“She must be in the middle of things in order to find a husband, Simon. Young gentlemen are thick on the ground in London during the Season. Only then are there enough of them about to give a girl a decent selection. Alexandra and I will be in London this fall. We can assist you. Now, if you would call Corrie, I can begin advising her on her apparel. Also, James has offered to teach her to waltz.”
Buxted cleared his throat from the doorway. “Ah, please regard me, my lords. I managed to snag some lovely cinnamon bread from the kitchen from under Cook’s nose. It is Lady Maybella’s favorite. When I found out she didn’t consume all of it at the breakfast table, I moved quickly. Just look-there are six nice fat slices left. There were seven, but I must confess that I nipped one slice, to ensure its freshness, you know.”
“Excellent, Buxted,” Simon said, and pushed a quantity of scientific journals off the table at his elbow. “You didn’t eat more than one, did you, Buxted?”
“Just one, my lord.”
Simon never looked away from that plate Buxted was holding as he said, “Did you find Corrie?”
“Yes, my lord. In the middle of the upstairs corridor. She was tugging on her breeches that have become too short in the past months.” Buxted fidgeted, looked over his master’s left shoulder, then drew himself up. “I warned her we had a very august personage visiting. I even managed in a very roundabout manner to let her know that she might also want to change her stockings. She squeaked and ran to her bedchamber. I daresay the result of my words might be a pale blue gown, just like her ladyship’s.”
“Well done, Buxted,” Douglas said.
Buxted drew himself up and gave the earl a blinding smile. “As to that, one would never wish to repel an earl, my lord.”
“Naturally not,” Douglas said. “I shall tell Hollis of your wily brain, Buxted.”
“Will you, my lord? Will you indeed? Oh, to have Hollis know that I perhaps managed to bring something worthwhile to fruition. Perhaps you’d best not, my lord. One must wait and see.”
“The cinnamon bread, Buxted. Now.”
Buxted reverently laid the plate on the table beside Simon, gave one last wistful look at the artfully arranged slices, sighed, blotted the sweat on his bald head with a handkerchief, and walked out the door.
The instant Buxted was gone, Simon grabbed up a slice of cinnamon bread. “I thought he would never leave, Douglas. We must hurry and eat the cinnamon bread before Maybella comes down. Don’t talk, Douglas, just eat, or else Maybella may appear and she will snag the other slices. She has a powerful sense of smell, does Maybella.”
Douglas smiled, took a slice, bit into it. He realized this wasn’t just any sort of cinnamon bread, this was cinnamon bread straight from the celestial realm. He was reaching for a second slice when his hand hit Simon’s.
“There’s a problem about this, Douglas,” Simon said, and gently eased out the slice from beneath Douglas’s hand.
Douglas snagged the next slice, managed to polish it off before he raised an eyebrow in question.
Simon sighed so deeply he nearly choked. “The money.”
“Money? Isn’t Corrie well-dowered?”
Simon looked on the point of bursting into tears.
“That would be bad enough. No, Douglas, it is far worse than that. She’s an
Douglas nearly laughed aloud. “Surely that isn’t all that bad.”
“You know what will happen when it’s discovered she has bucketfuls of groats, Douglas. She will be hunted down like a rat.”
“I wouldn’t put it precisely like that, Simon, but I do understand that she will be the focus of any fortune- hungry young gentleman in London.”
“If the young gentlemen don’t have the wit to do it, then their parents will plot and scheme to get her to the altar. Not to mention all the old gentlemen who would want to get their hands on her money. You know the sort- womanizers, lechers, gamblers who will forbid her breeches and keep her breeding until she’s thirty and likely dead of it. I don’t want that to happen, Douglas.”
“Is she really an heiress or does she have, say, in the vicinity of five thousand pounds?”
“She could drop five thousand pounds in a ditch and not even blink, Douglas.”
“I see. I will think about this. Perhaps we can keep it quiet.”
“Ha! When money is involved it won’t remain a secret for long.”
Douglas frowned. “Well, it has until now, but you’re right, Simon. Once she gets to London and it’s known she’s looking for a husband, even burying her money in the kitchen garden won’t help.” Douglas sighed and tapped his fingertips together.
A lovely low musical voice came from the doorway. “Good morning, my lord. So you are our august personage?”
CHAPTER SIX
There is no such thing as too much couth.
S. J. PERELMAN
DOUGLAS QUICKLY ROSE. “Maybella. You are looking fine this morning.”
She looked as she always looked, wearing one of her many pale blue gowns that covered her from throat to toe. She nodded and headed straight to the cinnamon bread. The plate was empty.
Maybella merely held out her hand. With obvious reluctance, perhaps even a small whimper, Simon stuck out his hand. On his palm lay two slices.
She took both slices without a word, sat herself down on the small sofa facing Douglas, and smiled placidly at him.
“Corrie will be down presently,” she said, and proceeded to eat, both men watching her avidly. “I believe she was searching for a stocking.”
“As I was telling Simon, Maybella, you are going to have to take Corrie to London this fall.”
She said matter-of-factly, “I hadn’t informed him of it yet, Douglas, because he would figure a way to get out of it.”
Simon said, “The weather is uncertain in the fall, Maybella. Perhaps Corrie can be presented when the weather is finer, in the summer, perhaps, two or three summers after this one.”
Douglas said, “I have just recalled that the second week of October is always pleasant, Simon, and we will see every balloon ascension during that week. Perhaps several will be held. Trust me.”
Buxted’s throat cleared once again in the doorway. “Miss Corrie is here, my lord, and she is not wearing her breeches. I did not inquire about her stockings as such a query could be taken amiss.”
Since Maybella’s mouth was full, she only nodded. Corrie came into the drawing room dressed in a very old muslin gown the same pale blue as her aunt’s. It needed more petticoats and fewer flounces and perhaps an inch of her neck showing. At least she was straight and tall, her waist small enough to please even Douglas’s mother. On the other hand, probably not.
“Good morning, my lord,” Corrie said and gave Douglas a fine curtsy.
“I taught her to curtsy,” Maybella said, beaming at Corrie as she chewed on the cinnamon bread. “Isn’t that shade of blue particularly fetching on her?”
“It always is on you, my love,” Simon said, eyeing that final slice of cinnamon bread lovingly held in Maybella’s right hand.
Douglas said, “Good morning to you, Corrie. That was a lovely curtsy. You’re tall and that’s excellent. No, straighten your shoulders. That’s right. Never stoop. Small, mincing girls aren’t to any gentleman’s taste, unless he
