She did not have to feel inadequate in her modest and juvenile attire. She did not have to sit down to dinner with any of these people and make conversation with whomever sat beside her. They were modest people rubbing elbows with the crème de la crème of the ton.Īt least Imogen and her family were not invited to the evening festivities. Gentlemen with jeweled signet rings and ladies in tea dresses that far outshone any gown her mother had ever donned-or, for that matter, any gown Imogen would ever don. There were dozens of people in attendance. She looked more like an enraged peacock in full fan. Other than a few thin plaits coiled atop her head, her hair hung loose down her back. She would not yet permit Imogen to wear her hair up off her neck as most of the girls in attendance this afternoon did. Mama was trapped under the delusion that Imogen, at ten and five, was still three years old. A great monstrosity at the back of her head that threatened her very balance. Imogen wore a matching blue and pink bow in her hair that was ridiculous. Oh, why couldn’t I be one of them now instead of stuck here? She would have preferred to stay at home among her books or visit one of her friends in the village-all girls who were never invited up to the duke’s grand house on the hill.
Other far more apt descriptors leapt to Imogen’s mind. Papa went as far as to proclaim it an honor. Mama had insisted on the extravagance since it was to be such a special occasion. She smoothed a trembling hand over her ruffled skirt. The guests attired in brilliant colors that seemed to celebrate the occasion, as though the heavens wished to shine down on the birthday of the privileged and lauded heir to the Duke of Penning.īut it might as well have been a funeral to Imogen Bates.
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