GARDEN INTRIGUE– Outtakes!
As the countdown to The Garden Intrigue continues (only a week left to go!), I’ll be posting a daily snippet here on the site, from background info to outtakes.
Today’s Garden Intrigue bonus? An outtake.
It won’t come as any surprise to anyone to hear that the ridiculous poet, Augustus Whittlesby, and my American heroine, Emma, are going to wind up having to form a temporary alliance to write a masque for a weekend at Malmaison. (If it’s on the cover flap, it doesn’t count as a spoiler.)
In the final version, the chapter ends at the point where Emma invites Augustus to call her by her first name. In the original, it went on a little bit longer….
“No,” said Mme Delagardie decidedly. “If we’re to work together, we ought to deal plainly with one another. Oh,” she added, “and you’d best call me Emma.”
“Emma?” He had heard it frequently enough before, from Jane, and, more recently, from Adele de Treville, but it sounded different in her voice.
“I do not respond to Emmie, Ammie, or Emily,” she said firmly. Her words were bold enough, but her hands betrayed her, fidgeting with the ruffle on her reticule. Emma Delagardie, fashionable widow and practiced flirt, was nervous.
There was something oddly endearing about it.
“Then you’d best call me Augustus,” he said mildly. “I don’t respond to Caesar, Auggie, or Gus.”
Mme Delagardie let out her breath in a rush. “There. You see? Honestly. Always best.”
“Always?”
“Well… mostly.” She cocked her head. “Auggie?”
“Don’t ask.” Honesty only went so far.
You can find my very favorite Garden Intrigue outtake (featuring Miss Gwen!) here.
More tomorrow!
Am so excited! Let the count down begin.
M.K.
Am so excited! Let the countdown begin.
M.K.
“More, please.”
Ouuuuh, so interesting! Are we going to learn about the origin of Auggie in the book?