Page 3 of Introducing Miss Joanna (Once a Wallflower 2)

“I’ll have one,” Fred said, leaning down with a coin in his hand. As he bit into the pie, the gravy must have spilled over his pants. With a curse, the reins slipped from his hands. “No need to worry,” he called as he climbed down to retrieve them.

Jo put her head out the window to watch the unfolding scenario with interest.

The pie still clutched in his meaty fingers, Fred was soon up on his box again.

“Eat hearty,” the fellow said and bit into the coin before moving back to his position. His cry went up again.

The traffic cleared ahead.

“What are you, top-heavy? Get a move on, you bacon-brained fellow,” a groom called from beside the coachman on the box of a glossy black coach.

“Cripes! I’m going, no need to get fidgety,” Fred called, waving at them.

Before Fred could move the horses on, the coachman in the black coach took advantage of a gap in the traffic and overtook them.

Halted by another snarl, they stopped side by side. Jo, clutching the window frame, stared directly into the coach and met a gentleman’s dark appraising eyes. His mouth quirked up, and he removed his tall beaver hat, revealing jet-black hair. “Good day,” he said through the open window.

She suspected she’d turned scarlet at the amusement in his eyes. “Good day to you, sir,” she said crisply.

“Who are you talking to, Jo?” Her father craned his neck to see around her. But the coachman had cracked the whip over the magnificent gray horses and moved the coach on.

Jo’s pulse thudded as she gazed after the disappearing coach. “A polite gentleman, Papa.”

“Life here is not the same as the country. You must never talk to strange gentlemen in London, Jo,” Aunt Mary said, having revived a little at the prospect of the journey’s end. “While I was in London as a girl, we couldn’t put a foot out the door without the footman.”

“Surely times have changed, Aunt Mary,” Jo said. She wasn’t used to being confined.

Mayfair was different from the parts of the city they’d passed through. Trees lined the clean streets, and some of the houses had gardens. The townhouse her father had leased was one of a row of narrow-fronted ornate brick houses in Upper Brook Street, three-stories plus attic rooms, with fancy ironwork in front. Lord Pleasance, the owner, was traveling on the Continent. His servants came with the house.

Once their carriage had pulled up outside the townhouse, two tall, handsome footmen rushed out. One put down the steps to assist them down, while the other removed their baggage.

Jo joined Aunt Mary and her father to farewell Fred before he drove off to Covent Garden, then they climbed the steps to the glossy black front door, which had an arched window over the top.

A gray-haired butler in black garb waited at the door. He introduced himself as Mr. Spears. Sober faced, he escorted them into the entry where they shed pelisses and hats into the arms of a maid.

Aunt Mary considered it proper to meet the staff, so she and Jo descended below stairs to the servants’ quarters to introduce themselves to the cook and the housekeeper. Her aunt was keen to discuss the menus and was quite put out to discover Mrs. Cross, the housekeeper and cook, had the menus for the next week already decided upon. Jo suspected the house ran like clockwork.

Jo’s bedchamber was furnished in rose pink and cream floral wallpaper. Sally, the maid who was to attend her, opened the trunk and took out the primrose muslin. Jo cringed to have her few things revealed to the servant’s gaze. “I am to have a whole new wardrobe made for the Season.”

Sally nodded, her fresh face kind. “There’s a bowl of hot water on the dresser, Miss Dalrymple. I’ll assist you to change, and shall I tidy your hair?”

Jo put a hand to where hair was escaping the pins and sighed. She must get her hair cut. “Thank you, Sally.”

They ate in the dining room at a long table covered in white linen beneath an unlit chandelier. Everything sparkled in the candlelight cast by a pair of silver candelabrum. The footmen served the courses while the butler, Spears, with great aplomb, poured wine from the cellar he’d decanted into crystal glasses. Jo’s father added water to Jo’s. After the dessert course, which was a delicious syllabub and fruit, her father sat back with a hand on his stomach and instructed Spears to compliment the cook. The butler inclined his head but didn’t deem to reply while he poured a glass of port. The man looked down his long nose at her father. Annoyed, Jo held her tongue.

Despite the noisy street below her window, which was so different from the quiet countryside, Jo slept soundly. The next morning after breakfast, while they sat in the parlor making plans for the day, the butler entered carrying a visiting card on a silver salver.

He showed in Mrs. Millet, an attractive, fair-haired woman in her mid-forties, dressed in what Jo considered must be the height of fashion, a spring-green dress and a white straw bonnet trimmed with plaid ribbon and silk flowers. She shook their hands in her gloved one. “How do you do? I trust your journey was satisfactory?”

Jo’s father rushed to assure her it was. As he assisted her into a chair, describing their excellent accommodation on the road, Jo covertly studied the woman her father had hired to ease their way in society. She disliked that they must rely on anyone but accepted the necessity for it. The ways of London society were new to them, and she fretted about how well they would be received.

Mrs. Millet’s carefully modulated tones lacked warmth, and her smile failed to reach her eyes. Jo supposed she was accustomed to the easy familiarity of country folk, but the lady had exquisite manners.

A maid brought in the tea tray while Mrs. Millet explained how best to begin. It was clear she knew the ins and outs of Society. She explained how Jo must deport herself at a ball and other affairs, discussed her wardrobe and the dressmaker she had engaged to make her clothes, then departed with the promise of securing several invitations from those who agreed to receive them.

They were not top drawer, and could not expect to have an intro everywhere, Mrs. Millet explained at the door with a soothing smile. Whilst Jo considered it unnecessary for her to remind them, there was no getting around it. They were shopkeepers from the country, despite her father’s newfound prosperity and her generous dowry.

After the door closed on Mrs. Millet, Jo gave a mental shrug. She wasn’t silly enough to set her cap so high as to wish to marry a duke or any titled gentleman. She wanted a man she could love and admire, who accepted her father. Surely, attending all the social engagements Mrs. Millet had mentioned, balls, soirees, breakfasts, and picnics, Jo would meet the man of her dreams and find friends among the other debutantes.

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