Minneapolis City Hall
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Not a great Dane but cuter Dear Reader,
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I hope that I never become so uncool that I forgo Natty Boh for wine.
The Myrtles Plantation in LouisianaMen have called Dayne both a destroyer and a temptress, and Dayne relishes her status as an unconquerable coquette who can tease and bend a man to her will without ever giving him the reward he craves. But nothing has ever prepared Dayne for a real man ... one determined to possess her at all costs ... a skilled and ruthless lover with the power to ignite a smoldering passion she is helpless to resist ....
Now, as simmering family secrets and an ages-old feud threaten to destroy all they cherish, Dayne and Flint have become passion's pawn, surrendering to a searing desire beyond their wildest dreams ... and beyond all control ....
My rating: 4 stars
Synopsis from author:"NO!"
Though the perfume bottle whizzed by his temple with no more than two inches to spare, Robert Anderson made no attempt to dodge, knowing that Maggie had an excellent aim and no real desire to damage him. She was merely, so to speak, sending him a message. With her usual good sense, she had chosen to throw the bottle of cheap scent given to her by a purse-pinching Bavarian with poor taste.
Robin smiled at his companion. Her magnificent bosom was heaving and her eyes flashed sparks; gray ones today, because of the silvery robe she wore. "Why don't you want to meet this duke that Lord Strathmore is sending? You should be flattered that the Foreign Office is taking such an interest in you."
A spate of Italian profanity was his answer. He tilted his blond head to one side and listened critically. When her outburst was over, he said, "Very creative, Maggie, love, but it isn't like you to slip out of character. Surely Magda, Countess Janos, should swear in Magyar?"
"I know more profanity in Italian," she said loftily. 'And you know perfectly well that I never slip out of character with anyone but you." Her look of aristocratic dignity gave way to an impish chuckle. "Don't think you can change the subject, which is the Most Noble, the Duke of Candover."
"So it is." Robin studied his companion thoughtfully. They had known each other for a long time, and though the relationship was no longer an intimate one, they were still the best of friends. It was unlike her to be temperamental, even when she had been acting the part of a volatile Hungarian noblewoman for two years. "What do you have against the duke?"
Maggie sat down at her vanity table and lifted an ivory-backed brush, then began pulling it through the tawny waves of hair that fell over her shoulders. Scowling into the mirror, she said, "The man's a prig."
"Does that mean he didn't adequately appreciate your charms?" Robin said with interest. "Strange— Candover has the reputation of being quite the lady's man. I can't believe that he would ignore a tasty morsel like you."
"I am nobody's tasty morsel, Robin! Rakes are the biggest prigs of all. Pious hypocrites, in my experience." She tugged viciously at a knot in her hair. "Don't try to pick a new fight until we've finished with the current one. I refuse to have anything to do with the Duke of Candover, just as I refuse to continue spying. That part of my life is over, and no one—not you, not the duke, not Lord Strathmore—can change my mind. As soon as I take care of a few matters of business, I will be leaving Paris."
Robin came to stand behind her. Taking the brush from her hand, he began pulling it gently through her thick, dark gold hair. It was odd how they still shared some of the intimacy of husband and wife, though they had never married. He had always enjoyed brushing her hair, and the faint sandalwood scent took him back to the years when they had been impassioned young lovers, challenging the world with few thoughts for the future.
Maggie was looking stonily into the mirror. Her eyes were now a cold gray, not sparkling as they had been earlier. After several minutes of brushing, she began to relax.
"Did Candover do something dreadful?" he asked quietly. "If it would upset you to see him, I won't mention it again."
She chose her words carefully, knowing that Robin was uncomfortably adept at detecting hidden meanings. "Though he was rather despicable, it was a long time ago and it wouldn't bother me to see him. I simply don't want another man nagging me to keep doing what I don't want to do."
Robin's gaze met hers in the mirror. "Then why not meet him once to tell him that? If you want to wreak a bit of vengeance for past injuries, a fitting punishment would be to look your seductive best. You can drive him mad with longing while you turn down his request."
"I'm not sure that would work," she said dryly. "We parted on rather poor terms."
"That makes no difference—he's probably been thinking lustful thoughts of you ever since. Half the diplomats in Europe have let state secrets fall from their lips while struggling for one of your smiles." Robin grinned. "Wear that green ball gown, heave an alluring sigh as you refuse his request, then glide gracefully from the room. I guarantee it will cut up his peace for at least the next month."
She regarded her reflection thoughtfully. While she had a great deal of whatever it was that drove men mad, she was not convinced that Candover would succumb to her charms. Still, anger and lust were closely elated, and Rafael Whitbourne had been very angry indeed at their last meeting___
A slow, wicked smile curved her lips. Then she drew back her head and laughed. "Very well, Robin, you win. I'll meet with your ridiculous duke. I owe him a few nights of ruined sleep. But I guarantee he won't change my mind."
Robin dropped a quick kiss on the top of her head. "Good lass." In spite of her protests, if she saw Candover there was a chance that she could be persuaded to continue her work for a while longer. And that would be a very good thing.
When Robin left, Maggie did not immediately summon her maid to complete her toilette. Instead, she crossed her arms on the edge of the vanity and laid her head on them, feeling sad and tired. It had been foolish to agree to see Rafe Whitbourne. He had behaved very badly, yet even then she had seen how his cruelty had come from pain, and she had been denied the pleasure of hating him.
Nor did she love him; the Margot Ashton who thought the sun revolved around his handsome head had died over a dozen years before. Maggie had been many different people in the ensuing years, as Robin had taken her under his wing and given her a reason to go on living. Rafe Whitbourne was only a bittersweet memory, with no relevance to her present self.
Love and hate were indeed opposite sides of the same coin because both meant caring; the true opposite was indifference. Since indifference was the only feeling Rafe could rouse in Maggie now, minor forms of revenge were not worth the effort. She just wanted to be done with this phase of her life, with deceit and misdirection and informers.
Most of all, she wanted to accomplish the task that had been delayed too long, then go home to England, which she hadn't seen in thirteen years. She would have to start over again, this time without Robin's protection. She would miss him bitterly, but even her loneliness would contain relief; the two of them knew each other too well for Maggie to reinvent herself if he was near.
She lifted her head and propped her chin on one fist while she regarded herself in the mirror. Her high cheekbones made her a convincing Magyar, and she spoke the language well enough so that no one had ever doubted that she was Hungarian. But how would Rafe Whitbourne see her after so many years?
A wry smile curved her full lips—lips that had had at least eleven pieces of bad poetry dedicated to them. Apparently the man could still arouse some emotion in her, even if it was only vanity. She studied her image critically.
Maggie had never been a great fancier of her own appearance, for her face lacked the classic restraint of true beauty. Her cheekbones were too high, her mouth too wide, her eyes too large.
But at least she looked little different from when she had been eighteen. Her complexion had always been excellent, and riding and dancing had kept her figure shapely. Though there was more fullness to the curves, no man had ever objected to that. Granted, her hair had darkened, but instead of becoming dull tan as blond hair often did, it was now the shade of rippling, golden wheat. Overall, she decided, she looked better now than when she and Rafe had been engaged.
It was tempting to imagine that he was fat and balding, but the damned man had the sort of looks that would only improve with age. His personality was another matter. Even at twenty-one he had not been free of the arrogance of wealth and rank, and the intervening years would only have made him worse. By this time, he must be insufferable.
As she resumed dressing for dinner, she told herself that it would be amusing to try to pierce his smugness. Yet she could not rid herself of the uneasy feeling that meeting him would prove to be a mistake.
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Cover of first edition
A good movie too
Janet's Foss in the Yorkshire Dales
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The Kiss by Gustav Klimt
The Love Potion by Evelyn de Morgan
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Synopsis from Amazon:“Why?” The exotic, raven-haired creature in tangerine silk started to cry. “Why has he done this to me?”
Miss Emmaline Dove did not venture a reply to that question. Practical, as always, she saved her breath and pulled out a handkerchief. She handed it to the woman on the other side of the desk without a word.
Juliette Bordeaux, the now-former mistress of Emma’s employer, Viscount Marlowe, snatched the offered square of cambric. “Six blissful months we have had together, and when I receive from his footman the pretty little box, I am happy. But then I find a letter with the present, a letter which ends our amour. Mon Dieu! He thinks with jewels to soften the blow that shatters my heart! How cruel he is!” She bent her head and sobbed with an abandonment that was wholly French and somewhat theatrical. “Oh, Harry!”
Emma shifted uncomfortably in her chair and cast a glance at the ormolu clock on her desk. Half past six. Marlowe could return any minute, and she wanted to speak with him about her new manuscript before he went on to his sister’s birthday party.
She was fairly certain he’d be back to his offices yet this evening. The present she had purchased for Lady Phoebe on his behalf was still here, wrapped and waiting. Unless he had forgotten the evening’s festivities altogether, which she had to admit was not an unheard-of possibility, he had to fetch the gift from here before going home.
This was her best chance to speak with him, she knew, for he was leaving on the morrow for a week at his estate in Berkshire. With no meetings to be rushing off to and no deals to negotiate, and with his family remaining in town, he would have leisure time at Marlowe Park. Emma hoped the serene atmosphere of the country would put him in a more relaxed frame of mind and enable him to see her work in a more favorable light than he had in the past. It was worth a try anyway.
Emma’s gaze moved to the typewriting machine on her credenza and the tidy stack of manuscript pages beside it. Her own birthday was only eight days from now, and if Marlowe agreed to publish her writing at last, what a wonderful birthday present that would be.
Suddenly, a vague disquiet stole over her, something so at odds with the delicious sense of anticipation she’d been savoring a moment before that Emma was startled. It was a feeling hard to define, but there was dissatisfaction in it, and a sense of restlessness.
She tried to dismiss it. Perhaps she was just afraid of another rejection. After all, Marlowe had rejected her four previous literary efforts. He felt etiquette books were unprofitable, but Emma knew that was because the advice offered in most of them was hopelessly old-fashioned, not at all in keeping with this modern age. In light of that, she had worked especially hard with her newest manuscript to create something fresh and current. If she could just explain to Marlowe why this new book would have popular appeal, he might be more receptive to it, especially if he was then able to read it with no distractions in the relaxed atmosphere of the country.
Miss Bordeaux, however, showed no sign of departing. Emma studied the distraught woman on the other side of the desk, trying to find a polite way of getting her out the door. If Marlowe’s former mistress was still here when he returned, the pair would no doubt have a row, any conversation Emma wished to have with her employer about her book would be impossible, and a golden opportunity would be lost.
Some might have deemed her inattention and lack of sympathy toward the woman opposite to be coldhearted. But that was not really so. As Marlowe’s secretary for five years now, she had seen the viscount’s mistresses come and go, and she had learned long ago that love had little to do with such arrangements. Miss Bordeaux was a cancan dancer in a music hall who accepted money from gentlemen in exchange for her favors. She could hardly expect love to result from such an illicit liaison.
But perhaps, Emma reflected, these observations were unfair. His lordship did have a potent effect upon many members of the female sex. Some of his appeal, no doubt, was due to the fact that he was one of Britain’s rarest commodities: an eligible peer with money. But there was more to it than that. Whenever Harrison Robert Marlowe entered a room where women were present, there was always an inordinate amount of fluttering, hair-patting, and sighing.
Resting her elbow on the desk and her cheek in her hand, Emma considered her employer with thoughtful detachment as Miss Bordeaux continued to weep over him with dramatic fervor.
He was handsome. A woman would have to be blind not to notice that. His eyes, a most extraordinary shade of deep blue, were all the more striking because of his dark brown hair. He was a well-proportioned man, too, very tall, with fine, wide shoulders. He had wit and a boyish sort of charm, the latter trait enhanced by what could only be described as a devastating smile.
Emma imagined that smile without feeling any increase in the pace of her pulse, but she hadn’t always been immune. There had been a time early in her employment with the viscount when she had felt that fluttering, feminine thrill at the sight of his smile. In the beginning, she had even patted her hair and sighed a time or two. But she’d realized early on that nothing honorable could come of such hopes. Aside from their difference in station, Marlowe was a thorough scapegrace, whose only associations with women were of the most dishonorable sort. As his secretary, she regarded his reprobate private life as none of her business, but as a virtuous woman, she had ridded herself of any romantic notions about him long ago.
Any other female with sense ought to be able to see the flaws in his character as clearly as she did. He had divorced his wife for adultery and desertion, a scandalous proceeding that had taken five years to obtain and had shocked all of society. His family felt the social stigma of it to this very day. Whether his wife’s infidelity had brought about his contempt for marriage or had only served to make that contempt obvious was anyone’s guess, but those who read Marlowe Publishing’s weekly periodical, The Bachelor’s Guide, knew from the viscount’s editorial page that he approved of matrimony as much as he approved of slavery—pronouncing the former merely a manifestation of the latter.
His past actions and cynical views should have impelled women to regard him as a poor prospect for future happiness and steer clear, but strange as it seemed to practical Emma, the opposite was true. His well-known vow never to wed a second time only seemed to enhance his attraction and make him an irresistible challenge. There were many women of all classes who dreamt of being the one to capture Marlowe’s unyielding heart. Emma was far too sensible to be among them. Rakes had never held any charm for her.
She studied the crying woman opposite, thought of Marlowe’s beguiling smile, and her conscience began to smite her. Not all women were possessed of good sense. Perhaps the dancer had been foolish enough to fall in love with him and had hoped for his love in return. Perhaps his abandonment had hurt her deeply. Emma’s experience with affairs of the heart was not extensive—she’d had only one to her credit a decade earlier—but she still remembered how painful heartbreak could be.
She opened a drawer of her desk and pulled out a cardboard box of pink and white stripes. “This entire business must be very distressing for you,” she murmured as she lifted the lid off the box. “Will you have some chocolates? I find them most comforting in situations such as this.”
The woman across from her did not seem to regard the offered candy as a kindness. She lifted her head, sniffed, and eyed the box with disdain. “I do not eat chocolates,” she said and blotted her rouged cheeks with the handkerchief. “They ruin the figure.” She paused, giving Emma a critical glance across the desk. “Although you should certainly eat more of them, chérie, for you could do with the padding. Not that it matters,” she added at once. “A spinster does not worry about her figure, n’est-ce pas?”
Emma stiffened. Spinster. That stung.
Her strange, restless discontent returned, stronger this time, and she realized the cause was her impending birthday.
She put the chocolates away and tried to adopt a philosophical attitude. Turning thirty was just something that happened. To everyone. It was a fact, one she could do nothing about. Granted, thirty sounded rather…old…but it was just a birthday. Nothing to make one upset.
As for her figure, it wasn’t as if her shape had anything to do with her unmarried state. She gave Miss Bordeaux’s jutting bosom a resentful glance and tried to tell herself a French cancan dancer’s opinion didn’t matter anyway.
“So you are Miss Dove.” The Frenchwoman studied her with an intensity that was quite rude. “His secretary.”
Those words were spoken in an assessing, calculated sort of way that put Emma on guard. Readying herself for more thoughtlessly cruel remarks, she replied, “I am Miss Dove, yes.”
The dancer laughed, but to Emma’s ears there was no humor in it. “Marlowe would have a woman for a secretary. It is so like him. Tell me, does he keep you in a flat, or in a house?”
Emma bristled. This was not the first time others had cast aspersions upon her character. She was employed by a man in a man’s position, and her employer’s reputation with women was a notorious one. But none of that meant she had to allow reprehensible assumptions about her virtue to go unchallenged. “You are mistaken. I am not—”
“It does not matter.” Miss Bordeaux gave a dismissive wave of her hand. “Now that I have seen you, I know you are no threat to me. Marlowe does not like flat-chested women.”
Emma made a smothered sound of outrage. She wanted to offer a cutting reply, but she knew that would be foolish. There was always the possibility that the dancer and Lord Marlowe would reconcile, and she could not afford to risk her position for the momentary satisfaction of losing her temper. Though it galled her, she held her tongue, just as she had done so many times in her life before.
Besides, she acknowledged to herself with wry chagrin, her anger was hardly of a virtuous kind. It was the dancer’s dismissal of her as too old and too thin to compete for a man’s affection that had gotten under her skin, not the assumption that she was a kept woman.
“Non,” Miss Bordeaux continued, interrupting Emma’s train of thought, “it is not you for whom Marlowe has abandoned me.” She leaned forward, and her black eyes narrowed. “Who is she?”
Putting aside the rather petty desire to fabricate a small-bosomed mistress for her employer, Emma said primly, “That is his lordship’s business, mademoiselle, not mine.”
“It does not matter, for I shall learn her identity in time.” Miss Bordeaux cast aside the damp, wadded-up handkerchief, and her tear-stained face took on a hard expression that made her seem older—by ten years, at least, Emma decided. Not that she would ever stoop to being catty.
“Miss Dove,” the dancer went on, “since you are Lord Marlowe’s secretary, you may give him a message from me.” She opened her reticule and pulled out a dazzling chain of yellow topaz and diamonds set in gold. “Tell him this pitiful excuse for a necklace is an insufferable insult, and I will not stand it!” She flung the string of jewels on the desk with contempt. “I shall not be bought off with such a paltry thing as this!”
Emma had gone on an exhaustive shopping expedition the week before, not an uncommon occurrence, for Marlowe was hopeless when it came to the choosing of gifts and remembering the occasions on which to give them, and she had long ago taken over that task on his behalf. Not only had she found Lady Phoebe’s birthday present, she had also purchased the necklace Miss Bordeaux found so unappealing.
Though she didn’t mind buying presents for his family, she had always regarded finding gifts for Marlowe to give his various mistresses one of the more distasteful tasks of her job. She was certain it could not be a proper thing for her to be doing. Aunt Lydia, were she still alive to see it, would have been appalled, for she had instilled within her niece the most scrupulous attention to proper behavior. Nonetheless, Emma felt a bit miffed at the dancer’s condemnation of her judgment. She had put a great deal of thought into the purchase, spending nearly an hour at the jeweler’s on Bond Street, though in all fairness, she had wasted some of that time lingering over the lovely emeralds and indulging in a bit of wishful thinking.
She had finally chosen a necklace for the dancer she felt was just right. It was expensive enough, yet not too expensive—it was meant to be a parting gift, after all. It was also big enough and gaudy enough for others to admire through opera glasses at the opera, and eminently salable should the woman ever need funds. Emma had thought that important, deeming the job of mistress a precarious one at best.
Miss Bordeaux did not seem to agree with her judgment in such matters. “Topaz?” she cried. “Topaz is all I am worth to him? This necklace is a trinket, a bagatelle, a mere nothing!”
This particular trinket would have kept Emma in funds for a dozen years, but it was clear Miss Bordeaux was not so thrifty.
“He casts Juliette aside like a worn boot, believing a necklace of topaz sent by a servant will pacify her? Non!” Miss Bordeaux jumped to her feet.
Breathing hard, her dark eyes glittering with tears of fury, she leaned over the desk. “This pathetic offering is nothing to me!”
These theatrics only served to make Emma all the more impassive. “I shall convey your message to the viscount,” she said without emotion, “and I shall inform him that you have returned his gift.” Hoping this uncomfortable scene was now at an end, she moved her hand to pick up the necklace from the desk.
Miss Bordeaux was quicker than she, snatching back the string of jewels before Emma’s hand had even touched it. “Return it? Non! Unthinkable. Did I say so? How could I return a gift, however trivial, from the man I love? The man who has been my dear companion? The man to whom I have given all my affection?” She clasped the necklace to her bosom. “Though he has broken my heart, I love him still, and I have no choice but to accept my fate and suffer.”
Emma heartily wished the temperamental dancer would go do her suffering somewhere else.
Miss Bordeaux sank back down in the chair. She once again began to sob. “He has abandoned me,” she moaned. “I am unloved. I am alone. Like you.”
Resentment flared inside Emma, not toward the dancer, but instead toward Marlowe, for it was he who had put her in this impossible position. A secretary, even a female one, did not have to bear the tantrums of her employer’s mistresses, surely.
Emma reminded herself that the viscount paid her a very generous salary, just as much as he would have paid a man. It was far more than she could have expected, as a mere woman, to receive from any other employer. She ought to be grateful, but she did not feel grateful. She felt decidedly cross.
What was the matter with her today? Resenting Marlowe for having horrid mistresses and rejecting four of her books, resenting the world because she could not afford emeralds, resenting the fact that all the chocolates in the world could not increase the size of her bosom, resenting fate because she was no longer young and had never been beautiful. Absurd, all of it.
Thirty is not old.
For a woman of her situation in life, she was very fortunate. An unmarried woman of staunch morals with no family had few options. Unlike the poor girls who slaved away in match factories or shops, her duties were both challenging and interesting, often enabling her to exercise her intelligence and her ingenuity. Most important of all, she wanted to be a published writer, and her employer was a publisher, making him her best hope to someday see her books in print.
As her own literary creation, Mrs. Bartleby, would have said, a woman of true gentility endures what she must, and does it gracefully.
With a resigned sigh, Emma handed Miss Bordeaux another handkerchief.
Une discussion littéraire à la deuxième Galerie by Honoré Daumier
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Source: www.mattstawicki.com
No, it's not the comic book ....
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This has nothing to do with the book -- just a picture of a cute kitten.
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The folly at Wimpole Hall
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Synopsis from Amazon Canada:Isadora Peabody is the brilliant but socially inept sibling in an otherwise perfect family. And although she struggles to fit into Boston society, her awkwardness dooms her to repeated failure. Fate intervenes when she learns that a sea captain, Ryan Calhoun, is in need of an interpreter for his next voyage to Rio. And despite Ryan's adamant opposition to hiring a female interpreter, Isadora gains a berth on his ship, thanks to a little blackmail.
Life aboard ship and away from the strict confines of Boston society finds Isadora losing weight, gaining confidence, and blooming like a rose. She befriends the motley crew of rough sailors, and in turn, they become a charm school of sorts, tutoring her in gracefulness -- which comes in handy when climbing the rope rigging -- dancing, and friendship. Isadora's transformation fascinates Ryan, but he is determined to stay away from her for he has secretive, dangerous plans. Unaware of Ryan's interest, Isadora struggles with her growing attraction to the reckless sea captain. But before they can resolve their feelings, prior commitments surface and endanger their chance of finding a happy future together.
My rating: 3 stars
Clément-Auguste Andrieux: La bataille de Waterloo. 18 juin 1815, 1852
Cover of first edition
"Keen Eddie" being dropped for "The O. C." -- now that's an American tragedy
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7:18 p.m.
My eyes are all swollen up like mice eyes from crying. Even my nose is swollen. It's not small at the best of times, but now it looks like I've got three cheeks. Marvelous. Thank you, God.9:00 p.m.
I'll never get over this.9:10 p.m.
Time goes very slowly when you're suicidal.
What tragedy has her so distraught? Her parents have told her she's moving to New Zealand just when she's managed to snog (kiss -- look it up in the glossary) the SG (Sex God, a.k.a Robbie). This is of course not the only source of drama in Georgia's eventful life. Her half Scottish wildcat, Angus, who is the size of a small Labrador, herds the poodles next door and terrorizes the neighborhood. Her little sister, Libby, who is slightly mad, stores her "pooey knickers" and her scuba-diving Barbie doll in Georgia's bed. Her mother (from whom she inherited her orangutan eyebrow gene and possibly her "gigantic basoomas") is clearly inhabiting Earth solely to make her life miserable, and even her best friend Jas is "half girl, half turnip."
Despite the fact that she's spared from going to "Kiwi-a-gogo land," things don't get much better for Georgia. She's suspended for a childish prank right before her dad returns from New Zealand, she falls in love with the SG who dumps her for being too young, and Dave, the "red-herring" boyfriend she's using to make the SG jealous calls her a "heartless whatsit." And, she continues, "the spot on my bum is probably a boil. I wonder what Buddha would do now?" Rennison's comedic timing is brilliant. Adolescent angst ("I hope I am not driven to the brink of madness by grief") vanishes less than an hour later ("Angus can fetch sticks!!!") and sometimes even sooner. (Warning: Do not read this book while riding a train or bus unless you don't care what people think of intermittent explosive laughter. Seriously.)
