Miss Felicity's Dilemma

by Eileen Dreyer

  She shrugged. “Pip would have it otherwise, but you know Pip.”

  He smiled again. “Pip invited Brady the gardener to her come-out ball. She even danced with him, much to the chagrin of both her mother and my mother.”

  Finally, he got a smile out of her, and it was a beauty, sparkling and sharp.

  “She considers Brady to be more of a good influence than most of her family.”

  “Probably for good reason. We're a rather reprehensible lot.”

  There was a brief, sudden silence. “Probably not the way you want to convince a girl to marry you.”

  He shrugged. “You've known all along what kind of family we are. It's not exactly a surprise.”

  “True.” She sighed. “Why, then, should I trust you enough to put my future into your hands?”

  “Why? Because I am a nonpareil, of course.”

  “An excellent thing to be if I were a horse.”

  “Top of the trees.”

  “Botany bores me.”

  “Well-breeched.”

  “Only if you marry me.”

  It was his turn to sigh. “True.”

  Not true. What he had to do was far worse.

  And then she had to go and smile, a small, sly quirk to her lips he almost missed. She should have been quite forgettable, a tiny thing with a rather plump figure and freckles sprinkled across her nose. And yet there was something devilishly attractive about those soft brown eyes.

  They rode on in silence until the gates to Glenhaven appeared. Easily swinging the horses through, Flint followed the familiar lane. It wasn't an opulent property. He would have called it a tidy inheritance, with quite enough profit to keep him comfortable when paired with his inheritance from his mother's mother. He had always considered it his own promised haven, mostly safe from his father's interference. For some reason, he wanted Felicity to like it.

  New guests were greeted by lion-topped stone gate posts, the gatehouse now empty where it looked over a long avenue of beeches, whose yellowing leaves rustled in the afternoon breeze. A herd of fallow dear could be seen in the distance cropping the back lawn.

  “What is that?” Felicity asked, pointing to the round white building perched on the edge of an ornamental pond. “A Greek temple? Isn't that a bit pretentious?”

  “It was my grandmother's favorite place to spend an afternoon,” he said. “She said it held memories.”

  They had found her there, that last day, curled up on the sofa, a book on her lap and an early rose in her hand. Ninety-two, and she'd walked half a mile to be in that gazebo for her last breath.

  “I'm sorry,” Felicity said. “Pip said you were very close.”

  Flint nodded. “We were.”

  It was the house itself, though, that held Flint's best memories. Ah, there it was, just appearing around the last corner, a pink brick E from that lady's reign, with row upon row of sparkling windows and a forest of chimneys littering the roof like a copse of trees. The front door was heavy carved oak and crowned by a triangular pediment bearing the griffon of the Flintrush crest.

  It was nothing fancy, in fact a burr under his father's saddle. A duke demanded more regal rooms, a more intimidating façade, he kept insisting. The duke had pestered his mother for years to tear the old girl down and replace it with Palladio's best. The only woman in the world the duke had not been able to intimidate had simply stared him down until passing the antique gem off to the only other person who felt compelled to keep it intact.

  With stipulations, of course.

  Flint wasn't sure whether it was a punishment for her grandson's lack of purpose in life, or her son's arrogance. Her son might have been a duke, but his mother had been a chandler's granddaughter. And she never wanted him to forget it.

  A sigh from Felicity brought Flint back to himself just in time to avoid driving into the ornamental pond.

  “I can't say I would not have made the same decision,” she admitted, head up to take in the comfortable lines of the house. “If it were mine.”

  He took a quick look over to catch a wistful expression in her eyes. Damn, but he wanted her to like the place, no matter that it might not help either of them.

  He pulled the horses to a stop in front of the door. “It could be.”

  She shook her head. “No, it cannot. No woman owns her own house. She doesn't own anything. She lives in a man's house at his pleasure, and when he dies, at his son's.”

  He found himself blinking. “Her son's, too.”

  She stretched her head back to take in the façade. “Indeed. Her son who will marry and evict his mother to the dower house so another woman may temporarily live under his roof.”

  For a moment, Flint just sat there staring at this mouse of a woman with her soft eyes and thick brown hair and razor-sharp tongue. She was right, of course. He'd never really thought of it that way, probably because his grandmother had somehow blackmailed her own son into leaving her alone in the one place she most wanted to be.

  “I would leave it to you if I could,” he said.

  She smiled, and again he noticed how it changed her features, as if it suddenly made her visible. “No, you wouldn’t. You would leave it to your son, just as generations have before. I did not say I don't understand the laws of primogeniture. I said I wish there was room for women in there somewhere.”

  And without another word or assistance, she climbed down off the curricle.

  Evidently Flint preferred to get over rough ground quickly. Felicity had barely had the chance to hand her bonnet and cloak off to Higgins before Flint had her by the hand and was dragging her up the grand staircase.

  “Have Mrs. Windom in my office in fifteen minutes, Higgins,” he said as he led the way.

  Poor Higgins looked as if he'd rather eat nails. Even so, he dropped a pro forma bow and headed in the other direction.

  “You won't like Aunt Winnie,” Flint was saying. “Nobody does. But she's absolutely necessary for your reputation.”

  “If no one likes her, why do so many visit?”

  “Because she is the highest ton. Only person in society who makes Mrs. Drummond-Burrell quake in her shoes.”

  Felicity shook her head, her equanimity leaking away like milk through a sieve.“She is your aunt? On whose side?”

  “My mother's.” It seemed he had to think about that. “More of a cousin, actually. But only she and Mother seem to be able to work out the connection.”

  “Was she your grandmother's companion?”

  He gave a short bark of laughter. “Gad, no. The two of them were like lionesses marking territory. I'm not sure if they had been friends or she just blackmailed Gran into letting her stay.”

  They reached the first floor and turned for the next set of steps, all of them lined with dark portraits of people in ruffs.

  “A poor relation?”

  “Rich as Croesus.”

  So, Felicity thought, a nasty old woman with money living off her relatives. We ought to get along famously. She almost sighed out loud. It was becoming clear that she should have taken that stage.

  The hallway they progressed down was one Felicity hadn't had a chance to investigate, just beyond the family hall where Flint’s room lay. Probably for the better. She couldn't imagine how difficult her stay would have been if she'd shoved open a door to find the old lady at her bath.

  Flint rapped sharply on a door towards the end of the hall. “My room is at the other end of the corridor,” he said, then grinned. “If you feel compelled to visit.”

  “I know.” She refused to let him see what his casual flirtation did to her breathing. “And no. I’ve done my visiting.”

  The door before them was opened by a tall, elegant, middle-aged blond lady in sensible gray serge. Seeing Flint, she smiled and curtsied. “My lord.”

  “Does he have his tart with him?” a warbling voice demanded from farther inside the apartment.

  “No!” Felicity called back before anyone had a chance to stop her. “I am the
decent one!”

  Astonishingly, she earned a rusty laugh. “Then get in here and let me have a look at you!”

  This was evidently not Aunt Winnie's customary greeting, if judged by the astonished look on not only Flint's face, but the lovely blond lady.

  “Miss Mary Fare,” Flint said, ignoring his cousin as he dropped a bow to the woman who had met them. “May I present my fiancée, Miss Chambers?”

  “Not his fiancée,” Felicity corrected, dropping her own curtsy.

  Miss Fare matched it perfectly and shred a genuine smile.

  “Felicity,” Flint said. “Miss Fare is my aunt's companion. She is all that keeps us from mayhem.”

  Miss Fare answered with a gentle smile. “This is the most excitement we've had here since the hunting party.”

  Flint grimaced. “If you love me, do not bring up the hunting party.”

  Felicity lifted an eyebrow. “Oh, no, I think Miss Fare must tell me all about it.”

  “What are you all waiting on,” Aunt Winnie demanded with a thud Felicity recognized as a cane hitting the ground, “a master of ceremonies?”

  Laying a hand against the small of Felicity's back, Flint ushered her in. Felicity would have been far happier if she hadn't felt that odd sparking again. It distracted her at a moment when she thought she needed all her wits about her.

  She stepped into the parlor and knew she was right. The room was over-warm and stuffed with an astonishing amount of furniture, as if the old woman had decided to empty out an entire house into these two rooms. Two tall, carved wooden chairs bracketed the roaring fireplace. Seated on one, her feet resting on a tapestried ottoman, was the tiniest woman Felicity had ever seen. It was rare that Felicity actually felt tall. She did now as she approached the wrinkled, beringed doyen.

  But it wasn't height or embellishment or the morning dress that looked as if it had been constructed from red brocade bed curtains that really caught Felicity's attention. It was the lady's hair. It was purple. Not a soft lavender, or lilac, although even those would have been noteworthy. This hair was bright, curling purple.

  Felicity caught herself just shy of bursting into laughter. If this was to be her reputation, she was doomed. Who could take this little elf seriously?

  And then Felicity looked into those large black eyes and curtsied before she even realized it. “Madame,” she greeted the old woman.

  “Miss Winifred St. Clair,” Lord Flint intoned with his own courtly bow. “Allow me to present to you, Miss Felicity Chamber.”

  “Hmmph.” The bright eyes swung over to take in Flint. “Your father sent me a message,” she barked.

  Felicity had been right. The little woman did have a cane, a gold-topped hickory affair she slammed into the floor once again. And not onto the carpet. Onto the bare wood, so that the crack echoed. “Is this the chit I'm to give countenance to?”

  Flint smiled. “It is.”

  “Hmmph.” She yanked a gold lorgnette from her lap and took a leisurely perusal. Having suffered her share of perusals over the years, Felicity stood still.

  “Shall I turn about so you can see the aft end?” she asked. “Or open my mouth wide enough for you to check my teeth?”

  The woman's scowl was magnificent. “Well, you're the saucy one, aren't you? What makes you think you can be so full of brass?”

  Felicity shrugged. “I have undoubtedly already lost my teaching position. I have been told I am to marry a perfect stranger for no good reason I can see, and was foolish enough to agree to two weeks in which he might try to convince me. I have nowhere to go, no one to see. I imagine I have little to lose.”

  “How tall are you?”

  “Five-foot one inch.”

  She snorted. “Well, there's that. Don't have to stand on a stool to talk to ya.”

  “Indeed. I imagine that gets old when living in the same house as his lordship.”

  The old lady waved the lorgnette. “What, him? The devil with it. I never see him. The only time he's here is with his disreputable friends, and he's too afraid to let me loose on them to introduce me.” Her face folded into a thousand wrinkles. “Even though I know most of them anyway.”

  Felicity looked over to see that Flint was singularly undismayed by the statement.

  “You terrify them,” he assured the old woman. “And if one is to throw a hunting party, you hope the only one terrified is the fox.”

  The old woman maintained her glare. Flint grinned back.

  “She won't do,” she snapped, swinging the cane so swiftly at Felicity, she had to stumble back rather than get rapped on the jaw. “Not at all.”

  Flint shrugged. “Tell His Grace. It was his idea.”

  “Why?”

  “We have just been having that discussion,” Felicity said. “I assume this means that you don't know either?”

  “I do not. And I refuse to countenance what I don't understand. What if one of my friends stops by and sees her? It is unconscionable.”

  “She went to school with Pip,” Flint said, pulling out a snuff box and flipping the lid open.

  “So did forty other gels. And all of them have surnames.”

  Flint's one eyebrow headed north; his actions momentarily paused.

  “I have a surname,” Felicity assured her. “I made it up myself.”

  That really earned her a glare. “You have no idea who your people are?”

  “Not a one. I was told I was left at a private home in the country for my first five years. The only thing I remember from that time was two other small children and a goat who was forever stealing my biscuits.”

  “So then, you come from people with means.”

  It was Felicity's turn to shrug. “So we have always assumed. I never wanted for anything.” Except affection, history, people to call her own.

  “And then?”

  “I was sent to Last...er...Lady Chase's Academy for Young Ladies, where I stayed until I graduated three years ago and went to my first position.”

  Again they waited, all standing around that Gothic old chair like supplicants before a bishop. Felicity couldn't understand how Flint could look so cool and unconcerned. She was beginning to feel limp and wet from the unbearable heat in this cramped little room. She didn't even want to consider it might also have been from tension. Did she want this old woman to accept her? Did she want to stay?

  She was standing at attention, hands clasped in front of her as if awaiting punishment. As for Flint, he was languidly dabbing snuff onto the hollow between his thumb and forefinger and taking a sniff.

  Felicity looked closer. She might be mad, but she could swear that he inhaled nothing. She afforded him a brief, sly glance to see him pulling out his handkerchief to brush at his suit coat, an aristocratic gentleman at his most officious. Which suddenly seemed odd.

  She never had the chance to challenge him. Suddenly his aunt, or cousin, or whatever she was, straightened in her seat and gave a resounding thump of her cane.

  “You might as well go back to where you came from,” she pronounced down her hawklike nose. “I refuse to countenance you.”

  And Felicity, who had abruptly gotten her wish, was surprised by a sting of tears.

  “Excellent,” she answered, straightening as if it didn't matter. “Then I can be on my way.”

  Although where, inevitably, she had no idea. Perhaps the school would be considerate. In any case, it was well past time for her to go.

  Chapter 5

  “Rude miss!” Miss St. Claire snapped.

  Felicity didn't bother to turn around. She needed to get out of the room before either that nasty old woman or her companion saw the sheen in her eyes.

  “One moment please, Miss Chambers,” Lord Flint said, never raising his voice. “Higgins.”

  Higgins stepped right into Felicity's path and bowed. She let him by.

  “My lord?” he asked.

  “Instruct Mrs. Windom to begin organizing Miss St. Clair's removal.”

  Felicity stu
ttered to a halt and spun about. Higgins gaped. Miss Fare paled.

  Lord Flint seemed to notice none of that. He was locked in silent combat with his aunt. “It is His Grace's wish that if Miss St. Clair cannot see her way to assist Miss Felicity, that she is welcome to return to her own home.”

  Felicity couldn't look away from that frigid contest. Flint stood completely still, looking as relaxed as if he were making a morning call. His aunt all but vibrated with fury, her fingers taut as claws on the carved arms of the chair.

  “You wouldn't,” the old woman rasped.

  Was Felicity the only one who saw that terrible fear flare in those sharp old eyes? The vulnerability? Within the space of a few words, she looked suddenly old.

  Flint shrugged. “It is not my decision, ma'am. It is my father's.”

  Felicity felt a hot rage ignite in her. Why torture that poor woman? No matter the visitors, that one glance of stark terror betrayed that she was old and alone except for the place she held in this house. And Felicity didn't want any other person to know what it was like to be abandoned, no matter how surly they were, or how much they deserved it.

  She swung around on Flint. “How dare you?” she demanded.

  She wasn't certain who was more astonished, Flint or his aunt. They both gaped at her as if she were a talking dog.

  “Pardon?” Flint asked.

  Felicity advanced on him. “A gentleman does not extort a frail old woman to go against her moral code. Your cousin does not feel able to support a bastard. I understand that.”

  Felicity heard gasps. Even Flint looked uncomfortable.

  She focused on him, the cause of her distress. “Why be delicate about this?” she demanded. “It is obvious what I am. I have lived with the truth my whole life. I have also spent a lifetime being met with just such disgust, so do not think I shall shrivel and die. Your cousin has just learned that she is expected to accept that which to her is unacceptable. And yet you expect her to throw over decades of training and perjure herself about how delighted she will be to welcome me into her home.”

  “My home,” he said, his voice still perfectly calm.