The Byram Succession Read Online Free PDF

disgust. Much could be set down to good breeding. But if the rest of his world treated him with a matching indifference, existence might be bearable after all. Certainly it was with a slight lifting of his spirits that he told Judd to “put ’em along a bit.”

 
    THREE
    Aunt Maria had begun to grow quite anxious by the time the travellers at last presented themselves in Berkeley Square. She greeted them warmly, voluble in her relief that she would not now have to put dinner back, since nothing annoyed Uncle Matthew more, and concealing her dismay at the brown merino and the limp, crushed curls. “I was sorry to have missed you when your uncle and I paid such a very hurried visit to your dear parents last month,” she said kindly. “Your mama said you were visiting friends in Westerham. But it was the only day that your uncle could spare to go with me, so occupied as he has been ever since the peace negotiations began. I am sure we are all heartily glad that the war is over at last, but your poor uncle is kept busier than ever. Something to do with the rights of those dreadful colonists to fish off Newfoundland—though what that has to do with the war or the peace I’m sure no one could imagine. But there! There’s no understanding politics anyway, and I don’t know why I am boring on about such dull matters when I expect you are all agog to hear about my plans for introducing you into society.”
    “Papa says that the fishing rights are just a sop to satisfy the Northern States,” offered Alethea obligingly. “The really important issues are the Western Territories and the Canadian frontier.”
    Aunt Maria looked horrified. “My dear child! What can you possibly know about such things? I do hope you aren’t blue! It would be quite fatal I assure you. Young ladies are not expected to understand affairs of state, far less to speak of them with such confidence. Should you chance to fall into conversation with a gentleman who is interested in serious matters—which is most unlikely, since the younger gentlemen care only for sport or, perhaps, for the set of a coat or the nice arrangement of a neckcloth—then a pretty diffidence, an air of reverence for the greater understanding of the superior sex, is all that will be required of you. In this respect I would advise you to study your cousin. I daresay I am over partial, being her mama, but it is only simple truth to acknowledge that she has any number of admirers, of the highest ‘ton’. And she hasn’t the least notion of politics. So you see!”
    At this point Miss Hetherstone hurriedly intervened, explaining that Mr. Forester had been deeply interested in the constitutional struggle so recently terminated, and had, in his own enthusiasm, carried his daughter perhaps a little out of her depth. “But I am sure, ma’am, that she would never put herself forward unbecomingly,” she added firmly.
    Aunt Maria smiled indulgently. “I see that I shall have to show you how to go on,” she said. “A debutante in her first season must be so careful; her behaviour modest, without gaucherie; her dress exquisite but simple—white for evenings, of course—no vivid colours or extravagance of style.”
    “Oh dear!” said her niece in accents of dismay. “Must it be white?”
    “For your come-out, most certainly. Pale colours are permissible on other occasions. But until you have been given vouchers for Almack’s you cannot be too discreet. And one can never take that privilege for granted. Indeed I was in agonies lest Tina should be refused them last year. That dreadful riding habit that she bought, quite unknown to me! Quite wickedly becoming, of course, but most improper. Kit said even the horse was shocked. It tried to bolt with her. Just funning, you know. That is Kit Grayson—they are childhood friends. So fortunate that he was riding in the Park and was able to prevent an accident, though it would have been more useful if he had been able to dissuade her