Masked Ball at Broxley Manor by Rhys Bowen Page A

of my dreams. In fact I hadn’t even received one proposal—not from a halfway decent sort of chap anyway. At nineteen I feared I was destined to become an old maid.
    I perched on the window seat and opened the first envelope, conscious of Fig’s and Binky’s eyes on me.
    “It
is
an invitation,” I said excitedly. “To a masked Halloween ball at Broxley Manor.”
    Fig’s jaw dropped in a most unladylike manor. “Broxley? Isn’t that the home of Lord Merriman?”
    I glanced at the invitation and nodded. “That’s right. It says ‘Lord and Lady Merriman invite you.’”
    “How on earth do you know Lord Merriman?” Fig sounded positively vexed now.
    “I don’t. Never met the Merrimans.”
    “Then why would they invite you of all people to a ball? They only mix with beautiful people.”
    “Oh, Georgie’s not too bad,” Binky said, making my self-esteem sink even lower. “Maybe not beautiful but she’s a healthy-looking kind of girl.”
    “I didn’t mean that,” Fig said. “Really, Binky, you are so clueless. I meant the smart set. You know, the Prince of Wales and his chums. Nobody like Georgie.”
    “She is the Prince of Wales’s cousin, old bean,” Binky reminded her. It was always a sore spot to my sister-in-law that Binky and I were related to the royals and she wasn’t.
    “Yes, but she doesn’t move in the same circles, does she? Monte Carlo and yachts on the Med and that kind of thing.”
    “I have no idea why I was invited,” I said.
    “Maybe they’ve invited all of this year’s debutantes,” Fig said, obviously trying to come up with an answer that would satisfy her. If I were just one of a crowd she could handle it. “Although I’ve never heard of anyone celebrating Halloween with a ball,” she added with a sniff.
    “Lady Merriman is American, remember,” Binky put in. “They make a big thing of it over there.”
    “Pagan feast, isn’t it? One step away from devil worship.” She took a long sip from her coffee cup.
    “Steady on, old fruit. That’s a bit thick,” Binky said. “I’m sure it will be a fun and respectable ball and Georgie will have a wonderful time. She may even meet a chap, you never know.”
    “She’s had all season to meet a chap,” Fig said coldly. She turned her reptilian gaze back to me. “So who is the other invitation from?”
    I was about to open it when I noticed the royal crest embossed into the envelope. “I think it comes from the palace,” I said. I tore open the envelope with unseemly haste. “It does. ‘Their Majesties request the presence of Lady Georgiana Rannoch at a reception in honor of Prince Rupert and Prince Otto of Prussia.’”
    “A reception? At Buck House? In honor of a couple of Prussian princes?” Fig’s voice had risen dangerously now.
    “The war is long over, old bean,” Binky said. “Forgive and forget and all that, you know. And the kaiser is our cousin, after all. So that makes two second or third cousins, doesn’t it? I expect it’s a little family do.”
    “Then why is Georgie invited to a little family do when we aren’t?” Fig was positively glaring at me now with undisguised hatred.
    Binky shrugged. “It’s up to the king and queen to invite whom they want, Fig.”
    “We don’t get out and about enough, Binky. That is our problem.” Fig rose from her chair and paced the room. “Their Majesties probably don’t even know we’re in London. We are not seen in society. They’ll think we’ve gone home to shoot.”
    “We don’t get out and about because it costs money to be seen in society, Fig, and you know we have very little.” He paused. “Pretty much zero, actually.”
    “We seemed to manage to fund Georgie’s season,” she said bitterly.
    “We had to do the right thing for my sister,” Binky said. “She had to come out into society. Surely you agree to that, Fig.”
    “And now she’s being invited to Buck House and we’re not.” She glared at me. “Do you know either of