hiring a mount for you.” She did a little dance around the room, her silk skirts swinging over her hoops, her beautiful face alight with joy. “I wonder if marriage is too much to hope for? He’s only a knight, not even a baronet or a viscount, so it might be possible. I wouldn’t mind being a bride.”
“You’re putting the cart before the horse,” Nanny Maude had said darkly, the one person who ever dared tell Lady Caroline the truth.
“Oh, pooh!” she’d said with her light, silvery laugh. “It’s all going to be glorious.”
She’d been wrong, as she so often was. Looking back on that day, it seemed to Elinor that that was the last time she’d ever seen her mother truly happy. It was one of her wild fantasies, with little connection to real life, but it had filled the house with light anyway.
Caroline had gone out that night, wearing the Harriman emeralds that she’d taken with her, the ones that were to be Elinor’s, and hadn’t returned for more than a fortnight. It was Elinor’s first taste of real responsibility, and she managed relatively well. There’d been money, and credit, and the hope of a splendid future. Until Lady Caroline returned home.
Her skin was sallow. She wore new clothes, made of rich, expensive fabrics, and a dashing new hat, but her jewelry was missing, and she waltzed in and collapsed on a chair, declaring herself exhausted.
“Where are the emeralds, Mama?” she’d blurted out. Not only were they supposed to end up with her, they were the most valuable thing their little family owned, their something against dark times.
“What a little miser you are, Elinor,” she’d said with what seemed like profound dislike. “If you must know, they’re temporarily in other hands.”
Relief flooded her. “They’re being cleaned? Repaired?”
“I lost them in a wager. I fully expect to win them back in a new few days, so there’s nothing to worry about. You’re such a greedy creature, Elinor. Even if you can’t be pretty like your sister you should try to acquire at least a few social graces.” Her gaze was withering. “And where did you get that hideous dress?”
It was one of the two dresses she’d been wearing for the last year. It was true, she’d grown too tall and curvy for it, but there hadn’t been much money for new clothes, and it was much more important that Lady Caroline look prosperous, since she was their public face to the world.
Before she could think of something to say, Lady Caroline turned her attention to Lydia. “There you are, sweetness. How I’ve missed you! Give your mama a kiss.”
Lydia had thrown herself into her arms. “Are we going to move, Mama?”
“I don’t think so, dearest,” she said in a distracted voice. “I’ve decided Sir Christopher is not the man for me. For one thing, he’s too old. For another…” She shrugged, an affectation she’d picked up since coming to Paris, one she did very well. “He’ll be coming to tea this afternoon. I want both of you on your best behavior. And, Elinor, do try to look a little prettier. Don’t we have anything better for her to wear?”
“No,” Nanny Maude said in her uncompromising voice.
“I know what we’ll do. Our neighbors have that absolute horse of a daughter. You know the one I mean—she’s Lydia’s age but absolutely enormous. I’m certain I can convince them to lend me one of her dresses for Elinor.”
“Clothilde de Bonneau is thirteen years old, Mama,” Elinor had protested. “And she’s much wider than I am.”
“We can fix that. Nanny Maude is a genius with a needle. Now, someone bring me my notepaper—we haven’t time to waste. Vite, vite!” Her eyes were bright, feverishly so, and she had two dark patches on her already rouged cheeks.
No one was immune to Lady Caroline’s charm, and the dress had been produced almost immediately. It had been an insipid shade of pink, with nowhere for her chest to go in the fortunately high bodice. To this day she couldn’t abide the color pink.
But her mother had fussed over her, directing her maid on how to arrange Elinor’s hair to her satisfaction. Never in her life had Elinor received so much of her mother’s attention. It was dizzying.
When she was done she looked in the mirror. The dress was expensive, better than anything she’d worn in years, and the maid’s ministrations had been expert. She’d almost looked pretty.
Her mother had clucked her tongue. “Too bad you’re such