Elisabeth Kidd (4 page)

“You must not be deceived by Prudence’s name, dear boy. Far from having been born with her—ah, retiring nature—she acquired it through the no-doubt extremely uncomfortable experience of marriage to Josiah Whitlatch—of whom, God be merciful, no more will ever be heard. However, a hard lesson is best learned, and Prue will be certain not to let Miss Archer get into any real scrapes. Besides. she has been hinting that I should have the dubious honour of footing the bills for her Susan’s come-out next year, and I see no reason not to make her earn my money. In any case, I shall naturally expect you to have earned your own keep, Cedric, and turned the ferocious Miss Archer into a model of decorum by then.”

“I may be a genius, Drew,” Cedric allowed with all humility, “but I can’t work miracles!’’

“Where do you suppose the young person is this morning?” Lady Romney wondered, resuming her meticulous dissection of her fish. “Perhaps she is unwell after her journey. You really ought to enquire into her health and such things, Drew dear. There is no telling what she may have been exposed to on that farm—feeding the cows and that sort of thing.’’

“Judging from the cartons of books I saw Murray struggling with this morning, I suspect Miss Archer spent more time in the classroom than in the barn.’’

“Oh, dear.” Lady Romney sighed. “A bluestocking as well as a tomboy! What an odd combination, to be sure.”

She laid down her fork and smiled at Lyle in a manner suggesting the utmost reluctance to say what she must. “I trust you will not think it poor-spirited of me, Drew, if I do not stay on here quite as long as I had intended. I should so dislike to be—also—underfoot. Of course, if you think I might be of some assistance, I will stay. I think I could instruct your Miss Archer in, for example, a more becoming mode of dress—although what is to be done with that extraordinary hair, I’m sure I don’t know.’’

“You are very kind, Vanessa,’’ Lyle said, interrupting another heartfelt sigh. “I shall not be astonished at being obliged to take up your offer once Miss Archer arrives in Town, but for now I think we gentlemen must do the—ah, spade work.’’

Lady Romney sat back, satisfied. “Certainly, my dear, I quite understand. You would soon be wishing me at the devil if I stayed to interfere, so naturally I shall neither stay nor interfere. You know where you may reach me, if you wish to do so.’’

“Seems to me you’ve already shoved your oar in deep enough, Nessie,” Cedric grumbled, having listened to this exchange with growing impatience. “You were willing enough to ape-lead the girl last night—before you’d seen her. I know what it is—you’re afraid she’ll cast you into the shade!’’

His sister directed a quelling look at Cedric, and was about to make some rejoinder, when her attention was caught by the precipitate entrance into the room of Miss Archer herself. Lady Romney’s shapely brows contracted themselves into something which, had it graced any other countenance, might have been described as a scowl.

It was not quite true that Lady Romney regarded Miss Archer as a threat. Sydney was impulsive, undisciplined, and—if one discounted those eyes—possessed of no very remarkable looks, while Vanessa was poised, accomplished, and an accredited beauty. Nevertheless, she was well aware that gentlemen had unaccountable preferences when it came to females, which even they did not fully understand, and which, therefore, even a woman as world-wise as Vanessa Romney might misinterpret. Really, it was very vexing!

Sydney closed the door behind her and faced Lady Romney’s vexation—and Lord Lyle’s amusement—with remarkable fortitude. She was dressed respectably in a blue kerseymere gown with a fringed shawl draped over her shoulders; her unruly hair had been drawn back into a severe but governable knot at the nape of her neck. Her cheeks were lightly but becomingly flushed. Cedric, who had turned around immediately on hearing her enter, was the first to rise.

“Miss Archer! How charmingly you look this morning. I trust you slept well?”

Lyle doubted this, since there were faint but unmistakable circles under Sydney’s eyes. He could not help noticing them, for his own eyes were inexplicably drawn to those deep blue pools. It was odd that he could not remember Owen having such intense eyes; they must be an inheritance from Sydney’s unknown Spanish mother. Certainly the pale complexion and nearly black hair were not Owen’s. Lyle looked in vain for some physical resemblance to his friend.

Sydney was aware of the Marquess’s intent gaze and the frown that gathered slowly on his forehead. She did not think she could have done anything to incur his displeasure as yet this morning, so she made an effort to disregard his look, smiling at Mr. Maitland instead.

“Thank you, sir. I was very comfortable indeed. Good morning, Lady Romney, my lord. I fear I neglected to ask when breakfast is served. Am I very late?”

Vanessa folded her hands in her lap to forestall being importuned into another unladylike handshake, but fortunately—or unfortunately, as this made Vanessa feel suddenly much older—Sydney only bobbed a curtsey at her and sat down in the chair Cedric held out for her.

‘‘Allow me, Miss Archer!’’ he said and, seeing her glance uncertainly at the coffee pot, hastened to pour out a cup for her. He procured a plate and proceeded through the covered dishes, heaping up a generous portion of everything, which he then laid like an offering before Sydney. Lady Romney laughed delicately.

“Why, Cedric, how very extravagant of you! I am certain Miss Archer cannot possibly eat all that!’’

Miss Archer, who was ravenous, thought that to the contrary she could doubtless suffer a second helping, but she was not about to be put at a disadvantage by Lady Romney—to whom she had already taken a considerable if imprecisely defined dislike. She hesitated for a moment, fork in hand. Cedric came to the rescue.

“Nessie, didn’t you mention you were going somewhere? Oughtn’t you to make a start?”

“I had not meant to depart at this instant,” his sister said, but after a glance at the Marquess, who had said nothing beyond “Good morning” since Sydney entered the room, she added, “Nevertheless, it would perhaps be advisable to consult my dresser. I do so hate a fuss at the last minute. Drew, dear, may I speak with you for a moment?”

Lyle rose obligingly, bowed to Miss Archer, winked at Mr. Maitland, and accompanied Lady Romney out of the room. When the door had closed behind them, Cedric looked at Sydney, who was scowling after the Marquess, and said quickly,

“Do you know, I think I shall have some more of these fascinatin’ curry eggs. Then we will talk together, eh?”

Sydney smiled, warming quickly to Cedric’s gift for putting people at their ease, and after a pause, she said, “I am excessively grateful to you, Mr. Maitland. I own, I disliked to eat alone in front of—of everyone else. That is not done, is it?”

“Not by ladies, I regret to inform you. Mind you, I myself like a girl who appreciates her food—know several excellent trencherwomen, in fact. You’d be surprised how they manage it.”

“How?” Sydney asked, swallowing a large bite.

“Well, the best method is to have your meals sent up to you on a tray. This gives the impression, you see, that you’re too delicate to get up and feed yourself, but still provides you with enough nourishment to survive on. ‘Course, you’ve got to get the maid or the chef on your side, and you can’t do it too often—at breakfast, certainly, but nuncheon and dinner too begins to look a trifle suspicious.’’

Sydney giggled, struck by a picture of dozens of goose and turkey pies secreted under her bed, with a wedge of cheese under each pillow.

“That’s really all Society is,” Cedric told her, with an air of confiding a secret, “a system of polite deceit. Everyone says so-and-so behaved disgracefully at some ball, but then goes home and more than likely does the same disgraceful whatever-it-was in his own home. Difference is, nobody sees it there.’’

“Uncle Augustus says one must always remember
where
one is.”

“That’s it. The other thing to remember is to please the ladies. Any young female with a bit of address can attach some man, but unless she had the approval of other females in the first place, she’ll never be invited to places where she’ll meet the most suitable gentlemen. In fact, the prettier and the more accomplished a girl is, the harder it is for her to be approved of by other females. They don’t like to see their own sex having any fun, you see.”

“Why not?”

“Dashed if I know. I expect it’s because the matrons have all had to give up doing what they really wanted to do to land their husbands, and the young girls have learned from their mamas that they’ve got to do the same, and both sets of ‘em resent anyone who don’t play by their rules—especially if the anyone makes a good match in spite of ‘em.’’

“Oh, dear,” Sydney sighed in discouragement, never having considered this particular hazard on the road to her goal before. “It all sounds very complicated.’’

“Not a bit of it! As I said, you just have to take care how you go about it. You’re very quick, Miss Archer—I can see that already. I should like to teach you how to go on, if I may.’’

“Oh, I should like it exceedingly, Mr. Maitland! And will you tell me about London? Uncle Augustus told me I am to be presented there—is that true?’’

“I believe some arrangement will be made,” Cedric told her, rather in the manner of an indulgent grandfather promising a child a special treat. “You will like London, Miss Archer. There is always something going on—in the season, indeed, one may attend two or three balls in the same night, and choose between any number of entertainments during the day.’’

“Oh, yes! I have read in the newspapers about Lord Elgin’s marbles, which I am eager to see—and Lady Holland’s literary evenings, and of course there is the great actor, Mr. Kean, and Madame Vestris at the opera—”

Cedric dropped his avuncular manner abruptly on hearing this. “You would
not
be interested in those things, Miss Archer,” he told her firmly. “Take my word for it, no one but bluestockings and shop clerks go to see the marbles
on purpose.
I mean, what use are a lot of statues with heads and arms missing? You can’t talk about ‘em at dinner parties—bound to depress everyone, except possibly Lady Holland, but as I am not acquainted with that lady, I could not say.’’

“Oh.” Sydney understood the activities she was so bold as to mention to be of the sort that were indulged privately or not at all, but her previous estimate of the level of intelligent conversation at Ton dinner parties dropped rapidly. “Well—what
do
people talk about, then?”

“Why, all sorts of things—last night’s parties and tomorrow’s horse races, and the latest bets in the gaming book at White’s, and Hoby’s new style of boot, and what Lord Palmerston said to Lady Cowper at the Pavilion, and whether the Princess of Wales will dare to make an appearance in England this year.’’

Sydney listened in amazement; she could see now that in spite of her education she had a great deal to learn! She sighed again and told Cedric so. He patted her hand comfortingly.

“Assure you again, Miss Archer—delighted to help out. Always happy to do Lyle a service, too.’’

“Lyle! Oh, won’t he—that is, will he agree to your kind offer, do you think? He does not appear very—accommodating.”

Sydney looked at Cedric anxiously, but with an eager glow in her eyes nonetheless, and Cedric, who last night had been at the point of declaring himself unequal to the task thrust upon him and retreating to his cozy rooms in Stratton Street, changed his mind again. The little minx did have the most amazin’ way of lookin’ at one! It’d be a pity to leave her to Lyle’s unsympathetic instruction.

She was, after all,
not such an unlikely candidate for presentation to the Ton as they had all presumed, Cedric noted once his critical faculties were restored to him. She had, besides those irresistible eyes set in a fine-complexioned face and framed by a dusky cloud of hair, an enchantingly retroussé nose and a rosebud of a mouth. She was also possessed of a neat figure which she held properly erect, and a pretty pair of hands—which at the moment were a little the worse for farmyard activities Cedric had no wish to enquire into, but whose effects were easily erased with a fortnight’s care and the liberal application of cucumber lotion.

“Lyle mayn’t approve of my methods,” Cedric felt obliged to warn his prospective pupil, “but he needn’t know what those are, so long as the finished result comes up to his standards. Told me as much. Said he would—ah, would give me a free hand, if you will pardon the expression, Miss Archer.”

Sydney said earnestly that she was sure this was the best plan, and did Mr. Maitland think they could start right away?

“Er—you mean,
now?”

Sydney bobbed her head up and down. ‘‘Yes, please!’’

“Oh! Well, I don’t know why not. No point in wasting time, eh, Miss Archer?”

“Thank you, Mr. Maitland!” she said, impulsively leaning towards him to drop a light kiss on Cedric’s cheek—a gesture he did not choose to tell her was perhaps just the slightest bit outré. Well, nobody saw it, did they? Cedric told himself, falling back on his own comfortable philosophy.

Meanwhile, those who might have seen and heard—and doubtless been amazed in their separate ways by the extraordinary conversation going forth in the breakfast parlour—were, fortunately for everyone’s equanimity, at that moment strolling in the herb garden his lordship had recently caused to be laid out amongst the replanted junipers to the side of the house. This garden was, besides being sheltered by trees, surrounded by a high brick wall. Just below the wall was a grass verge, and on this were placed white-painted benches for the benefit of those who might wish to observe the chamomile growing.

The Marquess and Lady Romney passed several minutes in strolling the path and scrutinizing the growth of herbs already planted, and in considering how best to lay out the remainder of the garden. Lady Romney stifled a yawn and allowed her companion to expound on the curious medicinal properties of certain plants which to her looked remarkably like all the other plants with which she appeared to be surrounded. She was nothing if not indulgent, however, and allowed him to go on for several moments before gently interrupting.