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Georgette let out a small noise of disbelief. Freaks and unwanteds! Anderson was right—the bleaker side of life truly did weed out those lacking a heart.

“If it is, then he is a braver man than I—or as mad as his mother,” muttered Mr Clarke .

Saye stood. “Come on then, you lazy fools. What have you found over in that corner? Anything of use?”

Georgette scarcely heard him. She did not often feel anger; she enjoyed life too well to wallow in its vexations.

She was particularly inured to attacks on Anderson’s perceived dreariness, secure in the knowledge that everybody was grossly mistaken about that.

Yet, this attack on his family, on his mother and his beloved brother Matthew, and on his beautiful home for children, made her blood boil.

“Who would have credited that a man so dull should come from such a colourful family?” Lord Mickels said, laughing as though it were funny. “It is always the quiet ones you have to watch.”

Mr Wigsby shook his head. “I should keep quiet, too, if I had so many damning secrets to?—”

“That is enough, you beasts !” Georgette cried, surging to her feet.

Her breath was coming so fast that speaking was difficult.

It made her sound hysterical. Perhaps she was.

“Mr Anderson is a better man than any of you could ever hope to be. While you all sit about gorging on burnt pigs, torching each other’s prized possessions, and arguing over who loves whom best, he is making a real difference in the world.

He is saving lives— actually saving the lives of people who do not have the privilege of family or fortune.

Children whose own mothers turned them out at birth because they were not pretty enough to love.

If that is dull to you, then I choose dull over all your specious elegance.

I choose heart . And I shall never be ashamed to call such a man my husband! ”

A collective gasp went up, followed by an unearthly silence.

Georgette held her breath. She had not meant to say that.

She looked around the room in dismay. Everybody was staring at her, their expressions varying from disbelief to revulsion.

Lady Aurelia, whose gaze was suddenly horribly sober, looked livid, as did her husband.

Lilly and Sarah were staring at her as though she were a stranger, and she felt all the guilt of having concealed the truth from them.

“ Merde , Georgette,” said Saye under his breath.

“Husband?” cried Miss Barlowe. “You are going to marry him?”

Saye then exclaimed, his voice dripping with false jollity, “Ho, Darcy! How nice of you to join us.”

Georgette turned to see Mr Darcy in the doorway, and then her stomach turned over, for there at his side was Anderson. He was staring directly at her, unblinking, his countenance devoid of any emotion.

“Samuel!” she mouthed silently.

He did not answer her. Instead, he turned to Saye. “My lord, I have been called away on urgent business and must leave Matlock immediately. Pray forgive my early departure.” He gave a perfunctory bow, then turned and stalked away.

His departure created a vacuum that tugged a sound of dismay from the pit of Georgette’s stomach up into her throat.

They had never had a cross word between them in all the time they had known each other.

She did not know what to do. Her heart would not stop pounding its alarm against her ribs, and she felt dangerously close to tears.

“Darcy, I have found copies of some of the drawings in Saye’s sketches in the books on these shelves over here. Will you help me pick out the right ones?” Elizabeth said loudly into the silence.

Mr Darcy agreed and called on several of the other gentlemen to assist, and with their perseverance, a general milling of chatter gradually returned to the room.

“Husband?” Lady Aurelia approached Georgette and Saye, and spoke so only they could hear. “That cannot happen, Georgette. You must know that. It is an entirely unsuitable alliance, and your father will never agree to it.”

Georgette shook her head, unable to fix upon her cousin’s words.

“Saye? Tell her, for you know as well as I do that our father will not permit this any more than hers will.”

“I shall not need either’s permission when I come of age. I shall marry him then,” Georgette objected. She tried to sound defiant, but she could not hear whether she was successful over the ringing in her ears.

“Not if your father marries you to someone else before then, which he will when he finds out,” Lady Aurelia snapped.

“He will not find out if you do not tell him,” Saye replied impatiently.

“I shall not tell a soul. I do not need to. Half the people in this house just heard it, and at least two footmen. And Phin. He plays cards with your father, for heaven’s sake, Georgette. He will find out.”

Saye pulled a face of disgust. “Aurelia, you are acting like a twatwaffle. What is it to you whom Georgette marries, hm?”

“Saye, you need to grow up and realise there are more important things in this world than pranks and debauchery.”

“Such as?” Saye retorted. “Superiority and cruelty?”

“I think I am going to be sick,” Georgette said breathlessly.

“I believe you have my chamber pot somewhere. Use that.” Saye turned on his heel and walked to join the others in looking at the books. He had not liked his sister’s set down, it would seem. He never had cared for other people’s anger.

Georgette stared after him for a moment, then as gracefully as she could, she walked out of the library.

She kept walking all through the house until she reached the attic where they had used to play as children.

She curled up on the dusty old chest on which Fitzwilliam had always stood to issue the rules of whatever game they were to play.

And there she remained, not knowing what to do, for a very, very long time.