The Lady of Bolton Hill by Elizabeth Camden Read Free Book Online

the added bit of confidence the structure of her ensemble provided.
    The carriage drew to the front of the mayor’s house, and Clara tried to force a smile to her face. “I know you are right,” she said. “It has been so long since I’ve been home and I won’t really know anyone here.” She felt like a stranger in Baltimore, with little memory of anyone outside of her immediate family. And Daniel, of course.
    Of all the people in Baltimore, Daniel Tremain was the one she was most curious to see again. Even though Daniel had become a powerful industrialist, her father said Daniel rarely attended society functions. “That man just doesn’t fit in,” Lloyd had said, and Clara could easily believe him. Daniel had always been too brash and opinionated to blend in with the Byzantine manners of high society.
    “I wish Clyde could be here tonight,” Clara said. “It would be nice to know at least one other person.” As a man who had spent the last decade working as a missionary doctor among Indians on the reservations of the American West, Clyde tended to look askance at all the “social nonsense of Baltimore” and had remained at home.
    “It is not so important for Clyde to be here,” her father said. “After his visit here he will be heading straight back to the Navajo reservation in Arizona Territory; that is where Clyde will make his mark in this world, not among the blue bloods. And even though you may not relish taking part in tonight’s sort of entertaining, a journalist can’t afford to pass up these opportunities. You’ve made me very proud with your work in London, and with the right connections, I know you can do equally splendid work here in America.”
    And that was what she wanted more than drawing her next breath of air. Some might think it strange for a woman to be so driven to succeed, but her father had planted the seeds of ambition in her before she had even stopped sucking her thumb. God had put her on this earth for a purpose, yet in the weeks since she had been banished from England, she had done nothing but nurse her battered soul and wallow in regrets. She needed to find a new way to make a life-affirming contribution to the world, and since her father was one of the few men in the entire country who was willing to publish the writings of a woman, Clara knew she had to get back to her writing.
    The disaster in London was no excuse for this self-indulgent malaise that had been plaguing her. If she ever hoped to regain any level of pride in her work, she was going to have to walk through those imposing front doors and try to pretend that she was not an utter failure. Clara squared her shoulders and forced her chin up a notch. Self-confidence could be feigned, even though she felt as charismatic as an oyster.
    Florence Wagner swept into the foyer the moment Clara set foot inside the mansion. Poured into a slim-fitting sheath of sapphire Dupioni silk, Florence’s petite little body was topped by a mass of tightly curled red hair with jeweled combs strategically placed like a crown around the top of her head. “Clara, darling,” the woman drawled as she rushed forward with outstretched hands. One would have thought they were long-lost friends, although Clara had been a girl of only sixteen when last she set foot in Baltimore. “Welcome back home, my dear.” She turned outward to face the crowd of assembled people. “Everyone . . . here is dearest Clara Endicott, just back from London.”
    Heads swiveled and gentlemen raised monocles to inspect her. Everywhere Clara looked she saw stunningly attired women, appearing like glorious butterflies draped in watered silk and satin gowns while diamonds winked from throats and fans wafted in the jasmine-scented air. The elegant notes of a string quartet played in the distance. Clara was overwhelmed with an odd sort of dissonance. Was it only a month ago when she was trapped in a dank stone prison? It did not seem possible for such splendor to