Chapter Text
“Please, mama. I could have a good life there,” Penelope implored, kneeling at her mother’s feet, one hand clutching a letter and the other wrinkling the silk of Portia’s skirt. “It is my third season, mama, and not one caller. Philippa is married, and Prudence is engaged. I do not understand why I must endure another series of insipid balls!”
“Insipid? But you love to dance!”
Penelope scowled. “Yes, which makes it doubly disappointing to have a dance card that is perpetually empty. It is humiliating, mama.”
“Oh, come now, Penelope. Do not be so dramatic. That Bridgerton boy dances with you often enough. Perhaps when he comes home from Italy or India, or whichever godforsaken place, you might bat your eyes a little more so that he may finally come calling.”
Penelope’s scowl deepened, if that was even possible, and she rose to her feet, only to plop back down into the couch, next to her disapproving mother. “It is Colin who has ruined me, mama.”
I would never dream of courting Penelope Featherington, he’d declared less than a year ago. Not in your wildest dreams, Fife. And then they laughed, he and those horrid, sought-after gentlemen.
The cruel words, proclaimed so loudly and publicly (and in her family’s garden, no less), spread like slow, quiet poison. Conveniently for the apothecary, however, he had departed for his next tour days before the news would have found its way back to him, so he was blissfully ignorant of the damage he had caused.
After attempting to write it into her column once, the very night Colin uttered the words into reality, she had damned her integrity to hell and given up, the words too painful to even think. But when word began to spread, and her own lady’s maid could hardly look her in the eye, she had been left with no choice but to pen her own ruin. Lady Whistledown would be terribly remiss if she had left such a ruinous pronouncement unreported. She would have given herself away or lost her credibility altogether.
She had cried all through her drafts, ruining the ink three times before managing to produce a dry manuscript for her publisher. She wrote two more issues after that and then ceased writing Whistledown altogether, without explanation, leaving the ton to speculate on what on god’s green earth could have happened to the prolific gossip columnist. Most of them simply thought she had taken a vacation rather early and would be back next season.
And as for the unfortunate wallflower, she received enough pitying looks to last all her days. If Penelope’s marriage prospects were dire before, they completely turned to dust the moment Colin Bridgerton proclaimed her un-court-able.
Portia was livid and humiliated, at least at first. The whispering was bad enough, but it was the snide remarks from Lady Cowper and her horrible daughter that finally compelled her to take Prudence and Penelope and leave for Ireland two weeks before their cousin in Kilkenny originally anticipated.
By the time the next season came along, Penelope had been firmly established as an undesirable and taken off the marriage mart.
Only her determined mama remained unconvinced.
“You are not ruined. We have weathered harsher blows to our family’s reputation. What is another one? Once the next scandal comes along, everybody will forget about a few silly words from a drunken boy. They probably have forgotten it already!”
Penelope inhaled in exasperation, unwilling to give up just yet. “Nobody was interested even before that night, mama. I had already taken my place on a shelf. Colin merely… cemented my place there.”
Portia waved her hand, dismissing the issue once and for all. “I will hear no more of this. No daughter of mine will become a working woman—a forgotten governess, no less—in some godforsaken corner of Ireland.”
Penelope said no more after that. Clutching her cousin’s letter even tighter, she stomped off to her room.
There, she dove into her bed gracelessly and let out a frustrated scream into her pillow. Allowing herself to groan and whine for a few moments, she finally turned over to stare at the ceiling.
It had been a month since they’d emerged from hiding, and the rest of the ton had just started trickling back to London to start the season. It seemed like every time she looked out the window, a frazzled mama and a young girl were exiting a carriage. Who is this one, she would think before recognizing the debutante as a taller, more filled out version of a child she once knew.
But if their lowered hems were any indication, they were no longer children by society’s standards, and neither was she.
At almost-twenty, she wasn’t quite so old yet—certainly not old enough to settle for being a governess, as her mother liked to remind her—but she was no naive debutante, not anymore. If one good thing came out of Colin Bridgerton’s public denouncement of her desirability, it was that she had cried out her fears along with all her unrequited love. And as she had wept every night for weeks, by the time she was done, there was nothing left but a clear, steadfast resolution: to make—in spite of him, her mother, and the ton—a woman of herself, one she liked and respected.
It was why she wanted to embrace spinsterhood, and why every single one of Colin Bridgerton’s letters was instantly tossed into the fireplace the moment they reached her hands.
Were it not for the hope of finding a moment to speak with Eloise at the Levitt ball (the first of the season), Penelope would not have left her room that night. The discussion over Ireland had left her simmering in frustration and helplessness. Here was a good alternative to marriage! A real job offer, the promise of a worthy life out of the confines of the ton! But alas, having finally found a match for Prudence, the Featherington matriarch was feeling rather overconfident that she could do the same for her youngest daughter, if only the latter would obey and stop carrying on about the merits of governessing in the Irish countryside.
The matter had been laid to rest for the meantime, but Penelope very much intended to bring it up with her mama, over and over, incessantly and indefatigably, until she was on a horse and leaving Mayfair for good—even if it took all season to convince Portia.
But she could not leave without repairing things with her dearest friend. If she had any news at all that would interest Eloise beyond the kind she published as Lady Whistledown, it’s that she was to fulfill Eloise’s dream of becoming a spinster—and earning an honest income to boot.
Scanning the hall for the Bridgertons—they tended to herd together upon arrival—she was surprised to find one headed straight for her, and not the one she wanted.
Eyes growing wide, she looked around in panic, wondering if she could outrun him if she bolted to the Levitts’ gardens.
It was too late, however, because before she could make a decision, he was standing right in front of her, hands flexing at his side as if to warn her that if she moved, he would throw propriety to the wind and grab her. “Good evening, Pen,” he said.
“Mr. Bridgerton,” she tilted her head politely, averting her eyes as she took a sip of wine from the goblet she held.
The cold greeting stung, but he ignored it. “We need to talk, Pen. Where have you been? Did you receive my letters? Perhaps your butler was remiss in forwarding them.”
“Briarly has never missed so much as an ant at the breakfast table.”
“So you did receive them. And ignored them.”
“I did not ignore them,” she said bluntly. “I burned them.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed, and he looked so hurt she had to look away. “I cannot tell you how sorry—”
“Why are you here, Mr. Bridgerton? I thought you would still be in…” She honestly could not remember.
“Italy. I was in Italy,” he replied, sounding a little bitter. She would know if she had read his letters. “I ended my tour early to come and see you, Pen. I enquired after you, but Eloise did not know where you were. I even wrote to your Briarly, but he refused to disclose your whereabouts.” Not that he could blame the man. He would be a terrible butler to betray his employers’ confidences in such a way. Still, Colin did not have to like it. He reached out to gently hold her wrist. “I would have come and found you earlier, Pen. I could not be more sorry for the harm I have caused.”
She jerked her arm free, looking around in mild consternation. “Please do not touch me again, Mr. Bridgerton. I would hate to think of someone mistaking your familiarity for something else.”
He clasped his hands behind him, unsure what to do with them all of a sudden. “One dance, Pen. Please. One dance.”
“No thank you,” she said plainly and walked away, awkwardly striking up a conversation with the first group she encountered, just to punctuate their interaction.
So focused was Penelope on trying to make conversation (a feat she was never particularly good at in the first place) that she did not notice the Bridgerton she did wish to speak with on the opposite side of the ballroom, already chugging down a second glass of champagne.
Eloise frowned at what she just witnessed. She had never seen Colin look so wounded, not even after that whole business with Ms. Thompson. Her first thought was a bitter one: There goes Whistledown again, harming another Bridgerton. However, she had to admit, she was slightly impressed and a little proud of her ex-friend. This was perhaps the first time in his entire life that Colin had ever been subjected to the sting of rejection—and by Penelope Featherington, no less.
“Hello, Ms. Bridgerton,” a slightly familiar voice startled her out of her musings. Prudence Featherington had sidled up next to her, holding an identical glass of champagne.
“Good evening, Ms. Featherington,” Eloise said awkwardly. She didn’t think she’d ever had an actual conversation with Prudence before. Had they ever even exchanged pleasantries?
The woman raised her glass, smiling vapidly. “Have you heard? I am engaged!”
And I do not care. “Oh, yes, yes! I heard from my mama who heard it from your mama. Congratulations are… in order then, I rather think,” she said, trying to sound genuine. Prudence could not have been barking up a wrong-er tree.
“Ah, well, thank you, Eloise. And don’t you worry,” the girl said with infuriating condescension, “I’m sure you will find a match soon. At least this is only your second season. Look at my unfortunate sister, into her third with nary a prospect. Nineteen, and already bound for life as a working woman. Can you believe it?”
Eloise’s eyebrows met. “What do you mean?”
“She has received an offer from our cousin in Ireland. His children need a governess, you see, and they took to Penelope quite well during our stay there, god knows why. She’s awfully dull. She has given up on the marriage mart and is trying to convince our mama to let her go, but mama is determined to give the season another try. I am inclined to agree with our youngest, however. I can’t imagine anyone finding a husband after being so thoroughly and so publicly scorned by a gentleman—a Bridgerton, no less!” Her gloved hands immediately covered her mouth. “Oh, I…” To Prudence’s credit, she realized her blunder without anyone having to point it out to her.
Eloise merely raised her eyebrows, pursed her lips in an awkward not-smile, and turned her head to look anywhere else. She did not feel particularly affiliated with her brother’s actions last season, nevermind that they shared a last name. She would be lying, however, if she said she did not feel just a little bit sad for Penelope, despite knowing who had written the damning column that followed.
Prudence muttered a few excuses and promptly left.
Ireland, was it? Eloise’s eyes scanned the room for her former friend. She would also be lying if she said she did not feel just a little bit envious.
“At least I actually did something,” Penelope had shouted after her the last time they talked. And here she was again, doing something, fighting for the life Eloise liked to claim was better.
Perhaps there was something to be learned from the insipid wallflowers of the world after all.