Page 54 of A Lady's Wager
“Of course.” Franklin offered a stiff nod.
Julian met his friend’s eye once more. “We need only be ourselves for a few weeks. And if those few weeks should notbring a wedding for the Earl of Tarrant’s daughter, then we can happily head to our respective homes. And mine might finally not have a hole in the roof.”
Franklin raised a glass he was not actually holding. “To holeless roofs.”
“And to four weeks of awkwardness.” Julian clinked his imaginary glass against Franklin’s.
A potentially helpful wager. Weeks of awkwardness.
London just got remarkably more interesting.
The Earl of Tarrant was responsible for the well-being of a widowed mother, an opinionated sister, a school-age son, and a daughter who’d had suitors aplenty but was, as yet, unmarried. Lady Charlotte, she of the lurking spinsterhood, recognized her father’s difficult situation and she empathized. She also meant to look out for herself, just as she’d done during her previous London Seasons.
She knew enough of the world to have accepted that her eventual husband would be chosen by her father. She also knew enough of his temperament to know that he would not intentionally choose anyone who would make her truly miserable. He, however, was a man with a great deal on his mind, and had a tendency to rush headlong at somewhat ill-advised things once he’d made up his mind to do so, then become immediately too distracted by other responsibilities to reconsider his decision. And thus she had been quite carefully directing her own Seasons for years now.
“St. James’s Park will be rather dull once you leave to become a very sophisticated married lady,” Charlotte said to her dearest friend in all the world as the two of them continued their circuit of the very busy park.
Miss Louisa Selby was soon to be Mrs. Granville, something Louisa hadn’t chosen for herself but thought a fine prospect just the same. Mr. Granville was not decades older than she, nor was he lacking in moral fiber or unkind to his future wife. Not all ladies could say as much about the gentlemen their families matched them with.
“I’ll return next Season,” Louisa said with a light laugh.
“But you will be terribly sophisticated.”
Louisa adjusted her parasol. “You might very well be the same variety of ‘sophisticated’ by the end of this Season. Your father mentioned the possibility no fewer than three times during last evening’s soiree.”
In dry tones, Charlotte said, “I noticed.”
“I daresayMr. Vernonnoticed as well.” Louisa grinned rather unrepentantly.
Mr. Vernon was as harmless as he was unexceptional. He was also a kind person, and she’d found him to be perfectly agreeable.
“Mr. Vernon is a fine person,” Charlotte said.
“Fine enough that, should your father choose him, you would be pleased with the arrangement?” Louisa’s tone was teasing, but there was also an earnestness to the question.
“He would not be a terrible choice.” Not her first choice nor necessarily the best choice, but not a terrible one. “Sir Duncan, on the other hand,wouldbe a terrible choice.”
“But an intriguing one,” Louisa added with a laugh.
“His variety of intriguing is acceptable in an occasional dance partner, but in a life partner it would be precisely the wrong sort of exhausting.”
The baronet himself rode past in the very next moment. He tipped his cocked hat to the two of them, his perfectly symmetrical smile filled with his characteristic confidence. Charlotte didn’t think he was actually arrogant, at least not ina way that was hurtful to others. She wasn’t certain Sir Duncan considered himself one of her suitors, and she didn’t think her father thought of him that way.
“My mother is proving a bit tiring,” Louisa said. “She is determined that my wedding will be impressive to even the most discerning in Society. I have attempted to explain to her that the most discerning in Society won’t be in attendance.”
“I beg your pardon.” Charlotte pretended to be deeply offended.
Louisa laughed. “Oh, you simply must promise to visit me in Sussex after my wedding trip. I will miss you terribly if I have to wait until next Season to be granted your company again.”
“Does Mr. Granville have a pianoforte in his fine Sussex home?” Charlotte knew perfectly well that he did—it had been a topic of discussion before—but she could not resist teasing her friend.
“He does, one obtained from Italy.” Louisa was even more fond of music than Charlotte was. Enough so that Charlotte had teased her about the presence of an Italian pianoforte being the very reason Louisa was pleased at the prospect of marrying her intended.
“And will you be permitted to take your harp with you when you marry, or will that be required to remain at your parents’ home?”
Louisa sighed with what sounded like relief. “The harp will go to Sussex with me.”
“I am convinced, then.” Charlotte nodded firmly. “I will visit your new home, but only with the promise that we spend an evening or two at our chosen instruments playing our favorite pieces.”
