Page 28 of Lady Waldrey’s Gardening Almanac for Cultivating Scandal (Love from London #3)

F rom the Quentin Daily-

Dinner party or dark rite? Recently a dinner party took place with far too many candles on the table to be considered anything but an ancient ritual.

Witnesses claim that offerings were scattered at the base of the candles—an entire goose, a suckling pig, and many sad vegetables!

Some claim it was all innocence, but questions linger—was it supper or ceremony?

On their way back to the house, Candace turned from the window and asked Vera, “You truly enjoyed the baroness’ menagerie, didn’t you?”

“They’re very sweet.”

“I thought you might not like animals.”

“Because of Seamus?” Vera asked. At Candace’s nod, she continued, “A large dog on the street pushed me down once. Tore my skirts. It’s not that I don’t like dogs; it was just the size of him. The surprise of him. ”

“I’m sorry. I’ve instructed James to keep him outside from now on.”

“No.” Vera shook her head, her eyes wide to accompany her earnest words. “There’s no need—truly. Now that I’ve seen him, I won’t be frightened of him, especially if I have warning first.”

“I suppose he would be frightening at first glance, but I can assure you that the great beast has no inclination toward harm. He’s possibly the sweetest dog I’ve ever met.”

“I’m happy to hear it.”

Candace nodded and turned back to the window, just as their carriage passed a cart heading the same direction.

“Did you see that, Hortense?” Candace hissed, even though they were well past the man by that point and there was no way he could have heard her over the thud of horse hooves and the jingle of livery.

Still, Candace thought the occasion warranted a whisper.

“You didn’t miss Thomas’s arrival at Devon Manor, after all. ”

She thought that her maid might take offense at her words and be irritated like she was before; instead, Hortense bunched her hands into the fabric of her skirts, instantly released them, and set to smoothing them out briskly.

Candace leaned back and smiled. This Thomas fellow had thrown her normally unflappable companion for a loop. If nothing else, it was nice to see a dreamy expression steal across Hortense’s face when she thought no one was looking.

When they alighted from the carriage in front of the house, Candace shooed her maid upstairs. “Go. See to your hair in my rooms. Use my brushes and pins and a bit of my rouge, if you like. But don’t go overboard—you already have a pleasing flush going.”

Hortense pursed her lips but fled up the stairs.

Candace turned to Vera. “Shall we try to spy, just a little bit?”

Vera nodded and smiled, but it was a listless, limp expression that didn’t look like Vera at all.

“Are you feeling well?” Candace asked, concerned.

“Oh, yes. I’m fine. Let’s sit in the music room—it has the best view of the servants’ door.”

When they were ensconced upon the wide window seat of the sun-drenched music room, Candace turned to her once more. “Are you sure you’re feeling quite well? I thought you might be having a difficult time at lunch with the baroness. Did she say something to bother you?”

“Not at all.” Vera’s eyes were wide. “The baroness is wonderful company.”

Candace nodded, nibbling her lower lip.

Vera hesitated, then began, “I suppose I should be honest, however?—”

“Oh! There he is!” Candace whispered as the tall form of Thomas came into view.

Vera clutched at Candace’s forearm. They watched as he hesitated near the back door, pausing to retuck his shirt and smooth his hair before he straightened his shoulders and rapped on the servants’ door. It was opened and he entered, out of their sight.

“I’m sorry, Vera. How rude of me to interrupt. What were you saying?”

“Nothing.” She smiled wanly, then nodded at the servants’ door. “What do you make of the potential couple?”

“If Thomas has his sights set on Hortense, he has his work cut out for him.” Candace frowned. “When she first came to me I thought there might have been a love in her past. Not that we were close enough for me to inquire about it at the time.”

Vera nodded. “We all have secrets.”

Candace was far too busy with her private memories of a moonlit garden to attend to the latent mystery in her friend’s words.

“Indeed.”

That night, the heavens opened and a deluge of rain battered Devon Manor. The next morning, Mrs. Penn was delighted; before it was even noon, she’d made three exclamations about how lovely it was to have a roof that didn’t leak.

Candace claimed a squashy old armchair before the crackling fire with an excellent view of the rain-splattered windows.

There was something delightful about a storm when one could be inside, out of its way.

She loved the contrast of the glowing red heat of the fire and the softness of a hand-knit blanket tucked over her knees, set against the roiling gloom of rain lashing against the glass.

Hortense hurried over and whispered into her ear .

Candace’s expression brightened; her back straightened. “Truly?”

Hortense nodded. “Miss Vera is in the back parlor with her novel; I think she'll be occupied for some time.”

“Let’s go, then. I wish to see.”

When Vera returned to her bedroom nearly an hour later, she found the door standing open, with many exclamations of female joy emitting from within.

“What is—” Vera's words died off as she pushed the door open.

“Come in,” Candace called, nearly bouncing on the balls of her feet in her excitement.

“Very kind of you, to invite me into my own room,” Vera said, but her eyes twinkled and there was no heat in her tone.

Candace grinned and extended her arm theatrically toward the bed, where she and Hortense had smoothed four of the dresses out side by side for dramatic effect. “You must try one on.”

“You must try them all on, Miss Vera,” Hortense added, nodding toward the wardrobe.

The door stood open, showing the shoulders of many more elegant gowns, hung upon hangers with Hortense-precision. In the corner, the edge of a mustard-yellow gown peeped from where it had been thrown to the ground behind a screen.

“What—” Vera stepped forward, then stopped once more. “What are these?”

“They’re yours.” Candace couldn't wait any longer; she darted forward and gently tugged her friend closer to the bed, as Vera seemed reluctant to approach on her own. “They just arrived from London.”

“But how—” Vera reached out and touched the embellished edge of a peach morning dress. The contact seemed to render her mute.

“Madame Aubert has your measurements. And you know she has exquisite taste. Of course, I did have some input on the general colors. I believe that cotton lawn was my direct request, but?—”

“I can’t possibly accept these,” Vera said, even as she smoothed her hand lovingly over a navy dress with a matching jacket trimmed in ribbon.

“I won’t hear such nonsense. You must. It gives me great pleasure to give them to you. In fact, I shall be offended if you don’t accept them.”

“If you'll be offended…” Vera said in a tone that made it plain she was willing to be convinced. She trailed her fingertips over a line of gorgeous jet buttons.

“Try the green one first.” Candace thrust the gown into Vera’s hands as Hortense fairly herded her into the adjacent dressing room.

Half an hour later, Mrs. Penn delivered a tea tray just in time to see Vera step from the dressing room wearing a pale-blue dinner dress.

“Lovely, Miss Vera,” Mrs. Penn said.

“That will go perfectly with the lace gloves,” Candace added from where she lounged on the settee at the foot of the bed. She snagged a tea sandwich from the tray.

Vera turned this way and that before the mirror, then gave a shy smile that Candace thought was worth the entire purchase .

“You look lovely, as you have in everything you’ve tried so far. Just as I knew you would.”

“Everything feels so light ,” Vera said.

“When a dress isn't fashioned from seventeenth-century curtains, it tends to feel lighter.” She winced. “Sorry; that wasn’t kind of me.”

“I’m not irritated in the least with your description of my wardrobe.” Vera turned and looked over her shoulder at the line of silk-covered buttons down her back. “You know those dresses weren’t of my choosing.”

Candace frowned with the sudden thought that these dresses weren’t of Vera’s choosing, either. “If you don’t like these, you don’t have to wear them. I promise I won’t be offended in the least. I was only saying that to get you to agree to them.”

Vera arched an eyebrow. “Surely you’re joking. You have beautiful taste—you and Madame Aubert, both. They’re all so beautiful, I cannot decide which dress is my favorite.”

“Still, it’s completely up to you. I don’t want you to feel as if you don’t have options.”

Vera’s forehead crinkled; she studied Candace for several moments.

Then, her expression cleared with sudden understanding.

“You’re worried that I’ll see this gift as controlling?

Candace, you’re nothing like my mother. Your motivations with these dresses are nothing like hers. Surely you must know I see that.”

“I don’t want to do the same thing to you that she’s done.”

“Not at all. These make me look like a different person—in a good way.”

“I’m so glad you like them.” Candace slid her fingers down the edge of a navy walking dress. The skirts were lined in a deep burgundy that would show only in flashes when the wearer walked.

“I love them. It’s almost a shame there’s not more company around to see them.”

Candace pursed her lips, her mind flitting from London society to the scandal sheets she expected in the mail. She sent Hortense down to the village nearly every day, but her maid returned with a solemn shaking of her head every time when Candace asked after them.

It was a wonder that Vera’s dresses had arrived before the copies of the Quentin Daily did, but then, that was the nature of the post. They were probably sitting beneath a stack of letters on some innkeeper’s counter and would arrive all together in a week or so.

“I said it’s almost a shame,” Vera said, misreading her friend’s silence. “I’m quite happy in our seclusion, trust me.”

Candace pretended she wasn’t thinking of James when she said, “Indeed. I’m quite content.”