“I can ask Miss Charming if you’re busy.”
“Um … I could use some help with the doing-up,” she said. He stood by the door as she touched up her makeup in the bathroom and turned his back when she pulled off her robe and slid into the ball gown. “And I haven’t even gotten to the part where I’m a racing driver.” Also, I get to keep whipping Mallery’s face with it till he cries like a baby.” “Do you think you’ll have another chance to use that?” He entered, still exercising his own right to tote a practice foil. No one had ever knocked at her door besides Mary, and the last time Mary had come around, she’d been exercising the right to bear arms. Something told her he’d be a whiz at an updo. She could ask Miss Charming to do up the unreachable buttons and help her with her hair. Charlotte had been doing her best to dress herself for the past week. Mary was no more, but Charlotte was certain that if she pulled her bell cord, some downstairs maid would come help her dress. Seventeen years of fashion changes had rendered her wedding dress laughable, but two hundred years hadn’t hurt this style.
The cream-colored organza was delicately embroidered in a pattern of flowers and curlicues and embellished with beads that winked in the window light. The length from high waist to low hem was longer than her everyday dresses, accentuating her height. Its newness seemed to make it glow, as if a magic wand had only just zapped it together from rags. She’d been measured for the gown on her first day, and it must have just arrived from the seamstress.
Charlotte didn’t feel much motivation to spruce up, but her ball gown lay neatly on her bed. That made her feel a little bit lonely, but a little bit lonely was nicer than a whole lot numb.Įddie would be back in character and dancing with Miss Gardenside tonight. The ball would be starting soon, and Charlotte could hear musicians tuning and smell pastries baking. Wattlesbrook chased the last of the police away and the guests to their rooms. Eddie didn’t say anything significant to her, such as “I love you,” or “Please stay forever,” or even “I’m going to go brush my teeth-meet me in your room in ten.” He stood near her, his attention on Miss Gardenside.Įvening drew close. Miss Gardenside, Colonel Andrews, and Miss Charming were always hovering nearby. They weren’t alone for the rest of the day. She was feeling at home at last in Austenland, and she meant to enshroud herself with that boldness and take it home with her.Īnd she meant, quite specifically, to damn the torpedoes and fall very much in love with Eddie, even if it was temporary, even if she didn’t quite know what she meant to him. There wasn’t just one kind of woman to be. Jane Austen had created six heroines, each quite different, and that gave Charlotte courage. It was the heroine’s prerogative to give the villain a final kiss, and she had decided to be the heroine after all.
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