Fanny nodded dubiously. She had met Mr Dalgleish earlier that morning but had been unmoved by his attempts to win her over with an abundance of charm.
However, whether his charm worked on Lizzy Scott was at the heart of how she’d play her role of hostess.
Regardless of what Mrs Hodge wanted her to do, Fanny would not champion Mr Dalgleish if she felt it was not in Lizzy Scott’s best interests.
Not after her own dreadful experiences not so many years before. Having been coerced into agreeing to a marriage organised by her mother, it was Fenton’s sudden arrival into her orbit that had changed the trajectory of her life and ensured her a lifetime’s union of happiness.
No amount of money or prestige could make up for an unhappy marriage.
And Fanny was well aware of the power held by an ambitious and ruthless mama. She had not yet met Lizzy Scott, but regardless of what the girl turned out to be, she could not, in good conscience, see her bartered for the benefits offered by an unconscionable fortune hunter.
Chapter 7
After nearly two days of feeling as free as a bird during her journey to Quamby House, Lizzy was not prepared for the sudden weight that seemed to land upon her shoulders as she stepped into the vestibule of the grand home where she was to spend the next five days.
One moment she’d been walking up the stone steps filled with hope and expectation, the next saw her literally sink onto the spindly settee against the wall as she was given the news she should have been expecting.
Mrs Hodge wanted to see her now?
Of course Mrs Hodge wanted to see her. Had been waiting for her. Was, right now, pacing her little sitting room and muttering a long list of Lizzy’s misdemeanours—imagined and otherwise—ready to throw at her head the moment she stepped through the door.
“Miss, are yer feeling all right?”
Lizzy managed a deep breath and nodded at the parlourmaid who stood waiting by the open door to the passage.
“Then I’ll take yer to see Mrs 'Odge directly. The footman 'as already taken yer trunk to the West Wing an’ yer maid is unpackin’ fer yer now.”
Lizzy followed the servant through a catacomb of passages and up a flight of stairs feeling increasingly sick with nerves. The house was enormous. She had no idea how she’d find her way back to her bedchamber, unless she clung to Mrs Hodge’s skirts the whole time. Which she had no intention of doing.
Except…
“I’m not sharing an apartment with Mrs Hodge?” she asked.
“’Fraid not, miss. She’s in the East Wing 'an yer in the West Wing.”
“Oh,” was all Lizzy could manage while the sense of liberation she’d felt these past two days made a tentative return.
“'Ere we are, miss,” the maid said at last, throwing open the door to a boldly decorated chamber with red walls and red and white striped curtains.
And there, upon an elaborately carved Egyptian sofa sat Mrs Hodge, who might have been diminished by the drama of her surroundings had her ensemble of puce satin with a matching toque surmounted by the plumage of an entire peacock not been designed to dominate all about her.
Including Lizzy who dropped her eyes as she bobbed a curtsey as she said in a calculated ploy to win a fair reception, “I hope you are as well as you look, Mrs Hodge.”
Mrs Hodge sniffed. “I hear you had an adventure, Lizzy. Mabel told me all about it.”
Lizzy sent her a cautious look as she continued to stand, like a schoolgirl awaiting direction. She was relatively certain Mabel could show the necessary discretion. The girl was loyal, but Mrs Hodge was a supremely efficient interrogator. More than once, Lizzy had spent the night in the cupboard under the stairs with bread and water for her supper after Mabel—or she—had broken down under questioning.
In this instance, however, and to Lizzy’s great relief, it seemed Mabel had bested her employer, for Mrs Hodge went on with a frown, “It was good fortune that it should happen to be a doctor who attended you at the scene of your terrible ordeal and who delivered you to the inn and looked after you. Both Mabel and John Coachman tell me you nearly drowned. Fortunately, my carriage didn’t suffer as much damage as I had feared. Tom says it was pulled out of the river last night and is being repaired.”
“A very lucky escape for your carriage, indeed, ma’am,” Lizzy murmured.
“And a very lucky escape for your entire wardrobe,” Mrs Hodge went on. “I believe it was discovered less than a foot from the river’s edge.” She raised her eyes heavenward and blanched beneath her rouge and powder. “Irreplaceable! At least the money spent on rigging you out so that you can do justice to all those who have invested so much into you, Lizzy, has not been wasted. I hope you spared a thought for that.”
“Indeed, I’ve thought of nothing else, ma’am.”
There was a flare of suspicion in the other woman’s eyes but she went on as if Lizzy hadn’t spoken. “You have four days to shine, my girl. Four days in which to make a match. Don’t squander it.”
“Oh, I won’t,” Lizzy assured her, this time with genuine sincerity. “I believe there are a hundred people invited to the Yuletide Ball. I’m sure that—”