Animating Maria (18 page)

Passion and modesty warred in Maria’s breast and passion won.

At last, his hands stilled. He raised his mouth from hers and smiled down at her tenderly. ‘How soon can we be married?’

‘I do not know,’ said Maria, dazed with love and kisses. ‘What if my father will still not allow it?’

‘We’ll elope,’ he said dreamily. ‘We’ll run away together, far away from those interfering harridans.’

‘I cannot allow you to speak thus of my parents!’

‘Not your parents, you goose; Amy Tribble and my mother. Why do you think I am in bed with my head bandaged? Amy Tribble followed me to St Charles Street and hit me on the head, brought me back here unconscious; and now I learn my own mother is in on the plot and sends you a letter saying, in effect, that I am dying.’

‘Amy Tribble hit you on the head? Why?’

‘Because, my sweeting, I promised the Tribbles money to make sure the engagement was not broken and this is Miss Amy’s way of going about it.’

‘How very terrible,’ said Maria. Then she began to giggle. ‘How v-very terrible.’

The duke began to laugh as well. Then he said, ‘Since her plot
has
worked and here I am and here you are, we may as well enjoy ourselves before the inevitable interruption.’

‘Has he got her clothes off yet?’ demanded the dowager duchess.

Amy Tribble straightened up from the keyhole of the duke’s bedroom door, her face flaming.

‘No,’ she said gruffly. ‘They’re lying
on
the bed, kissing.’

‘Leave them a bit,’ said the duke’s mother. ‘May as well be sure.’

‘Anyone in my charge,’ whispered Amy fiercely, ‘stays a virgin until her wedding night.’

‘I didn’t,’ said the dowager crossly. ‘Waste of time.’

Amy bent down and applied her eye to the keyhole again. The duke’s hand slid down Maria’s body and then began to slide up under the skirt of her gown.

‘Damme! That’s enough!’ roared Amy, opening the door.

Maria struggled up, blushing. The duke lay back with his hands behind his head, hands that had quickly been removed from the more interesting parts of Maria’s body the minute he had heard Amy’s shocked outburst outside the door.

‘I hope, your grace,’ said Amy, ‘that you will wait for the wedding.’

‘And I hope, Miss Tribble,’ he said coldly, ‘that you will realize how lucky you are not to be charged with assault.’

‘That wasn’t me. It was another woman,’ lied Amy. ‘Come along, Maria. It is time for you to return to your parents and tell them the good news.’

But to Maria’s horror, Amy’s fury, and Effy’s distress, Mr and Mrs Kendall refused to give their permission. Mr Kendall had ‘been treated like dirt’ by Berham, he said. He had been thinking over what Amy had told him. For Berham to wish to be released from the engagement because he thought them, the Kendalls, too vulgar, was the outside of enough. It was time Berham had his comeuppance.

In vain did Maria plead and Amy rage. Mr Kendall was adamant.

Mr Haddon had moved to a tall thin house in Chapel Street, which he now shared with his friend, Mr Randolph. Mr Randolph was at his club and Mr Haddon was alone when a distraught and tearful Amy arrived on his doorstep.

‘You cannot enter,’ he said after his butler had startled him with the news of Amy’s arrival. ‘Think of your reputation, Miss Amy!’

‘A pox on my reputation,’ shouted Amy, beside herself with worry. ‘I wish I
had
a reputation to lose. I’m too bloody old and ugly to have a reputation. Oh, damn it all to hell. I wish I were dead. I wish them poxy Kendalls were face-down in a cesspool. I’m sick of respectability. I’ll keep a brothel, that’s what I’ll do. Better money and less worry.’

Curious heads began to pop out of windows of houses across the street.

Mr Haddon drew Amy inside and shut the door. ‘I do not think entering my house can damage your reputation more than you have just damaged it,’ he said severely.

He led the way into the front parlour and sent his curious butler off to find the port decanter.

‘Now, try for some calm,’ he said, ‘and tell me all about it.’

And Amy did, in fits and starts, ending with, ‘Do you see what this means? Berham was going to pay us for fixing the marriage; Kendall was going to pay us handsomely for schooling. Now, neither will pay us, and all society will know we have had our first failure. Why, Mr Haddon, you are laughing!’

‘Miss Amy, you do not realize what you have done! You talk about hitting Berham on the head with a gin bottle as if it were the most everyday happening.’

‘It may sound like that now,’ said Amy miserably. ‘But I near died with fright and worry at the time. Tell me what to do!’

Mr Haddon poured port for them both and settled back in his chair. ‘I think we should see Berham and persuade him to elope with Maria.’

‘Elope? But what of our reputation as models of propriety?’

Mr Haddon bit his lips to stop himself from smiling. ‘What you must do,’ he said, ‘is present Mr Kendall with a bill for your services to date. Then you must get Berham to agree to the elopement and exact his promised fee from him before he goes. Surely that will give you enough to take a rest before thinking about taking on anyone else. Miss Effy is looking quite worn down with worry, and she is not as strong as you.’

All in that moment, Amy could have hit
him
with a gin bottle.

‘Effy has nerves of steel,’ she said coldly. ‘She is a better actress than I, that is all.’

‘We will go now and see Berham,’ said Mr Haddon firmly. ‘Oh, I know it is nearly midnight, but I think he will be glad to have this matter resolved. Then you may tell Maria of the arrangements and ask her to look in good spirits. You will get your money out of Kendall easier if he thinks you have been instrumental in making Maria forget Berham. When the Kendalls learn of the elopement, pretend to be shocked and swear you know nothing of it. Once they have returned to Bath, we shall put it about society of how you arranged all. Society will consider you matchmakers extraordinary. They will think it incredible that anyone managed to get the proud Duke of Berham to elope.’

Despite the late hour, the duke received them in his bedchamber. As he listened in amazement to the news of the Kendalls’ continued refusal of his suit and to the plans for his flight to Gretna, he wondered what ever had happened to his stately well-ordered life. Then he calculated, after Amy had fallen silent, that it might work out very well after all. He would be spared the horrors of a society wedding and he would be able to have Maria all to himself as soon as possible.

‘Very well,’ he said. ‘But strange as it may seem, Miss Amy, I am quite capable of arranging my own elopement. All you have to do is tell Maria to wait for word from me. Now I am anxious to get some sleep. It is not every day I am hit on the head.’

Amy looked mutely towards Mr Haddon for help. He cleared his throat. ‘Your grace, you kindly promised the Misses Tribble a generous fee for arranging the happy outcome of your engagement. As you will be pressed for time in the days to come and may forget . . .’

The duke grinned. ‘If you had not damaged my wits, Miss Amy, I would not pay you one penny and I would send you the physician’s bill as well. Bring my portable writing-desk over to the bed.’

Amy twisted her gloves in her hands as he wrote a draft. He handed it over. She took out her quizzing-glass and studied it. It was a magnificent amount. She made up her mind. They would have the whole year to themselves. No work. No difficult girls. No frights. No worries. Nothing but peace and calm. She would pluck up courage to consult a doctor about her aches and pains and soaring temperatures.

‘Thank you,’ she said quietly. ‘Thank you very much.’

Maria was roused at one-thirty in the morning by Amy shaking her awake.

Her eyes were red with crying. Gently Amy whispered the plans for the elopement.

‘But my parents. They will cast me off,’ protested Maria.

‘No, they won’t,’ said Amy, crossing her fingers behind her back. ‘I’ll see to that. Don’t worry about a thing and leave everything to me.’

‘You are so good to me. I am sorry to disappoint you. It would be wonderful if you could have paraded a grand wedding before society.’

‘No need for that now,’ said Amy. ‘You can always get married in church when you come back.’

‘If you are sure my parents will not be furious . . . ?’

‘No, no. All they need is to be presented with the
fait accompli
and they’ll be merry as grigs. Just you sit tight and wait for word from Berham.’

Effy cried with relief when Amy told her about the elopement and the money. ‘The only thing is,’ said Amy, ‘I do hope the Kendalls are not too sore about it, for I have taken a certain liking to them.’

But the events of the next few days were enough to turn Amy and Effy against the Kendalls. Mr Kendall certainly paid his bill and said he was grateful to them for their schooling and amazed that they had managed to cheer Maria up so quickly. But then Mrs Kendall led Yvette into the room and the trouble started.

‘We have news for you, ladies,’ said Mrs Kendall with a motherly beam. ‘You will be losing Yvette.’

‘You cannot go with them,’ cried Effy aghast. ‘You cannot hide yourself in Bath and waste you skill on . . .’ Her voice fortunately trailed off, for she had been about to say something very rude indeed.

‘She ain’t going to Bath,’ crowed Mr Kendall. ‘I’m setting her up in her own business in the West End. Got a neat little property. Rooms above the shop, a nurse for baby George and near enough the Park to get fresh air.’

‘And what have you to say to this, ma’m’selle?’ demanded Amy wrathfully.

‘I am so grateful,’ said Yvette simply. ‘I will be my own mistress. I will give you special rates.’

‘Ho! You will, will you?’ said Amy. ‘Is this how you repay us?’

‘Stow it!’ said Mr Kendall brutally. ‘You wasn’t even paying her a wage, and if we hadn’t taken George out to the Park, the mite wouldn’t have seen a peep of daylight this age.’

The fact that all this was true and made Amy feel bitterly guilty only added fuel to her wrath. Now Yvette’s marvellous creations would be available to anyone who could pay and not reserved for them alone. She raged, she pleaded, and she cajoled, but Yvette would not be moved.

Luckily for Yvette, a note arrived later that day with plans for the duke for the elopement, and so the sisters’ attention was momentarily diverted and she was able to take her leave with surprisingly little fuss, although both sisters did break down in tears at the last moment as baby George waved a chubby fist in farewell.

They turned their full attention on Maria. She was to leave in two days’ time at dawn. The duke’s carriage would be waiting outside. There was a bustle of packing and planning, all to be done in secrecy.

The great morning arrived. The sisters, in wrappers, nightgowns and fantastic nightcaps, stood on the step of their house on Holles Street, waving goodbye. Maria hugged them fiercely, begging them to send her love to Frederica Sunningdale and her apologies to her for not being able to engage her services as maid of honour.

The carriage turned the corner of the street and disappeared.

‘Another one bolted,’ said Amy sadly, ‘and left us the mess in the stables to clean up.’

‘I am glad it was not a wedding in London after all,’ said Effy. ‘You know, it always serves to remind me that we are still . . . are still . . .’

‘I know.’ Amy put an arm about her sister’s shoulders. ‘Come inside. The morning is chilly.’

*   *   *

Maria had left a note for her parents in which she said the Tribbles knew nothing of her elopement, but that did not stop most of Mr Kendall’s wrath descending on the Tribbles’ heads. He ranted and raged and told them they were a disgrace until Amy, exasperated, ordered both of them from the house. Mr Kendall demanded his money back, and then Effy and Mrs Kendall had to stop him from striking Amy after she had told him in which part of his anatomy she would like to lodge his money.

To Effy’s relief, the angry couple took their leave without any further demands for repayment. They left the Tribble sisters feeling shaken and sick.

Amy and Effy, strangely enough, would have been even more furious if they could have heard a conversation between the couple on the road to Bath. For after berating the Tribble sisters and cursing them and leaving them both feeling as if they had been in the wars, the Kendalls were slowly waking up to the fact that their daughter had made a very successful marriage indeed.

‘You know, my love,’ said Mrs Kendall, putting a hand on her husband’s knee. ‘I am wondering why we are in such a taking. Our daughter is to be married to a duke.’

Mr Kendall snorted furiously. Then he began to think about it. He was going back to Bath, where despite all his money and all his efforts, he had been cruelly snubbed so many times. He was about to become father-in-law to a duke. He looked down at his new clothes. The Tribbles had done their stuff, right enough. Why, his wife looked even better-gowned than some of the titled ladies in the Pump Room. He began to dream. He would be questioned about the elopement. He would say casually, ‘That young jackanapes of a duke was down on his knees begging me for Maria’s hand but I did not think him at all suitable. A bit too old, hey, Mrs Kendall? But the silly things must need run off to Gretna. Still, they will be married in London on their return. You want to come to the wedding, my lady? I’ll see, I’ll see. So many people to invite, don’t you know.’ And so Mr Kendall dreamt, while far to the north on the road to Gretna, one of his daughter’s wildest fantasies had come to life. She was eloping with a handsome duke.

The Tribbles missed baby George desperately. Why had they not paid him more attention of late? they mourned to each other. Mr Haddon and Mr Randolph missed the baby too. While they played whist of an evening with the sisters, Yvette used to bring the baby down to the drawing room.

Something in the house seemed to have died. Still, they did their bit for Yvette. Both went on calls and loudly mourned the loss of their dressmaker, praised Yvette’s skill to the skies and passed around notes with the address of her new shop. They called on Yvette, too, but she was too busy supervising the workmen who were laying out her showroom, and baby George was too fascinated with the jolly company of a plump young nursemaid to make either sister feel wanted.