Winning the Wallflower: A Novella (21 page)

C
HAPTER
T
HREE

In Which the Merits of Virginity and Debauchery Are Evaluated, and Debauchery Wins

O
livia and Georgiana had scarcely finished their discussion regarding the desirability of peaches over celery when their mother entered the room.

Most women in their forties allow themselves to take on a soft roundness. But, as if in reproach to her unsatisfactory elder daughter, Mrs. Lytton ate like a bird and ruthlessly confined what curves she had in a whalebone corset. Consequently, she looked like a stork with anxious, beady eyes and a particularly feathery head.

Georgiana instantly rose to her feet and curtsied. “Good evening, Mother. How lovely that you pay us a visit.”

“I hate it when you do that,” Olivia put in, pushing herself to a standing position with a little groan. “Lord, my feet hurt. Rupert trampled them at least five or six times.”

“Do what, my dear?” Mrs. Lytton asked, just catching Olivia’s remark as she shut the door behind her.

“Georgie goes all gooey and sweet just for you,” Olivia said, not for the first time.

Her mother’s frown was a miraculous concoction: she managed to express distaste without even twitching her forehead. “As your sister is well aware, ‘
A lady’s whole pilgrimage is nothing less than to show the world what is most requisite for a great personage
.’ ”

“Show
unto
the world,” Olivia said, making a feeble gesture toward mutiny. “If you must quote
The Mirror of Senseless Stupidity
, Mama, you might as well get it right.”

Mrs. Lytton and Georgiana both ignored this unhelpful comment. “You looked exquisite in your plum-colored sarcenet tonight,” Georgiana said, pulling a chair closer to the fireplace and ushering her mother into it, “particularly when you were dancing with Papa. His coat complemented your gown to a turn.”

“Have you heard?
He
is calling on us tomorrow!” Mrs. Lytton breathed the pronoun as though Rupert were a deity who deigned to enter their mortal dwelling.

“I heard,” Olivia said, watching her sister tuck a small cushion behind their mother’s back.

“You’ll be a duchess by this time tomorrow.” The tremble in Mrs. Lytton’s voice spoke for itself.

“No, I won’t. I’ll be formally betrothed to a marquess, which isn’t the same thing as actually being a duchess. I’m sure you remember that I’ve been unofficially betrothed for some twenty-three years.”

“The distinction between our informal agreement with the duke and the ceremony tomorrow is just what I wish to speak to you about,” their mother said. “Georgiana, perhaps you should leave us, as you are unmarried.”

Olivia found that surprising; Mrs. Lytton was fluttering her eyelashes in such a way that suggested she was in the grip of deep anxiety, and Georgiana had a talent for soothing aphorisms.

In fact, just as Georgiana reached the door, their mother waved her hand: “I’ve changed my mind. My dear, you may stay. I have no doubt but that the marquess will dower you shortly after the marriage, so this information may be relevant to you as well.

“A formal betrothal is a complicated relationship, legally speaking. Of course, our legal system is in flux and so on.” Mrs. Lytton looked as if she hadn’t the faintest idea what she was talking about. “Apparently it is always in flux. Parts of the old law, parts of the new . . . your father understands all this better than I.

“Under current interpretation of the law, your betrothal will be binding, unless the marquess suffers a fatal accident—when, of course, it would be invalidated by his death.” She snapped open her fan and waved it before her face, as if such a tragedy was too terrible even to contemplate.

“Which is all too likely,” Olivia said, responding to the fan as much as to her mother’s words. “Inasmuch as Rupert has the brainpower of a gnat and he’s apparently going into battle.”

“ ‘
Civility is never out of fashion
,’ ” Mrs. Lytton said, dropping the fan below her chin and dipping into
The Mirror of Compliments
. “You should never speak of the peerage in such a manner. It is true that in the tragic event of the marquess’s demise, the betrothal will come to nothing. But there is one interesting provision that falls under the provenance of an older law, as I understand it.”

“Provision?” Olivia asked, creasing her brow—unluckily just as her mother glanced at her.

“ ‘
Cloud not your brow with disdainful scorn
,’ ” Mrs. Lytton said automatically. Apparently duchesses remained wrinkle-free for life, doubtless because they never frowned.

“If you were to . . .” Mrs. Lytton waved her fan in the air. “To . . . to . . .” She gave Olivia a meaningful glance. “
Then
the betrothal would be more than legally binding; it would turn into a marriage under some sort of law. I can’t remember what your father called it. ‘Common,’ perhaps. Though how a
common
law could have any application to nobility, I cannot say.”

“Are you saying that if I tup the FF, I become a marchioness even if he dies?” Olivia said, wiggling her sore toes. “That sounds extremely unlikely.”

The fan fluttered madly. “I’m sure I don’t know what you intend to say, Olivia. You must learn to speak the English language.”

“I expect that the law is designed to protect young women,” Georgiana interrupted, before her mother could elaborate on the subject of Olivia’s egregious linguistic lapses. “If I understand you correctly, Mother, you are saying that should the marquess lose his composure and commit an act unbecoming his rank as a peer, he would be forced to marry his betrothed bride, that is, Olivia.”

“Actually, I’m not entirely sure whether he would be obligated to marry Olivia, or whether the betrothal would simply turn into a marriage. But most importantly, should this occurrence result in—in an
event
, the child will be declared legitimate.
And
if the betrothed were not deceased, then he would not be allowed to alter his mind. Not that the marquess would think of such a thing.”

“To sum it up,” Olivia said flatly, “bedwork is followed by bondage.”

Their mother snapped her fan shut and came to her feet. “Olivia Mayfield Lytton, your incessant vulgarity is unacceptable. The more unacceptable, because you are a duchess-to-be. Remember, all eyes will be upon you!” She stopped to take a breath.

“Might we return to a more important subject?” Olivia asked, rising reluctantly to her feet once more. “It seems that you are instructing me to seduce Rupert, although you unaccountably neglected to give me a tutor in that particular art.”

“I cannot
bear
your rank vulgarity!” Mrs. Lytton barked. Then, remembering that she was the mother of a duchess-to-be, she cleared her throat and took a deep breath. “There is no need for any . . .
exertion
. A man—even a gentleman—merely has to be given the impression that a woman is ready for intimacy and he will . . . that is, he will take advantage of the situation.”

And with that, Mrs. Lytton swept out the door without so much as a nod to either of her daughters.

Olivia sat down once again. Her mother had never been very interested in shows of maternal warmth, but it was painfully clear that quite soon Olivia would have no mother at all—merely an irritated, and irritating, lady-in-waiting. The thought made her throat tighten.

“I don’t want to make you uneasy,” Georgiana said, seating herself as well, “but I would guess that Mama and Papa are going to lock you in the root cellar with the FF.”

“They could move the matrimonial bed down to the study. Just to make sure that Rupert understands his duty.”

“Oh, he will understand,” Georgiana said. “Men come to it naturally, as I understand.”

“But I never had any particular sense that the FF was of that sort, did you?”

“No.” Georgiana thought for a moment. “At least, not yet. He’s like a puppy.”

“I don’t think he’ll mature by tomorrow evening.” “Puppy” wasn’t a bad description of Rupert, given that he had turned eighteen only the week before. Olivia would always fault her papa for leaping into matrimony before the duke, and then proceeding to procreate at the same headlong rate.

It was tiresome to be a woman of twenty-three, betrothed to a lad of barely eighteen. Especially a boy who was such a callow eighteen.

All through a light supper before the ball Rupert had babbled on about how the glory of his family name depended upon his performance on the battlefield—even though everyone at the table knew that he would never be allowed near a battlefield. He might have been “going to war,” but he was the scion of a duke. What’s more, he was an heir for whom there was no spare, and as such had to be kept from harm’s way. He’d probably be sent to another country. In fact, she was rather surprised that his father was allowing Rupert to travel outside England at all.

“You’ll have to take the lead,” Georgiana suggested. “Begin as you mean to go on.”

Olivia slumped a little lower on the settee. She had known, of course, that she would have to bed Rupert at some point. But she had vaguely imagined the event taking place in the dark, where she and Rupert could more easily ignore the fact that he was a good head shorter than she was and more than a stone slimmer. That didn’t seem likely if they were locked into the library.

“That’s one good thing about your figure,” Georgiana went on. “Men like curvaceous women.”

“I can’t say I’ve noticed. Except perhaps when it comes to Melchett, the new footman with the lovely shoulders.”

“You shouldn’t be ogling a footman,” Georgiana said primly.

“He ogles me, not the other way around. I am merely observant. Why do you suppose we aren’t simply getting married
now
?” Olivia asked, tucking her feet beneath her. “I know that we had to wait until Rupert turned eighteen, though frankly, I thought we might as well do it when he was out of diapers. Or at least out of the nursery. It’s not as if he’s ever going to achieve maturity as most people think of the word. Why a betrothal, and not a wedding?”

“I expect the FF doesn’t wish to marry.”

“Why not? I’m not saying that I’m a matrimonial prize. But he can’t possibly hope to escape his father’s wishes. I don’t think he’d even want to. He doesn’t have a touch of rebellion in him.”

“No man wants to marry a woman his father picked out for him. Actually, no woman either—think about Juliet.”

“Juliet Fallesbury? Whom did her father choose? All I remember is that she ran away with a gardener she nicknamed Longfellow.”

“
Romeo and Juliet
, ninny!”

“Shakespeare never wrote anything relevant to my life,” Olivia stated, “at least until they discover a long-lost tragedy called
Much Ado about Olivia and the Fool
. Rupert is no Romeo. He’s never shown the least inclination to dissolve our betrothal.”

“In that case, I expect he feels too young to be married. He wants to sow some wild oats.”

They were both silent for a moment, trying to picture Rupert’s wild oats. “Hard to imagine, isn’t it?” Olivia said, after a bit. “I simply cannot envision the FF shaking the sheets.”

“You shouldn’t be able to envision
anyone
shaking the sheets,” Georgiana said weakly.

“Save your tedious virtue for when there’s someone in the room who might care,” Olivia advised her, not unkindly. “Do you suppose that Rupert has any idea of the mechanics involved?”

“Maybe he’s hoping that by the time he comes back from France, he will be an inch or two taller.”

“Oh, believe me,” Olivia said with a shudder, “I have recurring nightmares about the two of us walking down the aisle in St. Paul’s. Mother will force me into a wedding dress adorned with bunches of tulle so I’ll be twice as tall and twice as wide as my groom. Rupert will have that absurd little dog of his trotting at his side, which will only call attention to the fact that the dog has a better waistline than I do.”

“I shall take Mother in hand when it comes to your gown,” Georgiana promised. “But your wedding dress is irrelevant to this discussion as pertains to tomorrow’s seduction.”

“ ‘
Pertains to
?’ I really think you should be careful, Georgie. Your language is tainted by that pestilent
Mirror
even when we’re alone.”

“You’ll have to think of tomorrow as a trial, like Hercules cleaning out the Augean stables.”

“I’d rather muck out the stables than seduce a man who’s a head shorter and as light as thistledown.”

“Offer him a glass of spirits,” Georgiana suggested. “Do you remember how terrified Nurse Luddle was of men who drank spirits? She said they turned into raging satyrs.”