The Temporary Wife by Mary Balogh

Author:Mary Balogh [Balogh, Mary]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Published: 2011-02-17T19:42:52.390000+00:00

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Chapter 10

"You are probably furious with me," she said, "and that is why you are striding along looking shuttered and morose."

There were too many people at EnfieldPark looking that way, she had decided. She was not going to be drawn into becoming one of them. And she was no longer going to be a meek observer—though from the start she had not been quite that. She had spent a splendid hour and a half with Claudia and Madame Collette—whose elaborate French accent acquired suspicious cockney overtones from time to time. They had pored over patterns and rummaged through fabrics. They had laughed and talked and measured and planned. The modiste, it appeared, was all but finished with Claudia's new clothes and had been planning—reluctantly, she declared—to return to London within a few days. But now she had agreed with great enthusiasm to go back to work, to produce a complete and fashionable wardrobe for her ladyship in very little more time than it took to snap her fingers—thus. The ballgown, of course, would take priority over all else.

Claudia had told all about the session when they had finally rejoined the men, and had forced from the marquess the declaration that he had never been so happy about anything in his life. He had smiled that dazzling smile again—directly into Charity's eyes.

But now he was striding along the driveway, staring straight ahead of him, looking too morose even to be satanic.

"What?" He stopped walking and swung around to face her, causing her to jump in some alarm. "Shuttered and morose, ma'am? Am I to grin inanely at the treetops? Am I to wax poetic about the beauty of the morning and the wonder of life? And why would I be furious with you?"

"You like me in brown," she said. "You approve of my sprigged muslin and my gray silk. You are not sorry for the fact that they are the full extent of my smart wardrobe. Now you are about to spend a fortune clothing me in lavish style for what remains of our few weeks together. You were trapped into it. But so was I, you must confess."

"I like you in brown!" he said, his eyes sweeping her from head to toe. "They are loathsome garments, my lady. The sooner they find their proper place at the bottom of a dustbin, the happier I shall be."

"Oh," she said. "You do not mind too much, then, that I will be replacing them soon—that you will be replacing them?"

"It was part of our agreement, was it not," he said, turning abruptly and walking on, "that I keep you in a style appropriate to your rank?"

Except that at the time he had not told her exactly what that rank was to be. And except that the agreement had referred to what she would be given after their separation. But she would not argue the point. She had always had sufficient vanity to enjoy acquiring new clothes. But very rarely had she had more than one new garment at a time.

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