The Marquis had agreed.
“Next year when she is eighteen,” he had told Peregrine, “she can be presented to the Queen and I have plenty of relatives who will be only too pleased to chaperone her.”
“Are you also going to sit on the dais with all the Dowagers?” Peregrine had teased.
“I am not going to do anything except fight off the fortune-hunters,” the Marquis replied. “By God, Peregrine, do you know how much this girl owns?”
When he heard the answer to this question, Peregrine agreed with the Marquis that it was far too much for one young woman and would undoubtedly result in all the wasters swarming around her like hornets.
“I am going to marry her off to the first decent man who comes along and then I shall be free of the responsibility, the Marquis said. “Because I was fond of Edwa
