Two days later, while sitting across from her mama in the white-and-beige drawing room overlooking the tiny back garden, Lydia had cause to regret the hasty note she had penned to Robert the evening of the fiasco. She was greatly disappointed. She had asked him to give Cora and her a little time to regain their equilibrium, and he was doing just that. What was wrong with him?
Lydia had said nothing of her own displeasure, though her choice of words might not have hidden her pique. Two larger-than-necessary bouquets of flowers had arrived the next day. They now graced the entrance hall, allowing the seductive floral scent to waft up through the stairwell into every room in the town house … and served as a reminder—that it had been two days since she had seen Robert.
Lydia sighed.
She was still mad at him.
She sighed again and picked up a letter to read. It had been sitting atop the overfull silver tray that Hugh had brought in moments earlier. Replies to their invitations were arriving almost daily; most were acceptances.
“How many is that now?” Mama asked, without looking up from her magazine.
“Oh.” Lydia glanced at the paper in her hand as if only just seeing it. She looked to her side and found a growing pile of notes and letters. Lifting them, she counted. “Twelve or so, that means … now, let me calculate. About thirty attendees to add to the list … and I have not finished reading the others yet.”
“Oh, most excellent. It will be a veritable crush.”
As this was said with the intonation of glee, Lydia refrained from complaining about the inconveniences of a crush. She sighed again.
“Are you quite all right, Lydia? You have a most serious countenance.” Lifting her eyes, Mama stared intently. “How is Mr. Newton? We have not had the pleasure of his company for several days.”
“Two, Mama.”
“Is it only two?” she said in an exaggerated casual tone. “I was not counting.”
“Please, Mama, don’t. We are just friends.”
“Yes, I have seen how you look at each other, very friendly.”
Lydia laughed; it surprised them both. “I know what you are thinking, Mama. Any bachelor within twenty miles makes your eyes light up, and you start scheming. Except for Lord Aldershot, of course.”
“If I thought you would be happy with Manfred Barley, my dear, I would support your father’s arrangement completely.”
“Would you?”
Dropping her magazine onto her lap, Mama straightened and smiled. “Yes, Lydia, I would. But, and I know you don’t want to hear this, I believe your father to have been wrongheaded. He always said, ‘What’s good for Roseberry Hall is good for the Whitfields.’ I believe, what’s good for the Whitfields is good for Roseberry Hall. He put the estate first—I would put the family first.”
Lydia stared at her mother and blinked stupidly. “Mama? I…”
“Shocking, isn’t it? I can be right once every so often.”
“Of course—”
“With that in mind, I have some advice.”
“In regard to?”
“Unexpected suitors.”
“Oh.” Lydia wasn’t sure she liked where this conversation was going.
“If you were to find yourself attracted to a young gentleman working to attain a career, such as in the law, and said gentleman was a true gentleman, he would feel the weight of your disproportionate fortunes. He would not want to be perceived as a fortune hunter to you or to society.”
“What are you saying?”
“This gentleman, no matter how strongly he felt about the matter, would never make an offer.”
Lydia’s heart sunk. “Never?”
“Most unlikely.”
Suddenly the mildly gray day was looking stormy, and Lydia considered joining Cora for a good hearty cry.
“There is a solution, of course.”
Lydia swallowed and met her mother’s sympathetic gaze.
“You could propose to him.”
“Mama!” Lydia was shocked. “That just isn’t done.” Granted, she had come dangerously close to doing so with Barley, but that was different; her father’s approval had already been secured—years earlier—and she knew Barley would be making an offer eventually. But with a young man of such short acquaintance, it bordered on vulgar.
Mama shrugged and picked up her magazine again. “Marry Lord Aldershot, then. Life will not be nearly as complicated. Love is both heady and messy.”
“I have not said that I am in love with … anyone—anyone, Mama. I don’t know what that would feel like.”
“That is true.”
“And, more important, I do not know that … anyone loves me. He has not said so.”
Flipping to the next page of the magazine, Mama smiled; it was a slow-growing expression that blossomed into a grin. Perhaps it was the article in the Lady’s Magazine that she found amusing.
Lydia huffed in frustration. She could hardly make an offer to a gentleman when the object of that quandary refused to pay a call simply because she had asked him not to.
Really, the male gender made no sense.
Chapter 18
In which a sudden realization changes Miss Whitfield’s entire world
For the better part of a day, Lydia chuntered over her mother’s suggestion. First, it was outrageous. Second, ladies did not make offers to men. Third, how could Lydia be so bold without knowing if Robert held her in high regard or in great affection? Fourth, it just wasn’t done. And fifth … well, it was outrageous.
She would think on it no longer!
It wasn’t hard to divert her attention, as there was no shortage of enterprises to keep her busy. Shelley paid a visit to discuss the two orchestras that were available to play at her birthday ball, and a great deal had to be said about decorations and dresses. Cora joined them for that discussion while Mama took herself off elsewhere so they could gossip and commiserate in private.
Shelley was devastated to learn that poor Mr. Granger had been taken in. Though, upon hearing about Robert’s role in Gloria and Tatum’s exposure, Shelley suggested that his greatest sin was in having tried too hard. Neither of the girls felt, as Lydia did, that he had overstepped. Even Cora, who had recovered from the shock, though not the melancholy, had decided that the truth was best, after all. And that it was comforting to know that she had not been mistaken in Mr. Granger’s attachment.
Lydia found the turnaround and Cora’s easy forgiveness of the person who had revealed the travesty rather baffling. She ignored the significant looks that passed between her friends every time Lydia mentioned Robert. It was only after they fell silent for a few moments that Lydia heard the echo of her conversation and realized that Robert’s name had come up a fair number of times. She changed the subject.