my lord,” cried Millicent, blinking rapidly.
“I’d ask you, Miss Carteret,” Ludham replied, “but I must keep myself free, in case Miss Vaughn arrives late. Indeed, I came here tonight with no other purpose but to dance with your good friend. Is she coming, do you know?”
Lady Dalrymple glared at Mr. King.
Mr. King said hastily, “I did try to tell his lordship that your ladyship and Miss Carteret are not acquainted with Miss Vaughn. However—”
Ludham laughed. “Of course they are acquainted, King,” he scoffed. “I have seen Miss Carteret and Miss Vaughn walking together, in Milsom Street, arm and arm.”
“Oh, Miss Vaughn!” cried Lady Dalrymple. “I thought you said Miss Fawn! Miss Vaughn, of course, is Millicent’s dearest friend. They have been knowing one another forever. We stayed with the Vaughns in Ireland for two months last summer. Such delightful people! The mother is English, of course, which helps. The girls became friends at once, but then, Millicent has such a sweet and generous nature. She makes friends wherever she goes. Why, they were Christian-naming one another within three days.”
“What is her Christian name?” Lord Ludham asked.
Lady Dalrymple batted her eyes. “Why, Millicent, of course. We call her Millie.”
“What an extraordinary coincidence!” exclaimed Ludham. “Miss Vaughn and your daughter having the same name.”
“Oh, was it Miss Vaughn you meant?” Lady Dalrymple sniffed. “She has a very silly name, I’m afraid. Cosima. It’s too ridiculous for words. Poor Miss Vaughn! She has never been presented, you know, and I daresay she never will be. Not our sort, really. But we quite charitably took her under our wing.”
Benedict made no comment; after all, it was a woman’s prerogative to change her mind. Lady Dalrymple was well within her rights to deny this Miss Vaughn one day and claim her the next. It was no concern of his.
“Cosima,” Lord Ludham said, pleased. “I’ve never met a Cosima in the whole course of my life. It’s Italian, isn’t it?”
“Such pretentious people, I know,” said Lady Dalrymple. She placed her fan on Ludham’s arm. “But I do pity them. The mother, Lady Agatha, as she calls herself, is ill, which prevents poor Miss Vaughn from going anywhere much. The father, Colonel Vaughn, has deserted them completely. Gambling debts, I’m afraid. Miss Vaughn and her sister are as good as portionless, and all they have to live on is Lady Agatha’s tiny little annuity. They have lost everything.”
Lord Ludham did not seem to find anything disagreeable with this picture. “Oh, she has a sister, has she?” he said eagerly.
“A mere child,” Lady Dalrymple sniffed. “Wilful and wild. Lady Agatha can do nothing with her, and there is no money for a governess. I daresay Miss Vaughn will make someone an adequate governess herself, when the mother goes, and she is forced to earn her bread. When the time comes, I shall be more than happy to find her a place in some respectable household.”
“I am glad to hear that the Vaughns are not without friends,” Benedict said dryly.
Lady Dalrymple had forgotten that Sir Benedict had been present in the Pump Room when she had denied knowing the Vaughns. She remembered now, horribly, but there was nothing she could do about it. “I consider it my Christian duty to help the Miss Vaughns of the world,” she said sweepingly. “It is especially hard on the pretty ones, I think. Their vanity leads them so quickly down the wrong path, if they have no money.”
Millicent could no longer contain her spite. “They are so poor, my lord, that they have no credit in any of the shops in town. Miss Vaughn is obliged to pay in cash wherever she goes! You mentioned Milsom Street, my lord. Well, it was very shocking for me to see Miss Vaughn actually pay for her ribbons. I have not seen her since; I daresay she is too ashamed to see me.”
“I don’t care if a girl has twenty thousand pounds or twenty,” said Ludham. “I’m a simple man. I like Miss Vaughn, and I want to dance with her. I am not mercenary.”
“No!” cried Lady Dalrymple. “Nor am I! What I cannot bear is being deceived!”
A slight frown appeared in Ludham’s eyes. He was not the cleverest of men, and, this being the case, he had been deceived often enough to know that he disliked it as much as Lady Dalrymple did. “Deceived, madam? In what way were you deceived?”
“The Heiress of Castle Argent, they called her in Dublin!” Lady Dalrymple complained bitterly. “Anyone would think she was fabulously wealthy the way they talk about her over there. Anyone would think she was the Queen of Ireland.”
Ludham was instantly diverted. “Does she really live in a castle?” he cried.
“Castle? A farmhouse with battlements!” Lady Dalrymple squawked. “When I think of how I suffered there—! Such cramped quarters! Such indifferent servants! Such noise from that enormous hell-hound of a dog! And, then, when my ankle healed at last, what should happen, but I should fall on the stairs and hurt myself again! I thought we would never leave!”
“A sentiment shared, no doubt, by the Vaughns,” Benedict murmured.
“What?” Lady Dalrymple snapped.
“It must have cost the Vaughns a great deal of money to entertain you for over two months,” Benedict pointed out.
“That is quite their own fault,” the viscountess returned frostily, “for pretending to be rich! I was never so deceived in my life!”
“What about me?” cried Mr. Carteret. “I asked the girl to marry me! I’d be in the basket now if she’d said yes.”
“Good God, so would I!” exclaimed Ludham.
“Depend on it, my lord: Miss Vaughn is a fortune hunter!” cried Lady Dalrymple, abandoning the subtle approach completely.
“How fortunate then that she refused to marry your son, madam,” said Benedict.
“Yes,” Lord Ludham agreed. “If she is a fortune hunter, she ought to marry someone with—well, with a fortune, you know. Will you tell her, Miss Carteret—since you are such good friends—that my income is ten thousand a year? Well, strictly speaking—I don’t want to deceive anyone—it is nine thousand, seven hundred-odd, you know.” He shrugged helplessly. “My man can get the exact figure.”
Benedict looked at him incredulously. Serena was right to worry about her cousin, he reflected. The young man seemed to have learned nothing from the fiasco with his opera dancer.
“She has the face of an angel,” Ludham sighed blissfully.
“Yes, indeed,” Lady Dalrymple agreed warmly. “Millicent is admired wherever she goes, and, of course, she has twenty thousand pounds…or so my Lord Dalrymple tells me,” she hastily added. “I never concern myself with money, you understand. Nor does Millie, not like some young ladies who must scrape as they can, and calculate as they go. I am but a bird-witted female, my lord, and I don’t pretend to be otherwise.”
“Excuse me,” said Benedict, abruptly, unable to bear any more machinations that were, at least to him, transparent. “I must pay my respects to Lady Serena.”
“What
