“You do things that are impulsive and unladylike and clumsy and even vulgar,” he said. “You chatter too much, you laugh too much, and you sparkle in a manner that is in no way refined. And yet you attract almost everyone within your aura as a flame does a moth. You think people despise you and scorn you and shun you, when the opposite is true. You have told me that you did not take well with the ton. I do not believe it. I believe you took very well indeed—or would have done if you had been allowed to. I do not know who put the idea into your head that you did not, but that person was wrong.
