tongue. Kenelm was a pleasant-looking man in his mid-twenties, brown-haired and blue-eyed, whose careless attire proclaimed him a sporting gentleman. Maddy overlooked, with effort, the Belcher handkerchief, blue spotted with white, that Kenelm wore as a neck cloth.
The West End streets were crowded with elegant carriages, and the clatter of wheels assaulted Maddy’s ears. She stared entranced at tilburies and curricles, tandems and phaetons, all drawn by nervous, glossy steeds. London was a great collection of diverse building materials: soot-darkened bricks of brown and yellow and aging red; streaked yellow and white and gray stone. Maddy gazed at superb townhouses, some of which boasted Greek pediments and porticoes and colonnades, huge statuary and handsome reliefs. Street sellers hawked their wares. She wondered if the city’s inhabitants ever grew accustomed to the incessant din.
“Mama,” whispered Alathea, “thought that you might do for Kenelm, since he shows so little inclination to choose a wife, but I suspect she’s changed her mind. You would not make a notable hostess, and she means him for a political career. In any case, you should be warned: his interests lie elsewhere.”
Maddy stared at her cousin and thought she’d never met such an abominable girl. She was to learn further that Alathea was not the biddable creature she had first appeared, and even so far forgot her station as to converse freely with her little maid. “There, I’ve made you blush!” Alathea exclaimed with glee.
“What cockle-brained thing have you said?” inquired Kenelm in tones that boded ill for his sister’s well-being.
“I told her about your actress!” retorted Alathea, in high spirits. “And she is shocked, as any person of understanding must be.” She turned again to Maddy. “The creature is hardly out of the ordinary way, I’m told, with various oddities of manners, but Kenelm’s affections have become fixed on her. Even were she well connected, it would be unthinkable for a gentleman of Kenelm’s station to ally himself with one who treads the boards.”
“You’re making a Jack-pudding of yourself.” Kenelm cast an apologetic glance at his cousin. “My sister has not enough with which to occupy her thoughts, and must therefore indulge in wild fantasies. I beg that you give the matter no further thought.”
“Gammon!” Alathea cried. “You have been seen on several occasions, dangling at her heels like a lovesick calf, and making a great cake of yourself.” Maddy wondered that Kenelm would accept such insults with equanimity, but Alathea’s next words provided the explanation. “I am surprised that word of this has not yet reached Mama’s ears!”
“No small thanks to you,” Kenelm retorted. “Someday you’ll go your length, my girl!” The matter of Kenelm’s actress did not greatly exercise Maddy’s mind; life with her particular father had led to the early awareness that gentlemen had an inexplicable fondness for such creatures. According to the Lady Henrietta, such popularity did the damsels no lasting good, for they invariably met with unhappy ends. Maddy gazed at the black and maroon mail coach, and neither its scarlet wheels nor the royal coat of arms emblazoned on its doors could brighten her sudden gloom. It was foolish to forget, even momentarily, the uncertainty of her own fate.
“I doubt,” Alathea said smugly, “that it shall come to that. The creature is casting out lures to all who come near her, and Kenelm has fallen neatly into the trap, but she continues to hold him at arm’s length. I suspect she seeks even richer game.”
“You malign the lady.” Kenelm wore a rapt expression. “She is an angel, dark and fair, who has been held down by circumstances, and has no other view but that of making her way in the world.”
“You are quick.” interrupted Alathea, “to take up the cudgels on her behalf.”
“She is little more than a child,” continued Kenelm,
The West End streets were crowded with elegant carriages, and the clatter of wheels assaulted Maddy’s ears. She stared entranced at tilburies and curricles, tandems and phaetons, all drawn by nervous, glossy steeds. London was a great collection of diverse building materials: soot-darkened bricks of brown and yellow and aging red; streaked yellow and white and gray stone. Maddy gazed at superb townhouses, some of which boasted Greek pediments and porticoes and colonnades, huge statuary and handsome reliefs. Street sellers hawked their wares. She wondered if the city’s inhabitants ever grew accustomed to the incessant din.
“Mama,” whispered Alathea, “thought that you might do for Kenelm, since he shows so little inclination to choose a wife, but I suspect she’s changed her mind. You would not make a notable hostess, and she means him for a political career. In any case, you should be warned: his interests lie elsewhere.”
Maddy stared at her cousin and thought she’d never met such an abominable girl. She was to learn further that Alathea was not the biddable creature she had first appeared, and even so far forgot her station as to converse freely with her little maid. “There, I’ve made you blush!” Alathea exclaimed with glee.
“What cockle-brained thing have you said?” inquired Kenelm in tones that boded ill for his sister’s well-being.
“I told her about your actress!” retorted Alathea, in high spirits. “And she is shocked, as any person of understanding must be.” She turned again to Maddy. “The creature is hardly out of the ordinary way, I’m told, with various oddities of manners, but Kenelm’s affections have become fixed on her. Even were she well connected, it would be unthinkable for a gentleman of Kenelm’s station to ally himself with one who treads the boards.”
“You’re making a Jack-pudding of yourself.” Kenelm cast an apologetic glance at his cousin. “My sister has not enough with which to occupy her thoughts, and must therefore indulge in wild fantasies. I beg that you give the matter no further thought.”
“Gammon!” Alathea cried. “You have been seen on several occasions, dangling at her heels like a lovesick calf, and making a great cake of yourself.” Maddy wondered that Kenelm would accept such insults with equanimity, but Alathea’s next words provided the explanation. “I am surprised that word of this has not yet reached Mama’s ears!”
“No small thanks to you,” Kenelm retorted. “Someday you’ll go your length, my girl!” The matter of Kenelm’s actress did not greatly exercise Maddy’s mind; life with her particular father had led to the early awareness that gentlemen had an inexplicable fondness for such creatures. According to the Lady Henrietta, such popularity did the damsels no lasting good, for they invariably met with unhappy ends. Maddy gazed at the black and maroon mail coach, and neither its scarlet wheels nor the royal coat of arms emblazoned on its doors could brighten her sudden gloom. It was foolish to forget, even momentarily, the uncertainty of her own fate.
“I doubt,” Alathea said smugly, “that it shall come to that. The creature is casting out lures to all who come near her, and Kenelm has fallen neatly into the trap, but she continues to hold him at arm’s length. I suspect she seeks even richer game.”
“You malign the lady.” Kenelm wore a rapt expression. “She is an angel, dark and fair, who has been held down by circumstances, and has no other view but that of making her way in the world.”
“You are quick.” interrupted Alathea, “to take up the cudgels on her behalf.”
“She is little more than a child,” continued Kenelm,
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