Free Barbara Metzger by A Debt to Delia

never outride her problems, no matter how fast the steed. Besides, the room she’d given the viscount overlooked the stable yard, and Delia did not wish him to think her a graceless hoyden. Furthermore, she was out of brandied sugar cubes.
    Reluctantly heading back toward the house, Delia thanked her lucky stars that she had not given into temptation, for a carriage was pulled up in front of the door. She recognized the coach easily, as well she might since the vehicle had belonged to Faircroft House not three months past. The carriage still did, of course, but Cousin Clarence now owned both. The furor that would have erupted if he and Gwen had espied her in britches did not bear contemplating. Neither did the reason for their visit.
    She should not be surprised to see her relatives, Delia told herself, not once news of the viscount’s arrival reached their ears. A titled gentleman in the vicinity, a respectable, rich gentleman, was sure to bring them running like ants to a picnic—or vultures to a wounded beast.
    The viscount was resting, Mindle reported, sparing Delia the embarrassment of having to present two of the biggest toads in the Hillsdale-at-Hythe pond. Fortunate man, she told herself. Or wise on the butler’s advice.
    She called for tea, hoping Cook had managed to prepare something, between cooking for the sickroom, for heroically proportioned gentlemen, and for their horses. Clarence would eat the rugs, otherwise. Clarence was not running to fat; he had outdistanced it years ago. Gwen, who was perpetually watching her weight—watching it increase with every sugarplum she popped in her mouth—was sure to disdain whatever appeared from Faircroft’s country kitchens.
    She’d been wrong, Delia realized as she waited for the tea cart to be brought. Her relations had not sacrificed their scruples to come here in order to fawn over the viscount for the afternoon. They came to complain that they could not move in, to fawn over him for as long as he stayed. A viscount, a wounded hero, Cousin Clarence declared at his wife’s prompting, ought to be entertained as befitted his stature.
    No matter that his stature was laid out on a makeshift bed in the room next door, Gwen wanted to hold a dinner party in his honor, here at Faircroft. The neighbors would expect it.
    “What,” Delia asked, “you’d throw a celebratory party in George’s house, with him barely cold in his grave?”
    Gwen was wearing a rose carriage dress under her furs, with a black ribbon wound through the ecru lace at the straining neckline. Clarence had on a puce and primrose striped waistcoat that did not button across his girth, a black armband his only sop to mourning.
    Gwen pulled her fur tippet closer to her ample bosom, like a ferret on a shelf. “Unlike others I could mention, we are well aware of the proprieties. We would not have dancing, of course.”
    “I am afraid that is impossible. His lordship is too ill”—Delia crossed her fingers behind her back, to make sure she did not jinx the viscount’s recovery—”and the staff cannot possibly manage a gathering at this time, with invalids in the house.” Aunt Eliza nodded her agreement from the stiff-backed chair she’d chosen, as far from the sofa the usurpers shared as possible. They, in turn, ignored Delia’s aunt completely. Delia continued: “As for your rooms, you agreed about Belinda.”
    “We agreed on a temporary visit. You said you were going to do something about That Person.”
    Clarence’s voice was taking on the same petulant tone he always had as a child, when the macaroons were gone. Delia prayed Mindle would hurry with the refreshments. “Yes, I was making plans for Belinda,” she told her cousins, full knowing all her ideas had expired with George. If her fingers were crossed any tighter, she would not be able to pour out the tea when it finally arrived. “But now she is too ill to move. I explained that in my letter.”
    Gwen sniffed. “I am sure she