Almost Heaven Read online

  “The creditors will back away the minute they see you’re betrothed to a man of means and consequence, and I promise you we won’t have a problem finding one of those.”

  Elizabeth thought the whole scheme sounded mercenary and cold, but Robert shook his head. This time he was the practical one: “You’re a female, love, and you have to wed, you know that—all women must wed. You’re not going to meet anyone eligible cooped up at Havenhurst. And I’m not suggesting we accept an offer from just anyone. I’ll choose someone you can develop a lasting affection for, and then,” he promised sincerely, “I’ll bargain for a long engagement on the basis of your youth. No respectable man would want to rush a seventeen-year-old girl into matrimony before she was ready for it. It’s the only way,” he warned her when she looked as if she was going to argue.

  Sheltered though she’d been, Elizabeth knew he was not being unreasonable about expecting her to wed. Before her parent’s death they’d made it very clear that it was her duty to marry in accordance with her family’s wishes. In this case, her half-brother was in charge of making the selection, and Elizabeth trusted him implicitly.

  “Fess up,” Robert teased gently, “haven’t you ever dreamed of wearing beautiful gowns and being courted by handsome beaux?”

  “Perhaps a few times,” Elizabeth admitted with an embarrassed sidewise smile, and it was something of an understatement. She was a normal, healthy girl, filled with affection, and she’d read her share of romantic novels. That last part of what Robert said had much appeal. “Very well,” she said with a decisive chuckle. “We’ll give it a try.”

  “We’ll have to do more than try, Elizabeth, we’ll have to pull it off, or you’ll end up as a landless governess to someone else’s children instead of a countess or better, with children of your own. I’ll land in debtors’ gaol.” The idea of Robert in a dank cell and herself without Havenhurst was enough to make Elizabeth agree to almost anything. “Leave everything to me,” he said, and Elizabeth did.

  In the next six months Robert set about to overcome every obstacle that might prevent Elizabeth from making a spectacular impression on the London scene. A woman named Mrs. Porter was employed to teach Elizabeth those intricate social skills her mother and former governess had not. From Mrs. Porter Elizabeth learned that she must never betray that she was intelligent, well-read, or the slightest bit interested in horticulture.

  An expensive couturier in London was employed to design and make all the gowns Mrs. Porter deemed necessary for the Season.

  Miss Lucinda Throckmorton-Jones, former paid companion to several of the ton’s most successful debutantes of prior seasons, came to Havenhurst to fill the position of Elizabeth’s duenna. A woman of fifty with wiry gray hair she scraped back into a bun and the posture of a ramrod, she had a permanently pinched face, as if she smelled something disagreeable but was too well-bred to remark upon it. In addition to the duenna’s daunting physical appearance, Elizabeth observed shortly after their first meeting that Miss Throckmorton-Jones possessed an astonishing ability to sit serenely for hours without twitching so much as a finger.

  Elizabeth refused to be put off by her stony demeanor and set about finding a way to thaw her. Teasingly, she called her “Lucy,” and when the casually affectionate nickname won a thunderous frown from the lady, Elizabeth tried to find a different means. She discovered it very soon: A few days after Lucinda came to live at Havenhurst the duenna discovered her curled up in a chair in Havenhurst’s huge library, engrossed in a book. “You enjoy reading?” Lucinda had said gruffly—and with surprise—as she noted the gold embossed title on the volume.

  “Yes,” Elizabeth had assured her, smiling. “Do you?”

  “Have you read Christopher Marlowe?”

  “Yes, but I prefer Shakespeare.”

  Thereafter it became their policy each night after supper to debate the merits of the individual books they’d read. Before long Elizabeth realized that she’d won the duenna’s reluctant respect. It was impossible to be certain she’d won Lucinda’s affection, for the only emotion the lady ever displayed was anger, and that only once, at a miscreant tradesman in the village. Even so, it was a display Elizabeth never forgot. Wielding her ever-present umbrella, Lucinda had advanced on the hapless man, backing him clear around his own shop, while from her lips in a icy voice poured the most amazing torrent of eloquent, biting fury Elizabeth had ever heard.

  “My temper,” Lucinda had primly informed her—by way of apology, Elizabeth supposed—“is my only shortcoming.”

  Privately, Elizabeth thought Lucy must bottle up all her emotions inside herself as she sat perfectly still on sofas and chairs, for years at a time, until it finally exploded like one of those mountains she’d read about that poured forth molten rock when the pressure finally reached a peak.

  By the time the Camerons, along with Lucinda and the necessary servants, arrived in London for Elizabeth’s debut, Elizabeth had learned all that Mrs. Porter could teach her, and she felt quite capable of meeting the challenges Mrs. Porter described. Actually, other than memorizing the rules of etiquette she was a little baffled over the huge fuss being made. After all, she’d learned to dance in the six months she was being prepared for her debut, and she’d been conversing since she was three years old, and as closely as she could tell, her only duties as a debutante were to converse politely on trivial subjects only, conceal her intelligence at all costs, and dance.

  The day after they settled into their rented town house her sponsor into the ranks of the ton, Lady Jamison, called on Elizabeth and Robert. With her were two daughters, Valerie and Charise. Valerie was a year older than Elizabeth and had made her debut the year before; Charise was five years older—the young widow of old Lord Dumont who cocked up his toes a month after the nuptials, leaving his new wife wealthy, relieved, and entirely independent.

  In the two weeks before the Season began Elizabeth spent considerable time with the wealthy young debutantes who gathered in the Jamison drawing room to gossip happily about everything and anyone. All of them had come to London with the same noble duty and familial objective: to marry, in accordance with their family’s wishes, the wealthiest possible suitor while at the same time increasing their family’s wealth and social standing.

  It was in that drawing room that Elizabeth’s education was continued and completed. She discovered to her shock that Mrs. Porter had been right about name-dropping. She also discovered that it was apparently not considered bad manners among the ton to discuss another person’s financial status—particularly the status and prospects of an unmarried gentleman. The very first day it was all she could do not to betray her ignorance with a horrified gasp at the conversation swirling around her: “Lord Peters is an excellent catch. Why, he has an income of £20,000 and every prospect of being named heir to his uncle’s baronetcy if his uncle dies of his heart ailment, which there’s every reason to expect he will,” one of the girls had announced, and the others chimed in: “Shoreham has that splendid estate in Wiltshire, and Mama is living on tenterhooks waiting to see if hell declare himself. . . . Think of it, the Shoreham emeralds! . . . Robelsly is driving a splendid blue baroche, but Papa said he’s up to his ears in debt and that I may on no account consider him. . . . Elizabeth, wait until you meet Richard Shipley! Do not under any circumstances let his charm fool you; he’s a complete scoundrel, and though he dresses to the nines, he hasn’t a feather to fly with!” That last advice came from Valerie Jamison, whom Elizabeth regarded as her very closest friend among the girls.

  Elizabeth had gladly accepted their collective friendship and, outwardly, their advice. However, she felt increasingly uneasy about some of their attitudes toward people they judged as their inferiors—which wasn’t surprising from a young lady who regarded her butler and coachman as her equals.

  On the other hand, she was in love with London, with its bustling streets, manicured parks, and air of excited expectation, and she adored having friends who, when they weren’