If Daphne had known what awaited her at church that day, however, it is quite possible that she would not have been so obliging; she had expressed a hope that she and Theo might be friends, and it soon transpired that she would need all the friends she could get. For among those present at divine services that morning was a rather dashing young matron rejoicing in the title of Lady Dandridge. Daphne had known this young woman as Kitty Morecombe; in fact, they were to have been presented in London during the same Season, had not the death of Daphne’s father caused an abrupt and irrevocable change of plans.
“Daphne!” cried Lady Dandridge as soon as services were over and the final “amen” was said. “Daphne Drinkard, as I live and breathe!”
Squeezing past her husband in an attempt to exit her family’s pew ahead of the departing worshippers, she hurried up to Daphne and seized her hands.
“How good it is to see you again! Dandridge!” she called, blonde ringlets bouncing as she turned to address her husband over her shoulder. “Dandridge, you must come and let me make you known to one of my oldest and dearest friends!”
They were joined at once by Lord Dandridge, a ruddy-faced and somewhat stocky gentleman of about thirty who had the look of a sportsman, and who would almost certainly grow stout in later years. “Eh? What’s that, Kit?”
“Dandridge, my dear, this is Daphne Drinkard,” said his fond spouse, blithely disregarding the unspoken rule decreeing that a gentleman should always be presented to a lady, rather than the other way ’round. “She and I were to have made our come-outs together, you know, but then her father died only weeks before we were to have gone to London. And how lucky for me that he did, for she always cast me quite into the shade at all the local assemblies, you know, and I daresay she would have done so in London as well. Why, you might have offered for her instead of for me!”
She pouted prettily at the very idea, and Lord Dandridge was quick to demur. “Not at all, Kit, my dear. Not that Miss Drinkard ain’t a deuced pretty girl,” he added quickly and with some alarm, as if he were unsure how to reassure one lady without insulting the other.
“But how well you look!” continued Kitty Dandridge, subjecting Daphne to an admiring scrutiny that somehow had the effect of making her all the more conscious of her three-year-old walking dress and the signs of wear on her kid gloves. “You know I’ve always thought that dress was particularly becoming on you. But you simply must add more flounces ’round the hem, you know! No one is wearing less than two these days, and very likely more. Why, I’m sure all my own gowns are trimmed from knee to ankle!”
As if in proof of this statement, she thrust out one small foot, pointing her toe in such a way as to call attention not only to her heavily ornamented hem, but also to the shapely, silk-clad ankle it concealed.
Daphne, still smarting over the assertion that her father’s death might be considered a stroke of great good fortune, found herself quite incapable of admiring her old friend’s fashionable clothing as Lady Dandridge obviously expected. Daphne had always marveled at, and perhaps secretly admired, her friend’s ability to say the most outrageous things with so much vivacity and good humor that it was impossible to take offense. Now, for the first time, it occurred to her that Kitty’s artless conversation was perhaps not so artless after all. Indeed, to lavish compliments that served only to demean their recipient was surely its own brand of cruelty.
“I’m—I’m glad things have worked out so well for you, Kitty,” she said, and tried her best to mean it.
“But what of you? Surely you don’t mean to remain here and become a dried-up old maid!”
I don’t see that I have a great deal of choice in the matter, Daphne thought bitterly, but would never have admitted as much aloud, even had she been given the opportunity.
“You’ll never meet any eligible gentlemen here,” continued Lady Dandridge, casting a disdainful eye toward the door, beyond which a handful of locals could be seen lingering about the churchyard.
“On the contrary,” Daphne protested, forcing a laugh she did not feel. “We’ve had a possible Member of Parliament visiting in the area, and—and there is a very handsome young man staying at the board—at the house—” She could not bring herself to call her family home a boardinghouse out loud, and within the hearing of one who might not be such a dear friend as Daphne had always believed. But she need not have worried, as Lady Dandridge would very likely have failed to notice in any case.
“A Member of Parliament? Oh Daphne, how wonderful if he should conceive a tendre for you!”
“You sound just like Mama! But he isn’t a Member of Parliament yet, you know. He has to win a seat first.”
“I shall have Dandridge make a donation to his campaign,” Kitty announced with the air of the Lady Bountiful. “Dandridge, you will see to it, won’t you?”
It occurred to Daphne that Lord Dandridge might know something about the mysterious Mr. Tisdale. “But about this young man staying at the house,” she began, turning to address his lordship, “I wonder, my lord, if you are acquainted with a gentleman by the name of—”
“Got a sudden notion,” Lord Dandridge exclaimed, displaying a lack of attentiveness equal to anything his wife could offer. “No need for Miss Drinkard
