From the stuffy depths of the lumbering carriage, Lady Charlotte Brumidge could discern one of her undergarments dangling like a banner of indecency from her bedroom window. She leaned forward, her body frozen in disbelief, her face turning pale. The bulk of her personal belongings had arrived from London just that morning. She and the maid had barely started to unpack them, let alone put them on display from her window.
She attempted to close the carriage curtains in a casual manner, hoping the other passengers would not notice this disconcerting sight. Not that anyone would be surprised by such a faux pas from Charlotte at this point. She had brought the inglorious label of troublemaker with from London and was almost expected to continue her worrying ways. Far be it from her to disappoint her growing critics.
The errant undergarment—heavens above, it rather looked like her favorite chemise—could only mean that her scapegrace brother Damon had come and gone while she had been carted off to a country ball in a cavernous cobwebby hall.
And what had the rascal pilfered from her room this time? she wondered in alarm. He had already pawned off a good deal of her jewelry to pay off his debts. But surely he had not stooped to stealing her underthings . . .
A more amusing thought jolted her upright. Could Damon be walking about the countryside disguised as a woman? Or had he found a female companion to give him shelter? He was supposed to be lying low with an elderly relative in the next village. Charlotte realized her brother, a nobleman who had overnight become a sort of heroic outlaw due to a stupid prank, felt a little desperate. Being a Brumidge, she was a very liberal person herself, but even so, there were limits to descent behavior. Damon seemed to be dangerously testing those limits beyond what a wicked Brumidge would usually dare.
She turned away from the window as the ancient carriage labored between the rusty iron gates of the modest estate, making enough noise to raise the dead. A furtive glance at the endearingly blank faces of her aunt and uncle, also ancient in her eyes, reassured her they had not niticed the wayward article in the window of their wayward niece's bedroom.
"As I was saying, " Uncle Humphrey continued to his wife, "the cat was only being a cat, Pennie. He did not drag the dead mouse to the person's chair deliberately to embarass you. It was an offering of the hunt."
Aunt Penelope gave a delicate shudder, her bosom lifting and falling like a wave. "I was mortified beyond words. It happened right when the poor parson was recounting the latest antics of the poor parson was recounting the latest antics of the Strathmere Ghost."
"Not that deuced ghost again, Pennie. Not in front of Charlotte."
Charlotte was half listening anyway, more intent on her own impending doom
than a dead man's imaginary exploits. She released a sigh of relief as the carriage rounded the drive and came to a jolting stop. No one would believe that she had hung her chemise from the window to dry—her improper conduct was a source of both prurient interest and kindly concern in this dull backwater parish. Even worse than being shunned, Charlotte's country relatives had engaged the entire village to reform her. She was surrounded by moral zealots on every side, well-intentioned people who knew of her past sin.
Caught kissing a young baron in a park, she had been promptly banished from London by her brother, the Marquess of Scotney, to the home of her retired uncle Sir Humphrey Crowbridge. It was the worst punishment imaginable for a social-minded young woman. Charlotte might have already considered the rest of the year doomed had met the most charming man in Chistlebury at the ball earlier tonight. Her waist still felt warm where he had held her—far too long to be proper, not long enough to be considered an advance by those observing them. It seemed there might be hope for her, after all. Her exile might even provide a little excitement. The village matchmakers had watched in encouragement as she and Lord Sinclair had flirted across the dance floor.
Practically bouncing out of the carriage, she ignored her aunt's tsk of annoyance and made a beeline for the house. She slipped off her high-heeled tapestry dancing pumps at the linen-coated front steps. It wasn't a proper manor house at all, more of a glorified stone farmhouse with a pond of noisy ducks beneath her window. She missed the smelly bustle and dangers of London, the gossip and daily social rounds. She missed her friends, although most had already forgotten her by now, their lives full of gaiety, parties, and glittering social affairs.
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