Free Enlightening Delilah by MC Beaton Page B

Little Season and not to have to wait until the real Season begins.’
    ‘We’ll manage,’ said Amy gruffly.
    ‘You are overset because for some reason you expect the squire to propose marriage,’ said Effy. ‘He will not, Amy. Oh, I know he likes you, but there is nothing of the lover there.’
    Amy looked up. ‘It’s no use hoping it ain’t true, Effy. He said I made him think of marriage.’
    Effy began to cry. ‘What will I do?’ she cried. ‘I shall be left here on my own to manage savage girls.’
    ‘Now, now,’ said Amy. ‘Don’t cry. You can come and live with us.’
    ‘But the country!’ wailed Effy. ‘I hate the country. Oh, are you really sure of this, Amy? What of Mr Haddon?’
    ‘Mr Haddon is fond of both of us, Effy. But face facts. He’s an old stick of a bachelor and will always be that way.’
    Delilah penned a letter to her father and then instructed Harris to have it sent express. Then, when her fury died down, it was replaced by a recurrence of the miserable thought that all her flirting and romancing had been discussed and worried over behind her back. It seemed to Delilah as if the whole of Kent was discussing her humiliation at the hands of Sir Charles and assuming she had turned down so many because she could not have him.
    She now hated Sir Charles. He had walked back into her life – calm, handsome and indifferent. She was stranded in this odd house with these odd sisters, one of whom was about to become her stepmother. There was no going back to her old life.
    Baxter came in and began to lay out Delilah’s gown for the ball. Delilah looked at her in surprise. She had assumed, after all the shocks and revelations, that she would not be going and neither would the Tribbles.
    But she felt too upset to face any more rows by declaring she was staying at home. In a stony silence, she allowed Baxter to dress her and fix her hair.
    She went down to the drawing room to join Amy and Effy, her face set in hard, haughty lines.
    Delilah was nearly bowled over by Amy, who rushed forward and clasped her in her arms. ‘I am a boor and a beast,’ said Amy. ‘Please say you forgive me, Miss Wraxall.’
    ‘Yes, do forgive us,’ said Effy quietly as Amy released Delilah and stood back. ‘It must have come as a shock to you to learn your father was paying for our services. We quite understand your wish to leave. But do consider, we can have a little fun and perhaps enjoy ourselves.’
    ‘You must need my father’s money very badly,’ said Delilah.
    ‘Oh, yes,’ said Amy seriously. ‘It is very hard to have to work for one’s money. One is so at the mercy of people’s whims.’
    Delilah looked at the odd pair of sisters: Effy, so delicate and pretty, Amy, so tall and masculine. ‘Tell me,’ she asked curiously, ‘how did you plan to . . . er . . . reform me?’
    Amy thought quickly. They had not, in fact, had any plan of campaign, merely hoping to refine Delilah’s behaviour as they went along. But she said slowly, ‘I think, you know, we would have encouraged Sir Charles to call here as often as possible and may even have held a dinner in his honour.’
    ‘Why?’ exclaimed Delilah.
    Amy wrinkled her brow. ‘You see, you were seventeen the time he left for the wars. Your papa told me you were pretty then but hardly as beautiful or modish as you are now. Sir Charles was twenty-eight then and a mature man worrying about going to the wars. He is now thirty-four and you are twenty-three, so there is less of an emotional age difference between the two of you. I think, you know, you would find it very easy indeed to make Sir Charles Digby fall in love with you. Then
you
could spurn
him
and perhaps that would change your mind and encourage you to settle down.’
    ‘I do not know why everyone insists on damning me as a heart-breaker,’ said Delilah. ‘Sir Charles means nothing to me.’
    But Amy’s words about making Sir Charles fall in love with her were like balm to Delilah’s