Page 48 of Fortune Favors the Viscount
Arabella’s eyebrows climbed up her forehead. “A ward! How old is she?”
“Nearly fifteen.”
“And he wants her dressed in Bond Street?” Arabella raised her brows even further. “She’s a bit young for it.”
Emilia lifted her hands helplessly. “I think the young lady wishes it more than he does, but he told me to take her.” He’d left a note with Pearce containing instruction about where to send the bills.
“If I have one indisputable genius,” said Arabella, recovering from her surprise, “it is shopping in Bond Street. Shall we go now? I’m glad Oliver and Papa stayed in Scotland, it will be a month before they see the bills I run up...”
Emilia rang for Pearce and asked him to fetch Charlotte. She hurried into the room, her face bright with excitement. She made a very proper curtsy when Emilia introduced her, and even kept her poise when told they were going to Bond Street with Lady Arabella.
“Are we still to meet my friend, Polly Neale?” she asked.
Emilia nodded. “Of course. I thought Lady Arabella would offer more fashionable advice than I can.” She saw Arabella’s startled glance, and ignored it. “If you fetch your shawl, we shall go. Pearce has sent for the carriage.”
Charlotte beamed, curtsied, then finally lost control and fairly skipped out of the room.
“She’s only fifteen?” asked Arabella.
Emilia smiled wryly. “Nearly.” Charlotte might be a girl who giggled at rabbits cavorting in the park and laughed over her musical mistakes with Lucy, but she was going to be a beautiful woman. With her hair no longer in braids, clad in stylish dresses instead of girlish frocks, Charlotte would look far older than her years.
Perhaps that was what made Mr. Dashwood uneasy about her going out; the few times they were in the same room, she’d caught him looking at Charlotte with a mixture of trepidation and delight.
“My, my. What about your other pupil?” Arabella asked as they went into the corridor. “Have you resolved the troubles there?”
“Well, I—” Emilia stopped short.
Lucy sat on the stairs, clutching Chester in her arms. Her thin face looked tragically woebegone, and at the sight of Emilia and Arabella, a fat tear rolled down her cheek.
So far she and Charlotte had done everything together, and Lucy’s shyness around the older girl was almost gone. But Lucy was only nine, and Emilia wasn’t taking her to Bond Street. She’d explained this to Lucy already.
“I shall meet you downstairs,” she murmured. With a curious glance at Lucy, Arabella nodded and went down the stairs.
Emilia stopped in front of Lucy. “Lucinda, have you completed the row on your sampler?”
“No,” she whispered.
“Have you finished copying the French verbs into your book?”
“No,” said Lucy again. Another tear wet her cheek and splashed onto Chester’s head. The cat began wriggling, and Lucy’s arms tightened.
“Then you must go back to the schoolroom and work on those,” said Emilia gently. “You should be finished when we return, and—”
“I want to go to Bond Street!” Lucy wailed, and burst into tears, burying her face in the cat’s fur. Chester writhed at this confinement, meowing loudly.
Emilia stepped forward and took the cat, releasing him to streak up the stairs. Lucy put her face in her hands and sobbed harder.
“Lucy,” said Emilia when the tempest seemed to be lessening, “you know why you may not come.”
The girl swiped at her wet, blotchy face. “B-b-but I want to, so desperately, Millie! Charlotte says it will be splendid, with beautiful dresses and jewels and then you’re to g-go for ices, and I want to have ices, too!”
“We will not buy any jewels, and there will be other trips to have ices. Compose yourself, Lucy. When you are fifteen—”
“That’s ages away!” choked the girl.
Emilia smiled in sympathy. “But it will come, and when it does, I shall take you to Bond Street for new dresses as well—”
“No, you won’t,” went on Lucy, lost in misery. “You’ll have launched Charlotte as a beautiful lady, and it won’t be the same with a plain, misshapen girl like me—”
