There were lessons in the meticulous details of each context: seating arrangements, table settings, which fork to use at dinner parties, instruction in popular card games such as Cassino, Speculation, and Commerce along with the mastery of dancing and the delicacies of small talk. There were also lessons in the things Isabella deemed mundane-planning one’s wardrobes for the seasons: the Little Season, the Winter Season, summers at the estate and fall hunting parties. Cate had always lived her life attuned to the seasons: the fall of the leaves in autumn, the bleakness of winter, the rebirth of spring, and the full vibrancy of summer. To Cate, the change of the seasons had rotated on cycles of nature. Now, under Isabella’s tutelage, she was introduced to a new rhythm-a rhythm dominated by events instead of buds and tender new shoots. She learned that the season might start after Easter but wasn’t official until the royal art exhibition at the academy, usually held in May. The season ended not with the heat of summer that made London nearly intolerable in July but in August, August 12 to be precise, correlating with the closure of parliament.
