Frederica by Georgette Heyer

Author:Georgette Heyer
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Sourcebooks, Inc.
Published: 2010-03-25T16:00:00+00:00

Sixteen

If Harry was doubtful of the Marquis, he found no difficulty at all in deciding that the Marquis’s cousin and heir was a capital fellow. The young gentlemen, in fact, took to one another on sight; and this in spite of the slight prejudice created in Harry’s mind by the knowledge that Frederica did not look with favour upon Mr Dauntry. Endymion was not much given to speculation, but had he thought about the matter he would have felt sure that he would like Harry – or any other of Charis’s relations. He was some few years older than Harry, and he had all the town-bronze which Harry lacked; but his intellect was not strong, and, like many other persons of slow wit to whom learning was a painful labour, he was inclined to regard with respect bordering upon awe anyone capable of passing Responsions.

It might have been supposed that disparity of age and of intelligence would have raised a barrier between the two gentlemen. Frederica did suppose it, but she had reckoned without one powerful factor: each was sporting-mad. A chance word revealed to Harry that this seeming-sapskull was a Melton man, and, from his description of the Shires, an accomplished horseman. Not that Endymion, a modest young man, boasted of his prowess: the only personal anecdotes he recounted were of having been bullfinched at a regular stitcher at Barkby Holt, and of having once taken a toss into the Whissendine; but you could tell, thought Harry, quick to realise that Endymion laid the blame for these mishaps not upon his horse but upon himself, that however blockish he might be in a drawing-room he was a first-rate man in the saddle. From hunting it was a short step to almost every form of sport; and by the time the superiority of Manton’s New Patent Shot had been discussed, the advantages of a Six or Seven over a heavier shot argued, and the fights each gentleman had had with various salmon of stupendous size, described in exhaustive detail, it would have been hard to have decided which held the other in the higher esteem.

Frederica might be exasperated by Endymion’s easy conquest of her volatile brother, but Charis, listening to their exchanges with a glowing look of gratification in her beautiful eyes, was encouraged, when she found herself alone with Harry, to say imploringly: ‘You do like him, Harry, don’t you?’ Blushing, she added: ‘Our cousin, I mean – Mr Dauntry!’

‘Oh, him!’ said Harry. ‘Yes, a first-rate man! Bang up to the knocker, too, I should think!’

‘And so very handsome, don’t you think?’ she suggested shyly.

Since this was not a matter which had previously excited Harry’s attention, he was obliged to consider it for a moment, before replying: ‘Yes, I suppose he is. Too big, though: I shouldn’t wonder at it if he rides as much as sixteen stone, poor fellow! Ay, and what’s more he might strip well, but you may depend upon it that it would be bellows

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.