Free Sorcery & Cecelia: Or the Enchanted Chocolate Pot by Patricia Collins Wrede

Society, so it cannot matter to her what opinions are in Rushton.”
    “But you cannot mean to present Dorothea now!” Lady Tarleton said. “The Season is half over! Have you no regard for Dorothea’s prospects?”
    “I am quite capable of taking care of Dorothea’s prospects,” Mrs. Griscomb said. She favored Lady Tarleton with an extremely cold smile. “More so than you may think. Dorothea comes to London with me, this very day.”
    “I—I would rather stay here, Mama,” Dorothea put in. “At Tarleton Hall, I mean.”
    Everyone looked at her in surprise. “You are being ridiculous, Dorothea,” Mrs. Griscomb said sharply. “Anyone would think you did not wish to be presented.”
    “I don’t wish it!” Dorothea said, and burst into tears. I set my teacup down at once and did my best to soothe her, but she was quite overset. Miranda Griscomb just sat watching us with a stiff smile and a tiny frown line between her eyebrows.
    “Really, Miranda,” Lady Tarleton said, and stopped. She looked at me as though she had just realized I was still there. Which was probably exactly what had happened, for I very much doubt that she would have argued so openly with Mrs. Griscomb had she remembered my presence. I took the opportunity to suggest that Dorothea and I retire until Dorothea was more composed and, perhaps, packed. This found favor with both ladies, so the two of us departed with great relief on all sides.
    I accompanied Dorothea up to her room, where she gradually became calmer. To be quite accurate, she stopped crying and simply sniffed dolefully into a handkerchief. Though I certainly sympathized with Dorothea (and, after all, Kate, my own hopes to join her for a Season next year were quite as cut up as hers), I could not see that anything was being gained by continued weeping.
    “Dorothea, do try to control yourself,” I said. “It is too bad, but perhaps Lady Tarleton will be able to persuade your Mama to see reason.”
    “She is not my Mama!” Dorothea said passionately.
    “Not your Mama?” I said. “But—”
    “She is my Stepmama, but she pretends to be my Mama and makes me call her so,” Dorothea said. “And, oh, how I wish Papa had not made his fortune in India, for I am sure that is the only reason she married him, and if she hadn’t we could be comfortable!”
    “I quite agree that she is an odious woman and you would be better off without her,” I said, “but I cannot think that you would be at all comfortable if your Papa had not got a fortune. At least, rented lodgings with leaky roofs and no servants and having to make over your gowns has never sounded comfortable to me, and that is the sort of thing that happens to people with no fortune. Unless, of course, you became a housemaid or a governess, but that’s not much better.”
    “Anything would be better than Miranda!” Dorothea said.
    I had a strong inclination to agree with her, but I saw that it would only send her back into the mopes, so instead I said, “Well, but one must be practical, after all. Do try to stop crying, Dorothea, and let us try to think of something.”
    “It will not be the least use,” Dorothea said gloomily. “She is going to force me to go to London and marry that horrid Marquis, and I shall be miserable for the rest of my life!”
    I was struck by a sudden horrid suspicion. “What Marquis?” I said.
    “The Marquis of Schofield,” Dorothea sniffed, confirming my worst fears.
    I sat very quietly for a few moments, while Dorothea reiterated her passionate desire for an early death and her equally passionate certainty that she was doomed to a long and miserable life. I cannot see why, if Miranda Griscomb dislikes the Marquis of Schofield enough to poison him with chocolate, she would be willing to have her stepdaughter married to him, but Dorothea was quite positive on this point. Dorothea, of course, has no desire whatever to be married to the Marquis.
    “But do consider, Dorothea,” I said at