Page 41 of Miss Determined
“Only poor people retrim their bonnets,” Diana said. “Are we poor, Lissa?”
“We are frugal. Our only poverty is a lamentable lack of menfolk to deal with the solicitors. We are, in fact, wealthy, though we would never be so ill-bred as to mention that beyond ourselves, would we?”
Diana twirled on the piano bench and laid her fingers on the keys. “Of course not, but retrimming bonnets never fooled anybody.”
“Play the F major, Di.” Caroline rose and shook out her skirts. “I like retrimming bonnets.”
Lissa hated it. As Diana had noted, retrimming last year’s millinery was the hallmark of straitened finances, also tedious beyond bearing. “Come along, then, Caroline, and we will festoon my hats with rainbows.”
They found Grandmama asleep, her mouth slightly open. Lissa gently eased the embroidery hoop from her fingers, tucked the needle into a corner of the fabric, and draped a lap robe over Grandmama’s knees. In sleep, Grandmama looked more frail than usual, more vulnerable, and she was dropping off in the middle of the day more frequently.
She had yet to fall asleep at table, but that day was doubtless close at hand. The London tabbies would not let that behavior go unremarked.
“When did you plan to tell me that Mr. Heyward timed Roland over a half mile this morning?” Caroline asked, taking up the half-completed pink ribbon project. “Cook says Mr. Dorning let Roland have his head, and he ran like a hound with his nose halfway to the ground.”
“We actually had two Mr. Dornings present,” Lissa said. “One of Mr. Trevor Dorning’s distant relations—Mr. Sycamore Dorning—has come out from Town. They are mad keen to brew beer commercially or something.”
Grandmama’s hand twitched, and then her eyes opened. “Where is my…?” She patted around her lap. “Who took my hoop?”
Lissa fished the requisite item out of her workbasket. “You were resting your eyes. I didn’t want this to fall to the floor.” She passed over the embroidery,
The look Grandmama gave her was odd. A little wary, a little suspicious, as if she might not have heard Lissa clearly.
“I don’t suppose you have my spectacles in that workbasket, young Lissa?”
Caroline looked up from her stitchery. “Your eyeglasses are about your neck, Grandmama. You always wear them on a chain about your neck.” Caroline shifted so she was closer to the window light, while Grandmama donned her eyeglasses and pretended to assess her embroidery.
We are going mad. We are all going slowly mad, and all I can think about is kissing Trevor Dorning again, and…
“Will you two excuse me?” Lissa said, rising. “The hem of my riding habit has doubtless dried enough to be brushed out, and one mustn’t put that off.”
“Sooner begun is sooner done, your grandpapa always says.”
Caroline rolled her eyes and kept stitching, and Lissa departed with as much dignity as tattered nerves and tried patience could muster. As she brushed at her hem, hard enough to remove any trace of mud and then some, tears threatened.
Grandmama would continue to fade, Caroline and Diana would fret, and Mama would insist that the solution lay in finding Lissa the right husband. A husband of sufficient standing to take the whole situation in hand—solicitors be damned, Gavin’s troubles be damned with them—and with a wave of his magic, husbandlywand, all would come right.
Though Mama’s proposed solution was all wrong.
Trevor Dorning wasn’t a courtesy lord or an heir-in-waiting. He was a common mister with some ambition and education. His connections were not spectacular, but they were good—witness an earl’s younger brother had come racketing out to Berkshire to talk business with him.
Lissa absolutely agreed with Mama that Papa had meant for his oldest daughter to marry a title and open the door for Diana and Caroline to make fine matches. Papa had made no secret of his ambitions or of Lissa’s role in them.
Mama was also correct that Giles Purvis would attempt a hundred delays and dodges before parting with an extra shilling of DeWitt money. In Gavin’s absence, not just any fellow would be up to the challenge of outwitting such schemes.
But Trevor Dorning would deal summarily with legal ditherers. He’d make a few pointed, polite comments, let silence speak volumes, and achieve more from Purvis without drama than Mama and Lissa ever achieved with tears, threats, lectures, and scolds.
Lissa left off scrubbing at hems that needed turning and fresh trim, though they were more than adequate for Crosspatch Corners.
“If Trevor Dorning asks to court me,” she muttered, “I will consent.” He wouldn’t be like the dimwits, making overtures in bad faith, taking liberties, and sauntering on his way. In fact, with Trevor, Lissa had taken the first liberties…
He had certainly joined in the spirit of the undertaking.
She cracked the laundry room window and hung up her habit to dry, then returned to the family parlor. Grandmama was stitching away, and Caroline was fastening the pink ribbon into place with a series of French knots done in matching thread.
“I didn’t realize you liked pink so much,” Caroline said.
“It’s not fashionable, but we have plenty of it, and one doesn’t want to run out halfway through a project. Grandmama, shall we ring for a tray?”
