“Mother! Mother, come quickly!” Miss Elisabeth called down the hall.
Lady Hendrickson left the comfort of the drawing room to see what her daughter was shouting about.
“It is from the Duke,” was all Miss Elisabeth said before handing over the letter.
“Mary!” Lady Hendrickson shouted after her eyes ran over the parchment. “Mary, come in this instant!” she called again to the back of the house.
Miss Mary and Lady Louisa were outside tending to the garden when the shouts came. Luckily the house was small enough that any voice shouted could be heard.
Miss Mary, upon hearing her mother’s call, got up instantly and brushed off her gloved hands.
Lady Louisa followed closely behind her, wondering what the excitement could possibly be about. She was rather reluctant to leave the small sprouts of plants just barely beginning to show their heads above the soil.
“It is a letter from the Duke,” Lady Hendrickson announced to the group once seated in the drawing room and tea had been called. “He has invited us over to an intimate dinner at Bassen Park.”
“How wonderful,” Lady Louisa said while Miss Elisabeth was bouncing in her seat with excitement having already read the news herself.
She turned to Lady Louisa as if remembering her presence.
“Oh, and there was this letter for you too,” she said, handing over the parchment.
Miss Elisabeth secretly hoped it was of so much importance that Lady Louisa would excuse herself from the room. Instead, she opened and read it right there, announcing she didn’t recognize the hand it was written in.
My Dear Friend Lady Louisa,
I am sure that along with this letter your household has also received an invitation from the Duke of Rowland for a dinner party. Rowland expressed to me that your last meeting was less than favorable and for that reason, you might hesitate to attend.
I am writing you to implore you to join our event and give Rowland another chance. He is a very admirable gentleman once you get to know him well.
I greatly enjoy your company and want to assure you that you are a welcome guest at Bassen Park. Please do join us for our evening of society and enjoyment.
Your Friend,
Colonel Hugh Jasper
“Well, what is it?” Lady Hendrickson said when Lady Louisa read the letter a second time and still didn’t speak. “It is very rude to read correspondence in front of others and not speak on it,” she added fluttering her own letter.
Lady Louisa went rather pink on the cheeks. She wasn’t exactly sure what to tell her aunt. She couldn’t very well say that she had chastened the Duke at the public dance and Colonel Jasper was only encouraging her to come to the dinner despite that.
Her aunt would be furious to know that Lady Louisa did anything that might offend the Duke. She would be sure it would hurt Miss Elisabeth’s chances. The proof of the letter, however, relieved Lady Louisa of that fact. One that she herself had wondered about these past few days.
“Well, it is just a small note from Colonel Jasper,” Lady Louisa finally answered in a soft voice.
“From the Colonel? Is it about the dinner? Well, what does it say? Why on earth would he write you?” Lady Hendrickson seemed to spew questions out without control.
“I believe he wanted to ensure that I would also be attending.”
“Why ever would he do that,” Miss Elisabeth said, then her honey eyes lit up like a candle. “Why, Lady Louisa, I believe you have a true admirer. I promise I won’t be cross that you have stolen him away from me,” she continued in a playful manner.
Lady Louisa wanted to say that Colonel Jasper had as much interest in her as he did in Miss Elisabeth, which was exactly none. She also wanted to tell her wretched cousin that it was awfully prideful to think after just a few interactions where she shamefully flirted with the man that he would have fallen deeply in love with Miss Elisabeth.
In fact, Lady Louisa would have rather liked to tell Miss Elisabeth that if she had any eyes at all, she would see that the only growing affection for the Colonel was from her own sister Miss Mary.
Lady Louisa looked over at Miss Mary at that moment. Again she held her hands tight to her apron and her gaze held fast to her hand. Lady Louisa suspected she was hoping not to give any of her thoughts away. Assuredly, living in this family with these female companions, it would not be safe for Miss Mary to announce her own feelings to them.
“I am sure it is only because the letter was addressed to the Hendrickson family and I am not of that family. I am sure it was a kind afterthought to clear up any miscommunication.”
“Then why are you blushing?” Lady Hendrickson asked with a raise of her brow and purse of her lips. “I do believe you have a small crush on the Colonel,” she finally concluded.
“Yuck,” Miss Elisabeth said with a shiver. “He must be at least fifty years old.”
Apparently, it was assumed that he would have an interest in Miss Elisabeth but not that she should ever have an interest in him. Lady Louisa suspected that she was undeserving of even his friendship, so shallow were her thoughts.
“Hardly, my dear,” her mother said, waving her off. “I suspect he could not be more than thirty and five. That is about your age, is it not, Lady Louisa?” Lady Hendrickson said with a narrowing of her cat eyes.
It was meant to be a slight, Lady Louisa was sure of it. “Actually, I am only twenty and six, Aunt Sarah,” Lady Louisa retorted. “Scarcely a year older than you, Elisabeth. Isn’t that right?” she added, turning her head to her offending cousin.
“I suppose that is true,” Miss Elisabeth said, brushing at her petticoats.
“Oh, dear, I didn’t mean offense,” Lady Hendrickson said with a laugh though she clearly did. “I only meant that this might be a very promising match for you. Surely you must come, for it would be a wonderful opportunity.”
“I don’t know if I like that idea,” Miss Elisabeth chimed in, not liking her mother inviting what Miss Elisabeth thought of as her biggest competitor for the Duke’s heart, right into his home.
“No, it will be perfect,” Lady Hendrickson said in a manner that meant the matter was settled. “She can help influence the Colonel our way. In turn, the Colonel will have a chance to influence the Duke. This will work vastly better than our previous plan that was muddled by the Duke’s appearance at the public dance.”
Lady Louisa was astonished at her aunt’s manipulative ways. Even something that might have been of little consequence to her was formed and shaped into a way to preserve her daughter’s claim on the Duke.
“Of course you would be more than happy to speak to the Colonel about Elisabeth, wouldn’t you, dear?” Lady Hendrickson said down her nose at Lady Louisa.
She took a steadying breath before answering. Never in her life had she felt such a strong desire to borrow the personality of her best friend, Isabella, and speak at that moment exactly what she was thinking.
Instead, Lady Louisa remembered her promise to her mother, practically chanted it in her head before answering.
“I would be more than happy to,” Lady Louisa said with a steady tone as best she could.
The dinner party was set in four days’ time. Miss Elisabeth spoke incessantly for the next three days on why it had been arranged so far in the future. The logical answer would be to first give the ladies time to respond and then allow time for the hosts to organize the event.
Miss Elisabeth would hear none of this. She was completely convinced the real reason was because the Duke would be having several similar parties with other families in the county to find his best fit.
It was deeply offensive and troubling to her that the Hendrickson invitation was so far in the future. How could he possibly have other ladies to see of more importance than her?
Every day for the next several days, all conversation circled around this fact, with Miss Elisabeth’s mother doing her best to assure that, to the best of her knowledge, no other families had attended to Bassen Park.
Lady Louisa often wondered if Lady Hendrickson sent one of the servants to watch the street. Now that Lady Louisa knew that Mentheith House was one of only a handful of houses that led down the road with Bassen Park at the end of the lane, Lady Louisa would not have put it past her aunt to do such a thing.
With each daily and sometimes hourly report that still no other carriage had yet passed by their house on the way to Bassen, Lady Louisa was almost sure that a sentry was posted at the head of Mentheith's private lane at all hours, day and night.
“I went to visit with the Jensen sisters yesterday, and Dorcas would not stop her incessant chatting over the public dance,” Miss Elisabeth said over dinner on the night before their invitation to dine with the Duke.
“She claims the Duke danced with her twice. I assured her that I was the only one that he danced with twice. I am sure if propriety had allowed it, he would have danced with me a third time.”
“How preposterous of her to claim such a thing,” Lady Hendrickson agreed.
Lady Louisa did her best not to roll her eyes as she dug yet another article of clothing from the darning basket at her feet. She looked over at Miss Mary to her right. Miss Mary, like Lady Louisa, was of little words. Lady Louisa didn’t mind the silence from her younger cousin, but would have preferred it to be filled with anything other than more discussion from her aunt and eldest cousin.
“I assured her as politely as I could that it wasn’t possible, as I already knew every lady he danced with that night and that I was the only one he danced with twice,” Miss Elisabeth said, lifting her chin.
“Well, what did she say to that,” Lady Hendrickson encouraged much to Lady Louisa’s disappointment.
“She had the nerve to produce her dance card and show me the Duke’s name on it twice.”
“I can’t believe it,” Lady Hendrickson said with audible shock. “Do you believe it to be valid?”
“Absolutely not! The second signature was the last dance of the night. I can scarcely say it resembled the first, which I can confirm the Duke of Rowland did dance with her. She had the nerve to put his name on the last dance,” Miss Elisabeth ended with a laugh.
Lady Hendrickson joined in with her daughter's merriment.
“What a wretched thing,” Lady Hendrickson added when they both had regained composure.
“I bet she sat all alone for that last dance and was too ashamed to admit such a thing, so she forged a name in its empty place,” Miss Elisabeth suggested.
“It is sad, really,” Lady Hendrickson said as she opened her fan and began to cool herself after such an episode of joy. “Some people will lower themselves to such shameful things all in the name of securing something they had no right going after in the first place.”
Lady Louisa laid down her work at her aunt’s words. Her mouth audibly dropped open. She checked herself quickly however and only exchanged glances with Miss Mary for a small second. She could see in her young cousin’s eyes that she had thought the exact same thing at the exact same moment.
They smiled wryly at each other, both feeling a little guilty for thinking such an unchristian thought about Lady Hendrickson, but also satisfied that each of them had not been the only one to think such a thing.
For surely if at least two or more people drew the same conclusion about a person’s character, wasn’t it more likely that the conclusion reflected the truth?