Elisabeth Kidd (31 page)

Antonia only laughed, but Imogen encouraged the officers shamelessly,
roundly informing the lieutenant that he was a hardened flirt and that
she would be sure to tell every mama in town to keep her daughter under
lock and key while he was about.

“’Pon my soul, ma’am!” the handsome young officer objected, “we have spent long, bleak years fighting in the Peninsula! Would you deny
us the enjoyment of our first contact with civilisation in all that time?”

“Certainly—if that enjoyment consists of seducing defenceless ladies.”

“In that case, ma’am,” said the unabashed lieutenant, drawing his
horse closer to Imogen’s side of the carriage, “I will devote myself to a lady more worthy of my attentions!”

Antonia could not help but be refreshed by this mass infusion of high
spirits, so that when Charles found his way back to them shortly after, he
found his betrothed in high good humour, a circumstance which ought
to have pleased him. However, since she was at that moment indulging in a light flirtation with an officer—somewhat older than his fellows, with a
handsome black moustache and a languid charm which Charles could
not be expected to appreciate—he received her lively greeting less than
graciously.

Charles was introduced all around, but Lieutenant Fitzroy, quick to
spot a damping influence, shortly excused himself, and even Antonia’s
moustachioed cavalier lingered only long enough to receive an invitation
to call later in Mount Street before following the others out of the park.

It was not until they arrived home, however, that Antonia detected
more than the usual reserve in Charles’s manner. Remembering that he
was never at his best in sultry weather, she invited him into the house for
a glass of lemonade and, while they were waiting for it, unthinkingly
treated him to a colourful description of Hester Coverley’s behaviour at the review earlier in the day.

“Imagine how in her element she was with all those scores—nay,
hundreds!—of young men in uniform parading in front of her! It was
excessively diverting. I only wish you had been present when—Charles, I wish you would sit down. I shall have an ache in my neck if I must talk to
you from this position.”

Charles, who had been pacing up and down in front of her, stopped and
said, “What? Oh, yes. I beg your pardon.” He sat down beside her on the
sofa and, taking her hand, impulsively raised it to his lips.

Unfortunately, this promising overture was interrupted by the arrival
of Belding with the lemonade, and after the momentary suspension of conversation, Charles lapsed once again into a pensive mood. Antonia
smiled and attempted to cajole him into a happier frame of mind by
asking if he did not find Lord Alvanley amusing.

“I think he must be, if Mrs Curtiz finds him so.”

Antonia laughed. “I fear Imogen’s judgement is not to be relied on in
this case, any more than Miss Coverley’s on the subject of—and particu
larly in the presence of—handsome young officers.”

Charles turned suddenly to gaze at her, then took both her hands in a firm grip.

“Why, Charles!”

“Forgive me! I do not mean to be
...
unfeeling, or—heaven forbid! —
interfering! But it is not Imogen’s or Miss Coverley’s behaviour which
concerns me.”

Antonia smiled at him gently. “Are you cross because I flirted with
Major Burton? I assure you, there was nothing in it, and the major knows
there was not. It was only a pleasant pastime for us both.”

“I do not remember you to be so inclined to frivolous pursuits,
Antonia.”

Resentful, she pulled her hands away. “Then you do not remember me
very well, Charles. I have always been addicted to laughter and kind
people, and will continue to be so.”

She knew as she spoke the words that she did so only to contradict him, but her awareness of this only roused her further. “If I choose to
flirt with attractive men who pay me attentions, I shall do so, Charles.”

“I do not dictate your behaviour, Antonia. I only fear that...that you
are not sufficiently discriminating in your acquaintance. Lord Kedrington, for example”—Antonia’s eyes narrowed dangerously, but Charles did not
perceive the warning in them—“while I was happy to find him more
gentlemanly than I had supposed—”

“Oh, yes,” Antonia said dryly. “He has excellent manners, when he
chooses to use them.”

“He is also, as I observed this morning, very much in the confidence of our great hero, His Grace of Wellington, which circumstance alone must raise him in anyone’s esteem. One must, certainly, take care to
cultivate the acquaintance of the more distinguished members of society,
both for the natural pleasure one of sensibility must take in conversation with educated persons and for the influence such persons may have and be inclined to exert to further one’s own small enterprises. Nevertheless,
it is not necessary to attach oneself too closely to those whose...ah, personal history and habits may be, ah
...
questionable.”

Antonia, surprised to find herself bristling with indignation on the
viscount’s behalf, brought herself sufficiently under control to avoid
saying aloud that she thought Lord Kedrington would not for a moment tolerate such boot-licking as Charles seemed to consider normal social behaviour, and enquired instead what it was about the viscount which Charles found so questionable.

“I am not very well acquainted with his lordship,” Charles conceded,
“but there have been rumours connecting him with spies and contraband
ists and other, ah
...
unsavoury persons during the war. Then, too, his
family history is not perhaps the most... irreproachable. That is—I
hesitate to mention this to you, Antonia, but there were also rumours
that his father, the previous viscount, engaged in clandestine
...
ah, amours with... various females.”

“Oh, the rumours are quite true, I can assure you!” she replied
deliberately. “That is, if you had any scruples about repeating them. I
have it myself on the best authority. But as Desmond’s
affaires
were, as
you call them, clandestine, and therefore not generally brought to public notice, I fail to see what bearing they can possibly have on your—on our
relations with the present viscount.”

“Do you condone such behaviour?”

“I neither condone nor condemn. I merely acknowledge its existence.
My point, Charles, is that we may not, in all justice, condemn the son for
the father’s indiscretions.”

“But the potential must be there, do you not think? And the viscount’s
having been out of the country all those years—”

“Do you imagine he has smuggled in some foreign code of behaviour, as you have your wines and laces? Absurd, Charles!”

She stood up abruptly, clasping her hands together in her skirt in an
effort to calm herself. Charles was obliged also to rise.

“I see no connexion between my situation and the viscount’s.”

“No, certainly there is none!” Antonia exclaimed, suddenly deflated
and eager to leave this subject of conversation. “I beg your pardon,
Charles! I should not be so outspoken.” She sat down again, and Charles
obediently followed suit.

“Pray, do not mention it! I feel certain you are not yourself today, my
dear. Such volatility is not in your nature, I know, and while I have always
admired your determination in defending what you believe is right, I
wonder if your judgement at this moment is not somewhat clouded by
the excitement of the life you have lately been leading.”

Antonia seized upon this. “Oh, yes! I think that must be the reason for
my ill manners. Indeed, Charles, you must not think you are about to
marry the kind of woman who indulges in megrims and fits of hysterics
at the least provocation! It is only...Charles, do you think we might go
home for a little while? Not now, of course, but after we are married? I think I shall be much better, if only I have that to look forward to.”

“Yes, certainly, my dear. That would be the very thing to bring you to yourself again. Carey has mentioned to me his intention of posting up to
Wyckham one day soon to settle himself in there—to make his bivouac, as he calls it—and I do not doubt he will be happy to make rooms ready for you to visit, as well.”

“Yes, I’m sure he will. But Charles, have you no intent to open Windeshiem? I had expected that we would live there, at least part of the
year.”

“But, my dear—surely you are aware that Windeshiem has been up for
sale for some months? In fact, my father tells me that he is on the point
of signing the final papers at any time now. It is a pity, of course, to lose a
valuable piece of property in the country—not to mention a house large
enough to entertain in during the winter—but my father, as you know,
has no head for business and has no other income left but what
Windeshiem produces. Happily, I have been able to persuade him to let
me invest the proceeds of the sale to his advantage. He has not told me
the name of the buyer, nor the precise sum settled upon, but I must leave at least that much to his discretion.”

Antonia’s heart had sunk with a sickening plunge during this speech.
“Charles—you do not mean we are not to live in Leicestershire at all?”

“Why, no!” he said with some surprise. “We shall live at Cavendish
Square. Naturally, you will be free to visit Wyckham whenever you so
desire, but my life is here now, with my business—Antonia, are you quite well? You look markedly pale, my dear.”

Indeed, another distasteful thought had come to her to make her feel
quite ill. “Charles,” she ventured, “if your father could not...that is,
how has Isabel’s season in fact been paid for?”

Charles looked uneasy, but chose honesty as the most expedient policy
in this case. “It has been my honour, and pleasure, to do this little favour
for Isabel,” he said.

Antonia—who had been telling herself that she should have guessed this long since; should have foreseen, too, that she could never expect
Charles to change his life to suit her fancy—nevertheless found she could
not accept these truths with any sort of equanimity, and ran from the room. A moment later, she had thrown herself on her bed and was
indulging in the floods of tears she had a moment before promised
Charles she was in no way subject to.

“Webster, is the carriage in use?”

Webster stared at his employer for a full minute before comprehending the import of this ordinarily innocuous query. He was assisted in reaching
an understanding, however, by the sight of Mrs Julia Wilmot buttoning her gloves, and by the undeniable fact that she was wearing a bonnet.
Stammering a little, he ventured the information that Miss Coverley had
taken the carriage out earlier that morning and had not yet returned.

“I am certain, madam, that if I had only known—”

“Very well, I shall have to take a hack. Kindly summon one for me, Webster,
and do not stand about gaping.”

Webster did as he was told, knowing better than to ask questions—but they would be raised, he also knew, by anyone who saw Mrs Wilmot that
day. He did not know that her unprecedented action had in fact been
prompted by her mentioning to Kedrington that she thought she would ask Miss Fairfax to tea, and his reply that he would be out of town that
day. As Julia had not mentioned any particular date, nor invited her nephew to join the ladies, she was somewhat
taken aback, but since Kedrington rapidly made his escape, she could
only enquire of Hester instead what ailed the tiresome boy. She did not
for a moment believe Hester’s suggestion that Kedrington must be
suffering from a headache—an obvious fabrication which only served to
whet her curiosity more—and she demanded a full explanation.

Hester
compromised by delicately recounting a partial history of Kedrington’s
attraction to Antonia Fairfax, but when Julia threatened first to take the
shameless girl to task for leading Kedrington on in that fashion, and then to box the clumsy gentleman’s ears for bungling the affair, Hester was
moved to reveal the whole story.

Thus it was that Antonia discovered Julia Wilmot seated precisely in
the center of the gold drawing room of the house on Mount Street, both hands resting on the handle of her parasol—which she held balanced on
its tip on the floor in front of her—and both eyes directed at the door by which Antonia entered.

Well aware of the singularity of Julia’s venturing outside Coverley
House, Antonia had received the announcement of her visit with aston
ishment and was not a little apprehensive to hear what had brought her
out. She made haste to the drawing room in order not to keep Julia
waiting, drew a long breath, and opened the door.