“An invitation to Miss Templeton’sbirthdayball?”
“Oh, good heavens, Jenny, I helped Ellen prepare the guest list,” Lydia said, as she passed through the entry hall into the sitting room. “Come, I have just made some raisin and walnut biscuits. Help me put them in tins, and by all meanssampleone.”
“But it is a ball! A real dancing ball! There has not been such an event since Alice Paddington’s husband died and she celebrated the end of her forty years ofmisery.”
Lydia had to laughatthat.
“Why ever do you suppose that my entire family was invited? I have never evenmetMissEllen.”
“Ah… but youhavemet me, and Miss Ellen asked me to invite the worst possible slags I knew—so, of course, I thoughtofyou.”
Jenny squeaked and swatted atLydia’sarm.
“But what am I going to wear? What are you going to wear? What shall my parents andbrotherwear?”
“Calm down, Jenny. The ball is still a month away. There is plenty of time to sort all ofthatout.”
Jenny jumped up to sit on the kitchen table. She let out a sigh and picked up one of Lydia’s newly baked biscuits. “Um, these are delicious. You are quite the cook, are you not?” Lydia did not respond. Jenny looked at her. “You are very quiet. Is somethingtroublingyou?”
Lydia looked at Jenny. “There has been adevelopment.”
“Oh?”
She didn’t feel it was right to tell Jenny about her aunt’s pending engagement until she chose to make it public, but she wanted to tell Jenny about her precarioussituation.
Lydia stopped putting the biscuits into a tin and leaned back against a counter. “I can’t go into the details, but there is a possibility I may no longer be able to stay with my aunt. I am going to need to find a new livingsituation.”
Jenny’s mouth fell open. “Lydia,why?”
“I can’t say why just now, but I need to talk to someoneaboutit.”
“Where would you go? Would you return toPiddlehinton?”
Lydia shook her head. “I can’t do that. My parents cannot afford tokeepme.”
“Then you must accelerate your pursuit of DoctorCooke.”
“Oh, Jenny… I don’t think I candothat?”
“Whynot?”
“First, it is he who must show a sincere interest, and then he must declare his intent. And I have seenneither.”
“Lydia, he certainly has shown interest. The walks, the flirty conversation over tea, his enduring interest in yourhealth…”
“Jenny, those are hardly indications of a pending proposal ofmarriage.”
“Perhaps not, but theyarethe first steps. Now it is up to you to encourage him to walk more briskly.” Jenny picked up another biscuit. “My, thesearegood. You should send the Doctor a batch of these. That would certainly encourage him and let him know of yourinterest.”
“I will thinkaboutit.”
“Lydia, you are too tentative. One would think you are not interestedinhim.”
Lydia thought about the wonderful moments she had shared with Edwin, and how attentive he was to her. But she also knew it was an impossible situation and to even think about a romance blossoming between the two of them was the height of uselessspeculation.
Lydia stood away from the counter where she had been leaning and resumed packing away thebiscuits.
“That is a splendid idea, Jenny. Perhaps I shall make a new batch of biscuits and drop them over to Doctor Cooke laterthisweek.
