Free Marrying Harriet by MC Beaton Page A

ladies were going out driving with a gentleman of whom she had never heard. Amy and Effy in their excitement forgot to tell her that Mr Lawrence was Lord Charles’s uncle, and so she thought, as she had thought in the recent days when he had failed to put in an appearance, that Lord Charles had forgotten about her plans of marriage for the Tribbles.
    Mr Haddon and Mr Randolph took their leave without waiting to see the sisters depart on their drive. ‘Lord Charles must have been telling the truth,’ said Mr Haddon wonderingly as both men strolled in the direction of Oxford Street. ‘Which one do you think he fancies, Miss Amy or Miss Effy?’
    ‘Bound to be Miss Effy,’ said Mr Randolph.
    Mr Haddon walked on for some moments in silence. ‘I would not be too sure of that,’ he said at last. ‘Miss Amy has very fetching ways.’
    Amy and Effy had told Harriet to continue with her French lessons in their absence, but no sooner had they gone than a message arrived from the French tutor to say he was indisposed and so Harriet was free. And then Lord Charles Marsham made his entrance, the cat at his heels, a cat that now sported a smart red collar studded with rubies.
    ‘I do not like Tom in that collar,’ said Harriet severely. ‘It is a stray cat, an undistinguished cat. To dress it up thus is making a mockery of the animal.’
    ‘I am bringing it into fashion, Miss Brown,’ said Lord Charles plaintively.
    Harriet turned to the butler, who was standing by the open door of the drawing room. ‘Is it quite correct for me to receive Lord Charles?’ she asked the butler.
    ‘Yes, miss. Mrs Lamont, the housekeeper, is at hand and I will leave the door of the drawing room open.’
    ‘And now the conventions have been satisfied,’ remarked Lord Charles when the butler had withdrawn, ‘tell me how you go on and why have you not been out and about in society?’
    ‘I have,’ said Harriet, ‘but not to any major event. Alas, I have not met any young female who would suit your taste. But I am to go to the Marchioness of Raby’s masked ball.’
    ‘I, too, will attend. What are you going as?’
    ‘A Cromwellian lady.’
    ‘How eminently suitable.’
    ‘I am sure that is not meant as a compliment,’ said Harriet. ‘Now, to business. Have you done anything at all about the Misses Tribble?’
    ‘Fie, for shame, Miss Brown, when I just saw both of them driving out with my uncle.’
    ‘Your uncle! Mr Lawrence is your uncle? But he does not have a title.’
    ‘My mother’s side of the family are very plain.’
    Harriet smiled on him with such warmth that he blinked. She was always pleased to find her faith in the human race justified. ‘I knew there was some good in you. If only you were travelling to Paris.’
    He smiled lazily and patted the cat. ‘Why Paris, Miss Brown?’
    ‘You could be of such use to me. Have you heard of Yvette, the dressmaker?’
    ‘Of course.’
    ‘There is no “of course” about it,’ said Harriet tartly. ‘Gentlemen do not usually know the names of dressmakers.
    ‘You will find in society,’ said Lord Charles meekly, ‘that any man worth his salt knows the best dressmakers and the best milliners and the best place to buy feathers . . .’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘In order to be able to converse with the fair sex. I have spent many a happy evening discoursing on the merits of glove-makers.’
    Harriet looked at him doubtfully. It was hard to understand a man of mature years and good physique who had fought in the wars and yet whose mind appeared to be wholly given over to dissipation and triviality. Still, he had done his best for the Tribbles.
    ‘Yvette,’ she began, colouring slightly, ‘has an illegitimate baby. The father is a Monsieur Duclos, now working in Paris as a valet to the Comte de Ville. He is not aware he has a son.’
    ‘Allow me to interrupt, Capability Brown. You wish me to ride to Paris and drag the guilty father back to London at the wheels of my