Free The Dreadful Debutante by M. C. Beaton Page A

carefully took off the clothes he had given her, wondering in a numb sort of way if she would ever have the courage to return them to him or to face him again. She washed and changed into her nightdress and lay down on the bed after having taken the dummy out. She lay on her back, very still, and stared up at the bed canopy. The sounds of morning London filtered into the room, carriages, street cries, footsteps, dusters flapping from windows as the maids went about their work, and the occasional clatter of an iron hoop, bowled along the pavement by a child.
     
    That kiss had changed everything. Unlike Sleeping Beauty the kiss had awakened her to a difficult world of reality. A child had slipped out to meet the marquess the night before, and a woman had returned. This was the day Charles was coming to propose to Drusilla, and she felt… nothing. She turned abruptly over on her side and fell asleep, not waking until two in the afternoon, when she was roused by the maid, who told her coyly that she had to put one of her best gowns on and make herself ready for a family celebration.
     
    When she entered the drawing room, she was not at first aware of Charles and Drusilla standing holding hands in front of the fireplace but of her father. Mr. Markham was surveying her with an odd half-questioning, half-anxious look in his eyes.
     
    “Wish your sister every happiness,” said Mrs. Markham. “She and Charles are to wed.”
     
    Mira went forward and kissed Drusilla on the cheek. “I hope you will be very happy.” She then curtsied to Charles. “It is a pleasure to welcome you as a member of the family.”
     
    It was prettily done, but Mira was still turning over the events of the night before in her mind and so was not aware of Drusilla’s startled and petulant look of surprise. Drusilla had been looking forward so much to scoring over Mira that Mira’s calm acceptance of her engagement took all the excitement out of it, and for the first time Drusilla began to wonder uneasily if she really wanted to be married to Charles. And what had happened to little Mira, accepting a glass of champagne and looking very much the mistress of herself and her emotions?
     
    Charles talked about how he planned to sell out of the army and discussed a “tidy property” near their own in the country that he had his eye on. And Mira, drinking and listening to him, could no longer see him with the eyes of love. He seemed a staid man, middle-aged before his time, and rather pompous.
     
    “We are to attend the Freemonts’ ball in Kensington tonight,” said Mrs. Markham with satisfaction, for to have one daughter engaged so early in the Season was a triumph, and although the announcement would not be in the newspapers until the following morning, Mrs. Markham intended that people should know of her triumph as soon as possible.
     
    Mira hoped the marquess would not be at the ball. He had suddenly become a stranger to her, an incalculable man rather than a friend. But he had given her good advice, and she would take it. If she married someone, say, like young Mr. Danby, then she would have an establishment of her own, her own horses and dogs, and children. Children! She had not thought of children before. If she had children, she could teach them to ride. If she had girls, she would not produce another Mira. She would train a daughter to be a young miss from the beginning. And a son? Her eyes grew misty with dreams.
     
    Charles, glancing at her, was arrested by the transformed glow on her face. How odd Mira was, he reflected. He had always accepted the Markham family idea that Mira was the plain one, and yet she seemed to have a strange, almost fey beauty. He found himself reluctantly remembering her courage and humor. Mira would never have expected you to leave the army, said a treacherous little voice in his head. He turned quickly and looked down at the beauty that was Drusilla Markham. He would be the envy of every man in