Jennie About to Be by Elisabeth Ogilvie

it curl of its own or do you frizz it?”
    â€œIt’s my own curl,” said Jennie.
    â€œ Good ! Men hate the sight of curl papers, or should.” She touched the thick chignon at the back of her head below her cap. “Staight as a stick mine always was, to my mother’s and my nurse’s despair, and I endured the torture because I was helpless. But I can assure you I didn’t endure silently .” She was laughing again. “As soon as I was engaged, I said, no more of this idiocy, my husband must take me as God made me. If he wanted to marry curls, he should have taken that little nincompoop Sarah Flowers. But we were both Scots and sensible, so it worked out well, curls or no.”
    The decanter and the chocolate pot were brought in, and the tray was placed on a taboret by her chair. Eyes downcast but managing to take in a good deal, Gertrude left as silently and swiftly as if on wheels. Nigel poured wine for his mother and himself, and Lady Geoffrey poured steaming chocolate into flowered French porcelain for Jennie.
    â€œI know something about you, Miss Hawthorne,” she said composedly. “I have my sources of information, as your aunt and uncle must have theirs.”
    It was rather a relief not to worry any more about what one should feel ; the swift gush of anger had taken care of it. She would not make a scene, but she would see that both Nigel and his mother knew exactly how she felt. She looked up at Nigel, intending that her long, deliberate gaze should tell him of her pride.
    He winked at her. Did he mean that she should simply humor an eccentric parent? Be secretly amused, and they’d laugh together as they rode back through the park? She accepted the chocolate and quickly took a sip which nearly scalded her into muteness.
    â€œNigel,” said his mother, “has always done exactly as he pleased. If he brought you here because I asked him to, it’s a mere formality, the surface observance of an ancient ritual. Whether I approve or disapprove of you, it makes no difference to Nigel.”
    Nigel, looking whimsically unconcerned, sipped his wine under his stepfather’s portrait, while the late baronet stared over the blond head into great distances, as if trying to discern his wife taking fences on Augustus.
    â€œAnd it makes no difference to me ”—Nigel’s mother went tranquilly on—“if Nigel chooses to marry a nobody from Northumberland with no connections to speak of, and no money. Let it be on his own head.”
    Jennie found herself on her feet. “I should like to leave now, if you please,” she said to Nigel.
    â€œPut the cup down first,” he advised, not moving away from the mantel. She set it on the tray beside the pot, keeping her face turned away from both him and his mother.
    â€œGood day, Lady Geoffrey,” she said with frigid courtesy. “Good day, Captain Gilchrist. You will find the mare in my uncle’s stable.”
    She turned to walk out. If perfect love cast out fear, so did perfect rage.
    â€œ Jennie .” He had never called her that before. His big hands clasped her shoulders and turned her around. She gazed stolidly at his chest, waiting to be released.
    â€œMay I call you Jennie, too?” his mother asked winningly. “Bring her back, Nigel, so I can apologize properly.”
    â€œI need no apologies,” Jennie said. “I need nothing at all from either of you. I would like to make it clear that I never did expect anything. All I desire now is my absence from here as quickly as possible.”
    Nigel, keeping an arm about her shoulders, walked her back to the hearth, but she stood like a wooden doll and hoped she looked like one; they should not guess how deeply they had wounded her.
    â€œJennie, I went too far perhaps”—Lady Geoffrey went on in that winning voice—“but you’re out in the great world now, not in the safe arms of Pippin