Maggie MacKeever Read Online Free PDF Page A

cambrics, ribbon and fine muslin might not tempt Cressida to part with her money— Cressida, avowed her fond father, was a nipfarthing—she had, all the same, struck in Brighton precisely the sort of bargain that most appealed to her. Her father might claim that Lieutenant Neal Baskerville would never come up to scratch, would cry off before the fatal hour, but Cressida believed otherwise. Cressida understood the gentlemanly precepts of honor, as her father did not. Lieutenant Baskerville could not break off a formal betrothal without appearing the veriest coxcomb. Cressida planned to burst upon the ton in a very memorable style, via St. George’s, Hanover Square.
    Not, of course, that Neal had shown any indication of developing cold feet. Cressida flattered herself that he was absolutely enraptured with her. Certainly he was indefatigable in his attentions. Cressida would take good care that he continued to be. She was a wise young lady, far too shrewd to let either her ambition or triumph show.
    At this point in her ruminations, as she proceeded toward the library on the Marine Parade, where she planned to gaze out to sea through a telescope, or perhaps peruse the London newspapers that were delivered punctually each evening by coach, Cressida’s progress received a check. Neal himself confronted her, looking rather out of breath.
    “I have been looking everywhere for you,” he said. “Your mother told me you had gone this way. Cressida, I must speak with you.”
    “Well, you are doing so, are you not?” Cressida prided herself on her practicality. “Ought you not to be on parade? Colonel Fortescue will be very displeased that you neglect the drill. You will likely receive a severe reprimand.”
    Neal was not especially gratified to receive from his fiancée a gentle lecture on the perils of missing parade of a morning, though what she said was true. Lieutenant Baskerville’s colonel was not enamored of him, a circumstance deriving not from Neal’s deficiency in military ability, but to Neal’s cousin’s friendship with the colonel’s dashing young wife. Neal firmly believed that Sandor had taken up with the fair Phaedra with that exact end in mind. Was he never to be freed of Sandor’s cursed influence? With a lessening of anger, he gazed upon the young lady who was his current hope of escape.
    She was waiting patiently for his explanation, her gray eyes fixed on his face. It occurred to Neal that he’d never glimpsed the slightest hint of passion on those exquisite features. However, passion was not an emotion with which young ladies of refinement were expected to be familiar. “My God, you’re lovely, Cressida!” he uttered, rather thickly.
    Miss Choice-Pickerell frowned, looking simultaneously offended and demure—to good effect had Miss Choice-Pickerell studied her attitudes before her looking glass. Clearly she was not flattered by his ardor. Reflecting that it was a damned dull courtship when both sides conducted themselves with the utmost decorum, and further reflecting that tedium was preferable to being made Sandor’s cat’s-paw, Neal apologized.
    Gracefully, Cressida indicated forgiveness. “You have not told me,” she scolded gently, “what has caused you to come racing after me like the veriest schoolboy. After all, we are engaged for this afternoon.”
    “That’s just it: we’re not.” Neal offered her his arm. “Sandor has bespoken me to run an errand for him. I am very sorry for it, but I must beg off from my engagement to you.”
    Lieutenant Baskerville, thought his fiancée, might be a man of rank and fashion, a very Apollo in form, but there were numerous flaws in his character. Chief among those defects was a lack of the courage to beg leave to differ with his cousin’s royal decrees. “I see,” Cressida said coolly. “What excuse has he used this time? I can only think His Grace does not approve of your association with me.”
    “Sandor,” retorted Neal heatedly,