Page 14 of Letters for Phoebe

P.K.

To The Clever P.K.,

While some might find your list-making presumptuous, I am only intrigued. You appear to be an intelligent woman. You have given your future a great deal of thought, and I am most sympathetic toward you. Here is your list given back, with my notations.

Mr. Henry Brockton (A slave to his mother. I cannot imagine an independent woman enjoying such a thing.)

Sir William Carter (Has announced his intentions to marry a Frenchwoman of his acquaintance.)

Mr. Bartholomew Kenley (A possible candidate, if one does not mind his obsession with insects.)

Mr. Howard Lambleigh (He is a confirmed bachelor with no interest in the fairer sex. Not even a lady as lovely as you.)

Lord George Pewton (While an agreeable man, I must warn you: his hair is not his own.)

Mr. Alfred Waymont (I cannot imagine you wishing to spend more than a moment in conversation with him. He is intolerably stupid.)

My friend, I cannot say what it is you see in these gentlemen. There is no pattern I can detect here, or else I might provide you with a list of men who are more suitable candidates. Do share your requirements with me, P.K., and I will do my best to aid you in your search.

Most Humbly,

Your Friend

* * *

Griffin waited in the park, having an idea when Miss Kimball would appear to collect his letter from the flower girl, Anna. The child had agreed to keep his identity a secret, and keep acting as messenger, without even asking a copper of him. She seemed delighted to take part in an intrigue, and he promised to purchase flowers from her every day for the rest of the Season.

He checked his watch, then glanced up at the gray sky. If it rained, Miss Kimball might change her plans. He would need to change his, too, given that he had no umbrella with him.

At three o’clock she appeared, wearing a walking dress and bonnet festooned in emerald green ribbons. She had no maid, which meant she did not mean to go farther than the square. Perhaps she would only pick up her letter and then vanish again inside the house.

As soon as she was on the walk, her back to where Griffin stood in the shade of a tree, he started to follow. Not because he wished to speak to her, necessarily. But seeing her reaction to his letter would amuse him. Finding fault in each of her listed bachelors had proved far too easy.

Not that he had wanted her to cast them all aside. But he had instinctively known not a single of the six men were worthy of a match with someone as bold and intelligent as Miss Kimball. It would take a different sort of man to make her happy, of that he felt certain.

Miss Kimball retrieved her letter from the flower girl and kept walking, perhaps to complete a circuit around the square. She opened the letter and read as she walked, while he kept pace several yards behind her. He was close enough to hear her giggle. The light laugh, at something he had written, gave him reason enough to smile with satisfaction.

Griffin did not hail her until he saw her put the paper in her reticule. Then he called out, “Miss Kimball, is that you?”

She stiffened and looked over her shoulder at him. “Mr. Fenwick.” She stopped walking, and he quickened his step until he reached her side.

“We meet yet again.”

“So we do.” She folded her hands in front of her, the reticule bearing his letter dangling from her wrist. “What brings you out to Berkeley Square today?” She glanced up at the gray clouds. “In such uncertain weather.”

“A desire for a walk. I found the park here to my liking, when last we met.” He motioned to the trees and well-kept grasses. “Though it is horribly named.”

“I do not suppose Berkeley Rectangle would sound as lovely, or as though it might rival Mayfair and Grosvenor Squares.” Miss Kimball’s lips twitched, though she did not fully smile. “Mr. Fenwick, I was correct when I settled upon your birthdate at our last meeting, wasn’t I?”

Griffin bowed, theatrically. “You were most correct. I was born on February the twenty-ninth, in 1784.”

Her eyes brightened, and she leaned slightly closer, though a foot of space still separated them. “So you have been alive eight and twenty years, with only six birthdays, because the year 1800 had no Leap Day. Am I correct?”

He grinned at her. “You are.”

“You must take great delight in vexing people with that riddle.” She did not laugh, though he suspected she wished to do so. “That brings me all the way back to my original question, sir. A man of your advanced years seems oddly opposed to the idea of matrimony. Why is that?”

Griffin shrugged. “As I have said, I have not found a lady to my tastes.”