“It will be as easy as taking honey from a flea,” she predicted, sitting down to write her letters.

***

“I can’t believe it! I just can’t believe it! How dare she refuse me a voucher! How dare she tell me I am not welcome to her blasted masquerade ball next week! How dare she tell me that no polite person will recognize me!” Charlotte ripped a cream-colored sheet of paper to shreds and threw it into the unlit grate. “Who would have thought that Lady Jersey had a memory like…like…like a lion?”

“A what?”

Charlotte made a dismissive motion with her hands as she paced by the figure sitting in the blue-and-gold brocade chair in her cousin’s sitting room.

“A lion, Caro, a lion. You know, one of those big gray beasts that lives in Africa. They have prodigious memories.”

Lady Caroline Beverly looked confused. “Are you sure? The lion I saw at the menagerie was sort of a yellowish-brown color and no bigger than a very small pony.”

Charlotte spun on her heel and paced a line back toward the fireplace. “Brown, gray, it doesn’t matter. They come from Africa, and they have excellent memories. Just like Lady Jersey.”

Caroline frowned. “I thought Lady Jersey’s family came from Devonshire.”

Charlotte stopped pacing, put her hands on her hips, and glared down at her friend. “What on earth does Lady Jersey’s family have to do with anything?”

“You mentioned it! You said she came from Africa just like the lions.”

“There are times,” Charlotte said, breathing heavily through her nose, “when I find myself regretting that I returned to England. Memory, Caro, I likened Lady Jersey to the lion because it has an exceptional memory. Just as she has.”

“Oh. Does she? What about?”

Charlotte tossed up her hands and resumed pacing, reminding herself not to snap at the only person who had responded to her plea for help. “I can’t afford to be discriminating,” she muttered.

“No, you said you were quite pockets to let, but that doesn’t explain why you’re upset with Lady Jersey’s memory.”

Charlotte took a deep, deep breath, and sat on the love seat next to the brunette. “Caroline, listen to me very carefully. You remember four years ago when I left England to marry the Conte di Abalongia’s eldest son?”

Caroline nodded her head. “Yes, of course I do. It caused ever such a scandal! Mama said it would all end in sorrow and that you’d come to a bad end, and for me not to even consider running off with Raoul the drawing master, which of course I wasn’t considering because dearest Algernon was about to offer for me, and why would I want to be married to a drawing master when I could be a viscountess instead? Although Raoul did have the most attractive mustache—do you remember it? The ends came to two lovely points. And of course dearest Algernon tried to grow one just to please me when I admired Sir Ralph Henderson’s mustache, but he did not seem to have much luck at it, although I rubbed pomade onto his lip faithfully every night.”