Miss Taverner wished that Peregrine could have been present to hear this pronouncement.
By the time Mr. Brummell got up to go, all the favourable impressions he had made on her at Almack’s were confirmed. He was a charming companion, his deportment being particularly good, and his manners graceful and without affectation. He had a droll way of producing his sayings which amused her, and either because it entertained him to take an exactly opposite view to Mr. Mills, or because he desired to oblige his friend Worth, he was good enough to take an interest in her debut. He advised her not to abate the least jot of her disastrous frankness. She might be as outspoken as she chose.
Miss Taverner shot a triumphant glance at her chaperon. “And may I drive my own phaeton in the Park, sir?”
“By all means,” said Mr. Brummell. “Nothing could be better. Do everything in your power to be out of the way.”
Miss Taverner took his advice, and straightway commissioned her brother to procure her a perch-phaeton, and a pair of carriage-horses. Nothing in his stables would do for her; she only wished that she might have gone with him to Tattersall’s. She did not trust his ability to pick a horse.
Fortunately, the Earl of Worth took a hand in the affair before Peregrine had inspected more than half a dozen of the sweet-going, beautiful-stepping, forward-actioned bargains advertised in the columns of the Morning Post. He arrived in Brook Street one late afternoon, driving his own curricle, and found Miss Taverner on the point of setting out for the promenade in Hyde Park. “I shall not detain you long,” he said, laying down his hat and gloves on the table. “You have purchased, I believe, a perch-phaeton for your own use?”
“Certainly,” said Miss Taverner.
He looked her over. “Are you able to drive it?”
“I should not otherwise have purchased it, Lord Worth.”
“May I suggest that a plain phaeton would be a safer conveyance for a lady?”