this is Miss Figgis, who has been most kind to us since we came to Coggleton. Miss Figgis, Lady Bilston, my husband’s cousin.”
The two women bowed to each other. Miss Figgis’s cheeks were pink with delight and interest.
“Excellent,” Georgianna murmured when they had walked on far enough not to be overheard. “Our friendship will be all over the neighborhood by evening. Now we can visit your mother.”
Georgianna seemed very pleased with these results, so Deborah didn’t mention that Miss Figgis was so unworldly she was unlikely even to have heard of the scandal in London.
However, her younger siblings were undeniably pleased to see her, and Georgianna took their boisterous welcome in her stride.
“Oh, Deb, I thought you were coming yesterday,” Mrs. Shelby exclaimed, emerging from the parlor. “Lucy has been so low and—oh!” She broke off at the unexpected sight of the brilliantly fashionable Georgianna bending to admire Stephen’s wooden sword while Lizzie and Giles spoke at once.
“My mother,” Deborah murmured as the children fell silent at last. “Mama, Lady Bilston.”
“Forgive my descending on you uninvited,” Georgianna said, extending her hand with a friendly smile. “I have heard so much about you all, and Deborah assured me you would not mind.”
“Indeed, not! Your ladyship is most welcome,” Deborah’s mother assured her. “Lizzie, run up and tell Lucy to come down.”
“I will go, Mama,” Deborah said, leaving Georgianna to the tender mercies of the rest of her family.
At the top of the stairs, she knocked on the door of the chamber she had once shared with Lucy and Lizzie. Receiving no answer, she went in anyway.
Lucy sat by the empty grate, dry-eyed, although from her stained cheeks and swollen eyelids, she had clearly wept a good deal recently.
“If the welcome below is not enough for you, I cannot help it,” Lucy said. “You are not welcome to me.”
“I can see that,” Deborah said calmly. “But Mama would like you to wash your face and come down and greet Lady Bilston.”
“Lord Bilston’s wife?” Lucy said, clearly interested in spite of her own tragedy.
“Yes. She is very friendly and kind-hearted.”
Lucy curled her lip. “Vising the sick and the shunned?”
“Helping the shunned,” Deborah said. “This does not affect her at all. Her life is in London. Yet, she gives up her time to prove her friendship to me and to you.”
Lucy’s eyes flickered, but she said only, “What is the point?”
“The point is not wallowing. You are not disgraced except by association with me. I am trying to improve things, not crying over the unfairness of life.”
“You have things to improve,” Lucy retorted. “You have a husband.”
“Yes, I do. He never believed the scandal nonsense in the first place, and he married me in the full knowledge that it could erupt at any time.”
“Do you expect my congratulations?”
“No, I expect you to think about what you actually had and what you lost by this. Do you think Sir Edmund was a good man, that he loved you? Did you love him?”
Lucy stared at her, then her eyelids drooped, and she frowned down at her hands. “I don’t know,” she said dully. “I suppose I never thought about it. I liked him. He is a baronet with several beautiful homes. I liked that he liked me, that he loved me.”
“Did he?”
“Of course he did,” Lucy exclaimed. “He would have married me if it had not been for your…trouble!”
“If he truly loved you, do you really think he would have been deterred by an accusation flung by his disreputable brother-in-law? An accusation against me that did not deter my husband.”
Lucy shrugged impatiently. “He only married you to get at his inheritance.”
“He could have married anyone to get at his inheritance. Lucy, you are nineteen years old, and you have lost one suitor you’re not even sure you love and who may not be worth loving. If I were you, I would pick myself up and show the world he is nothing to you. And that he has nothing to blame you for.”
Lucy raised her eyes with a hint of curiosity. “Is that what you are going to do? Show the world you are not to blame?”
“I hope to. And if you help me, it’s probable you will help all of us. We’re having a garden party next week.”
Lucy swallowed. “Will he be there?”
“I don’t know. I shall certainly invite him.”
This appeared to have given Lucy enough food for thought, so Deborah turned to go. “Wash your face, and come down. You will like Lady Bilston excessively.