An Unpracticed Heart

Chapter Fifteen

"No, no. None of the embroidered chintz, please." Lady Alvord waved away the bolt of fabric held before her for inspection. "Where was the cotton, with the simple print? That should do well enough, I would think."

Charlotte sat beside her stepmother, her hands clasped loosely in her lap. The air inside the dressmaker's shop was stifling, and she fought the urge to rip off her bonnet and toss her spencer over the back of her chair. But instead she remained still, gazing at nothing in particular while the materials for her new wardrobe were chosen out for her.

"With the Vandyke edging at the hem?" Lady Alvord continued, flipping through a stack of fashion plates set out for her perusal. "Oh, no. She'll not need anything so fine. She'll be in Wales, you know," she said, her voice lowering in such a way that indicated England's westerly neighbor was not worthy of fashionable hems or unnecessary embellishments. "And there'll be no opportunities for social calls or the like, so there's no reason for any of the pieces to be more than modest."

Charlotte closed her eyes, inhaled slowly, and released the breath again through parted lips. To Wales, now. To spend her days as companion to a third cousin who fancied herself afflicted with megrims, or at least that was her claim when the care of nine—nine!—children became too much to bear. Her suspicion was that she would be spending a greater amount of her time in the company of the offspring than their mother, but Charlotte doubted that any qualms or suspicions on her part would be regarded by Lady Alvord.

"And what is your opinion?"

Charlotte looked up at the question. Though it couldn't really be called a question. Her stepmother's query was simply a formality, a few words spoken that carried no real interest in any answer Charlotte might have to give.

"It is all very nice," she said, though her smile came a few seconds too late.

Lady Alvord's eyes narrowed, a deep line appearing between her well-shaped brows. "Very nice, indeed," she said, quiet enough so as not to be overheard by the staff who were currently occupied with wrapping up the afternoon's purchases. "I cannot send you off to Lord Lynley's estate dressed in the same gowns you've worn since Lord Alvord passed away. He'll think I've been remiss in my care of you, and how will that reflect on me?"

Two weeks she had been in London again, returned to her father's home and what was left of her father's memories within it. Two weeks, and this was the first time she'd been permitted to leave the house since her arrival from Ellesferth.

"Come along," Lady Alvord said, snapping her fingers at a footman who gathered up their parcels and followed them outside. Their carriage, an expensive, well-sprung vehicle that appeared to have been acquired within the last few months, waited for them. The door was opened, the step lowered, and they embarked with all the pomp and circumstance of members of the royal household attending an evening at Vauxhall Gardens.

It was all too much, but then her stepmother had always exercised a love of extravagance. Her father, she remembered, had taken great care to never live beyond the means provided by his income and investments. But Lady Alvord seemed to labor under the belief that the money currently allotted to her would never alter in its amount. And so she redecorated her rooms according to the fleeting whims of fashion, and employed more servants than was necessary as she plotted out the next changes to her wardrobe.

Charlotte settled into her seat and gazed out the window. The day was sunny and unseasonably warm. She thought of the weather she'd left behind in Scotland, the perennial fog and damp that had clung to everything, the changeable sky and the storms that one feared capable of rattling the foundations of even the sturdiest buildings.

And she thought of Lord Cowden. Of course she thought of him. She had left him, though a part of her still could not completely fathom why she had done such a thing.