Rules for Being a Mistress by Tamara Lejeune

Author:Tamara Lejeune [Lejeune, Tamara]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Romance, General, Historical
ISBN: 9781420101294
Publisher: Zebra
Published: 2007-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

Lord Ludham could only watch enviously as Sir Benedict left with the distraught young lady. Neither a husband or a relative, Ludham could do nothing for her, but Sir Benedict was her cousin. He got to place her cloak around her shoulders and order up a carriage to take her home and reassure her that everything would be all right.

Dr. Grantham was with Lady Agatha when Cosima and Benedict arrived. He came out of her ladyship’s room and met them on the landing of the stairs. “I warned you this might happen, Miss Vaughn,” he said, almost gloating.

Cosima’s eyes were squeezed shut. “How bad is it?”

“It might have been much worse,” Dr. Grantham said, as if disappointed. “As it is, she has broken her wrist.”

“Oh!” She made as if to dart into her mother’s bedroom, but the doctor caught her arm.

“Now perhaps you will listen to me, Miss Vaughn!” he said, giving her a shake. “Lady Agatha should be in a hospital. At the very least, your mother ought to be locked in her room at night, to prevent accidents such as these.”

Cosima pulled away from him angrily. “I am not going to lock my mother in her room like a prisoner! And she doesn’t want to go to your hospital.”

Dr. Grantham turned to Sir Benedict and sighed. “You see how irrational this young lady is on the subject? Lady Agatha became quite dizzy on the stairs and fainted. She might very well have been killed. She ought to be locked up at night for her own safety. Sir Benedict, I implore you. Reason with this headstrong, foolish child. Put your foot down.”

Cosima glared at Benedict, as though daring him to put his foot down.

“Perhaps, Miss Vaughn, you might consider—”

“I am not,” she shouted, “putting my mother in some damned hospital, and that’s final! I am not locking her in her room! And I’m not going to keep her in a state of oblivion with laudanum and God-knows-what!”

“I was going to suggest,” Benedict said mildly, “that you move her ladyship’s bedroom downstairs. That way, she at least need not negotiate the stairs.”

“Oh,” she said, embarrassed that she had interrupted him so fiercely.

“That would be most improper,” said the doctor. “A lady’s bedroom, on the ground floor? I never heard of such a thing. Even in cases of ill health, the proprieties must be observed, Sir Benedict. In any case, her ladyship ought not to be moved just yet.”

“I don’t think the man was suggesting we do it now,” Cosima said irritably.

She went in to see her mother. Lady Agatha was in bed. Nora was covering her ladyship’s pitted face with cold cream. Lady Agatha’s white hair, badly thinned from years of dyeing, barely covered her spotted head. She held out her right hand to her daughter. Her left wrist was immobilized by a splint.

“Oh, Mother!” said Cosima, kneeling next to the bed. “What were you doing out of bed? Where did you think you were going?”

“I lost another tooth,” Lady Agatha sobbed.

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