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Chapter One
Mayfair, London, 1817
“Patricia! What are you doing? We must not dally!”
Lady Patricia Hunter glanced back at her sixteen-year-old sister Margaret, dressed in a pretty white frilled gown, who was poised at the top of the staircase with one hand resting on the balustrade. Margaret’s face was a pale oval, her fair eyebrows knotted, as she entreated her sister.
“The carriage is waiting for us,” continued Margaret, biting her lip. “You know Mama will be most displeased with us if we are late for Lady Davis’s garden party. She was most specific in her instructions…”
Patricia frowned distractedly. “You go ahead, Margaret. I shall be along presently. I promise.” She forced a smile onto her face. “Mama shall have no cause to be displeased. We shall not be late.”
Margaret hesitated. Her eyes flickered towards the closed door, where Patricia was hovering. “You should not be eavesdropping, sister,” she said, in a loud, shocked whisper. “Mama and Papa will skin your hide if they find out.”
Patricia shushed her sister with a finger on her mouth. “They will not find out. Now go. I command it.”
Margaret hesitated for another second, before clattering down the staircase. Patricia turned back to the closed door. She had already forgotten about Margaret and Lady Davis’s garden party. All she was focused on was the voices within the parlour. Raised, angry voices.
She leaned closer towards the door, placing her face next to it. This was important. She must discover why her parents were arguing so ferociously. The fact that they were even fighting was shocking in itself; her parents never fought. At most, they might have a heated disagreement. And she did not think she had ever heard them shouting at each other in this shocking manner.
Her heart lurched with dread. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong indeed. And she intended to discover exactly what it was.
Lady Davis’s garden party could jolly well wait.
* * *
Patricia could hear them clearly. Her father Lord Henry Hunter, the Viscount Chant, had probably been enjoying a leisurely afternoon, reading the newspapers with an after-luncheon brandy as was his habit. He would have been surprised to have been interrupted by his wife. Mama usually left him well alone.
Patricia heard her mother’s pained, raised voice.
“How could you?” screeched Lady Hunter. “Our future! The future of our daughters! You have gambled it all away.”
“What are you talking about, Gertrude?” blustered her father. “Can a man not have some peace without being harassed in this manner? You are behaving like a harpy.”
Patricia could hear the barely contained rage in her mother’s voice.
“Do not try to put me off, Henry,” she said. “I know. I have always known where you have been slinking off to, when we are residing in London. Gambling dens. Pits of iniquity.” She drew a deep breath into her lungs. “Do not think I have not noticed how things have been changing here. Servants being dismissed without good reason. Objects vanishing, that I cannot account for.”
Patricia heard her father groan.
“You have been gambling more than you can afford,” hissed her mother. “I have turned a blind eye to it, in the vain hope that you would come to your senses. But I see now that you are beyond redemption.” She paused. “I have discovered notes of sale for most of our assets. Patricia’s dowry is virtually gone.”
Outside the door, Patricia gasped in shock. No. It simply could not be possible. Her dowry was gone? Tears of shock pricked behind her eyes. Her future was ruined.
“How dare you!” her father suddenly yelled. “How dare you sneak about my study like a thief, invading my privacy. I shall make very sure to lock the drawers in my desk from hereon in, madam!”
Patricia lowered her eye to the keyhole, just in time to see her mother throw a pile of letters into the air, which scattered like rice at a wedding around both her parents.
“That is what I think of your privacy,” cried her mother. “You have all but ruined us, Henry Hunter. Patricia cannot hope to secure a match with a gentleman she actually admires now. You have taken the choice away from her.” She sobbed with rage for a moment. “My beautiful, accomplished eldest daughter must sell herself to the highest bidder, instead of being swept off her feet by a suitor who truly deserves her.”
Outside the parlour Patricia shuddered in horror. She felt her blood run cold. She was very glad now that she had put off Margaret and insisted on eavesdropping on this fight. This was far more important than any garden party.
She collapsed against the closed door for a moment. Her mind was reeling. Papa – her beloved, charming, but feckless father – had spent most of her dowry. He had gambled away her very future.
She had been raised in splendour, wanting for nothing. Her father was a viscount. They had a grand country home in Staffordshire, with a hundred servants, full stables, and acres of prime hunting land. When they came to London, they always resided at this fashionable townhouse on Park Street, near Hyde Park. London was always a whirlwind of social calls, visits to the opera and ballet at Covent Garden, and shopping on Bond and Regent streets.
And now, that was all about to change, in ways that she had never envisaged.
She stifled a sob. How bad was it? Would they still be able to keep their homes? Would she and Margaret be reduced to penury, before too long, forced to become governesses? She shuddered at the very thought.
