Regency Rumours/A Scandalous Mistress/Dishonour And Desire Read Free Page B

had been happy enough there for her first twenty-two years, the two years after that had pointed out with brutal reality who she could depend on for true friendship.
    Caterina’s joy at being taken to live with her, though flattering, was not what Amelie had wanted, and the inevitable conflict of interests had not been satisfactorily resolved in their first few weeks. Caterina had expected to make a new set of friends and to be received almost instantly into high society. Amelie had not the heart to explain either to Caterina or to her grateful father, that the fickleness of high society was something she would rather have shunned than sought, and that the reason she had chosen Richmond was for its proximity to Kew Gardens, to Hampton Court Palace, to the famed Chelsea Physic Garden and to Royal Academy exhibitions. The day’s shopping in London, though necessary, had been more the result of a guilty conscience than for Amelie’s own pleasure, not having tried as hard as she might to make contact with the local leading families, as Caterina had expected her to. The young lady’s very inadequate wardrobe had dictated the pattern of their shopping, and now the maid Lise sat beside a mountain of brown paper parcels that threatened to topple and bury her at each bounce of the carriage. Fortunately, there had not been room for the controversial tea urn, or Lise might have been critically injured.
    The reason for Amelie’s accelerated haste to reach home was neither asked nor explained, as the clouding September skywas supposed by Caterina to be the cause. The truth, however, was more to do with Lord Elyot’s stated intention to attend directly to the problem of which the Vestry had complained.
    Homeless mothers-to-be were often hustled over the boundary of one parish into the next, even during labour, to avoid the responsibility of more mouths to feed. Naturally, these women could not be let loose to give birth under hedges: untidy activities of that nature did not look well where refined citizens could be shocked by such sights. As a last resort, they had to be rounded up until it was all over, by which time the problem was often solved more permanently.
    Sir Josiah Chester had not retained his vast wealth by giving it away to charitable causes, but by saving it; whether it was the powerful combination of childlessness, bereavement and wealth that gave rise to Amelie’s concern for waifs, strays and hopeless debtors, she had never tried to analyse, but the fact was that her acceptance of her new state had been smoothed by the help she had given to others less endowed and more distressed by far. She could be distressed in comfort, while they could not.
    With a name as well known in Buxton as Sir Josiah’s, it had been relatively easy for Amelie, as a widow, to pay the debts of poor families threatened by imprisonment and worse and to find employment for petty criminals. She had given shelter and aid, sometimes in her own home, to pregnant homeless women and had found suitable places for them afterwards, had persuaded farmers’ wives to take in starving children and had poured money into improving the local workhouse facilities. The legacy she had received from her own wealthy parents had been exceptionally generous, and all that giving had made a greater difference to her sense of worth and general well-being than it had to her reserve of funds.
    As long as she was actively helping the Vestry in Buxton to deal with their problems, no one had stood in her way, though nothing could stop the gossip of society women concerning the status of a young, wealthy and beautiful widow and the attentions of her brother-in-law, of supposed lovers and supposed rivals. The whisperings of scandal. It had been time for her to leave.
    But in Richmond, the advantages associated with the name of Sir Josiah Chester had not opened the same doors as they had before, and all the help she had given so freely in Buxton now had to be done rather