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Chapter One
Berkeley Square—May 1813
‘Doing something for others is so rewarding, isn’t it?’
Lady Harriet Fitzroy’s mother, the Duchess of Avondale, held up her knitting to the room as if it were a thing of beauty rather than a holey, misshapen disaster. ‘What a splendid idea this is! I am so glad Dr Cribbs suggested it. It is the perfect distraction to keep our nerves off the Queen’s ball tomorrow night.’
A ball Hattie was quietly dreading, although she kept that to herself because she really only had herself to blame for no longer being able to dance. While all the other debutantes were twirled around the floor by dashing partners, she would have to sit on the periphery pretending she was entirely comfortable to be there. All thanks to a reckless gallop across the same fields she had ridden over her entire life.
‘Launching three girls all at once is so stressful.’ Her mother attempted, momentarily, to appear frazzled by it all but could not hide her delight at the prospect, as there was nothing she enjoyed more than the whirlwind of the London social Season. Thanks to Hattie, she had missed two in a row, so she was determined the entire Fitzroy clan would make a statement this year, one which reclaimed her position as the undisputed doyenne of the glamorous elite. Nobody attended a party or threw one like the Duchess of Avondale. Everybody said so. Hattie’s mother had a knack for sprinkling sparkle wherever she went and the charm to make her guests leave feeling as though they had had the most magnificent time. ‘And now that all the preparations are finally done, a quiet afternoon spent with a few select friends is just the tonic to help settle my nerves before tomorrow.’
A few friends! There was an ocean of difference between her mother’s definition of a few and Hattie’s. ‘Only you could turn making socks into a social occasion, Mama.’
There was nothing that rallied the ladies of the ton more than a good cause, and her mother was always the most enthusiastic of them all when it came to taking up the call to arms. There were baskets of wool everywhere, all freshly delivered from the expensive haberdashers in Bond Street which the Duchess favoured, and twice as many Wedgwood cups and saucers than usual lined up on the sideboard waiting for her gaggle of guests to turn up. At the last count she had officially invited twenty ladies but as there were at least thirty cups—and the poor kitchen staff were running around like headless chickens preparing what promised to be an afternoon tea for an army—it was obvious twenty was a very conservative estimate. ‘Wouldn’t it have been easier to simply donate all the money you have spent on this little gathering to the hospital instead?’
Doctor Cribbs, the eminent Harley Street physician who had worked miracles to heal Hattie, had set up his charitable Ragamuffin Infirmary in Covent Garden with some of his altruistic colleagues several years ago. The infirmary helped provide medical care to the capital’s many sick or injured children who could otherwise not afford it. No sooner had they helped a child and waved them goodbye, another two came through the door. It was, she now knew, a never-ending struggle which constantly needed funds, able volunteers and equipment. Hattie had become involved shortly after returning to town a month ago, when Dr Cribbs had asked her to visit so that she could inspire some of the patients in the same way as he had inspired her to recover. As she would be for ever in the good doctor’s debt, she had agreed, and four weeks on the infirmary was now her second home. Partly because she enjoyed having a purpose again, but also because she knew from first-hand experience how devastating and frightening a life-changing accident could be on both the body and the mind.
‘Of course it would have been simpler to donate—but where is the fun in that?’ To be fair to her parents, they had parted with huge sums already for the cause, and with no fanfare at all. But then, her father preferred to keep his philanthropy private, so it was never mentioned outside of their walls.
‘Besides, it kills two birds with one stone, dear.’ Her mother took no offence at Hattie’s comment nor made any apology for the reason for it. ‘Because it gives us all the perfect opportunity to subtly catch up on all the gossip before tomorrow and do something good for the needy at the same time.’ She admired her knitting again, clearly pleased with herself for her cleverness as well as her benevolence. ‘It wouldn’t do for me to turn up at the palace tomorrow uninformed when everyone expects me to always be in the know.’
Hattie rolled her eyes at her twin Annie and then at her sister-in-law Dorothea. Both were wrestling with their needles and yarn trying to master the dark art of the sock while their cousin Kitty’s hands moved in a blur as they effortlessly turned a heel. She was the expert who had spent the last four days teaching them all to knit in readiness for the Duchess’s impromptu Keep a Ragamuffin Warm in Winter tea party.
‘Heaven forbid you relinquish your title as the Oracle of all Scandal.’ Hattie stretched out her bad leg and flexed her foot. Nowadays it tended to atrophy if she stayed still too long, proving Dr Cribbs’s favourite mantra that you had to work a weak limb or it would wither. Thanks to him, she had exercised her right leg so hard in the last year it worked half as well as it had before the accident—albeit with the dratted ungainly limp, which she had to accept no amount of exercise was likely to eradicate. But it was what it was and she refused to dwell on it. Walking with a limp was better than not walking, or worse, not being alive at all when she very nearly hadn’t been, so she was grateful.
Her mother grinned unrepentantly, taking the comment as a compliment. ‘As I keep telling you all, a woman is nothing without her reputation.’
‘Your Grace.’ Their butler poked his head around the door. ‘The Countess of Boreham’s carriage has just pulled up outside.’
Annie screwed up her face in disgust as she glared at their mother. ‘Please tell me you didn’t invite Lady Boreham!’ Hattie glared too, in solidarity. ‘Especially after her dreadful son sent Hattie that bouquet yesterday! As if my sister would ever consider that odious man as a suitor.’ Both twins shuddered theatrically at the thought.
‘While I sympathise and could think of nothing worse than entertaining him as a son-in-law, I had to invite her, dears. She thinks that she is one of my oldest friends.’ Their mother shrugged an apology then smoothed her skirts ready to receive her first guest.
‘But she’s as dull as dishwater and drones on and on about her awful son ad nauseam, trying to convince one of us to marry him!’ Annie was incensed now and Hattie couldn’t blame her. An afternoon with either of the Borehams was a fate worse than death, but at least Lord Boreham still considered Annie out of his league. Thanks to Hattie’s dratted limp, the pompous fool now thought he had a chance with her. That she would scrape the barrel and settle for him because no other man would consider her now that she was far from perfect. The gall of the man made her blood boil, even though, deep down, she also worried that he might be right.
‘She does, Annie, I cannot deny, but she’s harmless and, in her defence, has always been very handy with a needle so I could not, in all good conscience, exclude her. Her tapestries are exquisite so I dare say she will excel at socks too. Those who are good with their hands can usually turn them to anything.’ There was no point arguing with Mother’s warped logic because she had always been a law unto herself. ‘And it could be worse, we could have been blessed with his dire company too, but I spared us all that ordeal by stating plainly in the invitation that this was a gentlemen-free occasion.’ She wafted her hand in the air, smiling smugly as if they should all thank her for that small mercy. ‘You are welcome, girls.’
‘What is wrong with her son?’ After growing up in the country, Kitty was new to society and knew practically no one yet.
‘What’s right with him would be a more appropriate question.’ Dorothea lowered her voice in case it carried beyond the drawing room. ‘Behind his back we all call him Lord Boredom.’
‘Or, as I prefer to call him, Dribbling Cyril Who Talks Nothing but Drivel,’ said Annie in an unsubtle whisper. ‘Whatever you do, Kitty, never get trapped with him at a function. Or you’ll surely perish from the sheer tedium before he allows you to escape. That is unless you don’t drown in his spittle first.’ Hattie’s twin mimicked dodging the spray which always came from the uninspiring gentleman’s mouth in abundance. ‘He’s been on the hunt for a bride for so many years now it’s gone beyond a joke, yet he still persists and is so puffed up and so thick-skinned, he is oblivious of the reasons why he remains single. If he corners you, he will woo you with a list of all the uninspiring reasons why you would be lucky to have him. His mother is cut from the same cloth as her awful son as far as her conversation is concerned, but at least she doesn’t spit.’
The sound of Lady Boreham’s monotone drifted from the direction of the front door as she was relieved of her coat. ‘And there is my cue to leave.’ Hattie stood, wincing slightly as her right leg complained at the sudden movement, but she ignored it and forced it to fall into step behind the left. ‘As much as I would love to discuss the romantic enticements of Lord Boredom with his tedious mother, I am due at the infirmary in half an hour. Doctor Cribbs has a new patient he wants me to work with.’
‘How convenient.’ Her mother was still put out that Hattie had chosen the infirmary over her knitting party. ‘But if you must, you must.’
‘I must.’ Wild horses wouldn’t keep her here. Aside from the dull Lady Boreham and the looming presence of her son’s bouquet on the mantel, her mother had also invited their neighbours—the pious and disapproving Duchess of Warminster and her annoying daughter Lady Felicity Claremont.
The Claremonts had always quietly looked down their noses at the Fitzroys, which had been bad enough when both families had worked hard to avoid one another. Now that Hattie’s brother Freddie was married to the Duke and Duchess of Warminster’s eldest daughter Dorothea, politeness dictated they had to pretend to get on. ‘Even if I didn’t want to go, which I very much do now that I know Dribbling Cyril’s mother is here, after he saved my life I owe it to Dr Cribbs to assist in whatever way I can.’ Even her mother could not argue with that.
She also did not need to listen to another patronising diatribe from either the prim Felicity or her judgemental mother on how inadvisable it was for a young lady of her stature and breeding to frequent the insalubrious area of Covent Garden—even for charitable purposes. According to them, propriety dictated Hattie should better serve ‘the great unwashed’ from a distance as befitted her status. The Duchess of Warminster would certainly never allow one of her daughters to risk their precious reputations or their potential marriageability doing such a menial task, even properly chaperoned. Never mind that Dorothea Fitzroy née Claremont had blown her own reputation to smithereens when she had fled the last ball of last Season to run away entirely unchaperoned with Hattie’s brother! An outrageous double standard the Duchess of Warminster chose to ignore.
As if she’d read her mind and knew exactly why Hattie refused to change a perfectly changeable appointment, her twin shot her a pleading glance. ‘Please take me with you!’ Annie dropped to her knees in prayer then shuffled on them until she grabbed Hattie’s skirts. ‘We are sisters! We shared a womb! Please don’t leave me here and make me listen to another lecture from Dorothea’s mother!’
‘Well, I suppose...’
‘Out of the question!’ Their mother glared at Annie. ‘Hattie has an excuse, albeit a flimsy one.’ She narrowed her eyes at her eldest by just a few minutes because the Duchess of Avondale was not easily fooled. ‘You do not! And if you continue to protest, young lady, I shall be sure to tell Lord Boredom you were disappointed not to receive his flowers too and then insist he pencils his name on your dance card tomorrow as compensation!’
