Читать книгу Love Lords and Lady-Birds - Barbara Cartland - Страница 2

The off-side leader went lame and the Earl of Staverton swore beneath his breath. Then he pulled his horses to an abrupt standstill and his groom jumped down from the seat behind the phaeton.

“It’ll likely be a stone, my Lord,” he said cheerfully as he ran forward. “These roads be terrible bad.”

“Bad indeed!” the Earl replied, repressing more forceful language.

He tied the reins to the front of the phaeton and stepped down.

The road was in fact extremely stony and he was not surprised that one of the stones had lodged in the horse’s hoof.

He thought perhaps he had been driving imprudently fast over such a rough surface, but he was in a hurry to get to London and away from the boredom he had endured in the house where he had been staying near St. Albans for a mill between two well-known pugilists.

It had been an excellent fight and the Earl had backed the winner for a considerable sum of money. But both the company of his host and the food provided had been one long yawn from start to finish.

Admittedly the Earl was not easily amused and he found a great many things and a large number of people to be what he termed ‘a dead bore’.

It was a pleasant spring morning. Wild flowers were to be seen in plenty amongst the grasses by the road and there were primroses in the hedgerows and bluebells making an azure carpet under the trees in the woods.

The Earl watched as his groom carefully prised out the sharp stone that had lodged in the hoof so as not to loosen the shoe.

He looked at his team with some pleasure. Jet black and perfectly matched, they were, he knew, the most outstanding horseflesh to be seen in the Four-In-Hand Club, which he was confident that no other member was able to equal.

To stretch his legs he walked through the grasses, regardless of the fact that the pollen marked his shining Hessians, which had been polished with champagne as originally decreed by Beau Brummell.

On one side of him there was a brick wall, higher than was usual, enclosing the Park of some important aristocrat.

The bricks, narrow and red, had mellowed with time and the wall was now deep pink in colour, which told the Earl, who was an expert on architecture, that it was Elizabethan.

The spring sunlight playing on the bricks was very beautiful and he was just wishing that the wall that enclosed Staverton House in Oxfordshire was the same colour when suddenly a heavy object flew past his head missing him by inches.

It fell with a thud at his feet and he looked down with astonishment to see that it was a leather valise not too heavy to carry but a dangerous weapon should it have struck him.

He looked to where it had come from and saw climbing over the top of the wall a female figure.

There was a most improper expanse of very shapely legs before the owner dropped to the ground with a lithe grace that kept her on her feet and prevented her from sprawling, as might have been expected, on her back.

She had descended with her face to the wall and only as she turned round did she see the Earl with the valise at his feet.

“That was an extremely dangerous thing to do,” he said coldly. “If it had hit me, I could easily have been knocked out.”

“How was I to know that anyone would be standing by the only place where it is possible to climb the wall?” she asked.

She walked towards him as she spoke and he saw that she carried her bonnet on her arm and her hair was gold with pretty red lights in it.

As she looked up at him, her eyes were very large and there was something mischievous in the way they slanted just a little at the corners. Her mouth also curved, which gave her an unmistakably impish expression.

She was not strictly beautiful, but she had, he thought, a decidedly fascinating face, quite different from that of any girl he had seen before.

“I presume that you are running away,” the Earl remarked as casually as he could.

“I should hardly be likely to climb the wall if I could walk out through the gate!” was the instant reply.

She bent down, intending to retrieve her valise and then she saw the Earl’s horses.

“Are those yours?” she asked in an awestruck tone.

“They are,” he answered, “but the leader has collected a stone owing to your abominable roads.”

“Not mine!” the girl retorted. “But your horses are wonderful. The most magnificent I have ever seen.”

“I am honoured that you should think so,” the Earl said with a sarcastic twist to his lips.

“Where are you going?”

“To London as it happens.”

“Then please – please take me with you. That is where I wish to go and I would like above all else to drive behind such an exceptional team.”

She moved towards them as she spoke, forgetting the valise, which still lay on the grass at the Earl’s feet.

“I feel it is my duty to ask you who you are running away from and why,” the Earl said.

The girl had drawn nearer to the horses and was now standing gazing at them, her eyes shining.

“They are superb!” she breathed. “How can you have found four such perfect matches?”

“I asked you a question,” the Earl persisted.

“What about?” she enquired absent-mindedly and then added,

“I am running away from school and, unless they are to find out I have gone, we should be moving away.”

“I do not wish to become involved in anything reprehensible,” the Earl pointed out.

“That sounds very stuffy,” she replied scornfully, “but, if you will not take me, then Jeb the butcher will. He should be along at any time now.”

“You have an assignation with him?”

“No, but I have talked to him about his horses and I know he will oblige me.”

She looked down the road as she spoke and then her eyes came back to the Earl’s face.

“Please take me,” she begged him. “Nothing you can say or do will make me go back, so it is either you or Jeb. But I would like so much to drive with you.”

As she spoke, the Earl’s groom straightened his back.

“It’ll be all right now, my Lord.”

The girl’s eyes were still on the Earl’s face.

“Please,” she pleaded almost beneath her breath.

“You could not be so treacherous.” she exclaimed “At the same time my reason is a really good one.”

“I will take you on one condition,” the Earl suggested.

“What is that?”

“That you tell me why you are running away and, if I do not consider it a valid excuse, I shall take you back to your school.”

He helped her into the phaeton and undid the reins.

The groom picked up the valise, stowed it away at the back as he swung himself into the high chair-like seat that he himself occupied and they were off.

They drove a little way in silence and then the Earl was aware that his companion was not thinking of him but of his horses.

“I am waiting,” he remarked.

“For what?”

“You know quite well what for and I have a feeling that you are deliberately prolonging your explanation so as to be carried as far away from your school as possible before you tell me.”

She flashed him a smile which made her lips curve most beguilingly.

“That is quite intelligent of you.”

“I am not as obtuse as you appear to think,” the Earl answered sarcastically. “Who are you meeting when you reach London?”

His companion gave a little laugh.

“I wish I could tell you it was some ardent beau, but I can assure you that if there was one I would have made him fetch me from school and not have to rely on Jeb or the lucky chance of meeting a stranger like yourself.”

“No beau? Then why this anxiety to get to London?”

“Because I am too old to be at school for any longer, and my horrible beastly Guardian insists that I spend all my holidays in Harrogate.”

“What is wrong with Harrogate?” the Earl asked.

“Everything is wrong with Harrogate! It is dull, it is full of very old and ill people. When I was there for the Christmas holidays, I never met a single man except for the Vicar!”

Her tone was so scathing that the Earl laughed despite himself.

“You have obviously suffered acutely in such a place, but then is there nowhere else you could go?”

“Not as far as my Guardian is concerned,” the girl answered. “The loathsome creature does not even answer my letters and every suggestion I make is rejected by his lawyer.”

“He sounds somewhat unfeeling,” the Earl agreed. “When you do reach London, are you intending to beard him in person?”

“Certainly not! I have no intention of going near him and I suspect that the reason why he does not want to see me or communicate with me is that he is spending my fortune on himself.”

The Earl turned to look at her speculatively. As he took in the plain bonnet with its dark blue ribbons and the simple unimaginative gown, the girl said passionately,

“You are thinking that I do not look like an heiress and is it surprising when my clothes are chosen for me by Cousin Adelaide, who is nearly eighty and paid for by my Guardian’s lawyer?”

Her lips tightened before she went on,

“I was eighteen last week and all my friends, my real friends, made their debuts last year. I was still in mourning for Papa so I suppose there was some excuse for not allowing me to be presented at Court then, but this year I was sure that I would be allowed to go to London.”

“What are your Guardian’s reasons for refusing?”

“I told you, I never hear from the brute! I wrote him pages and pages after Christmas and his lawyer simply replied that I was to stay at school until further notice.”

She drew in her breath and then continued,

“I waited until now for three months and now I have made an important decision. I will take the matter into my own hands.”

“And when you reach London, what do you intend to do?” the Earl asked.

“I am going to become a Lady-Bird!”

“A – Lady-Bird?” he questioned.

“That is what Claire’s brother, Rupert, calls them, but I believe another description is ‘a bit of muslin’ or a ‘Cyprian’.”

The Earl was so astonished that for a moment he let the reins fall and his horses broke into a gallop. He steadied them again before he asked,

“Have you the least idea of what you are saying?”

“But, of course, I have,” his companion replied. “As I am not allowed to take my place in Society, I shall make my life in my own way.”

“I cannot believe you know what you are implying.”

“My best friend, Claire, explained it all last year before she left. All the smart beaux have mistresses and that means the lady they choose is expected to belong to them and to no one else. A Lady-Bird can pick and choose. If one man bores her, she can find another one who is more interesting.”

“And you really believe that sort of – life would suit you?” the Earl asked, choosing his words with care.

“It must be more amusing than sitting all day in that deadly school, having already learnt everything they can possibly teach me. Of course I shall be very careful in selecting the man I shall spend my time with.”

“I should hope so!” the Earl remarked.

“Think what fun it will be to do what I like and not permanently have people telling me that everything I want to do is wrong and unconventional.”

“What do you imagine you will do?”

“Go to Vauxhall, for one thing, and see the fireworks. Drive my own phaeton in Hyde Park, dance every night, have a house of my own and not have to worry as to whether I get married or not.”

“You have no wish to be married?”

“Of course not. It would be far worse than being a mistress to be tied up with one man forever! Claire says that Society is nothing more than a marriage market anyway.”

“What does your friend Claire mean by that?”

“She says that every debutante is competing either to marry a nit-wit because he has a title or some fat red-faced old man because he is rich. That at least is one thing I don’t have to worry about. I have a huge fortune all my own.”

“Surely, if that is the truth, your Guardian will allow you to spend some of it?”

“I told you, he does not answer my letters. His lawyer tells me to send him my bills and they are then paid. But what I want is cash in my hand.”

“I should have thought that there might be better ways of obtaining it than taking up the profession you are speaking about.”

“Profession?” the girl queried. “Is being a Lady-Bird a profession, like being a doctor or a lawyer? How interesting!”

He thought of quite a number of retorts he might have made to a more sophisticated woman, but instead he went on driving with a frown between his eyes.

He was wondering what he could say to this impulsive child who, he was certain, had not the least idea of the implications of what she was intending.

He could well imagine the perils she might easily encounter, if she found herself in the company of the more raffish and dissolute young men who drove about the countryside from Race Meeting to Race Meeting merely to see what excitements they could uncover.

“You have not told me your name,” he stated after a moment.

“Petrina – ” she replied and stopped.

“You must have another name.”

“As I have told you so much about myself, I think it would be unwise to let you know anything more. After all you might have been a friend of my father’s.”

“In which case I should undoubtedly try to dissuade you from this disgraceful idea.”

“Nothing is going to stop me now,” Petrina answered him. “I have made up my mind and when I have established myself I might get in touch with my Guardian.”

“I imagine you will have to if you want some money.”

Petrina gave a little chuckle.

“I wondered if you would think of that. I thought of it myself and that is why I waited so long before setting out for London.”

“What have you done?”

“I have collected quite a considerable sum through sheer cleverness.”

“How?”

“I sent bills to the lawyers, which I had made up myself.”

“What sort of bills?”

“Bills for books, for school uniforms, for all sorts of miscellaneous things. I thought that they might be suspicious but they paid up quite happily.”

There was so much triumph in the young voice that the Earl could not help smiling.

“I can see you are extremely resourceful, Petrina.”

“I have to be,” she answered. “Now that my Papa and Mama are dead, I have no relatives left except poor old Cousin Adelaide, who really has one foot in the grave.”

The Earl did not reply and after a moment she went on,

“I am sure I have enough money to get myself settled. Then, when I am the talk of the town, there will be nothing my Guardian can do but hand over my fortune.”

“Supposing he refuses?”

Petrina gave a little sigh.

“Of course he might, in which case I shall have to wait until I am twenty-one when I get half of it or twenty-five, when I get the whole of it.”

“I have a feeling that, as in most wills, there is a proviso if you marry.”

“Of course,” Petrina agreed, “and that is why I have no intention of getting married and handing all my money over to a husband to do what he likes with it.”

She paused before she added scornfully,

“He might be like my Guardian and keep it all to himself, giving me nothing.”

“All men are not like that,” the Earl commented mildly.

“Claire tells me that Society is full of money-grubbers, young aristocrats who are on the look-out for a rich wife to keep them. I shall fare so much better as a Lady-Bird, I am quite certain of that.”

“As you seem to have a very low opinion of the male sex,” the Earl remarked, “I cannot imagine that you will find the men you would associate with particularly attractive.”

Petrina thought this over for a moment and then she said,

“I need not make big financial demands on them. Claire’s brother has told her that his mistress costs him a fortune every year. She demands carriages, horses, a house in Chelsea, and masses of jewellery, far more than he can afford.”

“I don’t know who Claire’s brother may be, but I should not take his description of the Beau Monde as entirely reliable.”

“He is Viscount Coombe,” Petrina said, “and Claire says he is a ‘Tulip of Fashion’.”

It was one of the few accurate things that Petrina had said to him so far, the Earl thought to himself.

He knew the Viscount and thought him a pleasant but rather stupid young man, who was wasting his allowance from his father, the Marquis of Morecombe, in a spendthrift manner which had not gone unnoticed in the Clubs of St. James’s.

As if she knew by his silence what he was thinking, Petrina exclaimed,

“You know Rupert.”

“I have met him,” the Earl admitted.

“Claire thought that he would do me very well as a husband, especially as he is always wanting money. But, as I explained to her, I don’t want a husband, I want to be independent.”

“I think you must realise that it is utterly impossible,” the Earl said.

“How do other women become Lady-Birds?”

“They are not usually heiresses to start with.”

“It is no use being an heiress if you cannot get your fingers on your own money,” Petrina commented with inescapable logic.

“If you take my advice, I suggest that before you do anything drastic you call and see your Guardian.”

“What shall I gain by that?” Petrina asked him. “He will doubtless be so annoyed by my leaving school that he will send me back under armed guard. Then I shall have to escape all over again.”

“I think if you explain to him that you are too old to be at school any longer and that all your friends have made their debuts, he will see reason.”

“Reason!” Petrina snorted. “He has not seen reason up until now. Why, why out of all the men in the whole world, should Papa have chosen him to be my Guardian? I expect he is old, strait-laced and doubtless religious as well, so he will disapprove of anything amusing.”

“And why should you think he will be like that?”

“Because Papa, having lived an exciting and adventurous life himself, wanted to protect me. He was always saying, ‘when you grow up, my darling, you must never make the same mistakes as I have’.”

“And had he made a lot of mistakes?”

“I don’t think so. Not as far as I was concerned,” Petrina answered. “But he fought quite a number of duels over beautiful ladies and so I expect he was referring to them.”

She gave a little exclamation and flung out her hands.

“Whatever it was, here am I saddled with this beastly old Guardian! When I think of all my money locked up in his safe or hidden under his bed, I could scream!”

They drove on for a little while in silence.

Then the Earl said,

“I told you I have no desire to become involved in your mad escapade and I make no promises, but perhaps, seeing the circumstances in which we have met, I could speak to your Guardian.”

Petrina turned round to stare at him in surprise, her eyes very wide.

“Would you really do that?” she asked. “That is so kind of you. I take back all the things I have been thinking about you.”

“What were you thinking?” the Earl asked curiously.

“I thought that you were rather top-lofty, stiff-necked, the grand old man stuffed with wisdom and condescending to the poor little peasant girl who knows no better.”

The Earl laughed as if he could not help himself.

“You are the most incorrigible brat I have ever met in my life. I cannot believe that you are really serious in your intentions and yet, because you are so obviously unpredictable, I am half-afraid that you are serious.”

“I am entirely serious,” Petrina assured him. “And, if you go to see my Guardian, I shall hide myself, so that if he says ‘no’, he will not be able to find me and I can go on with my own plans.”

“Your own plans are not only entirely impractical, they are exceedingly reprehensible,” the Earl said sharply, “and would not be considered by any woman who might call herself ‘a lady’.”

Petrina laughed.

“I knew we would get round sooner or later to the subject of being a lady. ‘A lady does not go out walking without her gloves, a lady never answers back, and a lady does not walk in the street unescorted or go dancing until she is fully grown-up.’ I am fed up with hearing about ladies! They lead the most boring, dull and restricted lives. I want to be free!”

“The sort of freedom which you envisage for yourself is absolutely impossible.”

“Only because you think I am a lady.”

“Well, you are and so there is nothing you can do about it.”

“Except behave like a Lady-Bird.”

She was silent for a moment and then she said speculatively,

“I cannot help really wondering how they do behave, but I expect I shall see lots of them in London. Claire says I shall recognise them because they are usually very smart, very pretty and drive in Hyde Park unattended.”

She paused and glanced at the Earl from under her eyelashes as she added,

“Except by gentlemen, of course.”

“But the women to whom you are referring are not ladies and they certainly do not have fortunes like yours to fall back on.”

“Think how pleased the gentlemen will be with me if they don’t have to provide me with carriages and lots and lots of jewellery!”

The Earl did not answer and, after a moment, she asked him,

“How much does your mistress cost you a year?”

Once again the Earl was startled into almost losing control of his horses and then he said sharply,

“You are not to ask such questions! You are not to talk about such women. You are to behave yourself. Do you understand?”

“Because you say so?” Petrina asked. “You have no jurisdiction over me, as you well know.”

“I can refuse to take you any further,” the Earl threatened.

Petrina looked round her with a smile.

They had joined the main highway to London and there was quite a considerable amount of traffic not only of private phaetons and carriages but Post-chaises and stagecoaches.

“If I had any sense,” the Earl averred, “I would put you down and leave you to go to the devil your own way.”

Petrina giggled.

“I am not afraid if that is what you want to do. Now I am so near to London, I can take a stagecoach or hire a post chaise to go the rest of the way.”

“And when you reach London, where do you intend to stay?”

“At a hotel”

“No respectable hotel would have you.”

“I know the name of one that will,” Petrina retorted. “Rupert told Claire it was where he had sometimes stayed with a Lady-Bird, so I don’t think they will refuse me.”

The trouble with the Viscount Coombe, the Earl thought angrily, was that he talked far too freely in front of his sister.

“Have you heard of the Griffin Hotel off Jermyn Street?” Petrina asked.

The Earl had indeed and he knew it was not the sort of environment for a young woman alone, least of all anyone as young and unsophisticated as Petrina.

“I am going to take you straight to your Guardian,” he said aloud. “I will explain your predicament to him and I think I can promise that at least he will listen to me and I hope will behave in a reasonable manner.”

“He might, if you are of sufficient importance,” Petrina said after a moment, “and I think you must be to have horses like yours.”

“What is your Guardian’s name?” the Earl asked.

Petrina did not answer for a moment and he guessed that she was considering whether she could trust him or not.

Because of her reluctance to trust him, he then lost control of his temper.

“Dammit all! I am doing my very best. Any other girl would be grateful.”

“I am grateful to you for bringing me this far,” Petrina answered slowly.

“Then why are you so reluctant to trust me?”

“It is not that, it is just because I think that you are so old you have forgotten how to be young.”

The Earl squared his chin.

‘Old,’ he thought. ‘Old at thirty-three!’

But he supposed that was what a child of eighteen would think. At the same time it was a sobering thought.

Then he looked at Petrina and saw the mischief in her eyes.

“You are deliberately provoking me,” he accused her.

“Well, you have been so supercilious and stuck-up the whole way here,” she complained, “talking down to me as if I had not a brain in my head. I may tell you I am considered to be extremely intelligent.”

“What you are contemplating is not in the least intelligent,” he snapped back.

“I think I have got under your skin,” she teased, “and it delights me.”

“Why?”

“I suppose because you are so omnipotent, so immune to the troubles and difficulties of ordinary human beings like me. You make me want to throw stones at you.”

“Then it is a pity you missed me with your valise,” the Earl replied. “I might have lain unconscious on the ground while you found yourself under arrest for assault.”

Petrina smiled at him mockingly.

“I should not have waited to be arrested, I should have run away.”

“Something you seem to be particularly good at.”

“Well, I have not done that badly for a first attempt. Look, here I am driving to London behind the most magnificent horses I have ever seen with – ”

She stopped speaking and turned to look at him.

She took in for the first time the snowy-white intricately tied cravat with the points of his collar high against his chin-bone, the superb grey whip-cord driving coat, the tightly fitting yellow pantaloons and the high-crowned hat set at an angle on his dark head.

“I know what you are,” she cried. “You are a Corinthian! I always hoped I should meet one.”

“Instead of talking about me,” the Earl said, “I am waiting for you first to tell me the name of your Guardian and then your own name.”

“Very well, I will risk it,” Petrina answered, “and, if the worst comes to the worst, I can always run away so that you cannot find me.”

“That will be difficult for you if you become ‘the talk of the town’, as you intend.”

She chuckled again.

“You are rather good at repartee. I like it when you snap back.”

As the Earl was noted for having a ready wit and his bons mots were invariably repeated round the Clubs after he had made them, this artless remark made his lips curve cynically, but he said nothing and only waited.

“Very well,” Petrina sighed. “The name of my horrible, cruel and beastly Guardian is the Earl of Staverton!”

‘I might have expected it,’ the Earl thought to himself.

It was as if everything that had happened had built up to this particular moment.

Slowly, almost as if the words were forced from his lips, he said,

“Then your name is Lyndon. And your father was Lucky Lyndon!”

“How did you know that?”

Petrina’s eyes were wide.

“Because it is I who have the misfortune to be your Guardian!”

“I don’t believe it! It’s not possible! You are not old enough for one thing.”

“A moment ago you were telling me I was too old.”

“But I thought you would be decrepit, have white hair and walk with a stick.”

“I am sorry if I disappoint you.”

“Then, if you are really my Guardian, what have you done with my money?”

“I assure you that it is, to the best of my knowledge, intact,” the Earl pronounced.

“Then why – why have you behaved in such a horrible manner to me?”

“To tell you the truth I had actually forgotten your existence,” the Earl replied.

He felt Petrina stiffen as if at the insult and went on to explain,

“As it happened, I was abroad when your father died and, when I returned, I had a great many personal matters to attend to as I had only just inherited my father’s title and estates. I am afraid your problems were set aside for mine.”

“But you must have told your lawyer that I was to go to Harrogate in the holidays and stay with Cousin Adelaide.”

“I told him to deal with the matter as he thought best.”

“But you knew Papa?”

“Your father and I served in the same Regiment and before the Battle of Waterloo a great number of us made wills. Those who were married left their children and, sometimes even their wives, in the charge of friends whom they thought most capable of looking after them if they were killed.”

“Papa was older than you.”

“Quite a deal older,” the Earl agreed, “but we played cards together and we both had a great love of horses.”

“And as you knew a lot about horseflesh, Papa thought that you were a suitable Guardian for me,” Petrina said bitterly. “Well, I only hope he is aware, in Heaven or wherever he is, of what a mess you have made of it.”

“I am astonished that your father never changed his will.”

“I suppose he felt that there was no one else more suitable. Anyway he did not expect to die when he did.”

“No, of course not. Was it an accident?”

“He had been drinking with friends and, when they rode back home, someone bet Papa that he would not jump a very high wall. Papa never could resist a bet.”

“I am sorry.”

“I loved him,” Petrina murmured, “although he was often very unpredictable.”

“And your mother?”

“She died during the War when Papa was serving with the Duke of Wellington’s Army.”

“And that left only your Cousin Adelaide.”

“Yes, Cousin Adelaide,” Petrina agreed in a different tone of voice, “and no one except you could think her a suitable companion for a young girl.”

“I suppose I shall have to allow you to choose your own chaperone,” the Earl said.

“I am not going to have one.”

“Oh, yes you are,” he replied. “As your Guardian, I shall appoint one immediately and, if you are pleasant to me, I will allow you to have a choice in the matter.”

Petrina looked at him suspiciously.

“Are you intending to launch me on Society?”

“I suppose I shall have to,” he replied, “but let me assure you, Petrina, I have no desire to do so. I cannot imagine what I shall do, saddled with a debutante, especially one like you.”

“I don’t want to be a debutante, I want to be a Lady-Bird.”

“If I hear one more mention of that,” the Earl stipulated firmly, “I shall give you a good spanking, which incidentally is something that I can imagine has been regrettably omitted from your education in the past.”

“If you are going to take that attitude towards me,” Petrina retorted, “I shall run away here and now and you will never find me again.”

“Then I shall hang on to your fortune. You have already accused me of spending it on myself.”

“Have you done so?”

“No, of course not. I happen to be an extremely wealthy man myself.”

“Then I would like everything I own handed over to me immediately.”

“You get half, I think, when you are twenty-one and the rest when you are twenty-five or the whole lot when you marry.”

Petrina stamped her foot on the floor of the phaeton.

“You are only quoting to me my own words. I so wish I had known who you were when I was waiting for Jeb.”

“Think just how lucky you have been,” he said mockingly. “By sheer coincidence I have turned out, as if we were in a Fairytale, to be your Guardian. I have waved my magic wand and you come to London, make your curtsey to the Queen at Buckingham Palace and, if you wish, to the Prince Regent. You are then launched into the Beau Monde.”

“You mean everyone will pay a great deal of attention to me because I am your Ward?”

“And you are also, of course, an heiress,” the Earl pointed out.

“I am not going to marry anyone, even if you do plan to find me a suitable husband.”

“If you imagine that I am going to concern myself with your amatory adventures, you are very much mistaken. I will find you a chaperone and as my house is very large I presume you can live there for the time being. If you annoy me or are tiresome, I shall rent a house for you on your own.”

“Shall I never see you?” Petrina asked curiously.

“Not often,” the Earl answered frankly. “I have a well-organised life, a great deal to do one way or another and frankly I find young girls a bore.”

“If they are anything like the girls I was at school with, I am not surprised?’ Petrina said. “But I suppose they grow up into the witty sophisticated women of the world who you have tempestuous love affairs with.”

“Who told you that?” the Earl asked in a voice of thunder.

“Claire said that all the Gentlemen of Fashion have mistresses – after all, what about the Prince Regent? And all the most beautiful women have lovers.”

“If you would cease quoting your foolish and ill-informed friend I think we would get along a great deal better,” the Earl said irritably.

“But it is true, is it not?” Petrina enquired.

“What is true?”

“That you have made love to lots and lots of beautiful ladies.”

This was undeniably a fact, but it made the Earl extremely annoyed.

“Will you stop talking about things no well-behaved girl should mention?” he stormed. “When I launch you in Society, Petrina, you will be ostracised by all the important hostesses if you speak of mistresses and all the other vulgar creatures you have mentioned since we met each other.”

“I think you are very unfair,” she complained. “After all you kept asking me questions and I answered truthfully. It is no use complaining now that I did not lie. How was I to know that you are my Guardian?”

With an effort the Earl controlled his temper.

“I cannot believe that any girl with your opportunities would not want to be a success and it will be impossible to be one unless you learn to curb your tongue.”

“I have had to curb it at school,” Petrina replied, “but I had hoped when I got away that I should be able to be myself and I do not see really why that is wrong.”

“Your whole attitude is wrong,” the Earl said severely. “Nicely behaved, well-brought-up young ladies make their debut and get married and know nothing about the seamy side of life.”

“You mean about Lady-Birds and ‘bits of muslin’?”

“Yes.”

“Well, Claire knows all about them.”

“Claire has a brother who obviously has a very irresponsible attitude towards his sister.”

“I have a feeling that Rupert and I would have a great deal in common.”

“Perhaps you will,” the Earl replied. “In which case he might wish to marry you and, as he will be the Marquis of Morecombe one day, I should give such an alliance my whole-hearted consent.”

“There you go,” Petrina exclaimed. “Talking just like some cackling old Dowager who is thrusting her daughter upon the marriage market!”

She made a sound of contempt and went on,

“Rupert wants my money and you think I want his title. Well, let me make it quite clear, my dear Guardian, I have no intention at all of marrying anyone unless I come to feel very different from how I feel about men at the moment.”

“Of whom you know nothing except for a Vicar.”

“There you go again, quoting my own words at me. All right, of whom I know nothing. But even in London they must have heard of something called ‘love’.”

“I am surprised you have heard of it. It is the first time you have mentioned that elusive emotion.”

“I have thought about it,” Petrina said seriously. “I have thought about it quite a lot.”

“I am very glad to hear it.”

“But I feel it may be something that I shall never experience.”

“Why?” the Earl asked.

“Because when the girls at school talked about love they were all so sloppy. They would talk about some man they had met in the holidays as if he was an Adonis. They used to go to bed with his name written on a piece of paper under their pillow and hope they would dream of him. Claire was even kissed one night!”

“I might have guessed that,” the Earl said sarcastically.

“She said the first time that it happened was very disappointing and not a bit what she had expected. The second was better, but not really romantic.”

“What did she expect?” the Earl asked furiously. “Something like Dante felt for Beatrice, or Romeo for Juliet, but I have a distinct feeling that ordinary men are not like that.”

There was silence.

Then Petrina said,

“I have decided that no one shall kiss me until I really want them to. Of course I should like them to try and then I shall have the satisfaction of turning them down.”

“The truth is that your outlook on life is one of complete ignorance,” he said scathingly. “You only know what your friend Claire has told you, most of which she has learnt second hand from her brother. My advice is for you to start without a lot of preconceived poppycock ideas.”

“Of course things may be better than I anticipate.”

“I certainly hope they will be.”

“May I have lots of new gowns?”

“As many as you like since you will be paying for them.”

She gave a little sigh of satisfaction.

“I shall enjoy having men look at me with admiration and, of course, laughing at what I say because I am so witty.”

“I have not been very impressed by anything you have said so far,” the Earl commented.

“I have not had much opportunity yet, but once I get into the swing of things I expect it will come naturally.”

“I hope not,” the Earl replied. “What you are saying naturally makes me shudder.”

“You take things far too seriously. As I have already said, you have forgotten how to be young and carefree. If I am really going to make my debut, as you suggest, I am determined to be the most outstanding, the most exciting, and certainly the most talked-about debutante London has ever known!”

“That is just what I am afraid of,” the Earl answered her with a groan.

“Now you are being stiff-necked and top-lofty again,” Petrina said derisively.