Free Blossom Time by Joan Smith

Sylvester will come into something very worthwhile. He will be a good catch for some wide-awake lady. There are no girls in the family, you must know. Sylvester, as the second son, should get his mama’s dot. Twenty-five thousand, I believe it was. The estate in Surrey might very well go to him as well, from his uncle Cyrus. Cyrus Staunton was minister of war for the Tories a few decades ago. He picked up a dozen sinecures at court.”
    Annabelle didn’t know what a sinecure was, but as they grew at court, she felt they must be something good. “Lord Sylvester will live in London year-round, I should think,” she said.
    “You couldn’t drive him out with a team of horses. His head is full of nothing but causing a stir with his poetry and magazine. Byron, the scoundrel, has a good deal to account for. I expect Sylvester will grow out of it, but he will never be satisfied to rusticate. He is a city creature. He lives in the family’s London house. Dunston is too old to make the trip for the Season. Even Moffat seldom takes a Season, now that he is shackled.”
    A city creature. Annabelle was interested to learn there was a name for the cause of her particular malaise. She, too, was a city creature. She tried to like living in the country, but there was no denying she felt shortchanged by having to limit herself to country assemblies and such dull do’s as she had attended last night and tonight. Her own parties were much livelier, but it took more than one lady to create the sort of life she wanted.
    She had tried to interest Dick in hiring a house in London for a Season after they were married, but he just said she would likely be enceinte by then, and why would she want to be rattling about London when she was in such an ungainly condition. Lord Sylvester, on the other hand, lived in a noble London mansion all year round, on close terms with the tip of the ton. A city creature. The phrase held the allure of sin for her.
    She was the first one out the door when Dick announced that the dancing was about to begin. Only Sukey was there before her, waiting patiently on a bentwood chair against the wall. Annabelle had to have the first set with Dick, but as soon as it was over, she went to speak to Rosalind, who had been dancing with Sylvester.
    “Should Sukey not be in her bed by now?” she said.
    “Indeed she should. She likes to see the show—all the ladies in their finery.”
    She went to dispatch Sukey, who was sleepy enough that she went without an argument.
    When the next set began, Sylvester, perforce, stood up with Annabelle. Their first conversation was to agree that it was foolishly lax to allow a child to attend an adults’ party. That settled, Annabelle expressed a keen interest in poetry, and asked why there were none of his poems in the most recent issue of Camena.
    “I am ashamed to say I have never read your work, milord, for I am sure you must be famous. Croydon is so backward. I had to wait two weeks to get Sir Walter Scott’s Guy Mannering. I do miss the mental stimulation of London.”
    “There is nowhere like it. As Dr. Johnson said, ‘When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.’ Interesting you should ask why there is none of my work in the magazine, Miss Fortescue. There is nothing I like better than writing poetry, but the fact is, since I have become the editor and publisher of my magazine, I find my time pretty well filled up with the duties of running it. I have to read the submissions, you see, and decide which offerings merit publication.”
    “Could you not hire someone to sort out the wheat from the chaff for your final approval, and leave you free to write your marvelous poetry?”
    “Now we come to the financing. I should like to hire an assistant editor eventually, but I have to keep my staff to a minimum for the present. I don’t come into my inheritance for a few years. It is foolishly tied up until I am twenty-five. I am so weary of cadging from friends and