His Christmas Nymph by Marly Mathews

cousin. They simply adore you, Caroline, much as Robbie and I do.”
    Her aunt had somehow managed to pull together a grand affair in the form of a Christmas Country Ball to happen tomorrow night. She wondered if anyone would show up , seeing as her aunt had more or less been forgotten by the ton in the years since she had moved to America. However, many still remembered her as the youngest daughter of the Earl of Thoresby.
    “I rather wanted us to rehearse the Christmas Pantomime again but I guess the boys know their parts well enough.”
    “Are you still set on them coming down to perform it for the guests’ tomorrow night?”
    “I rather am. I think they would love to see it. We can perform it in the great Drawing Room.”
    “It sounds perfect to me as long as you think the boys can handle it.”
    “The boys are wondrous thespians. They will do you and Uncle Robbie proud. I’ve managed to convince Fanny to play the pianoforte just as she used to do when we were children. The only thing missing is Arthur and Christopher, and of course, dear Mama.”
    Georgia’s eyes filled with drowning sadness.  
    “I can’t wait for everyone to see you in your ball gown tomorrow night, Caroline. You will set the tongues of everyone who is anyone around here on fire. Robbie will have to keep the suitors at bay.”
    “I shall get my stick and be ready,” Robbie murmured, lowering the newspaper so he could smile at them both.
    “I should go and get myself ready for this afternoon,” Caroline murmured, as she finished off her tea. She stood up and moved around the table to kiss her aunt. Georgia smiled up at her.
    “You are a good girl. I sorely wish that we had made the crossing years ago to whisk you away from that dreadful man.”
    “He’s not that bad, Aunt. It’s Gertrude. She was a horrible influence on my father and made him quite tiresome. She brought out the worst in him instead of cultivating the best in him like Mama did.”
    “He doesn’t have the right to keep you away from so many things th at would benefit you socially. He was setting you up to be a spinster, darling.”
    She smiled at her aunt once more and left the breakfast room without saying anything further. Her aunt was dead set against her father and she could understand her prejudice—and yet, she and her father would be forever linked together by the grief they’d felt when they’d lost so much in such a short amount of time. She’d watched her father go completely grey overnight, and witnessed him change from a virile man into the shell he was today. He used to be strong and stalwart, now he looked as if a light breeze could knock him over.
    He was a broken man—and she didn’t think she could break him even further by taking herself completely out of his life.
    She just wished that Gertrude h ad never come into their lives. If she hadn’t, things would have been so much different. Whether or not her father would have attempted to debut her on the marriage mart was another matter entirely. She knew he wanted to keep her close and the thought of sharing her with anyone else least of all a husband frightened him badly.
    That and the fact that he would have had to rely completely on her aunt in o rder to afford the whole thing. His pride was the only thing he had left and he couldn’t quite bend it far enough to accept what he viewed as charity.
    It didn’t take her long to change for her visit to Lady Wallsworth’s. Sally hovered over her constantly, and her worry was palpable in the air.
    “Sally, pray do me the favour of airing your concerns with me.”
    “I don’t want you wearing yourself out, Miss Caroline. I think taking on this Christmas Pantomime and deciding to accept Lady Wallsworth’s invitation was sheer folly. You’re not up to this kind of thing.”
    “What do you mean by this kind of thing?”
    “You’re not acc ustomed to so much excitement. Why I’d never forgive myself if you caught your death straining yourself