Read Online Amanda Scott - [Dangerous 03] by Dangerous Illusions - Free Book Online Page B

said, watching her and wishing the light had not been behind her when she had asked about Sir Geoffrey. Susan never seemed to want to talk about her husband, and Daintry had little wish to press her now. “We mean to ride toward the sea,” she said, “but you need not fret, you know, for I will take excellent care of them both just as I always do. Come unfasten my buttons, will you? There must be fifty of them down the back of this frock, and I cannot reach most of them. Where the devil is Nance? I rang ages ago.”
    “You are so impatient,” Susan said with a look of fond exasperation. She dealt swiftly with the buttons, however, and by the time she had finished, Nance had arrived.
    “About time,” Daintry said, glaring at her. “I want my red habit, black boots, and black gloves. And please don’t be all day about it, Nance. My nieces are waiting.”
    “Oh, aye, and so they are,” Nance said, grinning at Susan. A plump Cornishwoman with warm brown eyes and a rosy complexion, she had served at St. Merryn nearly all her life—as had her sister, mother, and grandmother before her—and if she had ever possessed a formal attitude, she had long since abandoned it. Laughing, she said, “As if I and everyone else in the house did not know who’s come to call. And as if it were your custom to wear your best habit on a drearsome day like this one. The old blue one were good enough for Miss Charley and Miss Melissa afore today.” Abandoning her teasing attitude the moment Daintry’s expression hardened, she said, “What’s he like, Miss Daintry? I asked Medrose if he were a handsome lad, ’n all, but you know what a stick he is. Mr. Stiffrump, that’s him to the life, and not one word would he say to me about my Lord Penthorpe.”
    “Very proper of him,” Daintry said. “I hope you do not gossip with the other servants about my affairs, Nance.”
    “As if I would,” Nance said, whisking the red habit out of the wardrobe and laying it upon the high bed, where with its black cord trim, black-fringed epaulets, and jet buttons, it stood out splendidly against the sky blue silk spread. Returning to the wardrobe, she stretched to reach a box on the shelf above the rack, saying as she did so, “But I still want to hear about that young man, Miss Daintry. I’ll not breathe a word—”
    “I will not wear a hat today,” Daintry said.
    “Nonsense,” Nance said. “You’ll never wear that lovely habit without the hat what goes with it.”
    “You must not go bareheaded, my dear,” Susan said quietly. “’Twould be a most unworthy example to set for the girls.”
    Daintry ground her teeth but said no more about the hat. Susan was right. It would not do to teach the little girls to scorn the dictates of fashion. Not yet, at all events.
    She was out of her frock and into the habit in a trice, and Nance stood back to look her over. “Does your complexion proud, that red does. Suits you to a treat. I’m right glad you and my Lady Ophelia was able to talk your mama out of having it done up in the light blue muslin she fancied so strong for you.”
    “Susan is to have that,” Daintry said, smiling at her sister. “It will be most becoming to her, and will make up into just what she will want for riding in Hyde Park when we go to London in February. Moreover, muslin, fashionable though it may be, is not my notion of suitable material for a riding dress.”
    “His lordship will like that red sarcenet better on you,” Nance said. “Sit down and let me tidy your hair before we put on your hat. Is he handsome, then? Tell me all about him.”
    “He is well enough, I suppose,” Daintry said repressively. In the mirror she saw Nance glance at Susan again and was not surprised to hear her sister chuckle. Shifting her gaze to Susan’s reflection, she said, “I suppose you think he is a marvel of masculine pulchritude.” Privately she thought Penthorpe a good deal better looking than Sir Geoffrey Seacourt, but she