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Ellen would be free to return to Stalbridge. By the time she returned to the house, Arden was quite confident that things would work out her way.
    * * * *
    The earl joined her in the morning room for tea and a light nuncheon. She had decided that sulking (though that did not come naturally to her anyway) and resentment would get her nowhere, so she greeted him as though the conversation of the previous day had not occurred.
    “I understand you met Captain Richmond this morning, Arden?”
    “Captain Richmond? Oh, you mean that scruffy-looking fellow who came to see you? I could hardly believe he was an officer until he showed me the seals on his dispatches,” she answered coolly.
    Her response was hardly one to make the earl feel optimistic about his latest plan.
    “His dispatches held some bad news, I’m afraid. I am recalled to the campaign in three weeks’ time.”
    Arden did react then, although she could not have said whether it was the prospect of her father going back to the war or her going on to Millicent’s that upset her the most.
    “But, Father, you’ve barely arrived.”
    “I know, my dear, but the French care little for a daughter’s first Season, you know,” said the earl, attempting to lighten his announcement. “I am upset, but I have no choice.”
    “What will it mean, Father?”
    “For me? I return to Spain in order to lead the summer campaign.”
    “And for me?” she asked, looking down at the small triangles of bread on her plate, as though to figure out how to fit them back together again into one rectangular piece of bread.
    “After the Season is over, and if Celia has accepted an offer, you will go to Millicent as we planned, Arden.”
    “As you planned,” said Arden, almost choking on a piece of sandwich. “I still cannot believe you would do this to me.”
    “I cannot return to the front without knowing that you are in good hands, my dear.”
    “But I already am in good hands, with Ellen and Celia,” she protested.
    “I have told you why I think Ellen is no longer an appropriate companion. Come, let us not waste our last few days quarreling.”
    “I am sorry, Father, but I cannot stay if you do not wish to quarrel,” replied his daughter, pushing her chair away and muttering that she would see him at dinner.
    The earl poured himself another cup of tea and looked well-pleased. If he could pull this strategy off, he would have no worries about his plans against the French. Arden was so adamant against going to Millicent’s that Gareth was bound to look more attractive to her. Although “scruffy-looking fellow” was hardly a sign of instant attraction. He hoped Gareth was visiting his tailor this afternoon!
     

Chapter 8
     
    Gareth had indeed visited a tailor and managed to find something suitable that had been returned by another customer. Fortunately, the man for whom it was made had not been constructed along the lines of Lord Heronwood. Unfortunately, he was not constructed along Gareth’s lines either. Luckily, the pants could be altered while Gareth waited. But the coat, well-tailored as it was, had been made for a heftier man, and could not have been said to hug Gareth’s shoulders, despite their breadth. It didn’t precisely hang, but it was noticeably ill-fitting.
    “It is clean, however,” said Gareth, grinning at his aunt’s look of mock horror as he entered the drawing room before dinner.
    “Pour me more sherry, Nephew,” she teased, “or I will go off in a faint over your appearance. I suppose that was the best that you could do?”
    “For tonight, at any rate. I have ordered two more coats and a pair of trousers which he assures me will be ready by tomorrow evening.”
    “Thank God. You will never capture any young lady’s interest with clothes that hang off you like a scarecrow.”
    “You are a fine one to talk, Aunt. You have been the despair of your society friends for years over your lack of interest in clothes.”
    “For myself, perhaps. But