Cyrano de Bridgerton

Every Letter

Late that night, in his room, Colin got to work.

Keeping the image of Penelope firm in his mind, he allowed his dearest, most treasured thoughts of her to flow freely, from his mind, through his pen onto the parchment. He recalled all his fondest memories of her, like their first meeting, or the time she had seen him off to Eton with the promise of keeping in close tough, a promise she had faithfully kept, all those times they had danced together during the past two seasons since her coming out. He reminded himself all his favorite parts about her, her sweet, comforting smile, her gentle, patient nature, the sound of her laugh, her wit and humor, and how devoted and faithful she was to those she deemed most worthy of her loyalty, how she had steadfastly been there for him whenever he had needed her kindness, her friendship.

Colin's passion and devotion manifested into the words that rolled off his tongue, fusing into the blood that pumped from his brain and his heart, rushing through the veins leading to his writing hand, spurring to mold the ink on the parchment to match his mind.  He became lost in solaces of sentences, palaces of paragraphs, of which he himself was the architect.

His thrilling ride came to a depressing halt when he finally finished his declaration, and he realized all that was left to do was sign the document with a name.  That was when he remembered that this letter was not meant to be from him, at least not to Pen's knowledge.  No, this letter was meant to be from her real love, Christian Burnwood.

Colin reread the letter he had just crafted.  Every word that he had written on here was true and sincere, expressing his deepest, most treasured feelings from her.  Even though he had written this letter for Christian, he had meant everything he had put down there.  He could not have been more truthful to himself if he had truly been writing this to Penelope herself.

With a heavy heart, Colin marked the bottom of the paper with the name Christian Burnwood.  It was the only part of the letter that was falsified.
~~~
The next evening was the evening of the Dropshere Ball at the home of the recently widowed Lady Rutlidge, to celebrate the recent borth of her only child.  Despite ending up married to a man old enough to be her great-grandfather, Lady Rutlidge was considered fortunate by the ton, in that she had discovered that she was pregnant after her husband's death, even more so when the baby was a son, meaning she could retain control of the manor and the family, since she was the mother of the new Lord of the manor, while gaining a sort of freedom to live life by her own rules, at least to a certain extent.  In short, she could have her cake and eat it as well.

And if any of the ton noticed that little Lord Rutlidge bore a slight resemblance to his late papa's secretary, no one said a word of it.

The ball was elegant and grand, as the Dowager Lady Rutlidge greeted guests, among them, the Featherington ladies.  Lady Featherington and her eldest, Prudence, entered looked like birds of paradise, extravagant and showy in their bright frocks and overstated accessories and hairstyles.  They walked up to the circle of ladies and greeted them kindly and ladylike as always.

"Lady Featherington," greeted Lady Cowper in his usual falsely-sweet tone of voice with underlying bits of snobbery.  "You and Prudence are looking... grand, as always."

Portia understood that by "grand", they meant over-the-top and overdressed.  But she didn't care.  She needed her daughters to be noticed, to stand out in the crowd to catch the attention of suitors.  "Well, one must dressed for one's station as always."

Lady Cowper was about to say something in response, a backhanded compliment, no doubt, when Lady Goring spoke up.

"Hold on... is that your youngest, Penelope?"

Lady Featherington turned around.  Unlike her older sister, Penelope was wearing a pastel gown similar all the other debutantes, of a bluish-green hue like the still waters of a lake, with skirts if a material that subtly glistened.  She had forgone the signature Featherington headdress and instead settled for a simple headband of pearls, with a matching pearl necklace and pearl drop earrings.  Even her long gloves were nothing special, a boring white color common among all the other young ladies.