His Lady Mistress. Elizabeth Rolls

spoke to thin air, since Lady Faringdon had already stormed from the room. Arguing was a waste of breath. The mildest protest drew as heavy a retribution as full-scale rebellion. Not even over the hated name Selina did she object now.

      Resigned, Verity locked the chest with the key she wore on a plaited string around her neck. Giving the chest an affectionate pat, she gathered herself together, picked up her workbasket and left the bleak little room in her aunt’s wake. Celia, of course, would be hysterical with fury over the torn flounce, blaming everything and everyone for the catastrophe save her own carelessness.

      ‘Where have you been?’ screeched Celia, as Verity entered the elegant bedchamber. ‘Just look at this! And Lord Blakehurst may arrive at any minute!’

      Verity selected the matching cotton and threaded her needle, biting back the urge to point out that Lord Blakehurst would be admitted to the house by the butler and every footman available and would be greeted with all due ceremony by his host and hostess. Furthermore, since he would doubtless repair immediately to his bedchamber to adjust his cravat and swill brandy, he would scarcely notice the absence of his hosts’ eldest daughter, with or without a torn flounce. At least that was her considered opinion, based on the observation of other visiting gentlemen. There was no reason to suspect that Earl Blakehurst would differ from the rest in any degree. Except, of course, in being richer.

      She knelt down at Celia’s hem and began to stitch.

      ‘Hurry up!’ whined Celia, whirling away to the window and dragging the offending flounce out of Verity’s grasp. A ripping sound rewarded this indiscretion.

      ‘Look what you’ve done!’ Celia’s shriek of fury outdid her previous efforts. ‘Oh, Mama! Look what she’s done! She did it on purpose, too!’

      Biting back some very unladylike language, Verity turned to see her aunt advancing into the room.

      ‘Ungrateful girl!’ cried Lady Faringdon. ‘After all we’ve done for you! The very clothes on your back!’

      Verity rather thought the light-devouring black dress she wore was one discarded by the Rectory housekeeper, but she bit her tongue and concentrated grimly on stitching up Celia’s flounce as efficiently as possible. With a modicum of luck Lord Blakehurst would marry the girl and prove to be a veritable Bluebeard.

      Nothing she heard about Lord Blakehurst in the next twenty-four hours led her to revise her estimate that it would be a match richly deserved by both parties. Lord Blakehurst had arrived late, snubbed at least three people at dinner, whom he plainly considered beneath his exalted touch, and everyone was hanging upon his every utterance.

      ‘Such a personable man!’ sighed Celia the following evening as she prepared for bed. ‘Terribly rich of course. One can only wonder that he has left it so long to marry! Of course, he came into the title unexpectedly when his brother died three years ago.’

      Verity, tidying away her cousin’s clothes, thought it entirely possible that no female would have so conceited a man as his lordship must be, only to dismiss the idea. Anyone that rich could be as conceited as he liked and society would still deem him a personable man.

      ‘And, of course, he must be seeking a bride if he has come here,’ continued Celia.

      Verity blinked as she put away a chemise. ‘Oh?’ That leap of logic evaded her. She had yet to learn that a visit to Faringdon Hall was a prerequisite for matrimonially inclined Earls.

      ‘He never accepts invitations to house parties, except from his closest friends,’ explained Celia, in tones of gracious condescension. Or boasting, more like. Verity shut the drawer with a snap on the chemise. Pity it wasn’t Celia in there.

      ‘Conceive for yourself how pleased Mama was when his lordship indicated that an invitation would be accepted.’ Celia preened in the mirror, all golden-haired, blue-eyed conceit. ‘Naturally he wishes to court me a little more privately than is possible in London.’

      Since when did a house party with over twenty guests afford any privacy for a courtship? Verity swallowed the observation. If it made Celia happy, then who was she to cavil?

      ‘I’m surprised you came up so early, then,’ she remarked.

      Celia shrugged. ‘Oh, Blakehurst disappeared to the billiard room with a few of the other gentlemen. And Mama had to invite that tedious Arabella Hollingsworth with her parents, so what was the point? All she does is brag about her betrothal to Sir Bartholomew!’ Celia pouted. ‘So I said I had the headache and came up. Anyway, gentlemen prefer a female to be a little fragile.’

      Verity hid a grin. If Celia were as lucky as her erstwhile friend in snaring a husband, namely Lord Blakehurst, then cock-a-hoop wouldn’t begin to describe her. No doubt Celia’s sudden recognition of Miss Hollingsworth’s tediousness had its origins in jealousy. As for fragile—Celia was about as fragile as a viper.

      ‘You may brush my hair now, Selina.’ Celia gazed at her reflection in satisfaction, patting a bobbing curl.

      Verity reminded herself not to rip the curl out and picked up the silver-backed hairbrush.

      ‘Oh, dear,’ said Celia sadly. ‘Just look at all those disgusting freckles!’

      Staring at her cousin’s flawless complexion in the mirror, Verity wondered what maggot had entered her head now.

      ‘I can’t see any,’ she said unguardedly, ‘but the Denmark lotion is there on your dressing table if you need it.’

      The reflection smiled spitefully. ‘I meant your freckles, Selina.’

      Verity took a firmer grip on the brush along with her temper and began brushing. Much safer to say it all to her pillow. Unlike Celia, the pillow would not carry tales and earn her further punishment. If nothing else, the Faringdons had taught her the virtue of hiding her feelings under a stolid demeanour.

      She shivered. Being Selina made that so much easier. Frighteningly easy. At times it felt as though Verity had retreated into a numbing mist. That one day she might not be able to find the way out again.

      Verity wriggled her shoulders pleasurably as the sun poured over them, sinking deep. Not even the basket full of mending daunted her when she had managed to escape from everyone for a couple of hours. No doubt she’d have a few more freckles on her nose to add to the ones Celia had found so disgusting the previous evening. It seemed a small enough price for a morning spent out of doors.

      Her mind drifted as her needle flashed over the torn sheet, insensibly soothed by the trickle of the fountain, and the occasional flicker of a goldfish between the lily pads. A contented bee hummed in the lavender behind her. Here she could dream. Pretend that in the house, or somewhere about the estate, was someone who cared for her. She could be Verity, not Selina.

      Here in the centre of the maze she was safe for the time being. Except, of course, for her toes. They were in imminent danger of being devoured. She wiggled them gently in the water as she scissored her bare legs and felt the flutter as the startled fish fled.

      ‘Oh, Lord Blakehurst! What a tarradiddle! You are the most dreadful creature!’

      Celia’s most flirtatious simper, followed by a very male rumble, shattered her peace. What on earth was Celia—whom the servants dubbed Mistress Slug-a-bed—doing in the maze at nine o’clock in the morning, let alone with Lord Blakehurst? Not for the first time Verity crashed headfirst into her aunt’s towering hypocrisy—only to a man of massive fortune and noble degree would Lady Faringdon have entrusted her virtuous treasure in such a potential den of iniquity as the garden maze. And in any other damsel such behaviour would be condemned as shameless.

      Another giggle reminded Verity of the precarious nature of her situation. She surged to her feet, stuffing mending as well as her stockings and slippers into the basket and suppressing a curse as she pricked her finger on the needle. Which path were they on? She had to pick one that wouldn’t bring her face to face with Celia and her swain. She shivered. If they caught her here, it would be one more hiding place crossed