Time Scout by Robert Asprin & Linda Evans

”Well, you don’t have to rub it in.”

”Mmm, yes, I think I do. We very nearly died in St. Giles and …Well, the less said about your first riding lesson, the better. An unprepared scout has a very short career.

If he was aware of the pun, he wasn’t smiling.

Margo sighed. “Okay. I’m trying. Really, I am.”

”I know. Now, about dinner. Let me explain cutlery…: ‘

Margo’s last three days in London were as glorious as the first four had been miserable and terrifying. She mastered the knack of fluttering her eyelashes and deferring questions with naive requests of her own.

”Oh, but I’m so dull, you don’t want to hear about an orphan. Please, tell me about riding to hounds. I don’t understand anything about it and it seems so exciting ….”

In her school-girl mob cap and pinafore, she wasn’t taken seriously by anyone. Even the ladies thought she was adorable.

”Mr. Moore, what an absolutely delightful child. Your ward is a charm.”

”You really must bring her out in a year or two.”

”Oh, no, not back to that dreadful tropical backwater, surely?”

And so the evening went, in a wonderful haze of wine, sparkling conversation, and more food than she could possibly eat, course after course of it, with delicate little desserts between. She floated to bed that night and dreamed of long formal gowns, bright laughter, and an endless round of parties and dinners with Malcolm at her side ….

The next day they went riding again, this time in Hyde Park, with Margo sidesaddle in a long riding habit and Malcolm in immaculate morning attire. Some of the women they’d seen last night at dinner smiled and greeted Malcolm, then smiled at her. Margo returned the greetings with what she hoped was a properly humble air, but inside she was bubbling.