“But,” Harriet said confusedly, “there won’t really be a myself, if you see what I mean.”
Villiers eyed her. “Lived your life in the country. You’d better be my second nephew Cope. He’s an odd duck who is never seen in town. He has a doting mother: that explains the effeminacy.”
“I’m not—” Harriet began and realized the absurdity of what she was saying. “I suppose I will be a trifle effeminate.”
“You’ll have to figure out how to walk like a man. I can get you fitted up with clothes,” Villiers said, “but walking is important. Can you smoke?”
“Absolutely not. But I shall enjoy the clothing. I loathe wearing panniers. I’m always bumping into doorways, not to mention people.”
“What about your hair?” Isidore asked. “If you cut your hair now, you’ll never be able to wear it high again.”
Harriet smiled. “I don’t wear it high now.” She gestured toward her modest arrangement of curls and puffs. “Most of this was added by my maid this morning. My own hair barely reaches my shoulders.”
“Very clever,” Jemma said. “I keep meaning to try a hair piece.”
“I doubt you could do it successfully,” Harriet said. “Your hair is such a beautiful gold color. But mine is dull brown, and it’s easy to match.”
“Your hair is not dull!”
Harriet shrugged. “Who would know, what with the hot iron and crimping and powdering? I shall positively relish being male if it means I could stop trying to straighten my hair.”
“Men do not straighten nor curl their hair,” Villiers stated.
“Some do,” Isidore put in. “I am quite certain that Saint Albans curls his hair. And he wears lip color as well.”
“I shan’t,” Harriet said.
“I wouldn’t let you,” Villiers said. “If you’re going to do this, you’re going to do it right. And that means you’ll be my creation.”
Jemma laughed. “Created in Villiers’s image: you’re going to be a huge success, Harriet!”
Harriet bit her lip. The idea of being Villiers’s creation, after the time when she tried to seduce him and he rejected her, was mortifying.
She wasn’t the only one remembering that night. In the depths of his black eyes there was a mocking spark that said: you can’t do it. After all, when she kissed him in the carriage, he had done something so shocking that she actually slapped him. He knew her to be a conservative, tiresome country woman.
“There’s no need to go to these extremes,” he said now. “We could simply dress you as Isidore’s elderly aunt from the country. You’d make a fine chaperone and no one would question you.”
The anger in Harriet’s chest felt like fire. She had played the fool when she tried to seduce Villiers, and he had been right to scorn her. Benjamin had been his closest friend, and she had kissed him in a misguided impulse to make Benjamin notice his wife.
But she was no elderly aunt from the country.
“I shouldn’t think I’ll have the slightest problem playing a man,” she said. “I shall merely remember to rearrange my breeches in front at least once an hour, thereby drawing attention to the padding I carefully placed there in the morning, and I’ll blend in perfectly.” She let her eyes slide below his waist.
“A low blow,” Villiers said.
“Low indeed!” Isidore crowed.
“Lucky I brought my tailor with me,” Villiers said. “You need everything from boots to periwigs.”
“You can be measured for boots and I’ll send to London for them,” Jemma said.
“I must return to Berrow for quarter sessions before I can travel to Fonthill,” Harriet said with a frown.