The Proposition Read Online Free PDF Page A

love" —Ace, loov— " Tremore. But everyone calls me Mick."
    "Well, Mr. Tremore, I'm not your love. My name is Bollash, Miss Edwina Bollash. And I merely want to study your speech, do a palatographic, perhaps make a gramophone recording. So if you are interested in—"
    "Excuse me," said a voice to the side. "I have to ask: Are you the Miss Edwina Bollash?"
    She turned to find that the two gentleman brothers had not dispersed with the rest. The slightly shorter one, the one who was generous with his billfold, was addressing her.
    "I know of no other," she answered.
    He shot his near-duplicate a smug look, then held out his hand by way of introduction. "My brother, Emile Lamont. I am Jeremy Lamont of Sir Leopold Lamont's family, of Brighton and lately of London." He offered his card as he nodded toward Mr. Tremore. "So you speak this chap's language?"
    She nodded.
    The thinner, and somehow more snide, brother asked, "You are the same Miss Edwina Bollash who is renowned for her skill in teaching"—he left a pause—"shall we say, less than graceful young ladies how to enter gracefully into society? The one who did the Earl of Darnworth's daughter?"
    "Did her?"
    "Turned her from that—that thing she used to be into the elegant creature who married the Duke of Wychwood last month."
    Edwina was rather proud of this particular feat, but she never, never took public credit for her work. It demeaned the accomplishments of the young ladies themselves. "I can't imagine where you heard such a thing, though it is true that I tutor private students in elocution and deportment, if that is what you are asking." She opened her reticule, offering her own card in exchange. Miss Edwina Bollash. Instructor of Elocution and Deportment. Philologist, Phonetician, Linguist. Expert in Social Graces and Polite Behavior.
    "You groom the ugly ducklings of society into swans of the upper class. All the rich mamas were whispering about it in Brighton this summer," said Jeremy as he shot a look of significance, a raised brow, at his thinner, more skeptical version.
    Emile Lamont laughed. "Come now. You can't be serious," he said to him.
    His brother protested, "I am. And you are absolutely wrong. Why, she could take this very fellow here and make him into a gentleman in a fortnight. I would bet it." Turning to her, "Couldn't you?"
    "Make him into a gentleman?" The idea startled a laugh out of her.
    "Yes. Change the way he speaks—being a gentleman is hardly more than talking properly, wearing decent clothes, and few polite manners."
    "It's a good deal more than that, I'd say—" She glanced at the beggarly-looking fellow, who now watched her with the same interest he might have given to a houseful of rats.
    "Yes, but you could do whatever it took," Jeremy insisted. "I know. I've spoken with Lady Wychwood. She confided that you helped her, that you picked her clothes, had someone come in for her hair, taught her how to move, even how to intone her voice."
    Emile Lamont let out a derisive snort. "Lady Wychwood was a lady," he said. "That was no trick. I still say there is no science that can make—well, a silk purse out of a sow's ear. And I still say"—he poked the air in front of his brother's face for emphasis—"that anyone who can't speak the Queen's English properly may as well be shot, for there is no hope for their ever living a decent life. They are nothing but a drain on society."
    "You see? You see?" his brother exclaimed. His face reddened. "I have to live with this arrogant fellow! Have you ever heard such a thing?"
    In Jeremy's defense, she said to his brother, "You're quite wrong. You can change the way a person speaks. Heavens, you can teach a parrot to talk."
    "But not well."
    "Well enough."
    "She could do it well enough," Jeremy said. "You see? It can be done."
    There was a pregnant moment, in which his brother seemed to contemplate their discussion—after which he raised one eyebrow and smiled. "Let me buy you each a cup of tea." He