Author: Georgette Heyer
Category: Historical
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Wholly ignoring her left hand, he briefly clasped the other, saying: ‘Thank me for what?’
‘So like you!’ she murmured. ‘But although you may forget your generosity, I cannot! Oh, I am quite in disgrace with poor Harriet, and the girls, for venturing out-of-doors in such chilly weather, but I felt it was the least I could do! You are a great deal too good!’
‘Well, that’s something new, at all events,’ he remarked. ‘Sit down, Lucretia, and let me have the word with no bark on it! What have I inadvertently done to excite your gratitude?’
Nothing had ever been known to disturb the saintliness of Mrs Dauntry’s voice and demeanour; she replied, as she sank gracefully into a chair: ‘Dissembler! I know you too well to be taken-in: you don’t like to be thanked – and, indeed, if I were to thank you for all your goodness to me and mine, your never-failing support, your kindness to my loved ones, I fear I should become what you call a dead bore! Chloë, dear child, calls you our fairy godfather!’
‘She must be a wet-goose!’ he responded.
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‘Oh, she thinks no one the equal of her magnificent Cousin Alverstoke!’ said Mrs Dauntry, gently laughing. ‘You are quite first-oars with her, I assure you!’
‘No need to put yourself in a worry over that,’ he said. ‘She’ll recover!’
‘You are too naughty!’ Mrs Dauntry said playfully. ‘You hope to circumvent me, but to no avail, I promise you! Well do you know that I am here to thank you – yes, and to scold you! – for coming – as I, alas, could not! – to Endymion’s assistance. That beautiful horse! Complete to a shade, he tells me! It is a great deal too good of you.’
‘So that’s what you came to thank me for, is it?’ said his lordship, a sardonic look in his eye. ‘You shouldn’t have ventured out on such an unnecessary errand: I said, when he joined, that I would keep him decently mounted.’
‘So generous!’ she sighed. ‘He is deeply sensible of it! As for me, I wonder sometimes what must have become of me when I was bereft of my beloved husband if I had not been able to depend upon your support through every trial.’
‘My faith in you, dear cousin, leads me to believe that you would have lost no time in discovering some other support,’ he answered, in a voice as sweet as hers. He smiled slightly, watching her bite her lip, and said, as he opened his snuff-box: ‘And what is the trial at present besetting you?’
She opened her eyes very wide at this, saying in a bewildered tone: ‘My dear Alverstoke, what can you mean? Apart from my wretched health – and I never talk of that, you know – none at all! I’ve discharged my errand, and must take my leave of you before my poor Harriet begins to fancy I’ve suffered one of my stupid spasms. She is waiting for me in the carriage, for she wouldn’t hear of my coming alone. Such good care as she takes of me! I am quite spoilt between you all!’ She rose, drawing her shawl around her, and putting out her hand. But before he could take it she let it fall, exclaiming: ‘Oh, that puts me in mind of something I have been wanting to discuss with you! Advise me, Alverstoke! I am quite in a quandary!’
‘You put me to shame, Lucretia,’ he said. ‘As often as I disappoint you, you never disappoint me!’
‘How you do love to joke me! Now, be serious, pray! It is about Chloë.’
‘Oh, in that case you must hold me excused!’ said his lordship. ‘I know nothing of schoolgirls, and my advice would be worthless, I fear.’
‘Ah, you too think of her as a schoolgirl! Indeed, it seems almost impossible that she should be grown-up! But so it is: she’s all but seventeen; and although I had thought not to bring her out until next year, everyone tells me it would be wrong to postpone the event. They say, you know, that the dear Queen’s health is now so indifferent that she may pop-off at any moment, and even if she doesn’t she won’t be equal to holding any Drawing-rooms next year. Which has me in a worry, because naturally I must present the sweet child – it is what poor Henry would have wished – and if the Queen were to die there can be no Drawing-rooms. As for presenting her at Carlton House, I wouldn’t for the world do so! I don’t know how we are to go on. Even if the Duchess of Gloucester were to take the Queen’s place – which, of course, the Prince Regent might desire her to do, for she has always been his favourite sister – it wouldn’t be the same thing. And who knows but what one might find that odious Lady Hertford in the Queen’s place?’
Alverstoke, who could think of few more unlikely contingencies, replied sympathetically: ‘Who indeed?’
‘So I feel it to be my duty to present Chloë this season, whatever the cost!’ said Mrs Dauntry. ‘I had hoped to have been so much beforehand with the world next year as to have been able to do the thing handsomely, but that, alas, can scarcely be! Dear child! When I told her that I should be obliged to present her in one of my own Court dresses, because the cost of such a dress as one would wish her to wear is utterly beyond my means, she was so good and so uncomplaining that it quite went to my heart! I couldn’t forbear to sigh: she is so pretty that I positively long to rig her out to the best advantage! But if I must bring her out this season it cannot be.’
‘In that case, my advice to you is to wait until next year,’ responded Alverstoke. ‘Consoling yourself with the reflection that if there are no Drawing-rooms then none of the season’s fair come-outs will enjoy an experience which is denied her.’
‘Ah, no! How could I be so improvident?’ she countered. ‘Somehow I must contrive to present her this spring! A dance, too! But how to do that, situated as I am –’ She broke off, apparently struck by a sudden idea. ‘I wonder if Louisa means to bring Jane out this season? Sadly freckled, poor child, and such a deplorable figure! However, you may depend upon it that Louisa will make a push to present her creditably, though she is such a nip-cheese that I’m persuaded she will grudge every penny she is obliged to spend on the business. Indeed,’ she added, softly laughing, ‘rumour has it that you are to give a ball in Jane’s honour!’
‘Yes?’ said his lordship. ‘But rumour, as I daresay you know, is a pipe – er – Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures – I forget the rest, but do let me assure you, dear Lucretia, that when invitations are sent out for a ball to be held here Chloë’s name will not be forgotten. And now you must allow me to escort you to your carriage: the thought of the devoted Harriet, patiently awaiting you, is beginning to prey upon my mind.’
‘Stay!’ said Mrs Dauntry, struck by yet another idea. ‘How would it be if Louisa and I cast our resources into a pool-dish, as it were, and gave a ball in honour of both our daughters? I am afraid that my lovely Chloë would quite outshine poor Jane, but I daresay Louisa won’t care for that, if she can but make and scrape a little.’ She raised her hands in a prayerful gesture, and added, in a voice of nicely blended archness and cajolery: ‘Would you, dearest Vernon, if Louisa liked the scheme, permit us to hold the ball here, in your splendid ballroom?’
‘No, dearest Lucretia, I would not!’ replied his lordship. ‘But don’t repine! The occasion won’t arise, since Louisa wouldn’t like the scheme at all, believe me! Yes, I know that I am being so abominably disobliging as to make you feel faint: shall I summon the faithful Harriet to your side?’
This was a little too much, even for Mrs Dauntry. Casting upon him a deeply reproachful glance, she departed, her mien challenging comparison with that of Mrs Siddons, as portrayed by the late Sir Joshua Reynolds as the Tragi
c Muse.
The Marquis’s third visitor was Lady Jevington, who came, not to solicit his favour, but to adjure him not to yield to Lady Buxted’s importunities. She expressed herself in measured and majestic terms, saying that while she had neither expected him to lend his aid in the launching of her Anna into the ton, nor asked him to do so, she would be unable to regard it as anything but a deliberate slight if he were to perform this office for Miss Buxted, who did not (said Lady Jevington, with awful emphasis) share with her cousin the distinction of being his goddaughter. And if, she added, his partiality were to lead him to single out That Woman’s daughter Chloë, for this particular mark of favour, she would thenceforward wash her hands of him.
‘Almost, Augusta, you persuade me!’ said his lordship.
The words, spoken dulcetly, were accompanied by the sweetest of smiles; but Lady Jevington, arising in swelling wrath, swept out of the room without another word.
‘And now,’ the Marquis told his secretary, ‘it only remains for your protégée to demand a ball of me!’
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