Booklog 64/2020: Georgette Heyer: Charity Girl

Eligible bachelor-about-town, Desford, takes pity on a young girl, Charity (known as Cherry). When she runs away from her aunt, who treats her like a Cinderella, he meets her on the road and agrees to take her to her skinflint grandfather in London, but when they get there Granddad is out of town. Taking care not to leave himself open to compromising Cherry he takes her to Henrietta, his childhood friend, for refuge while he goes in search of her grandfather, whom he eventually finds, but with no good outcome. In the meantime Cherry's father, long thought dead, reappears with no good intentions.

This is a fairly mundane story for a Heyer, and not one of my favourites. The story doesn't go quite where you expect it to go, but there's a good resolution, even though part of it comes without foreshadowing.