Companion...?” Mama sidled up to them, a ribbon-thin, forced smile tweaking her mouth’s corners. “If anyone is granted a sponsorship and the privilege of being her ladyship’s companion, it must, quite naturally, be Adelinda. I’m sure you understand, my lady. She’s the elder daughter, after all.”
All hail the elder daughter.
Bah!
“Are you entirely daft, Mama?” Adelinda hissed near Mama’s ear, her usual artificial smile making her seem the mild-tempered innocent to the casual onlooker. The fury in her coffee-colored eyes told an entirely different tale.
Lady Lockhart slid Jemmah an I-knew-she’d-pitch-a-tantrum look.
Adelinda grumbled on, a pout upon her rouged mouth.
“You expect me to wait upon another? An old woman? At her beck and call?” She huffed her outrage, flinging a hand toward the dowager while thrusting her dainty chin upward in haughty arrogance. “I am not companion material. Most especially not to a deaf, demented, aged crone.”
Her chin descended an inch as if granting a royal favor. “Jemmah may act as the companion, and as the eldest, I shall accept the sponsorship.”
La de dah.
The last she uttered with the austerity and entitled expectation of a crown princess.
Jemmah lifted her cup whilst eyeing the dowager.
Lady Lockhart planted both gnarled hands upon her cane’s floral handle and cut Adelinda a glare of such scathing incredulity, only the dame’s irises remained visible.
This ought to be very entertaining.
Her ladyship was precisely the person to knock Adelinda and her pretentious superiority off her self-appointed pedestal and onto her well-rounded arse.
“An old crone, most certainly, but not at all deaf, Miss Dament.”
Jemmah bit the inside of her cheek.
Most diverting, indeed.
The dowager’s gaze raked over Adelinda who didn’t have the refinement to look abashed, but rather contentious.
“I’d have to be demented to consider you for the position. But since it’s already been filled by your utterly charming sister, we needn’t worry on that account, need we?” She graced Jemmah with a wide—yes, distinctly smug—closed-mouth smile. “Oh, and the two go hand in hand—the sponsorship and the position, lest there be any confusion.”
Adelinda’s smile slipped a fraction and displeasure pursed her mouth. However, accomplished in artifice, she quickly masked her true feelings and pressed her point.
