“Miss MacLean!” Lady B calls out from the opposite end of the grand foyer of Beaufetheringstone House. “What is that thing you are dragging about?”

I brush the hair back from my face and pretend not to be too grateful that she stopped me. The house doesn’t have an elevator, you see. “Lady B! It’s a suitcase.”

“A case of suits?” She’s confused, and I’m realizing suitcase is etymologically off.

“A valise.”

Her eyes go wide. “It’s blue.”

“Yes.”

“And it is on wheels.”

“That part is rather useful, when stairs aren’t involved.”

She ignores me. “But surely you aren’t missing tonight’s ball. I have plans. Albert shall be very put out if you’re not there.”

I hesitate. She only invokes Albert’s happiness when she’s very serious. “Well, Lady B–”

She gives me the look. “You are leaving.”

“I have to,” I explain quickly. “I’m going to a conference.”

“With whom are you conferring?”

“Well, there will be a few thousand people there.”

Her brow furrows. “The host must have the largest ballroom in London.”

Uh-oh. When Lady B gets competitive… “It’s not actually in London,” I say, trying to move us away from giant ballrooms. “It’s in Kansas City.”

She blinks.

“Missouri,” I add.

“This event isn’t even hosted by a peer? You’re choosing this Miss Ouri’s soiree instead of mine?”

Oh dear. “Missouri isn’t a person, Lady B. She’s a place. It’s a place, I mean.”

She looks unconvinced. “Explain.”

“I’m going to a very large…” I pause, considering the words. Convention clearly doesn’t work. Party will no doubt set her off. “Event. For authors and readers. The RT Booklovers convention.”

“It’s for your…writing?”

“It is!” I say, grateful. “In a place called Kansas City. In the United States.”

“You’re going to The Colonies.”

“Just for a few days. I’ll be back before you know it.”

“I am not an idiot, Miss MacLean, it shall take you months to get there.”

“Not–” I pause, knowing in 2013, won’t work. “–necessarily.”

She gives a little huff of displeasure. “I don’t like it.”

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I’ll bring you back some barbecue sauce.”

“What kind of queue?”

I shake my head. “You’ll see when I get back. And I’ll bring you some free books, too! Maybe some pictures of ladies in wild costumes!”

Her brows snap together. “This does not seem altogether businesslike.”

I’m quietly grateful for the lack of the Mr. Romance competition this year. And I’m just going to skip telling her about the Faery Ball.

**

Are you at RT this year? Be sure to come say hi to me! Have you ever been to a reader convention? What did you like about it? If you haven’t been to one, is it the kind of thing you think you’d enjoy? 

“Oh, Lady B! I’m so happy. Tomorrow’s a release day for me.”

“I’m so glad to hear it, Miss Dare. Who are the lucky couple this time? Another of those charmingly…unique…Spindle Cove ladies, I presume.  And does she get another rakish viscount? A taciturn officer, perhaps?”

“None of the above, my lady. This time, I’ve paired Miss Diana Highwood with the village blacksmith, Aaron Dawes.”

“The blacksmith?” Lady B sputters.

Despite Lady B’s obvious surprise, she’s still taking this much better than the heroine’s mother will.

“Yes, that’s why the book is called Beauty and the Blacksmith.”

“But Miss Dare, where would a gentlewoman and a blacksmith have any opportunity to become acquainted, much less fall in love?”

“At the smithy, of course. You see, Diana’s been infatuated with Aaron for ages. She brings every scrap of metal she owns to the smithy, just so she’ll have an excuse to sit and watch him work. She’s broken her necklace three times now by smashing it with a rock, just so Mr. Dawes can mend it.”

“Ah,” says Lady B. “I do know well the silly games young lovers play when they want to find time together.”

“Do you?” I sidle close, sensing a juicy story. “Do tell.”

“Once, at a ball in my first season, I developed a potent infatuation with the most handsome gentlemen I’d ever seen. Never in my young life had I glimpsed a finer pair of legs! I thought I noticed him admiring me too, but my dances were already reserved for the evening. Every last one, taken! By a line of boring old men my mother had chosen.”

(I make a mental note to ask about Lady B’s mother on another occasion.)

“I just knew I had to talk to that man,” Lady B says, leaning close. “Whether we met on the dance floor, the gardens, or somewhere else. I sensed that my future happiness would depend on it.  I was desperate, so I…”

She whispers the rest to me behind her raised fan.

“No,” I say.

“Oh, yes.”

I can’t help laughing. “Did you ever tell Lord B the truth after you were married?”

“My dear girl. What makes you think the gentleman in question was Lord B.?”

I am shocked. Shocked.

But I approve.

“Say, Monty,” I ask, “what’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever done to impress a lady?”

Monty lifts his head to answer. Even from across the ballroom, I can see that fresh bruises cover his face. “Well, let me think…” he begins.

“Never mind,” I say.

I mean, really. He must have so many stories to choose from! We could write about it for a month. Oh, wait. We did.

What about you? What’s the strangest, silliest, or most outrageous or embarrassing thing you’ve ever done to get the attention of someone you fancied?

And what bold ploy to catch a gentleman’s attention do you think Lady B whispered behind her fan?

Warning: This Saturday’s salon is brought to you by shameless
a) self-quotation
and
b) objectification

You’ve been forewarned. Read on if you’d like to be forearmed.

My new novella comes out next Tuesday – it’s called Beauty and the Blacksmith. Now, I always give each heroine I write a little piece of me. Sometimes it’s awkwardness around cute boys (Minerva, in A Week to be Wicked). Sometimes it’s a love of old books and the way they smell (Pauline, in Any Duchess Will Do). When it came to Diana Highwood, I gave her one of my most deeply personal qualities: an obsession with forearms.

From the first page of BATB:

Goodness. Just look at it. Thick as my ankle.

Diana Highwood took her glove and worked it like a fan, chasing the flush from her throat. She was a gentlewoman, born and raised in genteel comfort, if not opulent luxury. From an early age, she’d been marked as the hope of the family. Destined, her mother vowed, to catch a nobleman’s eye.

But here, in the smithy with Aaron Dawes, all her delicate breeding disintegrated.

How could she help staring? The man had wrists as thick as her ankle.

As always, he wore his sleeves rolled to the elbow, exposing forearms roped with muscle. He pumped the bellows, commanding the flames to dance.

But on reflection, I realize it really goes back further than that. My obsession with forearms was established in my very first book, Goddess of the Hunt. It’s pretty much all over for Lucy once she sees Jeremy with rolled up sleeves:

Clearly the sight of a well-muscled forearm incited a woman to utter depravity. How else to explain the invention of cuffs?

Okay, so maybe ALL my heroines are obsessed with forearms. Can you blame them? Let’s test this with a little visual feast of forearms. For, you know, science. Or something.

Matt Bomer’s thought bubble: Gosh, I have no idea how my forearms got this smoking hot.

I’m thinking Chris Hemsworth has been lifting more than bottles with those forearms.

Joe Mangianello is the boss of forearms.

Aww. Does Jason Momoa have a boo-boo on his forearm? Who wants to kiss it better?

You can’t say I didn’t forearm you.

We all know Lady B has a thing for a well-turned male leg.  Do you have a favorite body part you like to ogle … drool over … search obsessively on tumblr … admire?

I enter the ballroom with my usual sense of trepidation.  Lady B does not summon one to her side without a reason, usually associated with scolding.  And I have done plenty of late worthy of being scolded.  A canal in my rooms, throwing a Carnival ball behind her back, insinuating in writing that Lady B turned Albert into a hat…  Albert had to fly home immediately from his holiday in Majorica to put things to right.  Neither he nor Lady B would speak to me for a week after that.

So, yes, trepidation.  But when I emerge into the ballroom, Lady B greets me with a relieved, “Thank goodness!” and pulls me across the room to where I see two of the footmen in the practice of hanging one of her usual celebratory banners.

“Happy Robinson Crusoe Day?”

“I need someone who can look at this banner and tell me if it’s hung properly.  Miss MacLean is proving difficult.”  Lady B indicates where poor Sarah is standing, judiciously hiding behind a book.  I do wonder how she got roped into this.  I know she’s on deadline.

“I was caught up in a bit of writing and didn’t move fast enough,” she shrugs, by way of explanation.

Robinson Crusoe has the best subtitle: The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an un-inhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last as strangely deliver’d by Pirates

“But why are we celebrating Robinson Crusoe?” I ask Lady B.

“Because this is the day that glorious tome was published!” Lady B’s eyes gleam with pride up at the (slightly crooked) banner.

I shoot a look to Sarah.  “Yes,” I venture, “but why?”

“Because she couldn’t think of anything else.” Sarah replies drolly.

I nod sagely.  I know the feeling.

“A tart tongue does not become a lady, Miss MacLean.  Even a lady author.”  Lady B sticks her nose up in the air.  “And as every good party needs a theme, why not Robinson Crusoe?  Why it is an elegant tale of… er, a romance?  Yes a romance.  Between a Mr. Crusoe and –”

“The island he is shipwrecked upon for twenty-eight years?”  I venture.  The look on Lady B’s face tells me she hadn’t read it.

“Really?” she asks sadly.

“There are cannibals.” Sarah offers dolefully.

“But also a parrot!  I think.”  At least Albert preens a little at that.  I may be forgiven for my previous slight before the year is up.

“Well, does he at least meet a young woman with whom to fall in love?  Who doesn’t try to eat him, that is.”  Lady B asks.

Sarah and I look at each other.  How to tell Lady B that poor Mr. Crusoe is cast-away, and the only romances he would have engaged in were of the self variety?

Luckily we do not have to.  Lady B simply sighs, and puts her hands on her hips.  “Well then, Miss MacLean, this was your idea… what are our alternatives?”

“It was your idea?”  I whisper to Sarah, crossing the room to join her.

“Idea? No.” Sarah answers.  “Fault.  Yes.”

Then, she shows me her book.  Or rather, I should say, her iPad, hidden in the folds of a book.  All the better to not confuse poor 19^th century Lady B with.  “She needed an idea for a party theme.  She was about to accost poor Monty, but he’s been ducking her ever since she started talking about the family genealogy and his prospects for a proper bride, so I…”

“You found out something that happened today on the internet as a possible theme,” I conclude.  “Well, let’s see what else we can find…”

I begin flipping through web pages.

“What about Shakespeare?  It was his birthday – and anniversary of his death – on Tuesday.  Now, Shakespeare could create some romance!  Although it usually ended in death or cross-dressing,” I try.

“Hmm, a possibility… What else happened this week in history?” Lady B crosses over to us, but Sarah and I keep the iPad out of her line of sight.

I quickly scroll down some more websites. “Er… something about King Brian of Ireland being murdered?  Not exactly conductive to an amorous atmosphere. The Tea Act was introduced in Parliament!  Although that did not end well for the British side of things.  Something more fun…Oh, Studio 54 opened?  No, no — far too late an event…”

“Studio 54?” Lady B’s ears perked up.  “Is that some kind of artists’ garret?  A place for those struck by a muse to explore their creativity?”

“Er… sort of.”

“Well, then.  That’s a wealth of choices.  Which one do you think it should be Miss Noble?”

Indeed, which historical event should be the theme of Lady B’s ball tonight?  Shakespeare’s Life?  Studio 54?  Or should we just stick with Robinson Crusoe?  After all, the banner’s already hanging, if a little lopsided. 

I’ve been away from the Ballroom for a week as I’ve been trotting around on book tour, but I really hadn’t expected it to have changed as much as this. The spindly gilt chairs have been pushed to one side of the room, making way for old chests filled with dusty papers. A vast oak table is piled high with scrolls, parchments, and decaying chronicles.

Has Lady B taken up antiquarian scholarship in her spare time?

“Nothing of the kind!” snaps Lady B, making me wonder whether I spoke aloud, or if Lady B had taken up mind-reading among her other hobbies. I wouldn’t be surprised. “I shouldn’t wish to be thought a bluestocking. I am assembling my application for the DNC.”

I stare at her blankly.

“The Daughters of the Norman Conquest,” she elaborates. “In order to join, one must prove one’s Norman ancestry, as well as produce a ticket from the boat upon which one’s ancestor sailed with the Conqueror. Some of those boats,” she continues with asperity, “are becoming suspiciously crowded.”

“If it had gone the other way, do you think they would have called it the Daughters of the Saxon Resistance?” I wonder.

Lady B gives me one of those looks she saves for frivolous authoresses.

“Besides,” she says, as though I hadn’t spoken, “it’s past time Monty learned something of his family heritage. I was just telling—Monty? Where has that boy gone?”

Out the window, if the open shutter is any indication. I think I catch a glimpse of the heel of a well-polished Hessian boot, but I can’t be quite sure.

“Hmph,” says Lady B. “And after I took the time to read all sixty pages of the Chronicle of Sir Guillaume de Beaufeatheringstone aloud to him—in the original Norman French!”

There is the sound of a distinct groan from the vicinity of the window.

“That’s all quite interesting,” I say politely, “but don’t you think Monty would rather hear about his parents? Wasn’t there some sort of story about them?”

Lady B slams the chronicle shut. “Recent history is so uninteresting, don’t you agree?” she says, tight-lipped. “And, really, quite uninspired. There’s no chain mail, no jousting. Just assemblies and routs and—”

“The odd scandal?” I venture, watching Lady B closely. There’s some secret there, I just know it.

“Hmph,” sniffs Lady B, and plunks a heavy volume down in front of me, raising a cloud of dust. As I cough, she says, “If you are so interested in the past, Miss Willig, you might as well make yourself useful. I expect to see that entire chronicle transcribed—and footnoted!—by tonight’s ball.”

I risk a peek at it. This isn’t going to be fun. I haven’t seen handwriting that illegible since the last time I had to get a prescription from the doctor.

“But Monty’s parents….”

“BOTH these chronicles,” says Lady B, and drops another on top of the first. In the resulting dust cloud, she makes her exit.

The top of a man’s fashionable hat bobs briefly up above the sash of the window—and then disappears again.

Sighing, I settle down to transcribing the Chronicle of Sir Guillaume de Beaufeatheringstone, as recorded by his faithful scribe, Patsy—but I can’t help wondering, just what is it that Lady B doesn’t want us to find out? And how much does Monty know?

Maybe there’s really nothing to discover, but thanks to The Ashford Affair, which is all about a Big Family Secret and the ramifications thereof, I’ve had family mysteries on the brain recently.

Have you come across any surprising stories about your family?

If you’ve read more than about one Regency-era romance, chances are you’ve come across a special license. You see there was this pesky law by which marriages couldn’t take place in England without the banns being published in the resident parishes of both bride and bridegroom three Sundays in a row. In addition, marriages had to take place in church and before noon. This is damnably inconvenient for the writer who wants her couple wed quickly and who doesn’t want the trouble of sending them all the way to Scotland where the laws were less restrictive

Doctors Commons in the early 19th century

Luckily for our desperate heroes (isn’t it always the hero who’s in a hurry?), there was a way out. You could apply to the Archbishop of Canterbury, the head cleric of the Church of England, for a Special License which allowed a marriage to take place anywhere and at any hour without a waiting period. This useful document was obtained from the Archbishop’s London offices at Doctors Commons in the City of London.

A few years ago I became frustrated by the fact that I didn’t know what a special license looked like. I couldn’t find a picture on line, or even the text. So during a trip to London I went to the source. Doctors Commons was demolished during the 19th century but the Archbishop has a nice little London pad at Lambeth Palace, just across the River Thames from Westminster.

I imagined a printed form in which the names were inserted, but I was wrong about that. The Lambeth Palace Library possessed no “blank” licenses, only a few dozen completed ones for marriages that had been performed in the Palace chapel.

Lambeth Palace

A license was handwritten on parchment approximately 18 inches wide by 12 inches high, quite an impressive document. All the couple of dozen I saw (dated between 1754 and 1806) looked much the same. In a couple of instances the names of the parties were written in different handwriting from the text (which was boilerplate, scarcely varying by a word) as though a clerk had prepared a blank license when he had nothing better to do. More often the document had been written all at once, not something that could be dashed off in ten minutes.

A license was signed by the “Register” and finished with the Archbishop’s seal, hanging from a ribbon or string  looped through holes in the parchment.

The men are described as either widower or bachelor, the women as widow or spinster. In the case of a spinster, the name of her father is given, for a widow, her late husband’s. For the man the father is recorded if he’s a peer or someone else notable. As you can see by the list of titles for the bridegroom in the following license, they seemed to like to make the whole business seem important.

Here is the text of a typical license, that for the 1806 marriage of Prince Bariatinsky to Lord Sherborne’s daughter. There is absolutely no punctuation and, yes, the word “Honorable” is spelled in what we would call the American way.

Charles by Divine Providence Archbishop of Canterbury Primate of all England and Metropolitan by Authority of Parliament lawfully empowered for the purposes herein written To our beloved in Christ John Prince Bariatinsky of Russia privy counselor to the Emperor of Russia Chamberlain and Knight of the Military Order of St. George and also Knight of Malta now of Sackville Street London a Bachelor and the Honorable [sic] Frances Mary Dutton of Sherborne in the County of Gloucester a Spinster daughter of the Right Honorable James Dutton Baron Sherborne Wheareas As it is alleged ye have proposed to proceed to the solemnization of a true pure and lawful Marriage Earnestly desiring the same to be solemnized with all the speed that may be that since your reasonable desires may the more readily take due effect We for certain causes as thereunto especially moving do so far as in us lies and the Laws of this Nation allow by these presents Graciously give and grant our License and Faculty as well to you the parties contracting as to all Christian People willing to be present at the solemnization of the said Marriage to Celebrate and Solemnize such Marriage between you the said contracting parties at any time and in any church or chapel or other meet and convenient place by any Bishop of this Realm or by the Rector Vicar Curate or Chaplain of such Church or Chapel or by any other Minister in Holy Orders of the Church of England Provided there be no lawful Let or Impediment to hinder the said Marriage Given under the seal of our office of Faculties at Doctors Commons this twenty first day of April in the year of Our Lord One Thousand eight hundred and six and in the second year of Our Translation.

I wish I had a picture, but I had no smart phone back then. Also, the library was very strict with scary Anglican librarians who were polite but firm.  They only let me look at one document at a time and I was too intimidated to ask for a photocopy.

 Since a special license allowed a marriage to take place at any time or in any place, where would you like to see our Regency couple tie the knot?

It’s Thursday, of course, and I’m comfortably ensconced in Lady B’s library reading and avoiding doing the very thing an artist is supposed to do at the home of her patroness.

Lady B looks very put out. Immediately I catalogue all the things I’ve done that she might be upset about: the continued mess in my room, the fact that I never did bring my latest hero to visit…

“Have you seen Monty?”

I blink. Monty? Why on earth would she be looking for Monty in the library? I think back. I remember seeing Harold the other day. And I’m fairly certain I saw Monty’s valet creeping down the backstairs with one of the maids. But Monty?

Now that I think about it, I haven’t seen him in at least several weeks. Perhaps, since Easter.

I shake my head slowly. Of course, now I am curious to know what the rapscallion has been doing. Surely if he’s been up to his usual sport of saving damsels who may or may not actually be in distress, we’d have heard something about it. Why, with the season in full swing, Lady B’s parlor has been nonstop filled with callers. Mostly mothers with their newly come out daughters…oh.

Maybe that’s why he hasn’t been around.

“I haven’t seen him, but I shall definitely keep my eye out for him. He can’t have gone far with Harold and his valet still here. Has he done something to upset you?” Clearly he has, but now I’m fishing for gossip. Because after all, there is nothing like Regency gossip!

“Upset? Do I look upset?”

I’m not certain what I’m supposed to say to that so I hold my tongue and wait for her to continue.

“No, Miss Darby, I am not upset. I am furious!” She waves a stack of invitations around wildly. “Do you know that I have been beset with the most insipid of conversations for the last three weeks? I already had a list of prospective wives for Monty, but naturally, all of London wishes their pale, quiet, brainless daughter to marry the Beaufetheringstone heir. And if the daughters weren’t bad enough, I have to deal with their mothers, who seem to conveniently forget that in our youth I thought them just as brainless as their spawn.”

“Monty is quite a catch,” I offer tentatively.

“Yes, he is. Despite his irregular upbringing. However, I have a list and if he refuses to abide by my wishes and pursue these particular women, then I demand he at least be present during these interminable afternoon visits. He simply cannot go about London at all hour attracting the wrong sort of woman.”

Now I’m even more curious.

“Who do you think would be the right sort of woman?” I ask. I’d love a peek at her list. After all, after nearly two years at Lady B’s I’ve met half of London and certainly all manner of heroines.

“Someone intelligent. Vibrant yet restrained. Who will know how to curb his more physical tendencies. Lady Arabella Prescott comes to mind as a possibility. Her parents are both brilliant. Lord B always agrees with Lord Prescott in parliament and Lady Prescott is a fabulous wit. From the little I’ve seen of the young Prescott girl, I believe she has inherited her parents’ intelligence.”

I actually haven’t met Arabella yet, and I have a strange feeling this list might hold even more surprises. What about all of you? What qualities do you think Monty needs in his future wife? And do you think he’ll bend to Lady B’s will?

“My dear Miss Dare,” says Lady B upon my arrival in the ballroom today, “are you well? You are looking rather…”

“Taxed?” I suggest.

“Yes. Just the word.”

I heave a sigh and sink beside her on a plush divan.

“Do put up your feet,” she urges.

“I don’t mind if I do. It is Tax Day, and I will admit, I’m feeling taxed in many ways, Lady B. I’m not sure I have the heart for much beyond a well-spiked glass of ratafia, a perusal of some fine legs, and–”

squawkMadlibs!squawk

“Thank you, Albert. Yes. On tax day, a bit of silliness will be just the thing. It’s been far too long since we’ve played cover blurb MadLibs.” (Or MadGlibs, as this untrademarked version is called!)

You know how these work, right? Fill in the blanks, hit the button, and please copy and paste your silliness into the comments! On Tax Day, we all need a good chuckle!

Read the real blurb for Tessa’s Any Duchess Will Do here.

Read the real blurb for Kate’s Let it Be Me here!

Thanks so much to everyone for sharing your crazy travel stories this past Thursday!  It certainly made my own flight delays seem a great deal less traumatic.

I apologize for the lack of responses after about mid-day on Thursday.  Whether it was Lady B or the internet gremlins, I somehow managed to get myself locked out of the Ballroom while I was en route.  (I suspect Lady B.)

The winner of The Ashford Affair is… Geraldine Lucas!  Congrats, Geraldine!  You should be hearing from me shortly….

Greetings from the Indian Ocean!

It’s Saturday, which means it’s writer’s inspiration day. So as I lounge under the canopy that Captain Frye constructed for me and Penny on the quarterdeck and we sail ever westward, stopping at ports to trade pearls here and there for barrels of exotic spices and bricks of tea, I am reminded of the inspirations for my novel In the Arms of a Marquess (which SHAMELESS PROMOTION ALERT is now on sale at Amazon for $2.99 on Kindle). Authors are never supposed to tell you their favorite novels they’ve written (I have no idea why), and I’m actually not sure I have one out of my own. But I do have a very soft spot in my heart for Ben and Tavy’s love story, which was in my heart and head for many, many years before I finally wrote it. So today, since our ship is in the region, I give you three of the inspirations for that book:

Brave Rikki-Tikki-Tavi (from Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book) confronting his foe, Nagaina.

The heroine of Marquess, Octavia Pierce, goes by the nickname Tavy. Not a coincidence.

And…

The first epic historical novel I ever read, upon which I imprinted like a duckling chick.

And…

Bollywood star Arjun Rampal, because if noblemen had worn sunglasses and white t-shirts in the early nineteenth-century…

In the novella I’m currently writing on board ship, there also just so happens to be the faintest whiff of the British Empire at sea, which is central to the story in In the Arms of a Marquess. (More news on that novella to come!)

And now for your Penny and Captain Frye update:

There has been progress … of the intimate sort! From a distance I witnessed a starlit stroll on the deck at midnight during which two silhouettes briefly became one, followed by the silhouette in skirts running away. I have no idea why Penny is such a ninny. But they’re back to casting each other longing, slightly confused glances across deck. We shall see… We shall see…

That’s all I can fit on the page this time, lovelies. I wish you well and will see you soon. Until then, happy romance and adventure!

~ Katharine