“I do not know why our father could not spare the carriage,” Edna was saying when Jane took notice. “There is not enough room in the gig. If Jane would move her arms forward instead of insisting upon keeping them at her sides, there would be more room for the rest of us, but it is ever her way to be selfish. I daresay I shall have a sore side all the rest of the day.”

“I wonder,” Louisa said, “if Captain Mitford has arrived at the vicarage yet. He is expected this week, according to Amelia, and it would be a courtesy to arrive on his great-aunt’s birthday, would it not?”

“Who is Captain Mitford?” Edna asked, all sudden interest.

Louisa looked triumphant. She was fully aware, of course, that they did not know of whom she spoke.

“The Reverend Mitford’s brother is coming to stay for a few weeks,” she said. “He was in India with his regiment, but he was wounded a year or two ago and has only recently been well enough to come home to England to finish recuperating before rejoining his regiment in Portugal. I daresay he will be fighting the forces of that dreadful monster Napoleon Bonaparte before the winter is over.”

“The Reverend Mitford’s younger brother?” Edna asked hopefully.

“No,” Louisa said. “He is the elder. And do not, pray, Edna, proceed to ask me if he is also handsome. I do not know the answer and would not be interested if I did. Rank and fortune are of far more lasting significance than good looks. The Mitfords are not a wealthy family nor a distinguished one. It is said they were in trade until two or three generations ago. It would not do for a Miss Everett of Goodrich Hall, even a younger sister, to fall in love with Captain Mitford.”

“Oh,” Edna said crossly, “you say that, Louisa, only because you intend to fall in love with him yourself.”

Louisa’s eyebrows arched upward.

“I have a better sense of my own worth,” she said, “than to consider falling in love of any importance when I turn my mind to matrimony, Edna.”