Minor Indiscretions by Bárbara Metzger Page B

only seventeen, child. Your whole future lies ahead. You won't want to forfeit it now. Perhaps one of your schoolmates could invite you to town for the Season."
    "What, shall I go off to enjoy myself, turning my back on my family and my responsibilities?"
    The old man shook his head. Her mother surely would. "I cannot let you do this, my dear, but I respect your valiant sacrifice."
    "Thank you for your concern, Mr. Hadley, but what kind of future would I have if I could not respect myself?"
    They compromised. Mr. Hadley would let Melody have half of the money Aunt Judith had put aside for her, if it stayed in her own hands. The chit had bottom, he acknowledged, and a sensible mind that wouldn't be sidetracked by fancy frills and furbelows. There was a lot more of Judith Morley in the lass than she knew. If anyone could get that house in order—and Dower House, too—young Melody was it. Too bad such weight had to fall on such tender shoulders. At least Mr. Hadley felt he could relieve her of one burden.
    "Don't you go thinking that Miss Felice is another of your responsibilities. Judith provided for her, too, but the chit went through the blunt in one year, and some of those other monies we talked of, trying to nab herself a title, tagging along with your mother to those house parties and such. If ever there was a wench with ideas above her station it's that one."
    "I thought the nabob, Sir Bartleby, was to send for her."
    "We all did, but he hasn't been heard from. I thought for a while she'd make a match with young Edwin, but he wasn't good enough for her, nor were any of the local lads. She has her heart set on a London swell, it seems."
    "She's very beautiful."
    "And pretty is as pretty does, I don't need to remind you. Besides, what fancy gent is going to offer for a dowerless chit who cannot even dance at Almack's?" Mr. Hadley tidied the papers on his desk, pleased that the issue of Felice was dispensed with. He'd lost too many hours of work with Edwin's mooning after the heartless jade.
    "But why wouldn't Felice get her vouchers?" Melody asked, confused. "I always thought Sir Bartleby was of the highest stare."
    "That's because you listened to Miss Bartleby, I'll warrant. He only got knighted after years with the East India Company, you know, for lending so much of the ready to the crown. Bartleby wasn't married before he left the country either, and he left under some kind of cloud. You might say Felice was the silver lining."
     
    Then again, you might say Felice was the dark shadow on a sunny day. Here
Melody had her head full of important ideas: which bills to pay first, where
they could best economize, how she could earn a living and see to the others at
the same time. And there was Felice, grousing because Mrs. Finsterer would not let her put the purchase of a pair of York tan gloves on Lady Ashton's account.
    "Can you believe the nerve? These provincial shopkeepers should be pleased to do trade with us."
    "They would be more pleased to be paid what's owed them," Melody replied, sharper than she intended. Some of the other merchants must have been more lenient than Mrs. Finsterer, or more optimistic, or males, since Felice had a whole pile of packages. She was quick to transfer the bundles to Melody's arms, while retying her bonnet strings, and somehow that's where the parcels stayed.
    "Oh, but now that you have settled with Mr. Hadley," Felice chirped, turning her brightest smile on Melody, "you can go back and reestablish our credit."
    "I'm sorry," Melody told her, "but there will be no more credit." Truthfully, she wasn't sorry a bit. She wasn't even sorry when the sun went behind a cloud, and the underdressed, pouting, little blond tart shivered the whole way home.
Chapter Eight
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    Melody was going to make this work. She had to; there was no other choice. So what if she knew nothing about holding household or raising children? She didn't know anything about pigs and chickens and turnips, either,