evening dress of the palest blue trimmed with transparent gauze and decorated with small sprays of silk forget-me-nots. Her fair curls were held in place by a small hoop of the same silken flowers mounted on a ribbon of slightly deeper blue. Her slippers were frail things of white kid.
All in all it seemed that three years of sitting on the sofa doing nothing and letting others worry on her behalf had enhanced rather than marred her good looks. If she had become slightly plumper as a consequence of her lengthy idleness, her figure was so charmingly rounded that most gentlemen, Georgie conceded glumly, would have nothing but admiration for it.
And all this hard work over the past few hours was for Mr Jesmond Fitzroy—as Sir Garth immediately remarked when he entered to find Caro in her glory and Georgie, as usual, feeling eclipsed by it.
Her own green outfit with its cream silk trimmings seemed drab and ordinary, but Sir Garth bowed over her hand as though she were beauty’s self and complimented her on her appearance with, ‘When last I met you, many years ago now, you were only the humble little sister, but time has worked its magic on you to transform you.’
How in the world did one answer anything quite so fulsome? Georgie put down her book and offered him a meek thank-you, and was saved from further extravagant nonsense by the announcement of Mr Jesmond Fitzroy’s arrival.
Any hope that she had possessed that her memory had played her false by enhancing his good looks and his perfect self-command flew away when he entered. If anything, she had under-rated his good lucks and the ease with which he wore his good, but unspectacular, clothes.
She heard Caro draw a sharp breath when he bowed over her hand. Sir Garth, more sophisticated in the ways of the great world, raised his quizzing glass to inspect the visitor more closely, drawling, ‘I thought that we might have come across one another before in town although your name is not familiar, but I see that I was wrong.’
Jess surveyed him coolly. So this was Mrs Pomfret’s brother, the owner of the carriage which he had seen earlier that day. He was a regular London beau with all the hallmarks of one who moved in good society and had been born into it.
‘Oh, I live on the fringes of the ton, as many do, I believe.’
He offered Sir Garth no explanation of who and what he had been, and what he had just said to him was no more, and no less, than the truth.
Caro said suddenly, ‘I believe, Mr Fitzroy, that you have already met my sister-in-law, Mrs Charles Herron, when she was looking after my two children, so no introductions are needed, although to make everything comme il faut, I will offer you a formal one.’
She took Georgie, who had been standing half-hidden behind the brother and sister, by the hand to bring her forward—and Jess found himself facing the hoyden in breeches whom he had rebuked the previous afternoon. Only she wasn’t wearing breeches, but a plainish green frock with few trimmings. Her riotously short russet-coloured hair was held back and half hidden by a black bandeau, and the low collar of her dress and its artful cut left one in no doubt that here was a young woman in her early twenties and not the young girl whom he had thought her. Only her green eyes were the same—but even more defiant and mutinous than they had been the previous afternoon!
Caro Pomfret was explaining to him that Mrs Herron was a widow and was living with her so that they might keep one another company instead of being lonely apart.
‘She’s so good with my lively two, and keeps them in order, which I never could,’ she sighed, as though Georgie was a rather helpful nursemaid.
It would have been difficult to know which of the pair of them, Jess or Georgie, was the more embarrassed in view of the unfortunate nature of their previous meeting, although nothing that they said or did gave Caro or Sir Garth any hint of their mutual feelings.
I ought to apologise, they both separately thought, but how does one do that without making matters worse?
Jess’s other thought was that, unlike her sister-in-law, Mrs Caroline Pomfret was exactly the sort of unexceptional lady whom a wise man might make his wife. She would always, he was sure, say and do the right thing—indeed, was busy saying and doing them even while they sat and talked about Netherton and the late Miss Jesmond.
‘I was so fond of the dear old lady,’ sighed Caro untruthfully. She and Miss Jesmond had disliked one another cordially. It had been Georgie who, until her marriage, had provided Jess’s aunt with congenial company. After she had been widowed and had returned to Netherton she had lightened the old lady’s last days with her bright presence until death had claimed Miss Jesmond.
Caro was now giving Jess her version of her friendship with Miss Jesmond—which was an accurate account of Georgie’s transferred to herself.
‘So,’ she ended, smiling sweetly, ‘you may imagine how pleased I am to meet at last the nephew of whom she was so fond.’
Great-nephew, thought Georgie a trifle sourly.
‘And Georgie knew her a little, too,’ Caro sighed. ‘Although none of us was aware that you were her heir.’
‘And nor was I,’ returned Jess, who was enjoying more than a little the attention and admiration of a pretty woman. ‘It is many years since I last visited my aunt, but I believe that I am the only member of her family left—which accounts for the inheritance, I suppose.’
Sir Garth said, ‘I am never sure whether having relatives is a good thing or not, but one is supposed to commiserate with those who have none—so I shall do so.’
Jess bowed his thanks. ‘It leaves one feeling lonely,’ he admitted. ‘However, I can well understand that there are occasions when relatives can be a liability—although I am sure that that term could never be applied to your sister or your sister-in-law.’
‘True,’ replied Sir Garth, ‘and I was spared an unkind father so I am lucky.’
‘And I also,’ sighed Caro. ‘Until I lost my husband,’ she added hastily.
Georgie refused to join this mutual congratulation society. She was more than a little surprised by the resentment aroused in her by Jess’s admiration of Caro. It was not that he was being obvious about it. Indeed, most people would not have been aware of his interest in her, but Georgie was finding that she could read him.
It was her late husband who had tutored her in the art of understanding the unspoken thoughts of men and women, and she was beginning to regret that anger had led her to misread Jess when she had first met him. It was not that she was interested in him—no, not at all, she told herself firmly—but in a small society like Netherton’s she was bound to meet him frequently and it would not do to be at open odds with him, for that might cause unpleasant gossip.
So she said a few moments later, just before the butler came to announce that dinner was served, ‘Have you found the opportunity to visit Netherton yet, Mr Fitzroy?’
‘Indeed. I drove there this morning. I needed to find a bank and Miss Jesmond’s solicitor. Not all my business could be concluded by correspondence before I visited Jesmond House. I was pleasantly surprised by how attractive the little town is—and how busy. I had no notion that there were Assembly Rooms, for example. There were none, I believe, when I visited my aunt over twenty years ago.’
Georgie replied, pleased that they were about to have a civilised conversation at last, ‘They were built about fifteen years ago. My late father and Mr Bowlby headed a committee which thought
