Read Online Minuet by Joan Smith - Free Book Online

lady had her arms full.
    He saw as well that she was outfitted in a manner that caused her to stand out sharply from the crowd. That she looked quite simply ravishing was not sufficient to forgive her appearing in public in an ensemble that more closely resembled a peasant girl’s than a lady’s. Her hair was still in that atrocious mass of Titian curls; her gown was too simple and clung too closely to her body; her hat was recognized as a gentleman’s; and she was laden down with boxes and bags like a pack mule.
    Perhaps it was the gallant, smiling escort that annoyed Degan most of all. He darted across the street, narrowly missing collision with a carriage, and not quite missing the shower of dust thrown up in the wheels’ wake. When he approached them in an angry mood, he looked as odd as the lady for the layer of dust that decorated him.
    “What is the meaning of this?” he asked.
    “I would say you have been caught in a very bad dust storm, Citoyen Degan,” she replied brightly, with a merry glance at his predicament.
    Batting at his coat and trousers, he said, “I do not refer to my condition, but your own, Lady Céleste.”
    “You are indeed selfless to have a care for me, when you present such a discreditable appearance yourself. For that I shall stifle all my desire to pretend I don’t know you. You will bear with me, Henri. Perhaps we may pass Degan off as your solicitor. Do you like my new chapeau, citoyen? I call it the English liberty cap.”
    “No, I do not care for it. You will make yourself the laughingstock of London if you wear such contraptions in public.”
    “I am indebted to you for your sartorial advice,” she replied with a scathing eye at his jacket, which, while it was well tailored, made no claim to high fashion, even without dust. “As the duchess of Devonshire has been kind enough to compliment me with the sincerest form of flattery—imitation—I cannot feel my chapeau will be the butt of criticism.”
    “Don’t imagine the duchess will make herself ridiculous by following your example.”
    “She does not make herself ridiculous in the least. She looked quite well in her copy of my chapeau, but of course she must lower her pompadour to achieve the proper result. She will learn quickly, that one.”
    “Does your father know you’re out walking the street in that outfit?” Degan demanded.
    “I trust he does, as he gave me a great deal of money, and could not expect me to spend it while sitting home.”
    “You ought to have brought a footman with you. A lady does not tote her own parcels,” he said, finding himself out-talked at every turn, and disliking to say outright the father was unwise.
    “Truth to tell, my arms ache,” she answered agreeably, then promptly dumped all her load into his arms. “Our carriage is just there, at the corner. Would you be kind enough to put them in it for me? You might as well take Henri’s too. We were about to go to a coffee shop for some refreshment.”
    Mérigot hesitated to follow her example. Degan was glaring at him with such ill humor that he suggested they all go along to the carriage and unburden themselves. “If you are hungry, why do you not go home to eat?” Degan asked, disliking very much to think where this Frenchman would take Sally for refreshment.
    “We have an arrangement to meet some friends of Henri’s at La Forge. It is a little place run by some French émigré; it is where all the French crowd hang out,” she told him, voicing exactly what he dreaded to hear.
    “Your father would not approve,” Degan said repressively, wanting very much to forbid it, but coming to realize this would not serve his purpose with the headstrong creature. Nor was he in any position to forbid anything either.
    “My father is not so pompeux as you fear. The place is unexceptionable, or Henri would not have suggested it.”
    They placed their parcels in safekeeping with the lackey waiting at the carriage, and Sally turned to