Page 29

To suggest Mrs. Wynecott was a chinwag of the worst sort was an exaggerated kindness. She could concoct a scandal from a sneeze and a sideways glance.

There was no help for it, however.

Robyn forced a congenial smile as he made the introductions. “Mrs. Verbena Wynecott, may I introduce Miss Georgine Thackerly, our house guest? Miss Thackerly, this is Mrs. Wynecott, and her companion, Miss Mehetabel Twigg.”

Not quite the proper thing as far as introductions went, but they would suffice.

Miss Twigg darted an apprehensive glance at her employer but forged ahead. “My friends call me Hetty.”

Saints be praised.

Had Miss Twigg grown a backbone at last?

“Sounds like a hen pecking.” Mrs. Wynecott’s unkind comment brought another furious blush to Miss Twigg’s cheeks.

“It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Hetty,” Georgine murmured kindly, discarding protocol and acknowledging the companion before her employer.

Bully for her.

She’d just declared herself Miss Twigg’s friend, and from the grateful look Miss Twigg bestowed upon Georgine, she had earned lifelong devotion.

Georgine curved her mouth into a gracious smile as she carefully pushed her hair off her injured shoulder. “And your acquaintance, too, Mrs. Wynecott.”

Georgine would not have said that if she knew Mrs. Wynecott. The matron’s mind made a full chamber pot seem pleasant, and her tongue wagged faster than a racehorse ran.

“Hmph.” Mrs. Wynecott sniffed before narrowing her eyes and prying. “How exactly are you related to the Fitzlloyds?”

Angling her head, Georgine offered another sweet smile, but a jot of annoyance sparked in her irises.

“We are not relations, just friends.” She gestured toward her injured shoulder. “I am recovering from a gunshot wound.”

Polite, but to the point.

“Gunshot?” Mrs. Wynecott’s beetle-bug eyes grew impossibly rounder as she stared unabashedly at Georgine’s sling.

No doubt the snoopy old biddy was dying to ask the details, but even she wasn’t that brazen.

“And you chose to convalesce here, Miss Thackerly?”

And that tidbit would gallop through the ton faster than a husband-hunting debutante chasing an eligible duke.

“I had no choice. I was shot in the garden.” Georgine’s smile became as brittle as dried leaves. “My physician insists that I would have died had I been moved. Therefore, the Fitzlloyds graciously opened their home to me and my sister as I recover.”

Take that, Mrs. Wynecott.

“But, my dear.” Mrs. Wynecott tutted, affecting false camaraderie. “Your reputation…” Her tone became conspiratorial. “Surely, you must have a care what others might think—the conclusions they may draw.”

Mrs. Wynecott didn’t fool Robyn.

She practically frothed in anticipation of spreading this on dit.

“Which is why we are not at home to callers.” Robyn let his point sink home, but as always, Mrs. Wynecott paid no mind to anyone but herself.

Like a schooner in full wind, she sailed to the settee.

As she and Miss Twigg settled onto the cushions, the decades-old piece of furniture groaned in protest. The portly woman leveled a superior look at her slender companion. “Perhaps you should abstain from dainties for a time, Miss Twigg.”

Miss Twigg’s jaw sagged as she sent a not-so-covert, incredulous glance toward Miss Wynecott’s ample girth, the generous rolls straining against the fabric.