Author: judeknight

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Out of the mouths of babes on WIP Wednesday

One of the excellent roles children can play in fiction is truth teller. Too young to consider consequences or balance risks, they blurt out whatever they find interesting, and then we have the fun of writing our characters reaction. So in this week’s WIP Wednesday, I’m looking for excerpts that involve a child telling the truth when one or more listeners would prefer them to remain silent.

My excerpt is from Unkept Promises.

The captain had arrived home in the early hours of the morning. Mia had to admit he had been considerately quiet, and she would not have heard him if she’d not been lying awake. Once she was up, she ordered the servants to be quiet about their work. Let the man sleep in on the first full day of his leave. If nothing else, an hour or two’s extra sleep might grease the path of the conversation she and Jules needed to have.

She was reserving judgement about their future: unwilling to risk a dream, afraid of wasting the opportunity. Perhaps he had good reasons for all the actions that offended her, as with going out to dinner on the first night he and she were in the same country in seven years.

Last night, Adarinta was muttering bitterly about her father’s defection and Mia was silently agreeing with her, though trying not to let a hint of her opinion show, when Perdana stopped his sister’s compaints. “The captain did not wish to leave us, Ada, but he is an officer in His Majesty’s Navy, and when the admiral orders him to come to dinner, it is his duty to obey. You are an officer’s daughter. It is your duty not to complain.”

Mia avoided letting her wince show, too, she hoped. Or perhaps not, for Adarinta appealed to her. “But it is unfair, is it not Ibu Mia? I wanted Papa to stay with us.”

“The Royal Navy protects the seas for the King,” Mia replied. “That is what your father does, and your Uncle Rick, and the admiral too. Imagine if the ships could not sail because a captain wanted to stay with his little girls, and Napoleon sailed past in his ship with all his soldiers!”

“That would be bad,” Perdana agreed. “Our ships are the oak wall that protects Britain and all of its lands, at home and abroad.”

“Yes,” Mia agreed. “And the mothers, wives, and children of our brave sailors must let them go, and smile, and never complain at their leaving.” She had learned that lesson in her father-in-law’s household. He and her brothers-in-law were all naval or army officers. Her sister-in-law was a naval widow; her husband having been killed in the North Sea in a battle against French ships. Men needed to go heart-whole to war, confident that their women would provide a safe and welcoming home to which they could return.

Perdana rewarded her sentiment with a smile. “Ibu Mia knows,” he told his sisters.

 

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Run, don’t walk, to buy Unexpected Wife

I was introduced to Caroline Warfield’s books when I read her first published novel, Dangerous Works, and within a few pages knew she was giving me everything I want in an historical romance. Well-rounded characters I cared about. Stories soundly grounded in historical fact, including real challenges and issues consistent with the times. Interesting plots with unexpected but logical twists. A solid passion between the hero and heroine ending in a commitment that I can expect to last well beyond the last page of the book.

Each book in the Dangerous series just got better and better, and the novella A Dangerous Nativity was just plain funny, besides. I loved the three delightful boys and their plan to put on a nativity scene with animals in all the parts.

You can imagine how excited I was when she spoke about Children of Empire, in which the three boys, now grown and estranged (thanks to a vicious lying harpy), each have a book. The story of Canadian timber baron, Rand, is told in The Renegade Wife. Fred, who went into the army, meets the love of his life in The Reluctant Wife. Charles, the Duke of Murnane, appeared in the story for each of his cousins. Good as they were, each better than the last, I was holding out to hear what happened to Charles. And I wasn’t disappointed.

Take everything I said about Dangerous Works and magnify it. The Unexpected Wife stars my beloved Charles, as wonderful as ever, and a heroine who is worthy of him. Zambuk is brilliant, passionate, magnificent — and deeply frustrated at the constraints on her as a woman. Together, they face the challenges posed by her opium-addicted brother, rogue Western traders determined to break the Chinese ban on opium, a Chinese magistrate dedicated to stamping out the vile trade, small-minded gossip, and Charles’s wicked wife.

Who could ask for more? A sigh-worthy ending goes without saying in a Warfield book. And I know I’ve said it before, but this is Caroline’s best yet.  Can’t wait to see what she does in her next series.

Giveaway

To celebrate the launch, Caroline will give a copy of any of her books to one randomly selected person who comments. They can choose from the books found here: http://www.carolinewarfield.com/bookshelf/

 

The Duke of Murnane expects work to heal him. He doesn’t expect to face his past and find his future in China

Charles Wheatly, Duke of Murnane, accepts an unofficial fact finding mission to the East India Company’s enclave in Canton, China on behalf of the queen. He anticipates intrigue, international tensions, and an outlet for his grief over the death of his young son. He isn’t entirely surprised when he also encounters the troublesome offspring of his mentor, the Duke of Sudbury, but the profound love he discovers for the determined young woman is unforeseen and untimely. Charles certainly doesn’t expect to also face his troubled marriage in such an exotic locale. The appearance of his estranged wife in the company of their enemy throws the entire enterprise into conflict, and tensions boil over when the woman he loves is put at risk by his wife’s scheming—and the beginnings of the First Opium War.

Zambak Hayden seethes with frustration. A woman her age has occupied the throne for over a year, yet the Duke of Sudbury’s line of succession still passes over her—his eldest—to land on a son with neither spine nor character. She follows her brother, the East India Company’s newest and least competent clerk, to Macau to protect him and to safeguard the family honor—if she also escapes the gossip and intrigues of London and the marriage mart, so much the better. She has no intention of being forced into some sort of dynastic marriage, and she may just refuse to marry at all. The greed and corruption she finds horrifies her, especially when her brother succumbs to the lure of opium. She determines to document the truth. When an old family friend arrives she assumes her father sent him. She isn’t about to bend to his dictates nor give up her quest. Her traitorous heart, however, can’t stop yearning for a man she can’t have.

As an epic historical drama unfolds around them, both Charles and Zambak must come to terms with a love that neither expected.

PREORDER LINKS (ebook only) — published 25 July

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The Trailer:                 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CQ9QWkqLvw

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Excerpt

At the mention of Jarratt her stomach clenched, and a vile taste crept into her mouth. “What else,” she rasped.

Charles looked down. His sigh sounded deep and weary. “Elliot fears the Chinese response will eventually ensnare an English user or dealer. If they arrest someone or threaten violence he may be forced to act.”

If Thorn is as closely allied to the opium dens as Jarratt implied—and out of his senses from the narcotic—he could be… cow turds!

“Charles, I have to get to my brother. I can’t leave him in Jarratt’s circle.”

The duke’s eyes held hers until she felt him boring into her soul. He put out a comforting hand, and she gripped it to steady herself. “How exactly do you propose to do that, Zambak?” he asked.

“Jarratt said to come back. I’ll go tomorrow. He implied Thorn might be well, might be willing to come with me.”

“We’ll go tomorrow,” he corrected.

She stiffened in outrage for a moment before Jarratt’s face leered at her in memory, and she sagged toward Charles. When he cupped her cheek with one hand and searched her face, she thought for an insane moment he meant to kiss her. Absurd. Charles is a married man, and we’re friends. Only friends.

“We’ll go together, Zambak. We will get Thorn help together.”

Together. Relief flooded her. She had thought that accepting help made her weak, but the tenderness in the duke’s eyes gave her strength.

Author bio

Award winning author Caroline Warfield has been many things: traveler, librarian, poet, raiser of children, bird watcher, Internet and Web services manager, conference speaker, indexer, tech writer, genealogist—even a nun. She reckons she is on at least her third act, happily working in an office surrounded by windows where she lets her characters lead her to adventures in England and the far-flung corners of the British Empire. She nudges them to explore the riskiest territory of all, the human heart.

Visit Caroline’s Website and Blog

Meet Caroline on Facebook 

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Rounding the Cape of Storms

Action off the Cape of Good Hope by Samuel Scott

The English twice took over the Cape Colony at the southern end of Africa, first in the late 18th Century and then in the early 19th when they came to stay. Both times, it was part of the war with the French. Both times, the intent was to secure an important refueling spot on the sea route to India, and to secure the route against enemy shipping.

The Dutch East India Company (VOC) had the first of these goals very much in mind when they founded the colony in the 17th century, nearly 200 years after the first Europeans sailed into the region.

In the fifteen century, the Silk Roads — the land route for trade with the East — was becoming more difficult for European traders. The captain of that first expedition, Portuguese explorer Bartolomeu Dias  called the point off which the route turned East Cabo de Boa Esperanca, the Cape of Good Hope, because he hoped the route would clear the way to India, avoiding the land route. The name was bestowed on the way back. Stormy conditions meant he didn’t see the Cape on his way east, but once he had sailed far enough to confirm that the coast had turned to head northeast, he returned, and had a clearer view on the way back.

The Cape is the point at which a warm current from the Indian Ocean meets a cool current from the Antarctic, so storms are common and dangerous, which won the Cape its other name, Cape of Storms.

Problems and miscommunications with the local people, the Khoi, made the Portugese wary, and it was another 100 years before the Dutch took the plunge and founded a settlement on the west coast just north of the Cape of Good Hope.  The VOC initially intended a supply station, but when company servants asked for dispensation to set up private farms, they changed their minds. They brought in slaves and settlers, and built a fort to protect the colonists from invasion.

In 1795, the French took over the Netherlands, and the exiled Prince of Orange asked his English hosts to secure the colony, which they cheerfully did, gave it back when a peace was signed, then reinvaded after Napoleon took over the Netherlands again.

This time, they were there to stay, with many more storms in their future.

(I’ve been half living in the Cape colony in 1812 all this month. My hero is stationed there as part of the naval force patrolling the waters.)

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Animals in WIP Wednesday

The children in my current Redepenning novel, Unkept Promises, want a pet, and I’m inclined to give it to them. The question is what. A kitten or a puppy? Or something more exotic? A parrot? A monkey? A snake, maybe? They are in South Africa, but whatever I give them will need to go home to England with them.

Have you got an animal in a WIP to share with us? Post an excerpt in the comments.

Just to be going on with, here is the dog in my newsletter subscriber short story The Bookworm and the Beast, which I’m about to start rewriting as The Beast Next Door. Once rewritten, it will be a novella for the Belles’ Valentine’s Day box set.

Charis was struggling to hold onto her indignation at Eric’s deceit, especially with his eyes so intent on hers. He was so close. If she leant forward just a bit, she could have one of those heart-stopping kisses. But she did not want to be a countess, did she? Did she, if it meant she was Eric’s countess?

She frowned, just as the door burst open again, this time propelled by Ugo, one hundred pounds of wet mountain shepherd dog, barking his delight at having found Eric — yes, and Charis as well.

In moments, the sisters had joined them. Mama, too, all of them screeching when Ugo stopped his frantic greetings to his master and Charis long enough to shake himself, and to spray the whole room with his burden of rain.

At last, Ugo overcame his excitement enough to listen to the wrath in Eric’s voice, and to slink behind Charis’s sofa, sliding underneath enough to rest a cold wet chin on her foot. “I am sorry, Mrs Dalrymple,” Eric told Mama. “He must have slipped his collar and followed me.”

Mama managed a weak smile. “He is a– a handsome beast, is he not?”

“He is a wicked creature, who thinks charm will fish him out of well-deserved trouble,” Charis said sternly, fixing her beloved with a stern frown.

 

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Tea with Charles

 

How in God’s name does this woman know everything?

Charles Wheatly, Duke of Murnane glanced down at the missive in his hand, a rather personal one coming from a duchess, and shook his head.

Charles

Do come to tea before you leave for China.  Shall we say Tuesday next?

Eleanor Winshire

He knew the answer to his own question. The duchess spoke to Uncle Richard, of course.  The Duke of Sudbury wouldn’t have confided such a secret in many people, but he would be frank with the Duchess of Haverford who could be trusted with both the political and the personal aspects of Charles’s mission.  Which part does she wish to pummel me about? Charles wondered.

He suspected the personal. The last time she summoned him to tea, she urged him to divorce his wife.  “This time I may listen to her,” he mumbled to the empty carriage. But no. He had no more desire to drag his wretched marriage through the mud than he did three years ago. He liked Eleanor, he truly did, but his life was his own.

The duchess surprised him. After tea had been poured, he accepted her condolences on the death of his son. She wisely chose not to linger over them, and they quickly moved on to the sort of exchange demanded by good manners. Yes, Uncle Will has recovered from the bronchitis he contracted at the funeral. Yes, Fred and Clare were thriving at Songbird Cottage, but he’d had no world from Rand recently. Charles suspected his cousin was too busy building his timber empire. The duchess, in her turn, referred lightly to the doings of her vast tribe of grandchildren: the children of her sons and foster-daughters, and the step-grandchildren from her second marriage. “They are all growing up, Charles. Even Haverford’s daughter is about to make her debut, and my son made a late start, as you know.”

Charles reached over to pick up a second lemon cake, always his favorite, when she struck.

“You will of course want to get into Canton itself.”

He sat upright, and blinked at her.

“There is no point in you going all the way to Macao just to listen to Charles Eliot’s views on the matter, much less those of Jarrett and those wretched smugglers unleashing drugs on those people.”

He put the remains of the cake down and cleared his throat. “You are correct. I had planned to haunt the docks of both cities and Madras as well.”

“And shed your title and position to do it.”

“How else can I entice people into speaking plainly?” He grinned at her, enjoying himself now. “Besides, I may as well enjoy a bit of freedom while I can.”

“Quite so,” Eleanor replied. “It is a pity you don’t speak Cantonese. You will need a translator.”

That problem had bothered him, but he assumed it could be solved. “There are people—“

“Not many. Lily would be perfect, but of course she has much too much dignity at her age to go racketing about with you.”

He choked on his tea. Lilias Hayden, the Duchess of Sudbury, might be a gifted linguist, but she wielded her skills over diplomatic dinners, not on the docks. “I should say not,” he croaked.

“I wonder if her daughter has inherited her skills?” Eleanor murmured innocently. Too innocently. Sudbury had obviously told her that his hoydenish daughter had absconded to China after refusing to accept the attentions of no fewer than six suitors during the previous Season.

“I wouldn’t have any idea,” Charles answered carefully.

“You might ask her when you see her,” Eleanor replied over her teacup. She put it down and turned the subject to tea and the opium that supported its import into London. Her extensive understanding of the laws, the economics, and the ethics didn’t surprise him.

“Be cautious what you report to Victoria, however. She may think she wants to know the truth, but she won’t upset any apple carts, and she certainly won’t cross Melbourne. Still, it can’t hurt to have the sovereign well informed. I applaud the mission.”

He rose to leave sometime later and bowed over her hand. He was half way to the door when she spoke again.

“Don’t forget what I said about Lily’s daughter. She might be just the thing you need.”

He turned and gave her a slight bow.

“And Charles, do something about your marriage. Enough is enough.”

 

About the Book: The Unexpected Wife

Children of Empire Book 3

Crushed with grief after the death of his son, Charles Wheatly, Duke of Murnane, throws himself into the new Queen’s service in 1838. When the government sends him on an unofficial fact finding mission to the East India Company’s enclave in Canton, China, he anticipates intrigue, international tensions, and an outlet for his frustration. He isn’t entirely surprised when he also encounters a pair of troublesome young people that need his help. However, the appearance of his estranged wife throws the entire enterprise into conflict. He didn’t expect to face his troubled marriage in such an exotic locale, much less to encounter profound love at last in the person of a determined young woman. Tensions boil over, and his wife’s scheming—and the beginnings of the First Opium War—force him to act to rescue the one he loves and perhaps save himself in the process.

Zambak Hayden seethes with frustration. A woman her age has occupied the throne for over a year, yet the Duke of Sudbury’s line of succession still passes over her—his eldest—to land on a son with neither spine nor character. She follows her brother, the East India Company’s newest and least competent clerk, to protect him and to safeguard the family honor. If she also escapes the gossip and intrigues of London and the marriage mart, so much the better. She has no intention of being forced into some sort of dynastic marriage. She may just refuse to marry at all. When an old family friend arrives she assumes her father sent him. She isn’t about to bend to his dictates nor give up her quest. Her traitorous heart, however, can’t stop yearning for a man she can’t have.

Neither expects the epic historical drama that unfolds around them.

The Unexpected Wife, will be released on July 25 and can be preordered from Amazon internationally as well as here:

https://www.amazon.com/Unexpected-Wife-Children-Empire-Book-ebook/dp/B07FGGC918/

Here’s a short video about it:

https://www.facebook.com/carolinewarfield7/videos/924791187669849/

About the Author

Traveler, would-be adventurer, former tech writer and library technology professional, Caroline Warfield has now retired to the urban wilds of Eastern Pennsylvania, and divides her time between writing and seeking adventures with her grandbuddy. In her newest series, Children of Empire, three cousins torn apart by lies find their way home from the far corners of the British Empire, finding love along the way.

She has works published by Soul Mate Publishing and also independently published works. In addition she has participated in five group anthologies, one not yet published.

For more about the series and all of Caroline’s books, look here:

https://www.carolinewarfield.com/bookshelf/

 

 

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Help one person

I’m always embarrassed when people praise me for doing something useful, or for helping out when I happen to notice a need. To me, this is the base setting; the pass grade. I learnt at my mother’s knee, by watching what she did, that

  • if you belong to a group you take a role to support the group, whether it is baking cakes for a stall, setting out the cups for morning tea, chairing a meeting, or putting out the monthly newsletter
  • people should be kind.

That’s it, really. My whole philosophy. Take responsibility and be kind to those whose lives intersect with yours. If everyone did that, what kind of a world would we live in?

I manage it, mostly. I know others who manage it heroically, and my hat is off to them. They get a B grade or maybe even an A plus.

Today at Mass, Fr Binu told a story that resonated with me.

A man saw a child begging on a street corner. He was clearly cold and hungry — dressed in rags and mere skin and bone.

“Oh God,” the man said, “Won’t you please help this child. Look at him. He is shivering in the cold, and he looks more than half starved.”

“I see him,” said God. “He hasn’t had anything to eat since yesterday morning. He has no family, and he is afraid to go to sleep at night because the other children steal everything he has. Even if he can stay awake, the bigger children beat him up and take it anyway.”

“That is dreadful, God. Something must be done to help him.”

“I agree,” God said. “He needs warm clothing and food. More than that, he needs a home and someone to love him for himself. Without those things he will die.”

The man felt dreadful, knowing that the boy was at such risk. “Then you must act quickly, God, before it is too late.”

“I have already acted,” God replied.

The man was very relieved. “Thank you so much, God. I knew I could count on you. What have you done?”

God said, “I have made you.”

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Slavery in the Cape Colony

The slave lodge in which the Dutch East India Company (VOC) kept its slaves. The lodge was built in 1679, and was used to house slaves until 1811, when the new British government converted it into government offices.

The first slaves arrived in the Cape Colony in 1658. Slavery was abolished in 1834 — in what was to become South Africa as well as in the rest of the British Empire. In between, thousands — as many as 71,000  — of people from India, Sri Lanka, Madagascar, Indonesia and the East African coast were brought here to work as slaves.

Their diverse origins and therefore languages, the fact that they were mostly scattered and isolated on farms in the hinterland, and the skewed gender balance (four men for every woman) meant that, unlike in other slave-owning cultures, they didn’t develop their own slave society until the nineteenth century, and then mainly in Cape Town.

Life on the isolated farms was brutal, encouraging  many to attempt escape despite the punishment that would follow if they were caught.

Slaves in the countryside ate food grown on the farms. Sometimes they also ate fish and rice. Some slave owners took advantage of the lack of legislation and gave their slaves food of a very poor quality. One visitor wrote in 1804 that: “black bread, half sand, and the offal of sheep and oxen are their general fare”. On the other hand, on some farms, slaves had small pieces of land where they grew vegetables for their own use. Domestic or house slaves usually received better food than the slaves who worked in the fields.
(https://slavery.iziko.org.za/slaveexperience)

Some did better in private ownership in Cape Town itself, as a Dutch sea captain suggests in a possibly exaggerated account written towards the end of the 18th century.

“I would reckon that a white servant in Europe does twice, or even three times more work than these ‘slaves’; but I would also be certain that, in a house where everything is well ordered, four or at most six slaves can easily do work. However, I believe that, except for the least substantial burghers, there are many houses, large and small, where ten or twelve are to be found. As they divide tasks, they are necessary. One or two have to go out each day to fetch wood, which takes all day. If the mistress leaves the house, there must be two for the sedan chair. The slave who is cook has an assistant in the kitchen. One does the dirtiest work every day . . . and two are house slaves. Many Cape women do not gladly sleep without a maid in the room, and thus one is kept for this and, better clothed than the others, also has the job of lady’s maid and carries the Psalm Book behind on visits to church. If there are children, each has a maid, although sometimes two daughters share. Small children need one to themselves. This is without one who washes and makes the beds, a seamstress and a knitter, as three or four are always kept busy that way, and I still have none for the stable.”
(C. de Jong, ‘Reizen naar de Kaap de Goede Hoop . . . 1791-1797’, 3 vols (Haarlem, 1802-3), pg. 143-4.)

On the other hand, how hard slaves worked even in the town, and how they were treated, depended entirely on the disposition of their owner. Those retained in the slave lodge either worked for the company or were hired out for labour.  They lived in terrible conditions.

The Slave Lodge was dark, wet and dirty. A subterranean stream flows under the Slave Lodge and this stream flooded the cellar of the Lodge during winter. The roof also leaked which led to hardship in the wet winter months. The slaves only received blankets after 1685. Before then, they had nothing to cover themselves against the cold. However, Höhne, the Slave Overseer, reported in 1793 that the bedding stayed wet in winter and that the slaves never had time to properly wash and clean their belongings. Statistics show that the death rate was higher during winter than in summer. The building was very dark and without adequate air circulation. There were no windows in the building, only slits in the walls with bars. Only a few of these slits faced the outside of the building. Louis Michel Thibault, the building inspector, reported in 1803 that the building was so dark inside that one needed a lantern even in the day.

Furthermore, the Lodge was very dirty. Mentzel wrote in 1785 that the stench was unbearable in the Lodge. The stench was especially bad in the vicinity of the eight toilets next to the quarters of the mentally ill. Pigs were kept in the courtyard and fattened on garden refuge to be sold to the free citizens to earn an income for the slaves.
(https://slavery.iziko.org.za/slavelodgelivingconditions)

Women faced sexual exploitation, of course. The shortage of female slaves was echoed by the shortage of women overall. From late in the seventeenth century, the VOC issued regulations forbidding relations between Europeans and female slaves. They didn’t stop European men visiting the slave lodge, however, which was known to operate as a brothel. Mulatto children and cases of men who purchased a slave’s freedom and married her suggest  no-one took the regulations very seriously.

In the book I’m writing at the moment, the British have taken over the Cape Colony for the second time (after returning it to the Dutch a few years earlier). The slave lodge has been closed, but slavery is still legal, and slaves still outnumber free people in the colony by around three to one.

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Surprises on WIP Wednesday

Surprising my characters, and therefore my readers, is such fun. I’m working on three different projects at the moment — Unkept Promises, in which my heroine surprises her errant husband by turning up in the Cape Colony to look after his dying mistress and her children (my couple haven’t met in seven years); Never Kiss a Toad, the ongoing saga Mariana Gabrielle and I are publishing on Wattpad, in which the villain surprises the heroine in a dark alley and is surprised in his turn when she pulls a gun on him; and The Beast Next Door, in which my heroine flees her pushy family but finds her usual sanctuary has been invaded by a suspiciously well-cared-for dog.

Post an excerpt with one of your surprises in the comments. Meanwhile, here’s a surprise for Mia from Unkept Promises.

Mia turned left, but the servant darted in front of her, his arms wide. “Missus can’t go in there,” he said. “Missus go away. Come back another day. Captain wouldn’t like it.”

She raised her brows and glared. “The Captain is my husband, which makes this my house. Out of my way. Now.”

The glare, copied from her more formidable sisters-in-law, did the trick. He faded sideways.

“And you can make yerself useful,” Hannah said, “by bringing in Mrs Captain’s luggage before every street scamp in the town takes off with it.”

Mia had her hand on the door handle before the servant mustered another protest, and had turned it by the time he finished. “Miz Kirana, she not there.”

One glance in the room made that clear. A European girl lolled on the bed spooning fruit and cream into her mouth from a bowl — Scots or Irish by her pale skin and flaming red hair. Much of an age with Mia, at a guess, whereas Kirana was Eurasian, and in her early thirties, only a few years younger than Mia’s husband.

The girl confirmed her origins when she opened her mouth, her Irish accent plain. “Who’re ye, bustin’ into me bedchamber? Japheth, who is this gobermouch? And why did ye let ‘er in?”

“I am Mrs Julius Redepenning,” Mia said in her driest tones, “and you, I take it, are my husband’s most recent bed partner.” She ignored her sinking heart. It had been easy to overlook Jules’ attachment to Kirana, who had been his mistress for years before Mia met him. But were her hopes of making a real marriage to founder before she had a chance to even see him again?

A harrumph from Hannah. Her low opinion of men made her dubious about that part of Mia’s mission, but Mia would not give up. Not yet.

She looked around at the room, untidily strewn with clothing and jewellery. The woman had clearly been trying on garments in front of the large mirror before dropping onto the bed.

“Tidy up in here before you leave the room,” Mia instructed. “And do not think to take a thing that is not your own. My husband no longer requires your services.”

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Tea with Mia and Kitty

The two girls were discussing their suitors. Catherine Stocke had a sharp wit and a wicked gift for describing each man’s least charming characteristics. At least her suitors intended marriage. Euronyme Redepenning, as a married woman with a husband on the other side of the world, attracted less permanent offers, which she had no hesitation in refusing. Her stories of the rakes’ reactions had the girls in giggles.

The duchess should probably squash the conversation, which had become a rather racy for two maidens, for Mia was still untouched despite the wedding that took place in this very castle over two years ago. She would not, though. Both young ladies had experienced rather more of life than the sternest arbiters would consider desirable, and being able to laugh about the stupidities of men was a healthy reaction, Eleanor thought.

The mystery surrounding Kitty whereabouts these last seven years, and her sister’s recent marriage to Eleanor’s nephew the Earl of Chirbury, had made her a sensation since the day she walked into a London ballroom earlier in the year. Her own beauty and charm won her an immediate following. Her disinterest in any of her court had the paradoxical effect of increasing it event by event, despite her tactic of insisting that she would not dance more than once with anyone, and that the men surrounding her must take themselves off and dance with other ladies.

Mia’s tale was old news by this time. In the weeks surrounding her fifteenth birthday, she had been trapped by smugglers, forced to marry by the damage to her reputation, and abandoned by her husband on their wedding day (for his duty to the Far East fleet, said some; for his mistress in India, said others). Eleanor, who was rather fond of young Jules, thought the assessment harsh. Faced with conflicted duties, the boy had done his best. He had married an orphaned schoolgirl twelve years his junior in order to save her reputation and give her a home with his family. Then he’d returned to the east in obedience to his orders. Her in-laws had taken the bride into their hearts and been stalwart defenders these past two years.

Both girls had accepted her invitation to spend several weeks at Haverford Castle so they could spend more time together, away from the men who pestered them, and Eleanor was enjoying their company. No. She would not interrupt them. Let them have their fun. “More tea?” she asked.

Kitty and Mia are introduced in Farewell to Kindness the first book in The Golden Redepennings series.  In the Epilogue to that book, we are told that the two friends are staying with the Duchess of Haverford, so the scene above belongs to that visit.

My next newsletter subscriber story, going out this week, is of Mia’s encounter with the smugglers and her wedding. The novel I’m working on at the moment, Unkept Promises, tells what happens seven years later when she heads to the Cape Colony at the foot of Africa to retrieve her husband’s daughters by his mistress.

Kitty will have her own story told in the fifth book of the series.