Romantic Rebel by Joan Smith Page B

all wondering whether he has found a new light o’ love, or had decided to marry. His papa, the dear duke, has been at him this age to settle down. He would like to see a grandson before he sticks his fork in the wall. There is no word of a new lightskirt, and as he and you are so famously close ...”
    Further protestations proved vain. She had decided I was Paton’s betrothed, and as it was clear that was the only reason she had befriended me, I protested no more. But the awful idea was forming that he had taken me to Angelina’s lovenest for a quite different reason.
    “Paton is making a mighty long stay in Bath. Now we know why,” she finished archly.
    “He is attending to some properties for his aunt. They are building a set of apartments,” I informed her.
    “That will be more gold lining for his pockets before long. His aunt is seventy if she’s a day. I was still making the rounds when she made her bows. You must come to call on Isabel one day,” she declared as we approached Bath.
    Though hardly ideal, Lady DeGrue and Miss Bonham were the first respectable acquaintances I had made in Bath, and I expressed mild pleasure at this notion.
    We returned by a different route than Paton had taken out of the city. We had descended well into the heart of town before I realized it. “I think we have passed my house,” I exclaimed when I noticed the error.
    “Where do you live?” Lady DeGrue asked. Her niece, though a fully mature lady at least as old as myself, seldom spoke until spoken to.
    “On Lampards Street.”
    “Ah, way up on top of the hill. My poor nags will never make it. I take this circuitous path to avoid the steeper inclines. You should move closer to the heart of the city, Miss Nesbitt. It will be best if we let you off on Milsom Street, where you can easily hire a cab. Give Isabel your address before you leave, and we will drop you a note to let you know when you may call on us.”
    A grim, yellow-toothed smile accompanied this piece of condescension. Not eager to display my inferior abode, I kept my tongue between my teeth and thanked Lady DeGrue before leaving her carriage. She sent Waxon to find me a cab, then I was let down.
    During the steep haul up the downs, I reviewed my afternoon outing. It had begun well enough, but overall I was not happy with it. The destination, upon consideration, seemed extraordinarily inappropriate. It was bizarre that Paton offered me a cottage rent free. I had first taken it for a nobleman’s patronage to an aspiring writer. But for a bachelor to offer it to a spinster—that added a new flavor, one that I found bitter.
    Was I imagining that it was his intention to replace Angelina with me? Surely to God he did not take me for such a depraved creature! Yet we had met under less than auspicious circumstances at a party where Annie and I were, in fact, the only real ladies in the room. And I had hardly looked the part in that idiotic turban that kept falling askew. With Mrs. Speers’s uncertainty over my name, he had taken me for a dashing divorcee. When I considered that he knew I should have been in mourning for a recently deceased father, my shame was complete.
    Reviewed in this new light, I realized that during the visit the conversation had taken some highly questionable turns. All that talk of fallen women and the impossibility of their finding a husband. “Godwin did not believe in the sacraments— baptism, marriage ...” Of course I had loudly and instinctively expressed my outrage. And very shortly after, Paton had lost all interest in me.
    The wretch had taken me to Angelina’s cottage to try his hand at seducing me. A cottage, with a housekeeper and a carriage thrown in, all the perquisites usually bestowed on a man’s mistress. Including a little lovenest discreetly removed from town. He took me for a lightskirt! No other conclusion was possible.
    I was ready to burst with annoyance. Even at the inn at Corsham he still hoped to seduce me. It was