Cotillion by Georgette Heyer Read Free Book Online

pink-tipped with cold. There was nothing romantic about Miss Charing’s appearance, but her entrance would not have shamed a Siddons. “You!” she uttered, in accents of loathing. “I might have known it!”
    The Honourable Frederick Standen was faintly puzzled. It seemed to him that Miss Charing was both surprised and displeased to see him. He expostulated. “Dash it, Kitty, I was invited!”
    “I thought better of you!” said Miss Charing tragically.
    “You did?” said Mr. Standen, sparring for wind. His gaze, not wholly unlike that of a startled hare, alighted on the table; he fancied he could perceive a glimmer of light. “Yes, but you know what my uncle is!” he said. “Dines at five, or he did when I was last down here! Nothing for it but to snatch a mouthful on the way.”
    “ That !” said Miss Charing, with withering scorn. “I don’t care where you dine, Freddy, but that you should have come to Arnside gives me a very poor notion of you, let me tell you! Not that I ever had anything else, for you’re as bad as Dolph—worse!”
    Mr. Standen, considering the matter, was moved to expostulate again. “No, really, Kitty! Pitching it too strong!” he said. “The poor fellow’s queer in his attic!” It occurred to him that Mr. Pluckley’s interested presence might with advantage be dispensed with. He indicated this briefly and simply, and Mr. Pluckley regretfully withdrew.
    Miss Charing, who shared with her governess a taste for romantic fiction, toyed with the idea of remaining (a statue of persecuted virtue) by the door, but succumbed to the lure of a fire. Seating herself on the settle beside it, she untied the strings of her cloak, pushed back the hood from her ruffled curls, and stretched benumbed hands to the blaze.
    “I’ll tell you what it is!” offered Mr. Standen. “You’re cold! Put you in a miff! Have some brandy!”
    Miss Charing declined the invitation contemptuously. She added: “You need not have put yourself to the trouble of travelling all the way from London. You have quite wasted your time, I assure you!”
    “Well, that don’t surprise me,” returned Freddy. “I rather thought it was a hum. Uncle Matthew pretty stout?”
    “No, he is not! Dr. Fen wick said he could be cured of his stomach trouble by magnetism and warm ale, but it only did him a great deal of harm. At least, he said it did, and also that we were all in a plot to kill him.”
    “Gout bad too?” enquired Mr. Standen anxiously.
    “ Very bad!”
    “You know, I think I made a mistake to come,” confided Mr. Standen. “Not at all sure I won’t rack up for the night here, and go back to London in the morning. The thing is, the old gentleman don’t like me above half, and if his gout’s plaguing him I’d as lief not meet him. Besides, he won’t let me bring my man, and I find it devilish awkward! It ain’t my neckcloths, of course: never let Icklesham do more than hand ‘em to me! It’s my boots. The last time I stayed here the fellow who cleaned ‘em left a dashed great thumb-mark on one of them! I’m not bamming, Kitty! Gave me a nasty turn, I can tell you.”
    “You might as well go back to London now ,” said Kitty. “You made a great mistake to come! In fact, when I think of your circumstances I am quite shocked that you should have done so!”
    “That’s all very well,” objected Mr. Standen, “but I don’t like travelling at night. Besides, this ain’t a posting-house, and I need a change. Yes, and now I come to think of it, what have my circumstances to say to anything?”
    “You are as rich as—as—I can’t remember the name!” said Miss Charing crossly.
    “I expect you mean Golden Ball,” said Freddy. “And I ain’t.”
    “No, I do not! I mean somebody out of history—at least, I think he was, because when you wish to signify that a person is excessively wealthy you say he is as rich as—as him !”
    “Well, I don’t!” said Freddy. “Never heard of the fellow!