Rivals and Revels (A Regency Romance)

1. Dog in the Manger

May 1816, Lancashire, England

Mabel had entirely different aspirations from Napoleon Bonaparte. The dastardly man wanted to conquer the world. She was twenty already, not very pretty and unwed. She never as much as uttered a cross word about him, but he just had to thin the ranks of eligible men with his miserable wars on the continent.

"Truly, is marriage the only aspiration for a woman?" she exclaimed, opening her arms to greet Miss Carter, a confirmed spinster. "Your example testifies marvelously to the opposite. The enjoyment of life is writ in your smallest feature!"

"Good morning to you, my dearest girl. Aren't you a sight for sore eyes!" Miss Carter replied gladly, after exchanging the feather-light embrace. "If I am so enamored with life, it is only thanks to the hospitality of my friends."

And the woman gave a sharp look to Mabel's mother, Mrs. Walton.

Naturally, it didn't go unnoticed, and Mrs. Walton pursed her lips before reassuring Miss Carter in some haste that friendship is a precious gift, but any woman in her opinion would be happiest in a fulfilling marriage.

Mabel understood her mother's brief lapse of good manners perfectly. This was exactly the sort of capricious thought that the company of Miss Carter instilled in the young ladies. One rumor hinted that she could do even more damage to their morality, but those who said so remained tantalizingly vague. This included Mabel's mother, who wasn't in a habit of keeping her opinions secret. 

However, despite not holding Miss Carter in high esteem, Mrs. Walton had to put up with her for a very good reason. Unlike Miss Carter's secret influences, this reason was not at all hard to guess.

Miss Carter's company had been the most sought after in Lancashire ever since Mr. Everett Chesterton moved into the Chesterton Manor just after Yuletide.

This gentleman intrigued everyone. He was, by all reports, of excellent breeding, a decorated war hero and on top of that tall and uncommonly handsome. Yet he had stubbornly if politely refused all the overtures of the local worthies so far.

Miss Carter therefore had earned the distinction of being the only living soul that he had called upon regularly, owing to the distant family connexions.

Like a dog in the manger, Mrs. Walton characterized this vexatious situation, because Miss Carter had passed the age divide after which marriage was no longer in the cards. She seemed content with her situation, yet took up time that Mr. Chesterton could have spent more productively. For example, making new acquaintances or even courting an eligible young lady, of whom Walton's household fortunately had only two. 

Unlike her mother, Mabel loved the eccentric old maid and regretted that she saw her so rarely. Alas, the inquiries about Miss Carter's own doings had to wait until her mother concluded the interview about the boring Chesterton. He was not even the heir to the title, for there was an older brother, but ah, those wars! Those accursed wars!

As Mabel's eyes drifted restlessly around the sitting room she knew intimately, they studiously avoided the watercolor by her own hand. It was a still life of flowers in a vase and tossed artfully around it. She had wished to have chosen the whimsical wildflowers over the waxy camellias as her subject, but alas. Her mother deemed the fashionable flowers more worthy of covering the spot left by the winter's damp in the corner. It forever fixed Mabel's regret for being so pliant right where she could see it. Aside from the other paintings in the parlor, the piano afforded her some diversion. 

The animate objects of art on display included her sister, Hazel, and Miss Carter's companion, Amelia. These two beauties remained as silent as the furniture up to this point. Despite that lapse from Hazel, the conversation in Mrs. Walton's fine house hummed like the wheels in the textile factories, though spinning out a product of far lesser quality than the English wool.