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Chapter 1
Fanny bent over her needlework, pretending to concentrate, while out of the corner of her eye she watched her restless sister with foreboding.
Antoinette was staring out of the window with the kind of look that past experience suggested would bring trouble. The ingenuous blue eyes and cherubic features framed by errant tendrils of golden hair, might have given the impression that her sister was the most innocent of creatures who lived to please.
Nothing could be farther from the truth.
And right now, Antoinette was, herself, far from pleased.
Fanny took a breath before trying for something lighthearted and bolstering that might defuse her sister’s mood. “If Lady Indigo is really as deadly dull as you say she is, she’ll be snoring into her soup, and you can flit away and do as you please before eight every evening. And, as she’ll be bringing along her companion, that drab little thing we met at Stockton, I’m sure you won’t be required to entertain Lady Indigo entirely.”
Antoinette looked over her shoulder with a sigh. “But what if she wants to play cards? Quamby will encourage her; I know he will. He’s got no diversions at the moment, and he wants me to share in his boredom.”
Fanny struggled to garner the required sympathy in response to her sister’s look of desperation. “Poor Antoinette, you’re at a loose end, aren’t you?” She had suspected for some time that her sister’s low spirits were due to the defection of her latest lover. The marriage of Antoinette and her husband, Lord Quamby, had been contracted to legitimize Antoinette’s child which would, conveniently, provide the earl with an heir.
Though husband and wife were fond of one another, the aged earl was generally absent enjoying his peccadilloes, leaving Antoinette to find her pleasure where she chose.
Antoinette sighed again. “And, if she’s not wanting to play cards, you know that Lady Indigo will want to talk of her nephew. She’ll expect me to sympathise over his death. I’ll have to bite my tongue so I don’t remind her it was his own stupid fault he died falling from Mrs Compton’s balcony after her husband caught them.” Antoinette made a noise of frustration. “And Fanny, you know that pretending sympathy is not one of my strong suits.”
“Indeed, it is not. Nor do I think you will have to exercise it since I hardly think Lady Indigo will want reminding of her nephew’s death. Certainly, not the circumstances surrounding it. Oh! I know!” Clapping her hands, she said with sudden inspiration, “Talk of Mrs Compton has brought to mind that ill-used gentleman, Mr Sebastian Wells. Why not invite him here for a visit to coincide with Lady Indigo’s stay? He’s just come to the end of his mourning period and, as you know, he and Fenton share a godmother. You did think him very handsome, as you confided to me after the fireworks several summers ago, though he was married at the time, of course.”
The brief flare of light in Antoinette’s eyes dimmed. “He was, without a doubt, the handsomest man in Sussex. And now he’s the handsomest widower in Sussex, though much good that will do me. When I admired the cut of his gib, so to speak, he told me, quite kindly, that if he had a penchant for golden-haired women, he’d find me irresistible. It was a very respectful letdown, but a letdown nonetheless.”
“That’s a strange thing to say since Dorothea was golden-haired.” Fanny glanced up from her needlework to add, “Poor Dorothea. How sad that the doctor could only save the babe who, of course, would be a year now. Time flies! And how much can change in a year, for Mr Wells did once have a reputation for being the most faithful of husbands.” Resting the needle threaded with lilac silk on its hardanger backing, she added thoughtfully, “I wonder what could have happened for him to have changed so.”
“Perhaps I could find out.” Antoinette’s vivacity had returned. “The gossip sheets were filled with his exploits with Lady Banks and then Mrs Compton for months. But all that was some time ago so no doubt he’s missing feminine company. Perhaps Mr Wells is just the antidote I need—"
“No, Antoinette!” Fanny admonished her. “Give the man some peace. Until the duel, and then Mrs Compton naming him as the father of her unborn child, Mr Wells had a reputation as a man of honour and integrity. Undoubtedly, he fell into bad company after Dorothea died--”
“Yes, that must have been wonderfully refreshing for him and I’m sure that I—!”
Fanny wagged her finger at her sister. “No, Antoinette! I do not suggest you tempt him with whatever you might have up your sleeve. If you invite him when Lady Indigo is here you will still have to entertain her at unfashionable hours around the clock.”
“Can’t you entertain her and I’ll entertain Mr Wells?”
“No! Lady Indigo is your guest—or, rather, Quamby’s—and I think it’s time you lived up to your responsibilities. But I have a better idea than the schemes you obviously are cooking up. Tell me, what do you enjoy more than furthering your own amours?”
Antoinette looked at her blankly.
“Matchmaking!” Fanny supplied. “Why don’t you invite Mr Wells and some worthy, unmarried young lady here? The kind of young lady who would drag him out of the doldrums, or bad company, or whatever it is that is the source of his troubles.”
“Oh, I don’t think he’s been in the doldrums for one minute since poor Dorothea died! God rest her soul, of course! Anyone could see he and Dorothea were patently unsuited.” Antoinette studied the half-moons of her right hand. “Do you know that when I asked him at his wife’s funeral what he intended to do now, he told me he was leaving for France the next day as he had to…” she nibbled her fingernail as she recalled the conversation, “find someone.”
“What? A woman? I don’t think so,” Fanny remarked.
“Yes, a woman! He said he was off to search the length and breadth of England to find his brown-haired girl.”
“Well, obviously he didn’t find her.” Fanny wrinkled her brow in thought. “But he certainly couldn’t have been too brokenhearted considering those scandals he courted on his return!” Changing the thread from lavender to lilac, she added, “Or maybe it was because he was brokenhearted. Anyway, if his actions this past year are anything to go by, Sebastian Wells needs a steadying influence: a sweet young woman to take as his wife and to keep him in good order. And you can help him do that, Antoinette. Why, you’d enjoy it!”
Antoinette sank onto the chaise longue by the window
and tucked her legs beneath her. “Matchmaking? It would certainly be better than having to assist old Lady Indigo into her seat, and turning a blind eye to the old crone dribbling into her porridge each morning,” she agreed. “And you promise you’d stay here with me at Quamby House?”
Fanny smiled. “I wouldn’t miss your famous Yuletide celebrations for anything. Besides, the townhouse renovations are taking longer than we’d expected so it would suit Fenton and me very well. And I’ve just had a marvelous thought. Do you remember that young lady who scandalized everyone by reneging on her understanding with Lord Yarrowby for no better reason than she now thought him dreary?”
“Miss Arabella Reeves?”
“That’s right! Well, her aunt, Lady March, was telling me that Arabella was such an obedient girl until four months ago when she attended some ramshackle house party where her head was turned by someone quite unsuitable—”
“She sounds like a girl after my own heart,” Antoinette interrupted, and Fanny was glad to see her sister’s peevish look replaced by the sparkling vivacity most often whipped up by intrigue.
