Barbara Metzger Read Online Free PDF Page B

of!” At his sudden scowl she hastily added, “Not for being a lightskirt, Arthur, just a hoyden, you know. And if you think Squire is going to storm in here, demanding you do the honourable thing by me, you’re more paper-skulled than you used to be. Never fear, the last thing in the world Squire would want is to have me as part of the family.”
    She giggled at the very thought of it, till her companion quietly announced, “The only problem, sweetheart, is that I am not Arthur.”

Chapter Three
    “George,” Squire Bottwick told himself, hands crossed over his full belly, “life is sweet.” Good wine, good food, good friends, and, for once, good riddance to the aggravating Miss Trevaine. He patted his inside pocket where reposed the most satisfying correspondence he’d had in years. He had received the note before dinner, and was still tickled pink at the idea of letting the interfering little wench cook in her own stewpot while he enjoyed his meal.
    It was good English fare, none of those Frenchified dishes drowning in sauces that curdled Squire’s digestive juices. It was good enough for the fine London folks, too, judging from all they ate and drank, even his sister Clothilda Ponsonby, who’d put on enough airs for a duchess after snabbling herself a title. In her widowhood she had grown positively stiff-rumped with pride. Plain missus was good enough for Mrs. Bottwick, Squire thought, glancing at his wife at the opposite end of the table. She had done him proud, just as though she set ten places with five courses and six removes every evening. Even his daughter Samantha, invited to leave the nursery party when they found themselves an odd number at table, was behaving just as she ought. The gal was young, but she could take a few lessons from her cousin Priscilla, who had been Out for two years and was considered last Season’s Toast. Too bad Priscilla seemed to share her mama’s top-lofty consequence. Still, she was a taking miss, judging from her partners’ attentiveness. Colonel Highet, was it, and Lord Humboldt, or Captain Humboldt and Mr. Highet? Ah well, friends of Arthur’s.
    Arthur sat between Samantha and Priscilla’s pretty friend Miss Marcella Chadwick, here at Squire’s table, unthreatened, unfettered, uncaptured! Squire beamed. Top of the trees, young Arthur was, too, his shirtpoints nearly reaching his ears, his neckcloth done up in some pattern so intricate that it must have a name of its own. Personally, Bottwick thought it all a little overdone for a country dinner, but what did he know about fashion? He looked down regretfully at his own figured waistcoat, just a trifle redecorated with his dinner’s spatters, and wished he could undo a few of the buttons. Ah well, a man couldn’t have everything, he decided. It might spoil him.
    *
    By the time dinner was over and the men had shared port, cigars, and lies of their prowess on various hunting fields, Squire was fit to burst more than the seams of his jacket. A few more brandies, and the joke was just too good not to share.
    “Arthur,” he said when the tea tray was brought in, “do you recall Jacelyn Trevaine, m’neighbour’s daughter?”
    “You mean the nasty little tomboy with freckles? How could I forget? She pushed me in the lake once when I was searching for birds’ nests.”
    “She’s not changed much, I’ll warrant. Oh, she’s filled out some, but she still gets up to her mad starts. You’ll never guess what she’s done now!” He slapped his beefy hand down on his thigh, the sound drawing the attention of everyone except Lord Smedley, Clothilda’s cisisbeo, who was snoring in the corner, a handkerchief over his face.
    “I was just telling Arthur here about my neighbour,” Bottwick informed his listeners. “The father’s a good man. Not the sporting type, you understand, but good, for all that. The daughter, though, is an unprincipled baggage. Always was, always will be.”
    “You don’t mean Jacey, do you,